Cat looked away. “Uh huh. He was something else.”

  “He? A one-man band?”

  Cursing her dumb, sleepy, one-track brain, Cat said, “Oh, no, sorry, I meant they. They were something else.”

  Gracie wasn’t buying it. “Who’s the ‘he’?”

  Cat couldn’t even try to come up with a cover story. “He’s a drop-dead gorgeous bass player named Spence who is exactly the kind of guy Laine and my mother would have heart attacks over if I ever brought him around for dinner.”

  Nodding, Gracie put the lid back onto the shoe box, then gave Cat a tiny half smile.

  “Then I’d say it’s a good thing Laine and your mother are far, far away.”

  DYLAN DECIDED BEFORE leaving his house in Tremont Saturday afternoon that come hell or high water, before the night was out, he’d have kissed Cat Sheehan. Really kissed her.

  One kiss. He’d deliver the kiss he’d all but promised both of them last night. The one worth waiting nine years for.

  Then, and only then, would he be able to tell her the truth: who he was, how she knew him. He’d come clean about where he lived, what he really did. All of it.

  Except, perhaps for the song. He wasn’t quite ready to share that, or his memories of the bonfire. But everything else was getting laid out on the table.

  Too bad he wasn’t.

  “Knock it off,” he told himself, knowing he’d better not let his mind go down that road. Not if he wanted to be comfortable in his jeans for the rest of the night.

  He forced himself to focus on his confession. Honesty was the key. He’d tell her everything, right down to that moment in the cafeteria when her pretty white teeth had bitten into his apple and taken a chunk out of his heart.

  Okay, strike that, too. He’d mention the apple part, but not necessarily his heart. Because he certainly wasn’t the same nerdy fifteen-year-old kid he’d been then. He now knew his teenage infatuation with Cat had been merely that…infatuation. First love, when love had seemed to be the only explanation because of the goofy smile that always came to his lips whenever he saw her walk by. Or the way time had seemed to stand still whenever he’d heard her laugh. Not to mention the way he’d made himself believe he was the only person who saw the serious, lonely side of the most popular girl in school.

  Then it had felt like love. Now he recognized it as a raging case of hormones. Those immature feelings had nothing to do with adult emotions, and it would be silly to bring them up. He’d embarrass them both, particularly when the keen interest and heat faded from Cat’s eyes as she realized he wasn’t the dangerous, reckless guy she’d always seemed to date back in high school.

  Not even close.

  He was still a brain, still quiet, and still kept to himself when he wasn’t on stage. As for dangerous? Well, he was about as ruthless and tough as a guppy. The only part of the wild side he walked on with regularity these days was when he appeared with the Four G’s.

  And considering what the name of their band stood for, that wasn’t very wild at all.

  Dylan arrived in downtown Kendall a little early Saturday, hoping for some alone time with Cat before the bar crowd drifted in. Actually, he arrived a lot early. It was only five and they weren’t due to play until eight. “Too early,” he told himself. “She’ll think you’re a stalker.”

  He sat in his car in the parking garage a block away from the bar. He’d parked here instead of in the small lot behind her building for one reason: because he didn’t want Cat to know he drove an expensive, boring, imported sedan. Just like he didn’t want her to know he lived in a moderately pricey neighborhood in Tremont, in a large, modern three-bedroom house, whose only claim to being hip was the incredible sound system he’d had built into it during construction.

  She wouldn’t understand any of it. Cat wouldn’t be able to associate the car, the house—and certainly not his job as a software designer and consultant—with the laid-back band member she’d been coming on to last night.

  Coming on to. Yeah. She had been. They both knew it. Like they both knew he could have taken things a hell of a lot further last night if his conscience hadn’t kicked in and demanded he leave.

  Which was why he knew he had to take his shot and kiss her, just once, before telling her the truth. Because if he knew Cat—and he did—she would not be coming on to a guy she thought was a boring software geek who had his oil changed every three thousand miles and invested in tech stocks.

