Dylan’s jaw dropped. “What…”

  “Jeez,” Banks continued, embellishing his outlandish story for Cat’s benefit. “He’s a wild man on his Harley.”

  Dylan merely grunted in disbelief.

  “Starving musicians, we all do what we can,” Banks added, sounding so ridiculous Dylan expected Cat to burst into laughter at any moment. She couldn’t possibly believe any of this.

  “Shut the hell up, Billy.”

  His friend ignored him. “I’d give him a place to stay, but I’m crashing with a buddy in Tremont.” He gave Dylan an evil grin. “He’s got a great house, with a pool…but it’s full.”

  Dylan’s house. He was talking about Dylan’s house!

  “And Josh and Jeremy live with their parents,” Banks continued, “so that’s no good.”

  Cat, whose brow had furrowed during Banks’s ridiculous lies, turned to Dylan. “You really have no place to go?”

  “He’s full of crap,” Dylan said. “The motorcycle…”

  “Isn’t running well, I know,” Banks said. “You’ll be lucky if it doesn’t break down on you again tonight.”

  Motorcycle. As if Dylan would ever sit on Jeremy’s deathmobile when it was turned off. Much less ride it on the street! And Banks damn well knew it.

  Dylan didn’t know what to do first—tell Cat the truth or just beat his former best friend to a bloody pulp. Particularly since Cat was now staring hard at him, eyes narrowed and her head tilted as if she were deep in thought. “Is that so?” she asked.

  Wondering why her voice had trembled a bit, Dylan immediately retorted. “No, it’s not.”

  Banks shook his head sadly. “He’s a proud one, all right.”

  Clenching his back teeth, Dylan prepared to make his friend eat either his words or Dylan’s fist, but when Cat delicately cleared her throat, he paused.

  “Well,” she said, drawing the word out as she nibbled on the corner of her nicely healed bottom lip, “I hate to admit it, but I could use some help around here.”

  Dylan froze, the heated denial of Banks’s story dying on his lips. Meeting her stare, he looked for any hidden meaning, any secret agenda, but saw nothing. Not until a slow flush of color rose in her cheeks as she correctly interpreted what he’d been silently asking: Did she really need help? Or had she changed her mind about wanting a lover?

  Not even waiting for his reply, Cat suddenly busied herself drying some glasses, turning slightly away so he couldn’t figure out what was going on in her pretty head.

  “You wanna explain that?”

  “I don’t want charity,” she said, her voice as stiff as her shoulders. Then she added, “And I’m not offering it, either.”

  “What are you offering?” His voice held a challenge.

  She put the glass away and finally turned back to look him in the eye. A pregnant pause made him wonder if she was making some big decision, or just being careful with her words. “A job. If you really need one, I could use the help.”

  “Cat…”

  “He does,” Banks announced, clapping his hand flat on the surface of the bar. The grin on the guy’s face was positively gleeful. Hopping off his stool, Banks added, “I’ll let you guys work it out.” Then he turned and walked over to the stage, immediately engaging in a lively conversation with Jeremy.

  If it had anything to do with the damn Harley parked outside, Dylan was gonna lose it.

  But he couldn’t think too much about that. Because Cat was still standing behind the bar, a few feet away, suddenly appearing so small and delicate. She looked around the room, shaking her head a bit as if overwhelmed by what she saw.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, wondering how serious she was about needing help. She hadn’t mentioned it before. Then again, he didn’t remember Cat as the type who’d ever ask for help, unless she was truly at the end of her rope.

  “I hadn’t figured out how I was going to get the fixtures down or get some stuff out of the attic. I guess it hadn’t really sunk in until tonight that I have to do all this by myself.”

  “I do want to help you,” Dylan murmured, wondering how to offer to stick around while at the same time disabusing her of the notion that he was an unemployed loser looking for a handout.

