Cara Summers - Taken Beyond Temptation

He was big. At five foot two, she was used to men being taller. But as she tilted her head way back, she figured he had to be six-three or-four. Since he hadn’t lost his sunglasses, she couldn’t see his eyes but she noted the shaggy straw-colored hair, the very male face with a slash of cheekbones, the trace of stubble on his jawline. When her gaze lingered on his mouth, her heart gave another thud.

This time when the warning flashed, she drew back and slammed into the side of her car.

He grabbed her arms to steady her. One of his feet had moved between her legs and for a moment, she felt the long hard length of his thigh pressed against hers. Heat arrowed out from the contact point and pooled in her center. A mist settled over her brain, and her throat went dry.

“Are you all right?”

She was still coming down from the adrenaline rush of nearly hitting him. That had to be it. Her senses were still in overdrive. That was why she felt the pressure of each one of his fingers on her arms. That was why she was having trouble finding her voice.

“I’m fine,” she lied. She was going to start to tremble any second.

One of them moved. Jillian wasn’t sure which one, but suddenly he was even closer. She felt the warmth of his breath on her mouth. She could almost taste it, and what shocked her was that she wanted more. Then there was nothing but the torrid, liquid heat of that one concentrated desire.

For a moment, she was incredibly tempted to go on impulse—to rise up on her toes and close that last little distance between them.

No. This was not a time in her life when she could afford to throw caution to the winds. This man was a stranger. And she had … business … Business that had slipped right out of her mind the instant this man had touched her.

She wasn’t sure how she found the strength to raise a hand and press it firmly against his chest. “I have to go.”

He dropped his hands and stepped away. But he didn’t return to his car. Instead, he circled hers. His movements were slow so she had plenty of time to take in the broad shoulders, narrow waist and long legs in tight, tattered jeans. In spite of the distraction, most of her brain cells clicked back on. And by the time he finished his little tour, she could even stand without the support of her car.

He wasn’t local. She’d met almost everyone who was, and she wouldn’t have forgotten him.

Because he was definitely a hunk.

Get a grip, Jillian. Hunks were her particular weakness. And acting too quickly on her attraction to them was something she’d paid the price for again and again.

Mr. Racecar Driver had only been the most recent. It was the main reason she’d vowed to abstain from starting up any new relationships, at least until she met the next goal on her two-year business plan.

“You’re lucky,” the hunk drawled. “Not a scratch. Want to check my car out? ”

She glanced at her watch. No time. She’d wasted all her time checking him out. And he was coming closer again. “Look, I have an appointment in Belle Bay in five minutes. I really have to dash. Lawyers hate to be kept waiting. How about I take your word?” Reaching into her car, she grabbed her purse and fished out a business card. “I’m Jillian Brightman, and if there’s any kind of a problem, you can reach me at Haworth House.”

He took the card, studied it for a minute.

She barely kept from tapping her foot. “Are we good here?”

He nodded. “You’ll be the first to know if we’re not.”

“Great.” She slipped back into her car and started the engine. After first backing up and then edging her way carefully around the SUV, she pressed her foot on the gas pedal. It took three straight minutes of driving for her heartbeat to steady.

IAN MACFARLAND WALKED as far as the sharp curve where he’d nearly met his maker and watched Jillian’s car race down the twisting road to the village of Belle Bay. His heart was still hammering. And he didn’t think he could blame that all on the near miss he’d just had.

Although when he’d rounded the curve and seen the car nearly upon him, he thought he’d bought it. The oil slick had taken her into a spin and if she hadn’t been able to handle it, neither of them would have cheated the grim reaper.

The lady sure could drive.

But part of the reason his heart had kicked into overdrive could be laid at the door of Jillian Brightman herself. He wasn’t a man who normally went with impulse. In the five years he’d worked as an analyst for the CIA, he’d learned the value of taking his time, figuring the angles, not jumping to conclusions.

But from the moment he’d stepped out of his SUV, he’d felt the damnedest pull. Walking over to her car to see if she was all right—that he could understand. What confounded him was the almost irresistible temptation he’d had to touch her, to kiss her. For an instant while the soft curves of her body had been pressed against him, the desire to taste her had become so urgent, so overwhelming that he hadn’t thought of anything else.

Certainly not the possible repercussions.

The question was why? He’d researched the Brightman sisters, so why hadn’t he been more prepared for the impact Jillian would have on his senses? Perhaps because the image on her Web site, one that he’d returned to study more than once, didn’t even begin to do justice to the woman. Oh, it had done a fair job of replicating the large blue eyes, the tumble of gold curls and the pixielike features that could have belonged to Peter Pan’s Tinker Bell. But it hadn’t even begun to capture the energy the woman radiated in person. Jillian Brightman in the flesh had been more than he’d anticipated.

She moved as fast as she drove. He recalled how quickly she’d gotten out of and back into the car. Then there’d been that moment when she’d looked right into his eyes. He hadn’t expected the little punch he’d felt right in his gut. Nor had he expected the almost instantaneous emptying of his mind.

She’d surprised him in more ways than one. Ian’s lips curved into a smile. She wasn’t even supposed to be on the island for another week. And the fact that she was might complicate the job he’d come to do. Avery Cooper, the hotel manager who’d contacted him, had stressed that the investigation he’d been hired for had to be done incognito.

Ian recalled Avery’s initial phone call. The first thing out of the man’s mouth had been, “This is Avery Cooper. You may know who I am?”

“I do,” Ian had said.

“Are you as good an investigator as your brother?”

“Hopefully. I don’t have as much field experience as Dane does.” It was something that Ian dearly wished to rectify. “What do you need?”

“First, I need to know that you’ll keep what I tell you in strictest confidence. Not a word—even to your brother. I don’t want to interrupt his holiday with Naomi, and I don’t want the Brightman sisters unnecessarily worried. Not until I know that I’m not just being paranoid.”

“If I think I need to tell my brother, I will. I can ask him to keep it from the sisters. But I can’t guarantee anything until I know what you’re going to tell me.”

There’d been a brief pause on the other end of the line. Then Avery had told him of the incidents plaguing Haworth House in the few weeks since Ian’s brother Dane had captured swindler Michael Davenport on the premises and the story of Haworth House’s resident ghost had received extensive coverage on the twenty-four-hour news channels.

First there’d been a breakdown in the air-conditioning system. Avery had chalked that up to bad luck and the cost of doing business.

Then there’d been the poisonous mushrooms that had nearly made it into the veal marsala, the restaurant’s signature dish. It was a young chef Reese had hired who’d recognized them and saved the day. Avery had had the mushrooms tested in a private lab. The good news was they wouldn’t have proven fatal. The bad news was that whoever had eaten them would have wished they had.