Hot Pursuit Read online

  No, she’d been so thrilled with the way things were going that she’d spent more time doing what she really loved—cooking and creating recipes for the Cajun fusion dishes she’d become known for in their community. A mistake that she still kicked herself over, even though David had covered his tracks too well for her to see anything amiss.

  She’d trusted him. But how had she not known he was bad news? How had she let herself be fooled by a handsome face and charming manners?

  She’d learned in the aftermath of the destruction he’d wrought that the authorities thought he had ties to organized crime. He’d been skimming money, along with other more nefarious schemes such as money laundering and extortion. She hated to think about it. Evangeline’s had been everything she’d ever wanted when she’d broken out of her hometown and gone to cooking school a few years ago.

  But here she was again, back in Rochambeau and washing hair in her mama’s salon, just like when she’d been in high school. Loser. All she wanted was to get out again at the first opportunity. Before that loser feeling wrapped around her throat and squeezed the rest of her dreams away.

  Matt reached for the door, and Evie darted behind the stockroom curtain. Her heart slammed against her ribs as the tinkling bell announced his arrival. She turned to lean against the doorjamb and pushed the rose-print polyester aside with one finger. She was being silly. He wasn’t here because of her. He was here because his sister had sent him on some errand or other for her wedding.

  Hell, he probably wouldn’t even blink twice if he ran smack into her.

  Evie frowned. Her eyes slid down his body and back up again. He was still something to look at. Something easy on the eyes and hard on the senses.

  He’d changed in ten years, but some things were still the same. That cocky swagger as he’d approached the shop. He’d always walked like his daddy owned all the oil in the Gulf of Mexico. Which he damn near did. The Girards had been Rochambeau’s wealthiest family for as long as anyone could remember.

  Matt’s dark hair was cut very short, and his shoulders were much broader than when he’d been seventeen. The fabric of his white cotton T-shirt stretched across a wide chest packed with muscle. His bare forearms made her throat go dry.

  Something quivered deep inside her, the way it always had from the moment she’d become aware of Matt as more than a boy she played with. Something hot and dark and secret. Evie squashed the feeling ruthlessly.

  He pushed a hand through his hair, every muscle of his torso seeming to bunch and flex with the movement. She would have sworn she heard a collective sigh from the ladies in the salon. Rachel absently ran water in her sink, cleaning out the soap bubbles from the last shampoo. When she got too close to the edge, the water sprayed up into her face.

  Evie would have laughed if she too weren’t caught up in Matt’s every move. She’d adored him ten years ago and worshipped him until the night she’d given him her virginity.

  What a mistake that had been. Not because the sex had been awful. No, it’d been pretty exciting, all things considered. It was what had happened afterward that ruined it for her. The shift in their relationship hadn’t been what she’d expected. And then he’d been such an ass about it.

  “Afternoon, ladies.” Matt tipped his head to them.

  “Afternoon,” they murmured in unison, voices sugary and lilting, eyes assessing and cataloging him.

  “Miz Breaux.” He took her mother’s hand and kissed it like a courtier.

  “Oh, shoot.” She smacked him playfully on the shoulder. “What do you want? Don’t you know this is a beauty parlor? Sid’s Barber Shop is on Main Street.”

  “Well, ma’am.” He grinned that devil-may-care grin Evie remembered so well. “I figured Old Sid can’t see so well anymore and I’m still fond of my ears. I’d much rather have a lady’s touch, if you know what I mean.”

  “Oh my.” Mama giggled. Giggled.

  Evie rolled her eyes. No wonder she couldn’t pick a decent man. She came by the defect genetically. Mama had been divorced three times. She’d gone back to using her maiden name after the second one in order to avoid confusion. Evie had her daddy’s last name, her sixteen-year-old sister had a different name, and Mama had yet another one.

  “You don’t even look like you need a haircut,” Mama was saying.

  He scrubbed a hand over the nape of his neck. “My sister thinks I do. And it’s her wedding.”