  She wrapped her arms around her body, rubbing her hands up and down on her skin, as if suddenly cold. “I can’t pay you too much, but maybe this could work out for both of us. I know you’d be saving me money. If I have to have the broker do all the work as well as finding the buyers and handling the sales, I won’t make nearly as much.”

  “You don’t have to pay me…”

  She immediately dropped her arms to her side, her chin lifting a notch. “Like I said, I’m not looking for charity. If you want a job, I can give you one, short-term.” Faint color rose in her cheeks for some reason. When she continued, he began to understand why. “And I can even offer you a place to crash. There’s a small storage room in the back, with a cot and bathroom. You can eat whatever you care to fix in the kitchen and I’ll pay you what I can.”

  Stay here. Under the same roof. While she slept upstairs. If he’d ever had any willpower where Cat Sheehan was concerned, he knew it wouldn’t last through the first night.

  He wondered if hers would.

  “Well, what do you think?”

  Dylan didn’t know what to say. He simply watched her, absorbing her words, but paying even closer attention to her body language. That weariness he’d noticed earlier was back, evident in the tiny furrow on her brow and the slowness of her movements. The slight tremble in her hand as she wiped off the bar told him even more. She was tired, overwhelmed and in over her head.

  But there was something else…a faint gleam in her glistening green eyes. A hint of suppressed excitement in the tense position of her body. A sense of expectation in the deep breaths she took in, then slowly released.

  Something else was going on, he knew it as sure as he knew the lyrics to every Aerosmith song ever recorded. Cat had more on her mind than offering him a job. But Dylan didn’t trust himself to speculate on what.

  “He’s a con artist, Cat,” he said, making one more effort to get things out in the open. “Banks manipulated you into this.”

  Cat didn’t flinch, didn’t back down or rescind her offer. Instead, she said, “No, he didn’t. I’m not easily manipulated.” She leaned across the bar, lowering her voice though no one stood within a dozen feet of them. Licking her lips, she whispered, “I don’t want to do this alone, Spence. Will you stay? Please?”

  Oh, God. Would he stay? Of course he wanted to, not only so he could spend more time with her, but also because she needed help. Cat truly needed someone to lean on—she was admitting it aloud, for possibly the first time in her life.

  And she wanted him to be that someone. At least, the him she thought he was—Spence, the broke, unemployed, homeless musician.

  If he told her the truth—that he wasn’t some down-on-his-luck guitar player—she’d change her mind. He knew it. Cat was too proud to take charity and she’d feel like a fool for ever mentioning it. She’d put up a wall and retreat behind it and he’d be walking out the door.

  If he kept his mouth shut, he’d be silently agreeing with all the bullshit Banks had been spewing a few minutes ago.

  But he’d be staying.

  Dylan didn’t want to continue the lie. Now that she knew his name, part of him actually wanted the truth to come out, once and for all. Still, he couldn’t risk her refusing his help, couldn’t let Cat shoulder the burden her family had seen fit to thrust on her. Most important, he couldn’t leave here with so many questions still unanswered between them.

  How could he let Cat push him back out of her life before the two of them took a shot at figuring out how he might eventually fit into it?

  “Dylan?”

  That cinched it. The way his first name sounded on her lips nearly made him shake.

  So be it.

  He was damned if he told her the truth and damned if he didn’t. So if he had to be damned, he was gonna do it right here with the woman he’d wanted for nearly a decade. And let the chips fall where they may.

  “Okay, Cat,” he murmured, his voice low and unwavering. “I’ll stay.”

  6

  CAT HAD MADE THE DECISION to seduce Spence about one minute after she’d learned he was unemployed and a drifter.

  Soon. Immediately. Tonight.

  Actually, she’d been toying with the idea from the moment she’d hung up the phone with Laine earlier and had met Spence’s stare across the crowded bar. Something had happened—something electrifying and emotional and completely unexpected. She wasn’t sure why, but she hadn’t been able to shake the feeling that this thing building between them had been destined to happen. In that moment, it had risen above the sexual want they’d been dancing around since Friday night and had suddenly become…more.

