Cavanaugh's Surrender (17 page)

The only way they could keep the priest from presiding over the ceremony would be to have the man kidnapped. Logan laughed. “Absolutely.”

“And your uncle Andrew, is he taking care of the reception?” The latter was basically a rhetorical question.

“Who else?”

Destiny nodded. It was hard to imagine so many people being so close—but they obviously were. “A real family affair,” she commented. And she truly envied him that. Especially now that she had no family of her own anymore.

Her voice, stripped of any emotion or intonation, gave him no clue as to what she was thinking—but he had a strong hunch.

“Yeah, it is.”

She would have said that he was the rebellious type, not someone who conformed to the wishes of his family. And yet, here he was, sticking to the script. Just showed that you could never tell about a person.

“It doesn’t get old for you?” she asked, curious.

“Hasn’t been going on long enough to get old,” he told her, “although, to be honest, I doubt if it ever will. They’re there,” he said, referring to his family members, “just enough to let you know you’ve got a support system if you need one, and not enough to be annoying or get under your skin.”

Destiny regarded her temporary partner for a moment. He’d impressed her. “I didn’t know you were that deep, Cavanaugh.”

Logan shrugged off the compliment. “I didn’t either.” His computer already shut down for the night, Logan pushed his chair away from his desk and stood up. “I’m going to call it a night,” he told her, then asked, “How about you?”

Destiny rotated her shoulders, working out a kink. “I think I’m going to stay a little while longer.”

He would have bet money on that. “What a surprise,” he commented dryly. Then, passing her on the way to the door, he said, “Remember, ten-fifteen, whether you’re ready or not, I’m taking you to the wedding.”

She thought of the clothes in her closet, and a twinge of panic momentarily telegraphed through her. “I don’t have anything to wear.”

He wasn’t accepting excuses. “Naked might be an interesting change of pace.”

“I’m serious,” she called after him.

Stopping for a second, he turned around and grinned at her. “So am I.” And then he relented. “I could ask Bridget to lend you one of her dresses.” He did a quick assessment. “You look like you might be around the same size.”

As far as she recalled, she and Bridget hadn’t been anywhere near one another, so he couldn’t be drawing on that to form a conclusion. “How would you know?”

He winked then and told her in a low voice, as if he was sharing a secret, “I’ve got an eye for things like that.”

She found herself dealing with his wink and the unexpected tidal wave it had created in the pit of her stomach. Maybe she
was
punchy.

“Don’t bother your sister. I’ll find something,” she said dismissively.

“Don’t worry. You’ll look great in whatever you decide to wear.”

Without thinking, Destiny pressed her hand to her stomach.

His parting words hung in the air long after he had walked out of not just the squad room but the precinct, as well.

The man knew how to make an exit, Destiny thought ruefully.

* * *

This was a bad idea.

A really
bad
idea.

The words echoed in her head the next morning as Destiny looked at her reflection in the full-length mirror on her closet door.

What was she doing, going to this wedding? She wasn’t good at small talk, and she definitely wasn’t in a festive mood. These people had been nice to her, and she didn’t want to put a damper on the wedding by bringing anyone down.

She’d just tell Cavanaugh when he came to pick her up that she’d changed her mind.
He’ll understand,
she assured herself. After all, it wasn’t as if he was going to tie her down to the roof of his car and drive away. He didn’t need her as a date
.
The second he walked in alone into the reception, he’d have women flocking to him. Most likely, it would become a feeding frenzy.

The thought didn’t ease her conscience the way she thought it would. Instead, it irritated it.

Another sign that she needed some rest. Making up her mind to stay home, she started taking off the dress that Paula had given her last Christmas. The one she’d had no occasion to wear—until now.

Or not
.

There was a militant row of tiny pearl buttons from the base of her neckline to her waist on the Wedgwood-blue dress whose straight skirt stopped a few inches short of her knees. She began working them loose and had only managed to get six of them undone when she heard the doorbell.

Damn it, Cavanaugh was early. She should have known that he would be.

Biting off a few choice words, Destiny hurried to the door.

“I changed my mind,” she announced as she swung it open.

Logan’s deep green eyes appreciatively went from her face to an even more arresting area of her anatomy. The smile that curved his mouth would have gotten him arrested in several third-world nations.

“You’ve come up with something else for us to do?” he asked, his voice resonating with sensuality as well as sounding incredibly suggestive.

“No, I—” And then she remembered that she’d been unbuttoning the top of her dress, affording him a view he didn’t get to see during regular hours. “You could look away,” she pointed out, fumbling with the tiny buttons as she pushed them back through the loops as quickly as possible.

“I could,” he agreed. “But then I’d really be missing something,” he pointed out. His eyes lowered just enough to revisit the tempting, albeit disappearing view.

“Nothing you haven’t seen a hundred times before, I’m sure,” she said stiffly, fervently wishing that she could tamp down the flush she felt beginning to creep up her cheeks.

But she couldn’t.

Nobody blushed anymore, she upbraided herself. What was wrong with her?

“Not this particular view,” Logan assured her.

For a second, she was almost tempted to believe he meant it. But that would make her even more naive than she already was.

“Okay, I’m not unreasonable. We either go to the wedding, or we stay here and find another way to amuse ourselves,” he said.

Her eyes narrowed. He was bluffing. “You wouldn’t miss your sister’s wedding.”

Rather than concede that she was right, he pretended to shrug carelessly. “I have other sisters, there’ll be other weddings.”

Her eyes widened. “You don’t mean that,” she said, calling his bluff.

“What I mean,” he told her seriously, “is that one way or another, I’m not leaving you alone today. How we spend the day is up to you.” He looked at her pointedly.

The flash of heat came out of nowhere, telling her that if she was going to be around him, she needed at least a few other people around, as well.