  Besides, it wasn’t as if he’d be taking anything she didn’t want to give, judging by the way they’d danced around the sizzling awareness last night. Only a fool wouldn’t act on that awareness at least once before it disappeared forever.

  Hoisting his guitar case over his shoulder, he hoofed it to Temptation, walking through the front door to find the place pretty much deserted. Though it was just after five on a Saturday, not one pub diner sat at any of the tables munching on a greasy burger. No hard-core, all-day weekend drinkers were staring up at the television, where a ball game was going on.

  The only person around was Cat.

  Who was lying flat on her back on top of the bar.

  He grinned, unable to help it, and quietly approached her. Wondering what she was doing, he stood in the shadows several feet away, just watching. With a sigh he could hear from here, Cat lifted a pencil, took aim and threw it straight up. Following the pencil’s ascent with his gaze, he saw it join several others sticking into the ceiling over the bar.

  Somebody had obviously been bored today.

  “I think it took Mulder about three seasons of The X-Files to get that many pencils on the ceiling of his office.”

  She didn’t even look over. “Took me about three hours.”

  “You know, a fly swatter would probably be more effective.”

  She chuckled. “If I were going after Texas houseflies, I’d be using a shotgun, not pencils.”

  He walked to the bar, putting his guitar case on the floor beside it. Sliding onto a stool, he smiled down at her. “Bad day?”

  She rolled her eyes. “You’re the second person who’s walked in since we opened at one. And the first one was a construction guy asking to use the bathroom.”

  He frowned. “You didn’t shoot him, did you?”

  Cat finally looked over, her eyes twinkling in sudden merriment. “Not even with a pencil.” Then she looked up at the ceiling again. “It’s not his fault. He just works for the bureaucrats—he doesn’t make the lousy decisions.”

  He gave an exaggerated sigh. “Whew. Because I still don’t have a shovel handy.”

  A tiny grin tugged at her lips. “You’d help me bury the body?”

  He leaned closer over the bar, looking down at her beautiful face. “Oh, absolutely.”

  Their eyes met, their stares holding for a long, thick moment. Cat’s grin faded and so did Dylan’s.

  That awareness was back. Made more intense by her provocative position—flat on her back. And his position—above her. They were both remembering the last time they’d seen each other, right here, during their relatively innocent exchange that had been so incredibly intimate.

  Cat was the one who looked away first, though the color in her cheeks made a lie of her casual tone. “Well, thanks anyway, but I haven’t murdered anyone yet.”

  Dylan followed her lead, ignoring the sexual attraction dancing so strongly between them. She obviously wanted to pretend last night hadn’t happened. That was fine with him.

  For now.

  Straightening a bit on his stool, he asked, “You have fought this road issue as far as you can, I assume?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. There’s nothing more to do. The city has named the date and time of demolition. We have to be out of here by June 30 at the very latest.”

  He shook his head. “I’m really sorry, Cat.”

  She picked up another pencil from a pile next to her jean-clad hip. “I’m handling it.” This time when she threw it, Dylan was much closer. Close enough to see the way her tight, sleeveless red shirt pulled even tighter across her body as she flexed her arm. And a tempting, creamy strip of skin across her belly where her shirt pulled free of the waistband of her white jeans.

  She didn’t even seem aware of how each graceful movement accentuated the soft curve of her shoulder, the vulnerable, pale skin of her neck. Nor how she was affecting him. Which, for a woman as sensually aware as Cat, indicated the depth of her bad mood.

  He glanced away, trying to keep his breathing slow and steady. Swallowing hard, he forced his attention back to their conversation. “So what are you going to do after you close?”

  She shrugged. “Not sure yet.”

  “I assume the city’s giving you a fair price for the building? The law requires them to give you market value and downtown properties sell for a good amount.”

  Cat looked over again, raising a curious brow. Dylan realized he’d sounded a little more like a lawyer than a laid-back musician. He gave her a self-deprecating look. “I watch Law & Order.”

