Julie James - A Lot Like Love

She saw him glance at his rearview mirror, spotting her behind him. A few seconds later, her cell phone rang. When she answered, his whisky-rich voice came through the car’s speakers.

“So I’ve been thinking about your question. My character has decided he doesn’t want to see other people.”

“What made you change your mind? Let me guess – the Maserati.”

He chuckled. “Our cover story is that my character has been smitten from the moment he met you. He’s not about to let another man get anywhere near you.”

“Your character sounds a little possessive. Is this something my character should be worried about?”

They came to a stop at the light that would take them onto the Drive. Nick’s voice was low, even smoother than the car’s engine. “I think your character secretly likes it. You’ve been dating boring, uptight guys for too long. You’ve been looking for something different.”

Jordan looked sharply at the SUV in front of her. “I think your character presumes too much.”

His eyes caught hers in the rearview mirror. “Does he?”

The light turned green, and they drove off in opposite directions. As Jordan headed north, away from downtown and with Nick’s car safely out of sight, she decided it was time to change the subject. “What do you want to know about the layout of Xander’s office?”

“As much as you can tell me.”

As she sped along the Drive with the gray expanse of Lake Michigan on her right, Jordan filled him in on as much as she remembered. She finished the call with Nick just as she pulled into her garage. She hung up and sat in her car for a moment, thinking about his comment.

You’ve been looking for something different.

Presumptuous words. Very presumptuous. But she couldn’t help but wonder if there was any truth to them. Pushing the thought from her mind, she opened the car door and hurried into her house. There was one thing, at least, she knew without a doubt.

It was far too cold to be sitting outside thinking about Nick McCall.

THIRTY MINUTES LATER, suit in hand, Nick walked along Michigan Avenue toward the parking garage where he’d left his car. He made a phone call.

It was a truth universally acknowledged that FBI agents in possession of great skill and talent, even those who frequently engaged in the practice of trash-talking, understood that there were times when all bullshit needed to be set aside in order to get a job done.

This was one of those times.

After two rings, another agent answered Nick’s call.

“Pallas.”

“It’s McCall. I’ve got a problem.”

“The Eckhart op?”

“You got it. Huxley’s out with the flu.”

“What do you need?”

“Backup in the van.”

“I’m on it.”

“Meet me at the office in ten minutes.”

“Yep.”

Nick hung up the phone, mentally running through his checklist. Ridiculously overpriced Ralph Lauren suit? Sixteen hundred dollars, all of which had better be reimbursed by the Bureau. Backup man? Technically free, although he’d be hearing about this from Pallas for a long time. Nabbing the moneyman of the city’s most notorious gangster while infiltrating an exclusive wine tasting?

Priceless.

AFTER A TEN-MINUTE pit stop at home to change her clothes and throw on some makeup, Jordan hurried out the door and walked the three blocks to DeVine Cellars. The streets were relatively quiet since most stores and businesses hadn’t opened yet. Her cell phone buzzed loudly in her purse. She saw that it was Christian and answered.

“You couldn’t at least send me a metrosexual to work with?” he asked.

She grinned at that. “How did the shopping go with Nick?”

“We survived. That’s about all I can say. You should’ve seen his expression when he saw the colors of the ties I’d pulled to go with the suit. He told me that where he comes from, men don’t do boysenberry. I shudder to think such a place exists.”

“Boysenberry? You are lucky you survived. Thanks, Christian. I appreciate your help.” Jordan made a mental note to send him a bottle of wine from the store.

“Feel free to send me all the suit-buying customers you want. And I think you’ll be pleased with the results.” His tone turned sly. “Happy Valentine’s Day, Jordan. I have a feeling it’s going to be a good one for you.”

Right, she thought as she hung up the phone. Because Nick was her date. And of course any woman spending Valentine’s Day with a date who looked like Nick was guaranteed a night of endless great sex.

Hot, scruffy-jawed, throw-me-down-on-the-table, mindblowing sex.

Probably with dirty words.

Perhaps not a horrible way to spend Valentine’s Day, she conceded. But it wasn’t in the cards for her.

Jordan let herself into the store and hung her coat in the back room. She changed out of her snow boots and turned on the lights and music. She loved opening the store – that time of day more than any other was when it truly felt like hers.

Mornings were typically slow until about eleven, so she had a good hour to put out the shelf talkers and signs for the closeout sale, do inventory, and clean up. She doubted, however, that much cleaning would be necessary. Martin had closed the night before, and he tended to be as much a neat freak as he was a wine snob. Not an unwelcome quality in an assistant manager.

She checked the sales receipts from the night before and saw that they’d had a good night. In addition to regular sales, they’d added four new customers to their wine club.

The wine club was something she’d started two years ago. As often as customers asked for her and Martin’s recommendations, it had seemed to be a worthwhile endeavor. Each month, she and Martin selected two wines with a combined value ranging from one hundred to one hundred and fifty dollars. She’d hesitated at first at the price, and had asked Martin whether they should consider offering more budgetfriendly wines. She’d worried that at those prices, people wouldn’t be willing to sign up for memberships.

“If I pick it, they will come,” Martin had whispered dramatically.