  Thank heaven she hadn’t told anybody else about her new plans for herself and her life, because they’d think her crazy, given this decision. The truth about Spence’s situation might have made her run screaming in the opposite direction if she’d already succeeded in her transformation from the reckless Cat to the mature, responsible one.

  Right. It hadn’t happened yet. Because, in all honesty, she’d set out a list of nearly impossible goals. How she’d ever thought she could deal with losing the business, as well as completely overhauling her personal life, she had no idea.

  A girl couldn’t take on too much at once, right? Saying goodbye to her family heritage was quite enough all by itself, without throwing virtual celibacy into the mix. Sure, she would still do both, only she’d do them one at a time. After the bar closed for good, she could become the new, responsible, non-bad-boy-loving Catherine Sheehan.

  Not now. For now she was going to enjoy the hell out of Temptation…and temptation. With a man who epitomized the word.

  “One last fling,” she mumbled as she replaced the last of the clean bar glasses and glanced across the room. The tall, lean man standing there winding up cable was the perfect candidate for a fling. He was laid-back and unencumbered. Probably unreliable, not to mention unpredictable. A guy like Spence was as likely to be gone tomorrow as to still be here. Which meant he’d expect nothing, demand nothing and want nothing in return.

  Her heart wouldn’t be in danger, as it would have been if there were a chance of something real developing between them. Like if he had a job, a home, roots that tied him to this place, which might mean he could settle down and build a future with a woman.

  If he’d been that guy, she’d have shoved him out the door, figuring it was better to avoid the chance of heartbreak altogether. But he wasn’t that guy, and she could go into this with her eyes wide-open and her heart tightly guarded.

  With no chance of getting hurt.

  Over the next half hour, Cat finished cleaning up the bar, watching as Spence and his bandmates loaded up their instruments and carried everything out to the parking lot. She noticed the curious, somewhat salacious looks Spence received from the others. To give him credit, he did not acknowledge them in any way or act the least bit cocky about staying when they were all leaving.

  Because he wasn’t sure why he was staying. Not really. He didn’t know if she’d asked him to remain here because she needed him. Or because she wanted him.

  Both. She did want him, had wanted him desperately since the moment she’d laid eyes on him Friday night. But she also needed help, and he needed a job. It seemed like a perfect solution. She’d have someone to help her close down the bar and get this need for one last wild, reckless fling out of her system. He’d have employment and a place to crash for a couple of weeks.

  Then he’d go on his merry way. On to his next town, his next bar. His next woman?

  Thrusting the thought away, Cat refused to acknowledge the flash of dismay that accompanied it. She had no business worrying about what Spence might do after he left here. Because if she did, that would mean she cared about him.

  Impossible. Reverting to the reckless Cat who’d indulge in a passionate affair was all about Temptation and a need for release. Not about genuine emotion and vulnerability. Definitely not about love. She wouldn’t allow that, not when she knew damn well he could break her heart when he left. As he inevitably would. After all, didn’t everyone?

  “G’night, Cat,” one of the musicians called. It had been one of the blond ones—the young drummer who’d tried to buy beer. “I’ll come back to visit before you close down.”

  “I’ll have the ginger ale all ready for you,” Cat replied, grinning as he rolled his eyes.

  And soon, so soon she didn’t have a chance to prepare mentally—much less physically—she and Spence were alone. Locking the door behind his friends, he slowly turned to face her across the deserted room.

  She shivered, just a bit. From nervousness or anticipation, she really couldn’t tell. Nor did she care, since they both simply heightened the delicious tension.

  “Considering the crowds in here this weekend,” he said, filling the silence, “have you thought about relocating?”

  Cat shrugged. “It’s crossed my mind.” Then she ran her hand across the surface of the bar, so smooth and warm—almost living—beneath her touch. “But it wouldn’t be the same. What mattered was the place. This particular building.”

