Eclipse Bay

his left wrist was bound to the red wrought-iron bed frame. He studied the familiar-looking padded handcuff Hannah had used to chain him with great interest.
    “Where’d you get the cuffs?” he asked.
    “I bought them from Virgil.” She held up the second cuff. “An anniversary present.”
    “Oh, my.” Rafe smiled slowly. “Don’t know if I can handle so much excitement.”
    “Something tells me you’re up to the challenge.”
    “I’ll do my best.” He reached out for her with his free hand and pulled her down across his chest. “I love you, Hannah.”
    “I love you, too.”
    He speared his fingers through her hair. “Should have married you eight years ago.”
    “Maybe. Maybe not. I think we both needed time to decide what we wanted out of life.”
    “You could be right.” He thought about that for a few seconds. “I told you that night that it would be a long walk home.”
    “Yes, you did.” She brushed her lips across his. “But we both got here safely. That’s all that matters.”

Turn the page for an excerpt from

    SOFT FOCUS

    by Jayne Ann Krentz

    Now available in hardcover from G. P. Putnam’s Sons

Six months earlier…
    HE SAW HER COMING TOWARD HIM, AN AVENGING warrior princess in a crisp black business suit and high heels. Her dark hair was swept up into a stern knot at the back of her head. The little scarf at her throat matched the diamond-bright fire in her blue-green eyes. One look at her and the white-jacketed waiters leaped out of her path. She strode through the maze of linen-and-crystal-set tables, her gaze never wavering from her target.
    The movers and shakers of Seattle’s business community sensed disaster, or, at the very least, excellent gossip, in the making. A hush fell across the club’s formal dining room.
    Seated in the leather-cushioned booth, Jack watched her approach.
    “Oh, shit.” He spoke very, very softly. It was obviously too late to pray.
    One look at the fury that etched Elizabeth Cabot’s intelligent face told him that he had lost his gamble. She knew everything this morning. What had happened between them last night clearly made no difference to her now.
    A heavy cloud of stoicism settled on him. He waited for her with the patience of a man who knows he is facing an inescapable fate.
    She was almost upon him now, and he knew that he was doomed. It was not his whole life that flashed before his eyes in those final moments, however. It was the memory of last night. He recalled the sweet, hot anticipation and the hungry rush of desire that had flashed between them. Unfortunately, that was all they had shared. The concentrated excitement had taken him by surprise, probably because he had worked so hard to contain it for the past month. In the end it had swept away his self-control and the lessons of experience that any man his age was expected to know. He was well aware of his mistakes. Elizabeth did not believe in faking her orgasms.
    She had been very nice about it last night. Polite as hell. As if her failure to climax was her fault and hers alone. Actually, she had seemed quite unsurprised, as far as he could tell. It was as if she had not expected anything more from the encounter and had, therefore, not been disappointed. He had apologized and vowed to make amends just as soon as physically possible. But she had explained that she had to go home. Something about an early-morning meeting for which she had to prepare.
    Reluctantly, he had driven her back to the gothic monstrosity she called home on Queen Anne Hill. When he had kissed her goodnight at the door of the mansion he had assured himself that he would get a second chance. Next time he would get it right.
    But now he knew there wasn’t going to be a next time.
    Elizabeth arrived at the booth, vibrating with a degree of passion that had been noticeably missing in the final scenes last night.
    “You conniving, two-faced, egg-sucking son of a bitch,” she said between her teeth. “What made you think you’d get away with it, Jack Fairfax?”
    “Don’t be shy, Elizabeth. Tell me what you really think of rne.”
    “Did you actually believe that I wouldn’t find out who you are? Did you think that you could treat me like a mushroom? Keep me in the dark and feed me manure?”
    There was no hope of defending himself. He could see that. But he had to try. “I never lied to you.”
    “The hell you didn’t. You never told me the truth. Not once during the past month did you give me any