Free Cherry Adair - T-flac 09 by Edge Of Fear

eased. “No. You?”

    “Couple of brothers. One older. One younger.”

    “Are you close?”

    Caleb held up twined fingers. “Like this.”

    “Lucky you.”

    “Yeah. Never more so than when I saw a beautiful woman ogling a loaf of bread an hour ago.”

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    “We’re strangers.” Who was she reminding? Herself?

    “Do you really feel that way?”

    She bit the corner of her lower lip as their eyes locked. “No.”

    “Me neither. Fish or meat?”

    She smiled at the non sequitur, but got it. And relaxed a little more. “Both. You?”

    “I’m a meat and potatoes kinda guy. Dogs or cats?”

    “Cats.”

    “You don’t like dogs ?!”

    She shook her head. “Once bitten, twice shy.”

    “Where were you bitten?”

    “In the kitchen.”

    “Funny. Not funny. Show me.”

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    “Oh. I don’t think so.”

    “I’ll kiss it better.”

    “It happened when I was eight. It’s quite better now. But thank you for the offer.”

    “Okay, the kids can have a cat.”

    “Thank you.” She took a sip of her coffee, looking at him over the rim. “Raw or cooked?”

    “The cat ?” He gave her an exaggerated horrified look. She choked back a laugh.

    “Food!”

    “Ah. Definitely cooked.”

    God, she was sweet. Sexy and funny and damn cute as well. There was a vulnerability in her that he hadn’t expected.

    He didn’t have a type, he enjoyed most women. But if he did have a type, Heather Shaw wasn’t it, Caleb thought, playing with her slender fingers as he shifted closer still. Too bad his body wasn’t getting the message.

    “Yeah. Me too. Flying or driving?”

    “Getting there the faster the better.” Which was why this slow acquaintance dance, no matter how necessary, was making him crazy with impatience. Caleb let nothing of his thoughts show in his face, however. “Beatles or Elvis?”

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    “Beatles.”

    “Elvis.” He needed to speed things up. Needed to get the answers he wanted so he could get back to—What? A frigging vacation? Jesus, he needed to get out there and kick some tango butt. Mano a mano would suit him fine right now. Preferably something violent that would relieve some of this excess adrenaline he felt just looking at this woman.

    “Vacations?”

    “Often,” she answered.

    He focused on her words, on probing for clues, and tried to ignore his body’s reaction to her. Instead of fading somewhat with proximity, the lust factor was rising exponentially with every second he was with her. “Beach or mountains?”

    Her brow knit pensively. “Mountains. I’ve gotten the beach thing out of my system.”

    He smiled. “Suffered the obligatory family vacations to the shore, did you?”

    She shrugged. “We traveled a lot when I was growing up.”

    Brian Shaw was the banker du jour of some of the largest terrorist groups in the world. Taking his wife and pretty daughter with him when he went to see his clients was his MO. The family traveled extensively and often. “Favorite place?”

    “They all look the same after a while.”

    “Humor me. I spent almost every summer vacation in Scotland. I would have liked variety.” Almost as much as I’d like to see you naked.

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    “I love Paris,” she mused. “Great shopping and great restaurants.” Her mother had been French, and they’d had a home just outside Paris. As far as they knew, Shaw hadn’t returned to France since the death of his wife a year ago.

    According to their intel, Babette Shaw had been killed in an armed home invasion. Both Shaw and Heather had been out of the country at the time, Shaw in South America, Heather at a close friend’s in London.

    “But no beach,” Caleb teased. She