"Angela, one of the reasons I imagine you're offering me this job is because I'm a good detail person. Because I'm thorough and obsessively organized. I wouldn't be any of those things if I didn't take the time to sort this out."

With a nod, Angela took out another cigarette. "You're right. I shouldn't be pushing, but I want you with me on this. How much time do you need?"

"A couple of days. Can I let you know by the end of the week?"

"All right." She flicked on her lighter and studied the flame briefly. "I'll just say one more thing. You don't belong behind a desk on some local noon show reading the news. You were made for bigger things, Deanna. I saw it in you right from the beginning."

"I hope you're right." Deanna let out a long breath. "I really do."


The little gallery off Michigan Avenue was crammed with people. Hardly larger than the average suburban garage, the showroom was brightly lit to suit the bold, splashy paintings arranged nearly frame to frame along the walls. The moment Deanna stepped inside, she was glad she'd followed the impulse to stop in. Not only did it take her mind off Angela's stunning offer that afternoon, but it allowed her to follow up firsthand on her own interview.

The air was ripe with sounds and scents. Cheap champagne and clashing voices. And color, she mused. The blacks and grays of the crowd were a stark contrast to the vibrancy of the paintings. She regretted she hadn't wrangled a camera crew to do a brief update.

"Quite an event," Marshall murmured in her ear.

Deanna turned, smiled. "We won't stay long. I know this isn't exactly your style."

He glanced around at the frantic colors slashed over canvas. "Not exactly."

"Wild stuff." Fran edged her way through, her husband Richard's hand firmly gripped in hers. "Your spot this afternoon had some impact."

"I don't know about that."

"Well, it didn't hurt." Tilting her head up, Fran sniffed the air. "I smell food."

"It's gotten so she can smell a hot dog boiling from three blocks away." Richard shifted in to drape an arm around Fran. He had a pretty, boyish face that smiled easily. His pale blond hair was conservatively cut, but the tiny hole in his left earlobe had once sported a variety of earrings.

"It's heightened sensory awareness," Fran claimed. "And mine tells me there are pigs-in-a-blanket at three o'clock. Catch you later." She dragged Richard away.

"Hungry?" Bumped from behind, Deanna moved comfortably into Marshall's protective arm.

"Not really." Using the advantage of height, he scouted the area and led her away from the heart of the crowd. "You're being a good sport about this." "Coming here? It's interesting."

She laughed and kissed him again. "A very good sport. I'd just like to make a quick pass through, and congratulate Myra." Deanna looked around. "If I can find her."

"Take your time. Why don't I see if I can find us some canap`es."

"Thanks."

Deanna threaded her way through the crowd. She enjoyed the press of bodies, the undertones of excitement, the snippets of overheard conversations. She'd made it halfway around the room when a bold painting stopped her. Sinuous lines and bold splashes against a textured background of midnight blue, it turned the canvas into an explosion of emotion and energy. Fascinated, Deanna moved closer. The label beneath the sleek ebony frame read AWAKENINGS. Perfect, Deanna thought. Absolutely perfect.

The colors were alive and seemed to be fighting their way free of the canvas, away from the night. Even as she studied the work, she felt her pleasure turn to desire, and desire to determination. With a little juggling of her budget…

"Like it?"

She felt jolted into awareness. But she didn't bother to turn around to face Finn.

"Yes, very much. Do you spend much time in galleries?"

"Now and then." He stepped up beside her, amused at the way she stared at the painting. Every thought in her head was reflected in her eyes. "Actually, your spot this afternoon convinced me to drop in."

"Really?" She looked at him then. He was dressed much as he'd been when he'd crossed the runway. His expensive leather jacket unsnapped, his jeans comfortably worn, boots well broken in.

"Yes, really. And I owe you one, Kansas."

"Why is that?"

"Th." He nodded toward the painting. "I just bought it."

"You—" She looked from him to the painting and back again. Her teeth locked together. "I see."

"It really caught me." He dropped a hand on her shoulder and faced the painting. If he continued to look at her, Finn knew he'd break out in a grin. It was all there in her eyes — the disappointment, the desire, the irritation. "And the price was right. I think they're going to find out very soon that they're underselling her."

