Parker And The Gypsy

“Yeah, tragic.” She was the one ready for a straitjacket and yet she had the nerve to stand there looking as though she felt sorry for him.

Stepping around her, he swung open the door. “Sorry I can’t be of service, but I’m sure you and Miss Patrick will manage just swell without me. Maybe you can locate the guy in your crystal ball.”

“I don’t have a crystal ball,” Sara said reproachfully. “If I had that much psychic power, I wouldn’t need you to help Mamie.”

“If she’s a ghost, why doesn’t Miss Mamie just fly off and find the kid herself?”

“She’s restricted to the old Pine Top Inn, the last place she lived before she died. Manifestations usually cannot go wherever they want to.”

“Ghosts have rules?”

“Everyone has rules, Mr. Parker.”

“And one of mine happens to be I don’t take on any client where I have to hold a seance to present my bill. So if you don’t mind—” Mike indicated the door with a sweeping gesture, but Sara ignored him, fishing inside her purse instead.

“If you’re worried about being paid, you needn’t be,” she said. “I can write you a check right now.”

Mike pressed one hand to his brow. This woman just wasn’t getting the message. As she started to drag out her checkbook, he covered her hand to stop her.

“Look, honey, save your dough. I have a feeling you’re going to need it. Good psychiatric care is expensive these days.”

She flinched as though he’d struck her “I was hoping that you would be much more open-minded, Mr. Parker.”

“Whatever gave you an idea like that?”

“It was your picture in the paper. Your face...it seemed so wise and accepting. And kind.”

“That was my dazed look. A flashbulb had just gone off in my eyes.”

“But I was so certain you were the one to help,” Sara murmured almost to herself. “I could sense it, and when I trust my instincts, I’m almost never wrong.”

Pressing her lips in a stubborn line, she gazed up at Mike again. “Would you mind letting me feel your aura?”

“Feel my what?” Mike’s pulses rioted with the possibilities. But it was only his hand she reached for. She turned it palm upward.

He tugged free of her grasp, but she begged, “Please. Just let me run this one little test. Then I promise I’ll go away and leave you alone.”

Mike opened his mouth to argue, then closed it again as she looked up at him, pleading. Why was he always such a sucker for big blue eyes?

Grimacing, he held out his hand. “This test isn’t going to involve voodoo pins or anything like that?”

“Of course not.” She cupped his hand in her own smaller fragile one. “Now close your eyes.”

“What for?” he asked suspiciously.

“I’m not going to hurt you. Trust me.”

It had been a damned long time since Mike had trusted anyone, but he gave a long-suffering sigh and shut his eyes. She ran her fingertips lightly across his open palm.

“Just relax, Mr. Parker.”

Mike sucked in his breath. That wasn’t what was going to happen if she kept stroking him in that slow, sensual fashion. When her soft fingers danced across his wrist, his pulse gave an erratic leap. He was starting to really enjoy this when, to his disappointment, she stopped.

“Now I’m going to close my eyes and lower my hand toward yours. If we do this right, as I get closer, you should feel a surge of power between us.”

“This is stupid,” Mike grumbled. He wished she’d go back to the caressing part again. He felt like a total idiot standing here with his hand held out like a bellboy hoping for a tip.

“Please, Mr. Parker. Concentrate and keep your eyes closed.”

Mike tried to, but he’d always had the same problem not peeking whenever he played hide-and-seek as a kid. He cracked one eye open and realized that whatever else Sara might be, she wasn’t a con artist. She really believed in all this mumbo jumbo.

Her smooth brow was furrowed in earnest concentration. Her purse balanced in her left hand, her right one hovered barely an inch above his own. There was something strangely arousing about standing so close to her, just short of touching. He had only to reach out to bury his fingers in her ripples of silky gold hair, trace the line of that fairy chain along the smooth white column of her throat.

With her eyes closed, a delicate flush coloring her cheeks, she almost appeared as though she were in some sort of trance, like that sleeping princess in those sappy stories his one foster mom had insisted upon reading to him. If Sleeping Beauty had looked anything like Sara, no wonder that dopey prince had risked burning his a—fighting dragons to get to her bedroom.

“Are you experiencing anything yet, Mr. Parker?” she asked.

“Not a blessed thing,” Mike denied, but he was disturbed to notice his hand begin to tremble. A tingling sensation started in his fingertips, quickly spreading along his arm, through the rest of his body to become the most intoxicating rush of desire he’d ever known.

Sara’s eyes fluttered open to stare straight into his. She frowned. “You haven’t really been trying. Didn’t you feel any impulse at all?”

Mike shook his head. Oh, he was having plenty of impulses all right, but none, he feared, that Sara would approve of.

“Let’s try it again,” he murmured. “Close your eyes.”

She looked a little wary, but obeyed. She stood before him, her lips half-parted in unconscious invitation. This was too easy, Mike thought with a groan. He should be ashamed of himself. He should resist the temptation, but he didn’t seem able to help himself.

Bending forward, he covered her mouth with his own. He felt Sara stiffen with surprise, but then he was a little surprised himself. He’d never kissed any woman this gently before. At least, it started out that way.

But when Sara didn’t resist, he folded her in his arms, deepening the embrace. She tasted and felt just like she smelled—all softness, innocence and seduction. He kissed her with increasing hunger, passion and heat rushing through him, warming places inside him that he had not even realized had gone cold.

Two

Sara clung to Mike’s shoulders, his mouth wreaking havoc with her senses, even her sixth one. Since she’d set foot in the door, this interview had gone nothing like she’d anticipated. Not only had Mike Parker turned out to be more rough-edged than she’d expected, he was now kissing her in a way to make her curls stand on end.

Any protest she should have voiced was swept away beneath the hot mastery of Mike’s lips on hers. Her purse dropped from her nerveless fingers, hitting the carpet with a soft thud. She melted closer, her head reeling. Her mind felt like she was floating, her body like it was on fire.

It was only when his tongue breached her lips, exploring her mouth with even greater intimacy, that alarm set in. Struggling to be free, she insinuated her hands between them, breaking off the heated contact of their mouths.

His breathing ragged, Mike blinked at her. For a moment, he looked as dazed as she felt. She had never experienced a kiss like that in her whole life. It would have been rather wonderful... if only he had really meant it.

But Mike was already making a rapid recovery. The tender set of his mouth hardened into the familiar sarcastic smirk.

“Sorry,” he said. “I guess my psychic—um—gizmo got a little out of control.”

Sara felt her cheeks heat, but this time with humiliation. Mike’s arms were still wrapped loosely about her waist. Bracing both hands against his chest, she squirmed away from him.

“You don’t have to believe in the same things I do, Mr. Parker,” she said. “But you don’t have to make fun of me, either.”