“Guess I’m stuck.” Her eyes never left his. “I’ll just have to hang around here for a while . . . until you see things my way.”
“Like I said, I’m not interested in whatever Dolph wants from me.” Which wasn’t the complete truth. He was more interested than ever in getting himself out of town, especially with Paul Kelly’s boys breathing down his neck. It just wasn’t enough to make him interested in getting caught in Dolph Saunders’ web. Whatever Dolph had planned, it would be dangerous and reckless, like it always was. Now that Dolph didn’t have Leena to ground him, it would probably be even more so. “I’ve never really had a taste for suicide.”
“Your act indicates otherwise,” she drawled, the handcuff still dangling from her wrist like a bracelet. “You were dying out there.”
“Funny.” He gave her a dark look.
“It’s a bit stale, don’t you think?” She stepped toward him slowly, a challenge if ever there was one. “Houdini already has the market on escape acts. You need something”—she waved her hand vaguely, letting the cuff swing loose on her wrist—“you know, to spice things up. I’d be happy to give you some pointers, if you’d like.”
If she hadn’t been so bad at seduction, he would have been more irritated about the Houdini comment. She would have been better to come at him straight, not that he’d be telling her that anytime soon.
“You’re going to give me pointers?” He wanted to laugh, but then she leaned close, and the scent of her strangled his senses and made his throat go tight.
“Don’t you remember?” she whispered in his ear. “The crowd loved us.”
“Did they?” He turned his head so their faces were barely a breath apart, and he sensed that she had to steady herself.
Interesting. She didn’t want him to touch her, but she also didn’t want him to know she was avoiding it. He could use that.
“Well, they loved me,” she said, her pink lips twitching in amusement. “They were simply tolerating you.”
He could feel the warmth radiating from her, and she smelled like sunshine. Like fresh laundry and soap. That close, her eyes looked even more like dark honey, but they also held a challenge, and he never could refuse a dare. He leaned closer still, enjoying the way she tensed as she stopped herself from backing away. Enjoying turning her game back on her.
“Tolerating me, you say?” He stopped short of touching his lips to her neck.
“Mm-hmm,” she murmured, suddenly sounding awfully breathless.
“What if what I want is you?” he asked.
“I’d say you couldn’t have me.”
“No?” And then he latched the other handcuff around her wrist.
Her eyes widened, and she backed away from him, but to his surprise, she didn’t panic or curse him for seeing through her ruse, as he’d expected. She didn’t look thrown at all, just examined her locked wrists and did the one thing he didn’t expect: She laughed. Delight sparked in those glittering eyes of hers.
“You said there’s no key?” She didn’t seem the least bit worried.
“I lost it years ago,” he told her with a shrug. He turned away from her to take his shirt from the radiator and slip his arms into its warmth, satisfied with the spot he’d managed to maneuver her into. Until he remembered the lock she’d picked at the museum.
But by the time he turned back around, her wrists were already free, and she was dangling the unlocked handcuffs from her fingertip.
YOU CAN’T CON A CON
“I’m afraid it’s going to be harder than that to get rid of me,” Esta said, enjoying the look on Harte Darrigan’s face at how quickly she’d managed to escape.
It was a pretty enough face, she supposed. He had rough, brooding good looks at odds with the refined act he put on, both of which were only improved by the smudges of kohl beneath his eyes. But she knew from her experience with Logan that charm and good looks often only went skin deep. Darrigan was too good of a performer to reveal whatever was beneath that charm of his, and she was too smart to be taken in by the charm itself—or whatever was beneath, come to think of it.
Still, she had to admit, she’d enjoyed the view when he’d taken off the robe to expose the wet shorts he was wearing. ?Who wouldn’t? They’d clung to his well-muscled thighs, which only complemented his flat stomach and broad, defined shoulders. He had an angry-looking, angular welt on his right shoulder, like a brand or a scar, which was at odds with the uptown act he put on. ?An injury from some past life, she suspected. Otherwise, his body was damn near perfect—definitely the result of a lot of hard work.
She couldn’t help but admire that, and not only because he was nice to look at. It meant he knew what it was to work at something, to master it. He knew what it meant to not only depend on magic.
It was a lesson she’d learned as a girl. When Professor Lachlan first taught her how to dip into a pocket for a fat purse, he never let her use her affinity. Only once she could lift a wallet without tipping off the mark did he show her how magic could amplify and augment her already developed skills.
Admiration or not, she wouldn’t let herself be distracted. Not by the magician’s corded arms or by his teasing smile, which was probably another mask. According to the news clipping, the Khafre Hall job wasn’t a fact anymore. She had to get Harte Darrigan on board, to make sure he was part of the team and to make sure he wasn’t the one who gave up Dolph. She didn’t have time to swoon over some boy, no matter how pretty he was.
He took the cuffs from her, frowning as he examined them.
“I didn’t break them, if that’s what you’re wondering,” she said when his brows drew together in a puzzled expression. She held up the hairpin she’d used. It was the only useful thing about the elaborate style that one of Dolph’s people had done for her earlier that day.
Esta had tried to tell them that Harte Darrigan wasn’t going to be impressed by a new outfit or hair, but they’d insisted. Seduce him, they’d said, but a con only works if the mark wants what you’re selling.
The handcuff trick did seem to impress him, though. For a moment at least.
But a second later, he shrugged indifferently and pulled his armor back into place as he hung the cuffs from the hook where she’d found them. “An easy enough trick to manage with some practice, I suppose. It’s not a secret that I keep those here.”
“Try another pair,” she challenged. “There’s not a lock that’s ever stopped me before.”
“After that trick at the museum, I don’t doubt it. But I know how to pick a lock too, sweetheart.”
“Bet you I’m faster.”
As he studied her, she could see the internal struggle. A part of him, she knew, itched to test her, to show her that he was better. But the other part eventually won out. “Like I said, I’m not interested in your games, and I’m still not interested in whatever Dolph Saunders has planned.”
“Maybe you should be.” She took another step toward him. “How long do you think this gig is going to last for you?” she asked.