Free In Your Wildest Dreams by Toni Blake

just that I wish I could forget this place. I can't go home. Not until I find my sister."
    Jake let out a long sigh. This woman tired him. He pulled out a chair from a little white table next to the railing and sat down, resting his elbows on his knees as he loosely laced his fingers. "What am I gonna do with you, chère? I can't be chasin' you around all over New Orleans tryin' to keep you safe—I'm nobody's hero. But seems to me that if I don't, you're gonna keep on gettin' yourself in trouble you can't get out of."
    "Look, I'm not your responsibility." Her tone was pointed, harsh. "I appreciate what you did just now, but you can consider yourself relieved of duty."
    He shifted a sour gaze from his hands to her face to see that damnable determination still shining in her eyes, even after this. He simply shook his head. "How you expect me to sleep nights, bebV
    "You just said you weren't a hero. So what's it to you? I never asked for your protection."
    But I just can't seem to stop giving it, can I? He wanted to accuse her of dragging him into this, but she hadn't. He'd made her problems his business by coercing the truth from her last night, and again tonight, by following her out here when he'd seen her leave with Cummings. 'Tell me somethin', chère? Is there anything I can say to make you stop actin' like some crazy couillon? Anything I can do to talk some sense into you and get you out of Sophia's? And into some clothes?"
    When she lifted her gaze, he couldn't help wondering what she'd look like without all that makeup. What was she like—out of this place, out of this situation, in her normal, everyday life? Softer, he thought. Softer, in a good way.
    She crossed in front of him, moving to the other side of the table to the remaining chair. He made a point of staying bent over and went back to not looking at her, instead studying the grain in the balcony's wooden floor. It was easier that way.
     
    "I don't even know your name," she said, her very tone relaying everything her words didn't. / don't even know your name, yet you 've touched me. I don't even know your name, yet you're asking me to listen to you.
     
    He couldn't help raising his eyes. "Jake Broussard."
    She offered a soft nod in reply, then said, "It's like this. My ex-escort friend tells me this is the only place where high-priced escorts and their customers meet publicly. And Tina put herself in that category of prostitutes, unequivocally—it seemed important to her. Do you know of any other places high-priced girls work?"
    "No," he agreed, still tracing the wood grain with his eyes. "Used to be more hot spots for high-priced hookers, but the feds came in a few years back and closed 'em down. The NOPD never quite understood—prostitution's against the law, but we had plenty else to keep us busy besides comin' down on the workin' girls. When the feds moved in, we were surprised they didn't have better things to do, too. Only thing we could figure is they were lookin' for somethin' bigger and didn't find it."
    "Well then," she said with a nod, "I have no recourse than to continue asking around here. Someone has to know something about my sister—I just haven't found them yet."
    He lifted his eyes to hers for the first time in a while. "Supposin' I said I'd ask around/or you. Would that keep your pretty little butt at home a few nights?"
    He saw her absorbing the offer, finally leaning across the table to say, "What more could we do? Where else could we search? If you're willing to help, surely there's more to be done than just snooping around this one place. As an ex-cop, you must know other avenues we could try."
    A thin ribbon of weariness fluttered through him. "So you're sayin' that me askin' around here isn't enough for you?" He hiked a thumb in the direction of the party.
    "I'm saying that if you're going to help me, why not use all your resources? Like I said, I can pay you whatever you like and the sooner we find Tina, the sooner I'll be out of