He shook his head and didn’t seem to care enough to turn away from her to the mirror behind him.

She put the bowl down and snapped on latex gloves before stepping up to him and dipping the washcloth. “You have a gash on your cheek.”

“Do I.”

“Brace yourself.”

He didn’t, and he didn’t flinch as she touched the open wound.

Dab…dab…dab…Then back to the bowl, a little tinkling sound as she rinsed the cloth out. Dab…dab…

He closed his eyes and parted his lips, his chest rising and falling evenly. Up this close, she saw the five-o’clock shadow over his straight jaw and each of his long, black eyelashes and all of his trimmed, thick hair. He’d had his ear pierced at one point, but only on the right side, and it had obviously been years since he’d worn anything in the hole.

“What’s your name?” he asked, his voice guttural.

She never gave johns her real fake name, but he wasn’t just a john, was he. If he hadn’t come along when he had, things could have gotten ugly for her: Trez had been away from the club, the bouncers had been breaking up a skirmish out by the bar, and the hall led directly into the parking lot. Work of a moment and those two beefy college types could have had her in a car and…

“You have blood on your shirt,” she said, going back to the bowl.

Great conversationalist, she thought.

His lids lifted, but he didn’t look down at himself. He looked at her. “I have other shirts.”

“I’ll bet.”

He frowned a little. “Does that kind of thing happen to you often?”

With anyone else, she would have shut the question down with a quick of course not, but she felt as though, given what he’d done in the hall for her, he deserved something more truthful.

“Any chance you’re undercover?” she murmured. “Not that you’d necessarily tell me, but I have to ask.”

He reached into the breast pocket of his coat and took out a card. “There’s no way I’m a cop. I’m not as illegal as I used to be, but I wouldn’t be eligible for a badge even if I wanted one. So ironically, you can trust me.”

She looked over what he gave her. The diPietro Group. Address here in downtown Caldwell. Very expensive card stock, very flashy professional logo, and a lot of numbers and e-mail addresses to reach him at. As she put the thing down on the counter, her instincts told her the part about his not being with the Caldwell PD was right. But the trust thing? She didn’t trust men anymore.

Especially ones she was attracted to.

“So does that happen a lot?” he said.