Swiftly Nate’s hand settled on the thief’s throat, squeezing savagely and lifting until the boy was on his toes.
“Drop the bag,” he ordered in a voice cold as ice with an edge akin to that of a razor.
The thief immediately dropped the bag.
“I… I’ll call the police.” Her low, rich American voice, a voice that had a strange twang to it, stuttered from beside him as she cautiously leaned forward to grab her bag. Nate noted she wasn’t moving cautiously because of fear but because she was hurt.
Nate turned to watch her, her head was bent as she searched through her bag and then she pulled out a mobile and lifted her eyes to him.
The moment they hit his, Nate froze again.
Her eyes were simply indescribable. A pale blue that was bottomless, inescapable, the irises rimmed by a smoky midnight that was so alluring, he thought for a moment he’d leaned toward her, he was so drawn to her eyes.
They widened upon looking at him almost as if she recognised him.
A gasping noise came from the thug.
Nate didn’t move. He stared in frozen fascination as she stole closer.
Without taking her unbelievable eyes from his, her hand settled gently on the forearm that was holding the thief against the wall. When it did fire shot up his arm from where she touched him.
“You’re choking him,” she whispered.
His hold loosened and her hand dropped. With effort he tore his eyes from hers and dropped his hand only to grasp a handful of the thug’s sweatshirt at his throat, jerk him forward a few inches and slam him viciously back against the wall.
The boy grunted in pain.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” Nate snarled and fury unlike anything he’d known ripped through him as he looked at the boy.
“Bennett has called the police. Bloody hell, girl. Are you all right?” Victor was at their sides, had his hand on the girl’s shoulder and was bent into her, peering at her to ascertain the answer to his question.
“I think so. Just had the breath knocked out of me, that’s all,” she answered.
“What were you thinking, leaping on him like that? You could’ve been hurt,” Victor admonished because she was not all right, she was holding her body like it was made of crystal. She was not as deft and loose-limbed as she had been while flying toward her assailant.
Victor slid his arm around her waist in an effort of support because of the way she held her body.
“He took my purse,” she answered Victor’s question.
“It was still bloody dangerous,” Victor carried on with his gentle remonstration.
“I like that purse,” she returned with a slight teasing lilt to her tone and a quirky, shaky smile.
Witnessing that quirky smile Nate found he was having trouble breathing.
Victor’s head came up at her smile and then snapped to look at Nate. Or more to the point, he took one look at the way Nate was looking at the girl. Then Victor looked at her. Then back at Nate.
Then he made a quick decision.
“Nathaniel, wait for the police. I’m taking her home to Laura and calling our physician.”
“No, please, I’m fine. I’ll stay to talk to the police,” she resisted.
“Nathaniel will bring them to the house. You can talk to them at home. Come with me.” Victor was using his no-nonsense, no-argument voice, a voice that sent shivers up grown men’s spines.
She completely ignored it. “Really, no. I should stay.”
“Go with him,” Nate’s voice rumbled this command and her head jerked round to look at him. She regarded him for a moment and he wondered what she’d do.
It took a moment but she nodded.
Nate watched over his shoulder as Victor put her in the Rolls and it swept cleanly away.
Not long after, the police arrived.
Lily carefully unfolded herself out of the decadent bathtub, snatched a velvety-plush, peach-coloured towel from the heated rail and wrapped it around her sore body.
Laura had forced her into a hot, scented bath even though Lily resisted because she wanted to be available for the police when they arrived.
The physician who was at the doorstep of the house within moments of their own arrival, as Victor phoned from the car and told him to “get his ass to the house” had told her to take some ibuprofen, a long, hot bath and told Laura and Victor to keep an eye on her for a couple of days. Lily had no broken bones, no cracked skull, she was fine but just in case she was not the physician said she should be looked after.
So, after a brief but earnest talk Lily had seen them have in the hallway, Laura, with Victor’s adamant concurrence, insisted she stay the night with them rather than taking the train back to Clevedon. Then they insisted she take a bath.
Without the strength to resist them, or, indeed, the ability, they were very insistent, very nice but not the kind of people who took no for an answer, there she was in their Georgian mansion, in their opulent bathroom which was off an equally sumptuous guest bedroom decorated in what she had counted were at least seven different but coordinating shades of pale peach.
And she’d finally met the man Fazire had sent to her.
Lily was certain of it – as certain as she was that she was Lily Sarah Jacobs, daughter of Rebecca and Will Jacobs and a Hoosier born and bred. And there was no denying any of that.
When she’d lifted her gaze to look into the eyes of her tall defender she’d nearly fainted. Swooned. Fallen to the ground in an unconscious heap.
If he hadn’t been imminently facing a life sentence for strangling a man to death regardless if he was a nasty purse snatcher, she would have done it.
And now…
Now…
Now what?
She didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t exactly throw herself at him. Tell him she’d wished for him to come to her through her own personal genie that just happened to live at home with her parents in a small town in Indiana. She couldn’t seduce him because, since she was a virgin, she wouldn’t even know how. In fact he probably, considering how handsome he was (impossibly handsome), didn’t know she existed as a female with all the right parts in all the right places and with all the yearning she felt for him even though she only knew his name.
Nathaniel.
That was a very, very good name.
“Lily, my dear, the police are here.” Sweet, kindly, Laura was in the other room.
Lily had taken to Laura immediately. The older woman was petite and slightly but pleasantly rounded with middle-age. She had a soft dark-brown bob that framed her face, elegant hands with perfect fingernails (Lily thought they looked like pianists hands, they were so lovely) and warm, brown eyes.
“I’ll be right out,” Lily called.
She quickly towelled off, wrapped the towel around her body and rummaged through her saved purse for a hair band. She pulled her hair into a ponytail at the back of her head and went into the bedroom where she saw Laura standing at the bed which now had a half a dozen shiny boxes resting on it.
Lily stopped and stared.
Laura explained, “I called a few shops. Since you’re staying, you need a few things, of course. I hope you don’t mind but I checked the labels on your clothes and found your size.”
How long was I in the bath? Lily thought incredulously as she stared at the boxes.
“I can’t,” Lily resisted.
“You can, you will, you must,” Laura returned in a mother’s voice that would not be denied. Lily had heard that voice before; her own mother used it on her often. Laura lifted the lid off a box and pulled out a silvery blue silk robe with long flowing sleeves like a Japanese kimono and ordered, “Put this on.”