Forbidden Stranger

But Rosey had a criminal record five miles long. Amanda had nothing more than a speeding ticket when she was twenty-two. He was scum who belonged in the underworld where he resided. She’d just been passing through to better things.

Though twelve years was an awfully long time to pass.

“Well?” Julia prodded. “You think Amanda has something going with Hines?”

“You’re a woman. What do you think?”

“I think if he came near me, I’d shoot him where it don’t grow back.”

“But?” With Julia, there was usually a but.

She shrugged, her hair shifting in soft waves. “A woman does what she has to. I’ve never been in Amanda’s place. I don’t know how she grew up, how she got to where she is today. I don’t know what she’s had to do.”

Rick didn’t know any of that about Amanda, either. The background the bureau had done on her was cursory—name, age, address, credit check, criminal record check. It had been sufficient for their purposes.

Now that he’d talked to her, it didn’t seem sufficient at all. He wanted to know a whole lot more.

“You know, we’re overlooking one possibility,” Julia said, clearing everything from the bed, then turning down the covers. The sheets were pastel green and white stripes, and the pillowcases matched, with the addition of tiny roses embroidered in bright pink. “She could actually like the guy.”

She could be a nice woman who’d become friends, nothing more, with her sleaze of a boss. Rick would rather think not, but it beat the other possibilities.

He pushed to his feet and went to the door. “Whatever the case, she’s leaving the business next month. You’ve got to be in place well before then.”

Julia nodded, her look less apprehensive than it had been before she’d met Amanda. Do you think she’ll loosen up enough to actually get onstage? he’d asked Amanda.

I don’t know, she’d said. A lot of people will do whatever it takes to get what they want.

While Julia might not want to strip, she did want to succeed at her job. She would pull it off. For the first time since their boss had suggested it, Rick felt confident of that.

Then he thought again of Rosey and the way he’d smiled at Amanda. What about her? What had she done—what would she do—to get what she wanted?

Chapter 3

Wednesday was one of Amanda’s days off. Normally tips were good enough that she worked four days a week, though on occasion she had put in five or six days—when tuition was coming due, when her car needed a new transmission, when her aunt had asked for money for a divorce. Though Amanda hadn’t seen Dana in years, she’d given her the cash to pay the lawyer and the deposits on an apartment and utilities.

She hadn’t heard from Dana since. But that was all right. Amanda had to live with her conscience, Dana with hers.

“You want to get something to eat?”

Amanda looked at Julia, collapsed on the floor, one foot propped on the stripper’s pole. They’d spent the last four hours working, Julia mimicking moves before hesitantly trying a few of her own. She felt foolish, she’d admitted, but Amanda had already figured that out. Every stiff line of her body had screamed it.

But by the end, she’d been a little more relaxed. She’d shown something more than determination—a hint that someday this might come naturally to her.

“Sure,” Amanda agreed. She’d had a salad for lunch before Julia had arrived, but that seemed a long time ago.

“I’m supposed to meet Rick at that Mexican place down the block from the club at five-thirty. Is that okay?”

No, Amanda wanted to say. She’d agreed to a meal with Julia. It wasn’t fair to throw in Rick after the fact. She didn’t want to sit down at a table with him. Didn’t want to share a meal. Didn’t want to feel that intense gaze on her.

Didn’t want to be reminded that he had a thing with Julia.

“Yeah, sure,” Amanda said with an awkward smile. “That’ll give me time to shower.”

Julia sniffed, then her nose wrinkled. “Yeah. Me, too. I’ll see you there.”

Padding along quietly, Dancer followed them to the door, then trotted into the yard to take care of business. The dog sniffed the flowers, stopped to watch a squirrel in the neighbor’s yard, then stopped again to watch Julia drive away.

“Not in any hurry, are you, puppy?” Neither was Amanda. Wasn’t it enough that she saw Rick at the club?

But Dancer finally trotted back onto the porch. Amanda opened the screen door for her, then headed for the bathroom herself.

Ninety minutes later, she was showered and shampooed, smelling of exotic spices and looking like any thirty-year-old woman in faded jeans and a lace-edged T-shirt. Her still-damp curls were piled on her head none too tidily and her makeup was her toned-down everyday version. She looked fine for dinner with a friend.

Better than fine for dinner with that friend’s boyfriend.

The restaurant was three doors down from Almost Heaven, a mock-adobe hacienda with a red-tile roof and lush vines flowering everywhere. Amanda paused for a moment inside the door to let her eyes adjust to the dimmer light, then the hostess pointed out the corner where Rick waited. Alone.

The table was a half-round booth, barely big enough for three, and he sat with his back to the wall. He wore a white shirt, unbuttoned at the neck, sleeves rolled halfway up his forearms. His fingers were clasped around a practically full glass of beer, his head was tilted back and his eyes appeared to be closed.

“He’s a good-looking man,” the hostess murmured. “Do you suppose he has a father who’s available?”

Amanda shrugged. Gerald Calloway had been dead for as long as she could remember, but according to gossip, before his death he’d always been available.

