Chapter 6

She needed to get away from him, to think. It had been too damned long since she had seen Chase or Cam, too long since she had allowed herself to think about the Falladay twins, either separately or apart.

"Let me take you back to your hotel, or are you staying here?" He nodded to the mansion.

"I'm at a hotel. But I'll be fine."

"We could talk—just talk, Jaci, I promise." He smiled. The charm and sensuality that was so much a part of him wrapped around her, encouraged her to join in, to let herself be seduced.

"I don't know."

"Just the two of us."

He said it so easily, with just a hint of amusement, a promise of sensuality. There was a shade of mockery in his tone, an acknowledgement of her hesitancy and the reasons why.

Jaci looked around the thick foliage of the grotto, the scent of summer, of sultry heat wrapping around her, the scent of the man sinking into her. And she weakened. He wasn't Cam, but he knew her. He wouldn't betray her or deliberately hurt her. And she was tired—tired of being alone and wishing for things she couldn't have. Tired of dreaming of one man and regretting one night.

Finally, she nodded. A slow, hesitant movement, a part of her holding back, the other part reaching out for him.

His smile was slow, confident, and for a moment Jaci wondered if she had somehow just stepped into something she didn't have a chance of handling.

"You can't change your mind." He caught her hand and drew her back along the path.

Rather than heading back into the ballroom, he drew her instead to a glass door that opened into the private wing of the house.

"I need to let Courtney know I'm leaving," she said as they moved through the short hall and into the kitchen and formal dining room, before turning into the foyer.

"Matthew will let her know." He drew her to the front door where the butler stepped from the small room that connected to the private wing as well as the main mansion.

"Mr. Falladay. Miss Wright." Matthew nodded his head politely.

"Matthew, please let Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair know we've left. Tell Ian I'll contact him tomorrow about those files."

"Of course, Mr. Falladay," Matthew acknowledged impassively. "I'll inform them immediately."

He stepped forward and opened the door for them, his brown eyes flickering with curiosity as they passed him.

Matthew was the scourge of Courtney's life, and the bastion of the male-only club Ian Sinclair owned—the one Courtney wasn't allowed in. The one Jaci had been hired to redesign, along with the private wing and main mansion. The Sinclair home was being turned over to the club itself, while Ian and Courtney would be moving into the new home they were building out of sight of the club, on the other side of the estate.

"Courtney's going to skin us both," she warned him as she lifted her dress and moved down the stone steps to the driveway beyond.

"I promise to protect you." He flashed a smile over his shoulder, his gaze wicked.

"Who will protect you, though?" She laughed, allowing him to pull her to the curb of the circular driveway as a vehicle's lights moved around the drive.

"Quick service," she murmured, as the Jaguar pulled to a stop in front of them and the valet driver jumped from the car.

"Matthew's a very efficient man."

He opened the door and helped her into the passenger seat before moving around the front of the car.

Jaci watched him move. He didn't hurry. He strode with determined steps, with powerful coordination. A wolf in elegant sheep's wool, she thought with a smile. And he did look elegant.

A second later he was moving into the driver's seat, pulling the door closed, and accelerating away from the brightly lit mansion.

"Where was Cam tonight?" She turned to stare at his profile, unable to forget that Cam was back at that party. She could have seen him. At least from a distance. Perhaps spoken to him.

He turned and flashed her a quick look. "He was looking for Ian when I caught sight of you. By now, they're likely deeply involved in a business discussion."

Had they changed that much over the past seven years? Despite Chase's words, perhaps Cam had forgotten about the immature little virgin who had dared to tease him, then ran away from the truth she didn't want to face.

"He didn't even want to stop and say hello to me?" She didn't want to admit that it hurt, that he had known she was there and hadn't stopped to speak.

"I slipped away with you." There was no smile this time.

His jaw seemed to tighten, a fine sense of tension invading the interior of the car.

Jaci turned her head and stared through the windshield again. There were so many questions raging inside her, so many emotions.

She felt off balance, meeting Chase like this, unprepared for it, not expecting him.

"Courtney's been excited over the design project Ian approved," he spoke into the silence. "I bet it took her two months to talk him into those plans. He wanted to give the mansion over to the club, but I don't think he was certain about allowing a woman to do the designing."