  Mama giggled again. What was it about that man that turned even the smartest woman into an airhead? “Well, we can’t let Christina be disappointed then, can we? But you’ll have to wait until I finish with Mrs. Martin.”

  Mama gestured toward the pink vinyl seats in the front of the shop, and Matt gave her the famous Girard smile that used to melt the female hearts of Rochambeau High School. Evie felt a little hitch in her own heart, in spite of herself.

  Why did he still have to be so damn good-looking? Was it too much to ask for him to be balding or growing a potbelly? Apparently so. Mother Nature was cruel.

  “Sure thing, Miz Breaux.”

  Before he’d taken three steps toward the waiting area, Mama said, “You remember my daughter, Evangeline, don’t you? She was a year behind you in school. Y’all used to play when I’d come out to do your mama’s hair every week.”

  Evie’s heart crashed into her ribs. The ladies in the shop grew quiet while they waited for his answer. She knew what they were thinking. What they were waiting for. Why should it bother her what they thought? What any of them thought?

  It had been ten years ago, and it didn’t matter anymore. She was grown up. Matt was grown up. Who cared?

  Except that’s not how Rochambeau worked, and she knew it. It might have been ten years, but he’d humiliated her. He’d broken her heart and tossed her to the wolves when she wasn’t prepared to deal with the consequences of her actions. Not that anyone knew for sure what had happened, but rumors were usually enough in Rochambeau.

  “Yes, ma’am, I sure do. How is she?” He didn’t sound in the least bit remorseful. But why would he? He’d departed for college a week later, and she’d been the one left behind to pick up the pieces.

  “Evie’s great,” Mama announced. “Been living in Florida, but she’s home now. Maybe you can talk to her while you wait. Y’all can catch up.”

  Evie’s stomach plummeted to her toes. Oh no. No, no, no. What if she went into the bathroom and refused to come out? Or just quietly slipped out the back door and disappeared for a couple of hours? It was time for her lunch break, and—

  Coward. Evie stiffened her spine. She wasn’t running away. If it wasn’t now, it’d be some other time. She couldn’t avoid him forever. And far better to get this over with in public, while she could maintain her dignity and show the good people of Rochambeau there was nothing left to talk about.

  “That’d be great,” he said in an aw shucks way she didn’t buy for a second. He might talk smooth and act all friendly and gee-whiz ma’am, but she knew better. God, did she know better.

  He was nothing more than a self-centered, arrogant jerk with a giant sense of entitlement and no mercy for those he considered beneath him. A little corner of her heart still hurt like it had been yesterday, but she ruthlessly stomped on the feeling until it stopped.

  “Good,” her mother said as if it were the best idea in the world, her gaze sweeping the shop. “She was here just a minute ago. Evie? Evie?”

  “She went in the back,” Stella offered with what Evie was convinced was a hint of glee. Bitch.

  Right. There was nothing Evie could do except face this particular blast from the past. Because there was no way on earth she’d ever let Matt Girard humiliate her again. She’d learned the hard way, but at least she’d learned.

  “I’m right here, Mama,” she said, whipping off her smock and pushing back the curtain.

  CHAPTER TWO

  MATT STILL DIDN’T KNOW WHAT he was doing at the Cut ’N Curl, but the second Evie Baker walked out of the stockro
om, he felt as if someone had dropped a truckload of cement on his head. He hadn’t seen her in ten years, not since the night he’d taken her virginity in the back of his daddy’s Cadillac.

  He’d never forgotten that night, never forgotten what a dickhead he’d been. He didn’t expect she had either, which is why he wasn’t surprised that she was currently glaring daggers at him.

  Little Evie Baker. Not so little anymore.

  He remembered the first time he’d ever seen her, when he’d been seven and his mama had first gotten sick. Norma Breaux always brought Evie with her when she came out to Reynier’s Retreat. He hadn’t known any of the kids in town because he’d been in private school then, but when Evie didn’t scream after he dropped a worm on her, he knew he’d found someone fun to play with. His sister always screamed and hated even a speck of dirt to land on her pretty clothes, but Evie had been as good as any boy when it came to getting dirty.

