Читать книгу Covert Desires - Sondrae Bennett - Страница 5

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Daniel Christopher Callahan. No criminal record to speak of. A couple minor traffic incidents, including one at-fault crash when he was seventeen, but no injuries. Started a software business with his two older brothers with inheritance money from their grandmother. He also had two sisters, one older, one younger. Took a few online college courses in computer programming from Phoenix University, which he’d aced, but never earned a degree.

Everything matched up with the sweet, sometimes a bit awkward, but still confident, and definitely dominant, man across the table from her. A good ole country boy, the boy next door, born and raised in the same town he lived and worked in as an adult. But some instinct whispered that there was more to Danny than met the eye. And she’d learned the hard way to trust her instincts.

Maybe it was in the way he’d start to make a move, then pull himself back. Almost as if he didn’t trust himself. As if he thought he was dangerous to her. Amber didn’t think he meant her harm, but every now and then when he’d touch her, she felt him…hesitate. Yet, he reached for her hand time and time again.

The pieces to the Danny puzzle kind of fit together, but only if hammered in. With a few empty spots as if she was missing a piece or two. He was a riddle. Amber loved solving riddles. And wasn’t it lucky that solving this one happened to be part of her job? Well, kind of.

As soon as she’d read over his file, she’d suspected he wasn’t involved in whatever her bosses had sent her here to investigate. By the time he’d shown up with his heated eyes, slow smile, and bouquet of bright yellow daisies, she’d grown pretty certain. And after the ride to the restaurant while he pointed out things of interest in the town, she’d pretty much ruled him out entirely. But, there were still plenty of reasons to pursue a relationship with someone who knew the area as well as Danny did, even if it wasn’t directly related to her job. The information he could provide would help narrow down her search.

Besides, Danny was great company. She couldn’t remember enjoying an evening more. He proved charming and courteous, with just a flair of danger. Not the for her life kind–there’d been too much of that in her life already–but the kind that reminded her of the time she’d snuck out and gone skinny dipping with Bobby Thompson in high school. The kind that pooled in her belly and made her smile with secret wicked intent.

Easy on the eyes, too. When he smiled, one crease appeared to the left of his mouth. Not so much a dimple, but a small indent. Just on the one side. Amber found it adorable. Not that she’d tell him that. Men wanted to be dashing or handsome. Not adorable.

“Are you ready to order?” a waitress asked, standing beside their table with a pen poised over her pad of paper.

Amber peered over her menu and met Danny’s gaze. A jolt of heat struck her as their eyes met. The portfolio she’d gotten on him had stated his eye color as brown, but it hadn’t described the rich honey color of them or the flecks of darker brown hidden within. She could get lost in those eyes.

She stiffened. No, she couldn’t afford to get lost in a pretty pair of eyes. Not ever again. She was here for information. Nothing more. But how easy it would be to pretend, if only for one night, that things could be different.

Across the table, Danny raised an eyebrow, a slight smile tugging the corner of his mouth.

“I think he’s pretty too, sugar, but I need to get your order if you want to eat sometime tonight,” the girl said, making Amber aware of just how long she’d stared at him. What was wrong with her?

“Right, sorry. I’ll have a buffalo blue burger, well done, with fries.”

Jeez, caught ogling a potential informant during a mission. She could almost hear her director’s lecture now.

With as much pride as she could muster, Amber handed the waitress her menu, meeting her eyes directly, a pretty girl with large blue eyes and a name tag that read Charlee. Amber sized her up with no more than a glance. Cute as a button and completely harmless. She winked at Amber in friendly gesture, but Amber cursed her and herself as she felt a blush rise up in her cheeks. Damn it, she’d almost escaped with no visible evidence of her embarrassment.

“Well done?” Danny cringed at her dramatically, before turning his attention to the waitress.

Amber looked down and smiled into her lap, grateful he hadn’t teased her about staring too long.

