Page 10 of The Mouse and the Maestro

The line at the restaurant was long, giving him a lot of time to think. Maybe too much because by the time it was his turn to order, he had become suspicious of Miss Jane Dunbar. Her words rose up to condemn her. A good forger would have to know a lot about her subject. Who better than a woman with a doctorate? And she had no footprint. The only other people he knew who didn’t were spies and top tier military guys like Ethan and Ridge. Their lives had been erased, making them untraceable. Maggie and Amelia were the same, thanks to their marriages. If they had children, the same protection would be granted to them. Guys like himself found it too easy to prey on people using their digital footprint. He could find out anything about anyone. Except Jane Dunbar.

She reappeared coincidentally as their food arrived. What had she been doing all that time in the bathroom? Reaching out to contacts? Setting up another deal?

“Feeling okay?” he asked.

“Yes, thank you. But I am hungry. This looks and smells amazing, thank you.” Her smile was gentle, but maybe that was all part of the act. Suck in innocent dupes by pretending to be innocent herself and then—WHAM!—take them out when they least suspect it. Though, if she were a forger, she’d probably be more used to dealing with people who looked like him. Maybe she’d had a bad run in with someone who had tats and a dye job and he had merely gotten caught up in her vendetta.

“Everything okay?” she asked, and he realized he was standing at the pickup line staring at her. He gave himself a mental shake. It was possible his dislike of her was causing his imagination to run away. She was a highly esteemed anthropologist who worked for one of the most prestigious museums in the world. That alone made it unlikely she was a forger. Or did it?

“Yes,” he said decisively, leading the way through the crowd to a table. They sat and he forced himself not to devour the cheesesteak like an emaciated wolverine, even though that was what he wanted to do. The restaurant had always been his favorite and his choice for every birthday and special occasion with his family.

“Does this bring back memories?” Jane asked, and he blinked at her, shocked.

“Yes, but how did you know I’m from Philly?”

“I read your bio,” she said.

“Oh,” he drawled. Ridge had given her a printout to help acquaint her with their team. It never occurred to him she actually read it.

Her phone buzzed with a text. She checked it, smiled, and sent a reply. Would she smile like that if the message was from one of her contacts? Perhaps, if the price was high enough.

She ate her sandwich as she did everything else—delicately, somehow even managing to not get messy. Blue, meanwhile, looked like he played the kissing game with a jar of Cheez Whiz. But she ate every bite of the huge sandwich.

“Thank you so much for that,” she said when the meal was over. “It was amazing. I’ll definitely come back, next time I’m here.”

“You’re welcome,” he said. “Quick question, do you mind if we swing through a car wash so I can try to get the dried cheese off my face?”

She laughed, a tinkling little sound so delightfully unexpected that he smiled what was possibly the first real and whole smile he’d given her since he met her. She stopped short and looked at him and then promptly ran into a wall.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” she assured him, but her hand was covering one eye. He led her to a bench outside the restaurant, sat her down, and crouched to inspect her.

“Let me see,” when she stubbornly retained the grasp on her face. He tugged her wrist, thinking as he did so that it was the first time she didn’t flinch away from him. Apparently all it took for her to be comfortable around him was possible brain damage and vision loss.

“That’s going to leave a mark,” he said, inspecting the little purple spot on her cheek. It would likely swell and hurt for the next day or two. “Let’s see if we can get you some ice for the ride home.”

She said nothing, and in fact she seemed not to be blinking. It was as if someone had turned the lights off in her head, and he began to fear maybe something actually had happened to her brain.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes, I, I…” her gaze fell to his hand resting on her leg.

Oh. That was it. She couldn’t stand him touching her. He snatched his hand back, the angry roar filling his chest again. For one moment he had fooled himself into thinking she was human, that she saw him as more than a guy with body art and blue hair. But he was wrong. She was as cold and uppity as he had first assumed.

“No, I,” she tried again and then floundered.

“It’s fine,” he snapped. He started to stand when her hands reached out and captured his face. Slowly, she brought it closer to hers. She closed her eyes and kissed him, long and slow and deep, so that when it was finished, Blue was the one with a scrambled brain.

“Sorry,” she whispered when the kiss was over, and then she kissed him again, drawing his face to hers again, while Blue remained too shocked to do anything more than let it happen.“Sorry,” she added again, though her thumb slid gently over his bottom lip and she leaned forward and touched her lips lightly to his once more, no hands this time. Then she sat back. “Again, sorry. We should probably go before I do it again.”

“Okay,” Blue said. His voice sounded tinny and strained, even to him. What in the name of anime had just happened to him? No woman had ever randomly kissed him like that and, if they had, it would have been less surprising than Jane being the first. She was so…He was going to say standoffish, but that seemingly no longer applied. Different. Yes, she was very, very different.Try looking in a mirror sometime,his treasonous inner voice reminded him. He prided himself on different. Why did it bother him when he encountered it in someone else? Was it possible he had been guilty of reverse prejudice? That he judged Jane for her upright demeanor and unassuming style?

Chapter 7

Have now kissed the guy whose pants I peed.

Jane sentthe text to Emily in the silent awkwardness of the car. It was the only barrier between her and waves of mortification. Without the distraction, she would surely erupt into the tears that, even now a half hour later, threatened to overwhelm her. She had always cried easily, and she hated it. Tears seemed to be hotwired into every one of her emotions—angry? Cry. Sad? Cry. Frustrated? Cry. Kiss a stranger on a whim? Cry, or try hard not to.

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