  “Well, that’s good to know, in case I do murder the next construction worker who comes in looking for a bathroom.” Grinning, she abruptly sat up on the bar and swiveled around so her legs dangled off the front of it. She was close. So close her hip almost touched his arm. And the awareness factor shot up a notch.

  He tightened his fingers into a fist on his lap and forced a casual tone. “You never answered my question about the sale.”

  “The city is paying a good amount for the land, but since my mother and uncle still own the building, the bulk of it will go to them.”

  Ouch. He hadn’t figured on that. He’d assumed Cat owned the place and would be financially stable after the shutdown. Stable enough to stick around town for a while.

  “I’m hopeful, though,” she admitted softly, “that I’ll have enough to help me go to school part-time.” She looked as if she regretted it the minute the words left her mouth.

  “School? You want to go back to college?”

  “Basically start college. I think I lasted one-and-a-half semesters at the community college before I dropped out. But I’m ready for it now.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  She looked away. “You’ll laugh.”

  “No,” he replied, meaning it, “I won’t.”

  Lifting her hand to her mouth and almost covering her lips, she mumbled, “I’d like to teach high school.”

  Dylan coughed a bit as the air in his throat turned a little grainy. Talk of high school cut way too close for comfort.

  “You’re laughing,” she snapped.

  “No, I’m absolutely not laughing. I think that’s fantastic and you’d be a great teacher. Being able to deal with people from all walks of life, to listen and advise and befriend anybody who pulls up a stool at your bar is a remarkable bonus for someone who wants to teach teenagers.”

  She didn’t look entirely convinced, but finally, she shrugged. “Well, who knows. Right now all I’ve done is call for an application. I haven’t even visited the university campus.”

  “You should. You definitely should.”

  She again lowered her head, shielding her expressive face with her long hair, appearing uncomfortable at having started the conversation. “We’ll see. There’s so much to do in the meantime, and without anybody else around, it’s not going to be easy.”

  “So why aren’t they here helping with all this going-out-of-business stuff?”

  “There’s a good question. God, all my life I’ve been waiting for my family to treat me like a responsible adult who can do more than pour beer. Be careful what you wish for, right? Because now they’re all gone and I’m handling everything by myself.”

  She let out a tiny laugh—definitely forced—which made Dylan reassess her mood. Cat being alone in the bar when he’d arrived hadn’t merely been about a lack of customers. It had somehow symbolized much more. As if she were totally alone in her life. And more than a little unhappy about it.

  Which got him thinking about those occasional lonely moments he’d witnessed in high school. The other Cat only he had seen.

  Judging by the way she crossed her arms and looked away, she didn’t want to continue that conversation, so Dylan looked up at the ceiling. “You gonna leave them hanging there?”

  She shrugged. “The wrecking ball can handle a few pencils, I think.” Then she added, “This looks pathetic, I know, but I’ve always wanted to do it. I used to imagine lying on top of the bar when I was a kid. I figured I might as well do it while I have the chance. Nobody was around to see.”

  Since she was now sitting above him, instead of lying below him, Dylan had to look up again to answer. He tried to focus only on her face, but it was tough with her curvy body so close to his. Her breasts were at eye level and it was all he could do to keep his stare firmly above them. “Anything else you’ve always wanted to do in here?”

  She looked around the room, studying the groupings of tables, the small stage, the jukebox. Then, with a small nod, she admitted, “Yeah. A few things.”

  The secretive smile playing about her lips made him very curious about what kinds of things. When she didn’t elaborate, he prodded, “One of them have anything to do with that stage?”

  She nibbled her lip and nodded. “Uh huh. And different colored spotlights.”

  The wicked glint in her eye told him she wasn’t necessarily thinking of performing on that stage, but he still had to ask, “Are you a closet singer?”

  “A shower singer,” she admitted. “A tone-deaf shower singer. Even worse than Tess.”

  “Tess?”