  Matt’s temples throbbed. He’d never wanted to hurt her, God knew, but he’d been in a bad place back then. No, he’d been an arrogant, entitled prick. He knew he shouldn’t have touched her when she’d asked, but he’d done it anyway.

  By that point, he’d been trying for years to ignore the way she’d changed—one day she started wearing dresses and blushing whenever he looked at her; the next she had breasts and curves and he had no clue what to say to her anymore. But then she was there, standing before him with her eyes flashing and her cheeks flushed, and she’d just been so damn pretty, and so damn exciting, that he’d taken her hand, led her out to his daddy’s car, and drove them away from the party they’d been at.

  He’d felt guilty every moment since, but it was simply another thing to add to the heap of guilt inside his soul. Later, when he’d gotten his head on a bit straighter, he’d thought about calling her to apologize, but too much time had passed. By then he’d figured it was better to let it stay in the past.

  A mistake, he thought now. This woman was not happy to see him. There was no pushing aside old mistakes, no going back to a simpler time when they’d gone fishing for crawdads together or sat in a tall tree and watched the gators glide through the bayou.

  This Evie Baker was not in a forgiving mood, and he didn’t blame her at all.

  Still, a very male part of him couldn’t help but appreciate her on another level. The level that had gotten him in trouble in the first place.

  Evie had been a lovely teenager, but she’d blossomed into an even lovelier woman. And he shouldn’t do a damn thing about it, no matter how much he might want to. If he’d met her in a bar, he’d do everything he could to get her to go home with him.

  But she was not a woman in a bar, and he owed her more than that. Matt focused on her pissed-off posture and flashing eyes.

  “Evie.” She stopped in front of him, arms crossed.

  Jesus. She was all curves and sleek skin in a pair of cut-off jean shorts and a body-hugging pink tank top. Her legs were still long, still built to hug a man’s waist.

  Shit. He didn’t need to be thinking that way.

  And yet, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t help it. It was the first thought that sprang to his head when his gaze glided over those legs. He’d kick himself for it later. Right now, he had a bigger problem: keeping his body from responding the way it wanted to at the memory of the last time he’d seen her.

  She’d been naked, her lush form arrayed before him, her skin hot, silky, and damp with sweat. She’d been so damn sweet, so innocent. And it’d been a long time since he’d had any sweetness in his life.

  “Hi, Matt.”

  “You’re looking all grown up.” He could have bit his tongue off when her eyes narrowed.

  “It’s what happens in ten years.” Hostility swirled around her like a tornado.

  He stretched his arm along the back of the chair beside him with a casualness he didn’t feel. New tactic. “So how have you been?”

  “Great. You?”

  She was smiling now, but he wasn’t fooled. Violet eyes looked back at him with a mixture of embarrassment and fury. He’d done that. He’d put that look on her face, and it bothered him more than he could say.

  God, he had a lot to answer for.

  “Great,” he said, parroting her like an idiot. “Why don’t you have a seat?”

  She shook her long black ponytail. He remembered wrapping his fists in that hair and tugging when they’d been children. And then he remembered wrapping his hands in her hair for a completely different reason.

  “Thanks, but I can’t stay. It was nice to see you.”

  “Wait a minute,” he said as she moved away. She stopped and half-turned toward him. He glanced at the ladies watching them. They were just out of earshot, but he leaned forward and pitched his voice lower anyway. “What’s your hurry? We’ve hardly said two words to each other.”

  He knew the reason, but he didn’t want her to go. Not yet. There was something about having her near, something that sparked inside him and made him feel somewhat human again. He didn’t know why, and he didn’t know if it would last.

  But he liked it. For the first time in months, he felt as if he could breathe again. As if he’d come home for real instead of simply going through the motions.

  She sighed and turned to face him completely. He got the distinct impression she was calling up some sort of internal armor system in order to deal with him. Definitely not what he was used to in a woman—but then nothing about his relationship with Evie had ever been normal.

  Usually, with other women, he was the one with the internal armor. He was the one who pulled away, because he had nothing to offer beyond a few stolen nights before he was back out on a mission.

