Hand on his holstered weapon, he stepped inside. Everything seemed normal. He walked through the entry, gave a cursory glance into the kitchen, passed the empty den, entered his bedroom and nearly keeled over.

Amber lay in his bed wearing nothing but one of his collared shirts. She was a vision. The shirt was buttoned low, showing off a generous hint of cleavage, making his mouth water. Her long, bare legs peeked from beneath the hem of the too-big shirt. Her red-painted toenails teased him from beneath his navy blanket. And those riotous blond curls fell over her shoulders in gorgeous disarray, making him forget everything but his body’s immediate and obvious reaction.

He blinked, certain she was nothing more than a mirage, but when he opened his eyes, the vision remained. That was when he noticed the rest.

She lay on his bed surrounded by cold hard cash.

“Amber?”

He still didn’t believe she was real, even as every emotion imaginable rushed through him, from desire to relief, shock to gratitude, curiosity back to desire again.

Until she spoke. “Hi, honey, I’m home.” She waved at him.

Anger, the emotion he should have felt first, finally emerged. “What the hell is going on?”

“I know you’re angry and you have every right to be, but before you say another word, look around me. Money. Granted, it isn’t all of it, in fact it’s half. Less cab money and airline fare, but I can explain-”

“Get dressed.” He stepped forward and began collecting the clothes she’d left scattered at the foot of the bed, tossing them at her. “I’ll meet you in the other room.”

He couldn’t think clearly when she was stark naked beneath his shirt, lying seductively in his bed. Memories of making love to her came at him from all sides and he needed his head on straight to deal with her rationally like the sober cop he was now, not the guy who’d rescued her in Vegas and then let her sucker him.

IT COULD HAVE GONE WORSE, Amber thought. She’d seen a flicker of desire in Mike’s gaze before he’d banked it in favor of his anger.

She could work with that flicker. Amber had one goal and one only-she wanted to get back to having a real life, one similar to her life before her father had grown ill. Mike and this sudden marriage offered her possibilities she wanted to explore more fully. And she wanted that chance.

Before he could let his emotions overcome him and refuse to deal with her at all, she slipped on her shoes and headed for the other room.

She found him, arms crossed, staring out the window onto the street below. Her heels clicked on the wood floor and he turned at the sound of her approach.

“I thought I told you to get dressed.”

She glanced down at her sandal-clad feet and the shirt that covered as much as any skirt and top would. “I am dressed.”

“That’s not what I meant.” He exhaled a frustrated sound. “Never mind.” He shifted his hands to his hips. “Go on. Explain.”

She followed his movement with her gaze and paused. “Would you mind taking off your gun first?”

He rolled his eyes and removed his gun, muttering under his breath the entire time. “It’s not like I’d shoot you,” he said finally.

“You look pretty upset, not that I blame you.”

He held up one hand. “Start at the beginning. It was a scam, right?”

“Wrong!” she said, wanting him to understand that from the beginning. “Everything that happened between us was as much of a surprise to me as it was to you. And just as real. I had every intention of being there when you woke up. I’d made coffee and everything, but then I got a call on my cell phone-”

“From who?”

She met his gaze. “Marshall.”

“Your ex-partner. The one who was manhandling you.”

She nodded. “He wasn’t happy you ran him off. All day long I’d had the feeling I was being followed,” she admitted.

“Yet you didn’t say anything.”

“You’d already confronted Marshall. I didn’t want you to have to deal with J.R., too. He’s Marshall’s right-hand man. I thought I saw him and so I ducked into the wedding chapel to get away.”

He exhaled a rough breath. “Go on.”

“Anyway, like I said, that morning, Marshall called my cell. He knew about the money you’d won, and our marriage. He said he’d taken my father from the nursing home and the only way I could get him back was to meet him and hand over the cash or else. I didn’t believe him at first so I hung up and called the home. They said Marshall signed my father out. I wanted my father back and I had no other option but to do as he said.”

He held out his hand. “Give me your cell phone.”

She narrowed her gaze. “It’s in the other room.” She ran back to his bedroom and returned with her phone, handing it to him. “Here. Why?”

“To verify your story.” He turned on her phone and played with some of the buttons. “Incoming at the right time, outgoing immediately after…” He hit another button and placed the phone to his ear.

“What now, Officer?”

