Читать книгу The Sex Files - Jule McBride, Jule Mcbride - Страница 7

“WELL, KATE,” Oliver Vargo was saying conversationally as he leaned forward in a white-upholstered sectional chair. “I can hardly take personal credit for bringing psychological talents to law enforcement. It’s really nothing new.”

“Please don’t be modest, Mr. Vargo,” replied Kate Olsen, the redheaded interviewer for NBC’s Rise and Shine show and talking head for the evening news. She chuckled knowingly. “The psychological profiles you’ve produced for the FBI have led to the arrest of countless felons, including many who committed crimes previously deemed unsolvable.”

“Psyching out the other guy is as old as crime itself,” Oliver returned agreeably.

“Yet some experts devalue criminal profiling, saying it’s not an exact science.” Before he could respond, Kate turned toward the camera, beginning a slow segue toward the commercial break. “For anyone tuning in, our guest today is FBI agent Oliver Vargo, whose first book How Evil Thinks was one of the longest-running nonfiction bestsellers ever on the New York Times list.” Leaning, Kate lifted a hardcover from a glass-topped coffee table and held it up, her manicured fingers bracketing Oliver’s photograph. “His latest book, Catching Crooks the Old-Fashioned Way, promises to be every bit as successful.

“In a moment, we’ll need to pause for a commercial break,” she continued, returning her gaze to Oliver, “but before we do, what can you tell us about your fascinating book?”

As a wry smile curled the corners of his mouth, his dark eyes twinkled in a way that wasn’t lost on the camera. “In ten words or less?” he joked, playing the audience like a natural while clearly noticing a cue from someone off-camera, probably a producer.

“Don’t worry,” said Kate with an encouraging laugh. “We’ll have time after our break, too!”

“My book defends criminal profiling,” Oliver said, turning serious. “Something that—as you’ve pointed out, Kate—has been debunked by many as mumbo jumbo.”

“Even though the methods are successful?”

“Yes.” He continued in a deep voice that quickened with passion for his subject. “Detractors argue that profiling is a new method for solving crimes, but it’s really more tried-and-true than scientific evidence we readily accept, such as fingerprinting, or analyzing hair and fiber samples.”

“Fascinating,” Kate murmured, her eyes intent. “For those who are just tuning in, what exactly is profiling?”

“Profiling is the old-fashioned way to solve crimes,” explained Oliver.

“And what does it take to become a profiler?”

“Too much schooling,” he joked. “Profilers have dual college degrees in law enforcement and psychology. Some, like me, go on to get post-graduate degrees. Technically, I’m a licensed psychologist.”

“Wow,” she said.

“Yes,” he agreed, “it is exciting. When we profile, we’re playing armchair detective, much as Sherlock Holmes did. We’ll slowly walk through a crime scene, pretending we’re the criminal, to get into his or her mind—”

With every word, Oliver became more intense; dark eyebrows met, accentuating a high forehead from which black, wavy hair was slicked back. “We try to think as the criminal thinks. See as the criminal sees. Feel as the criminal feels.”

For once in Rise and Shine’s three-year run, Kate looked as if she hadn’t heard a word her interview subject was saying. She looked mesmerized by Oliver’s face. “There’s something else our audience—and particularly women—want to know,” she murmured when he was finished.

He blinked, as if talking about work had transported him to an alien planet and he was only now returning. “Yes?”

“We know you deal with the darker side of human nature, Mr. Vargo, but how about the lighter side?”

Now he looked uncertain. “Lighter side?”

Kate smiled indulgently. “Yes, lighter side. What do you do for fun?” When he still seemed mildly stupefied, she plunged on. “According to your biography, you’re unmarried and based in Quantico, Virginia, near the FBI’s profiling headquarters where you usually work.”

“True, but I’ve been traveling this year, Kate, and for the next six weeks, I’m assigned right here in New York City. I’ll be here during Thanksgiving and Christmas.”

“As hard as you’re working, and with so much travel, do you plan to take time off for the holidays?”

“Sure. Although my folks are leaving the country for Christmas, and my sister’s going on vacation with a friend. I guess I’ll…” He looked stumped.

