When Mason finally lifted his head, Bliss appeared breathless. “Well,” she finally said, her cheeks flushed to a rosy hue, “I’d love to steal away to the bushes with you right now, Mr. Lafferty, but we have duties to attend to.”

“Too bad,” Mason drawled.

Bliss touched him lightly on the nose. “If you’re lucky, I’ll give you a rain check.”

“I’m gonna hold you to it, Mrs. Lafferty.”

They linked fingers and she pulled him back into the interior of the old hotel.

Luke finished his drink, then stared through the windows and spied Katie dancing. She was grinning and looking as if she were having the time of her life. He wondered what kind of trouble she was getting herself into. First the letter—be it a hoax or the real thing—then the phone calls to her house where no one answered. They could just have been someone dialing the wrong number, but he couldn’t shove them out of his head.

Not that he could forget much about Katie Kinkaid. As the two women drifted back into the ballroom, Luke leaned against the rail and glared down at the darkened ravine. Lights from the hotel reflected on the tumbling water of the creek and he thought he saw a lone man, a black figure, slip behind a thick copse of trees.

The hairs on the back of his neck lifted in warning, even though he told himself that he’d imagined the shadow, or, if there really was someone hiding in the undergrowth, it was probably just some kid sneaking booze from the reception or stealing away from his parents’ wary eyes. Luke squinted hard into the darkness and strained to hear a sound—a snapping twig or muttered oath or anything to convince himself that he hadn’t imagined it.

Watch it, Gates, you’re getting paranoid. Still, he studied the night-darkened banks of the creek. The suspicious part of his mind considered vaulting over the rail and following his instincts, tailing whoever it was and finding out if he was up to no good.

“I thought I saw you sneak in.” Katie’s voice startled him.

Luke glanced quickly over his shoulder. She was standing only inches from him, her tiny, flushed face angled up to look at him. Her green eyes sparkled and he wondered if she wasn’t the most intriguing woman in the universe.

“I suspected that you might decide to put in an appearance after all.” Her lips curved into a smile of silent amusement, as if she could read his mind and found his thoughts laughable.

“I think you invited me,” he replied, turning and placing his body between hers and the stranger in the shadows—if there was one. A thin sheen of perspiration added an alluring glow to her skin, which was already smooth as silk.