License to Thrill

“Melanie!”

Her cheeks felt on fire. Of all the places for the sucker to land. She tightly clasped her hands in her lap where they were unlikely to do more damage.

“Pardon me.”

“Are you all right?” Craig asked.

Melanie made a show of watching her mother pluck the foreign piece of silver from her food.

Look at him, she ordered herself. She did.

It wasn’t that Craig Gaffney wasn’t attractive. He was appealing in an all-American way that included surfer good looks, wide grin and a sharp mind for drugs. Pharmaceuticals, she amended. She thanked the waiter when he brought her another set of linen-wrapped silverware. Her mother cleared her throat. Melanie carefully freed the silver from the white linen and picked up the clean fork, though she didn’t think she could swallow another bite of food.

Craig had a great sense of humor. Did it really matter that he sometimes didn’t grasp a punch line? Or that his capacity for humor had somewhat dwindled since they announced their engagement?

She picked up her wineglass and took a hefty sip only to realize she shouldn’t be drinking. She forced herself to swallow, then coughed. Craig’s father narrowed his eyes, watching her far too closely.

“Wrong pipe,” she said quietly.

Her fiancé was also very comfortable to be around, she continued, reviewing her Pro-Marriage to Craig column. A quality that had instantly cemented their friendship nearly twenty-five years ago when they were in kindergarten. He didn’t judge her the way most people did then…and now. She glanced in her mother’s direction. Wilhemenia was frowning…again. No, Craig had always accepted her for who she was. Which made accepting his proposal all too easy when she’d spilled her troubles to him.

Craig leaned toward her, giving her a hefty whiff of his cologne. I can change that. He lowered his voice. “You don’t feel like you, well, you know, have to—”

“Throw up?” she said a little too loudly.

He didn’t laugh. Instantly, she realized why. No one else at the table knew she was pregnant.

She searched for a way to cover her mistake. “I think I’m suffering from a case of pre-wedding nerves. Otherwise, I’m fine. Really.” Which was true enough. She hadn’t suffered through a moment of morning sickness, and she was two weeks into her second trimester.

Pregnancy. Baby. Marriage.

Suddenly, Melanie did feel sick.

Sick with fear.

What did she know about being a mother?

“I never thought Melanie would be the first of my girls to marry,” Wilhemenia was saying to Doris. The comment caused Craig’s father’s gaze to sharpen. “Joanie was always the better bet.”

More wife material, Melanie silently added, wondering exactly where her sister was and why she wasn’t here defending her. And why was her mother discussing her as though she weren’t even at the table?

Craig’s mother tittered. “But you have to agree, she’ll make a handsome bride.”

Archie drained half his glass of beer. “Tell me again why you two are in such a rapid-fire hurry to have Pastor Pitts marry you?”

Melanie started. Craig squeezed her hand and said, “I think a twenty-five-year courtship is long enough, don’t you, Pumpkin?”

Pumpkin? Okay, so soon she’d look as though she’d swallowed a pumpkin, but still… “You did ask me to marry you on the playground, didn’t you, Pookems?”

He blinked at her.

Melanie was aghast at her behavior. She resisted propping her elbows on the table and covering her face as she considered exactly what was going to hit her and Craig once everyone found out she was pregnant. And learned just how far along she was. It wouldn’t take a Ph.D. to figure out the math. Craig had been not only out of town at the time of conception—he’d been out of the country. In New Guinea. Doing whatever pharmacists did in third-world countries. That wasn’t fair, because she knew exactly what he had been doing. While she…

Melanie finally gave in and rested her forehead against her hand, ignoring her mother’s stare.

God, she was going to be sick.

She pushed away from the table. Everyone grabbed their glasses and silverware to keep them from becoming deadly projectiles. Tears burned her eyes. Could she possibly make this dinner any worse?

“Excuse me. I’m going to…” What? Lock myself in a bathroom stall until the world makes sense? “Powder my nose.”

Her mother neatly placed her napkin next to her plate. “I’ll come with you.”

“No!”

The occupants of the head table stared at her in stunned silence, as did the half of the population of Bedford that had been invited to the dinner. Melanie tried to control her voice. “I mean, thank you, Mother, but I can see to this myself.” Her mother appeared ready to argue. “I’m fine. Really.”

