Just One Look

In the distance she heard a police siren. Would she ever see the hot detective again? Or had he handed over her case to the patrol cops who had shown up later in the evening after she’d admitted the only person she knew with a .38 was her? Detective Vitalis’s suggestion that her ex could have been involved in the shooting last night was ludicrous since her former husband had always been far too concerned with appearances and what other people thought of him to lower himself to gangster tactics.

No, Manny Redding had too many other more subtle weapons to hurt her. The cheating creep.

“We’re ready now, Tabitha,” the set assistant called out, ending any time for psyching herself up for this scene.

Damn it.

Today wasn’t just a run-of-the-mill soap opera shower scene. Tabitha had been a little nervous about this gig—a prime-time movie special for a cable network—from the moment she’d learned she would be standing in for the actress playing a prostitute. Worse, the prostitute was in her late teens and Tabitha’s body was clearly that of a woman on the far side of twenty-five. She’d be thirty next year. Could she still pass off her bod as a nineteen-year-old’s?

Planting one foot in front of the other, she congratulated herself that at least she hadn’t resorted to any of the unhealthy eating tactics she’d struggled with in the past. She’d worked her tail off for the lean muscle tone she had these days. One of the best benefits of her spectacularly messy divorce was the clear head that allowed her to be healthy again. She’d silenced her ex-husband’s voice in her head telling her she wasn’t cut out to be on film. That she shouldn’t share her talents with the world when he needed her working behind the scenes for him.

And finally, that no other man should look at his wife.

The subtle possessiveness that started off as sort of endearing eventually became suffocating and for a few dark months toward the end she’d staved off the anxiety with food. The bulimia she’d struggled with as a teen resurfaced with a vengeance.

She was under control again now. Every day that she bared her body for the camera now soothed a little more of her wounded ego and healed the part of her that knew she’d stayed in a bad marriage for too long. Besides, body double work was just a means to an end to finance her return to filmmaking.

Allowing her coat to slide off her shoulders, she didn’t bother counting the number of people on the closed set the way she used to when she first started life as a body double. By now, she didn’t care how many people saw her mostly naked because she was stronger. More fearless.

And screw them if they couldn’t appreciate an almost thirty-year-old’s body forged of sweat and discipline.

Letting the bathrobe slip from her shoulders, she allowed the world to see her flesh-toned body stocking that covered only the most crucial parts. The custom-made nude thong matched her skin color exactly. The pasties she wore on her nipples weren’t half as cute as the one Janet Jackson had once famously displayed to the world, but Tabitha’s more functional brand made sure her nipples didn’t show up unexpectedly in any camera shots.

There were no costume malfunctions when Tabitha was in charge.

Tabitha walked toward the bed where the scene called for her to fake a sexual encounter with the aging former Hollywood bad boy who’d been relegated to made-for-TV movies after hitting rehab too many times. He was handsome enough, she supposed, if you liked a guy in makeup with a sock covering his privates.

But as Tabitha strode toward the bed, her mind suddenly replaced the actor with a vision of Detective Warren Vitalis lying between those sheets waiting for her, his virile male body taking up much more of the bed than her current co-star.

A wave of want halted her in her tracks and sent pleasurable shivers over her bare skin.

Ooh.

There couldn’t have been a more supremely bad time for her mind to play tricks on her or for her hibernating libido to come roaring back to life. Her cheeks flushed, not from embarrassment so much as that preorgasmic full body tingle she’d only vaguely remembered until this moment. Her nipples tightened beneath their cover-ups and she half feared the self-adhesive pasties would pop right off her suddenly excited body.

Scavenging every bit of willpower she possessed, she forced herself to see the makeup line on her co-star’s neck, to remember where she was and that she wanted to get this scene over with. The sexy detective might have her fantasizing, but she couldn’t allow wishful thinking to cloud her vision ever again.

Lust had landed her in the worst sort of marriage. She’d be damned if something so insubstantial as sexual attraction would ever steer her into the arms of any man who didn’t see beyond the surface to appreciate the woman inside.

WARREN STALKED THROUGH the old building a block behind Central Park West in search of the camera crew. In search of one woman in particular. Tabitha’s casting agent had given Warren a hell of a runaround this morning, but once he’d finally pried an address out of the guy, Warren had hightailed it to the shoot to have another crack at the closemouthed body double.

She hadn’t been totally honest with him the night before and that pissed him off. She’d admitted to owning a .38 that had been a gift from her husband while they’d been married. What she hadn’t bothered sharing was the fact that it had been reported stolen long before her divorce was finalized.

She also hadn’t bothered sharing the fact that her divorce had been acrimonious and high-profile since her ex was a powerful New York producer. Why would she want to protect a guy who—judging by the claims volleyed at her in the tabloids—had been determined to drag her name through the mud during divorce proceedings?

The questions gnawed away at him after he’d gone to the station to file an incident report and do a little homework. Tabitha’s vacant eyes when he’d first entered her apartment had eaten at his conscience, telling him she’d probably been in shock when he dove into her apartment and pointed a gun at her.

“Detective Vitalis, NYPD.” He announced himself at the door once he found the right apartment and then flashed his badge a few more times to gain access to the room where Tabitha was shooting.

Several crewmembers tried to explain the concept of “closed set” to him on his way in, but he’d always been good with people and adept at using the authority of his position to get where he needed to be. He didn’t want to stop the shoot, but he had to admit a definite interest in seeing Tabitha Everhart at work.

And when was the last time he’d felt that kind of intense interest in any woman? Occasional nights with holster groupies had never engendered the kind of heat Tabitha had with nothing beyond her presence.

