LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER ONE

      TANSY ORMEROD shivered in the frigid air blasting straight up from the South Pole. Although she’d had four years to get accustomed to the winds that buffeted Wellington she still found them hard to bear. And three weeks before Christmas it should be summer, warm and languorous, calling people to the beaches and the mountains.

      Except that in New Zealand’s capital nothing to do with the weather was ever so easy. The city’s position on the southern coast of the North Island, open to the funnel of Cook Strait and the wild southern gales, meant that its reputation as Windy Wellington was well-earned.

      ‘You’re too thin. And born and bred in Auckland—that makes you a total wimp,’ Rick used to tease.

      ‘So were you.’

      ‘Yes, but I spent my first five years in Christchurch. Now that’s a climate you can get your teeth into!’

      A reminiscent smile curved Tansy’s controlled mouth. She hadn’t expected to miss Rick. He’d been good company and she’d grown fond of him, although he’d only stayed a couple of months. Four months ago he’d gone to find his own destiny, leaving her surprised at the gap in her life.

      That secretive little smile widening, she invited the passers-by to enjoy the mock-tragic ballad she was soulfully singing. Several coins landed in the guitar case at her feet, but not enough. Her gaze roamed further, beyond the lines of cars inching their way forwards.

      He was back.

      Few passers-by noticed the falter in her poignant small voice; the momentary lapse in concentration wasn’t obvious except to her. That same large, discreetly opulent car, with the same man driving it, had sat opposite her for almost an hour on each of the last three days.

      Of course, it meant nothing. Danger here came from people as poor as she, people who preyed on the buskers, not dark men with hard-edged, haughty profiles who could afford cars like that. It was just a coincidence. Perhaps he thought she was haunting him!

      The last chords on her battered guitar summoned a smattering of applause, augmented by the cheerful clunk of coins landing in the case.

      ‘That was a pretty tune. What’s it called?’ a middle-aged woman asked encouragingly.

      Tansy’s expression relaxed, although she kept a close watch on the money. Years spent earning her living as a busker meant she trusted very few, and certainly no one on the street. Yesterday her whole day’s takings had been stolen when she went to the aid of an old man who’d had some sort of seizure close by. She’d only been gone five minutes, giving him first aid until others took over, but the money had disappeared when she got back.

      She should, she supposed with a flash of acid humour, be grateful they’d left the guitar case behind!

      ‘”Lament for a Lover”,’ she said, smiling.

      The woman nodded and moved on. The person who took her place was big enough to block the keen force of the wind. Tansy looked up, one hand pushing back a straggle of carroty hair that refused to stay confined beneath her black beret. Her carefully impersonal smile froze into a travesty.

      It was the man from the car.

      That first shocked glance told her his presence wasn’t one of the meaningless coincidences cities specialised in. Pale green, purposeful eyes scanned her with the cool mastery of a man who knew exactly what he was doing, and why.

      Tall, quite a lot over six feet, which meant he towered above her five feet three, he was the sort of man she instinctively despised, all lean, languid sophistication in a pin-striped suit. Too young and too handsome to be a member of parliament, she thought snidely, using another professional smile to banish a clammy clutch of foreboding in the pit of her stomach. A lawyer, perhaps, or one of the businessmen who flocked to the seat of power to lobby discreetly for their particular field. Although something more fundamental and disturbing than the external indicators of expensive clothes and good looks, something that probably sprang from the unfaltering self-possession she sensed in him, sparked her initial suspicion into positive dislike.

      Whatever, he certainly wasn’t a civil servant.

      ‘A very pretty tune,’ he drawled, looking her over in a speculative fashion that made her bristle with resentment. Slashing brows the same charcoal as his smoothly waving hair gave him an autocratic appearance not mitigated by those chilly, perceptive eyes. He had a good nose for looking down, too.

      A five-dollar bill was half concealed suggestively in his hand. Tansy’s eyes flicked from the note back up to a mouth which, for all its beautiful shape, was set in lines that indicated an unyielding lack of compromise.

      ‘Thank you,’ she said stiffly.

      ‘Have I heard it before?’

      Her normally quick wits deserted her. In a flat voice she said, ‘Often.’

      ‘Ah, yes, in a couple of hundred folk songs about doomed love. I especially liked the tremor in the second verse. It made every woman go all misty-eyed. Who wrote it?’

      ‘I did,’ she snapped, brown eyes suddenly transformed by glittering sparks.

      Anybody with more than a smattering of musical knowledge would have recognised the song for the pastiche it was, which made her grudging respect unnecessary. Anyway, she didn’t have time to bandy words with him now. Unless fifty dollars ended up in the guitar case before the end of the day she’d be late with the rent again.

      If this was an attempt to pick her up, she simply wasn’t interested. As a prelude to dismissal she let her glance drift past the rangy, athletic body, and positioned herself to begin another song.

      ‘Clever girl,’ he said enigmatically. Then, so swiftly that she didn’t for a moment realise what he’d said, he asked, ‘Did you write it for Ricky Dacre?’

      Normally sallow, Tansy felt the last tiny hint of colour vanish from her skin.

      Although she had learned how to deal with anything the streets were likely to throw at her, there was a latent threat in the stranger’s brilliant eyes and chiselled, angular features that tightened the muscles in Tansy’s throat. He might look like some city sophisticate, but a hard determination transmuted the good-looking face.

      ‘Who are you?’ she asked quietly, because it would be useless to deny any knowledge of Rick. This man was here for a purpose.

      ‘I’m his brother.’

      Tansy had to clench her jaw

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