Page 1 of Fergus

CHAPTERONE

Fergus knewsomeone was following him.

Correction: it would be more accurate to say he knew exactly who was following him. A young woman. The same young woman who had been dogging him every time he had stepped out in public for the past two days.

Oh, she thought she’d been clever, staying out of sight whenever he chanced to glance in her direction. But what she hadn’t realized was that Fergus was using the windows of the shops he passed or paused in front of to also observe what was behind and to either side of him.

He’d seen the same young woman too many times in that reflection the past two days for it to be a coincidence. What she probably didn’t know was that Fergus was just as guilty of watchingherevery chance he got.

Because from the moment he’d first seen it, he’d decided she had the singularly most delectable and bitable arse he had ever had the pleasure of looking at.

Those twin globes were both small and pert, and Fergus instinctively knew they would fit perfectly in the palms of his hands. The more he looked at them, the more he wanted to squeeze and caress, tobitethem.

He had always thought of himself as a leg man. He liked and enjoyed a woman’s breasts, as he did all parts of a woman’s body, but he’d always loved having a pair of long legs draped over his shoulders or wrapped about his waist as he licked and sucked a woman’s clit to orgasm or thrust inside her with the same result.

This woman’s lack of height meant that although her legs were slender, they weren’t long. Her breasts were small too. But that arse…

Fuck, he was getting hard just thinking about baring and taking his time pleasuring it!

What held him back from introducing himself was the fact he had no idea why she had been following him for the past two days.

To double-check that he wasn’t being suspicious about someone newly moved to Paris who just happened to be developing the same routine as him—leaving his house at eight o’clock to go to his office at Wynter Security, leaving the office building at ten o’clock to stroll to his favorite coffee shop on the Champs-Élysées, sitting down to enjoy coffee and a croissant and people watch before strolling back to his office, and the same again at lunchtime—this morning, Fergus had left his house at the normal time but waited until ten thirty and then taken a different route to the coffee shop.

Within seconds, he had spotted the woman’s reflection behind him in half a dozen store windows.

Even now, he could see her loitering at a bus stop a few yards away, supposedly waiting for a bus and checking information on her cell phone. So far, two buses had stopped to drop off and pick up passengers, and she hadn’t made any attempt to get onto either of them before they pulled away.

She was extremely beautiful in a pale and ethereally slender way. As far as he could see, she wore little makeup. Her eyes were light in color, but she hadn’t ever been close enough for Fergus to tell exactly what that color was. Her nose was small and snub, her lips full and bow-shaped. Her straight, light brown, shoulder-length hair revealed red highlights in the sunshine.

She was thin in that way so many other women envied, because she could wear anything and look amazing in it. Even the fitted denims and T-shirts she had been wearing the past couple of days looked elegant on her.

It was because her jeans and T-shirts fit her so well that Fergus could clearly see that the only thing she had in the back pocket of her jeans was a cell phone in a case that probably also housed her credit cards and cash. Nor did she carry a shoulder bag or backpack in which she might have also stored a weapon. If she had, Fergus would have put an end to what he considered her stalkerish behavior on the first day he’d noticed her.

But he’d had enough now. It was past time for this shit to stop.

Fergus threw several euros onto the table to pay for his coffee and croissant, plus the added tip, before walking straight toward her.

* * *

Thea’s eyeswidened in alarm as she realized, after days of keeping her distance, deliberately arranging for it to be that way, Fergus Wynter was now heading purposefully in her direction.

No, she must be mistaken. He?—

She wasn’t.

Nor was she imagining that his eyes, those deep and mesmerizing emerald-green orbs, were totally focused on her. So much so that he almost plowed down a young couple who got in his way, his apology for doing so distracted at best as he kept his gaze fixed on his goal.

There was now no denying Thea was that goal.

She tried to move, to get away before Fergus reached her. But her feet seemed to weigh a ton each and had rooted themselves to the pavement, making it impossible for her to go anywhere.

She heard the sound of the brakes of another bus as it pulled into the stop behind her, followed by the whoosh of the doors opening. A glance back revealed a single person stepping off the bus, but there was no one getting on it. Would she be able to get on board before?—

“Don’t even think about it,” Fergus Wynter grated as his hand curled about the top of her arm, just tight enough to keep her in place but not to hurt her. “You aren’t going anywhere until you’ve explained exactly why you’ve been following me for the past two days and…approximately three hours?” he added after a glance at the watch on his wrist, which Thea knew had cost as much as some people’s houses.

It was alarming to be told he was aware ofexactlyhow long Thea had been following him.

She’d done her homework and had already known where Fergus now lived and worked in Paris, and where the Wynter Security offices were situated. But she had needed to know more about him than that before she attempted to speak to him. Before she dared trust him.

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