“You mean there’s no special someone?”

DURING THE PAUSE that followed, the tall blonde who was watching the show resituated herself. Tucking a black nightie beneath her behind, she squirmed, grimacing at the discomfort of the thong she wore. Nestling against the satin headboard of a king-size bed at the Plaza Hotel, she groaned when the movements caused her breasts to spill from the scooped neckline, then she felt tears sting her eyes. She wished she could cry, but she hadn’t since….

She pushed the thought away. One manicured thumb was on the remote control; the other tapped the cover of Oliver Vargo’s new book. “Well, c’mon,” she whispered, tossing her head to dislodge a lock of honey-streaked hair that fell over a brown eye, obscuring her vision. “Is there someone special?” If Oliver had a lover it could interfere with her plans to contact him.

Kate Olsen turned to the camera again. “Sorry, but we’ll have to wait until after the commercial break for the answer. So don’t go away. When we come back, agent and author Oliver Vargo, tells us if his personal life’s as adventurous as his professional one!”

Glancing down, the viewer surveyed his picture. “I would recognize him from a million miles away,” she murmured, sucking in a shaky breath. After all, she’d long been a fan of his work, and she’d been tailing him around Manhattan all afternoon, wondering how she should approach him.

She continued blinking, hoping her tears might start to fall but she was still in shock. Yesterday a bullet had almost claimed her life, and now she desperately needed Oliver Vargo’s help. Already, she’d been having a rough day when, last night, she’d gone to the home of her fiancé—only to find him in bed with another woman, a woman she’d recognized from a wanted poster as a bank robber. As unbelievable as the events seemed, they’d really happened. The woman’s name was Susan Jones. Even worse, the man in question, Miles McLaughlin, her fiancé, was an FBI agent.

“Incredible,” she whispered now, perspiration beading on her upper lip.

As soon as she’d entered the bedroom, Susan Jones had rolled away from Miles—they’d been making love—grabbed his revolver from a bedside table and aimed at her heart. She’d frozen, standing there like a deer caught in headlights, wondering what her fiancé was doing in bed with this woman. Shock, betrayal and terror were rippling through her when she heard the distinctive sound of Susan’s voice as she turned to Miles and said, “What’s she doing here?”

Then the bullet had exploded, splintering the wood of the door frame near her head. She’d whirled in terror, hitting a hallway first, then a staircase. She was at the downstairs door when she heard the pa-choo of a second shot. She hadn’t looked back. Her heart hammering, she’d kept running. And she’d been running ever since.

She’d been so shocked, so scared, that an hour had passed before she completely registered what she’d seen. It was astonishing enough that she’d seen an FBI agent in bed with a bank robber. Devastating, since she’d been engaged to him. But when she’d calmed down, she’d registered the open suitcase she’d seen shoved under the bed. Money had been stuffed into the case, no doubt from the bank heist for which Susan Jones was wanted. Was her fiancé—ex-fiancé—she mentally corrected—involved in the woman’s crimes? And why hadn’t she seen through him?

She hated men, she thought now, shivering. Yes, this betrayal was the last straw. A woman had nearly killed her, true. But ultimately, a man was responsible for what had happened—and she was going to make him pay. Oliver Vargo was the perfect man to cast in the role of Avenging Angel, too. Now she was glad to feel her eyes stinging again. She’d felt so stunned, she hadn’t yet been able to have a real cry, and it was yesterday that the shots had been fired. Right now, yesterday felt like a century ago.

Despite her terror, every time she looked at Oliver Vargo, something inside her melted and she wanted to reconsider her vendetta against men. She shivered again. If not for her profession, none of this would have happened. Hadn’t her mother been devastated, saying what she did for a living was too dangerous? But who could have foreseen that she’d meet a crooked FBI agent while she was working?

“I’ve got to find someplace safe to go when I check out,” she murmured.

