Midnight Heat by Donna Kauffman Page A

We might as well go over it now. If the phone rings before I get there, let the machine get it. Understand?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    Even tired and unsettled, she didn’t let up on him. “I like ‘Dane’ better,” he said before he thought better of it.
    This time he hung up first.
    Adria met him at the door with a huge glass, filled almost to the rim with ice and Coke.
    “Thank you,” he said. She smiled lightly and traded the glass for his briefcase.
    “Come on in.”
    He followed her down the hall, nursing the Coke, taking in her clothes. He couldn’t say which was worse—the ragged cutoffs she had on last time or the gray sweats she now wore and that clung to her legs. Her shirt wasn’t as old as the Redskins jersey, but she’d tucked it in, revealing the shape of her backside.
    She’s been harassed by some weirdo on the phone, he reminded himself. The last thing she needs is you drooling over her.
    They entered the kitchen and Daneglanced around. No plane parts in here. The room was average size, with standard appliances in standard colors. But it was warm, homey somehow. Maybe it was the woman occupying it that made it seem that way.
    The center of attention was a large oak pedestal table flanked by four ladder-back chairs. Adria put his briefcase on the table, sat down on the other side, and snagged her cup of coffee.
    “Please.” She nodded at the chair in front of him.
    He started to slide the briefcase to the floor, then changed his mind. It might be wiser to keep the constant reminder in sight. He swallowed more of his Coke and allowed himself another glance at her. Her hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail and her face was pale. There were shadows under her eyes that hadn’t been there before. It was probably the lighting. He really wanted it to be the lighting.
    The thought of her being terrorized by strange phone calls in the middle of the night had his stomach muscles tightening. One call he could dismiss—and he’d done a lousy job of that—but two calls …
    The instincts riding him now were unfamiliar. They were primal, basic. The sort that made men go out and confront dragons. Because there was simply no other alternative.
    Dane shook off the rather intense, unsettling feeling as he clicked open his briefcase and took out a pen and notepad. He felt ridiculously obvious in his attempts to armor himself, but she didn’t appear to notice. Besides which, no matter how much he might wish it, she wasn’t the dragon he wanted to fight. It would be so much easier if that were the case. Instead, she was rapidly becoming the damsel he wanted to fight the dragons to win.
    “I appreciate your coming over,” she said quietly.
    He shrugged and began flipping the pages, looking for a clean one. “Like I said, I was up, you were up.”
    Out of the corner of his eye, Dane noticed Adria’s gaze stray to his shirt. She’d done that at the door, but he hadn’t paid much attention then. Now he looked down at the dark blue polo shirt, but didn’t see anything strange. His eyebrows rose in question.
    “Sorry,” she said, color blooming in her face. “It’s just I’ve never seen you without a suit on.”
    Heat crept into his own cheeks. He didn’t know why he even bothered trying to keep things businesslike with her. He damn well knew he didn’t want to. “Did you think I slept in a suit, too?”
    Her widening eyes told him he’d missed dry humor by a mile.
    “You weren’t in—I mean, when I called, you were working.” She stumbled over her words. “You
were
at your office.”
    “Yes, I was.” He’d been at work all right, but she
had
caught him dreaming. His thoughts tumbled from falling asleep at his desk way too often to not wearing suits, to wondering what it would be like to fall asleep not wearing anything and being with her when he did it.
    It was a powerful image.
    He shifted in his seat and took another sip of Coke. It was icy cold but did next to nothing to cool him