LITMIR.BIZ

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of times, Shallis had seriously feared they were headed for an instant annulment or divorce.

      She would never forget it, and she would never forget the way Jared had purely wanted to win, the way he’d selfishly wanted to prove he still had power over Linnie’s heart. Shallis had spent nearly an hour with him at the reception, decoying him safely away from Linnie—flirting outrageously, in fact—so she knew how he’d really felt. He hadn’t cared about her sister, and he hadn’t even pretended to care about Ryan’s feelings.

      Winning was all.

      Shifting the power balance in his favor.

      Showing the whole town who was in control.

      And even though he’d lost the game that day and Ryan had won, Jared had finally left the big hotel with the cocky attitude of a cheating gambler who knows his luck’s going to come around again one day, because he has the aces up his sleeve to prove it.

      A part of her wished the subject of the Grand Regency had never come up, but another part of her was very glad that it had. She didn’t want to lose sight of the kind of man Jared Starke really was, beneath the smooth and adept professional facade, beyond the unwanted havoc he wrought with her woman’s needs.

      What the heck was wrong with her?

      “Back to this mystery property tax bill,” she said, making each word clipped and cool. “Will you follow it up for us? My mother is a little concerned that Gram could have been conned into parting with her money to cover some false tax claim.”

      “If you find anything else of a similar nature, bring it in right away, won’t you? You’re right, there are people who’ll take advantage of an elderly woman living alone, and someone comes up with a new scam every week.”

      “I can’t imagine Gram falling for something like that.” Shallis clicked her tongue and sighed between tight teeth. Jared’s gaze seemed to follow the sound of her escaping breath, and her lips felt dry again. She gathered her train of thought and kept speaking. “She still seemed so sharp in her mind, right up until the day of the stroke, and she was very vocal on the subject of men who preyed on naive women. But we’re definitely confused so, yes, anything else we find I’ll bring right over.”

      She stood up and looked deliberately at her watch. It was after noon. “I’m sorry, I need to get back.”

      “I’m about to order in a sandwich lunch.” Jared stood, also. He narrowed his eyes for a moment, then looked down at his thumbnail and pushed the cuticle back with his middle finger. His head came back up, his regard steady again. “Andrea can pick up something for you, too, if you want. It’ll only take twenty minutes.”

      “I’m fine, thanks.”

      “You’re sure? There are a couple more things we could get through while we eat.”

      He came around the desk and put a hand under her elbow. Suddenly their eyes were fixed on each other, locked together, giving off naked heat, drowning. A blast of awareness hit her—the same physical and emotional ambush Shallis had felt when she’d first found him here instead of his grandfather. Jared looked at her as if the chemistry of her physical response to him was written on her skin, as if it had made her whole body turn blue.

      She froze, unable to pull away as she needed to, unable to stop looking at him or hide her reaction. It scared her to feel like this, when she so seriously didn’t want to, when she had so many reasons not to.

      Whatever had happened to the strength of the human will?

      “What do you want from me, Jared?” It came out on a whisper.

      There was a tiny beat of silence before he spoke. “I’m just trying to do my job.”

      “No. I don’t think you are.” She snatched her arm out of his grip, about thirty seconds too late. “I think there’s something more.”

      And it wasn’t the princess thing.

      “Do you?” His lids flickered, and a shuttered look came onto his face.

      He was lying, evading the truth in some vital area, only she didn’t know what. The whole way he held himself right now, so stiff and wary and closed, reluctant and almost angry, in such contrast to the bland professional bearing he’d seemed to have in the beginning.

      Everything had changed with her mention of the Grand Regency Hotel. The air itself seemed electric, crackling with complex tensions she couldn’t read.

      “If you want me to tell you that I forgive you, and that Linnie and Ryan forgive you, and it’s all water under the bridge and we know you’ve changed, that’s not going to happen,” she told him. “If that’s what this is about, then you can have it straight, without the sandwich lunch.”

      “Why, thank you, ma’am,” he drawled.

      She ignored him. “I don’t believe you have changed. If you could behave that badly six years ago, on Linnie’s wedding day, you could behave that badly still. I love my sister, and she’s hurting right now, over Gram’s death and—and—other stuff. If she has anything whatsoever to do with why you’re back in town for the next six—”

      “She doesn’t,” he cut in, hard and fast. “Okay? Let’s get that on the table right now. She doesn’t have anything to do with my being here.”

      “No? Good.” If she believed him. What had she seen in his eyes? “Because some mistakes you just have to live with. You have to live with this one, Jared. Linnie doesn’t, Ryan doesn’t and I don’t.”

      “I guess not.”

      “We’re done here.”

      “Sure…”

      “Thanks for your time.”

      He put on a crooked, cynical smile. “Thanks for the insights.”

      “You’re more than welcome, if they’ve gotten through.”

      “Oh, they have.” He glanced behind him toward the shelf where various polished trophies gleamed, as if reminding himself that he was still a winner. “I’ll keep you and your mother posted on how I’m doing with the estate.”

      “Sure. And I can leave any messages or papers with your secretary.”

      “Right. No personal contact necessary.”

      But Shallis didn’t reward this barbed observation with a reply. She simply snapped her briefcase shut, picked it up and left.

      Jared watched her go—the graceful walk, the squared yet feminine shoulders, the pretty, bouncing hair.

      “You are such a damned idiot, Jared Starke,” he muttered to himself seconds after the door shut behind her.

      It didn’t slam, because Jared couldn’t imagine that Shallis Duncan, ex Miss Tennessee, would ever slam a door.

      She was far too perfect for that.

      As perfect as a splinter stuck under his thumb. As perfect as a melody in his head that wouldn’t go away. As perfect as some twisted form of hell, in which a man didn’t see a certain woman for six years and when he did, he discovered that he still hadn’t gotten over a gut-level response to her that he’d never wanted, that maddened him and embarrassed him and confused him to the point where he could barely walk straight.

      He ought to feel proud of his performance this morning. Professional and courteous and pleasant. Bland as vanilla pudding. For most of their meeting, he was positive she’d had no idea. Even when his guard had slipped a little and she’d seen something, she’d gotten it wrong. She still thought he was on some twisted quest to change the balance of power between himself and Linnie.

      Thank heaven, he wasn’t. One thing to be grateful for, at least.

      He’d behaved despicably toward Melinda Duncan Courcy in the past—twice—his arrogant ultimatum on her wedding day wasn’t the first time—but he was in no doubt

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