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She read on her phone for about twenty minutes and then fell asleep. He used the quiet time in an effort to recenter himself.

The fact that he had a strong physical attraction to her coupled with the fact that he genuinely liked her was a dangerous combination. He didn’t want to like her, and he definitely wished his intense desire for her would just go away. The last thing he wanted was to really care for her. The last time he’d cared about someone really bad things had happened.

Afraid of where his mind was taking him, he got up and went to the kitchen table.

He stared outside the window. Rain still came down from the heavy gray clouds. At the moment, they reflected his mood. The talk about the people left on their suspect list had concerned him.

He hoped like hell she didn’t intend to continue visiting those homes for an opportunity to search for her mother’s book. After being beaten up so badly, surely she would recognize the amount of danger she would be in if she continued on that path. She was stubborn, but she certainly wasn’t stupid.

And who had beat her? God, he would love to know. It took a special kind of man to beat up a woman. Who had killed the voodoo queen, Mystique? That murder was what had set into play these dire circumstances for Monique.

It had been just about four months now since the murder. Jacque knew from his own experience as a cop that once a case went on that long it grew cold. Leads dried up, and people’s memories faded. There was a possibility now that the crime might never be solved.

As far as who had beaten Monique? There were no clues to follow, Daniel had told him they had tried to identify where the box that had been left on her porch had come from but so far they had been unsuccessful. The note inside had been handwritten and hadn’t been matched to a particular person. So it was equally possible her case might not be solved as well. Jacque had never liked loose ends, and this was one he definitely didn’t like. Dammit, these crimes needed to be solved by law enforcement and not by a beautiful woman all on her own.

Now that he realized the assailant could have learned about what they were doing by listening at his windows, the possibility that a person from the swamp was the killer was a very real thing.

He shoved all these thoughts away. He hadn’t had a moment of complete peace since the minute he agreed to help Monique. She had brought chaos into his life.

She had also brought a warmth and vibrant energy that he’d been missing for a very long time. She made him smile and reclaim his sense of humor.

He released a deep sigh. All he really knew was he was tired of thinking about murder and mayhem. And he definitely didn’t want to think about his desire for the woman sleeping on his sofa.

She slept for about an hour and awakened with her beautiful smile in place. “I feel so much better,” she said as she swung her legs around to sit up.

When she’d come in from her shower, he’d not only noticed the bruising on her skin but also that her legs were slender and shapely.

“I’m glad you feel better,” he replied. “I think I’m going to go ahead and get started on dinner. How does spaghetti with sauce and shrimp sound?”

“Delicious,” she replied. “I wish you’d let me help you. I feel guilty just sitting at the table and letting you do all the work.”

“Don’t feel guilty. I cook every evening for myself, and it’s no trouble to make the meal for two. Besides, the kitchen is too small to have the both of us in it.”

He didn’t want her that close to him where he could feel her body heat radiating toward him and where they might inadvertently touch each other. He didn’t want to be so close to her delicious scent as it threatened to dizzy his senses. He didn’t want her anywhere near him as he was feeling particularly vulnerable right now. He’d spent far too much time this afternoon thinking about what her lips would taste like and how her naked skin would feel against his own.

She was bruised all over, had two fractured ribs, and he was thinking about sex. He was ashamed of his own thoughts. He got up from the table and moved into the kitchen area where he couldn’t see her.

“I’ll sit in here and keep you company,” she said as she sat at the table.

So much for his brief escape from her presence. He stepped outside the back door and started his generator, then got out his cooktop and plugged it in. From his pantry, he pulled out a pound of spaghetti and a jar full of sauce.

“Before you forced me to go to sleep, you told me you quit being a homicide detective because of burnout. Was it one particular case that really got to you?” she asked.

He wished he’d never opened this door, but he had, and of course she had questions for him. It had certainly been one event that had made him walk away from his job, but it had nothing to do with his work. But he wasn’t about to go down that path.

“No, it wasn’t any one particular case. I guess it was just an accumulation of all of them.” He filled a pot with water and put in on the burner to boil, then emptied the jar of sauce into a pan and placed it on the stove to warm. “It’s a job where you definitely see the horror that human beings can do to each other.”

“How long were you on the force?” she asked.

“Almost eight years.” He pulled the bag of cooked shrimp out of the cooler and set it next to the saucepan. “I was hired on when I had just turned twenty-one.”

“Then that makes you thirty-three years old?” It was more a question than a comment.

“That’s right,” he agreed.

“Have you ever been married?”

“Yeah, once.”