Not even.
His gaze was still settled on her in quiet observation. “‘Sack of pig manure’? You’re really attractive when you’re in a snit.”
She couldn’t come up with a reply.
Couldn’t remember the last time a man had told her she was attractive.
Hunter’s lips shifted. He… almost smiled. The muscles in his face moved stiffly, as if he hadn’t used them to smile in a long time.
His fingers relaxed.
The backhanded compliment had disconnected the neurons between her brain and body. There could be no other reason she stood perfectly still as his warm hands slid down her exposed arms, waking excited nerves everywhere he touched bare skin.
When he took her hands in his, she wasn’t sure what she expected. Maybe just an obligatory soft clasp of his fingers over hers, but his grasp was firm, his fingers closing with care. Strength hovered beneath the skin, warning there was more to this man than she’d initially assumed.
Something familiar about him bubbled in her mind again.
Did she know him?
In her dreams maybe. She had to tie this up and move on before she allowed herself to be flattered by his attention. “Can you see your friend’s fiancée yet?”
“If you stood a little closer, as if we’re whispering, I could get a better look.” He didn’t act on his statement until she nodded mutely. With a gentle tug, he had her chest-to-chest with him, too close for her to see his face.
But she could feel him.
Her hands went to his arms out of automatic response for somewhere to grasp. She curved her fingers around the black sleeves of his tuxedo, holding roped muscle that rippled with imperturbable confidence.
Time skipped by.
Her skin tingled where his hands touched her.
Her skin never tingled around other guys. She never reacted this way to anyone from celebrity land, so why was this guy pressing all her female buttons?
Had to be hormones combined with her long dating dry spell. Self-inflicted, to be sure, but better alone than lied to and betrayed by men.
Men like this Hunter.
No problem. She’d keep her end of the deal and provide a few minutes’ cover in trade for meeting Gwen. Abbie hadn’t missed the way most of the room noticed when he’d walked her away from Lydia.
If she watched Brittany’s weekend show on celebrity affairs she might have an idea who Hunter was, but why should anyone care about how people with more money than God spent their time?
She should be glad she didn’t recognize him. That meant Hunter wasn’t a member of Chicago law enforcement or involved in Illinois politics.
But many of Chicago’s elite knew him. Hunter had to be somebody important.
He smelled like somebody important. Like he wore cologne sold by the teaspoon.
She could taste him with each inhale.
Her ears were becoming tuned to the smooth blend of cultured voice and sexy undertones.
But he wasn’t saying a word, which was starting to feel weird. She didn’t know this guy well enough to stand this near him and not talk. To be honest, she didn’t like standing still and not talking period.
Hunter whispered, “You smell intriguing.”
Her heart thumped. “Thanks.” Thanks? Talk about sounding stupid, but she was not in her element and he embodied this element. Stop worrying about what he thinks and act like a trained investigator. Get to the point of all this. She had to meet Gwen. “Um, so let’s talk about introducing me around.”
“Make you a deal.”
“What? I thought we had a deal.”
“We do. You agreed to help me catch a cheating fiancée. This is a new agreement.”
Technically, he was right, since she’d bailed on the first deal to stand with him for ten minutes. She hated when her sense of fair play got in the way.
She typed her fingers against his forearm, getting exasperated by yet another game. “What’s in this new agreement for me?”
“You want to meet people, right?”
“Maybe. Depends on what you want in exchange.”
“Are you always so suspicious?”
Yes. She’d believed another man once without question and he’d stomped on that trust. “Let’s just say I’ve been on the losing end of a proposition before and didn’t like it. Don’t make an offer you can’t back up.”
Hunter’s chest expanded with a slow breath. “Didn’t expect this to be quite so serious a negotiation, but I can meet that requirement. I don’t like unsolved riddles. If you figure out how we know each other I’ll introduce you around—”
“You already agreed to that,” she pointed out, hoping he wouldn’t call her on having walked off earlier.
“—as a friend of mine.”
That could carry more weight to help her convince Gwen to speak in private without using the hardball card Dr. Tatum had given her. “I’m game. Just who are you?”
His next breath ruffled fine hairs along her forehead. “Hunter.”
“I heard your old nuisance call you that. No last name?”
“Is it really important?” He’d asked that as if the wrong answer would somehow judge her.
She couldn’t think of a way to say, “Just how rich and important are you?” and he clearly didn’t want to share more than he had about his identity.
She should have set some guidelines before agreeing so quickly.
He really thought they’d met before now?
As if she’d forget meeting a man who looked like him?
“If I knew your last name it might help…” She paused. A waste of time asking since he didn’t respond. “But either way you still owe me for helping with this fiancée snooping.”
He stopped staring over her head and lowered his gaze to meet hers, not acknowledging or denying her point. Just giving her a scorching look that brought her dormant hormones to life.
His lips were cut like a man’s should be, not too smooth or too thin. A mouth that invited speculation.
If he rattled her that much with one long look, what would happen if he kissed her?
What was she doing even thinking something so ridiculous?
He gave all women that look. He probably couldn’t turn off his sexiness without medical intervention.
His hand smoothed upward along her spine when he glanced away, as though keeping a connection to her even when something else held his gaze.