“Detective. I’m calling your friend Marshall.” He made a frustrated face and handed her back her cell phone. “It’s disconnected. But at least I can see you aren’t lying, for whatever that’s worth. What did Marshall want the money for?”

“To buy into a poker game. He needed to make some big cash to pay off a guy he owed. He promised he’d win back what I took so I could pay you back in full.”

Mike couldn’t believe the idiocy coming from her lips. “Exactly what guarantee did Marshall have that he’d win at cards? Isn’t that why it’s called gambling? The outcome is uncertain?”

“Unless you know how to count. Look, he’s good at what he does, but something went wrong. He only won back half of what I owe you. But if you remember, you said if you won, half was mine, so technically you’re paid back in full-less the taxi and airline ticket, which I’ll pay back. But I never intended to take any of your money, so I promise I’ll pay you back every cent of the other half, too. Somehow.” She smiled and fluttered her lashes at him, trying to make light of the mess she’d gotten herself into.

“Damn right you’ll pay me back,” he muttered.

“The first thing I did afterward was to come back to your hotel room, but you were gone,” she pleaded, wide-eyed and rushed, obviously hoping he’d buy her story.

“Should I have waited around for my wife to return with the stolen cash?”

She winced. “I’m sorry. I really am.”

“You could have woken me. I stepped in with Marshall once. I would have helped you again.”

She drew a deep breath. “My life is complicated. I wanted to get settled here and make things work with you. I even hoped to eventually move my father here if our relationship was strong enough.”

“But we’ll never know because you didn’t trust me with the first big thing that came up.” And that, Mike thought, hurt more than it should have.

So did the wounded look in her eyes at his bluntly spoken words.

“It’s got nothing to do with trust. It’s habit. I’ve been on my own for so long. I never had my mother, and my father was loving and fun, but he wasn’t always around. Look, I’m not used to turning to anyone. Marshall had my father and it was up to me to save him. But I came back. And I’m here now…”

It wasn’t enough that she distracted him with her long, bare legs and flashing cleavage, but he was drawn to her plea of understanding, to her words. She expected him to buy her crazy story. Crazy enough to be at least partially believable because she had come all the way east to find him.

Still, she was obviously omitting plenty and this woman was trouble. So why was he still so damn attracted to everything about her, including her fantastical tale?

His phone rang, interrupting his thoughts. He walked to the portable and picked up the receiver. “Hello?”

“Mike, it’s Derek. You’ve got to come deal with your father. In person.”

Damn. “What’s he done now?”

Amber watched him, curiosity all over her expressive face.

“He strung cats around our front porch,” Derek said.

Mike shut his eyes and groaned. “Live cats?” Mike asked, his stomach in knots. “Or dead ones?” He crossed his fingers as he waited for an answer.

“Stuffed ones, but that’s not the point. Dammit, Mike, Gabrielle’s going to have a heart attack wondering what he’ll string up next!”

Mike ran his hand through his hair. “I hear you. I’ll be there in an hour.”

He glanced at Amber and knew he had no choice. He wasn’t letting her out of his sight again until he could decide what happened next.

“Get dressed. For real this time,” he said.

“Where are we going?” she asked, wide-eyed.

“To meet your father-in-law.”

“NOBODY CONS King Bobby!” King Bobby Boyd bellowed into his cell phone, yelling at one of the men who worked for him in Texas. He had enough connections in the underworld to do his dirty work, but there was a lady involved and King Bobby didn’t like to hurt the fairer sex. For now, he’d just use those connections to get himself some answers. Now, if she didn’t cooperate, then he’d have to come up with another way to convince her. And that would be a pity.

But for now he’d take things slow. “Listen to the information I got and write it down. Got a pad and pen?”

He waited for the yahoo on the phone to get something to write with and puffed on his cigar.

“Calm yourself down or you’ll have another heart attack,” Emmy Lou said from the bed. “It’s bad enough the doctor told you to cut out cigars and you don’t listen-”

“You ready now, you redneck simpleton?” Bobby ignored his wife’s yammering, waiting for the man on the other end to return to the phone. “Good. Listen up. Blond hair. Curly. Pretty gal. First name’s Amber. Used to work as a concierge at one of the bigger hotels in Beverly Hills. Start with that and see what you can turn up.” He flipped his cell phone closed and took another puff.