The Second Lie (Immortal Vikings Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

taking a full breath. Her voice sounded soft on the
shush
sounds and she tilted her chin down, using her face to lead his gaze to the place she held her wineglass. One deep inhale at the same time she swirled her glass, slowly this time, and she caught the widening of his eyes. Yes, he was a man who liked breasts. “It’s unforgettable.”
    “I’m sure it’s hard once you’ve tasted it.” He leaned closer.
    “Have you?” She licked her lips and moved the glass slightly toward him. “Tasted it?”
    “Not yet.”
    “Why not?” They’d drifted close enough that she could see the individual details of his eyelashes.
    “I’ve been waiting.”
    “For what?” Her fingers held the stem where she wouldn’t warm the liquid in the bowl with her body heat.
    “For you to go first.” He easily inserted his hand above hers at the base of the goblet and lifted with the lightest pressure until she released the glass. He was playing with her too, and doing a better job, because he didn’t look as flushed as she felt. “The scent alone is intoxicating, isn’t it?”
    Her senses had opened so fully that his scent wrapped around her, almost as if he’d brushed his body across hers, when the only parts that had touched had been their hands. They were standing too close to each other. That was the issue, the reason why her bones felt quivery. She needed space, air to breathe that didn’t link her to him, but stepping away would break the connection that might elicit answers.
    He brought the glass to his lips. His jawline was firm and square, not a hint of softness around his chin. All of him would be that honed, she suspected. His throat worked when he swallowed, the only movement in their tableau.
    Intellectually, she knew he was deliberately distracting her, just as she was trying to do to him. She cursed herself for letting his pheromones send her into the same softening craving other women at the preview had displayed. Like them, her body had become putty.
    Unlike the rest, she knew he was a liar and a fraud.
    She shivered. The cave was colder without other people, and as a female she was beginning to feel like the prey of a much larger hunter. Time to hit hard and leave. “You counterfeited dozens of my wines, didn’t you?”
    His grin was lazy and slow, as if he couldn’t or didn’t want to abandon the tension that had been flowing between them a moment ago, even as fake as it had been. “Check the labels. Corks. Capsules.” He shrugged. The movement emphasized how perfectly fitted his clothes were, because they moved with him like skin. “Call a glass expert if you wish.” One hand gesture encompassed the wall of bottles behind him. “Taste them. I guarantee not one of these will fail whatever examination you choose.”
    “You’re too smart to pour a substitute at Bodeby’s, I’ll give you that.”
    “Then what will you do?” His grin made her back teeth hurt.
    “I’ll prove it.” She had her records, and the director was on the other side of these walls. She could unwind his scheme in five seconds.
    “Will you? With expensive tests that show the world Morrison and Mancini sold Spanish tempranillo doctored with oak essence as premier Napa cabernet?” He held out the mostly full glass. “Or will you use a handful of flimsy receipts signed by the disgruntled employee I recently sacked?”
    The pinch of her fingernails digging into her palms only made her angrier. He’d ruin her business. She’d never have her down payment for a vineyard, never make her own wine, if he didn’t pull the bottles. “You can’t sell fakes.”
    “I have paperwork to prove they’re genuine. Signed by Christina Mancini. Some of it signed by Geoffrey Morrison.”
    “There is no Geoffrey Morrison!” She’d said it.
    “I beg to differ.” One-handed, he reached inside his tuxedo jacket and retrieved a flat rectangle with the familiar wavy gold color scheme of a California license. Geoffrey R. C. Morrison. His face