Desperado by Diana Palmer Read Free Book Online

turned abruptly and slammed out of the door without a backward glance.
    Maggie watched him go with sparkling eyes. She could always throw him off balance like that, from their earliest acquaintance. It made her proud, because even his precious Patricia had never been able to do that. It was the one weaponin her arsenal, and a great pride-saver. It was all bluff, of course. She tingled from head to toe just thinking about how it might have been if he’d taken her up on it.

3
    C ord’s visit unsettled Maggie. It was several minutes before she could get herself together enough to shower and dress and go downstairs for breakfast. She had a light meal and looked up the addresses of several employment agencies in the phone book. Then she started making the rounds.
    She’d just come out of the third office on her list, with no results, when she walked straight into a tall brunette she hadn’t noticed rounding a nearby corner.
    “Oh, I’m sorry!” Maggie exclaimed, steadying the taller woman. “I wasn’t even looking where I was…” She hesitated. The other woman was familiar. “You’re Kit Deverell!” she exclaimed, smiling broadly. “I met you and your husband at an investment seminar year before last. We’ve seen each other at several seminars since. I’m Maggie Barton.”
    Kit Deverell’s eyes lit up with recognition. “Of course! You’re Cord’s foster sister.”
    Maggie’s face closed up at once, defensively.
    Kit grimaced. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have blurted that out. You see, my boss is Dane Lassiter, who founded the Lassiter Detective Agency here in town. He met Cord some years ago after he started the detective agency—one of his operatives was a rookie when Cord was, and knew him!”
    “Yes. I’ve…heard Cord mention him once or twice, at odd times when we were speaking to each other,” she added with a grin.
    “You don’t get along well, do you?” Kit asked sympathetically. “I shouldn’t have mentioned Cord. What are you doing at an employment agency, for heaven’s sake?” she added. “You’re vice president at Kemp’s Investment Agency, aren’t you?”
    Maggie nodded. “I was. I gave it up to take a job in Qawi. But it didn’t pan out,” she summarized, avoiding the reason. “Now I’m out of work.”
    “But Logan’s got an opening in his investment firm,” Kit continued, chuckling. “Isn’t that fate at work? Really, his partner quit and went to work over in Victoria. He’s pulling out his hair trying to manage all the accounts by himself. Please come and interview,” she added, tugging at Maggie’s arm. “He’s got me doing stock research in my spare time, and I hate it! I work for Lassiter as a skip tracer, you see. I had to fight Logan, but it’s not dangerous work and we have a reallygood babysitter for our son, Bryce. Logan’s brother’s wife, Della, is pregnant and unable to work because of complications. You’d be saving my life if you could take some of the strain off. Would you? Please?”
    Maggie laughed with pure delight. “If there’s a job going, I’d love to interview. Actually I sort of had in mind a position that would get me out of the country. But perhaps I can take the job temporarily, while your husband looks for someone permanent and I look for something international…”
    “That would work,” Kit said with a grin. “Come on!”
     
    Maggie went to interview. Logan Deverell was a huge man with dark hair, not overweight, but tall and muscular. He obviously doted on his wife, and vice versa.
    “You’re the answer to a prayer,” he said after they shook hands and the three of them were seated in Logan’s spacious office, his long oak desk covered with photos of Kit and a mischievous-looking little boy of about two years of age. “Tom Walker and I were partners, until he moved to Jacobsville. Then I took on another partner. He married several months ago, but he just quit and moved to Victoria, where his wife has family. She’s