LITMIR.BIZ

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the curve of her waist visible beneath the cascade of dark hair.

      The drug hangover must have finally worn off because to Marc’s utter amazement, he felt a familiar throb as if his body wanted to prove that the rest of him wasn’t as damaged as his leg.

      This particular urge hadn’t made an appearance since before the accident. He’d be an idiot to put too much stock in anything right now, but the simple fact that his reactions were still there reassured him.

      “Jeez,” Courtney said as the window shot open, throwing her off balance in the process. The sheers fluttered and she righted herself with a steadying hand on the frame. “Needs oil or something. I’ll add it to my to-do list.”

      Then she vanished into the bedroom.

      Marc didn’t follow, didn’t want to risk connecting the sight of Courtney with a bed, so he hobbled over to the desk instead.

      Modem. Laser printer. Fax-copier-scanner combo.

      None of the equipment appeared to have seen much wear, but that didn’t surprise him. Why wouldn’t she outfit the office in a place she didn’t even open up for air? There was no computer, but that wasn’t a problem. If he’d been thinking when he’d left his mother’s, he would have brought his laptop.

      He hadn’t been thinking about anything but getting the hell out before he killed someone. Starting with his mother.

      Courtney reappeared. “How will this place work for you? I mean, after it airs out, of course.”

      She’d only brought him here because he had made such a pathetic sight getting out of her car. But Marc wasn’t going to dwell on that. Nor would he look a gift horse in the mouth. “This place is good. I work better without distractions.”

      “No distractions here. The admiral works around the yard, but he doesn’t usually come back here. I think he got out of the habit after selling the cottage to Harley.”

      Just then a few pieces of a puzzle clicked into place. “This was Harley’s old house?”

      “I didn’t realize you didn’t know.”

      “I knew about her house, just not that you’d bought it.”

      Harley was the connection between his family and Courtney’s. His mother would have adopted Harley long ago if the State of Louisiana would have allowed it. They hadn’t, so Harley had contented herself with being an honorary family member, solidifying her place during years as Anthony’s girlfriend.

      Until Mac Gerard had come on the scene with all his money. Now Harley brought her husband’s family home for Sunday dinner, too. Anthony didn’t seem to mind. Marc couldn’t begin to explain the situation, didn’t care enough to try.

      But anyone who had known Harley had known when she purchased this place—her first home. And from that moment on, Marc’s visits had been punctuated with stories about whatever work she’d been doing. Any time he had asked, “How have you been, Harley?” he never heard about college achievements or career successes, but her accomplishments around this house.

      “I sanded the floors to the grain before refinishing them,” she had told him proudly. “They gleam like new.

      “I tackled plaster last month. Repaired the damage from some old broken pipe, and now I’m texturing the walls. By the time I’m through, no one will know there’d ever been a leak.”

      Marc glanced around the room, at the bright white, finely textured walls, at the planked floor with the rich pine finish beneath the gleam of polyurethane. Both jobs done with care and attention to detail.

      If anyone had deserved a home, that anyone had been Harley. She had grown up on the wrong side of Courtney’s business—foster care. But if Harley had owned this place, then Marc knew Courtney must have purchased her portion of the property from her brother after Harley had married him.

      He supposed that shouldn’t surprise him, either.

      “Oh, I forgot,” Courtney said. “Let me run up to my house. Be right back.”

      She didn’t give him a chance to reply, just spun around and took off again, leaving the door open behind her. The sound of her footsteps on the flagstones faded, and Marc took the opportunity to scope out the rest of the place.

      The kitchen chewed up a lot of square footage, but as he ran a hand long the smooth finish of the wooden cabinets with their scrolled pewter handles, he could remember Harley talking about the months of work it had taken her to dismantle the cabinetry and refinish the wood. She’d lived without hinges and handles until she’d had the money to purchase the hardware so everything would match.

      Such attention to detail because she had cared so much.

      There were three large windows in the kitchen overlooking what appeared to be another walled edge of the property. Hard to tell with all the foliage. There were a lot of windows for such a tiny place, and he didn’t have any problem imagining why the Harley he had known had been so in love with her home. Secluded. Airy. Traditional. Right up her alley.

      Of course Marc had known the Harley who had been Anthony’s longtime girlfriend. Not the Harley who had left his brother to marry Courtney’s brother. That Harley was a stranger.

      Hurried footsteps through the open door brought Marc around in time to see Courtney reappear, the shallow breathing and high color in her cheeks as if she’d run the whole way.

      Covering the distance to the kitchen, she set a thick file folder on the table. “Lots of reading here.”

      Marc edged closer and flipped open the cover to riffle through the contents.

      Reports. Court documents. Profile pages. Correspondence.

      “How did you get all this?” he asked.

      “It’s the case file from work.”

      Normal rules just didn’t apply to any of the Gerard family. Marc should have seen that coming. Courtney wasn’t playing games. She had already made that clear. But this confidential file shouldn’t be anywhere but in her former office, particularly during an ongoing FBI investigation.

      She seemed to think she could do whatever she wanted to get what she wanted. Marc knew the type. He wondered if Courtney had a clue that he didn’t think much of the way she operated. Or her family. She probably wouldn’t care. She’d tell him to keep his opinions to himself and write him a check.

      “So how do you want to do this?” she asked. “I’ll swap my car before I need to take you home, so any idea when you’re going to want to leave?”

      Marc smiled then, a real smile he didn’t have to force for someone else’s benefit. No, this smile just happened, a memory from days when he’d actually had something to smile about.

      He didn’t want the complication of Courtney Gerard in his life right now, and he certainly didn’t need the complication of his attraction to her. He didn’t like who she was or what she stood for. But compliments of his nuisance family, she was his to deal with for the time being.

      So he would make the situation work for him.

      Folding his arms across his chest, he stared at her and said, “I won’t be leaving until we track down your kid. So why don’t you swing by my mother’s place while you’re out and grab my things?”

      * * *

      COURTNEY STARED AT MARC and blinked stupidly. He was waiting for her reaction. That much she knew.

      But she didn’t have one. Not yet, anyway.

      In that moment, she couldn’t decide what surprised her more —Marc’s declaration to become her guest or the purely physical sensation that dropped the bottom out of her stomach.

      Because she stood close to Marc DiLeo?

      Courtney knew this feeling, though she hadn’t experienced the sensation in a very, very long

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