Melanie shakily stood her ground. Surprisingly, it worked. Her mother sat down. “Very well, dear.”

Melanie looked for the tiny bag she’d brought with her, then saw it lying on the floor. She stopped herself from crawling under the table for it, smiled at everyone, then stepped as casually as she could toward the hallway.

She felt awful. Her stomach was upset, she felt bloated and her swollen feet ached. But it was more than that. She felt out of her element. Usually in command of every situation, she now felt inexplicably vulnerable. As soon as she was in the hall, she collapsed against the wall, blinking back hot tears. What was the matter with her? Hormones? Or did some part of her realize she was making the biggest mistake of her life?

Out of eyeshot of everyone in the dining room, she slowly slid her hands down her stomach, resting them over the exact spot where even now her child was growing within her.

Marc’s child.

She briefly closed her eyes, wondering again if not telling Marc about her condition was such a good idea.

She wiped the dampness from her cheeks. Too late now, wasn’t it?

Besides, Marc had made it clear he wasn’t interested in anything permanent. She reached down and slid her aching feet from the torturous contraptions Joanie called shoes and tried to work the heel off one. She couldn’t very well wear them if they were broken, could she? It wouldn’t budge. She started in the direction of the rest rooms before someone caught her trying to snap the heel off from the other one.

Inside the pink-and-gold rest room, she locked herself into a stall and sank down on the seat. She needed a few moments to herself. Bolstering minutes to take a deep breath and pull herself together. She had to. Not for her sake. For her baby’s. And, a guilty part reminded her, for Craig. He deserved better than a cranky bride who abandoned him to his mother-in-law.

Melanie swallowed hard, appreciating if not particularly overjoyed with the humor of the situation. After using up the better part of her life trying not to upset the delicate balance of her relationship with her mother, she’d spent the past eight years going through an odd, ambitious sort of rebellion. Not a planned one, by any means. But during her first year at college, all the emotion—all the hunger for adventure she had secretly craved—had just kind of gushed out, overwhelming her with its intensity. She’d been as unable to deny the change in herself as she would have been able to keep the sun from warming her skin.

Then, three months ago, she had paid for that “coming out” of sorts. But tucking away the thrill-seeking Melanie Weber was not an easy task.

The outer door opened. “Yoo-hoo.”

Melanie closed her eyes and clutched her shoes, half wishing she could climb on top of the toilet so her mother couldn’t see her stocking feet from under the door. Not that it mattered. She peeked through her eyelids to find her mother angling her head to peer through the thin crack between the hinges.

“I’m in here, Mother.”

“Oh!”

She had to give her mother credit. At least she attempted to act as though she hadn’t just been gaping into a closed stall.

She heard the door next to hers close. There was no rustling of clothes, meaning her mother wasn’t doing anything in her stall, either.

“Mother?”

“Yes, Melanie?”

“Why are you so afraid I won’t go through with…well, you know, with marrying Craig?”

There was silence, then the distinct sound of the toilet paper roll going around in circles. Melanie gave in to a sudden smile. At least her mother was attempting to make the situation look somehow normal.

“Well…I have to admit, I am a little concerned about your unusual behavior these past couple days.” Wilhemenia paused. “I don’t know, your behavior reminds me so much of that time you came home from university for the summer and neglected to tell me you’d changed your major from business to pre-law.” She made a quiet sound. “I won’t say a word about how your choice of careers after graduation disappointed me.”

You don’t have to say anything because you already have. Every time you want me to do something I’m against.

Melanie propped her shoes on a metal shelf then toyed with her own toilet paper. “And do you really think hovering over me like a—” jailer? “—like a mother hen is going to prevent that from happening?”

Another brief silence. “It’s not like that at all. I…I just want to be here if you need anyone to talk to.”

Melanie caught herself ripping the paper to shreds, the pieces floating to land around her feet.

“Melanie?”

God, she was crying again. If she kept up the waterworks, she’d end up floating down the aisle on a wave of her own tears.

Her mother spoke again. “Is there anything you want to talk about?”

Melanie opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She swiped at her damp cheeks.

Her mother cleared her throat. “If this is about that Marc character, you should just put him out of your mind right now.”

