Up All Night. Joanne Rock

good. Not good. Not good.

      Okay, fine for him. Impressive for him. Not good for her at all.

      She wriggled on instinct until the soft scrape of his light wool trousers on her thong-exposed butt made her think the better of it. This situation of a stranger on her bed holding her half-naked body close to his…impressiveness…was completely absurd and inappropriate. But duh. What did wriggling do to any man sporting that kind of condition?

      The problem increased in response.

      As did her shaky, shallow breaths.

      “Wait.” He squeezed her closer to his chest without really tightening his grip on her. Nevertheless, her breasts were a breath away from popping free of her scanty lace bra. “Sit still until you’re sure you can get up without hyperventilating. You scared five years off my life and I don’t even know you.”

      “About that…” Her voice scraped awkwardly over her vocal cords, the pitch all wrong after her bout with too much breathing.

      “I’m serious, lady.” He relaxed his hold again, keeping a wary gaze on her. “It’s Jenny, right?”

      She nodded automatically before she could consider the wisdom of confirming her identity for a man who knew more about her than most of the rest of the world between guessing her name correctly and cradling her bare thigh in his palm.

      And while the sensation didn’t feel good per se, given the fact that he could still be in her hotel room for nefarious reasons, she had to admit that having his hands on her wasn’t an entirely unpleasant experience either. She hadn’t been touched intimately since—ugh—her brief affair with a takeout delivery guy she’d slowly gotten used to seeing without leaving the safety of her home turf. But that had ended a year ago when she’d refused to go out on actual dates with him and, sweet psychosis, had she missed the sex.

      “How did you know my name?” Had he been rifling through her purse while she was in her room rolling on her sexy one hundred percent silk stockings—items also available from the De-Luxe catalog?

      If she hadn’t been so busy trying to get David to change his mind about a relationship tonight she might have heard this stranger’s entrance into her hotel suite.

      “You signed the e-mail you sent me,” he informed her, his hands sliding away from her body completely, silently giving her permission to walk away now if she wanted.

      Except that her insides still shook and she couldn’t believe her ears even though her Beethoven CD remained pleasantly soft in the background. The Ninth Symphony provided welcome familiarity in an uncomfortable situation.

      “What e-mail?” She racked her brain, wondering if she’d ever met him before. Could he be with the psych conference? There were enough borderline crazy people in the Quintessence Hotel this week to ensure she ran into one every time she turned a new corner.

      Sliding off his lap with as much grace as she could muster and possibly a little unwanted thrill, Jenny concentrated on taking slow, deep breaths as she kicked off her mules and tucked her legs up underneath her on the bed. The movement released the scent of roses, another sensory anchor that helped her hold steady in unfamiliar surroundings.

      The sheer white robe she’d worn provided little coverage, but she drew it more tightly about her and attempted to regroup long enough to figure out what this guy was talking about. If he was an escapee from some local mental institution trying to fix himself via a weeklong psych seminar, Jenny had more reason than ever to watch her back around him.

      “The note you sent inviting me to your room tonight.” He stared at her as if she was the mental patient.

      “You got a message inviting you here?” She knew he could be lying to justify letting himself into her hotel room, but she couldn’t help but think about her note to David an hour ago. Could she have hit a wrong key? “What’s your e-mail address?”

      “D B at Shore Engineers.” He straightened his shirt cuffs beneath the sleeves of his jacket. “You told me you saw me in the lobby bar earlier so I assumed you were someone attending the engineering seminar at the hotel this week. Are you in the industry? I’m pretty sure I’d remember you if we’d met before.”

      The tightness in her chest returned, but she forced herself to breathe slowly through the pinch. It had been almost two years since her last full-blown panic attack and she didn’t plan to put herself through that scary ordeal again any time soon. She’d keep her inhalations steady now. Even.

      “You work for Shore Engineers?”

      That was David’s firm. His e-mails had glowed with pride about the success of his company. His father’s company that he’d recently taken over, in fact. How could this man have intercepted her note to him?

      Unless…could David have given her someone else’s address by mistake?

      “I’ve already handed in my notice but I’m still technically with the company for a few more days.” His now straight cuffs provided an interesting contrast to the front buttons of his shirt, one of which had been undone from the first moment she’d spotted him in the room tonight. He looked equal parts slick corporate guy and negligent playboy. “Are you suggesting you didn’t mean to e-mail me?”

      “I, um—” Wavering, she didn’t wish to insult him, knowing firsthand how fragile an ego could be. But then he also deserved to understand the reason for her panic attack. “Actually, I meant to e-mail David Brady. One of your colleagues, I suspect? I thought that address belonged to him.”

      “This was for Wonderboy Brady?” Pointing toward her outfit, he shook his head. “Please tell me you don’t know him well.”

      The expression of pure contempt on his face made her hesitant to tell the truth. Would she be lumped in his condescension category if he knew she’d been e-mailing David through the dating service system for the past two months? Then again, most people who weren’t agoraphobic might consider that kind of contact very limited.

      “I guess not.” She mourned the loss of her much-anticipated sex romp now that she knew this man had received her note instead of the intended party. “You’re DB?”

      “Devon Baines. And I’ve been with the company longer than Brady so they let me keep the address even though I’ve got the same initials as the man you were hoping to contact tonight.” Something about the sardonic set of his mouth told her exactly what he thought of her taste in men. “His address is Hercules at Shore Engineers, by the way, if you’re still interested in salvaging a date.”

      Hercules?

      He started to rise as if their conversation had ended. But to Jenny’s way of thinking, things were just beginning to get interesting.

      “Wait a minute.” Either this Devon Baines was making up stories or David Brady was a far cry from the man she thought she knew. “Hercules? Are you kidding?”

      “I wish I was.” Cracking a grin for the first time since she’d spotted him in her room, Devon Baines gave a humorless laugh. “But in all fairness, he’s had the world by the tail his first six months with the company.”

      “It’s not like those addresses are a letter different and he could have written it down wrong or I could have read it wrong.” Jenny knew she wasn’t the hottest woman in the world, but she wasn’t so unappealing that a man would just foist her off on another guy to get away from her. Was she? “He had to have given me your address on purpose. Is that some kind of sick joke you have going between the two of you? Write off the women you don’t want by giving them phony contact information?”

      Anger burned anew in her, chasing away every last vestige of fear or self-consciousness she might have had about hosting Devon Baines in her hotel room. He wasn’t a killer or a sex fiend. Just a guy with a sick sense of humor. Either that, or he’d been set up.

      Devon paced to the bed, retracing the steps he’d taken away from her.

      “I