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He looked at the address she’d given. “I’ll drop you off on my way home.”
By the time he’d taken them home, the Hamburger House had closed, so he stopped at the River Café and bought enough Cajun-fried catfish, french fries and coleslaw for two meals, got the Sunday papers and headed for his co-op town house.
For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why Kate Middleton wouldn’t get out of his head. He put on a CD and listened to his favorite music—a Max Bruch violin concerto—while he savored his lunch.
Relaxed, he thought back to the time when the woman he loved, his wife, had needed him and called for help. But he’d been busy saving someone else’s life, and he’d lost her, a victim of mistaken identity. He was not going to get involved with a woman he might have to protect. The fact that the robber had selected Kate’s store from among those nearby, which even the most inexperienced criminal should have known would yield more cash, made the crime suspicious. To his mind, it wasn’t an ordinary stickup. It occurred to him that he ought to have someone put a new lock on her store and get the keys to her. An expletive slipped through his lips.
Kate crawled into bed and replayed the day in her mind. Luke Hickson wasn’t an ordinary man whom you met on an ordinary day. The personification of gentleness, but oh, boy, you would not want to cross him. Power. He exuded it. Even seven-year-old Randy noticed it, because he hadn’t tried any of his usual antics on the captain. She couldn’t let her thoughts dwell on him, though, because such a man had to be married. And even if he wasn’t, she’d served her years of martyrdom in her marriage, and she wasn’t going that route again.
Thank God the robber hadn’t come ten minutes earlier. No one would ever know how glad she was that she’d taken all but a few dollars from the cash register and put her day’s take in the safe in the back room. She couldn’t afford to lose money. Buying a little summer home on the Albermarle Sound, moving Randy and herself into an apartment and setting up her bookstore had taken over half of her capital. Still, she was thankful. The robber had spared their lives. Tremors shook her at the thought that he might return to finish what he’d started. She hoped Luke Hickson would catch him.
She didn’t let herself dwell on the career she’d given up when Nathan moved them to Grosse Pointe, because she couldn’t resume teaching music education and advanced piano in the Portsmouth schools unless she took refresher courses or got another degree. Even then, she’d have to pass board exams again. With Randy to care for, she couldn’t spare the time or the money. Her career was a thing of the past.
She stretched out on the satin sheets—that her late husband had insisted they use—and let her bare skin enjoy the silky softness. Now that she wasn’t married, she’d taken to sleeping nude and loving it; that was part of her statement of independence.
She reached for the phone on its second ring.
“Ms. Middleton, please. Luke Hickson speaking.”
Currents of dizziness attacked her, and it seemed as though her head had lost most of its weight. “This is Kate, Captain Hickson. Is…is something the matter?” She hated the unsteadiness of her voice. The man must be used to having women roll over for him. Not this one.
“I hate to disturb your rest, but it’s occurred to me that you need a new lock and key for your store, and you need it now. With the simple padlock I put on it, a criminal wouldn’t need much imagination if he wanted to open it.”
“What do you suggest?”
“We can take care of it, but you have to be present. I can pick you up in half an hour.”
“Thanks. I’ll be ready.”
What next? She wanted to stay as far away from that man as she could get, but fate seemed to have other plans. She phoned Madge Robinson, the building superintendent.
“Madge, I have to go out for…I don’t know…an hour or two. Could you please keep an eye on Randy for me? He’s asleep.”
“In that case, I’ll go down to your place. It ain’t smart to leave a child his age alone. Be right there.”
She met Luke in the lobby and knew she’d never hear the end of it, because Madge was standing in the garden, though she should have been inside with Randy.
“Who’s with your boy?” Luke asked after handing her the new keys to her store.
She told him and waited, since it was clear he had something else to say.
“He needs a strong male hand. Where’s his father, if you don’t mind my asking?”
She hated talking about herself. Although he’d asked without seeming to probe, that didn’t make her more comfortable. “I’ve been a widow for fourteen months. Randy is showing the results of his father’s pampering and overindulgence. Sometimes he’s very unruly.”
“I can see that.”
He had a way of looking at her intently, of focusing on her as if she were the only other living creature on the planet. Suddenly, he smiled, and her heart flipped over like a jackknifed eighteen-wheeler. She took a deep breath to steady herself.
“You didn’t get any rest, but…well, since we’re out here, do you feel like having a decent meal with me?”
Stunned at the unexpected invitation, she gazed up at him, judging his intent.
His smile widened. “I’m harmless. Besides, everybody in town knows me, so I can’t possibly abduct you and get away with it. What do you say?”
An infectious grin, his sparkling white teeth against his dark brown skin, gave her a warm feeling, and the twinkling mischievous challenge in his beautiful gray eyes provoked in her an oddball sense of devilment, a wickedness she hadn’t felt in over ten years.
In a reckless moment, she said, “Harmless? Luke Hickson, you’re about as harmless as a hungry lion among a herd of antelope.”
With his jacket open and his hands in his pants pockets emphasizing his six-foot, four-inch height and his imposing maleness, he gave his left shoulder a quick shrug. “I expect I’ve been likened to less admirable things, but when a charming woman tells me to my face that she thinks I’m dangerous, there’s no telling what will pop into my head.” He grinned again. “You willing to risk it?”
Primed for the game, she looked him up and down. “Oh, I don’t know. What kind of ideas get into your head?”
His eyes flashed fire, daring her. “You might be surprised.”
If he thought she’d back off, he was in for a surprise. “Good. I love surprises.”
His left eyebrow shot up. “And challenges, too, no doubt.”
She pulled on the long strand of hair that hung beside her right ear. “Oh, I thrive on those.”
“Ever pushed your luck too far?” he asked, his voice low and dark.
She couldn’t remember when she had last enjoyed flirting with a man, giving him back as good as she got. And a sharp-looking brother, at that. She pulled a curtain of innocence over her face and smiled. “Maybe. I don’t think so, though I’ve been told I have got an angel on my shoulder. So who knows? Where’s this place that serves a good meal?”
When he stepped closer and touched her elbow with a single finger, she looked around and then glanced up at him. He wasn’t smiling, and she knew she’d given herself away.
“If you’re checking to see who’s around in case you want to play, we’re alone in front of your store, four feet from a streetlight.”
The thought of playing with him, as he put it, sent a riot of sensation through her body, but she steeled herself against his intoxicating virility. “I don’t make a spectacle of myself, Captain. I just like to—”
“Tease?”