Page 13 of Colorado Christmas Carol
“Can I speak to you for a few minutes?” he asked.
She looked at him with visible reluctance. “It’s so late . . .” she moaned, because it had been a long day, and she was really tired.
“This won’t take long.”
She shrugged and followed him into the bar.
“I don’t drink . . .” she began.
“Well, I do. Have a seat.” He put her into a booth while he went to fetch a gin and tonic from the bar. He came back and slid into the seat. “Want coffee or something cold?” he asked as an afterthought.
“No thanks. I had a Coke in the kitchen.”
He sat back in the booth, staring at her evenly. He took a sip of his drink before he spoke. “Give me your impression of Mr. Sutter,” he said.
She stared at him, surprised. “Can I ask why you want to know?”
“No.” He took another sip.
She really wanted to blow up at him. He was terse, unpleasant, mildly arrogant, and conceited. But, on the other hand, he was really gorgeous, and she wasn’t used to being singled out by gorgeous men.
“He seems very self-contained,” she said after a minute. “There’s something simply horrific in his past, something that torments him constantly . . .”
“How do you know that?” he asked, shocked.
She blinked. “I don’t know. It’s a . . . well, a sort of sensitivity. I’m extremely vulnerable to sound and light—I have migraines. But it works with people, too. I sense them. Sort of.”
“Go ahead.” He nodded, encouraging her.
She wondered what he knew about Dean and why he was so interested in the man. Then she remembered Mellie. He was concerned as a parent, of course. He wanted to know about a man who had befriended his daughter as well as Essa. Of course he’d checked him out.
“Well, he’s incredibly controlled. Never loses his temper, never gets angry when another person might. He said that his stepmother taught him those things, but he didn’t sound as if he cared for her. I got the impression that she frightened him. He’s methodical, highly intelligent . . .”
“And extremely dangerous,” Duke interrupted coldly.
She gasped faintly. “What?”
“Never mind what. But if he invites you anywhere away from here, where you’d be completely alone with him, find an excuse to not go with him.”
“Why?” she burst out, stunned.
He ground his teeth together. “I can’t tell you. It’s confidential information. Suffice it to say that I know what I’m talking about. Most people are far different from the public faces they assume.”
He irritated her by fingering Dean as dangerous. It was absurd! The man was gentle and kind. Unlike this barracuda!
“So, is your private face sweet and kind, then?” she retorted, throwing down the gauntlet.
“My private life is none of your business,” he said pleasantly. “Any more than yours is mine—what you have of one,” he added with faint sarcasm.
She glared at him. It was an insult. He assumed that since she wasn’t pretty or what he would call intelligent, she never got out of her room. It was true, but she wasn’t admitting that to him!
“I can go out any time I like!” she returned hotly.
He just raised an eyebrow and smiled. Smugly.
She got up, feeling cold and devalued; like the young teen who’d been the target of half a dozen unkind people who enjoyed tormenting her. Her father had said she had to learn to deal with people—so she’d tossed one of her tormentors into the backstop on the baseball field and been expelled. Not for long, because her father did get involved then. But she felt just as miserable now, with this blond idiot making her feel like an insect.
The jolly surroundings of holly and tinsel and golden bells didn’t put her in any sort of holiday mood. They were a reminder of the joy she’d lost. And here was Mr. Perfection reeling off all her disadvantages.
