The Engagement Party - Barbara Boswell

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imagination.” Matthew tried but failed to suppress a grin. “But the answer is no. Sorry if I’ve disappointed you.”

      Her body reacted to his smile, her heartbeat accelerating as hot little quivers pierced her abdomen. Hannah tried to will them away. “Why are you here in Clover, Mr. Granger?” she demanded sharply.

      “I’m a writer.” His eyes held hers. “This bag holds research and reference materials. I’m here to...gather information for the book I plan to write.”

      “I checked room 206 and it’s fine.” Katie rushed into the room, panting from exertion. “Shall we get you moved in there, Mr. Granger?”

      “I would appreciate that. And please call me Matthew.” He zipped up his canvas tote and grabbed its straps. “Lead the way, Miss Jones.”

      “If we’ve moved to a first-name basis, you must use Katie, please.” Katie was relieved that his fury seemed to have abated and that he was willing to be placated. “May I carry something for you, Matthew?”

      “The laptop.” Matthew pointed, and Katie scooped it up.

      “Katie, did you know he’s a writer?” Hannah eyed him dubiously. “At least he claims he is. He says he’s here to do research for his book.”

      “A writer here in Clover?” Katie paused at the threshold. “Are you going to write a book about the town?” she asked him eagerly. “I read a wonderful novel about Savannah a few months ago and—”

      “I know the book,” Matthew cut in. “Mine won’t be anything like it. I’m going to describe the insect life of a small Southern coastal town. Clover seemed a likely setting.”

      “You’re writing a book about insects in Clover?” Hannah was incredulous.

      “I’m sure it will be very interesting,” Katie said diplomatically.

      “Will it be like a textbook?” pressed Hannah.

      “Like, yes.” Matthew’s eyes mocked her. “I promise to send you both an autographed copy.”

      “I don’t believe for one minute that you’re here to write an insect textbook,” Hannah declared boldly. The gleam in his dark eyes was all the proof she needed to know that he was putting them on. Katie was too polite to call him on it, but Hannah had nothing to lose. He wasn’t her tenant. “And I don’t—”

      “As long as you’re determined to stick around, you may as well make yourself useful, angel face. Take my shirts from the closet and bring them to 206,” Matthew directed Hannah.

      He didn’t wait around to see if she followed his orders. Obviously he expected to be obeyed, just as he had assumed that Katie would follow him upstairs after he’d issued his earlier command. Matthew strode from the room, Katie at his heels.

      “Yes, sir. Whatever you say, sir.” Hannah gave a mock salute. The man barked out orders like a general on the battlefield. But it was her curiosity, not any sense of obedience, that drove her to open the closet door.

      An assortment of shirts was hung neatly on hangers on the rod, and Hannah draped them over her arm. From the number of them, it appeared that Matthew Granger planned to stick around for a while. There were also two lightweight summer suits hanging there. Hannah decided she could carry them, too.

      She felt the hard lump in the inside pocket of the jacket as she added the suits to her load. The same innate curiosity that had prompted her to examine the books inside his canvas bag caused her to investigate the bulge in the pocket.

      Hannah’s eyes widened in shocked alarm when she pulled out a small, gleamingly polished handgun.

      Two

      Hannah dropped the gun back into the pocket as if scalded by its touch. Her heart thumped wildly against her ribs. She hadn’t believed Matthew’s lame assertion about being here to research and write about insect life in Clover, and the sight of this gun confirmed her doubts.

      Why would he carry a gun? Was he a police officer? She knew Ford Maguire, sheriff of Clover; just yesterday she’d had coffee with him at the diner, and he hadn’t mentioned anything about a new officer coming to town. And it seemed logical that Katie would’ve mentioned that her new tenant was a cop when she’d introduced him.

      Unless Katie didn’t know. Perhaps Matthew Granger was doing some sort of undercover investigation that required total secrecy. But what? Clover was not exactly a hotbed of crime. Oh, there were the occasional domestic disputes, petty larceny and disorderly-conduct arrests, but the downtrodden Polk clan usually figured in most of those. Certainly, no secret agent was necessary to deal with the Polks!

      That left the other side of the law.

      Was Matthew Granger a criminal who’d chosen to hide out here at the boardinghouse? Laying low until the heat is off, as a movie gangster would say. It occurred to Hannah that the only things she knew about gangsters were from the movies because she had never met a bona fide mobster in her life.

      But here was Matthew Granger, dressed all in black, projecting an aura of danger, demanding and insolent and secretive. He definitely had not wanted her to see what was in that canvas bag of his, although why a criminal would take pains to hide his reading material escaped her. Unless the titles offered some sort of clues or evidence against him? Perhaps the books were simply decoys, hiding the real secrets in the bottom of the crammed satchel? Drugs?

      Hannah shivered. What else did racketeers do? Laundering money, bookmaking, loan-sharking. Murder-for-hire? She flinched. She did not want Matthew Granger to be a criminal! A telling insight that unnerved her as much as the possibility that he was one.

      Nervously, Hannah hung the suits back in the closet. She didn’t want Matthew Granger—if that was his real name—to know that she knew he had a gun. She heard his voice and Katie’s outside the room and quickly slammed the closet door.

      “I have your shirts,” she sang out, hurrying into the hall, where she came face-to-face with Matthew. “They go to 206, right?”

      “You have amazing recall, little girl,” he growled.

      She met his eyes—they were dark and hot and challenging—and a sharp thrill tore through her. What she should be feeling was fear, Hannah admonished herself as she fairly ran down the hall to room 206. She would not be attracted to a gangster! Not even Grandmother, the soul of patience and understanding, would condone such lunacy.

      She hung his shirts inside the closet in his new room and turned to see the canvas bay lying on the floor beside the bed. A quick peek assured her that there was no one in the hall, so Hannah succumbed to temptation, pulled the zipper half open and reached into the bag.

      She examined the hardcover titles first. Inside the Criminal Mind, a textbook written by a psychiatrist. Three other books on the personalities of serial killers by three different criminologists. Was Matthew Granger a criminologist or psychologist himself, taking a vacation in Clover? If he was accustomed to the crime-infested urban scene, Clover would be a welcome change of pace for him. Her anxiety began to dissolve; she preferred this new, favorable theory.

      She next turned her attention to the paperbacks, which were all bestselling thrillers. Hannah recognized the names of the authors but hadn’t read any of the books. She preferred historical novels with plenty of romance. There were none of those in the bag.

      Delving deeper, she pulled out a beat-up copy of The First Families of South Carolina, a privately published book that also graced the shelves of the Farley family library, although that particular copy was in mint condition. There was a thick piece of folded paper in Matthew’s tattered copy, perhaps marking a page?

      Hannah turned to it. The heading at the top of the page read “The Wyndhams.” That family, who was so important, wealthy and influential within the state that they rated two entire chapters in the book, had a major branch in Clover. The collective Wyndham tribe boasted

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