Mind Over Matter

the rest off.”
    “That’s right.” She picked up her cold coffee and downed it. “After today, I guess that goes to hell.”
    “I told Sam I’d discussed what had happened in that room with you, that we’d talked about the murder and coming up there had upset you.” He rose to fetch the pot and freshen her coffee. “The crew may mumble about overimaginative women, but that’s all.”
    She shut her eyes. She hadn’t expected sensitivity from him, much less understanding. “Thanks.”
    “It’s your secret if you feel it’s necessary to keep it, A.J.”
    “It’s very necessary. How did you feel when you realized?” she demanded. “Uncomfortable? Uneasy? Even now, you’re tiptoeing around me.”
    “Maybe I am.” He started to pull out a cigarette, then shoved it back into the pack. “Yeah, it makes me uneasy. It’s not something I’ve ever had to deal with before. A man has to wonder if he’ll have any secrets from a woman who can look inside him.”
    “Of course.” She rose, back straight. “And a man’s entitled to protect himself. I appreciate what you’ve done, David. I’m sure my clothes are dry now. I’ll change if you’ll call me a cab.”
    “No.” He was up and blocking her way before she could walk out of the kitchen.
    “Don’t make this any more difficult for me, or for yourself.”
    “Damned if I want to,” he muttered, and found he’d already reached for her. “I can’t seem to help it. You make me uneasy,” he repeated. “You’ve made me uneasy all along. I still want you, Aurora. That’s all that seems to matter at the moment.”
    “You’ll think differently later.”
    He drew her closer. “Reading my mind?”
    “Don’t joke.”
    “Maybe it’s time someone did. If you want to look into my head now, you’ll see that all I can think about is taking you upstairs, to my bed.”
    Her heart began to beat, in her chest, in her throat. “And tomorrow?”
    “The hell with tomorrow.” He brought his lips down to hers with a violence that left her shaken. “The hell with everything but the fact that you and I have a need for each other. You’re not going home tonight, Aurora.”
    She let herself go, let herself risk. “No, I’m not.”

7
    T here was moonlight, streaks of it, glimmering. She could smell the hyacinths, light and sweet, through the open windows. The murmur of a stream winding its way through the woods beside the house was quiet, soothing. Every muscle in A.J.’s body tensed as she stepped into David’s bedroom.
    The painting hung on the wall as she had known it would, vivid, sensual streaks on a white canvas. The first shudder rolled through her as she turned her head and saw her own vague reflection, not in a mirror, but in a tall glass door.
    “I dreamed this.” The words were barely audible as she took a step back. But was she stepping back into the dream or into reality? Were they somehow both the same? Panicked, she stood where she was. Didn’t she have a choice? she asked herself. Was she just following a pattern already set, a pattern that had begun the moment David Brady had walked into her office?
    “This isn’t what I want,” she whispered, and turned—for escape, for freedom—in denial, she couldn’t have said. But he was there, blocking her way, drawing her closer, drawing her in just as she’d known he would be.
    She looked up at him as she knew she had done before. His face was in shadows, as indistinct as hers had been in the glass.But his eyes were clear, highlighted by moonlight. His words were clear, highlighted by desire.
    “You can’t keep running, Aurora, not from yourself, not from me.”
    There was impatience in his voice, impatience that became all the sharper when his mouth closed over hers. He wanted, more desperately than he had allowed himself to believe. He needed, more intensely than he could afford to admit. Her uncertainty, her hesitation, aroused some deep, primitive part of him. Demand, take, possess. The thoughts twined together into one throbbing pulsebeat of desire. He didn’t feel the pleasant anticipation he had with other women, but a rage, burning, almost violent. As he tasted the first hint of surrender, he nearly went mad with it.
    His mouth was so hungry, his hands were so strong. The pressure of his body against hers was insistent. He held her as though she were his to take with or without consent. Yet she knew, had always known, the choice was ultimately hers. She could give or