still hadn’t returned to normal size. She hadn’t stopped staring after the guy either.
Leah may not know the face but she recognized the name. “The middle one.”
“He’s better than a random nineteen-year-old.”
“He’s more like thirty.” And not at all what she’d expected. She’d prepared to feel a double kick of anger and disgust when she met the Hanover boys. The stammering and boiling heat beneath her skin were totally unwelcome.
High cheekbones and dark brown hair with that wide grin. His eyes actually twinkled. Had to be some sort of drops or something, because no way was that sort of thing natural. And she’d bet that practiced smoldering look of his lured more than one innocent woman to bed. Probably made them hand over the bank accounts and family jewelry as he unhooked their bras.
“He looks like six feet of sexy trouble to me.” Mallory almost smashed her nose against the glass of the window next to them and took a final look at Declan as he climbed into the small black pickup parked out front of the diner.
“Just like his father.” Actually, to Leah’s thinking, Declan had his father beat on the objectively attractive scale. Whether Declan possessed his father’s notorious con-man charm was a question, but he sure had the Tall, Dark and Deliciously Dangerous gene.
Mallory’s head snapped back around. She pointed her finger in Leah’s direction. “I see you’re not denying the sexy part. That’s a nice change. Good to know your girl parts are working.”
Well, she wasn’t dead. Unfortunately. “I was too busy worrying about the trouble that follows his family. I can ignore his looks.”
Mallory snorted. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“I can’t believe you think you’re going to take him on.”
“Thanks for the support. I’ll hope Declan underestimates me, too.”
The amusement faded from Mallory’s eyes. “And if he doesn’t?”
“I’ll still win.”
Chapter Two
Declan stood on the porch of the stone house, all three crumbling stories of it, and wondered what he’d ever done to piss off the universe. Four months ago he stepped out of the Army uniform that had defined him for ten years. Now he was unemployed and stuck with a one-third ownership interest in a property in Sweetwater, Oregon. The same property with a mortgage hovering on the brink of foreclosure.
Sucked to be him.
Not that the property was a total write-off. Someone generations ago had named it Shadow Hill, which fit a building framed by fireplaces at each end with a turret in the middle. He didn’t know the exact definition of a manor, but he guessed one would look a lot like this place with its acres of rolling hills and open spaces.
The field behind the main house could work as a pasture if someone cleared out the dead tree limbs and forgotten piles of dirt and old wood. Towering pines lined the long drive from the road to the house, surrounding it on two sides, and the Pacific coast sat close enough for a hint of salt to float in the air.
Yeah, the place could be something. It would take piles of cash he didn’t have and months of intense work to make it happen. Daunting but not impossible. Certainly less dangerous than dodging roadside bombs outside Baghdad, and he’d survived four tours of that.
No matter what, making the house livable would probably be less trouble than the woman trying to sneak up on him. He’d heard the crunch of gravel under tires a minute ago, though she parked far down the drive. Even now he sensed her closing in. Smelled the same coconut scent he caught in her hair when he leaned in close to her at the diner.
“Do you live here now?” She asked the question without any warning. Just like that her voice cut through the sunny afternoon.
He turned around, following the now-familiar husky female voice to the redhead standing a few feet behind him with her hands on her hips. She had huge gray eyes and wore a strangely sexy don’t-mess-with-me scowl. Add to that the slim dark jeans and a yellow shirt held on her tan shoulders only by thin straps and things were looking up. Well, except for the part where she made it clear she thought he was a scum-sucking criminal.
Never mind the trespassing, which she was, his biggest issue came from her attitude. She looked at his father’s history and put them in the same category. He’d spent his entire life outrunning his father’s shitty reputation. Having people judge him on his genes wasn’t new, but