Dragging a hand through her hair, she read over her orderly notes. She should have held the reins of the conversation from the very beginning. If she was an expert on anything, it was on channeling and steering talk along the lines she wanted. She’d interviewed subjects more closemouthed than Hunter, more hostile, but she couldn’t remember any more frustrating.

Absently, she began to tap the end of her pencil against the table. It wasn’t her job to be frustrated, but to be productive. It wasn’t her job, she added, to allow herself to be so utterly seduced by an assignment.

She could have prevented the kiss. It still wasn’t clear to Lee why she hadn’t. She could have controlled her response to it. She didn’t want to dwell on why she hadn’t. It was much too easy to remember that long, strangely intense moment and in remembering, to feel it all again. If she was going to prevent herself from doing that, and remember instead all the reasons she’d come to Flagstaff, she had to put Hunter Brown firmly in the category of assignment and keep him there. For now, her biggest problem was how she was going to manage to see him again.

Professionally, she warned herself. But she couldn’t sit still thinking of it, or him. Pacing, she tried to block out the incredibly gentle feel of his mouth on hers. And failed.

A flood of feeling; she’d never experienced anything like it. The weakness, the power—it was beyond her to understand it. The longing, the need—how could she know the way to control it?

If she understood him better perhaps … No. Lee lifted her hairbrush, then set it down again. No, understanding Hunter would have nothing to do with fighting her desire for him. She’d wanted to be touched by him, and though she had no logical reason for it, she’d wanted to be touched more than she’d wanted to do her job. It was unprecedented, Lee admitted as she absently pushed bottles and jars around on her dresser. When something was unprecedented, you had to make up your own guidelines.

Uneasy, she glanced up and saw a pale woman with sleepy eyes and unruly hair reflected in the glass. She looked too young, too … fragile. No one ever saw her without the defensive shield of grooming, but she knew what was beneath the fastidiousness and gloss. Fear. Fear of failure.

She’d built her confidence stone by meticulous stone, until most of the time she believed in it herself. But at moments like this, when she was alone, a little weary, a little discouraged, the woman inside crept out, and with her, all the tiny doubts and fears behind that laboriously built wall.