Duty At What Cost?. Michelle Conder
whom? You?’
Wolfe gave her a stare he knew from experience made grown men think twice. ‘You have an awfully smart mouth for someone in your predicament.’ And he wished she would close it. The husky quality of her lightly accented voice was having an adverse effect on his body.
‘I am Princess Ava de Veers of Anders and I demand you let me down from here immediately.’
Wolfe ran his eyes over her again, just for the sheer pleasure of it and because he knew it would put her on the back foot. ‘What are you doing on a wall, Princess? Learning to fly?’
‘I am a guest at this wedding and you are likely to lose your job if you insist on leaving me up here. I’m probably sunburned by now.’
‘By this watered-down version of the sun?’ And on that golden skin? ‘Unlikely. And honoured guests usually approach by the main gates. What outlet do you work for?’
Her brow crinkled. ‘I don’t—’
‘Newspaper? Magazine? TV station? Nice camera, by the way. Mind if I take a look?’
‘Yes, I do.’
He dumped her handbag on the grass and started checking through her photos.
‘I said yes, I do mind.’
‘Whether I look or not isn’t contingent on whether you mind.’
‘Why bother asking, then?’
He nearly smiled at the exasperation in her voice. ‘Manners.’
She made a cute noise that said he wouldn’t know what manners were if they conked him on the head.
Frowning at the photos on her camera, he glanced up at her. ‘Nice celebrity shots on here. I repeat—what rag do you work for?’
She rolled her eyes. ‘I am not a member of the paparazzi, if that’s what you’re suggesting.’
‘No?’
‘No. I own an art gallery. Those were taken at a recent opening night. Not that it is any of your business.’
Wolfe rubbed his jaw and pretended to consider that. ‘Really? Given your current predicament, I’d say it’s very much my business.’
She looked as if she was holding on to her temper by a thread. ‘I do understand how this looks. And I even appreciate how efficient your men were at spotting me—’
‘I’m so happy to hear that.’
‘But—’ she carried on as if he hadn’t interrupted ‘—I am who I say I am. My car is a couple of hundred metres that way, and your men would already know this if they had bothered to go and find it instead of holding their weapons on me as if I was a terrorist.’
Wolfe handed the camera to Eric. ‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ He didn’t bother to hide the contempt he felt for her type. Haughty princesses—real or imagined—who thought their needs took preference over everybody else’s. ‘Did I forget to tell you? My men take orders from me, not you.’
Her pout turned even sexier. ‘Convenient.’
He wasn’t in the frame of mind to appreciate her wisecrack and nearly reconsidered his need to verify her identity before tossing her back over the wall.
‘Eric. Dane. Take the Jeep and find her car. If it exists.’
She sniffed at his instructions and shifted her bottom on the wall. She must be completely uncomfortable by now. Serve her right.
‘I told you to keep your hands where I could see them.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Do you think it might be at all possible that I could wait on the ground for your men to return? I promise not to overpower you while they are gone.’
The air seemed to buzz with the antagonistic heat she imbued him with, and her accent lent her sardonic words a sexy edge. She was a wicked combination of beauty and spirit, and not even the way she spoke down to him was enough to keep his libido at bay. A truly annoying realisation.
‘I think I can handle you.’
Her eyes dropped to his mouth and Wolfe felt a kick of lust all the way to his toes. He waited, breathless, for the heat in his groin to dissipate, but if anything it got worse. Then her eyes blazed into his and the chemistry he’d been trying to ignore sparked like a live wire between them.
The way her eyes widened he thought perhaps she had read his thoughts, but that was impossible. Fourteen years in the business and Wolfe knew how to hide what he was feeling—hell, he’d learned how to do that by the time he could walk.
Perhaps she’d just felt the same burn he had. And had liked it just as little, if her wary gaze was anything to go by. Which gave him a moment’s pause. If she was a journalist—or, worse, some sort of political stalker—she’d have already used that connection to manipulate him, not shy away from it as if she’d just been singed.
His eyes took in wrists that looked impossibly slender within the cuffs of her masculine-style shirt, then moved down along fine-boned hands and nails buffed to perfection. She didn’t do hard labour. That much was obvious.
He knew instinctively she was who she said she was. It was in her regal bearing, the swanlike arch of her neck, in her sense of entitlement and the way she looked at him as if he was staff. His mother had often looked at his father like that and Wolfe had always felt sorry for the poor bastard.
She shifted again, her eyes on the ground. ‘Do you have any suggestions on how I might get down from here?’ And with a degree of dignity, her tone seemed to imply.
‘Perhaps you’d like me to unfold my trusty ladder from my back pocket?’ Wolfe mocked. ‘Oh, dear. Left it at home.’ He opened his hands, palms facing upwards. ‘Guess you’ll just have to jump into my arms, Princess. What a treat.’
His horse snickered and her eyes used the excuse to glance at the stallion before returning to his. ‘Channelling your inner Zorro?’ she asked sweetly.
His lips twitched. ‘Only because I left my Batman tool belt at home.’
‘With Robin?’
Despite his less than stellar mood he chuckled. ‘Cute. Toss down the boots first.’ The last thing he wanted was to be stabbed by one of those dangerous-looking heels, and by the gleam in her eyes that was exactly what she was considering.
‘I have a better idea. Why don’t I just go back down the way I came up?’
‘No.’
Her lips tightened. ‘It makes perfect sense. I can—’
‘Try it and I will shoot you.’
‘You don’t have a gun.’
‘I have a gun.’
She paused, her stillness telling him she was weighing up whether he was telling the truth or not. Her eyes slid down his torso and over his legs and he felt a rush of unexpected excitement, as if she’d actually touched him.
‘You are being overly obnoxious about this,’ she fumed.
‘Not yet, I’m not.’ Wolfe barely managed to suppress his rising aggravation at this physical response to a woman he already didn’t like. ‘But I’m getting close.’
‘If you drop me I’ll sue you.’
‘If you don’t hurry up and get down from that wall I’ll sue you.’
Her dark brows arched imperiously. ‘For what?’
‘Trying my patience. Now, pass down the boots. Nice and easy,’ he warned softly.
With an audible sigh she dropped her boots one after the other into his outstretched hands. The kid leather was warm from her touch.
‘Now