Melanie released a long, silent sigh, the words a vivid reminder of exactly why she couldn’t talk to her mother.

“He’s not the marrying kind, you know. More little boy than man. You’d only be miserable.”

Melanie nodded, hating her mother’s words but agreeing with them nonetheless. She was beginning to suspect that the only thing worse than being without Marc McCoy was being with him.

“Mom?” The shortening of the word mother should have sounded foreign, but oddly enough it didn’t. “Did you love Dad?”

For the life of her, she couldn’t figure out why she had asked that. Her father had died when she was three, right after Joanie was born. What did ancient history—especially her mother’s ancient history—have to do with what was happening now?

“Never mind. Forget I just asked that question.” Melanie got up and collected her shoes.

“Melanie?”

She stopped midway toward the door. “Yes?”

“I…” Wilhemenia’s voice trailed off. “I just wanted to tell you that all I’ve ever wanted is for you to be happy.”

Some of Melanie’s tension melted away. “Marrying Craig will make me happy, Mom. Thanks.” She gestured vaguely, though her mother couldn’t see her. “Thanks for putting everything back into perspective.”

Clutching her shoes in one hand, she opened the outer door. She skidded to a dead stop, finding herself nose-to-chin with a whole different barrier.

Marc McCoy.

Melanie’s breath gusted from her.

That can’t be right. This was her rehearsal dinner. Marc shouldn’t be anywhere near the inn or the rest rooms, much less her, right now. Yet there he was, big as life and twice as tantalizing. She stumbled backward.

“Wrong way. You want to come out.” Marc folded his fingers around her wrist and tugged her the rest of the way into the hall. Melanie’s knees felt about as substantial as baby food. She had no choice but to lean into him, causing a wave of longing to flow through her body. Suddenly, three months seemed like a very short period of time, indeed.

“What’s going—”

“Shh.” Marc laid a finger against her mouth. The simple action was maddeningly sensual. Her gaze was glued to his lips. But rather than kissing her, he set her purposefully away from him, confounding her even more. She moved her hand to the side of her throat, feeling her pulse thrumming wildly, her skin searingly hot.

“Interesting conversation you and your mother were having in there,” he said.

Melanie avoided his gaze. “You heard?”

She didn’t realize what he was doing until he slid a mop handle through the door handle, securely barring her mother inside the ladies’ room.

A hysterical laugh tickled Melanie’s throat. She couldn’t count the times she would have loved to lock her mother in a room. But wishful thinking was one thing; willful doing was quite another. She battled the irresponsible emotion.

“Let’s go,” Marc said, taking her hand.

Let’s go? Had he actually just said, “Let’s go”?

Melanie dug in her heels as best she could, considering she wore no shoes. Her stocking feet slid across the tile as Marc hauled her toward the parking lot. She swatted at him with the lethal shoes in her free hand.

“Hold on a minute, McCoy. Just where do you think you’re taking me?”

He stopped. “Why, out of here, of course.”

Melanie stared at the man who had the power to overturn every one of her well-laid plans. Her stomach pitched as she realized he intended to do just that.

Then he had the nerve to grin. Grin! Okay, he was rubbing the spot where her spike heel had nicely connected, but otherwise there was no evidence she had done anything more than blow a strand of his rich brown hair out of place.

“Hello, Mel. Miss me?”

Miss him? About as much as a bad sunburn. But her heart started to murmur something else. Melanie ignored it.

“What are you doing here? You weren’t on the guest list. I know because I drew it up.”

“I penciled myself in.” Marc’s reflective sunglasses prevented her from seeing his brown eyes, but his smile told her more than she wanted to know. His head tilted forward as he took a languid look over the tight-fitting silk of her dress, then up to where the sleek material hugged her waist and breasts. “Put on some weight, haven’t you, Mel?”

Scorching heat spilled over her cheeks again as she fought the desire to cover her stomach. He doesn’t know, she reminded herself.

“Looks good on you.”

While her physical dimensions had altered a bit since she last saw Marc, he hadn’t changed a bit. At six foot two, he was two hundred pounds of raw, muscled male. His military background was evident only in his tall posture. The easygoing grin and lazy casualness were pure Marc, as were his black T-shirt, jeans and the suede vest she knew concealed the 9mm revolver he always carried.