  A tiny frown appeared on Cat’s brow. “She’s one of our waitresses. She had to leave town unexpectedly.”

  Sensing the subject was a sore one, he didn’t ask for details. “So what do you see yourself doing on the stage?”

  Her eyes flared and her lips parted as she drew in a slow, deep breath. The intensity shot up, as he imagined Cat, naked, highlighted in the colored spotlights she’d mentioned. Having hot, erotic sex on the stage, bathed in all that light.

  “I’m not sure I’m ready to share that particular fantasy.”

  Dylan shook his head and managed a rueful grin. “To be honest with you, I’m not sure I’m ready to hear it.”

  “Chicken?”

  “Self-preservationist. I have to go up there and perform in a couple of hours. And it won’t be easy if I’m imagining you the way I’m picturing you right now.”

  His husky words dared her to go further in this sexy game of supposition—to ask him what he was picturing. But Cat didn’t take the bait this time. Just as well. If she confirmed his most heated imaginings, Dylan didn’t think he’d be able to stop at the one simple kiss he planned to have from her in a very short while.

  Reaching into a bowl on the bar, he grabbed a fistful of peanuts and tossed a few into his mouth. A stall for time, but it worked. Because eventually his pulse stopped racing and his groin obeyed his brain’s command to go back into standby mode instead of running things, as it wanted to.

  “So,” he asked, “What else do you plan to do before you shut the doors for the last time? Tap dancing on the tables?”

  She snickered. “Tap dancing? If my mother had tried to put me in a pair of tap shoes as a kid, I would have used them to kick down the nearest door and escape.”

  Sounded like something the wild young Cat would have done. Sounded like something the adult Cat would do now.

  “But I might just have to dance on top of this bar one of these nights,” she added, stroking the smooth wood surface with the palm of one hand. “To something slow and smoky.”

  Smoky. A word most people wouldn’t think of in connection with music, but one which made perfect sense to Dylan. It was sensual, perfectly apt for this woman who continued to caress the wood with lingering strokes of her long, delicate fingers.

  Unable to resist, he smoothed his own hand over the mahogany, feeling what she was feeling. Experiencing the same touch Cat so obviously savored.

  It was smooth. Warm. Slick. Strong and solid. And probably held a great many memories for the young woman sitting there, touching the surface of something that meant so much to her. Something she was being forced to give away.

  His gut twisted. Cat revealed so much, without even saying a word. The way she tenderly rubbed the tips of her fingers over a scratch here, a gouge there, revealed the depth of her emotions.

  It had to be like losing a part of herself.

  God, he wished there were something he could do to help her through it. Then he realized there was. Because until he’d walked through the door, she’d been completely and utterly alone.

  And now she wasn’t.

  “So,” he finally said, “is there anything else you have to get out of your system before you move?”

  She cocked her head, thinking about it. “Well, I fully intend to sunbathe naked in the garden out back at least once before they kick me out.”

  The air in his mouth suddenly tasted thick and dusty. Dylan couldn’t help coughing a bit at the mental image of Cat lying naked in the sunlight, glorious, pagan and seductive.

  “Sorry, did I shock you?” she asked, not sounding a bit sorry. “You don’t look like the type to be easily shocked.”

  No, the wild, up-for-anything rock and roller she saw when she looked at him wouldn’t be easily shocked.

  And he wasn’t. The images cascading in his brain weren’t shocking. They were…intoxicating.

  “I’m not shocked,” he said softly, letting her see the heat in his eyes. “Just picturing…the possibilities.”

  This time, Cat was the one who appeared a little breathless. Her lips parted and she nervously licked at them, eliciting another nearly silent groan of reaction from him. Dylan covered the sound by clearing his throat.

  “Oh,” she said.

  “Feel free to let me know when you’re going to be checking off all the items on your to-do list,” he said, not quite achieving the light tone he’d been going for. “I’d be happy to keep watch.”

  “You mean you’d be happy to watch.”

  “What if I gave my Scout’s honor not to even sneak a peek?”