Good God, he hoped he wasn’t about to be Margot’s boy toy. Though there could be worse things, he speculated, catching the gleam in her eye.
“Margot, are you—” The door opened farther and a blonde goddess stood in the dark hallway. Matt’s heart stopped dead in his chest.
It was Savannah, from the photograph.
Sort of.
The beauty was there, the perfect skin, bright blue eyes and shiny sweep of hair. But that was where the similarities ended. The real-life Savannah was somehow sharper, her radiance hard and refined to an edge. Her cheekbones alone could cut through tin.
She was razor wire next to Margot’s magnolia.
There was no sunny warmth. No shimmer. This woman was a stranger to him. He knew this was ridiculous—picture or no, she was still a stranger to him. But the loss was there nonetheless. He didn’t realize how much he was looking forward to basking in that warm glow—until that glow was buried under ice.
She was, however, painfully sexy in a long straight gray skirt and a white shirt that couldn’t quite diminish the curves she clearly was trying to hide. The whole look gave her the appearance of a prison warden on lockdown.
In a porno.
And, he realized, aside from sexy she was also a dead ringer for the surveillance picture he had of Vanessa in New Orleans. Right down to the eyes, which were guarded. Wary. Hiding something.
He lost his companion, that fantasy woman, but he gained something else. Something better. Something righteous.
In a stunning moment of clarity, he knew that coming here, believing these women somehow had the answers he needed, had not been wrong.
It occurred to him that the missing gems, the Pacific Diamond and Ruby—the million-dollar reasons his father sat alone in a jail cell while his accomplices and turncoats lived in freedom—could be right here.
Hidden and guarded by Savannah O’Neill.
Out of the corner of his eye he took in the crumbling house, the faded paint, the sagging porch. That the gems were here now, or ever had been, seemed like a long shot.
“Oh, sorry,” she said, looking at Matt with plain distaste. “Who are you?”
“He’s here about the ad,” Margot said, standing aside and smiling at Matt. “Please come in.”
His lip curled, satisfaction rippling through him. Savannah must have sensed it, because her own lips tightened, her eyes narrowed.
He hitched the loose waist of his worn khakis and climbed the steps, feeling the heat of the South mesh with the sudden warmth in his flesh. His eyes stayed glued to Savannah’s as something primal swept through him.
You, he thought, have a secret. And I will find out what it is.
CHAPTER TWO
“MARGOT,” SAVANNAH MUTTERED as the strange man climbed the stairs, like some kind of predatory cat, all muscle and intention. His shaggy brown hair gleamed like polished wood and his green eyes radiated something hot and awful that she felt in the core of her body—a trembling where there hadn’t been one in years. Hot sweat ran between her breasts under her white cotton shirt. “This is not a good idea.”
“Please, Savannah,” Margot all but purred, her eyes hovering over the man like a honeybee. “Look at him. It’s a fabulous idea.”
Savannah’s hand tightened on the door as if her muscles were about to override her system and slam the door in his handsome, chiseled face.
But then he was there, big and masculine on the tattered welcome mat. C.J., the little tart, stepped out of the sleeping porch to curl around his dusty boots.
Seriously, that cat gave all of them a bad name.
“My name is Matt Howe,” he said, holding out his hand.
Margot shook it, clasping Matt’s big paw in her lily-white one. “I’m Margot O’Neill,” she said. “Welcome to my home.”
Then it was Savannah’s turn.
Her turn to touch his flesh to hers. Her turn to stand under his neon gaze.
Just a man, she told herself. Tell yourself he’s a client. He wants research on minor battles in the Pacific during World War Two or about the migratory patterns of long-tailed swallows.
Her hand slid into his and receptors, long buried, long ignored, shook themselves awake, sighing with a sudden pleasure.
“Savannah O’Neill,” she said, her voice a brusque rattle.
“A pleasure, Savannah,” Matt said, bowing slightly over her hand.
Pretend, she told herself, yanking her hand free from his callused, strong grip, that he’s gay.
But the way his eyes climbed quickly over her body belied that particular fantasy.
Pretend you are gay, she told herself. But the heat in her belly ruined her pretense.
“Your ad was a little vague,” he said, stammering slightly on the words. “I was hoping for some more information about what you’re looking for?”
Savannah cast a quick, dubious look at Margot. What about Handyman/gardener needed was vague? Despite the sharpness in his eyes, the guy clearly wasn’t all that bright.
“Margot,” she said, grabbing her grandmother’s elbow. “Perhaps we—”
“Should show him the courtyard,” Margot said, smiling at Matt and shaking off Savannah’s hand. “So he can see the scope of the work.”
Margot was determined—more determined now that a man was here, handsome and virile, stepping into the Manor—than she’d been in front of the greenhouse two days ago, cradling her dead orchids.
Savannah began to sense that this was wrong in more ways than they could possibly fathom.
Men in general were a danger to the O’Neill women; it had been proven time and time again men brought out the worst in them. The most notorious aspects of their already inappropriate characters.
Even her.
Especially her.
But handsome strangers? They were catnip to a certain kind of woman—and Margot was one of those women.
Right, she nearly laughed aloud at her own blindness, and you’re so immune.
It had been years since her heart had thundered in her chest like this—and that had not ended all that well.
“I’ve lived in this house my whole life,” Margot was saying, her hand cradled in Matt’s elbow as she led them through the shabby manor as if it was still the best property in the area. “And my mother did the same before me.”
“It’s a beautiful house,” Matt said, glancing up at the high ceilings, all of which needed spackle and paint. The mahogany floors beneath their feet were beginning to buckle and sag in places and she watched as Margot led him around the worst patches, as though they were avoiding puddles in the rain. “Did your family build it?” He asked.
Savannah laughed and Margot tossed her a wicked look over her shoulder. “Yes,” Margot said. “My great-great-grandfather built this house.”
As a saloon and whorehouse.
She noticed Margot wasn’t advertising that fact.
The devil in Savannah wanted to point out the origins of the house, just to watch Margot’s skin get splotchy and Matt get flustered, but Savannah spent so much time pretending not to be born from a long line of gamblers and whores that she couldn’t bring herself to say it.
No