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waist to tug my arm. Furious, I ignored her and pushed forward. She gave my arm another, stronger tug. As I half turned to tell her to knock it off, I was pulled off balance and spun around. But instead of frowning down into Becky’s mischievous brown eyes, I was glaring at a man’s chest. A very nicely built man’s chest. I tilted my head up and met blue eyes, the blue of the night sky just before the sun totally disappears.
    The censure for Becky died on my lips as I got lost a second time staring at the hot man.
    His eyes crinkled slightly at the corners, and he broke the fraught silence with a simple hello. His voice was low and gravelly with an accent I couldn’t quite place. It made my knees weak. I’ve always been a sucker for an accent . Oh, no. I was definitely in for some trouble with this one.

Chapter Two
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    “I hope I didn’t alarm you just now,” said the man in black, “but you looked like you needed rescuing from your dinner party.”
    The kitschy disco ball above the adjacent dance floor started to spin, showering him in twinkling fragments of color as if gift-wrapping him in fairy dust. I felt a giggle bubble to the surface and ruthlessly tamped it down.
    “You’ve come to save me from certain-death-by-boredom? How wonderful.” I stretched out a hand. “I’m Jo. You must be Prince Charming. How nice to finally meet you.”
    “Not quite.” His lips twisted briefly in a wry smile. “Will.” His handshake was good and firm.
    “Jo’s an unusual name for a woman,” he said.
    “It’s short for Josephine,” I admitted. Why had I told him that? I never told anyone that. Even my bank knew me as “Jo”.
    The band had launched into a funky, ironic rendition of an old disco tune and the crowd around us surged with enthusiasm. I had to place a hand against the wall to keep my balance.
    “It’s getting a little crowded in here,” Will said, raising his voice to be heard over the din. “Maybe we should go out to the back porch where we can talk?”
    He pointed toward an open doorway at the back of the dance floor where a heavyset bouncer stood guard, but my attention was turned in the other direction.
    Becky had scuttled back to our table. She and Carol were pointedly looking elsewhere and Roger was fully absorbed in whatever he was saying, but the rest of my colleagues were getting restless. Hunky Bob was pointing to the band with one beefy hand and Kendra’s new blonde highlights glinted as her head swiveled to follow. After four hours of talking nonstop sports, they’d picked now to run out of things to bore people with?
    I gave in to the inevitable. It was one thing to be talking to Will while waiting in line for the bar, quite another to be seen leaving with him. Even if it was only to the back porch.
    As I opened my mouth to decline, a strong jab pushed me off-balance and I lost my footing. Will caught me and held me upright.
    “Are you all right?”
    “I’m fine, thanks…”
    He was holding me at a respectful distance, but really, twenty feet was too close to this man. His beautiful blue eyes had darkened with concern and I felt a strange recklessness. My nosy, gossipy coworkers could take pictures for all I cared.
    “Maybe some air would be good,” I said. The words seemed to tumble out on their own.
    The crowd opened up for us as if by magic and Will steered me out into a relatively private nook another couple had vacated. The porch area was about the size of a four-car garage and enclosed by two-story tall cypress trees. It might have been claustrophobic but for a clever arrangement of potted green ficuses and red Japanese maples that divided the area into smaller, inviting alcoves. Everything was strung with those fat multicolored bulbs that had been big in the Seventies. I’m sure the effect was supposed to be ironic or retro or something, but to me it just looked pretty and festive.
    I knew all this because conversation had ceased between us and I was looking