Led into Temptation. Cara Summers

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СКАЧАТЬ of parchment she’d pulled out of Hattie’s hatbox. Now you will experience all of those forbidden pleasures…. And that was what had motivated her to reread the diaries she’d written at fourteen. Then she noticed the expression on Avery’s face. “What?”

      “Just thinking. You know, there’s a priest, a Father Dane MacFarland, who’s due to check in to Haworth House today.”

      “Avery, you can’t be—”

      He raised both hands, palms outward. “I’m not suggesting anything. Just providing information. Besides, he may be eighty and using a walker.”

      He accepted a menu from the waitress and flashed her a smile. “We’ll have your best bottle of champagne and four lobster rolls.”

      “Champagne?” Naomi echoed.

      He turned his smile on her. “Sisters’ orders. My mission is to get you from mourning into celebratory mode ASAP. Before anyone finds you here.”

      “My sisters are being pushy.”

      Avery’s brows shot up. “Turnabout’s fair play. You’ve been taking care of them and pushing them for a long time.”

      Her lips curved.

      Avery patted her hand. “That’s better. They’re annoyed that they can’t talk to you in person. But since we’re pretty sure your phone is being tapped, they want you to have as much privacy here as you can get.”

      “We were careful not to mention Haworth House when we talked. We have this code we’ve used since we were kids.”

      “Right.” Avery raised both hands and wiggled his fingers. “They’re being very cloak-and-daggerish with me, too, using pay phones and only contacting me on my private line at the hotel.”

      Naomi sighed. “It’s not going to take a Sherlock Holmes to trace me here.”

      Avery shrugged. “Hey, if using codes and pay phones makes your sisters feel like they’re helping, I say it’s a good thing. And who knows? Might buy you twenty-four to forty-eight hours of privacy.”

      The waitress arrived and began the uncorking ritual. Once she’d filled the glasses, Avery raised his. “To the new Naomi Brightman.”

      Naomi blinked. “I’ll be perfectly happy to get the old one back.”

      “I assumed that old Naomi’s bridges are pretty much burned.”

      “And then some. But there’s got to be something I can do to fix that. I haven’t let myself think about it.” She lifted her glass thoughtfully and her gaze shifted beyond his shoulder to Haworth House. Something inside of her stirred. “I have a feeling that I’ll figure something out while I’m here.”

      “Good plan. All I’m saying is that you should keep your options open. You don’t necessarily have to return to your life BMD.”

      “Before Michael Davenport.”

      He grinned at her. “You’re catching on, sugar. When one door slams shut, another one always opens. Hattie Haworth reinvented herself here. You might as well give it a shot, too. So I’ll drink to the new Naomi Brightman.”

      “Cheers,” Naomi said, and they both drank champagne.

      “ANYTHING ELSE I can get for you, Father MacFarland?”

      Dane glanced up from his book, removed his sunglasses and smiled at the pretty redhead who’d been cheerfully refilling his glass of iced tea for the past hour. “No thanks, Tess.”

      Except for an introduction to Naomi Brightman. That would be nice. She’d been in her room in the tower for over an hour now. He knew that because he’d kept her in his sights ever since she’d left the ferry. Dane had no doubt that the FBI and the police would soon figure out she’d come to her home on Belle Island. But for now MacFarland Investigations, the firm he ran with his brother Ian, appeared to be the only ones on the scene.

      Except for Michael Davenport. Gut instinct told Dane that the swindler was probably already here and would make contact with Naomi soon. And so far, she hadn’t been lured out onto the balcony by the breathtaking view.

      He handed Tess the bill he’d already signed to his room. “I thought I’d stay here and read for a bit more.”

      “No prob. During the summer months, the courtyard is one of our most popular spots and it’s open to Haworth House guests twenty-four-seven.”

      Dane considered that providential. The hotel itself was a three-story structure built around an inner courtyard lined with porticoes. One side opened into the lobby, and through an archway on the other, guests could access a stairway that descended to the beach. Dane’s location at a table beneath one of the porticoes offered him a perfect view of the balcony that opened off Naomi Brightman’s room. So far she hadn’t made an appearance, but that might be providential, too. He was going to have to tread carefully with her. She’d already managed to throw him off a bit. It hadn’t been a part of his plan to talk to her on the ferry.

      But there’d been something about the way she’d looked, standing alone at the railing, and he’d felt the tug of sympathy in every fiber of his being.

      He lifted his gaze to her balcony. He’d been in her bedroom two days ago on a reconnaissance mission. Once he’d cracked the primitive code she and her sisters used to communicate and learned that she was definitely coming to Haworth House, he’d assigned a man to watch her apartment in Boston, and he’d taken a quick trip to Belle Island to get the lay of the land.

      Tess tucked the leather folder containing his bill into her pocket. “We’ve never had a priest stay here before.”

      He and Ian had prepared for that question when Dane had chosen to masquerade as a man of the cloth. “My bishop is interested in finding locations for spiritual retreats.”

      “Oh, Haworth House has a lot of spaces to retreat to. You should talk to our manager, Mr. Cooper.”

      He smiled at her. “I’ll do that, Tess.” More importantly, he intended to talk to Naomi Brightman about it. It would be his initial reason for meeting with her.

      “I’m going off the clock until tomorrow morning. Will I see you then?” Tess asked.

      “You bet.” He’d be here until he got his hands on the elusive Michael Davenport. According to his FBI informant, Naomi Brightman had been quite candid with both the police and the FBI. Davenport had told her that he would be in touch. And every instinct that

      Dane had told him the swindling con man would keep his word.

      Part of Davenport’s method of operation was to use women as either partners or patsies in his schemes. During the last con he’d worked in Kansas City he’d stashed his ill-gotten gains with a woman partner until the heat was off. In the end, he’d gotten away with the money. His partner had ended up dead.

      Davenport had stashed something with Naomi this time. Dane was sure of it. Because of her squeaky clean record, he figured her for a patsy, not a partner. But that didn’t mean she was in any less danger. What he knew for sure was that Davenport hadn’t left the Boston area. In the past fourteen days, he’d СКАЧАТЬ