Otherwise...

“All right.” She surrendered. “We’ll go to the wedding.”

Pleased, he nodded. “Good choice. You’ve made my sister Kendra very happy. By the way—” he indicated her neckline with his eyes “—you missed a button.”

Caught off guard, Destiny looked down at the neckline that had been plunging just a bit more than she’d intended a minute ago. “I did?”

“I could do it for you,” he volunteered.

Over her dead body—then they’d never get out of the apartment.

“I see it, I see it,” she said, verbally swatting him back.

Logan laughed softly to himself under his breath as he took her arm and escorted her out the door.

* * *

Some twelve hours later, they were back in front of the same door.

It might have been only half a day later, but it felt as if days, not hours, had passed by since this morning. Or maybe even a lifetime, she amended silently, smiling to herself.

It had been quite a day, at least to her.

Rather than keep to herself and sit quietly on the sidelines the way she had intended, almost immediately Destiny had found herself drawn into one conversation after another. Her opinion had been sought out on a variety of subjects, most of which had nothing to do with work.

Not only was her opinion sought out, but her likeness, as well. Despite her protest, she got pulled into more than a few family photos. It seemed to her that every few minutes, another camera went off and someone else framed a photograph and pulled her into it.

They were a pushy, boisterous bunch of people, and she enjoyed their company even more the second time around than the first. But then, this was a wedding, not a funeral.

“I think your family now has more pictures of me than my mother ever had in her family album.”

The faded-green album she was thinking of had actually been rather sparse for what it purported to be. Its contents spanned not just her early life but the life of her mother and her mother’s mother, as well. Three generations and there were less than twenty pages of photographs in total.

She shrugged carelessly as her words came back to her. “My family wasn’t much on taking pictures.”

That was
not
the problem with his family, especially not his immediate family.

Standing on her doorstep, Logan laughed. “Kari has over twenty albums or so,” he told her. “It’s almost an obsession with her.”

His mind turned to more intimate things as he watched Destiny. Even in this light, he could see her face was ever so slightly flushed. The woman had a slight buzz on. He would have figured she’d need more drinks than the number she’d had to blush. Showed that you just never knew.

“So, I take it you had a good time,” he guessed. Even as he made the assessment, he found himself fighting a very strong temptation a second later.

Destiny turned her face up to his and smiled.

She knew she was feeling the effects of a few glasses of champagne and that margarita—or was it two?—that she’d had a little while ago.

Better tread lightly here
.

But despite her warning, she had to admit that she did like this fluttery, uninhibited feeling. And she
definitely
liked the fact that everything felt as if it was smiling inside of her.

“Yes,” she told him. “I had a
very
nice time.” Her eyes smiled into his. “Thanks for dragging me.”

“My pleasure,” he told her. It was getting harder and harder not to close his arms around her. “Anytime you want to be dragged somewhere, just let me know. I’m your guy.”

I’m your guy.

Wow.

The three-word sentence stood out in blaring neon lights, completely cornering her attention.

Not that the words were true, of course. He wasn’t “her guy.” Why would he want to be? There were so many more exciting women for him to choose. But wouldn’t it be nice if just for a moment, she could pretend that he meant it. And if...

If.

The single word that could make everything else possible, she mused.

God, now she was babbling even in her head, Destiny thought, trying to get hold of herself.

He was looking at her. Looking
into
her.

“I’m not used to partying,” she heard herself saying as her throat grew progressively drier.

Amused, Logan pushed back a wisp of her hair that kept falling into her eyes. His fingertips lightly brushed against her skin.

“Really?” he teased. “You could have fooled me.”

“I doubt that anything could really fool you,” she murmured.

He didn’t know about that. It seemed that all this time he’d been fooling himself, claiming that empty, shallow relationships were all he wanted.

That didn’t seem to be enough anymore.

Not nearly enough.

The night breeze was just warm enough as it wrapped itself around them. The area was still, its inhabitants either asleep or away.

Everything seemed to be focused on the two of them.

On her.

Destiny’s face was still turned up to his. A soft invitation he couldn’t make himself refuse even though he knew he should.

The next moment, his lips were against hers.

And all hell broke loose.

Chapter 13

L
ogan wasn’t sure just what he was thinking when he leaned over and kissed her. Most likely, he
wasn’t
thinking.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he had to have told himself that this would just be a simple, uncomplicated kiss. But in the depths of his soul, he had to have known better.

There was nothing simple about sharing a kiss with Destiny.

He’d already learned that the first time around. No reason to expect that the second time would be any less exhilarating.

If anything, it was more so.

Because the moment he kissed her, Logan wanted more. An entire galaxy more. He wanted to
be
with her. He wanted to
experience
her and lose himself in whatever followed.

It was as if he’d lived for years in a cave and had, just now, walked out into the bright sunlight. It might take some adjusting, but it definitely did not even begin to flirt, even remotely, with anything that was even
close
to regret.

Maybe, if Destiny hadn’t kissed him back, he would have been able to harness this wild energy pulsing through him. Might have been able to get himself under control and stop after a few moments had gone by.

But she
did
kiss him back.

Hard.

And just like that, all bets were off, all the scaffolding that was carefully holding up his reconstructed walls now cracked and broke apart.

Logan’s hands ran up and down along her body, increasing her body temperature until Destiny was certain she was standing in the center of a lit fireplace instead of on her doorstep.

“Hold it,” she urgently breathed against his mouth as he continued to kiss her and make her head spin.

The words penetrated half a beat later, and with grave effort Logan drew back from his partner. Was she having second thoughts? Or had he misread her signals? Was he guilty of pushing too hard?

“If we keep this up out here,” she told him, her words coming out in breathy spurts as she turned toward the door and did her best to stick her key into the lock, “we’re going to get arrested.”