But where? It would be hours until Oliver Vargo got off work and she could approach him for help. She didn’t have time to dress and try to catch him leaving the TV studio. She wasn’t sure she trusted him, but she did need help from a smart FBI insider who knew how to use a gun and who wouldn’t mind protecting a woman. And Oliver looked honest, though appearances could lie. Still, because she knew his work, and because Miles was an agent, she felt safer going to Oliver Vargo than to the police…

Opening the cover of his book, she skimmed the bio, noting his degrees in law enforcement and psychology, an explosive ten-year career and the long list of criminals he’d caught. He was unmarried and lived alone, just as Kate Olsen had said, but the picture showed him lying in a hammock in front of a family-size home. He was reading a book.

“The New York Public library,” she whispered, feeling a jolt of relief at the idea. When she left the Plaza, she’d lose herself in the crowds at the library, read Oliver’s book, and then go to Grand Central Station. The Forty-second Street entrance was across from the midtown FBI office where Oliver worked, and she could leave the duffel in one of the train station’s lockers. She’d have to be careful, of course. But at five o’clock, when Oliver left work, she’d find out where he was staying and approach him.

“And we’re back from commercial break!” Kate Olsen’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “We’re here with FBI agent, Oliver Vargo, the bestselling author of How Evil Thinks and Catching Crooks the Old-Fashioned Way. “Well, Oliver,” continued Kate. “We know you’ve been touring the country, training other FBI agents to profile criminals as well as promoting your new book. But why are you in New York?”

“To help work out kinks in the bureau’s new, state-of-the-art computer software,” he explained.

“Could you tell us more?”

“Sure. Our new computer software is called Quick Composite. As I mentioned, profilers assemble facts about possible suspects, imagining how the criminal thinks and feels. Now, with Quick Composite, the FBI will be able to input that information into computers and generate pictures of suspects.”

“Pictures?”

He nodded. “Very similar to photographs. We’ll know what the criminal might look like when we find him. Or her. As we work, we deduce facts about the suspect—such as gender and race. Height and weight. Hair and eye color. Now, as we input those facts into Quick Composite, a computer will produce a picture.”

“Like a police artist’s sketch?”

“Exactly, Kate. Except this is more sophisticated. The image is more accurate and of photographic quality.”

“Amazing,” said Kate dreamily, as if captivated. “Do you really think a picture of a suspect—one generated by inputting facts about a crime—might be identical to that of a real criminal when you catch him?”

“Or her,” Oliver added. “And yes. Absolutely. Our computer-generated pictures should resemble the mug shots when we arrest criminals. It sounds amazing, but new technology is emerging all the time.”

Kate’s eyebrows knitted. “But how does using new technology fit with your desire to solve crimes the old-fashioned way?”

He chuckled, as if to say she had a point. “It doesn’t, Kate. I’m of the old school. And I’m here in New York to play devil’s advocate with the team creating the Quick Composite software. My job’s to point out whatever the new technology misses.”

“And then?”

He sounded relieved. “I’m going home to Quantico.”

“Where your personal life is as intriguing as your professional one?”

Oliver shook his head. “Believe me,” he joked, “I get enough excitement at the office. It’s my younger sister, Anna, whose personal life sizzles. She lives here in New York City, and she’s a statistician for…” He paused to build anticipation. “The Sex Files.”

“The Sex Files?” the viewer whispered.

The annual report of fun statistics about North Americans’ erotic behavior was being advertised all over Manhattan—on the sides of city buses and in the subway. Scheduled for its usual Christmas release, the magazine-style booklet was fashioned to look like a red-and-green file folder and was the perfect stocking stuffer.

“Can you give our audience a sneak preview?” urged Kate.

“It’s top secret. I can only say that this is the best Sex Files yet, and you should plan to race out and get your copy.”

As she watched him plug his little sister’s work instead of his own, the viewer’s heart missed a beat. “Family values,” she whispered. “A good sign.” He might be work obsessed, but he seemed to possess integrity.

“Well,” said Kate, wrapping up, “next time you join us on Rise and Shine, I want you to do us a big favor.”

“Anything for you, Kate.”

Kate grinned. “I want you to take the statistics from the Sex Files—all the facts about the most erotic behaviors in North America—and run the information through the FBI’s new Quick Composite software.”