If Danny really was everything he appeared to be, he was a stand-up guy. The kind she hadn’t thought existed anymore.

“I’ll have the BBQ burger, and onion rings.”

The waitress took the menu from him and left.

Amber watched her progress, before turning a questioning look at Danny. “She didn’t ask how you wanted it cooked.”

“They know me here,” he responded with a shrug.

“Which means?”

“They know how I like my meat.”

Curious. Not “burger,” but “meat.”

“And how is that?” Blame it on her inquisitive nature, but she couldn’t let the subject go.

“Medium rare, emphasis on the rare. They cook it just the way I like it.”

Rare hamburger meat? “Eww.”

He laughed, reaching for his beer. A Guinness, which was another eww in her book, but to each their own. “That’s how I feel about the charred version you ordered.” A teasing smile softened his words.

“We’ll just see which one of us comes down with food poisoning first,” she teased back, making his smile grow.

With Danny, it was so easy to forget who she was and why she was here. So easy to forget her facade and be natural around him. Maybe she had lost her investigative skills when she lost her heart for the job. Or maybe she was still stalling. Time to get to work.

“So Danny, how long have you lived here?” Of course, she already knew the answer. But he didn’t know that, and she had to keep up appearances. Couldn’t appear too eager for the knowledge she needed.

Besides, even the typical first date questions had their uses. By studying his body language and expressions, she could pick up tells, to see how he reacted when he told the truth and when he lied.

Civilians were often clueless to how easily they could be read by someone with a little experience. She wasn’t a profiler by any means–tried that and it was not for her–but the mandatory courses she’d taken to become an agent had included some basic skills.

“My whole life. The town doctor delivered me, and I haven’t left.”

Amber paid close attention to his face when he answered, watching the way his eyes moved, how the lines around his mouth shifted when he talked.

“So what do you do?”

Again she watched when he answered, asking the expected questions and analyzing his responses. So far nothing seemed suspicious. It all jived with the information she’d been given. What she needed to do was catch him in a lie, just a small one, but something that would allow her to assess his physical response. But what to ask…

“So why relocate to this area?” he asked her before she could come up with something.

She’d expected this. Had prepared for these types of questions. She’d spent an entire week learning her supposed history. Even an expert psychologist would have trouble distinguishing the lies from the truth. Not foolproof, granted. She knew a few agents who could call her out. But still pretty damn good, if she said so herself. The trick was to stay as close to the truth as possible.

“After my parents passed, I floundered a bit.” Truth. “My father wasn’t close to his family. They didn’t approve of my mother and cut him out when he married her. And my mother was an only child.” Truth. Amber looked into her beer and shrugged her shoulder. “I guess I just got restless with my job, my home, everything.”

Another truth. She wasn’t just restless with her job, her home, her life–but tired. Bone weary tired. Every day she struggled more, but nothing helped. She felt…stuck. Moving to the middle of nowhere and escaping her current existence sounded like heaven. If she had the money. Which she didn’t.

Not because she didn’t make enough. But she hadn’t exactly been worried about saving it before. As an agent, her life had constantly been in turmoil. Hard to prepare for retirement when standing so close to death. Now she was cursing her expensive apartment and the fancy car that she still made payments on after four years.

But that was why she was here, trying to discover what secrets this town and its people held, and not quitting her job and moving for real. There had to be some mysteries, and she would find them. After all, every town had secrets. It fell upon her to find out this town’s secrets and decide whether they were dangerous to the country.

She glanced at her hand in surprise as Danny reached across the table and squeezed it in sympathy, almost as if he could read her thoughts. Dreading the look in his eyes, Amber cautiously met his gaze. She’d seen a lot of pity in people’s eyes in the past year, and didn’t know if she could stand seeing it in a virtual stranger’s. How pathetic could she get?

But Danny’s eyes didn’t carry the dark knowledge of what had happened to her. The sympathy in his eyes wasn’t pitying, but warm.