Slipping silently into the huge master suite where her scene was being shot, however, he began to realize maybe he didn’t need to see this. The room was darkened but crowded with camera people and crewmembers despite the “closed” label. At the center of the silent movement on the fringes of the room, Tabitha Everhart sat on top of a smug-looking bastard in a bed of rumpled white sheets and fat pillows. The two of them were highlighted by umbrella lights and spotlights with diffusers stretched over the lamps. The perfect lighting illuminated every square inch of Tabitha’s barely covered skin.

Warren had thought for one heart-stopping instant that she was buck naked on top of the guy, but soon he’d spotted the tiny cups that hugged her nipples and the hint of flesh-toned strap around her hip that gave away she must be wearing panties.

Her deep red hair was pinned up, possibly to make sure it was kept out of the shot. The director seemed fixated on filming the actor’s hands on Tabitha’s back, judging by the monitors stationed near his camera. The shoot seemed focused on body parts instead of facial expressions. That made sense given Tabitha’s job, but it was disconcerting as hell to watch lovemaking broken down into a step-by-step pantomime that seemed cold and calculated, stilted and awkward.

Once the fascination with the strange process wore off, Warren could focus on details besides the fact that Tabitha was mostly naked. He studied her expression and found her miles away from her job as if she consciously disconnected from the work. It bothered him to realize he liked that idea because her co-star looked totally into the moment, the guy’s superior “I’m the stud of the free world” expression really getting on Warren’s nerves.

But Tabitha was clearly distracted, her body moving automatically when the director called for her to slide her hand up her own thigh or—worse—slide her hand up the actor’s thigh.

How had she learned to disassociate herself from those touches, the practiced intimacy of the camera shots? Was it simply the mark of a professional body double to perform her duties with such clear distance? Or had Tabitha Everhart learned to remove herself from her work for personal reasons? Maybe she was unhappy with the job. Bored. Did she take it for granted that she was a beautiful woman whose curves were so perfect that other women clamored for her to stand in their place?

The thought bugged him almost as much as the fact that she’d lied to him through omission the night before. After growing up in a violent household based on keeping up appearances, Warren didn’t appreciate people who hid dangerous secrets. It wouldn’t matter how many thieves, dealers or murderers Warren kept off the streets through his job. He’d never bring his father back. He’d never fix the fact that he’d kept his family’s secrets until all their lives imploded.

“That’s a good take,” the director shouted, interrupting the dark directions of Warren’s thoughts. “Let’s get Maureen back in here,” the director continued, releasing Tabitha from her close clinch with the actor who held her a second too long after the shot was finished.

Was there something going on between her and the actor? Warren realized he didn’t like that idea at all. Not that he had any designs on the hot divorcée, especially if a deceptive personality went along with those killer curves.

But Warren recognized her cohort actor as a former big-league star who’d been a notorious womanizer and drug user.

The guy smiled wolfishly at Tabitha’s back view as she walked away from the set toward the door to the makeup room behind where Warren stood. She didn’t see him for a moment, her eyes blinking against the change in light, and Warren did all he could to keep his jaw off the ground at the sight of her. Heat rushed south along with his blood and his sense.

She had the kind of body men went stupid over. Lush, high breasts that swayed just enough when she walked to advertise the wares were 100 percent authentic gifts from God and not a surgeon. He’d only just begun to take the scenic journey to her hips when an assistant hurried over to give her a long white bathrobe to wrap herself in. A good thing since it was time for Warren to go to work.

He cleared his throat and breathed in a steadying gulp of air. Too bad her scent filtered through, seducing his senses with the knowledge of how she smelled.

Clean. Like soap rather than fragrance. The intimate realization made him want to know what her hair smelled like, too. Hell.

“Tabitha, may I speak to you a moment if you’re done with your day?”

He already knew she was finished since one of the assistants had told him the bed scene was her only responsibility to the production today. But after she’d given him half answers the night before, he was curious to see how far she would go to avoid speaking to him again.

“Detective.” Her hand flew to the collar of her robe, where she clutched the neckline just long enough to be sure it was closed. An odd response from a woman who’d just walked around a bedroom mostly naked in front of at least ten other people. Did he make her uncomfortable? Or was she as aware of the heat between them as him?

“Do you have a minute?” he pressed, struggling to keep his thoughts on the investigation. He was ready for some answers about her gun, the shot through her window and a marriage that had gone down in flames in a very public fashion.

“Of course.” She tugged at the clip in her hair and brought the whole red mass falling down around her shoulders in unruly disarray. “Just give me a minute to change and I’ll meet you by the front door.”

Nodding, Warren headed to the living area of the spacious apartment that someone had given over to the day’s shoot. He settled in on a sofa to wait for Tabitha and tried not to imagine her peeling off those tiny pasties in a room down the hall.

WHEN SHE CAUGHT HERSELF swiping a brush through her hair for at least the fiftieth time, Tabitha realized she couldn’t stall any longer on the inevitable talk with Detective Vitalis.

She’d changed into a long khaki skirt and a yellow tank with a sweater over it, but she couldn’t quite shake the feeling of nakedness around him since he’d first seen her in a skimpy nightgown and now he’d watched her work, for heaven knew how long, in little more than a thong. Surely if she made it through today’s interview with her head held high she could call her old insecurities dead and gone.

And there was a chance she could have done it if only she had a few more layers of clothes. A burka maybe. Or a poncho at the very least. Her attraction to the man made her feel far more naked and aware of herself than her body double gig.