Catching her drift, Oliver chuckled. “I see. You want me to generate photographs, showing what the sexiest man and woman would look like—if they existed?” Before Kate could respond, he continued. “I’ll be glad to, Kate, but before saying goodbye to our audience, I’d like to add that I usually find women the way I solve crimes.”

When Oliver Vargo looked into the camera, the blond woman shivered again, and for the first time since last night, it wasn’t from fear, but from the man’s dark, penetrating gaze. Her belly clenched and her body tingled. “I’d love to see the effect you have on women in real life,” she whispered. Even though he was on TV, her erogenous zones ached. If only her reaction to him could be as simple as raw lust…

For a second, she indulged the feeling, forgetting her troubles. No one had tried to kill her. She could go home and to work and use her bank and credit cards. She was wearing clothes that fit, too. Clothes she now imagined Oliver Vargo removing….

“I find women the way I solve crimes,” he repeated, then added, “the old-fashioned way.”

Did he mean he enjoyed missionary-style sex? Or taking a woman from behind? Or just cuddling, holding hands and kissing?

She shook her head to clear the thoughts. No doubt anything sexual with the man would be great, but at the moment, she had other needs. Even if she didn’t totally trust him, she was going to have to ask for his help.

“OH, C’MON, Big Brother,” Anna Vargo begged the next day at noon, seating herself on Oliver’s desk and digging a hand into an Au Bon Pain bag, pulling out two sandwiches. “Kate Olsen’s idea was inspired! All I want you to do is run the Sex Files statistics through your Quick Composite software.”

Oliver groaned, staring at the computer screen, which was running a list of the country’s most wanted criminals. “I’m working.”

“Be a sport,” she coaxed, unperturbed by his lack of immediate compliance. “I brought ham and Gouda on rye with hot mustard.” She waggled the sandwich in front of him. “Your favorite. And a double mochaccino. Besides, if you don’t help me, I’ll call Mom and Dad and tattle.”

“They’re in Utah. Besides, bribery’s illegal,” he retorted, taking the sandwich and unwrapping it. “You seem to forget you’re talking to an FBI agent.”

“Yeah, right. One I’ve seen in house slippers.”

As he bit into the sandwich, she flashed a smile, her teeth as straight and white as her brother’s. She had his black, wavy hair, too, although she dressed more stylishly, wearing trendy, thick-framed, black glasses and a tailored, front-zippered black leather jacket with black jeans. Oliver was wearing wide-waled corduroys and a white shirt.

He said, “I don’t own house slippers, Anna.”

“I was speaking metaphorically,” she quipped, taking a healthy bite of her own sandwich and washing it down with a gulp of latte. “That’s the problem with law enforcers, you know,” she chided. “You have no imagination. You’re too literal.”

“We have imaginations,” Oliver countered, pretending to be wounded even though his dark eyes were sparkling.

“Oh, really?” Anna didn’t look convinced as she glanced through a glassed-in window of her brother’s office at a sea of open-concept cubicles. “Gray was an inspired choice. All you G-men are regular Martha Stewarts.”

“My office in Quantico is colorful,” Oliver defended. “This space is only temporary, Anna.”

“Okay,” she conceded. “But everybody else, besides you, has a gray cubicle. Which only goes to show that you don’t fit in, Big Brother. Face it, you’re a renegade. A rebel.” Her voice was rising. “A man who’ll—”

“Run your Sex Files through my Quick Composite software?”

“It’ll only take a minute, Ollie,” she urged, polishing off the first half of her sandwich and reaching for the rest. “Everybody at the office wants to know what North America’s most erotic guy looks like. And you’re the only one who can show us.”

Grinning, he opened his arms wide.

She rolled her eyes. “You? Oh, please.” Reaching into the pocket of her leather jacket, she pulled out a CD. “Here. Just stick this in your ROM.”

As if he could deny Anna anything. She was the only woman on earth who could get away with calling him Ollie. “That’s the new Sex Files?” Oliver queried, pretending to hedge as he continued eating, but only because he loved teasing her. “You’re going to get me fired, you know.”

