Page 27 of Legal Desire
Of course, he’d seen that slip a couple of times. She held tightly to it now, using it like a shield against him.
“Why did you change your name?” he asked. “You on the run from the law or something?”
She smiled.
“A jealous lover?” That, he could believe. Just the thought of her previous lovers had jealousy coursing through him. And he hated that. He wasn’t the jealous type. Competitive—hell, yes. He always had to win. But that was the only thing he wanted. The win. Not the woman.
Never the woman.
Until now. He wanted Allison McCann or whoever the hell she was. But that was just because he hadn’t had enough of her yet. Once he was with her again...
Eventually, he would grow bored with her as he had every other lover before her. But a little voice inside his head whispered that no other lover had ever been as exciting as Allison was.
“You don’t need to worry about me,” she said. “I’m not going to run for office with you. It doesn’t matter who or what I am.”
“What are you?” he asked.
The mole?
She had to be. Nobody else had had the access she’d had to their case files. It had to be her.
But why?
“I’m a publicist,” she said. “A damn good one. I can help you revamp your image.”
“Maybe I like my image the way it is.”
She shrugged. “Then you don’t need me,” she said, and she crossed her arms over her chest as if she needed to protect herself from him. And maybe she did. He was after her—in more ways than she knew. Or had she grown suspicious? He heard some suspicion in her voice when she asked, “Why did you try to hire me, then?”
He nearly shivered for real at her coldness. She was catching on, and he couldn’t have that. He dropped into one of the chairs in front of her desk and sighed. “Okay, I do need you.”
More than she knew.
His body ached for hers, tension gripping him.
“Then you need to be straight with me,” she said.
His stomach flipped. How the hell had she gained the upper hand again? She was a more formidable opponent than he’d ever faced in court. And since he’d gone up against billion-dollar corporations, he’d faced some really high-priced attorneys. After his victories over them, he was now higher priced. He’d beaten them. He could beat her.
“You first,” he said. “Why’d you change your name?”
She chuckled. “I’m not running for anything.”
But she was running from something if she was the mole, if she had any idea he was onto her. And he was damn well onto her.
“It doesn’t matter who I am,” she said. “But I need to know who you are.”
He snorted. “You know me.” After last night she knew him better than most people did. He wriggled his brows suggestively. “You know me very well.”
Her lips curved into a slight smile before she pulled them back down as if fighting it. As if she was fighting him.
Why had she agreed to help him?
She shook her head. “I think you have a lot of surprises in you yet.”
He wriggled his brows again. “Let’s go back to your place and see how much I can surprise you.” He lowered his voice to a gruff whisper. “And please you.”
Color rushed to her face, and she released a shaky breath. He was getting to her. Pride suffused him that he could melt the ice queen.
