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She studied her desk calendar and began making mindless notes on it about things she needed to do in the next week—tasks she couldn’t help but remember to complete, like going grocery shopping and taking out the garbage. Anything was better than contemplating what Luke’s scowl might mean. Just as she’d run out of space on her calendar for the week and noticed that she had an oil change coming up, Luke put the papers on the corner of her desk and sighed.
She looked up at him, but he didn’t speak.
“Well?”
“Taking a more thorough look at these, I noticed something. Did the police tell you most of these look like they’re written by the same guy?”
“Um, they mentioned the possibility.”
“A single angry stalker is more of a threat for you than a bunch of letters from random jerk-offs.”
“So you really think one person is behind all the threats?”
“Not all of them, but most. This creep should be taken seriously.”
Jane narrowed her eyes, opting for sarcasm to hide the chills that nearly overtook her. “Which means you think I absolutely need you, right?”
Luke’s gaze remained fixed on hers. “You need me more than you know.”
6
For men, sex is only slightly more complicated than shaking hands. They aren’t plagued by the emotional intricacies of it the way we are.
—Jane Langston, from Chapter Fifteen of The Sex Factor
LUKE FOUGHT TO KEEP his thoughts focused on the matter at hand. No more thinking about what he wished he and Jane had done last night. No more imagining what he’d do with her if she gave him half a chance today. Sitting here in her office wishing he could take her on that paper-strewn desk wasn’t going to help. Jane needed him to focus on keeping her safe.
She needed him to do his job.
If he did a little extracredit work in the bedroom, she could only benefit, but right now he had to keep his mind off sex and on how to keep Jane safe. She may not have been fully ready to accept how her life had changed in the face of sudden celebrity status, but it was Luke’s job to make her understand.
He went back outside to get the rest of the equipment to install the security system, and Jane followed him out the door. He turned and gave her a questioning look.
“I just noticed on my calendar that it’s time for an oil change,” she said. “I need to check the manual to remember which kind of oil to buy.”
He went to his SUV and opened up the back, then grabbed the spool of wire and a few stray tools. He was just closing the hatchback when he heard Jane emit a high-pitched screech.
“Luke!”
He peered around his Toyota to see Jane backing away from her car, the passenger door still open.
“What’s the matter?” he said, already dropping the tools and wire as he started up the driveway.
“C-come here!” She was staring at something inside the car, and when he approached, Luke saw a book—or the remains of one—lying mangled on the passenger seat.
“Is that how you treat library books?” he joked, then realized by her frightened expression that she wasn’t in the mood for humor.
“The car was locked. I had to unlock it.”
Hmm. He decided not to blurt any more stupid comments. Okay, so the car was locked, and she apparently hadn’t been the one who’d mutilated that book…
It was a copy of The Sex Factor that looked as if it had been attacked by a toddler with a black marker, then fed to a starving pit bull.
“You’re absolutely sure the car was locked?”
“Yes, I remember specifically hearing the sound of the lock clicking when I turned the key… And since all of this craziness started happening, I’ve been obsessive about checking and double checking all my door locks, including the car.”
A quick glance confirmed that the driver’s side was locked too. Okay, so the creep who’d done this knew how to pick car-door locks. Not a huge feat, especially on an older-model car like this one. The fact that he—or she—had chosen to lock the car again was meant as a message to Jane, to make sure she felt violated, to let her know she wasn’t even safe behind locked doors.
“Don’t touch anything else until the police come. Why don’t you go inside and call them while I look around and make sure nothing else is out of place?”
Jane tossed him a suspicious glare. “This isn’t your psycho way of proving your necessity, is it?”
“I don’t dislike your book that much,” Luke said as he peered into the back seat of the Mercedes, which was empty.
He let the insult to his professionalism slide. After all, Jane had reason to be suspicious of everyone, and it was smart of her to question even him. A hell of a lot smarter than jogging alone in the woods, so maybe there was hope for her after all.
