Dangerous Kiss by Avery Flynn Page A

he killed her for reasons that only make sense to him.”
    “No doubt the Voice of Doom was tweaking hard yesterday. Could it have been Darcy? He’s in the right age bracket and he’s definitely a meth head.”
    “Maybe. Burlington couldn’t give me a good description of him, said he hadn’t ever seen him and it had been years since the wife had. My office is searching arrest records now to pull a photo.”
    “Something still seems off.” A worry line formed between Claire’s eyes. “If she was giving him money already, killing her doesn’t make sense, even for a meth addict.”
    “Agreed. Burlington did bring up a third possibility. Kendall siphoned off three million dollars from her parents to give to Darcy. Burlington thinks she did so at Darcy’s request and that he killed Kendall to cover his tracks.”
    “How did Burlington find out about all this?”
    “Kendall told her mother everything the day before she was killed.”
    She pursed her lips and squinted at him. “Why is my bullshit meter going crazy right now?”
    “Because you’re not a moron.” He stole another drink of coffee. “Also, it’s the second story he’s told about why he wants the phone. The first story was his wife wanted some photos of herself and Kendall that were on the phone. Both stories are crap. Maybe not all of the embezzled money story is crap, but a good portion of it is.”
    He stood up, shoved his fingers through his hair. “Burlington is an asshole, but he’s not stupid. I doubt anyone could siphon off twenty bucks from him, let alone three million. Something else is going on here. I don’t know what Kendall stumbled onto, but it was enough to get her killed.”
    He lowered himself to the chair and stretched his legs out. “I did some research last night at the hotel, called up some buddies who owe me favors. There are questions about the legitimacy of some of Burlington’s clients’ profits. Maybe the three million dollars Kendall stole, if she took any money at all, didn’t belong to her parents. Maybe it belonged to one of daddy’s clients.”
    Jake gave Claire a moment to digest the information.
    “Shit.” The vivacious spark that usually glimmered in her eyes dimmed. “So how do we nail the son of a bitch who killed Kendall?”
    God, he loved the spit and vinegar in her. She refused to give up. As a double bonus, she’d said “we”.
    “Same plan as before. We wait for him to come at you again, but this time I’ll be with you.”
    She gave him a wan smile. Her obvious worry hurt him as if he’d been kicked in the knee. To lighten the mood, he leveled his best wolfish leer at her. “Enough of this. I’d rather talk about when we’re going to finish what we started in your kitchen.”
    Claire pursed her lips and turned toward her screen. “We’re finished with that.” Her fingers sped across her keyboard.
    He doubted anyone but an android from the science fiction channel could type that fast. Jake got up, circled the desk and stopped directly behind Claire’s high-back office chair. The screen showed a mass of gibberish. Her shoulders tensed, but she didn’t turn to look at him. He leaned down.
    “That may be true, but I’m still not going anywhere.” He twirled a strand of auburn hair, which had escaped from her loose bun. “I’m going to get the son of a bitch who hurt you.”
    She grasped his hair-wrapped finger. He expected her to pull her hair away, but she didn’t.
    “Is that the only reason you’re staying?”
    Her breathy question made his nuts tighten. “It should be.” His concrete dick clearly didn’t agree. “But right now it’s not.”
    He brushed his lips against the spot below her earlobe. She smelled of oranges and crisp snowfall at the same time, a sensual contradiction much like the woman herself. He meant to stop there, but couldn’t. He sucked on her earlobe, then nibbled down her neck and strung kisses across her shoulders.
    “Jake,” Claire half moaned,