Amber took a moment, letting it pierce through her barriers and comfort her. She filled up on the glow, basking in it for just a moment, before slamming the barriers close again. Cutting off the pleasure she’d received from his gaze, was harder than she’d thought it would be, causing her to worry her lip. What was happening to her?

Shaking off her concern, she took a sip of beer to hide her discomfort, letting the tart liquid sooth some of the tightness in her throat and chest.

“So it’s just you, then?” Danny asked.

Amber cleared her throat. “Just me.” Her first lie of the evening. She had a younger sister, one of the few bright spots in her life. But she refused to talk about her sister during a job. Someone had to protect her from the things that went bump in the night. Doing her job and hiding Tara’s existence from the bad guys was the best way Amber knew how.

Danny laced their fingers together. “Well, you moved to the right place. Alpine Woods is kind of like one giant extended family. Everyone helps each other out here.”

“Sounds too good to be true.”

He laughed. “I guess it would seem that way to an outsider. I’ll have to introduce you around. You’ll love my siblings.”

“How many siblings do you have?” Another question she knew the answer to, but she had to keep up appearances.

“Two brothers, two sisters, two sister-in-laws, and one almost brother-in-law.” The smile on his face when he talked about them brought a sharp pain to her chest. There was love. A lot of it. And Amber was jealous. She took a hasty sip of her beer, covering up the awkward moment. What would it be like to be surrounded by that much love? She hadn’t spoken to her sister more than a few sentences in the past year. Before that… Well, it had been best all-around to keep her existence a secret, even if that meant cutting her out.

Lucky for her, their food arrived at that moment, and while the waitress moved things around on the table to make room for the plates, Amber reestablished control of her emotions. Danny had an uncanny knack for piercing her protective shell.

* * * *

Danny stared at Amber’s eyes as she laughed when he teased her. Her rich amusement surrounded him and made him a little light-headed. Nothing like a woman who could laugh at herself. Her eyes sparkled, matching the smile on her lips. They had lost that sparkle when she’d talked about her parents, and he’d wanted nothing more than to erase whatever pain she’d been feeling. This woman called to him, as no other had before. In more ways than one.

His gaze dropped to her mouth. Before the night was over, he would taste those lips. And when he did, he’d watch her eyes until they clouded with pleasure.

But more than just attraction buzzed between them. He was surprised to find he actually liked her. That morning, he’d been dreading trying to get close to her, but in one day his outlook had changed. What could be bad about spending time with a beautiful woman?

A hand slammed down on his shoulder with enough force to cause him to cringe.

“Hey Danny boy,” his sister, Laurie, said behind him. Damn it. He should have been watching the door. But he hadn’t expected anyone to be out on a Thursday night.

“Laurie, what are you doing here?” He turned and found all his brothers and sisters behind her. Shit. What the hell were they doing here?

But Laurie wasn’t looking at him. She was glaring across the table, at Amber. Danny glanced between them, noting the confusion in Amber’s eyes as she caught the hostile look on his sister’s face.

“Uh, hi guys. This is Amber, she just moved into the cabin off of Route 70,” Danny explained, hoping they’d realize he was at work and leave him to it.

“So that’s why I hadn’t seen you here before. Danny, a word.” Her hand tightened painfully on his shoulder before she spun around and exited.

Danny coughed to cover his embarrassment at his sister’s rudeness. A word, indeed. He had a few of his own for her. Laurie could be brash, but had never been outright rude before.

“Amber, I’ll be right back.” He turned around and grabbed Ethan’s arm as he passed. “Be nice,” he murmured to him. Ethan never failed to put women at ease.

Last year, Danny never would have trusted Ethan alone with an attractive woman, afraid the woman would have lost her heart to his charming brother. But since Ethan was completely devoted to his mate, Gwen, Danny had nothing to fear.