“Never.” She smirked. “You’re too good at your job.”

“Pride goeth before a fall.”

“Oh, don’t get puritanical.” She groaned. “From the way those sparks were flying on Rise and Shine, I—and everybody else—was imagining how you and Kate Olsen must have gone at it after you finished taping that show yesterday.”

“Did not,” he said.

Not that Kate Olsen hadn’t tried. Practically salivating, she’d come into the dressing room without knocking, and when she’d found he was only changing shirts, not pants, she’d looked seriously disappointed. She’d propositioned him, too. Reaching over and cupping his privates was about as direct as it could get.

Why he hadn’t gone for it, Oliver couldn’t say. But ever since he’d finished building his dream home near Quantico, women hadn’t held the same appeal. He figured it was because he was starting to look for something more than just sex. For somebody who intrigued him enough to share a life with. Or maybe, perish the thought, he’d just been too damn tired.

Between giving workshops on profiling, traveling to scenes of unsolved crimes around the country and promoting the new book, he’d been in fifty cities in the past twenty-five days. He’d lived in a string of hotels he didn’t even want to contemplate, and now he was having trouble sleeping in New York because of the noise.

At least Anna was leaving tomorrow. He loved his sister, and was sorry they wouldn’t be able to visit during most of his stay, but it wasn’t as if she didn’t visit Quantico on weekends. His New York assignment had unfortunately coincided with a vacation she’d planned with her boyfriend, Vic, a photographer for the Sex Files. Since this year’s Sex Files had been put to bed, the two had angled for—and gotten—a six-week unpaid leave. After they left for the Virgin Islands, Oliver could move from his hotel into their tiny—but quiet—West Village apartment.

And then he could finally sleep, providing their wily black cat, Midnight, let him. At least there’d be no more wake-up calls, intrusive maids and newspapers shoved under his door. Glancing around the office, Oliver decided the only thing worse than hotels was the new paperless FBI.

Like every large company, the FBI was deciding that hard-copy records took up too much space. Data was being transferred to computers, then destroyed. Trouble was, there was a huge margin for error in relying on electronic information. When Oliver’s e-ticket from L.A. to New York wasn’t at the airport, for example, Oliver had to buy another ticket that cost the agency—and ultimately the taxpayer—twice the price of the initial ticket.

The flight was a nightmare, too. Every time Oliver boarded an airplane, the seats got smaller and the food tasted more like plastic. How flight attendants survived, he’d never know. He sighed, thinking of the wanted posters usually displayed in airports and post offices. This week they were being recalled, soon to be replaced by an easier-to-read format. If you asked Oliver, it was all busywork, generated by people who weren’t good enough agents to actually solve crimes.

“You still here, Oliver?” Before he could respond, Anna added, “You know that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, right?”

“Good thing my name’s not Jack.”

She nodded at a blond man in an expensive suit wending his way through the cubicles. A distinctive birthmark stained his left cheek. “That’s Miles McLaughlin, right? He looks like Don Johnson on the Miami Vice reruns.” She paused. “And you’re right. He also looks like a jerk.”

Oliver eyed the head of the Information Systems Department, brainchild for the paperless FBI and co-creator of the new Quick Composite software. “What tipped you off? That he’s wearing sunglasses inside the building?”

Anna laughed, contemplating a tall, massively built black man with a shaved head who was as nattily dressed as Miles. “Yep. His sidekick looks like an African-American Bruce Willis.”

“Kevin Hall.” He was the other half of the Quick Composite team. “In their honor, I’m calling my next book Disappearing Evidence. Or maybe the Virtual FBI…”

“What about FBI Dot-Com?”

“Clever. They’re referring to this place as the E-Bureau.”

Anna giggled. “Really?”

“Really.”

“You sound cynical. I thought you backed the bureau all the way.”

Oliver had done so publicly, but for every criminal caught by new methods, others roamed free and, as far as he was concerned, the agency’s E-Bureau was siphoning manpower. Destroying hard-copy records was crazy. “You should see what’s happening downstairs.”

“That bad, huh?”

