Through a Crimson Veil by Patti O'Shea Read Free Book Online Page B

clarified, “but you’re kind of prudish.”
    She was doing it again, trying to wind him up to get a reaction. He wouldn’t fall for it this time. “No,” he answered.
    Mika looked amused. “The second bedroom is filled with a weight bench and its accoutrements. There’s nowhere else to sleep.”
    She stretched, a deliberate action to call attention to her breasts. To Conor’s disgust, it worked. He fisted his hands, his palms itching with need. When he was able to tear his gaze away and look into her eyes, she was smiling again.
    “I don’t want to play this game,” he said. He knew his irises were glowing, damn it, and it wasn’t from anger.
    For a minute he thought she was going to persist, then she gave up and said, “My question was serious. Where are you sleeping?” She looked unperturbed.
    Whether or not she was disappointed by his refusal was anyone’s guess, and he couldn’t keep ascribing other motives to everything she said or he’d drive himself nuts. “I’ll sack out on the couch,” he decided.
    She looked from one side of the sofa to the other. “You’re kidding, right? You’re too tall to be comfortable. It’s so short that I don’t think I ’d be able to sleep on it.”
    “It’ll be fine.” She was right, he was going to be miserable, but he’d get more rest out here than he would lying beside her. And if things became too unbearable, he could always use the floor. He’d slept in worse places. A lot worse.
    “Whatever,” she said.
    Her amusement came through loud and clear—as did a certain smugness. His temper started to simmer again and he struggled to tamp it down.
    “Do we need to discuss strategy about how we’re going to hunt the demon that’s after me?” she asked.
    “We? What the hell do you mean, we? You’re staying here.”
    She pursed her lips, crossed one ankle over the other, then asked, “Why do you get to have fun while I sit home?”
    Conor realized then that she was teasing him again—no way was she serious about hunting demons—but just in case, he said, “You hired me, so you should stay out of the way and let me do my job.”
    “Sweet talker,” she murmured, giving him a flirtatious look from under lowered lashes. “You just don’t want me along because I distract you. Say otherwise all you want, but I know you were this close”—she held up her hand, her thumb and forefinger maybe a quarter of an inchapart—“to taking me against that alley wall, and you didn’t even know my name.”
    Conor took a deep breath, then another. How much of this woman’s forwardness was a ploy? She was looking for a response, and he wasn’t going to give one to her, no matter how tempting. He wanted to tell her she was wrong—it wasn’t the alley he’d had in mind; he’d been thinking of taking her right there on the street. But that would be playing into her hands. And it might not shock her the way he wanted. She seemed unshockable.
    Control, he reminded himself. Ignore the provocation.
    “Besides”—he actually managed to sound halfway normal—“you’ll be safe here. I’ve got protection around the property. No one—demon, human, or anything else—can enter.”
    His home was a damn fortress. He wasn’t sure how it worked, but from the day a human woman, a psychic, had buried four stones at the corners of his land and performed some odd ritual, no one had been able to cross the boundary. If he wanted to make an exception, he needed to chant a spell using the person’s full name. To get Mika inside, he’d intoned the words, his voice not even a whisper, while he’d been retrieving her suitcase.
    “I walked right through,” Mika continued blithely, “without feeling any barrier. Are you sure no demon can enter?” she asked.
    “You’re not supposed to feel it, but it’s there. And I gave you permission to come in,” he growled. Was she intentionally questioning his competence?
    “How many others have you given permission?” she