LITMIR.BIZ

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can assure you he has no interest in me.” Eva glanced up the stairway again, but upstairs was still and silent. “What does it mean when a guy says you have good bones?”

      “When a crime writer says it, it means you need to get out of there,” Frankie muttered. “Lucas Blade writes scary stuff. The last guy he wrote about used to strip his victims.”

      “Of their clothes?”

      “Of their skin.”

      “Ew.” Eva wished she hadn’t asked. “Why would you read that?”

      “Because I can’t not read it. Everything he writes is gripping. He gets into the minds of people. Exploits your fears. He is hugely successful and his books are getting better and better. Everyone is waiting for his next book, including me. Hey, if you get a glimpse, send me a couple of chapters. What’s he like, anyway?”

      Intimidating. “He wasn’t expecting to see me here, so I don’t think I’ve seen him at his best.”

      “If you can’t find anything good to say about him then he must be truly bad,” Paige said. “You always see the good in people.”

      “He isn’t bad. He bought his grandmother a puppy.”

      “So? Psychopaths can be pet owners. Come home, Ev. He’s not your responsibility.”

      “I’m the only one who knows he’s here,” Eva said simply. “And he’s in trouble. Whether he wants me here or not, I’m not leaving.”

      * * *

      Lucas stared at the glow of the screen.

       Do I look like a murderer to you?

      Those words had triggered a flow of ideas in his head, but none of them had made it from his head to his fingers. There were still too many unanswered questions.

      It was like looking at a tangled ball of wool. The threads were there, but so far he hadn’t managed to untangle them and weave them into a pattern that would keep his readers turning the pages.

      But he had something. He knew he had something.

      He rose to his feet and paced to the window of his study.

      It was his superpower, the ability to delve deep into the psyche of the average person and expose, and exploit, their deepest fears. If he hadn’t been a writer, he would have been a profiler for the FBI. He had contacts, had developed a few close relationships over the years. If he’d thought about it for too long he might have been disturbed by the directions his mind took. Right now though it was going nowhere.

      His agent would be calling again soon. And his editor.

      Soon they wouldn’t just want a few chapters, they’d want the whole damn book.

      He was running out of time. The book was due on Christmas Eve. He had less than a month. He’d never written a book that fast. He was approaching the point that he was going to have to tell them the truth. He’d have to tell them that the book wasn’t finished. It wasn’t even started. He didn’t have a single word on the page.

      A scent rose up through the apartment and he turned his head to the door, trying to place it.

      Cinnamon.

      The moment he identified it coincided with a soft tap on the door.

      He dragged it open and saw Eva standing there, holding a tray.

      “I thought you might be hungry. I’ll make supper later, but for now I made a batch of my special Christmas spice cookies. I was going to freeze them for you, but as you’re here you might as well eat one now.”

      He stared down at the plate. The cookies were shaped like Christmas trees and specs of sugar dusted the golden brown surface.

      “Aren’t cookies usually round?”

      “They can be any shape you choose.”

      “And you chose Christmas trees?”

      “It’s a cookie, Mr. Blade. Eat it or don’t.”

      He eyed the tray in her hands. Next to the plate of cookies was a mug full of—

      “What the hell is that?” A slice of lemon floated on the top of straw-colored liquid.

      “It’s herbal tea.”

      “Herbal—?” He shook his head. “I’m pretty sure you didn’t find that in my cupboards.”

      “I didn’t find anything much in your cupboards.”

      “I drink coffee. Strong. Black.”

      “You can’t drink strong black coffee in the afternoon. It will stop you sleeping. Herbal tea is refreshing and calming.”

      He rarely slept, but he didn’t tell her that. He’d seen enough of his life plastered across the press over the past decade to make him miserly with the personal details he shared.

      Herbal tea. As if that was going to solve his problems.

      “Take it away.” If it had been neat whiskey he would have downed it in one, but he wasn’t swallowing herbal tea for anyone. “Do I look like a guy who drinks herbal tea and eats cookies shaped like Christmas trees?” His tone was infused with a harshness a thousand times more unpalatable than the brew in the cup in front of him and she studied him for a long moment.

      “No, but you can’t tell much about a person by looking at them, can you? You were the one who taught me that. Has it occurred to you that maybe I’m not trying to sweeten you up, Mr. Blade. Maybe I’m trying to poison you.” She pushed the tray into his hands and walked away, dismissing him with a swish of her golden hair.

      He stared after her, reeling from the contrast between her sweet face and the sharp rebuke.

      Poison him?

       That was it.

      Finally he was ready to type something, and he had his hands full.

      He took the tray into his study and set it down on his desk.

      It was already dark and the only light in the room came from the glow of his laptop and the strange, luminescent light reflecting off the snow beyond the windows.

      He returned to the screen. So far there were only two words on the page.

      Chapter One.

      He sat down and started to write.

Four

      You are what you eat, so keep it sweet.

      —Eva

       Of all the rude, moody, irritable—

      Eva stomped around the kitchen, hurt and upset. She’d been raised to consider what might lie beneath the surface of a person’s behavior. You didn’t have to be a psychologist to understand what was going on with Lucas, but still his words had stung.

      She told herself that he was grieving. He was in pain. He was—

       Cold. Distant. Intimidating. Formidable.

      And obviously not a lover of herbal tea.

      Her brief glimpse inside his study had shown her that the room was nothing like the rest of the apartment. It smelled of wood smoke and leather, and had both personality and warmth. A warmth that came from more than the flickering fire. Unlike the rest of his apartment, his office space had been furnished with loving care and attention. Two worn, deep leather sofas faced each other across a low table piled high with books. Not coffee-table books chosen as a design accent, but real books, thumbed at the corners and stacked haphazardly as if they’d only recently been read.

      There had been a desk, she remembered, dominated by what appeared

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