She wove her way between tables and other early diners to the booth. About halfway there, she realized that his eyes had only appeared to be closed. Though he showed no signs of awareness, she felt the instant his gaze locked in on her.

When she slid onto the seat across from him, he raised his head and fully opened his eyes. “Hey.”

“Hey.” She ordered iced tea from the waiter who’d followed her, then gestured to the empty margarita glass beside him. “Where’s Julia?”

“In the bathroom. The margarita didn’t sit well on an empty stomach. She was too nervous to eat lunch before going to your house.”

Amanda nodded. “She did fine today.”

“Good.”

That was the extent of their conversation until Julia returned from the ladies’ room. She looked paler than usual and the smile she gave them both was sickly. Instead of waiting for Rick to stand up and let her slide into the middle, she bumped against him, pushing him over. He looked as if he wanted to protest—Amanda certainly wanted to—but moved, giving her his seat.

“Oh, man,” Julia said, patting her face with her napkin. “No booze ever again. I see why you don’t drink.”

Since Rick was sipping his beer at that moment, Amanda assumed the comment was directed to her. “I work too hard to stay in shape. If I’m going to splurge, it’s going to be on chocolate and ice cream.”

Rick gave her a long look—at least, the part of her he could see. “You don’t look like you ever splurge.” His voice was normal, his comment a simple statement. But it was the look that sent a tiny shiver down her spine, that raised her temperature a degree.

The look, and the fact that his girlfriend was sitting right next to him, oblivious.

Amanda turned her attention to the menu, though she always ordered the same thing. Better than looking at Rick, though, and feeling that little sexual tingle, or looking at Julia and feeling guilty.

After placing their orders with the waiter, Amanda and Julia chatted about pretty much nothing until the food came. Halfway through the meal, Julia put her fork down, pushed her plate away and fixed her gaze on Amanda. “Would it be okay if I come by the club some night and just watch?”

The memory of Rick “watching” the night before streaked through Amanda, leaving heat and edginess behind. It made her throat tighten, made her hand tremble when she picked up her glass for a sip. “That’s what we’re there for,” she replied with a smile she couldn’t hold for more than a moment.

“I think maybe I could learn something. Could I meet some of the other dancers, too?”

“Sure. Anytime you want.” Preferably on Rick’s night off, though he’d be likely to accompany her. He’d said he wanted to keep an eye on her, hadn’t he?

Amanda’s father was the first and last man to care about keeping her safe. He’d lost the physical ability to protect her when she was six, but emotionally, he’d been there for her until the day he died. She missed that. Missed having someone who would worry if she didn’t come home. Missed having someone to share things with.

She missed having a man in her life.

“Are you friends with all of them?” Julia asked, then smiled deprecatingly. “I know I’m probably totally naive, but I imagine it’s like some kind of sisterhood. You know, exotic dancers united against the rest of the world.”

Amanda glanced at Rick, leaned back, one arm resting on the seat cushion at Julia’s back, apparently content to listen to the conversation without contributing, then she shrugged. “I’m friendly with all of them, but not necessarily friends. It’s like any group of women who work together. Some are nice. Some aren’t. Some are competitive. Some are jealous. The younger girls are looking for friends or mentors—or mothers,” she added drily, thinking of the eighteen-and nineteen-year-old kids she’d helped along. Even when she was nineteen, she’d felt years older.

“How old do you have to be to dance?”

“Eighteen most places.”

“How old were you?”

She finished the last of her tea and folded her hands in her lap. “Eighteen.”

Julia shook her head. “Wow. I was finishing high school and starting college then. And you—” she elbowed Rick “—were probably raising hell back home at eighteen and making everyone grateful you were leaving for college, too.”

“Hey, there were plenty of people who were sorry to see me go,” he protested.

“Let me guess. All of them female and under the age of twenty.”

“Twenty-two.” His gaze narrowed, as if he were thinking hard, then relaxed again. “No, twenty-four.”

Julia laughed. Mention of girls in his past didn’t seem to faze her at all. She must trust him a lot, Amanda thought, and envied her that. Most of the men in her past had been trustworthy only about as far as she could have thrown them.

“How did you get into dancing?” Julia asked, including Amanda in the conversation again.

“I had a friend who danced. She badgered me into auditioning and…” She shrugged as if to say, Here I am. And it was basically true. Just the shortened version. She had intended the dancing to be a temporary thing, just something that was fun and would give her a little extra cash to make life easy for once. Financially, life had gotten easier, practically from the first day. Emotionally, it had taken a nosedive. Her mother and her aunt had both objected strenuously—first to the dancing, then to her. They’d wheedled, coaxed, demanded, judged and damned, and her relationship with them had never recovered.

The waiter began clearing dishes from the table. “Would you like some dessert? Fried ice cream, flan, sopaipillas?”

“Sopaipillas,” Rick said. “With three spoons.”

Amanda’s mouth watered, though she was experienced at resisting temptation. She took a sidelong look at Rick and reminded herself: very

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