She smiled at that. Ian had questioned her extensively, on not just her credentials, which she knew he had checked out, but also her ideas about a male-dominant domain.

"So you and Cam knew I was arriving?" She turned back to him as that thought hit her.

"We did the investigative check on you before Courtney was given the go-ahead to contact you."

Jaci's lips parted in surprise before she tightened them with irritation. "I'm surprised Ian approved me, then." And now she wasn't surprised Cam hadn't wanted to see her.

Chase was quiet for long moments after that. "If Cam and I hadn't known you, he probably wouldn't have," he revealed. "We were the deciding factor."

She turned from him then, anger stealing past the shield she had learned to keep between herself and the world.

One accidental misstep, one job she never should have taken, and it had nearly destroyed her career. The repercussions were like echoes, they never went away, even five years later.

"Do you want to tell me what happened between you and Congressman Roberts?" he asked, his tone harder now, slipping from curiosity to demand.

She hated being ambushed, and suddenly that was how she felt.

"No, I don't. And if this is why you insisted on returning me to my hotel, then you should have stayed where you were. Perhaps you should have allowed Ian Sinclair to make up his own mind about me while you were at it. I don't need your help."

"You're just as damned stubborn as you ever were," he growled. "It was a logical question, Jaci. Something happened, or they wouldn't have targeted you so heavily."

"So tell me, Mr. Investigator," she snapped, "what answers did you come up with? Why don't you tell me what happened with Congressman Roberts?"

She knew what rumors the Robertses had spread.

"Wait." She held up her hand before he could speak. "On second thought, let me guess. I was caught attempting to steal a large amount of cash that Congressman Roberts kept in the desk in his private office. When they caught me, out of the kindness of their hearts, they just fired me from the job they hired me for and sent me on my way, rather than calling the police. Did I get it right?"

He shot her a short glance. "There were rumors of an affair with the congressman, as well," he stated.

Oh yeah, she hadn't forgotten about that one.

Jaci propped her elbow on the door ledge, pressed her fingers to the bridge of her nose and breathed in deeply. For five years she had been dealing with this.

It had taken her years to save up the money to finance her dream of settling in one city and opening her own design shop, all because of one malicious, corrupt couple that didn't know how to keep their dirty laundry hidden.

"So, why did you vouch for me? So you could interrogate me?" She turned to him with a glare.

"You're no thief."

"But I could very well be a home-wrecking little tramp out to snag a congressman?" she sneered.

"Or Annalee Roberts could be staying true to form, and attempting to destroy someone who has managed to get in her way, or who knows something she's terrified of others knowing," he suggested. "What happened, Jaci?"

"I breathed," she gritted out as he pulled beneath the entrance to the hotel Ian Sinclair had placed her in. "And now I'm going to my room, alone. Thank you for the ride."

The door opened smoothly, the doorman extending his hand to her as she stepped from the vehicle and headed for the entrance.

She was furious and she knew she had no right to be. She had known in coming here that this would come up, that there was no escaping the past, once she stepped into the Robertses' territory.

Congressman Roberts was rumored to be making a bid to replace his father-in-law in the Senate. He had a lot to lose, and as far as she knew, only one person knew their dirty little secrets. Secrets she wished she didn't know.

"Dammit, Jaci. Hold up." Chase caught up with her in the lobby, his fingers wrapping around her arm, pulling her to a stop as she headed for the elevators. "Talk to me."

"I'm done talking to you," she bit out. "You're as overbearing as Cam ever was, and I'm not in the mood to deal with it. Go back home, Chase. Find a nice little woman who can put up with you and your brother, and leave me the hell alone."

"Dammit, you don't want Cam asking these questions," he warned her, his voice dark. "And he will ask them, Jaci. He's not the man you left behind in Oklahoma. And trust me, he hasn't forgotten that promise he made to you the night he took you home. Do you remember it?"

His voice roughened, as Jaci became aware of the odd looks they were getting from the hotel staff and the guests that loitered in the lobby.

"I don't know . . ."

"He said he would kill any man who dared to hurt you." His voice was soft, warning. "Did you think he was joking? Do you think for a moment he forgot that promise? Tell me, Jaci, do you want to be the cause of Congressman Roberts's death?"