Page 48 of Hot Pursuit

Nate looked up.

Jo carefully studied her bagel, searching for the perfect bite.

You’re mine, Jolene Carter.

The thought cut through his mind like a promise. The gala was in less than twelve hours. Her flight back to the Bahamas was in less than twenty-four. Which meant he had hardly any time at all to figure out how to make the impossible happen—how to get her to turn on her father and her best friend. Luckily, he had a plan. A risky one. But one he felt in his bones would work.

Tonight, Jo, you’re mine.

- 17 -

Jo

A hungry gleam filled Nate’s gaze, and it wasn’t aching for the half-eaten bagel on his lap. He wanted something else, something his eyes whispered only she could possibly provide, something that made a molten stream of heat course through her blood, starting deep in her belly, spreading all the way to her toes, bringing a blush to her cheeks—one she tried to hide behind her coffee cup.

Stick to the plan.

The plan. Right—the plan.

Seduce Nate.

Get invited back to his room.

Finally figure out what those hands could do besides stop a girl midpunch.

Break into his computer.

Steal whatever information he had on her father.

And then bail.

Back to business. Back to Thad. Back to the operation she came to New York for. Her dalliance with Nate would be a side-play, maybe a distraction enough to throw him off the bigger scheme of the night.

Easy. Simple.

A little something for everyone to enjoy.

Jo flicked her gaze to those blue, blue eyes laser focused on her. They burned with a heat even fiercer than the one coming from the sun above their heads. She swallowed.

Yeah…easy.

Except, for the first time, she wasn’t quite sure who was doing the seducing here. Was Nate falling into her trap? Or was she tumbling headfirst into his?

“Who was that?” she asked, gazing pointedly toward his cell, mildly curious, but more needing to fill the silence.

Nate shrugged and slipped the phone back into his pocket. “No one important.”

I don’t believe that for one second.

But she bit her tongue.

“So, did you find Ryder yesterday? After I left?”

The question was so casual she almost didn’t realize at first that he was talking about Thad. Jo rarely used his last name—he was just Thad. Thaddy Bear on occasion. But never Thaddeus Ryder. Too formal. And she didn’t like to remember that for all their history, he wasn’t truly a brother, by name or by blood.

She swallowed her bite. “No talk of Thad, remember?”

“Those were yesterday’s rules,” Nate said calmly.