And maybe, just maybe, to relax knowing that because she didn’t expect anything, her inability to read him couldn’t be termed a failure.

“He’s not going to ask me out,” she said again.

“So why don’t you ask him out?”

Why didn’t she jump up on the table and strip naked while singing Katy Perry’s “Hot N Cold”? “I can’t do that,” she excused.

Kathy just gave her The Look.

Pandora pressed a hand to her stomach, feeling as if she was about to jump off a very high cliff.

It was scary.

But it was also exciting as hell.

“I’m not promising anything. But-and it’s a teensy-tiny but-but…if I do, and if he says yes, then our next kiss will involve tongues,” she vowed.


CALEB LEANED HIS LEATHER-CLAD shoulder against the black iron lamppost and stared across the street at the warm welcome of Moonspun Dreams.

He’d promised Hunter he’d give it two weeks. So in between watching the store, he’d spent the past four days nosing around. He’d hit what passed for the party scene in Black Oak. Bounced through a few bars, made himself known to the major partiers and netted a couple easy introductions to the town’s lower-level drug dealers. The first step was to get the lay of the land, to gauge how challenging the bust would be and to establish his identity.

The ecstasy was definitely available and at discounts usually only seen in Black Friday sales ads. Marketing 101, make the product cheap and plentiful until you’d hooked enough suckers, then bleed them dry. As he would on any DEA job, he’d scored a little from each dealer, sending it all to Hunter for analysis. But experience and instinct told him it was all coming from the same source. A source nobody could-or would-pinpoint.

So far this visit was a bust. He hadn’t found out much for Hunter. He hadn’t cleared his father. Of course, he’d done his damnedest to avoid seeing his father at all after that first surprise visit, but that was neither here nor there.

And all he could think about was that one small kiss from the intriguingly reticent Pandora.

Unlike his usual M.O. in breaking a drug ring, this time he had no cover. Around here, everyone and their granny knew who he was. Many had pinched his cheeks at the same time they’d bemoaned his probable criminal career. That all worked in his favor, his lousy rep ensuring that nobody questioned his activities.

Still, that was then. He’d have liked to come home and be appreciated for who he really was now. An upright citizen who’d made a life outside of crime.

Except, he realized with a tired sigh, that he really didn’t have any life outside of crime. Which was why he’d quit. To relax, to get a hobby and to figure out what he wanted from life.

Which brought his thoughts back, yet again, to Pandora. He couldn’t figure out why the woman fascinated him, but she did. She was quiet, when he usually went for the flamboyant. She seemed sweet, which he was pretty sure he was allergic to. And she was friendly with his father, which meant she had questionable taste.

As he pondered, and yes, stared at Moonspun’s window hoping to catch a glimpse of the sexy Ms. Easton, something on the corner across the street caught his eye. Two guys in black hoodies, both hunched over as if they were trying to blend in with the brick siding of Pandora’s building. Caleb shook his head in disgust. He didn’t need years of DEA experience to recognize a drug deal going down. Hell, the little old lady walking her Pomeranian was shooting the two guys the same disgusted look. When one of the guys made a hulking gesture toward her, obviously trying to intimidate, she flipped him the bird and kept mincing along in her fluffy pink knitted hat. Caleb could see the goon growl from across the street. He made as if to go after her, when his buddy grabbed his arm, saying something and showing him a bag of what Caleb assumed were the drugs in question.

Hulk flexed a little, then followed the Baggie into the alley. Caleb considered trailing them. He had no jurisdiction. Hell, he was on a pseudovacation with his resignation sitting on his boss’s desk. It was the pseudo part of that equation that made him hesitate, not the vacation or the resignation.

But, really, how far did fake authority go? Favors for buddies and an unexplained need to vindicate his father didn’t give him the jurisdiction to bust a deal going down.

Then again, when had he ever worried about rules?

Before he could step off the curb, though, Hulk slunk out of the alley. His hoodie pulled low so his face was shadowed, he loped down the street.

No point following the doper. Caleb wanted the guy hooked into whoever was running the game. He waited for him to come out.

But the alley opening stayed empty.

Five minutes later, Caleb was mentally cussing and ready to hit something. There were only two businesses accessible through that alley. Moonspun Dreams and his dad’s bike shop.

Dammit.

Before he could decide how he wanted to handle it, a car pulled up next to him. Caleb’s sigh was infinitesimal as he cut his gaze to the sheriff’s cruiser. His eyes were the only thing he moved, though.

