UP IN SMOKE (Chapter Two)

CHAPTER TWO

Connor shot forward to block the girl from the newcomer's view. She'd gotten up on that table for him, and no one else got to enjoy the scenery. No one but him. His hands reached out of their own volition to drag her off the table and set her behind him.

They grasped at thin air.

Panic flared for two reasons. One, he didn't like taking his eyes off the man framed in the doorway when his identity hadn't been established. He'd been told to expect a roomful of convicts, after all. He needed to know who posed a threat and he wanted to know immediately. Especially now, when the threat could be directed at the girl. Two, not being able to touch her made him anxious. Ridiculous, really, since he'd only held her wrist and she'd nearly had a full-blown breakdown. It had only made him want to touch her more. Smooth out the fear with his hands. Gentle her. Tame her.

Connor whipped his head around, needing to get eyes on her. She gave him a pinkie wave from her chair. How had she moved so fast? And dammit, how could she look so serene when the barest hint of contact with her mouth had shot electricity down his spine?

He split his attention between her and the new guy.

Although "guy" seemed an informal moniker for someone who held himself as if expecting to own the room's attention. Not a con, then. Captain Derek Tyler? He'd been told back in New York to expect a man who brooked no bullshit, and the description fit. Most importantly, he wasn't a threat to her.

Connor lowered himself back into his seat. He thrived on control. Always had. What she had inspired in him since entering the room didn't compare to anything in his thirty years of experience. He'd watched the girl vacillate among terrified, curious, and confident so many times his head was still spinning. So many things seeming to war for precedence in her head... and he'd found himself wanting to battle them all. What would it be like to harness all that vitality?

Initially, she'd wanted him to back off. Her admission that she liked to "set things on fire" was meant to scare him away. Instead, his mental response had been, it's a good thing I know how to put them out. He'd been doing it for the last two years. Cleaning up after his volatile cousin, who'd preferred to solve matters through violence. Guns, intimidation, fists. You name it. Connor's life had been filled with violence. Images imprinted on his brain since childhood, then the navy. He'd fit seamlessly into the Brooklyn operation without a hiccup and he'd resented that. Resented that a place had been carved for him there all along, waiting for him to screw up and go the hell back where he belonged.

Resented how easy doling out pain had become. Feeling too easy, too...good. A numbing distraction from the direction his life had taken.

He'd found a way to get free of it, though. Finally. For that very reason, this pink-haired pyromaniac should not appeal to him. Chicago was supposed to represent a new start for him. For his ailing mother. The word "complicated" didn't even begin to describe "she who still had not been named." He had issues of his own to solve. He sure as hell didn't have time for this. For her.

For Chrissake, she didn't like to be touched. His hands were everything to him. Whether they were being used as weapons or to give a woman pleasure, they were always at the ready. Being on the receiving end of her come-ons without being able to touch would be pure torture. She tested his restraint while simultaneously demanding he exercise more than ever. No, he needed to set aside his fascination with her and focus on the job. This one would drive him straight out of his mind. It wouldn't be the first time he didn't get what he wanted. He'd survived every time. He'd survive without having the girl beneath him. Probably.