Her skin moved toward his hand. Don’t shiver.
Where could she have possibly run into this guy? At a function she’d attended? “Been to any weddings in Chicago in the past couple years?”
He leaned back and raked her with a curious look, shaking his head. A lock of golden hair brushed his brow. His rugged chin fit with the relentless cut of his smooth jaw and cheeks. Professional grooming? No doubt.
Too perfect. Sort of like Harry the jeweler, that rotten low-life, cheating bastard. He’d screwed around on her the whole time she’d starved herself thin to drop two dress sizes and struggled with heating irons to straighten her hair.
She’d looked like his image of sexy, a total physical overhaul that never felt right.
No more starving or hair straightening.
All gone back to natural now.
Good thing. Six years ago, she’d stared into the mirror the day after catching Harry in the wrong sister’s bed—Casey’s.
Abbie hadn’t spoken to Casey since then.
She’d made a life-altering decision that morning. The next man she got seriously involved with would have to take her the way God made her, with curly hair and a few extra pounds.
And she’d walk the minute she caught him in a lie.
“What kind of writing do you do?” Hunter asked, reminding her she was supposed to be figuring out where they might have met.
“Nonfiction.” Abbie chewed on the inside of her lip, avoiding any discussion of how they met that might involve bringing up her employment with WCXB. “You do any volunteerin
g with Greenpeace or the animal shelter?”
“No.”
Another strike against this guy. Everyone should donate time to something.
An idea popped up. Her dad had collected antique farm equipment, storing treasures in his barns. She used to hunt for additions to his private museum during her travels. Before he died. “Do you own a farm of some sort?”
“A farm? Like a working farm?”
Why’d Hunter sound so incredulous? Some very influential people had grown up on farms and they were proud of their background. She was proud of hers. “Yes, a real live farm that produces things like crops, livestock, pigs, whatever.”
“Pigs? No.”
His insulted tone underlined how they were lifetimes apart in so many ways, the way they grew up only being one difference.
Keep that foremost in her thoughts to counteract any renegade tingling or stray hormones. She gave up. “You could help. How do you think we met?”
“No idea.” He leaned back. His indolent gaze floated down to hers. “But I did meet you somewhere.”
She couldn’t be expected to figure this out with no reciprocal information. “What do you do?”
“I don’t exactly have a job.” He said that in a slow that-I-exist-should-be-enough voice.
She really hated men who did nothing. Harry thought selling diamonds was hard work.
Where were the real men in this country?
“We could get to know each other again,” he said in a tone more suggestive than his words. “Might jog our memories.”
Now that sounded like a line if she’d ever heard one.
Logic kicked in. Sure, he was hot, but underneath all that window dressing slept another lazy pretty boy who didn’t lift a hand to do serious work and would never get involved with a woman like her. A woman who’d grown up with dirt under her nails and calluses on her hands.
Hunter used a finger to toy with an errant curl dangling above her eye.
All the logic in the world didn’t stop the stampede inside her chest at his touch.
Did he know the effect he was having on her?
Of course he did. He was a man, one with lots of Lydias dying to climb into bed with him.
So why is he flirting with me? Because he considered her an easy target who would be thrilled over his attention?
She was pretty flattered, but not enough to feed an ego with an insatiable appetite.
Hadn’t she learned anything six years ago?
All men were jerks.
Never, ever, forget that.
Within an instant, all playfulness vanished from his posture. His gaze flashed up and past her shoulder, alert, at something behind Abbie. The cheating female?
A rumble of excited voices vibrated the room.
She broke away from Hunter and swung around to find out what had everyone buzzing.
Gwen Wentworth had entered the main ballroom. Finally.
Abbie had played “how did we meet” long enough. The way the crowd was flooding in around Gwen, she doubted Hunter could even see his friend’s fiancée any longer. Gwen would disappear into a gulf of humans in the next minute. Gaining her ear for more than ten seconds would be tough at this point.
Hunter owed Abbie an introduction for allowing him to use her as cover. That whole bit about knowing her had probably been a big fat lie just to keep her talking.
Her conscience argued that she’d had a moment of déjà vu, too, when she’d first seen Hunter outside.
Didn’t matter.
She wasn’t asking for much in return and Gwen would be out of reach quickly. “That’s who I want to meet.”
When she didn’t hear a reply, Abbie swung around.
Hunter was gone.
Chapter Seven
Hunter passed through a sea of faces more intent on being recognized by a Wentworth than noticing his retreat from Abbie. When he made it to the next salon, he whipped around the opposite side of a replica of an Elgin marble statue to observe the excited guests.
And one disappointed Abbie.
Dammit.
She would want to meet Gwen. An innocent enough request any other time, but not tonight.
At least his suspicion of Abbie had abated. If she had some ulterior motive for attending beyond stargazing and rubbing elbows with celebrities she’d have dressed to blend in with the other women and wouldn’t have played along so easily with him.
“Regretting your decision to come alone?” Rae had approached quiet as a thought.
“No.” Hunter kept watch so that no one—Abbie in particular—walked up on his conversation. But the entire room had migrated toward Gwenyth, who shimmered in gold and white like a billion-dollar magnet.
