Angel at Dawn Read Online Free PDF

honey? Not if you’re coming here at this hour.”
    Christian’s gatekeeper wasn’t moving out of the doorway, and he didn’t appear impressed by her feminine wiles. Grace wished she were better at batting her lashes, but it was too late to fix that now.
    “Perhaps I could leave a message. If he’s busy with a cow.”
    The older man frowned like he was going to turn her away. Luckily, Christian appeared in the shadowy hall behind him. Grace’s stomach did an unsettling flip. He was dressed only in his blue jeans. Both his torso and feet were bare. He didn’t have a lot of hair on his chest, just a thin veil of black over steely muscles and olive skin. The way that hair narrowed to a line and dove past his navel seemed too personal to stare at.
    “It’s all right,” he said, sounding as sleepy as if he’d just then rolled out of bed. “I’ll talk to her.”
    His guard dog seemed surprised to hear this. “You sure?”
    Christian rubbed his palms up and down his face, causing interesting muscles to shift in his arms and chest. His biceps displayed veins Grace wasn’t familiar with. “I’m sure. Go check on the barbwire in the east pasture.”
    The older man opened his mouth, shut it, then shot Grace a warning look. “Don’t you overstay your welcome, gal.”
    “Cross my heart,” Grace promised, which earned her a harder stare than before.
    Sadly, Christian’s manners weren’t any better than his companion’s. Grace surmised he must be a night person like Nim Wei.
    “Suppose you want coffee,” he muttered.
    He turned, treating her to his fine back view, and padded on long pale feet into a large, viga-beamed kitchen. She would have said it was decorated in “frontier” style, except the cabinets looked like they really might date back to those days. He had the usual appliances, though their color was hard to identify. The room was as dim as the entryway, probably because every shade in the place was pulled.
    “Was that man your father?” Grace asked as she followed.
    “Roy? Hardly. Though I suppose he acts like one now and then.” He scratched his bare chest, then seemed to remember what he’d come here for—or at least he sort of remembered. He tried three doors before finding the coffee mugs. He took one down like it was heavy. “Roy usually keeps coffee brewed on the stove.”
    Grace could tell he did. Even from where she stood, the pot smelled undrinkable. Deciding politeness was the better part of valor, Grace took a seat at the stainless steel and splatter-patterned Formica table. She didn’t ask if Christian wanted to don a shirt. As absentminded as he was acting, he might disappear for good.
    “I thought we could talk some more,” she said. “About you starring in our film.”
    “Right.” He set a mug half full of ink before her, then glanced unsurely toward the big Frigidaire.
    “I would like cream,” she prompted, “and sugar if you have it.”
    This resulted in more searching and banging of cabinets, but at last Christian unearthed the items she’d requested. He dropped down, with apparent relief, into the vinyl chair opposite hers.
    “Don’t cook much,” he said gruffly.
    Because this seemed a reluctant apology, Grace found herself smiling. “I brought the script.” She pushed the clipped stack of pages across the table. “I thought reading it might help you make up your mind.”
    He took it, blinked a few times, and looked up at her. Grace had to brace against the heart-stopping handsomeness of his face.
    “Your name is on the front page,” he said.
     
     
    W hen he mentioned this, Grace flushed the hardest yet, the rush of vibrant color sweeping up her forehead. Nim Wei was right about her blushes being yummy. Though it was too early for his responses to be at full strength, his gums itched in reaction. If it hadn’t been daytime, he’d have been flashing fang. Gritting his still-normal teeth, he focused on her answer.
    “I reworked the screenplay,” she said,