Quinn smiled and nodded.

"Meet me at three o'clock at the main entrance to Lakeside Pointe, then. I usually do a loop up to Montrose Harbor and back, sometimes wander through Lincoln Park Zoo, about ten miles or so. Can you handle that?"

"I can handle it." He let his fingers barely graze the top of her hand and whispered, "See you then."

He was precisely on time, appearing from behind a massive black marble pillar, already grinning.

"Do you need to stretch?" she asked him.

Quinn tried not to look at her below the neck, and God, it wasn't easy.

"Already did. You?"

"I'm ready. Let me know if you can't keep up." She shot him a smile.

They took off side by side down the paved pathway, through the green ribbon of public parkland along Lake Michigan. This afternoon, the water shimmered in the sunlight and absorbed the blue of a cloudless sky. It was hot but less oppressive than the last few days had been.

Once they'd hit a comfortable pace together, Quinn decided he'd risk looking at her. She wore a pair of high-cut running shorts and a torso-length black sports bra. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail. She had nice wide shoulders. And her legs were muscular and trim-the legs of an athlete.

"I like running with you better than running after you," he said.

"Yeah, but I bet it's harder to look at my butt this way." She kept her eyes in front.

"Maybe you should be a detective," Quinn mumbled.

The lakefront was crowded that day, and a steady parade of cyclists, joggers, skaters, and walkers streamed by.

"Do you play any sports, Quinn?"

"Hoops now and then. Pickup hockey. A little soccer with the guys in the neighborhood."

"Where do you live?

"Well." Quinn fell behind her for a moment to let a group run by, then returned to her side. "I live on the North Side now, but I meant the neighborhood where I grew up."

"And where's that?" She glanced over at him. He wasn't even breaking a sweat.

" Beverly. You've probably never even heard of it."

"Sure I have. The stronghold of the Irish South Side. Nineteenth Ward. Alderman Paul Ryan."

Quinn looked at her in shock before it dawned on him. "Oh, yeah, Timmy Burke. How could I have forgotten?"

She grinned at him. "He talked about it sometimes. So how long have you two known each other?"

"Too long. We grew up about a block apart and went to school together, from kindergarten all the way through Brother Rice."

Quinn dropped back again to avoid a bicyclist.

"Having trouble keeping up, Detective?" She increased her pace a bit.

"I'll let you know, Homey."

Audie's head whipped around and she laughed outright. "Homey? That's funny, Stacey."

"Point taken," he said. Suddenly Quinn darted around a dog walker and took off a bit faster. Audie pulled up alongside.

"Are we racing, Quinn?"

"Nope. Just out for a nice jog."

Quinn tugged at the neck of his Police Athletic League T-shirt and jerked it forward over his head with one hand. The gesture struck Audie as an overtly macho thing to do, and as he tucked the shirt inside the back of his running shorts she tried not to look at him below the neck. God, it was hard.

"Don't you worry about skin cancer?" Audie asked. "You're very fair."

"All the time. I wear SPF thirty."

She cast him a sideways glance. He was a soft peach color and covered with pale freckles and light brown body hair. He was lean and hard and she could see the ripple of muscle through his back and shoulders. His upper arms looked powerful. "So how Irish are you, Quinn? Your grandparents or something?"

He laughed and caught her eye. "Them, too. But Da and my mother were both born there. They came over in the sixties. I'm first-generation."

"Oh, I see."

"Do you now?"

Audie chuckled. "No, not really. I don't know much about Ireland. I suppose you're Catholic?"

"I suppose I am. You got something against Papists?"

She blew out air. "No. Are you trying me make me hit you again or something?"

He laughed. "Just making conversation. How about you? My guess would be Presbyterian."

Her mouth fell open and she glared at him. "Why do you say that?" Was it her imagination, or had he just kicked up the pace?

"Well, there's growing up rich in Winnetka. The name Adams. The general upscale North Shore WASP thing you have going on."

"Upscale North Shore WASP thing?" She huffed. "That's pretty insulting, Stacey. If you must know, I'm nothing, really, but my parents were married in the Presbyterian Church. Don't tell me you're prejudiced against Presbyterians?"

This time it wasn't her imagination-he'd just sped up again.

"I've got nothing against Presbyterians in particular, just Protestants in general."

She narrowed her eyes at him and shook her head. "You're mocking me."

It was a marvel to her how slowly his grin spread and how much smug sexuality was conveyed in the gradual curl of his lips. "I'm just playing with you, Homey. It seems you've got a fine sense of humor for a Protestant girl."

She rolled her eyes and made a break for it, turning on the heat now. She began to weave and pivot through the crowd of people, skateboards, scooters, bikes, and dogs, leaving Quinn in the dust. It served the cocky bastard right.

Then he ran right by her.

As she chased him, Audie knew she was being childish. She knew he was teasing her, testing her. She realized she should just turn around and have a nice, peaceful, quiet run home. She didn't need this aggravation.

But instead, she focused on the white T-shirt bobbing along his compact, muscular butt and the really nice set of his shoulders and poured it on.

Just as she reached him, he slowed considerably, and Audie had to twist sideways to avoid slamming into him.

"You're very graceful, Homey. And fast. You play a mean forward, too."

Again he surprised her. A compliment-several of them in a row, in fact.

"Thanks. You're pretty fast yourself." Audie was sweating up a storm now and she wiped her forehead with the back of her hand.

"Here." Quinn tossed the shirt to her and she mopped her face with it. The clean, bracing scent of him nearly made her topple over. She slowed almost to a walk and raised the shirt to her face once more before she tossed it back to him.

"I'd like to talk to your brother sometime soon," Quinn said.

Audie stopped dead. "Drew? Why? You think he's writing the notes?" She placed her hands on her knees and leaned forward, catching her breath. "That's ridiculous."

Quinn grabbed her arm suddenly, pulling her off the pathway before she was flattened by a kid on Rollerblades.

They stood in the grass staring at each other, breathing fast. They'd been sprinting for quite a distance.

"Not necessarily, but I need to check it out."

She nodded, swallowing hard, staring at the muscles in Quinn's chest and his little pale pink nipples. "Drew wouldn't do something like that," she breathed, letting her eyes travel down Quinn's rippled abdomen and then out over the lake, anywhere but at that body! "Anyway, there have been, what, eighteen letters now?" She let out a laugh. "Andrew Adams is incapable of that kind of scheme, Quinn. It would mean coming up with a plan and sticking to it-you know, commitment. Not his strong point."

Quinn took her hand and they walked together across the grass, toward the water, and Audie stared at his striking profile. This man left her bewildered. In a span of thirty minutes, Stacey Quinn had insulted her, aggravated her, mocked her, complimented her, made her laugh, and saved her from harm.

And now he cradled her hand with such tenderness that she couldn't bring herself to pull away. In fact, she found herself moving closer to his side.