The mop handle rattled against the door. “Melanie?”

Oh, God. Mother. “You know, it’s not very nice to go around locking people in bathrooms.” Melanie tugged her hand, but he only tightened his hold. “Marc!”

“What?”

“Let me go.” She considered whacking him with her shoe again. He finally released her.

“Aw, now is that any way to treat an old boyfriend?”

A handsome grimace creased Marc’s face. A face she had tried to forget. A face chock-full of remarkable features she sometimes found herself wishing her child would inherit. Their child. Melanie swallowed hard.

“Ex-partner, then,” he said quietly. “Surely you have a few minutes for your ex-partner.”

Partners. Yes, they had been at least that. Although not in any permanent sense of the word, despite her present condition. Their partnership had been more professional than personal, and she had been dumb to forget that even for a second. As special agents for the Treasury Department’s Secret Service Division, they had worked together for two years. Up until Melanie decided it was time to get out.

Wrong choice of words. She hadn’t decided anything. The decision had been made for her. By a fellow agent who had turned his gun on her…and by a doctor’s innocent words.

“Ex-partners do not lie in wait when all they want to do is catch up,” she said softly. “What do you want?”

Marc had always been good at his job. When he wanted, he could be formidable. His physical appearance alone was enough to scare off any number of fanatics hoping for a shot at stardom by targeting a political candidate. But in his downtime, Melanie knew him to be an irresistibly handsome, rambunctious little boy who usually took nothing and no one seriously. Which gave her a definite advantage over him.

Melanie bit her lip. She didn’t want to think like an agent anymore. In fact, she hadn’t thought about her previous career for at least—well, half a day. Hooker had called her from jail that morning, after a two-month silence, despite court orders for him not to do so. Hearing his voice before she broke the connection had rattled her as much as his previous calls, not to mention the countless letters he’d sent her, which she had returned unopened. Out of the need to feel safe, she’d strapped her firearm on. An irrational act, considering Hooker was in custody.

“Yoo-hoo. Melanie, there’s something blocking the door. Could you open it, please?” There were rattling sounds as her mother tried to open it herself. “Melanie?”

Melanie swallowed hard, feeling Marc’s gaze hone in on her despite the sunglasses. She suppressed a shiver.

“You’re going to have to call off the wedding, Mel.”

She blinked. “What?” she whispered.

“You heard me. Tell the poor guy you agreed to marry you’re sorry, but there’s been a change in plans.”

Hysterical laughter again threatened to erupt from Melanie’s throat. She thought of all the plans that had been made, the guests who had been invited, and realized she’d drop everything in a heartbeat if she thought for a minute that Marc loved her. But he’d already made it clear he didn’t and never would.

No, Marc’s appearance was just one more unfair occurrence in a day chock-full of them.

“Not on your life.” She surveyed him. She noticed the way he stood, all too handsome and deceptively relaxed, then watched the casual way he shifted his weight toward the bathroom door. Melanie’s gaze slid to the barrier, and her heart gave a triple beat.

“Melanie? Who’s out there with you? Is it Craig? Maybe he can help—”

Melanie dove for the mop handle. Before she could pull it free, Marc’s arms snaked around her waist. She gasped and thrust her elbow into his stomach with all the force she could muster, given her restricting apparel. She met with what felt like reinforced steel. While she’d gone a little soft around the middle, he’d gotten more than a bit harder.

“Come on, Mel, don’t make me go to Plan B,” he murmured.

Plan B? What was he talking about? And why did dread and anticipation spread through her at the humor in his voice? She stilled. “You can let go of me now,” she said with forced calm.

“Why? So you can try to let your mother out again? No way. I’ve been trying to get you alone all afternoon. Now that I’ve got you, I intend to do what I came for.” His breath stirred the hair over her right ear. She was powerless to stop an obvious shiver. “You are happy to see me.”

She tried to loosen his grasp, but again he tightened it.

“Come on, Marc, where am I going to go?” She wriggled against him, hating that he could read her reaction so well.

“Mmm.”

Melanie’s knees threatened to give out at the sound of his soft hum. His palms had flattened against her hips and now nudged up toward the underside of her breasts. She gasped, every traitorous part of her body craving that all too familiar touch.

