IntheMood Read Online Free

part
of the evening stops here.”
    She nodded. He released her so she could open her purse and
find her keys. She pulled out the ring, jingling it. “Coffee?”
    Then she put the key to the lock and saw the blinking light
inside. “Shit. I have to go home.”
    “You don’t live here after all?”
    “Yes, yes I do. I own the place. But my business partner has
put the new security code in and if I unlock that door, we’ll have half the
cops in Chicago rushing over here. Not least because we’re one of their
stopping places and they don’t want trouble here.”
    She stepped back and restored her useless keys to her purse,
turning to face him. “Sorry. The security is a bit over the top. I told my
partner Jack I’d go to my parents’ house tonight, so he went ahead with the new
code. We change it every week. I won’t know what it is before I see him
tomorrow.”
    She raised a brow and grinned. “Unless you want to take a
chance. I could try the last four codes, but by the time I’d entered those, the
time would be up and all hell would break loose.” She glanced up at the bell
set just below her bedroom window. “It’s old, but it works fine. There’s an
electronic backup too.”
    He gave a low whistle. “So your relatives are keeping their
princess safe?”
    “Something like that.”
    “Nothing to be done, then. My place it is.”
    She thought of her mother, who might not be waiting up but
slept lightly, and she’d certainly know when V didn’t show up for breakfast.
And her father, who’d placate her mother and scold her just as he did when she
was a teenager and stayed out at some rave or other. She’d told them she’d go
back to their place tonight, and her mother would call the apartment.
    She decided it was worth it. This man had scrambled her
brain since the moment she’d laid eyes on him. She’d forgotten she’d planned to
go home because she wanted more time with him, and when he kissed her, he only
made it worse. Leaving him wouldn’t have worked for her tonight. Because she
knew who he was, knew his identity, she could do this. He was right. If he’d
been any Joe, even a Joe with a recording studio, she wouldn’t have taken the
chance.
    “Okay. Just let me make a call.”
    He stepped away and she pulled out her cell, breathing a
sigh of relief when it went to voicemail. “Mom? I won’t be back tonight after
all. I went to the café and I must have just missed Jack, because it’s closed
and I don’t know the new security number. I’m staying with a friend, okay?
Don’t call, I’m fine, I promise.”
    She hung up and turned back to him. He was smiling, holding
out his hand. She took it. It felt like an agreement.
    He was right, his apartment wasn’t far. Just as well,
because he pulled her into a couple of doorways on the way and by the time they
reached his building, she was panting to get inside. She had never wanted a man
this bad, never wanted anyone this much.
    He showed her the same eagerness, touching her, sliding his
hand up her arm, around her shoulders. Even with her coat on, she felt it as if
he were branding her skin. Walking through the familiar streets had never been
so exciting. She loved walking here at night, when the lights shone brightly
behind closed windows, imagining what the people behind them were like, what
they were doing.
    He stopped in front of one of the huge warehouses that lined
the river. Only of course they weren’t warehouses anymore. Once they’d held the
products of the cattle driven here from all over the West—horn, leather, meat.
No part of the animal remained unused, they used to boast. The industry had
died long before she was born, but she remembered people talking about it, had
seen the films and photos in class at school.
    It seemed so distant now, in the well-paved, clean streets.
“One time it ran with blood around here,” she murmured.
    “What?” He turned to her, key in hand. “Gangsters?”
    “Slaughterhouses. For all the