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which would change the rest of Hannah’s life.

      The uneasy flutter she’d felt in the pit of her stomach when he’d issued the invitation came back again, even more strongly.

      Hannah was in the law library, still poring over Jacob Jones’s files, when Brenton came in. “What’s keeping you?” he said. “I’ve been waiting.”

      Hannah stopped fitting together the bits of an invoice which had crumbled with age. “You said you had clients all afternoon. I told your secretary I’d be here if you needed me.”

      “Very discreet of you to put it that way.” He chuckled. “I always knew you had sense, Hannah. She said you were very bright-eyed when you came in, and that you looked as if you’d had quite a surprise.”

      “I suppose you could put it that way.” Hannah fitted the last piece of the invoice into place, glanced at it, concluded that the information it contained carried no importance to the legal matter at hand, and put it in the finished stack.

      “So tell me the good news. How did you and Ken Stephens get along? And when will Isobel’s estate all be wrapped up?”

      “Oh, it’s pretty well finished already,” Hannah said dryly. “All but the dust settling.”

      “I was right, wasn’t I?” Brenton pushed aside a stack of papers and sat down on the corner of the table. “She left you everything she owned.”

      “Just about.”

      “What did I tell you?” Satisfaction almost dripped from his voice. “You can give me all the details over a nice long dinner.”

      Hannah brushed off her hands and stood up. As she fitted the lid back on the box, she said casually, “You were absolutely right, Brenton. The only trouble with your scenario is that Isobel cut it right down to the wire and died without a penny to her name. So I was right, too—because in fact she didn’t leave me anything at all.”

      She’d taken two steps toward the door before she realized that Brenton hadn’t moved, except for his mouth dropping open.

      That was pretty much the identical reaction she’d had, of course. Not inheriting hadn’t surprised her—but the fact that there was nothing to inherit had been a stunner.

      “Nothing?” Brenton’s voice was almost a croak. “But…but she was a wealthy woman!”

      “She appeared to be a wealthy woman,” Hannah corrected. “In fact, she was something of an expert at appearing to be well-off.” She succinctly repeated Ken Stephens’s rundown regarding Isobel’s condo, furniture, jewelry, china, silver, and furs.

      She was just starting to tell Brenton about the odd little Lovers’ Box when she realized that would lead almost inevitably to telling him about the scene at Cicero’s.

      Brenton seemed too shocked to notice that her story had abruptly broken off. “Nothing,” he repeated. “She left you nothing at all?”

      Hannah’s eyes narrowed. “Exactly why is that so important?”

      “Oh, I just…” His voice was little more than a whisper. “I was so certain. At least, she always seemed to indicate that you’d get everything she owned.”

      “I did. She just didn’t own much of anything.”

      “But it was like she told me that you would—” He broke off.

      Hannah braced her hands on the table. “You seriously thought I was going to be rich, didn’t you?”

      He didn’t answer, but his gaze shifted uneasily away.

      And you were planning to end up with a good share of my supposed wealth, weren’t you? Now she understood. That was why Brenton had invited her out tonight, after months of casual friendliness. That was why he’d trotted out the line about getting to know her, and that was why he’d left it dangling instead of going on to tell her how special she was, and how important she’d become to him. He’d left it to Hannah to fill in the blank, and she’d done exactly as he’d expected she would.

      Now she could see precisely how careful he’d been to say nothing that could be taken as a commitment. Nothing that he couldn’t escape. Even that invitation to dinner had been very carefully phrased….

      Hannah kept her voice level. “Are we still going out tonight, Brenton?”

      She didn’t quite know what she’d do if he said yes, for she’d rather share a meal with a rattlesnake. But she suspected that Brenton was so eager to escape that he wouldn’t stop to consider the possibility she was bluffing.

      “Actually…” His voice almost rasped. “You don’t feel like celebrating, I’m sure, under the circumstances. So maybe it would be better if we didn’t.”

      How thoughtful it was of him, Hannah mused, to put her feelings first! “Then how about taking me out for a nice dinner to commiserate?” she asked gently.

      He swallowed hard. He looked, she thought, like a hunted rabbit. “The Jones case,” he said. “I really do need to burn the midnight oil on it, so—”

      “And of course it would be foolish to spend money on me at the Flamingo Room if there’s no chance of getting it back.”

      She could see the truth written in his face.

      Too annoyed to think it through, Hannah said, “If I’d told you Isobel had left me a million or two, would you have proposed to me tonight, Brenton? Or would you have waited till you could check out the facts with Ken Stephens, just to be certain I was telling the truth?”

      She stopped there, but only by biting her tongue hard. No matter how much he deserved it, she couldn’t tell him to jump off a cliff; he was still her boss.

      And it was suddenly and perfectly clear to Hannah that not only was Brenton Bannister a jerk, but he was the kind of animal who became most dangerous when cornered. Almost accidentally, she’d done precisely that, by forcing him to admit—if only by a look—what he had plotted.

      She’d been concerned about what kind of revenge Cooper might take on her—but she was terrified of what Brenton might do.

      She was an embarrassment to him now, that was clear. Perhaps he even saw her as a threat, able to damage his career by telling this story. And in Brenton Bannister’s narrow view of the world, whether she was an embarrassment or an active danger, the answer was obviously the same: Hannah would have to go.

      He would stay within the rules, for he was too clever to break them and give her cause to charge him with sexual harassment or discrimination. But one way or another, he’d get rid of her—and soon.

      Unless she did something to prevent it.

      But what could she possibly do?

      She forced herself to smile at him. “You’re right,” she said. “It’s just as well we’re not going out. We’ve both got work to do to have the Jones case ready for trial. In fact, I’m going to take a box of papers home with me now. But first, I want to thank you, Brenton. It has been a very special evening.”

      And, she thought wryly, it had certainly turned out to be one which would change the rest of her life.

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