Intimate Strangers Read Online Free PDF

suspicion of her.
    "Lift your purse off the floor. Dump the contents into your lap, and then hand the purse to me."
    She nodded, still too shocked by his behavior and the entire situation to object. But her mind raced a hundred miles an hour as she tried to understand the reasons for Nicholas Benteen’s attitude.
    She moved slowly, keeping her hands exposed to his gaze as she leaned forward and caught the leather strap of her purse with her fingertips. After following his orders to the letter, she watched him flip through the contents of her wallet.
    He glanced at her driver’s license. "Lousy photo."
    "I had the damn flu, for heaven’s sake."
    His lips twitched as he inspected each item in her lap, scooped everything back into the leather shoulder bag, and then shoved it beyond her reach.
    She watched him, her eyes on the shadowed contours of his face as she quietly asked, "Has Sean become like you?" Apprehension filled her, making her throat ache with sudden unshed tears as she waited for his answer.
    Nicholas flinched.
    She saw pain flash in his startled gaze, but the telltale emotion disappeared, leaving her to speculate about what had happened in his life to make him so wary and defensive. She suddenly regretted her blunt question as well as the possibility that she might have hurt him.
    She just as quickly felt like a fool for allowing herself a sympathetic response to a man who’d provoked, threatened, and then terrorized her with ease. She knew she owed him nothing other than the civility and good manners her mother had drilled into all of her children. Unfortunately, a part of her wanted to give him much more. Hannah exhaled a shallow breath, banished the insane thought from her mind, and kept her conflicted emotions to herself.
    After devouring the contents of the photo album with an attitude that went far beyond simple curiosity, he set aside the leather bound photo album.
    "Now do you believe I’m telling the truth?" she asked.
    "A photo album doesn’t prove anything."
    "Of course, it does! It proves that I’m who I say I am. Hannah Cassidy, Sean’s sister from St. Louis. Who else, other than a close relative, would travel almost two thousand miles, tolerate being scared half to death by a knife wielding lunatic, and then put up with the interrogation you’ve just conducted? Certainly not a stranger off on some lark."
    "Driver’s licenses and credit cards are easy to fake. You’re either a hell of an actress or very sincere. Only a sincere person could be so stupid."
    "I am sincere."
    "What’s the family matter you mentioned this afternoon?"
    She hesitated. "It’s private and very personal."
    "Too bad."
    "I don’t know you, Mr. Benteen. In my family, we protect the privacy of those we love."
    "And where I come from, Hannah Cassidy, we’re willing to kill in order to protect our friends."
    She blanched. "Can’t you give me the benefit of the doubt and believe me when I tell you that Sean is my brother?"
    "Hardly."
    She exhaled softly as she tried to think of another way to deal with him. "Do you have a family, Mr. Benteen?"
    "That’s none of your concern."
    He suddenly jerked her forward until their faces were just inches apart. Hannah stared at his lips, and then looked up. He glared at her, his penetrating gaze so intense that she blinked and then closed her eyes. A sigh washed past her parted lips. She felt his grip on her upper arms tighten, and the heat emanating from his body reminded her of a furnace.
    Hannah managed not to plead with him to release her. Instead, she concentrated on the sound of her heartbeat as it thundered in her ears. And she tried to ignore the chaotic throbbing of every pulse point in her body.
    He pushed her backwards, his large hands like weights atop her shoulders as he held her in place. "This is my land and my home. You’re trespassing. I want you gone, lady."
    "I can’t," she whispered. "I must speak to Sean. Please help me."
    He hissed a curse.
    The word was so