Medium Well (9781101599648) by Meg Benjamin Page B

hell she did in the morning. He still had trouble connecting the silvery blonde from last night with the slightly mousy blonde currently checking a listing. Then she raised her turquoise eyes to his and he had no trouble at all.
Oh yeah, definitely time to cool it.
    â€œWhat’s up?”
    â€œNew prospect for the carriage house.” He tried to make his voice sound casual. “Clark Henderson. I’ll give him a call, see if we can set something up for this afternoon.”
    Her eyes widened. “So soon? We haven’t had time to get it cleaned up. Are you sure?”
    â€œSure about what?” He pressed his lips together again.
Not going to have this conversation.
    â€œNothing.” She took a breath. “Forget it. Your schedule’s clear after two.”
    â€œRight.”
    Actually, he’d have much preferred showing the carriage house in the morning. The place might look better then. Besides, he’d get it over with instead of waiting all day for the axe to fall.
    But he already had morning appointments with clients who might make up for any disasters later in the day. Not that there were going to be any disasters. Not this time.
    Danny looked down at his hands, frowning at the slight trembling of his fingers.
Pull it together. You can do this.
Of course he could. So what if he felt like he’d be throwing up breakfast before he got any lunch?
    ***
    Clark Henderson made Biddy’s skin crawl. Nothing new there. Several of her sister’s clients gave her the creeps. Henderson was typical. A rich man who wanted to be a lot richer and didn’t exactly care how he got what he wanted. He didn’t strike her as particularly interesting, not even with his thousand-dollar shoes and his European tailoring. They came with his sleazeball personality.
    Henderson had given her a brief and faintly insulting once-over and then ignored her, muttering into his cell phone as he paced around the yard outside the carriage house until Danny arrived.
    Biddy might not have cared about Henderson, but she cared a lot about Danny Ramos. At the moment, he looked like he might shatter on impact. Every muscle in his body seemed clenched, most especially his jaw. If he tried to smile, he’d probably break something.
    Whenever she looked at him, Biddy felt like trying to help. Like patting his hand. Like telling him everything would be okay. Doing some idiotic thing that would make the whole situation a lot worse than it already was.
    Not that Clark Henderson noticed anything. Henderson hadn’t even acknowledged Danny’s arrival beyond a brief nod. To Henderson, they were about as important as a pair of pigeons.
    Right now he was inspecting the cracks in the stucco on the outer walls. “Structural report?” He raised an eyebrow in Danny’s general direction.
    â€œThe structure’s sound. We have the report whenever you’d like to see it.”
    Henderson went back to ignoring them as he walked the length of the front wall, ending up at the door to the house. “Open it,” he grunted, glancing at Danny.
    Danny’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing as he reached into his pocket for the key.
    Biddy considered calling Henderson an arrogant asshole, but she really wanted him to buy the damn carriage house. If he did, she wouldn’t have to come here anymore. More importantly, neither would Danny.
    She followed the two men into the lower story, rubbing her arms against the instant chill. It hadn’t escaped her notice that she was the only one who seemed to feel cold in the place. Something bad had happened here at least once. She knew that, although she didn’t know exactly how she knew it. She also knew it was a place where bad things could easily happen again.
    Henderson surveyed the downstairs area, his expression blank. “Needs a lot of work.”
    Danny nodded. “Lots of possibilities, but yeah, it needs work. Still, with the right