  He nodded, instantly understanding. Then he reached for the light switches beside the front door and flipped them down. The room descended into that red semidarkness, only the overhead, colored glass lamps remaining on.

  Holding her breath, Cat waited, wondering if Spence had already realized what was on her mind. When he slowly reached toward the cord for the blinds covering the front windows, she suspected he did. Because with one easy pull of the cord, he shut out the view from the street. Shut out the rest of the world.

  “Thanks,” she murmured.

  He didn’t answer. He merely waited for her next move. So she made it. “Have I thanked you for walking through my door Friday night?” Licking her lips, she added, “And have I told you how glad I am that you’re staying…with me?”

  That seemed to be enough. He gave her one tiny nod of understanding and she waited for him to approach. Instead, he surprised her by walking over to the old jukebox near the stage. Something of a family heirloom, the jukebox was original to the bar, right down to the music it contained. After her grandparents had died, the rest of the family had decided to leave the records exactly as they were, reflecting that generation’s taste in music.

  The old standards didn’t appeal to their new, younger clientele, so the machine seldom got used. Especially not with the shiny new karaoke machine in the opposite corner. But the jukebox did work, as Spence seemed to know. Glancing over the song list, he inserted several quarters into the slot and pressed a few of the numbered buttons. In the thick silence of the room, he turned around to look at her, the intensity of his expression saying more than words ever could.

  The whir of the machinery and the click of the record falling were only slightly more audible than the beating of Cat’s heart. When the sultry strains of an old jazz tune emerged from the old, tinny speakers, she closed her eyes, letting the seductive quality of the music fill her head.

  She sensed the moment Spence reached her side, though he’d moved with catlike silence across the room. She hadn’t had to look to know he was there. Feeling his warmth, she breathed deeply to inhale his male scent. Her whole body arched a bit closer to him, drawn by his warmth. His presence.

  When she opened her eyes, she saw him watching her with visible hunger. “Slow and smoky enough?” he whispered.

  Immediately knowing what he meant, she nodded. Without another word, she kicked off her sneakers, then reached for his hand. His fingers tightened reflexively around hers for a split second before he helped her onto the step stool she kept for reaching bottles on the top shelf. She stepped up, then up again, until, with his help, she ascended onto the bar.

  Within a heartbeat, he joined her there. “Dance with me?”

  Feeling the thrum of the music—not to mention a bone-deep, sensually inspired lethargy—Cat nodded and stepped into his arms. And was utterly lost. Lost to everything else but this time and this place and this man.

  Their bodies fit together as if they had been made for one another, the soft curves of hers mating perfectly with the hard breadth of his. She’d been incredibly intimate with Spence in some ways, but had never been held this closely by him. The contact was both electric and erotic. She felt it from head to toe.

  “Careful now,” he said softly, beginning to sway to the music, still holding her tight.

  “You won’t let me fall,” she replied, meaning much more than physically falling off the bar.

  Bathed in the reddish glow of the overhead light, his eyes glittered as he replied, “No, Cat, I won’t let you fall.”

  Then they were silent. Cat tucked her head against his neck, resting it on his shoulder. Her lips brushed his skin and she couldn’t resist sampling his salty taste with one gentle swipe of her tongue. He reacted with a hiss, nothing more.

  Inhaling his earthy, spicy scent, she completely relaxed and gave herself over to the music, instinctively following his every move. She should have known he would be able to dance, since he moved, breathed and thought in rhythm.

  What she couldn’t have imagined was that slow dancing with Spence would be like making love. Sweet, hungry, erotic love.

  “I like this music,” he murmured.

  “It’s not exactly AC/DC.”

  He laughed softly. “It’ll do.”

  Yeah. It would do.

  With one hand curled over her hip, he used the other to lazily stroke the small of her back. His fingers dipped low, sliding beneath the waistband of her jeans. When he began tracing small circles there, Cat knew he was picturing her tattoo, following the swirling pattern with his touch. The wicked images he’d spoken about in her apartment the previous evening made her shiver with anticipation.