The basement was in pandemonium. On the first floor, files from open cardboard boxes were being scanned into a central database. Upstairs, Miles and Kevin were holding meetings, announcing that in the new global economy, evidence was going to become superfluous. “J. Edgar Hoover’s probably rolling over in his grave,” Oliver muttered. He slugged back a last gulp of mochaccino just as lightning flashed, illuminating the entrance to Grand Central Station.

“Big Brother,” Anna said, shaking her head, “you look grim. I think Kate Olsen hit the nail on the head.” Laughing, her eyes twinkling, Anna reiterated Kate’s words. “‘We know you deal with the darker side of life, Mr. Vargo, but what about the lighter side?’” Pausing, Anna offered her best dumb-doofus expression, then lightly mocked her brother, saying, “Duh? Lighter side? Fun? What’s that?”

Oliver couldn’t help but smile.

“Which brings me to something else,” she plunged on. “While I’m in the Virgin Islands, promise me you’ll meet some people. I’m leaving phone numbers for all my girlfriends who developed crushes on you when they saw you on TV. They all want you in the worst way.”

“So, it was you who put all those condoms in my wallet.”

“Who did you think it was? The condom fairy?” He chuckled as she continued. “You seem stressed and overtired, and you look like you need a vacation. Since it’s been so long that you’ve obviously forgotten, sex is the closest thing to a vacation when you don’t have time to go out of town.”

“It hasn’t been that long.”

She leveled him with a stare. “Did you do it with Kate Olsen?”

“None of your business.”

“I didn’t think so,” Anna returned.

Damn. His little sister had been playing matchmaker ever since his arrival. When it came to fixing him up, he was beginning to think there was nothing she wouldn’t try. While he considered calling one of her friends for a date, he looked down at the entrance to Grand Central and a sidewalk teeming with open umbrellas. People without them crowded under awnings, craning their necks to stare at the downpour as if they expected the rain to stop sometime soon. Others lifted coats over their heads and ran through the deluge.

“Have fun while I’m gone,” Anna was saying. “You work all the time, Ollie.”

So did she, and the way Oliver figured it, they were lucky to love their work. Anna’s boyfriend, Vic, was just as passionate and could talk for hours about the various ways photographers manipulated images. Kate Olsen also enjoyed working, so it was too bad she hadn’t rung his chimes. The truth was, lately he’d been rejecting most women. It was as if, deep down, he’d decided on an image of what he was really looking for and now he was waiting for that dream woman to materialize.

“I’ve changed my mind,” Anna announced, drawing Oliver from his reverie as she put the Sex Files CD into his ROM drive. “We’ll get a picture of the sexiest woman first. That’ll get your juices flowing, so you’ll be ready to call all my friends who are dying to meet you.”

This was definitely more intriguing than getting a printout of the sexiest man. “I’m working on the Most Wanted List.”

Anna leaned and jiggled the mouse, moving the cursor. “We can keep that program open,” she assured. “We’ll minimize it and work in another window.” He watched as she hit RUN.

They waited.

And then text filled the screen. Anna groaned in disappointment. “I thought you said we’d get a picture.”

“We will when you scroll down.”

“Oh, but this is good,” she whispered, reading the words. “America’s Sexiest Woman would be named Cameron,” she announced breathlessly.

“And according to this, she’d be tall,” he added. “Five-eleven.”

“Her measurements are thirty-six, twenty-four, thirty-six,” continued Anna. “And she loves wearing sexy clothes.”

“She sounds like a walking cliché.” Still, as he continued reading, there was no denying the pull of arousal. Barely suppressing a shiver, he tried to ignore the tightening below his belt, but it only increased when he read that Cameron never wore panties under her Lycra slacks, body-hugging knit dresses and silk teddies.

When she has to get dressed at all, the text read, Cameron likes to get out and have spicy, erotic adventures. She especially loves the excitement of world travel and meeting new male playmates. She likes a hint of danger, too. Exploring kinky aphrodisiacs is her favorite pastime, and she dabbles in everything from body paints to edible undies. Cameron will do absolutely anything—and everything—to please her man.

