Baptism In Fire

Now a whole new set of questions flooded her mind. Had he known she would be coming back? Had A.J. lied to her and orchestrated this to get his two friends to reconcile? No. A.J. wouldn’t do that. It just wasn’t like him.

Rachel stared at Luke. Words deserted her. Probably because they’d said all they had to say to each other over the deposition table in her divorce lawyer’s office. But that didn’t mean that his presence didn’t spark her pulse to racing. If she hadn’t reacted to him at all, she hoped someone had ordered her casket, because surely she’d died. Once he entered a room, Luke was not the kind of man any healthy woman ignored, not even one who had dismissed him from her life months ago.

“Hello, Rachel.” His voice was deep, rich and had the effect of silk shimmering over her skin.

He seemed to fill the windowless room. Rachel took a deep breath, hoping to dispel the sudden smothering sensation his presence produced, despite the laboring hum of the AC. “Luke.”

He looked past her at Tony. “I’ll take Mrs. Sutherland in, Sergeant.” Without waiting for a reply, he took Rachel’s elbow, but she shrugged him off.

“Lansing. Ms. Lansing.” She stared straight ahead, then, when he made no reply, glanced sideways to see if he’d heard her.

One dark eyebrow was raised, but Luke neither looked at her nor said anything. He just led her down the long hall. They stopped in front of a door with a frosted-glass panel embossed with gold letters outlined in black that proclaimed this to be the office of Captain Austin J. Branson, Chief of Detectives.

Luke swung the door wide, and Rachel, careful not to touch him, stepped past him and into the office of the man who had been their closest friend and the best man at their wedding. “A.J.’s at a meeting. He’ll be back shortly.”

The room thickened with an uncomfortable silence. Her back to him, she felt him move to the side of the room. It surprised Rachel that she could still sense Luke’s every movement without looking at him. But, then again, the man did have a presence that permeated all corners of any room.

“What’re you doing here, Rachel?”

His question stunned her. She jerked around to look at him. “A.J. didn’t tell you I was coming?”

He shook his head. A lock of dark hair slid over his forehead. With a huff of impatience, he pushed it back. “No.”

Luke had propped his thigh on the corner of the desk. The bunched muscles beneath the denim fabric brought images to mind of watching him during his daily workout, when sweat coated his tanned body and…

She pushed the thoughts away with both hands.

His dark gaze traveled slowly from her chestnut hair to her gray suit, then downward to her tanned legs, remaining there for a tantalizing moment before moving back to her face. Insanely, she wished she’d worn panty hose.

“You’re looking good, Rachel. Georgia agrees with you.”

Fighting off the magnetic pull of his gaze, she dropped her briefcase to the floor, then slipped into the chair in front of the desk and pulled her skirt over her knees, effectively cutting short his appraisal.

He smiled knowingly. “You always did have legs that magnetized a man’s senses.”

She gripped her hands together in her lap to cover their shaking. In an attempt to feed her suddenly starving lungs, she took a deep breath. What the hell was wrong with her? She was over him, over his charismatic ways, over falling victim to his pretty words. Nerves. It had to be nerves. After all, it wasn’t every day she embarked on a case that could lead her to the bastard who took Maggie.

Unwilling to prolong this conversation, she glared at him. “I didn’t come all this way to discuss my legs. You can leave. I don’t need you to babysit me. I’ll be fine until A.J. comes back.”

“I’ll wait,” he said and settled his back against the file cabinet beside the desk.

“Suit yourself,” she said, then picked up her briefcase and opened it. She glanced at Luke, then quickly averted her gaze to a handful of papers she’d extracted from the open case and attempted to read them. The words swam across the bright white paper. If he would just leave or, at the very least, stop staring at her.

Luke drank in the sight of his former wife. It had been so long. Why was she here? A.J. hadn’t mentioned that he’d been expecting her. Had she somehow heard about the arson case they’d been working on and come to offer her help?

If she had, she had a big surprise coming her way. As head of the task force investigating the arsons, he would never agree to having her join the team and, knowing what kind of emotional strain it would put on her, A.J. would never take her up on it. Both he and A.J. knew that Rachel was one of the best arson profilers in the business, but there were too many emotional ties connected to this case, ties she didn’t need tearing her apart. So, back to his original question. Why was she here?

She pushed her hair from her face and the light reflected off something at the open neck of her blouse. He waited for a better look, and when she straightened for a second, he saw it. The Oriental necklace he’d given her the week before Maggie was—

He broke the thought off abruptly before it had time to fully form. The last thing he needed right now was to be distracted by the guilt that seemed to ride his back and eat at his belly daily.