It was hers, damn it. She'd already imagined it hanging above her desk at home. She couldn't believe he'd snapped it out from under her. "Why this one?"

"Because it was perfect for me." With the lightest of pressure on her shoulder, he turned her to face him. "I knew the moment I saw it. And when I see something I want…" He trailed a finger up the side of her throat, feather light, while his eyes stayed on hers. "I do what I can to have it."

Her pulse jumped like a rabbit, surprising her, annoying her. They were standing toe to toe now, their eyes and mouths lined up. And too close, just an inch too close, so that she could see herself reflected in the dreamy blue of his eyes.

"Sometimes what we want is unavailable." "Sometimes." He smiled, and she forgot the crowd pressing them together, the coveted painting at her back, the voice in her head telling her to back away. "A good reporter has to know when to move fast and when to be patient. Don't you think?"

"Yes." But she was having a hard time thinking at all. It was his eyes, she realized, the way they focused as if there were nothing and no one else. And she knew, somehow, that he would continue to look at her just that way, even if the ground suddenly fell away beneath her.

"Want me to be patient, Deanna?" His finger roamed over her jawline, lingered.

"I—" The air backed up in her lungs. And for a moment, one startled moment, she felt herself swaying toward him.

"Oh, I see you found refreshments already," Marshall said.

She saw the wry amusement on Finn's face. "Yes, Marshall." Her voice was unsteady. Fighting to level it, she gripped his arm as though he were a rock in the stormy sea. "I ran into Finn. I don't think you've met. Dr. Marshall Pike, Finn Riley."

"Of course. I know your work." Marshall offered a hand. "Welcome back to Chicago."

"Thanks. You're a psychologist, right?" "Yes. I specialize in domestic counseling."

"Interesting work. The statistics seem to point to the end of the traditional family, yet the overall trend, if you look at advertising, entertainment, seems to be making a move back to just that."

Deanna looked for a barb, but found nothing but genuine interest as Finn drew Marshall into a discussion on American family culture. It was the reporter in him, she imagined, that made it possible for him to talk to anyone at any time on any subject. At the moment, she was grateful.

It comforted her to have her hand tucked into Marshall's, to feel that she could be, if she chose, part of a couple. She preferred, overwhelmingly, Marshall's gentle romancing to Finn's direct assault on the nervous system. If she had to compare the two men, which she assured herself she certainly didn't, she would have given Marshall top points for courtesy, respect and stability.

She smiled up at him even as her eyes were drawn back to the dramatic and passionate painting.

When Fran and Richard joined them, Deanna made introductions. A few minutes of small talk, and they said their goodbyes. Deanna tried to pretend she didn't feel Finn's eyes on her as they nudged their way to the door.

"Be still my heart," Fran muttered in Deanna's ear. "He's even sexier in person than he is on the tube."

"You think so?"

"Honey, if I was unmarried and unpregnant, I'd do a lot more than think." Fran shot one last look over her shoulder. "Yum-yum."

Chuckling, Deanna gave her a light shove out the door. "Get a hold of yourself, Myers."

"Fantasies are harmless, Dee, I keep telling you. And if he'd been looking at me the way he was looking at you, I'd have been a puddle of hormones at his feet."

Deanna combated the jitters in her stomach with a brisk gulp of spring air. "I don't melt that easily."


Not melting easily, Deanna thought later, was part of the problem. When Marshall pulled his car to the curb in front of her building, she knew that he would walk her up. And when he walked her up, he would expect to be invited inside. And then…

She simply wasn't ready for the "and then." The flaw was in her, undoubtedly. She could easily blame her hesitation toward intimacy on the past. And it would be true enough. She didn't want to admit another part of her hesitation was attributable to Finn.

"You don't need to walk me up."

He lifted a hand to toy with her hair. "It's early yet."

"I know. But I have an early call in the morning. I appreciate your going by the gallery with me."

"I enjoyed it. More than I anticipated." "Good." Smiling, she touched her lips to his. When he deepened the kiss, drawing her in, she yielded. There was warmth there, passion just restrained. A quiet moan of pleasure sounded in her throat as he changed the angle of the kiss. The thud of his heart raced against hers.