BEVERLY BARTON - Dangerous Deception

“No, thanks, I can manage,” she replied, her voice soft, ultra feminine and Southern sweet.

Dom studied her intently, then glared at the photo. In person she was even prettier. Thanks to plastic surgery? And she most definitely had a new hairdo. In the studio photograph Edward Bedell had given Dom, Audrey wore her straight, shoulder-length, red hair in a smooth pageboy. Today a mane of thick, unruly, dark strawberry blonde curls fanned out and down almost to her shoulder blades.

When she brushed off the bellhop and went straight to the nearest elevator, Dom jumped to his feet and rushed after her, catching up just as the elevator door started to close.

“Wait up,” he called as he dove toward her. He managed to stop just short of knocking her down, his body colliding with the bags she held in front of her. “Sorry.” He stepped back, looked into a pair of startled, moss-green eyes and smiled involuntarily.

Without hesitation, she smiled back at him, then glanced away, as if she’d just realized her smile could mistakenly be construed as flirting with a stranger. Odd, Dom thought, that a woman with Audrey Perkins’s reputation would care.

“Need some help with those packages?”

“No, thank you.”

That voice should be illegal. It was the kind that gave a guy ideas. Hot, sweaty, body-heat ideas.

“Have you been in Palm Beach long?” he asked.

“Two days,” she replied, then lifted her gaze and connected with his.

This time neither of them looked away, and she smiled at him again. Tentatively. Almost shyly. He couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her and it wasn’t simply because she was a damn good looking woman. There was something about her, an air of vulnerability, a hint of wariness.

She was lovely. No doubt about that fact. Creamy smooth skin, with only a hint of freckles across her small nose and over her high, sculpted cheekbones. Full red lips that made a man want to kiss her or made him think about all the wicked things that gorgeous mouth could do to him. But it was her eyes that drew Dom to her and held him enthralled.

As a connoisseur of women, he found the opposite sex utterly fascinating. He’d been a ladies’man since puberty and had endured years of kidding from his brother Rafe.

“All the girls have the hots for you, little brother, because you’re so damn pretty. Heck, you’re prettier than our sisters and almost as pretty as Mama.” Rafe had inherited their father’s rough, rugged looks, even Dad’s Irish blue eyes and ruddy complexion; whereas, except for the Shea height and broad shoulders, Dom’s basic appearance was a replica of their beautiful Mexican mother.

Dom had known his share of lovely, fascinating women, but he couldn’t recall ever being as instantly attracted to a lady as he was to Audrey Perkins.

Hell, man, you’re a damn fool. The lady is not only married, she’s a rich, spoiled brat. And a slut to boot.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

Dom suddenly realized that she’d been talking to him and he hadn’t responded, that he’d been too busy drooling over this small, elegant piece of fluff.

“Yeah, fine. My mind just wandered. Sorry. Business matters.”

“Are you here in Palm Beach on business?” she asked.

Dom nodded.

Without warning, the elevator doors opened and someone entered behind Dom and it was only then that he realized neither he nor Ms. Perkins had punched in a floor number. They’d been talking while the elevator rested at the lobby level.

“You two getting out?” the bald, middle-aged man asked.

Audrey giggled. “No. I—I’m going to the sixth floor.”

“What about you, buddy?” the guy asked after he punched in the fourth floor for himself and the sixth floor for Audrey.

“Seventh, thanks.” Since he wasn’t registered at this hotel, Dom said the first thing that came to mind.

The three of them remained silent as the elevator lifted; then after the man got off on the fourth floor and the elevator door closed, Dom and Audrey burst into laughter.

“We were just standing here in the elevator and hadn’t even punched in our floor numbers,” she said. “He must have thought we were crazy.”

“Probably.” Dom reached out and grasped two of her four large shopping bags. “Those look way too heavy for you. Let me carry them to your room. I swear you can trust me to be a gentleman.”

Her smile vanished instantly. “Thank you. They were getting a little heavy. But as far as trusting you…I don’t know you and I learned the hard way not to trust anyone.”

“You’re too young and beautiful—” he surveyed her from head to toe “—and rich to be so cynical.”

“Haven’t you heard? Money can’t buy happiness.”

“And are you unhappy, Miss—?”

The elevator stopped at the sixth floor.

“Ms. Perkins,” she told him as the door opened. “Audrey Perkins. And right this minute, I’m quite happy.”

Using his body as a wedge, Dom held the elevator door open until she exited; then, with shopping bags in hand, he followed her down the corridor.

Glancing back over her shoulder, she paused for a moment and asked, “Are you going to tell me who you are?”

He grinned. “Sure thing. I’m Domingo Shea.”

Audrey nodded, then continued down the hall until she reached the double doors that opened into a suite. “Here we are.” She rummaged in the pocket of her tailored beige slacks and retrieved a plastic entry key. After shoving the handle on one bag farther up her right wrist, she slid the key through the lock, opened the door and entered the suite. When Dom followed, she dumped her bags on the floor, and then turned and blocked his entrance.

He paused, offered her his most persuasive smile and inquired, “Not going to let me come in?”

She shook her head and held out her hands. “Thanks for your help. I can take those now.”

“You’re a mighty suspicious lady, aren’t you?”

She took the shopping bags from Dom, but didn’t close the door in his face, which he’d halfway expected. “Look, Mr. Shea, if you must know, I find you terribly attractive, but I’m not in the market for a one-night stand and I’m not—”

“How about dinner? No strings attached. No expectations.”

She eyed him speculatively, a hint of curiosity in those remarkable green eyes. “Just dinner?”

“I can come back at eight and escort you or we can meet at the restaurant, whichever you feel more comfortable doing. I assume they have a nice restaurant here in the hotel.”

“The Flamingo Room.”

“So, is it a date?”

She hesitated.

He leaned forward, bracing his hands on the door-frame on either side of her and looked right at her. “Why not share a meal and get better acquainted?”

“Just dinner,” she told him.

“Just dinner.”

“You make the reservations and I’ll meet you downstairs at eight.”

He grinned broadly, then turned around and whistled to himself as he headed toward the elevator.

Maybe he should have simply told Ms. Perkins that he was a PI sent by her father and husband to bring her home. But if she put up a fuss and refused to return to Chattanooga, all he could do was call her father and tell him where she was. By the time the old man could get to Palm Beach, his darling daughter could well be on her way to Timbuktu. And he could hardly pick her up, kicking and screaming, then carry her down the hall, into the elevator and through the hotel lobby. She was, after all, over eighteen and had a legal right to go wherever she wanted to go, with or without her daddy’s approval.

No, the best thing to do was wine and dine her first, then maybe take her on a moonlit stroll along the beach before presenting her with two alternatives. One: she went with him willingly to the airport and flew back to Chattanooga on the Dundee jet. Two: She telephoned her father and assured him she was well and happy and did not want to return home.