Prince of Air and Darkness by Jenna Black Read Free Book Online

annoyance, and finally she looked up and met his eyes again.
    “You’re pouring it on a little thick,” she told him, amazed that she was able to force sound out of her throat. Annoyed she might be, but it was hard to deny the way his regard made her shiver deep inside.
    Hunter looked startled, blinking and sitting back once more. The surprise banished some of the sexual heat, and for just a moment he looked like a normal—if insanely good-looking—human being. “What do you mean?” he asked, his eyes all boyish innocence.
    His attempt to deny it was even more annoying. No way in hell Hunter was not aware of the sensual heat he kept putting into his gaze. The Irish temper that she had inherited from her mother began to stir. She swallowed a number of comments that would be highly inappropriate with a client.
    “Look,” she said, “I’m perfectly happy to design this website for you, and I’m perfectly happy to meet for coffee like this to discuss it, but I could do without all the smoldering looks, okay?”
    “Smoldering looks?”
    She rolled her eyes. His face just wasn’t made for feigned innocence. “Yeah. You know, like this:” She let her lids slide heavily halfway over her eyes and parted her lips in a parody of a come-hither expression.
    For a moment, he looked both surprised and offended, and Kiera had a terrible fear that she’d been wrong and had just made the worst kind of fool of herself. Then he laughed and shook his head, but it was a self-deprecating laugh, not a mocking one. There was a warm, pleasant burr to his laughter, and everything about him looked more relaxed and natural. It was like watching an actor as he walked off into the wings, dropping his assumed character and slipping back into himself.
    “Sorry about that,” he said, still grinning. “I’m an incorrigible flirt, I’m afraid. I’ll try to knock it off if it’s bugging you.”
    She would not have described what he was doing as flirting. Flirting was light and fun and nonthreatening, and she couldn’t apply any of those words to the way Hunter had been looking at her. What the hell was he after, anyway? It wasn’t like she was one of the world’s great beauties, and he didn’t know her well enough to be interested in her for her personality.
    Hunter was still smiling at her ruefully, looking unguarded for the first time she could remember, but instinct told her he was hard at work rebuilding his facade. For some reason, he seemed to feel like he needed to play the role of the suave and polished ladies’ man with her. If he was hoping to make the relationship between them into something more than business, he’d be much better off dropping the act. But since Kiera wasn’t interested in Hunter as anything but a client, it was just as well he continued to play the charming rake. Maybe there was a part of her that found his act sexy, but there was something just a tad off about it, something that made her want to hold him at bay. And holding him at bay seemed infinitely safer than letting him charm her.
    ****
    Hunter sat at the table and fumed as he watched Kiera slip out the door of the coffee shop and practically run across the street to the square. She couldn’t get away from him fast enough, apparently.
    He’d never had that happen to him before, never had a woman turn him down like that. He had thought for a moment that her defenses were weakening, had thought the glamour and his own personal appeal had become irresistible. How had she managed to shrug it off?
    Never before had Hunter met such a strong-willed woman. He should find that will of hers a blasted nuisance, something that interfered with his mission and therefore needed to be destroyed. But in the moment when Kiera had shrugged off his glamour, he’d felt a strange stirring of admiration in his chest. She had a fighting spirit, one that resisted manipulation, whether magical or otherwise. How he wished he were free to do the same thing. Of course, as