She’d given him six months to prove he was right.

He had been.

With nearly eight hundred members, the wine club was a huge success. They sometimes took a gamble with the wines they chose – excellent in quality, but often from boutique, lesser-known wine makers. And Martin, a traditionalist, always insisted on choosing one Old World wine, despite the fact that research indicated consumers preferred New World wines because of their user-friendly labels. Yet no one in the wine club had complained thus far.

“They love you. Seriously, when are you going to open your own store and run me out of business?” she’d teased Martin one day.

“It’s not me. It’s you,” he replied matter-of-factly.

“Hardly – you deserve the credit. If it had been up to me, this wine club would’ve been ninety percent California cabs. Ten-dollar New Zealand sauv blancs in the summer.”

“And you still would’ve had eight hundred members,” Martin said. “Let’s be honest, Jordan. Rich people like what other rich people like. They buy the wines I pick because you tell them to.”

She had immediately opened her mouth to object – the conversation was sounding far too The Emperor’s New Clothes for her tastes – but part of her suspected that Martin wasn’t entirely off the mark. Market share-wise, she knew a vastly greater proportion of wealthy Chicago wine buyers frequented her store. She may have been financially independent, but her father’s money was there nevertheless, and with that came a certain level of fascination from others.

“You’re sort of like the Paris Hilton of wine,” Martin had offered.

She’d nearly keeled over in horror.

“If you promise to never, ever make that analogy again, I’ll let you pick two Old World wines for next month,” Jordan had said.

Martin had rubbed his hands together eagerly. “Can I make one of them a Brunello di Montalcino?”

“You always say the quality of the Brunellos is erratic.”

“And for a lesser man, that might pose a problem,” Martin had said. “I’m telling you, Jordan, with your name and my impeccable taste, I think we can really go places with this store.”

So far, he hadn’t been wrong.

NICK PARKED HIS car a half block from Jordan’s house and walked the short distance in the cold. He opened a tall wrought-iron gate and stepped onto a front patio and garden area.

He had assumed her home would be nice – very nice – and hadn’t been incorrect. The brick house stood two and a half stories above the ground, with elegant Juliet balconies curved around the arched glass windows of the main level. A large brick and limestone balcony, part of what he guessed was the master suite, looked over the front patio from the second floor.

As he climbed the stairs to the front door, he caught himself wondering if Jordan’s father had bought the house, or if she made enough money to afford it on her own. Not that it was any of his business, he was just … curious.

He rang the doorbell and could hear its melodic chime through the door. When a minute or two passed without an answer, he reached up to ring the bell again.

The door flew open.

“Sorry,” Jordan said breathlessly. “Zipper problems.”

Nick tried not to show any reaction as he just … stared. From where he stood, he saw no problems whatsoever.

The deep purple fabric of her dress hugged all the curves of her slender frame. She wore her hair up, and a few errant blond chunks swept across her smoky-lined, ocean-colored eyes – eyes that sparkled even more radiantly than the diamonds in her ears.

She braced one arm against the door frame. “That’s the longest you’ve gone without talking since we met, Brooklyn. I take it you like the dress.”

Busted.

Nick regrouped. “Don’t get too cocky. I was just trying to figure out where we’re going to stash a microphone in that thing.”

Jordan stepped aside as he entered her house and shut the door behind him.

Nick’s eyes nearly fell out of their sockets.

My God, the back of her dress … it dipped invitingly low, practically begging him to stare at her ass.

“What’s this about me wearing a microphone?” she asked.

He blinked cluelessly. “Excuse me?”

“You said I’m wearing a microphone?” she prompted him.

Right. The microphone. Undercover op. “It’s just a precautionary measure. I want to be able to hear you and Eckhart talking while I’m downstairs in his office.” Nick reached inside the pocket of his suit jacket and pulled out a wireless, quarter-inch-sized microphone. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

Jordan examined it curiously. “I can’t believe how small it is.”

“It picks up voices from fifty feet away, even through clothing. All you need to do is tuck it inside your bra.” His eyes went to the V of her neckline. “Assuming you’re wearing a bra with that dress.”

“Nope. Just Band-Aids over my nipples.”

Six years working undercover for the FBI, another five years on NYPD vice, but damn if Nick had a clue how to handle that predicament.

Jordan grinned. “I’m kidding.” She twirled her finger. “Turn around.”

He complied. Don’t think about her nipples. Don’t think about her nipples.

He was thinking about her nipples.

“Are you done yet?” he asked brusquely. Perhaps things would go faster if he lent her some assistance …

“I think I’ve got it,” Jordan said from behind him.

Nick turned around and watched as she adjusted her neckline, making sure her bra was hidden once again.

She straightened up and faced him. “What do you think? Good?”

His eyes roved over her. Good was putting it mildly. But instead of answering, he gestured to the door. He’d seen the car waiting for them out front, and it was time to go. “Ready for this?”

Jordan took a deep breath. “No. But I’ll do it anyway.”

BECAUSE OF ALL the wine they’d be offered at Xander’s party, Jordan had rented a Town Car for the evening. It was what she did every year, and Nick had emphasized that it was important for her to stick to her routine as much as possible.