Because he knew damn well the lack of reaction would piss Jeff off.

“I heard you were back in town,” Jeff Kendall, the bane of Caleb’s high school years, said as he unfolded himself from his car, leaning his forearms on the open door and offering an assessing look.

“Looks like you heard right.”

“C’mon, Black. Just because we didn’t get along before doesn’t mean you should be holding a grudge,” Kendall said with his good-ole-boy smile. The one he’d perfected in grade school, usually used in tandem with tattling to the teacher about the bad Black kids.

It still made Caleb want to punch him.

Hunter had broached the possibility of bringing in local law enforcement, but Caleb had nixed the idea. If the locals knew about the drugs and hadn’t shut them down, they might be dirty. And that’d been before he knew who he’d be dealing with. When he’d heard that this guy was in charge of the law in town, Caleb had sneered. No wonder they had problems.

“Look, I’m just offering a welcome home, okay. I hear you’ve seen your share of trouble after leaving town. I’m not here to add to it. But if you don’t mind a friendly warning, keep it clean while you’re enjoying Christmas with your dad.”

Caleb didn’t even blink. After all, that was his cover. Prodigal loser back for the holidays, nothing to his name except a bad attitude and a crappy reputation. And, of course, a whole lot of family baggage.

All in all, it was pretty damn close to the truth.

His silent stare seemed to bug Kendall, though. The guy shifted from foot to foot, then frowned.

“Are you standing here for a reason?” the sheriff prodded.

“Just biding my time.”

Kendall glanced around, his gaze lighting on Moonspun Dreams, then flashing back to Caleb. “Looking for a little help in the sack, are you?”

Caleb didn’t move. Didn’t bat an eyelash. But his entire being snapped to attention.

“Thanks to Pandora and her little concoctions,” the sheriff continued, “Black Oak is seeing more sex than a teenager with his daddy’s credit card and a link to online porn.”

“Geez, Kendall. Can’t you score your own credit card yet?”

The sheriff glared, then jerked his head toward the store again. “You must be in the market for a little bedroom boost. There’s nothing else in there for you.”

It took a second before that sunk in. Caleb’s grin was just this side of a smirk as he raised his brows to the other man. “You warning me off?”

“I’m just saying you need to watch your step.” Kendall rested one hand on the gun at his hip and tilted his head. “This isn’t your town. It’s mine. Crime is low and trouble is rare. I’m not going to like it if you sweep in here, stir up a bunch of problems, then make me kick you out.”

Low crime and rare trouble? Was the guy really that bad at his job? Caleb’s eyes slashed to the corner where the drug deal had gone down. Good thing Hunter had sent him here, since Kendall clearly had no clue what was going on.

“Do you watch John Wayne movies on your nights off and practice that shit in front of the mirror?” was all he said, though.

Kendall’s red face tightened, right along with his fist. “I’m a sworn officer of the law. That makes me in charge of this town, Black. So watch your ass.”

The guy’s delusional self-importance amused Caleb enough that he could easily ignore the jabs.

Besides, he was pretty sure he’d just seen the first break in this case. And he’d much rather follow that up than exchange insults with this dipwad.

“Tell you what. You’ve piqued my interest,” Caleb said, straightening for the first time and stepping toward the curb. “I’ll head on over and see if the lady’s interested in fielding a hit or two.”

“I warned you, Black-”

Caleb just grinned and offered a jaunty salute before crossing the street.

The only thing better than having an excuse to flirt with Pandora handed to him on a silver platter was knowing how much it pissed Jeff the jerk off.

He was still grinning when he walked through the heavy brass door of Moonspun Dreams. Not seeing Pandora among the dozen or so people milling about the store, he made his way toward the back.

“The café is closed,” the airy blonde said, tearing herself away from a shaggy-haired guy by the counter.

“I’m here to see Pandora.”

“Oh.” Her look was speculative, but she just shrugged and went back to helping her client.

Caleb swept the beads aside and stepped through the door.

Then he almost tripped over his own size thirteens.

And grinned at the sight before him.

Holiday music playing loud enough to inspire a little swing of the hips as she arranged a bunch of green Christmas stuff, glittery bows and… Caleb squinted, were those blown-glass suns and moons…? Pandora stood at the top of a tall ladder before the wall by the door to the kitchen.