Hot Target. Lisa Renee Jones

“This morning, I started reading through your press coverage, trying to find things that might point to your stalker. I didn’t know about your manager and your ex-girlfriend trying to embezzle money from you until I read the many stories written about it. Ron should have told me. I mean—he’s your manager, and he’s brought this female into your life in a very intimate role. There is an uncomfortable parallel there I didn’t know about. I can see why you didn’t want me here. It feels unprofessional on our part, both Ron’s and mine, not to address this up front. I’m prepared to make this work, but are you? I have a couple of excellent men I can recommend—”

      “I want you, Katie,” he said, his voice low but firm, his gray eyes warm. The room seemed to shrink around them, the intimacy expanding in the same breath. “No one else.”

      Something about the way he spoke had her body quivering. They weren’t talking about security and they both knew it. “You are aware that I’m not the least bit enamored by your star-ballplayer status, right? That I won’t sleep with you because you’re some famous pitcher.”

      “I wouldn’t want you if you would,” he replied, his eyes holding hers, his expression unwaveringly intense.

      Understanding swept through Katie as she put two and two together thanks to those articles she’d read. Luke was feeling used and abused because of his stardom. He was drawn to her for the very reasons she was nervous about him. Yet, he seemed to trust her more easily than she did him. “How do you know I’m not manipulating you?” she asked. “Maybe I’m pretending to hate athletes because that’s what you want to hear?”

      He stepped to her side of the bar, his big body towering over hers, her body angled toward his, her knees all that separated the two of them. He smelled fresh, of soap and shaving cream. “Because I saw how much you hated me when you thought I was like Joey last night, how much you resented Ron for bringing you here.”

      “And you still trust me to protect you?”

      “Ron sent me your credentials, and after meeting you, I reread them. You come well qualified.”

      Katie believed in being direct and honest. She liked that Luke was direct, as well. And she was beginning to think she liked him, too.

      Feeling more than a little mesmerized by his gray eyes and nearness, she said, “All right, then. We should start working on our cover story. You know. The entire dating thing. How we met. Where we met. We should learn a few things about each other so we display convincing intimacy. Your season starts in less than a week, which thankfully is a home game. I’ll want to be in the bleachers, and getting close to those close to you, so I can look for trouble.”

      “First things first,” he said. “How do you like your eggs?” His eyes twinkled, his voice taking on a sensual play on words as he added, “Because I don’t know about you, but something about all this being close stuff has me starving.”

      Katie’s thighs clenched on that final word, and the implication that he was starving for more than eggs. He was starving for her. And damn it, she was starving for him. He moved to the refrigerator, and a breath escaped her lips.