The Unknown Woman Read Online Free PDF Page B

long-sleeved, green silky blouse, she crossed the courtyard on the way to Chez Remy.
    Attempting to join in the spirit of the Mardi Gras season, she wore two earrings with dangling stars in her left earlobe and one earring, a smiling moon, in the other. This was good Ju-Ju , according to the street vendor who’d sold them to her. Between those and the charm bracelet, she should be safe from the city’s otherworldly elements. And shocks such as the one last night, she thought.
    “Kerry, good morning,” a deep voice said.
    Matt Anderson sat at an outside table. A waiter placed an insulated pitcher of coffee near his cup. The power had come on sometime in the night, and the staff must have worked overtime, because the hotel felt surprisingly back to normal.
    “Join me?” he invited.
    Kerry nodded. Matt stood and held a chair for her.
    “I’m having the cold breakfast buffet, but there are hot items like eggs, bacon and grits if you want the full service.”
    “Cereal and fruit is my usual, so I’ll have the cold buffet, too,” she told the waiter. “And coffee, please.”
    The man flipped her napkin open, laid it across her lap, then filled a coffee cup for her. He departed, only to return in less than a minute with pitchers of water and orange juice. He filled the stemmed goblets already in place on the natural grass mats, then left Matt and Kerry.
    “Did you sleep at all?” Matt asked, his deep-set eyes as solemn as a surgeon’s.
    Kerry was taken aback as she gazed into eyes the color of the blue-eyed Marys that grew on her grandparents’ farm back home. His hair was blond with darker undertones, like fields of ripe wheat, and had a stubborn wave that the short, stylish haircut couldn’t quite subdue.
    When he’d held the chair for her, she’d realized he was quite tall, probably six feet.
    Last night, with all that had been going on, she’d been much too upset to notice just how impressive he was in the looks department. As if to belie the thought, a distinct memory of a toned body in black briefs with long, muscular legs flashed across her mind. With an effort, she forced it aside.
    “Yes, actually I did.” She managed a smile. “It surprised me that I woke so late, even with all that happened. I’m always up by seven at home, even on the days I don’t have to get to work.”
    “What kind of work do you do?” Matt asked.
    “Dental hygiene. I work in a clinic with four dentists and one other hygienist.”
    “Do you like your work?”
    “Very much. I get to do the good stuff for our patients. No drilling. No root canals. No tightening up braces until the patient feels like screaming.”
    He returned her grin as she described the tortures of dentistry. “You’ve made me recall why I hated going to the dentist as a kid—braces.”
    “Yes, but now you have a perfect smile.”
    “So the pain was worth it,” he concluded. He raised his juice glass in a toast to her. “So do you,” he said. “Here’s to the good neighbor who came to my rescue last night.”
    His expression became serious and he gave a sigh that she thought he was unaware of. She suppressed the need to reach out and touch him in sympathy. Death wasn’t something either of them could shake off easily.
    At that moment, a man and woman crossed the courtyard, each pulling luggage behind them. “We’ll sue,” the man muttered to his companion. “We’ll get back every penny we’ve spent on this vacation and then some. Bunch of thieves.”
    Kerry felt very sorry for whoever was working the registration desk and had to handle the couple and their complaints. There was total silence in their wake,then the other diners began talking again, but in lower tones.
    She overheard a man say his room looked as if it had been ransacked. Nothing was missing, his wife reported, but she’d heard things were taken from other rooms.
    Matt gave her a troubled glance, “Sounds as if a lot of bad stuff happened last night.”
    Oblivious to human