Rae offered him the humble smile of a staff member that he wouldn’t trust right now to turn his back on. “I’m okay with you coming solo, too.”
He sent her a look that said he knew better.
“I’m serious.” Rae’s smile took on life in a sly way. “If I’d been assigned to accompany you I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of watching her walk away from you earlier. Must be a new experience for you to get shot down by a mere mortal.”
“I needed a cover to observe someone. Don’t make it out to be more than it was.”
“That’s right.” Rae handed him a napkin and a flute of champagne. “She couldn’t possibly meet your high standards.”
He didn’t want to discuss anything specific to the mission so he ended the conversation by refusing to engage further. Rae knew nothing about him. Bloodline and family ranking were rock-bottom on his give-a-shit list.
Rae started to move away, paused, then swung around and asked, “Excuse me? What did you need?”
He caught the signal. Something she had to share with him was being transmitted between agents. “Couple napkins. Sloshed my drink.”
“Absolutely.” With perfunctory motions, Rae sat her tray on the nearest available surface and strode back to him with a handful of napkins she used to dab at his untouched tuxedo lapel. She spoke softly. “Your new friend just shoved up close to Gwen, made some comment, then stepped away. Gwen looked shocked, then recovered and excused herself. She walked away but told one of her security something he relayed to the woman you were standing with. Who is she?”
Damned if he knew. “Don’t know. That’s what I was trying to figure out.”
“Head of catering’s walking this way,” Rae whispered, then backed up and spoke louder. “Think that got it. Please, excuse me.” She took a couple strides, grabbed her tray, and hurried over to where a gray-haired man in a black suit spoke to several of the staff. Immediate head-bobbing indicated they understood his instructions before the servers dispersed.
Hunter turned back to search for Abbie in the crowd Gwen had abandoned.
Maybe he’d dismissed her too quickly.
His gaze climbed the grand staircase to the upper landing, where the three men Gwen had been meeting with earlier now stood talking. The Italian-looking woman with the wavy shoulder-length black hair wore a demure royal-blue dress with a jacket and stood a step behind the men again. She moved forward and spoke to the man Hunter thought might be Vestavia, who nodded before she descended the staircase on the far side and blended into the crowd.
Could those men be the three Fratelli Linette had indicated would attend?
What of the Italian woman’s identity? Linette?
Hunter couldn’t go up the stairs to investigate until he had the damned package. The signal would be given on the main floor. He had plenty to keep him busy down here until Linette made the drop and sent the signal.
Like finding out why Gwen had disappeared after talking to Abbie.
Abbie clearly hadn’t come to rub elbows with celebrities.
That niggling worry about tonight’s mission crawled up his neck again. He discarded his champagne flute and headed for the throng of people ebbing back into private fissures within the mansion now that Gwen had vanished.
He and Abbie were goin
g to have another chat. One wrong answer and she’d finish the conversation in shackles. He’d taken three steps when someone on the Wentworth serving staff politely inquired, “Have you seen an emerald-and-diamond earring? A guest is missing one of hers.”
Talk about suck timing.
That was Linette’s signal to retrieve the USB memory stick.
Abbie’s heart raced ahead of her feet. She turned sideways, sliding like a flexible knife through the humans cluttering the Wentworth mansion.
Please don’t let her be rushing into a security ambush that would hand her over to law enforcement.
When she reached the far end of the ballroom only a few people littered the hallway. None noticed her. At the next corner, she slowed to move through a hall broken up by four white doors trimmed with intricate gold designs.
One door opened. Abbie’s blood pressure skyrocketed.
The young woman exiting the powder room wore a deep blue knee-length dress better suited to a boardroom than a party.
As they met, Abbie glanced over to take in the exotic female with lush black hair that fell to her shoulders and a petite face that resembled some Italian actress Abbie couldn’t identify. But the curiosity wasn’t returned.
Invisibility had its perks.
As Abbie reached the bathroom entrance, she paused just long enough to check behind her to ensure the Italian beauty had disappeared. She scampered ahead, following the directions Gwen’s security guard had issued in the harsh tone of an order.
Probably because Gwen hadn’t been happy when she’d spoken to him, which would be Abbie’s fault for shocking the color from Gwen’s face.
Two more turns and Abbie located the thick double doors crafted of varnished hickory she’d been told were not locked.
She placed her shaking fingers on a cool bronze handle and pressed her thumb on the lever, which moved smoothly.
Please don’t let an alarm go off.
A small snick sounded then, hallelujah, the door opened.
Gwen hadn’t tricked her. Yet.
A little too late to worry about being arrested for trespassing in a secured area of the mansion.
Still following instructions, Abbie crossed a paneled library that smelled of history and ink, then passed through a set of open glass doors into a sunroom twenty by forty feet. She kept walking across hand-painted tiles and through another set of open doors to a pool and patio area enclosed by a vine-covered stone wall that was chest high and appeared to be more an architectural decoration than a security measure. The fortress-looking wall a hundred feet away and partially hidden by trees should intimidate most of the population out of trespassing.
[BAD 07] - Silent Truth Page 8