Oliver was surprised by how easily he was getting sucked into the fantasy. He prided himself on not being sexist and for liking a woman for her mind, though he thoroughly enjoyed the rest. “If I was a woman,” he commented, dragging a hand through his hair, “I’d hate this kind of thing.”

Anna laughed. “But you’re a man.”

As such, he had to admit that he found this fantasy woman appealing. “Point taken.”

Anna merely shrugged. “Ah. You don’t scroll. There’s a link.” She clicked on the mouse. In the instant before the image of America’s Sexiest Woman filled the screen, she said, “So, this is what Cameron would look like if she were real.”

Oliver felt as if somebody had punched him. Her hair was dark blond, a shade most would call honey, but it was shot through with everything from pale straw to bumblebee yellow to strands of brilliant white. Looking as soft as silk, it hung in loose waves past her shoulders, tightening into curls where the ends rested on a tan cashmere sweater.

His eyes dropped to her breasts. Slightly aroused nipples pebbled under the shirt. In contrast to what he’d felt with Kate Olsen, he found himself imagining cupping those mounds, then slowly stroking their creamy sides and swirling his tongue around their excited, satiny tips. When his eyes traveled toward her face, he couldn’t tear them away. Her neck was so nice. Very round, very creamy. And her face… “She reminds me of film stars from the forties.”

“Veronica Lake, maybe,” Anna agreed.

Parted in a jagged line, her hair framed her face, waving over one of her unusually wide-set dark eyes, lending an air of mystery. Miles McLaughlin hadn’t been kidding about the photographic quality of the pictures generated by Quick Composite, either. Cameron definitely looked real.

And familiar.

He could swear he’d seen her somewhere, but that was probably because she was such a cliché-woman, blond and dark-eyed with a perfect body. Because the picture looked so real, he had to remind himself that she didn’t really exist as he continued surveying her.

Her face was closer to round than oval; her cheekbones high and slanted. Light-brown eyebrows arched on poreless, pink-toned skin. Her mouth was decidedly kissable, the red, glistening lips parted slightly. The velvet tip of a tongue was exposed, touching a very slight, sexy gap between her two front teeth.

“Before you get carried away, Oliver,” murmured Anna, studying his expression, “please remember she’s not real.”

He barely heard.

“I’ll come back when you’re not so bedazzled,” she continued on a sigh, planting a kiss on her brother’s cheek. “I still want to see the sexiest guy. But now I’m late. I’ve got to run to Bloomie’s for another bathing suit to take to the islands. See you for dinner? After work, Vic and I want to take you to Little Italy. We want you to meet a friend of ours. If you hit it off, you can spend time together on Thanksgiving or Christmas. Her family—”

“Is going out of town, just like you and Vic, and Mom and Dad. C’mon, quit worrying about me. I’ll be fine over the holidays. And I’ll get my own dates.”

“When?”

He merely shrugged, his gaze returning to the computer screen. When he looked up again, Anna was gone. Because he turned instinctively toward the window to catch a glimpse of her, he was staring down at Forty-second Street when lightning jagged across the sky, illuminating the entrance to Grand Central Station.

The flash lasted only a heartbeat, just long enough for his jaw to slacken and for his heart to miss a beat as the angry sky turned dark again. He felt sure he was going crazy. But she’d been standing there, hadn’t she? He shook his head in disbelief, but he could swear he’d seen the same woman whose image still filled his computer screen.

“Cameron,” he murmured. But it was impossible. It wasn’t really her. It couldn’t be.

No. The lightning had come as fast as a camera flash. Oliver was far away, too. And besides, Cameron wasn’t even real. She was just a computer-generated image they’d gotten by crossing the Sex Files with Quick Composite.

And yet he could swear he’d seen her standing under an awning, staring up at him. She was exactly the same as the picture in every detail, tall and curvy with blond hair that fell over one eye. She’d been wearing a green raincoat. His mouth went dry as he edged closer to the window. Not a man usually given to flights of fancy, he set his mouth in a grim line as he stared down, his eyes piercing the rain and darkness.

When the lightning flashed again, the woman was gone.