He waited until the door had firmly closed behind him before turning to his sister angrily, but the emotion died when he saw the fury radiating off her, putting his own to shame. Wolf eyes stared out at him, letting him know just how close Laurie was to losing control. He couldn’t allow himself to get into a fight with her, because his wolf would rise to the challenge. And nothing was important enough to risk hurting her…or anyone else.

“Why did you bring her here?”

Confused, Danny shook his head. “We’re on a date. I thought the whole point was to get close to her.”

“Yeah, so you can lead her away from us. Not bring her into the heart of our territory.” Laurie closed her eyes and took a deep breath, struggling for control. When she opened them again, the human was back in charge, and Danny almost breathed a sigh of relief. For a moment, he’d been afraid things were about to get ugly. “I don’t think you understand the seriousness of the situation. The shifter council charged us with making sure she doesn’t get too close. What do you think they’re going to do if we fail?”

Danny frowned. He’d never thought about it like that before. He knew this was a serious task and that the council didn’t joke around. There was a reason shifters everywhere feared them and revered them in equal parts. But the worst he’d envisioned happening was the world learning about the existence of shifters. It wouldn’t be a perfect situation, but shifters could take care of themselves.

He hadn’t considered the council’s part in all this. He’d seen some of the devastation they’d wreaked on shifters who stepped over the line and almost revealed themselves to the untrustworthy humans. Sure, those who lived around shifters tended to know their secrets–pretty much everyone in Alpine Woods knew, humans included–but only once they’d proven they could keep secrets. And Danny wasn’t quite clear on how much the council knew about the town’s general knowledge.

Everyone was counting on him. In more ways than he knew. He rubbed a hand over his face. Things had just gotten a whole lot more complicated.

“Next time, take her somewhere else. And not fox territory, either.”

“I’m not stupid.”

She just stared at him.

“I’ll admit taking her here was a mistake, but I’m smart enough to make the connections between not bringing her here and not dragging Cody and Misty in the middle of this.”

“They’re already in the middle of this, but I’m glad you’ve made the connection. There are lots of places in human territory you can wine and dine her.”

Resentment welled in Danny’s chest, but for what? Maybe because this task had somehow become his alone, or because sometime between beer and burgers, he had forgotten it was just a task. More likely because whoever, or whatever, she was, he was starting to care for the woman he intended to deceive.

Even if he ignored the instant pull his wolf had felt when he first set eyes on Amber, there was no denying the easy tension of mutual attraction between them.

He’d been wrong when he assumed his attraction made his task easier. It only made things ten times worse. Somehow, he had to remember the end goal and keep reminding himself that there was more to her than met the eye as well. He wasn’t the only one putting up pretenses.

* * * *

Something had changed. Amber noted it the minute Danny and his sister Laurie reentered the pub. The rest of his family had gathered up their plates and beer and moved them to a big booth in the corner that must have been made for giants, because even with the three huge men and the four women, there was still room for Danny and Laurie.

His siblings had been quick to explain that the woman who had dragged Danny outside was nothing more than a sister. Even concocting some story about why she was mad at him. Not that she believed them. It had been too easy to spot the lie on the petite blonde’s face as she’d explained it all to Amber. Now they sat in awkward silence, waiting for the two to return. Some of his siblings were making an effort to be friendly. Others didn’t even bother. The undercurrents were heavy here.

As the pair made their way to the booth, Amber studied first Danny’s defeated expression he tried so hard to hide, and Laurie’s smug one. Dislike for his sister was instant and deep. Whatever she’d said to him had really burrowed under his skin.

Moments before, she and Danny had been having a good time. Sure, she’d been questioning him, but that didn’t mean she hadn’t been appreciating the way his eyes had lit up when he talked about his business or his family. Or the way his easy smile had warmed her belly. All in all it had been the best date she’d had in…maybe ever, even if it was under false pretenses.

And whatever this witch of a sister had done had not only killed the mood, but broken his spirit.

The smile Danny gave her as he sat down lacked the warmth of the previous ones and didn’t meet his eyes. His thigh brushed against hers before putting space between them. Curiosity pulled at her. What was going on?

