Stevie Lee by Tara Janzen Read Free Book Online

a fish, I fell to my knees and yelled “Thank God!” his voice rose to a crescendo, popping her eyes open.
    “Well, yes, I can understand that, of course.” Was he nuts?
    “Naturally, I’ve toned it down a bit for civilization.”
    “Naturally.” Stevie discreetly rolled her eyes and went back to eating her breakfast, hoping they wouldn’t have any more outbursts, praying that he’d eat and leave, and that she’d be done with him.
    * * *
    Hungry guests a happy hostess makes , Stevie silently repeated her mother’s favorite phrase for the third time, once for each piece of toast he’d eaten after he’d finished off ten ounces of rib eye steak, half a pound of hash browns, and two eggs. He was never going to leave, she just knew it. But she wasn’t nearly as concerned as she’d been. There was something about watching a marathon eating spree that wore the nervous, sexual energy right out of her.
    Resting her elbows on the table and her head in her hands, she watched him devour another slice of toast, and wondered what she’d feed him next. Her half-gallon carton of milk registered empty. Only a heel of bread remained in the wrapper.
    “You should have warned me about your hollow leg.”
    Completely nonplussed by her barb, he glanced up and grinned. “A guy can store up a lot of hunger living on raw fish.”
    “No kidding,” she said dryly, settling back in her chair and waiting for him to pounce on the last piece of bread. She didn’t have to wait long.
    As he leaned forward to put it in the toaster, she spied a telltale dent in his ear, and a smile twitched the corner of her mouth. No doubt about it, Hal Morgan was full of surprises.
    “What happened to your earring?” she asked, mildly intrigued.
    “I had to pawn my diamond in Oahu. Do you want to go halfsies on the toast?”
    She shook her head and leaned in closer. “You had a diamond earring?”
    “What I had was a diamond. I figured the safest place for it was in my ear. Turned out to be a real good idea.”
    Definitely intrigued, Stevie had to ask, “What do you mean, best place for it?”
    “When Freedom , my sailboat, crashed on the island, a lot of my stuff disappeared. But my good luck charm”—he reached up and tugged his ear, grinning—“she was safe and sound.”
    “Good luck charm?” her tone cast serious doubt on his terminology. “You end up shipwrecked on a deserted tropical island—and you’ve still got a ‘good luck charm?’ Where did you get such a great piece of luck?”
    “I picked it up the hard way . . . running for my life on a beach in South Africa.” The toast popped up, and he slathered it with butter and jam.
    Sighing, she rested her head on the table and gave him a choice. “Do you want to tell me about it? Or do you want me to drag it out of you?”
    He took a bite of toast and chewed it thoughtfully for a moment. “I guess that all depends, Stevie. Are we talking a real physical dragging out? With you and me rolling around on the floor and—”
    “Don’t press your luck,” she interrupted, cautioning him with a lift of her brow.
    Teasing blue eyes flashed at her from across the table. “I’d been in Angola for a few weeks,” he started in. “Things were heating up with the government and the guerillas, and it was time to get out.” Slowly but surely, his eyes took on a faraway look. “When this small freighter came through looking for crew, I signed on as far as South Africa. I knew a couple of guys there, and I figured we could work a deal to get me back to Australia—I’ve got lots of friends in Australia,” he said pointedly, and Stevie wondered why, but she didn’t interrupt him. “Anyway, about a week out, I got to thinking that this little tramp wasn’t all she’d been cracked up to be. It doesn’t take an expert to know when you’re going around in circles, even in the middle of the ocean. Sure enough, one night the captain hits me up for ‘shore duty.’ I figured he was