The gold necklace winked at him. Given that Rachel had done all she could to cut him out of her life—not that he blamed her—that she was still wearing it shocked him.

His gaze strayed from the necklace to the creamy white skin of her throat, then up to her face. God, she was beautiful. Could have been a model. But she chose to dig through the charred ruins of buildings and the sick minds that started the fires.

Luke drew in a deep breath to steady his libido. A.J.’s office normally smelled of the occasional cigars he indulged in and various other stale odors, but since she’d walked in, he was aware only of the intoxicating scent of her perfume—a scent she had specially made for her, an odd combination of spices and honeysuckle. Seductive and earthy at once, and all Rachel. Despite his efforts, his groin tightened. His pulse quickened. His throat went dry.

How had he ever found the strength to walk away from Rachel? You found it because she didn’t need your guilt hanging around her neck like a dead albatross. She had her own problems to contend with, and her strength could only support one set of battered emotions. That she had made a new life for herself proved that. Didn’t it?

Before he could think about an answer, the door opened and A.J. stepped into the room. His assessing gaze flicked from Luke to Rachel.

Rachel smiled, understandably happy to see her old friend after so long. Older than them by five years, A.J. had Nordic blue eyes and blond good looks that turned the heads of some women, but Rachel had always said she preferred Luke’s dark hair and eyes. Still, when she offered his boss the smile Luke craved for himself, he felt the faint stirring of the green-eyed monster. What he wouldn’t have given to get that kind of greeting.

She stood and opened her arms. “Hi, A.J.”

“Rachel.” He engulfed her in a tight embrace, plastering her slight body against his physically fit, six-foot-plus frame. “It’s so good to see you. How have you been? It’s been way too long.”

Gasping for air, she pushed at his broad chest. “I was fine until you did surgery on my rib cage with your belt buckle.”

“Sorry.” He laughed, then released her immediately. “So, what brings you here?”

Mouth agape, she frowned, then stared first at A.J., then at Luke. “I—”

Luke read the look of puzzlement on Rachel’s face. Suddenly, the reason for her presence struck him square in the gut. “Son of a—” Luke rolled to his feet. “Can the act, A.J. I may not be the brightest bulb in the chandelier, but I’m not stupid. You asked her to come, didn’t you?”

A.J. shrugged and looked for all the world like a child who had gotten caught drawing on the living-room wall. “Okay, I called her and asked her to consult on the serial arsonist we’ve been tracking. She said she’d think about it, so I wasn’t sure if she was coming or not. Until she made up her mind, I figured I’d keep my mouth shut for a change. I was afraid if I told you, you’d raise hell.”

“You got that right.” Luke glared at A.J. While his nerves screwed up into tight knots, something akin to panic began forming a ball inside him. He took a step toward his boss. “What the hell were you thinking?”

“Now, wait just a minute, Luke. I’m a big girl and I had the option of saying no.” Rachel looked him in the eye, her face grim, her lips set in a tight line. “Luke, I need to do this.”

Luke looked from her to A.J., well aware of A.J.’s ability to talk the leaves off a tree, if the need arose. “Like I’m supposed to believe he didn’t pressure you into this.” Luke stared at her, his jaw clenched so tight his teeth ached. “You need to get out of here and go back to Atlanta,” he growled, his gaze locked with Rachel’s.

His attitude puzzled Rachel. He knew she was a damn good profiler. Why this sudden need to send her packing? It certainly couldn’t be because he had any concerns about her personally. The day he’d packed his clothes and walked out of their apartment, he’d given up any right to a say in her life.

“I’m here, and it’s a done deal.” She snapped her briefcase closed with a decisive click, then turned to A.J. “Can we get started?”

A.J. sighed, his tense expression melting into one of relief. “How long before you have to get back to Atlanta?”

Ignoring Luke’s reproachful scrutiny and his presence in the small office as best she could, she said, “I have two weeks of vacation time, so we’d better get to it.” Rachel took a pad from her briefcase and clipped a pencil from A.J.’s desk. “Tell me about the fires.”

Transforming from concerned friend to hard-nosed cop, A.J. glanced at Luke, then took his place behind the desk. He motioned for Luke to sit in the chair beside Rachel. When he didn’t, she glanced around.

“I’ll stand, thanks.” Luke leaned against the gray file cabinet, which, when she turned to face A.J., would put him just out of her range of vision. His arms were crossed, his flinty gaze silently castigating A.J.

Did his hardened expression mean that he was pissed because A.J. had brought in outside help? Or was it because the outside help was Rachel?

It didn’t matter. Either way, she was here and, like it or not, he’d have to learn to live with it.