“Everything okay?” she asked as he sat.

“Of course.”

Lie. He was good, she’d give him that. But she was better than most at reading people, and she’d spent the past half hour analyzing his responses. Yet, she couldn’t exactly come right out and demand to know what had happened. This was his family and his business. Amber bit her lip to hold back the interrogation she was dying to launch. A normal first date would leave it alone and let him and his sister sort it out.

Amber threw a glare at Laurie when she squeezed into the booth opposite them. Didn’t mean she had to like the bitch. The other woman glared right back. Obviously the dislike was mutual.

She studied Laurie’s mean demeanor and the muscles hidden under her long sleeved t-shirt. Clearly, the woman could put up a fight, but she wasn’t trained by the agency, and she’d probably never had to use her skills in a real life situation. Amber could take her. And if she ever had the opportunity and motive, she’d prove it.

Jason, Danny’s brother-in-law…wait, that wasn’t right. Brendan, the tall gorgeous one sitting next to the curly haired brunette on the end was the brother-in-law. Jason was the eldest of Danny’s siblings. All of the men were tall, dark, and handsome; it was hard for her to tell them apart. Jason cleared his throat and drew the attention to him.

“Those burgers look good, but I’m in the mood for nachos. Anyone else?” Clearly he was trying to diffuse the tension between Laurie and her, even though he’d been glaring in her direction moments before.

Danny glanced nervously between the two, making Amber realize her mistake. Here she was trying to seduce information out of him, and she was relishing the thought of picking a fight with his sister. Not the most solid plan she’d come up with, but something about the woman rubbed her the wrong way. Thinking that the woman was trying to tear Danny away from her awakened some primal cavewoman response.

Stupid. Danny was a job, nothing more. Worst case, she’d find another person to show her around town, since she’d already ruled him out as a potential unfriendly. But the thought of losing Danny made her stomach jump unhappily. If she played it cool now, she might be able to salvage the damage the woman had done. She couldn’t let this get to her, or wedge a gap between her and Danny.

Amber smiled at Jason, who watched her closely, a scowl still on his face. The vibe he projected wasn’t as antagonistic as Laurie’s, but was cautious and still bordered on the edge of unfriendly. The sort one would give to a rattlesnake while hiking.

Were his siblings just trying to look out for Danny? Their reactions seemed a bit extreme. She’d think that kind of attention would be stifling. How had the rest of them ended up married, if their siblings were this judgmental?

If she were a weaker woman, she would have left an Amber-shaped outline in the door as she ran away.

Smiling at the eyes around her, varying from wary to downright hostile, she leaned into Danny’s side and put her lips next to his ear.

“I think I understand why you’re the only one in the welcoming committee.”

* * * *

Danny jumped when her lips caressed his ear as she spoke, the warmth of her breath heating his flesh and sending wicked thoughts careening through his mind. Under the table, he hardened. Thank God he’d already put his napkin on his lap, providing some cover. He didn’t want to imagine Laurie’s response if she saw that.

He glanced around at his siblings. With their wolf senses, they would have picked up her whispered words.

Mixed reviews, if their expressions were anything to go by. Some, like Jason’s and Laurie’s, seemed to grow darker; others, like Ethan and Brendan, appeared to lighten. A couple struggled with grins. But he focused on the scowling faces, experiencing for a moment what she must be feeling, surrounded by a group of people who, for seemingly no reason, disliked her. After all, she didn’t know that they knew why she’d moved here.

A laugh bubbled up, and he felt her smile against his ear as it spilled out. Turning his head, he caught and held her gaze.

“Not a very welcoming bunch, huh?”

She shook her head, causing tendrils of hair to fall into her face.

Gently, he brushed them back. It would be so easy to forget his task and hers. To lose himself in this woman. Too easy. As much as he hated to admit it, he might be over his head. Because he feared it was already too late.