Page 14 of The Jade Stone Sleuth

Clara laughed. “We can hope.” She entangled her fingers in his short dark hair and urged his head down toward hers.

His grin made her knees weak.

A pounding came on the door.

“Maybe if we sneak out back,” he whispered against her lips.

“I like that idea.”

Before they could move, she heard the door fling open and calls of, “Clara! Where are you, girlie?”

Her stomach sank. Usually she loved to see her sister.

Tonight she wanted to curse the interruption.

Chapter

Five

Brex was losing his mind.If he didn’t find it soon, he might mess up this entire job.

He’d never experienced flirtation or a desire to be close to and kiss somebody like this before. Casually dating Rachel or anyone else, no matter their beauty or status, was ruined for him.

Clara was all he could see. All he wanted to see.

And this gorgeous woman who was drawing him in wasn’t his type, wouldn’t fit in his world, and might be a murder suspect.

Brex wanted to curse the interruption, but it was for the best.

He couldn’t see any scenario where Clara had killed anyone, but that was why he was here. He couldn’t let Aiden or the Hendrys down, and he longed for that million dollars in his bank account. What was he doing almost kissing her? He’d done enough groundwork to spend more time with her. Kissing her would make him lose his mind and was stretching far over the line of acceptable protocol.

He and Clara straightened and turned to face a man and three women who burst into the kitchen from the front entry.

“Clara’s cookies,” the reddish-blonde woman with jade-colored eyes said, but she was studying him with questions in her eyes.

“Ultra-hot man,” the brunette with deep-brown eyes who he recognized as Clara’s younger sister, the influencer Melody, murmured.

“Who are you?” the man demanded, an average height, well-muscled blond guy about Clara’s age in a golf shirt and pants.

The third woman was pressed into the man’s side, a petite brunette with a soft smile and a vacant look in her eyes.

Clara sighed and lifted a hand toward Brex. “Brex Cabella, this is my sister Melody, my cousin Tess, and my closest friends Weston and Jane.”

Weston’s mouth turned down at the word ‘friend’. The possessive way he was looking at Clara said he wanted more than friendship.

“Nice to meet you,” Brex said to the three of them. He stepped forward and shook each of their hands. The first two women each gripped his hand normally. Jane’s grip was limp. Weston tried to clamp onto his hand. Brex put pressure with his thumb on the man’s median nerve in the thenar space between the thumb and first finger.

Weston winced and pulled away. Brex hid a smile and stepped back to Clara’s side.

“How did you meet my gorgeous sister, Mr. Brex Cabella?” Melody asked, grabbing a cookie and biting off half of it. She was loud and borderline obnoxious on her feed but well-loved by her audience. She was much calmer in person but still had a mischievous glint in her dark eyes. She reminded him more of Lincoln than of Clara.

“We met hiking this morning,” Brex answered. “Then she invited me to dinner. For Lincoln.”

“For Linc?” The cousin Tess’s eyes, so similar to Clara’s, narrowed. It was intriguing to see those eyes in a paler face with strawberry-blonde hair instead of Clara’s dark locks. “Why not for Clara?” She blinked long lashes at him, a seemingly innocent motion, but he could tell she was baiting him.

“Brex works for Aiden Porter,” Clara explained, “so I knew Linc would die to meet him.”

“Aiden Porter?” they all exclaimed. Except Jane who remained silent.

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