Passion Patrol 2 - a Sexy Police Romance Suspense Novel With a Touch of Humor: Hot Cops. Hot Crime. Hot Romance. by Emma Calin Read Free Book Online Page A

more of a stroke and turned her attention to the tea set. He immediately followed her interest.
    “It’s a Paris set, Rococo Revival style from the mid-19th century.”
    “Not from the charity shop then?” she said.
    “No. The 8th earl married a French vicomtesse, Odile de Saintonge and it came with her. Her picture is in the gallery.”
    “Did she live here?” asked Shannon, warming to the sheer romanticism of his history.
    “Oh yes. She set up the dairy to make cheddar cheese and export it for the French. Sadly her husband drowned in the lake at the age of eighty-two trying to retrieve a pheasant he’d shot.”
    Shannon tried to look serious.
    “Don’t they send dogs to do that?”
    “Ha, ha! Dogs have more bloody sense than earls,” he said, letting out a laugh.
    Spencer poured tea while a maid brought a silver tray of perfectly cut, crustless sandwiches.
    “This doesn’t seem real,” she said.
    “You don’t like it?”
    In truth she was blown away. The elegance and splendor overwhelmed her. She chose another word to express herself.
    “It’s so seductive. It’s hard to resist,” she said, taking a glance at him to see if she had subtly gone under the radar.
    “Well, seductive is a good word indeed, Shannon. Nell Gwyn, mistress of King Charles II sat on this terrace with him many a time when it was used as an orangery. Ann Boleyn stayed here, but that was before my family took over,” he explained.
    “It’s fantastic,” she responded, munching a superbly flavoured smoked salmon and cucumber sandwich.
    He looked at her across the table, smiling warmly.
    “You have blue eyes,” he said, almost as if the thoughts had mugged him and pushed him aside. He gathered some composure. “Shannon, I’m sorry, I just said that....”
    “And you Sir have brown eyes. We should swap really,” she said, holding his focus.
    He looked away, seemingly embarrassed by his conduct. She reached across and touched his shoulder.
    “Spencer, it’s nice—no—it’s wonderful to say what’s in your head, or heart. That’s what they call getting real, man. Your tradition and quality must be about being real,” she said, knowing that she’d fired another tender torpedo at his huge gentle rudderless battleship of formality.
    They sat silently as the maid returned with a delicate china cake stand. It was loaded with tiny treats that looked like works of art and far too good to eat. She selected a tart with a perfect glazed strawberry.
    “That’s hardly a mouthful. Please enjoy them. Everything shared is four times the pleasure.”
    “Well I couldn’t deny you that, Sir,” she said, taking a wonderful square of very dark, chocolate and ginger confection. “Delicious!” she said. “I’m gonna have to do a few miles on my bike to burn this off.”
    “You look jolly trim to me,” he said.
    “And so do you, kind Sir—but not jolly trim. You look fit,” she said.
    Spencer blushed visibly.
    “I’m sorry. That was a personal remark. I wanted—I want to talk about the village and your role as policeman—policewoman, I mean. That’s what I intended.”
    She studied him for a moment, letting him know with her eyes that she was thinking. This poor man was on a golden hook of his tradition and his dead wife. If this had been a boxing match, he would have been on the ropes now with his hands down. The soft tissue was there in front of her.
    “Do you get to talk much? I mean talk like this,” she said.
    “Not much,” he began, almost as if he choked up a little. “I guess I’m not that much of a talker. You know, a stereotype eccentric chap fixing my Jag and reading the Times.”
    “If you were really that guy you wouldn’t have put that idea together and said that to me. And I think you know that,” she said.
    He looked at her and let his chin sink into his cupped hands.
    “You should be a cop.”
    “So, you’re nicked in the act of trying to throw a lady off your scent,” she replied.
    “Ben was