LITMIR.BIZ

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a seat, Jenna.” He took a chair near the fire and gestured for her to do the same. Lord, she was a beauty. He watched her arrange her skirts. There were long legs beneath them, he’d wager. He was a breast man himself, but long legs never hurt.

      Hayden settled back in the chair, stretching his legs out until his boots rested on the fender of the fire place. It was time to get comfortable. “What is it that you’ve come to, ah, ‘discuss’? The race? Did you see it? There was quite the situation out there on the turn. That can be dangerous when a horse goes down, it puts all the riders in jeopardy.”

      Her features settled into a frown of impatient tolerance. “No, Mr. Islington, I’m not here to talk over the race. I’ve come to discuss something else entirely.” “Well, that’s alright by me. We don’t have to discuss anything at all, if you’d prefer not to.” Maybe what she meant was that she was eager to get down to business and not waste time on small talk. Hayden yanked on his cravat and pulled it free. Now they were getting somewhere. “Perhaps you might give me a hand with my boots?” He could already imagine that derriere of hers bent in his direction as she tugged at his boots.

      Unfortunately, Miss Jenna Priess didn’t share his enthusiasm for the activity. “Mr. Islington, let me be blunt. I am not one of your swooning ladies who are dying to get into bed with you. I’m not even here about racing. I’m here because you were once an investigator and I have need of one.”

      Hayden froze. The past had finally reared its ugly head, here in this remote industrial town. He’d not been expecting it, not here, not now, not from this woman he didn’t know. She might as well have said she needed an escort to the moon. Hayden took a swallow of wine to hide his surprise, to marshal his thoughts.

      “I’m an ice racer now, Miss Priess.” His investigation days were long behind him. His celebrity on ice had long since eclipsed any public recollection of what he used to be and for the better, if you asked him. That she even knew he’d been an investigator was nearly as big of a surprise as the initial request. It provoked a host of questions, not the least being how did she know? Perhaps it had been mentioned in passing in an article promoting the race. He’d have to tell Logan to watch the releases more carefully. The other question was how to play this? He had two choices, give in to the curiosity and shock of her request and ask his questions or brush it off with flirtation and innuendo. Perhaps if he flirted hard enough, she would forego her intentions and forget all about wanting an investigator.

      Always err on the side of discretion. It had been his motto during his investigatory days and it had kept him alive more than once. If he’d always heeded that advice, things might have turned out differently. Hayden let slip the slightest of wicked grins and decided to play a little in the hopes of drawing her out. “So you do need me?”

      He got the reaction he wanted. He’d rather expected he would. Even if she wasn’t indifferent to him, she’d come for real business. She had her pride and she would choke on it before she admitted to the possibility of anything more sensual between them. Miss Priess rose abruptly and pulled on her gloves with short, forceful motions, jamming her fingers into them. “Not in the way you are insinuating, Mr. Islington.”

      “I’m not insinuating, I’m clarifying. Do you need me or not?” He rose too, putting himself in close proximity to her, too close to be decent. But he wasn’t a decent man and it was time she knew it.

      “I need an investigator.” Her green eyes flared but to her credit she did not back away. “While we’re clarifying, I understand your naughty innuendo perfectly well, and to that I say, not in a million years.”

      She might have made a striking exit at that point but she’d forgotten where she’d placed her cloak. Hayden spied it first. His grin widened. Her eyes narrowed as she divined his intent and she moved fast to pre-empt it but his legs were longer and he moved faster. Hayden picked up the cloak and held it out for her, knowing full well it would gall her to take even this small gentlemanly gesture from him.

      His hands lingered at her shoulders deliberately as he bent his mouth to her ear, breathing in the welcoming scent of her. “Never is a long time. You might want to keep your options open, Miss Priess.” Lord, she smelled wonderful, like cinnamon and spice, all the good things of a winter kitchen, like a home; nothing at all like the smells he was used to — the sour smell of taprooms, of stale, spilt ale.

      Her neck curved forward as she focused her attention on the fastenings of her cloak — too much attention for a task she’d performed a thousand times before and could likely do blindfolded. Hayden smiled. She wasn’t unaffected by him. He could change her mind about leaving. All he had to do was drop a kiss on the nape of her exposed neck, run his hands down the length of her arms. He shouldn’t. It would not be in his best interest in the long run. There was only trouble and ghosts down that path. It didn’t matter what she wanted him to investigate. He simply wasn’t in that line of work any longer. She would be the persistent sort if he let her stay. What he needed, what he wanted was for her to leave and take her notions of investigating elsewhere.

      “I need an investigator, Mr. Islington.” She turned to face him, effectively removing his hands from her shoulders and taking away his chance for kissing in any case, her words affirming his perception. He’d guessed right about the persistence. He took her hand, encased inside smooth, expensive leather. The woman had good taste and the money to indulge it from the fur at her neck to the gloves on her hands.

      He kissed her knuckles one more time. “I regret to inform you, an investigator is something I haven’t been for a very long time, Miss Priess. It’s a wonder you even knew to ask. How did you know?”

      “A little bird told me.” She pulled at her hand but this time he didn’t let it go. He needed to know. He pressed on with a sly rejoinder.

      “Really? Haven’t they all flown south for the winter?” This was a sharper flirtation than earlier. They were fencing now. She’d encroached on private territory and he was forced to defend it.

      “I haven’t time for your games, sir. I have several mill workers who have gone missing and a father who may be wrongly accused of crimes he has no knowledge of if I can’t find the workers. I came here looking for honest help.” She gave him a derisive look. “And what I found was you.”

      That stung. She had definitely prodded a sleeping bear with her sharp tongue. Hayden folded his arms across his chest, common sense warring with his pride. He was an ice racer now. His investigatory days were over and for good reason. He couldn’t help her, he shouldn’t help her. Yet, that fatal twinge of chivalry, that desire to help others which had driven him into investigation work in the first place was starting to stir. It didn’t help that the woman standing before him was beautiful, proud and desperate.

      Oh she was desperate alright, a classic casebook study of desperation in fact. He’d learned to see the signs. The prouder someone was, the more they tried to hide how desperate they really were. She’d hidden it in her frosty tones, in the fine impeccable quality of her clothes, all of it designed to suggest she was a woman who didn’t need anyone when in reality she needed someone badly. Quite badly if she’d resorted to looking for him.

      “I have obligations while I’m here. My time isn’t necessarily my own.” Hayden iterated his excuses — very valid excuses, he thought. He, Carrick and Logan were slated to be here for the latter part of winter, however long that lasted. Hopefully until the first of March if the ice held. They had the race today, a few races later and then they were using Kendal as a base for other visits nearby.

      “It may not take that long and I can pay you handsomely. Two hundred pounds.” she pushed, her stubborn pride perhaps sensing an opening in what others would have taken as a polite refusal. He’d meant to use his commitments as an excuse. But she saw the hope in it for her. Commitments bound him to the area. He would be here for the duration. She swallowed hard. “Please.”

      Hayden could feel himself starting to prevaricate. There were so many reasons he shouldn’t do this. It went against the grain of common sense. It was a side of his life he’d left behind. And not the least

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