He made a move toward her, maybe not a menacing one, per se, but confronting enough so that she automatically responded.
She stepped forward and used a quick kick to sweep his legs out from under him. He toppled onto the floor on his side with a loud crash. Oops, she’d managed to upend a dainty Queen Anne-era side table along with Jack.
“What the—” Jack was already scrambling out of that embarrassing position when she pounced on him. She rolled him onto his back and sat on his chest, her knees pinning his arms to his sides. He twisted from side to side, but she hung on with all the tenacity she could muster. “What are you doing? Who are you?” he demanded.
Interesting response. Even though she had him on his back, he wanted answers from her. Down, but not defeated.
She stared into those startled gray eyes, felt his muscles flex under her thighs.
And then it clicked. Where she’d seen him before.
“Denver Black? From that show?”
In her confusion she remembered the character’s name but not the show, even though she’d seen every episode.
“Not a fan, I take it.” Jack had given up struggling and was watching her with weary amusement.
“You’re wrong. I’m a huge fan. But where…” She peered closely at his face. “Where’s your scar?”
Denver Black was known for the knife mark that slashed in a diagonal across his face, dividing it in two, just like the dual parts of his personality. Brilliant and caring versus tortured and brooding.
“Makeup, obviously. It’s a real art form. Amazing what they can do.”
No wonder she hadn’t recognized him. She couldn’t stop scrutinizing his face, marveling at the difference. A layer of scruff where Denver was clean-shaven, dark hair naturally mussed where Denver wore his slicked back to show off his scar. He never hid his scar because it was so useful as a means to intimidate suspects.
Dark of Night. That was the name of the show. It was one of her top-five shows. Denver Black was a brilliant detective who only ever worked the night shift. It was written into his contract or something. According to the show’s backstory, he was ashamed to be seen in the daylight with that horrendous scar. It was left from the time he’d gotten thrown into a shark tank and nearly gotten his face eaten off.
She’d always hoped they’d do a flashback episode with that incident so she could see his face without the scar. They hadn’t, but now she’d gotten her own personal show. She couldn’t stop staring at him.
“Can you let me up?” said Jack. Jack…she searched her mind. Finnegan. Jack Finnegan was the actor who played Denver Black. “I’m clearly not any kind of threat to you. You have some serious moves.”
“They’re not moves,” she snapped. But she eased her knees off his arms.
“No? Why not?” He started to sit up, causing her to slide down his body. She scrambled off him before she wound up on his lap.
“I mean, they’re moves, of course, but they’re not fake moves for a TV show.”
“Ouch. I thought you said you were a fan.”
“I am a fan. There’s nothing I enjoy more than yelling at the screen while you do stupid shit to solve your ridiculous cases.” She rose to her feet and brushed off her pants. Everything she’d said was true, but she’d left out one detail. She always really enjoyed lusting after Denver Black and his scar and his sexy body and his complicated soul. Hopefully he couldn’t read all that on her face.
Jack sat up and rested his forearms on his bent knees. “Let me guess. You’re a police officer.”
“Yes. And let me tell you?—”
He interrupted. “I know how improbable our cases are, how illegitimate our investigative techniques are, and how unlikely it is that we’d encounter so many criminal masterminds when most criminals are predictable and dimwitted. I’ve heard it all before.”
She gaped at him. He was in full Denver Black mode right now. The famous detective was known for his extensive vocabulary, his encyclopedic knowledge of odd quirks of history, his grasp of statistics and random bits of facts that he whipped out to confuse his interview subjects.
“We have police consultants on the show, you know, and we even sort of listen to them, sometimes. It depends on the storyline. The goal is to give it some semblance of reality but make it cool. I could talk about how we produce the show all night. I am one of the executive producers, have been ever since season four, but right now all I want to know is?—”
The next thing she knew, her feet were no longer on the ground and she was staring at the ceiling as a big body pinned her to the carpet.
Damn, that was smooth. She couldn’t even be mad about it since she’d been distracted by the way he was talking about her favorite show. That was exactly what Denver Black would have done, and she’d fallen for it completely.
“Why are you here and does it have anything to do with Seth Baker?” he finished.
4