Marc buried his face in her hair and breathed deeply. “God, I forgot what it was like to touch you.”

Need grew within her again, stronger this time. “Please let me go.” She hated the helpless quality of her voice and tried to insert some metal. “Or else I’ll do something you won’t find very pleasant.”

His chuckle stirred more than her hair. “You always were one for idle threats, weren’t you?”

Somehow she found the energy to do what she had to. Curling her fingers around one of the shoes, she swung it backward, heel first, hitting her intended target. Air rushed from Marc’s body. He stumbled back, releasing his hold on her and reaching for his crotch.

“How idle was that?” Melanie whispered. Clutching her shoes in one hand, she reached for the mop handle with her other.

“Oh, no, you don’t,” Marc said.

Melanie’s stomach gave a small flip as she struggled to open the bathroom door. She nearly had the mop free when Marc drove it home.

“Why did I think this would be easy?” he murmured.

The world tilted beneath Melanie. By the time everything stopped spinning, she found herself draped over one of Marc’s wide shoulders, her shoes bouncing off the tiled floor. Her eyes were parallel with his jeans-clad rear end. And oh, what a rear end it was, too. Too bad she wasn’t in the mood to enjoy it at the moment.

What was she thinking? She didn’t want to enjoy anything about Marc. Not now. Not ever again. In two days she was getting married. And not to Marc. Because Marc had a bad habit of disappearing when she needed him most.

“I can’t believe you just did that!”

“Yeah, well, believe it,” he murmured. “I don’t care what they say, sometimes drastic measures are necessary.”

They? Who were they? God, she wished some of this mad situation would start making sense.

Marc suddenly stilled. “Everything’s fine, sir. You just go on about your business.”

Melanie peeked around his hips to see her uncle Fred worrying his tie in his hands. Bedford’s most prominent banker scurried toward the men’s room across the hall, not even attempting to help. Melanie suddenly wanted to cry.

A tentative knocking sounded on the ladies’ room door. “Melanie? Are you all right?”

Drawing in a fortifying breath, she said, “I’m fine, Mother.” Aside from feeling like a sack of flour. “Feel better now?” she asked him quietly.

“Much, thank you,” Marc said lightly. “Now, tell me how I go about making you see reason.”

“Reason? I’m not the one who just threw someone over her shoulder.”

She felt a hot hand on her ankle. She fidgeted and tried to see what he was doing.

“Hold still, or you’ll find a hand right where I’m sure you least want it,” he said. “Tell me, Mel, do you still take that neat little nickel-plated .25 everywhere you go?”

Melanie’s eyes widened as he cupped her right heel, then slowly slid his fingers up her calf, tickling the back of her knee. “Marc! Get your hands off me, you overgrown—”

His probing ceased just short of her panties. He stood silently for long moments. Melanie didn’t dare breathe. Awareness tingled everywhere his hand had touched, and even now neglected parts of herself pleaded for the pleasure they knew Marc could bring.

“Satisfied?” she croaked.

“Not nearly,” Marc said quietly. He moved his hand across her backside, eliciting a gasp, then slowly began down her other leg. “There she blows,” he said, pulling her .25 free from her thigh holster.

Melanie groaned and pushed against him in exasperation.

“Tell me, Mel, does your fiancé know what you hide under your skirt?” he asked, not removing his hand. Instead, he caressed the spot around her empty holster with feathery, fiery flicks of his callused thumb. She wriggled against him, threatening to topple herself to the floor. The way she figured it, anything was better than subjecting herself to Marc’s all-knowing touch.

“Put me down.”

His hand abruptly disappeared from her leg.

Rather than relief, Melanie felt nothing but disappointment. She held on for dear life as he bent to pick up her shoes.

“I will,” he said, the lazy teasing back in his voice. “Eventually.”

2

MARC TOOK IN everything and everyone in the parking lot in one glance. He hadn’t expected to spot Tom Hooker lurking in the shadows—the shooter who could even now have his gunsights set on Mel—but he hadn’t expected Hooker to escape custody the day before, either. No matter how overloaded his senses were with Mel’s nearness, he couldn’t forget that all evidence indicated Hooker was not only on a direct route to Mel, he was armed to the teeth, as well.