Hook's Pan by Marie Hall Read Free Book Online Page B

tossed it into the fire with a loud crack. “You’ve wit, beauty, and,” he licked his lips, eyeing her body again, making it tingle and shiver with heat and flame, “a fine body. You’ll warm my bed this eve.”
     
    “Bloody hell, Hook.” Danika rolled her eyes. “She’s no whore, she’s your mate.”
     
    Trisha snorted and crossed her arms across her chest.
     
    Hook lifted a dark brow, rubbed his chin, and shook his head slowly. “No. I reject her.”
     
    Seriously? Trisha might have been insulted, if it wasn’t for the small fact that she had absolutely zero desire to do the horizontal mambo with a pirate.
     
    Swaggering up to her, he tipped her chin up with his hook and the feel of the cold steel pressed against her warm flesh made her break out in a fine sheen of sweat. He really needed to stop touching her.
     
    The smoky, peaty scent of his breath washed over her lips as he said, “Are you a Pan sympathizer?”
     
    His left hand trailed up the fabric of her sleeve and suddenly it was feeling a little too warm. She licked her lips. His gaze locked on the movement.
     
    James’ fingers were firm as they continued gliding up and down her arm. Blinking several times, Trish tried to remind herself to breathe. This man was a shark—a deadly, dangerous beast of the sea whose awe-inspiring façade did little to hide the predator within.
     
    But what he didn’t know was that she was no shrinking violet, she was a predator too. And one other thing—her best friend was a psychologist. Betty had taught Trisha all about body language. The man thought himself superior, better than her at least.
     
    He was probably used to whores doing whatever he pleased, and ladies twittering and fanning themselves in nervousness.
     
    Thrusting her face to within inches of his, she smirked. “Touch me like that again, and I’ll cut your balls off. As for being a Pan sympathizer, I’ve always had an irrational hatred for the little beast in the book.”
     
    He licked his teeth, but he didn’t look angry, or even annoyed. In fact, he seemed the opposite of it. James looked pleased, smug even.
     
    “Then why do you dress like him? Hmm?”
     
    “It’s called a play. Or do you not have those in Neverland?” She arced a brow, pursing her lips, enjoying their verbal sparring, excited by it even. All the nerves in her body on high alert and buzzing with anticipation, she waited for his comeback.
     
    “You’re a strange little Pan.”
     
    Quicker than she could track, he embedded his hook into the edge of her green cap, flipping it off her head, and pulling the red feather gently through his fingers as he crushed it to his chest. The mass of blonde curls she’d pinned up for the play tumbled down as the pins scattered to the rug. Refusing to preen or nervously flit her fingers around her head, she instead lifted her chin, not caring how she looked at the moment, intrinsically knowing she was engaged in a battle of wills and she’d not back down now. She might be the Chihuahua next to his Rottweiler, but sometimes the smallest were also the most tenacious.
     
    “No,” he said, “you look nothing like the bastard.”
     
    They stared at each other for what felt an eternity. Only the sounds of their breaths and the snap and crackle of burning logs filled the space between them.
     
    But Trisha wasn’t nervous, she was thrilled, because even though he was large and powerful, and trying his damndest to intimidate her, something inside her screamed that she wasn’t in any real danger around him.
     
    Even if he had pointed a sword at her throat.
     
    “Good Lord,” Danika breathed heavily, breaking their eye contact, forcing Trisha to finally look away and breathe around the giant ball of heat sliding up the back of her throat. “I hope you don’t plan to eat the girl, Hook. The way you look at her, ‘tis enough to make me mourn my younger days.”
     
    Twittering, she fanned her face while she flew in front of