Hello Stranger (The Ravenels #4) - Lisa Kleypas Page 0,3

with a fluid, limber way of moving. Even standing still, he conveyed a sense of explosive power.

“Try it with me,” he invited softly, his gaze locked on hers.

Garrett blinked in momentary surprise. “You want me to hit you with my cane? Now?”

Ransom gave a slight nod.

“I wouldn’t want to hurt you,” she said, prolonging her hesitation.

“You won’t—” he began to reply, just as she surprised him with an aggressive thrust of the cane.

As fast as she was, however, Ransom’s reaction was lightning swift. He dodged the cane, turning sideways so the tip barely grazed his ribs. Grasping the cane mid-shaft, he leveraged Garrett’s forward momentum with a strong tug, pulling her off her feet. She was stunned to feel one of his arms close around her, while he twisted the cane from her grip with his free hand. So easily, as if divesting people of weapons was child’s play.

Gasping and infuriated, Garrett found herself held firmly against his body, the knit of muscle and bone as unyielding as cordwood. She was utterly helpless.

Perhaps it was the reckless velocity of her pulse that accounted for the strange feeling that came over her, a velvety quietness that routed her thoughts and smothered every awareness of the scene around them. The world disappeared, and there was only the man at her back, his brutally hard arms around her. She closed her eyes, conscious only of the faint scent of citrus on his breath, and the measured rise and fall of his chest, and the wild tumult of her heart.

The spell was broken by his soft chuckle, the sound rippling gently along her spine. She tried to wrench free of him.

“Don’t laugh at me,” she said fiercely.

Carefully Ransom released her, assuring himself of her balance before handing the cane back to her. “I wasn’t laughing at you. I only liked it that you caught me off guard.” He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender, a dance of amusement in his eyes.

Slowly Garrett lowered the cane, while her cheeks burned as red as poppies. She could still feel his arms enclosing her, as if the sensation of him had sunk into her skin.

Reaching into his vest, Ransom pulled out a small silver whistle shaped like a tube. He blew three shrill blasts.

Garrett gathered he was summoning a constable on patrol. “You don’t use a police rattle?” she asked. Her father, who’d had a beat in King’s Cross, had always carried one of the official weighted wooden rattles. To raise an alarm, a constable swung the rattle by its handle until the blades made a loud clapping sound.

Ransom shook his head. “The rattle’s too cumbersome. And I had to give it back when I left the force.”

“You’re no longer with the Metropolitan Police?” she asked. “Who employs you now?”

“I’m not officially employed.”

“You do some kind of work for the government, however?”

“Yes.”

“As a detective?”

Ransom hesitated for a long moment before replying. “Sometimes.”

Garrett’s eyes narrowed as she wondered what he did for the government that couldn’t be handled by the regular police. “Are your activities legal?”

His grin was a brief dazzle in the gathering darkness. “Not always,” he admitted.

They both turned as a constable dressed in a blue tunic and trousers came hurrying along the street with a bull’s-eye lantern in hand. “Hallo,” the approaching man called out, “Constable Hubble here. Did you raise the alarm?”

“I did,” Ransom said.

The constable, a portly man whose blunt nose and florid cheeks were perspiring from exertion, regarded him intently from beneath the brim of his helmet. “Your name?”

“Ransom,” came the quiet reply, “formerly of K division.”

The constable’s eyes widened. “I’ve heard of you, sir. Good evening.” His tone was instantly textured with deference. In fact, his posture became positively submissive, his head lowering a degree or two.

Ransom gestured to the men on the ground. “I found these three drunken sods in the process of physically assaulting and robbing a lady, after threatening her with this.” He handed the sheathed bayonet knife to the constable.

“By George,” Hubble exclaimed, glancing down at the men on the ground with disgust. “And soldiers too, more’s the shame. May I ask if the lady was harmed?”

“No,” Ransom said. “In fact, Dr. Gibson had the presence of mind to drive one of them off with her cane, after knocking the knife from his hand.”

“Doctor?” The constable regarded Garrett with open amazement. “You’re the lady doctor? The one in the papers?”

Garrett nodded, bracing inwardly. People rarely reacted well to the idea of a woman in