  But dealing with Evie felt completely different.

  Her chin thrust out, her eyes flashing cold fire. “It’s not personal. I’m just busy. And there’s really nothing to say, is there?”

  Matt stood. Hesitated when she seemed to shrink away from him. His height and size could be intimidating, he knew, but he hadn’t expected that reaction from her of all people. As if she were afraid of him. She’d never been afraid of him, even when he’d jumped out from behind a tree and screamed bloody murder. She’d shrieked, of course—and then she’d socked him.

  But this, here and now… it loosened any remaining restraints on his tongue.

  “I’m sorry.” He hadn’t known quite what he would say if he ever saw her again, but that was certainly the least of what he owed her.

  “For what?” The question surprised him, though perhaps it shouldn’t. Evie Baker never had liked to show any weakness. She glanced over her shoulder to see if anyone was listening, lowered her voice another notch. “I came on to you, remember?”

  At least she didn’t pretend not to know what he was talking about. He admired that. And he also admired the way she always tried to take responsibility, even when it wasn’t her fault. It was frustrating as hell, but so was Evie. She’d never backed down from a challenge in all the time he’d known her.

  Still, she wasn’t the one at fault here. He was. “Yeah, but you probably didn’t expect me to brag about it.”

  Anger slid through him. He’d been such an arrogant young fuck back then. Stupid. She’d given him her innocence, and he’d trampled it in the dirt like it was his due. He still had no idea what he’d been thinking when it was over and he’d swaggered back to the party.

  He was leaving in a week, going off to West Point, and he remembered being so ready to escape. Ready to get the hell out of his father’s house and be his own man. He’d been drunk, stupid, and filled with a rage at the world that he couldn’t explain.

  Evie shrugged. “What guy wouldn’t have told his buddies, especially at that age? It was a long time ago.”

  He stepped closer, lowered his voice as Rachel Mayhew turned off the taps to her latest shampoo customer and cocked an ear in their direction.

  “Maybe so, but I shouldn’t have done it. We were friends and then—”

 
Her gaze snapped to his. “Were we? Were we ever?”

  He felt her words like a barb to his heart. He deserved them. “I thought so. But I fucked up. I’m sorry.”

  He didn’t bother to tell her he’d been falling-down drunk when he’d spilled the details of their evening to his friends. It wasn’t an excuse.

  She drew in what he assumed was a calming breath. And then she lifted those lashes and speared him with her pretty eyes again. “You did fuck up. Bad. But nobody gave you a hard time about it. They reserved that for me.”

  Shame rolled over him. “I know the guys made your life hell after I left.”

  “Not just the guys. Oh, they thought I was an easy mark, that’s certain. But the girls weren’t particularly nice either. Well, some of them. It hurt. A lot.”

  Before he could even begin to answer, to find the right thing to say, she seemed to shake her head as if clearing away the fog of pain and anger. “Ancient history though. Over and done and not your problem.” She glanced down at her bare wrist. “Oh, hey, look, it’s time to get going. As much as this little reunion has buoyed my spirits, I gotta run.”

  “Evie—”

  The door chimed then and a petite blond woman barreled inside, stopping Evie in her tracks and cutting off any further apologies Matt tried to make.

  He recognized her cousin right away, but Julie Breaux didn’t even spare him a glance.

  “Hey, Evie, can you see if there’s room to fit me in? I want to get my highlights done before the party tonight.”

  “Sure, let me check the schedule.” Evie turned away and the woman started to follow, then came up short as if she’d just realized he was there.

  If looks could freeze a guy in his tracks, he’d be stuck here into the next millennium. Julie arched an eyebrow, coolly assessing him.

  “Heard you got a whole battalion captured out there in Iraq.”

  Jesus. There was nothing this town didn’t blow out of proportion. Though what he usually did for the military was top secret, the Department of Defense propaganda machine had to work overtime once the Freedom Force took to the airwaves with news of their captives. By the time the DoD was done, Matt and his team looked like average G.I. Joes on a rescue mission rather than part of an elite counterterrorism unit.