The Vengeful Groom. SARA WOOD

said it wasn’t healthy for you around here,” she agreed huskily.

      His mouth twitched. “You misunderstand. I’m staying. I’ve gone through too much to be scared off by townspeople,” he said dismissively. He gave an enigmatic smile. “I have schemes to protect me from being tarred and feathered. Be patient. You’ll learn about them soon enough.”

      Leaving her openmouthed in dismay, he made straight for her apartment door at the side of the garage, and before she could find her brains he’d put his finger on the bell and was keeping it there.

      Tina slipped quickly through the picket gate to his side. “What are you doing?” she asked warily.

      “Waiting.”

      She closed her eyes and offered up a brief thanks for deliverance. With her grandfather and Adriana on their way to Rockport—probably planning on exploring the delights of rock pools and the gift shops at Bearskin Neck, she thought fondly—she’d been saved an ugly scene.

      “No one’s in,” she said.

      “I’ll hang around.”

      Alarmed, she ruthlessly calmed her nerves, wondering what he meant to do. Judging by the set of that smooth jaw, he had a purpose in mind and was going to see it through once his car was mended. But he was a mechanic! she thought, kicking herself for not remembering.

      “If you can’t handle the trouble with your car and can’t wait for the part-timers,” she suggested brightly, “try the garage in Ipswich. There’s a pay phone nearby.”

      He smiled faintly, his cynical mouth curling at the corners. “There’s nothing wrong with the car. I parked by the garage on purpose.”

      “Oh!” Stunned, she remembered the neat patch of oil, the handy car trolley and his still-immaculate suit. A setup. “What…purpose?” she said, her voice wavering, her nerves crumbling.

      “I arranged the car—and myself,” he said, ringing the bell impatiently again, “as a lure.”

      Her eyes widened. It had worked. “To bring me out?” she asked.

      “Heaven forbid,” he murmured, rolling eloquent eyes up to heaven. “I knew what your reaction would be when you saw me. I was hoping to lure out your grandfather.”

      “He’s not about, and the garage is closed till the part-timers arrive,” she said stiffly, still not understanding why he needed her grandfather. Her black eyebrows arched and disappeared beneath her bangs. “Have you run out of gas?”

      “No. Patience,” he answered dryly. “Where is Dan? He always started at seven.”

      “Not nowadays. He’s nearly eighty,” Tina reminded him shortly.

      “I see. I thought he was probably still having breakfast. That’s the reason I slid under the car to wait for him to come over and ask me what the trouble was.” He smiled, his eyes distant as though remembering happier times. “He and I could smell out classic cars at a hundred paces. I was sure he’d be out like a shot.”

      “Seems an elaborate ploy,” she said with a frown. “Why risk ruining your rented suit for that?”

      A blankness deadened his eyes and he stared at her somberly for a while. “The stakes were high,” he said eventually. “Worth a little subterfuge, a little waiting and some good honest dust.”

      Tina went cold. “Like I said, he’s not in.” Her tone was curt, her voluptuous mouth set in decidedly stubborn lines.

      He looked upward, scanning the windows and frowning when he came to the small barred one. Tina held her breath. “I don’t believe you. Let me in, Tina,” he ordered.

      Incredulous that he’d even consider asking, she said coldly, “Not on your life.”

      He leaned against the porch, elegant, cool and totally implacable. And his body language told her in no uncertain terms that he’d keep attempting to reach his declared goal and wouldn’t let up. His arms were folded across the big chest, his legs were slightly spread, and his jaw stuck out ominously. She leaned against the opposite side, but for support, not display.

      Languidly his hand reached out, and Tina’s mesmerized eyes followed its progress to her throat. She swallowed, the flicker of his eyes telling her that he’d seen her fear. Then the tips of his fingers met her hot skin and she felt them slide over the slippery surface down to her collarbone.

      “Nervous about something?” he murmured, lifting his fingers from her skin and holding out their sweat-dampened tips for her to explain.

      “Hot. From running. You’ve got a long stride.”

      “I’ve got a long checklist to get through.”

      “Meaning?” she asked nervously.

      The black velvet eyes glimmered. “I came to talk to your grandfather. Since he’s not around, it seems I must make do with you, instead,” he said in a lazy predatory drawl. “Alternatively, I could ask a few questions in town.”

      “What questions?” she asked, brazening it out.

      “Anything there is to know about you, for a start. Since you’re a school counselor, I imagine those students over there know a few things about you they’d be willing to divulge.”

      “Don’t involve them!” she said quickly, hating to beg.

      “Let me in and I won’t need to.”

      She was silent. Her pulse throbbed heavily in her temples, and she put her fingers there for relief so she could think straight. It was the uncertainty she couldn’t stand. There were three possibilities: either he knew about Adriana, or he suspected something, or he knew nothing at all. But if she invited him in to talk sense into him, he’d see enough evidence to give the game away after a few minutes.

      “You can’t come up,” she said firmly. “People will talk.”

      “Plan C, then.” With a casual shrug, he strolled over to his car. Tina waited, holding her breath. A bluff. He’d get in the car and drive away…

      He began talking to Lisa. She fumed as Lisa and Giovanni laughed together, his sun-shot blond head bent low over hers. Recognizing that look of admiration Lisa was giving him, Tina winced. If she didn’t move soon, he’d dispense with the preliminaries and ask a few direct incriminating questions.

      Angrily she stomped across the lot to where Giovanni was holding court.

      “Oh, yes, known her for years,” he was saying. The students stared at Tina in awe as she came closer, and he smiled at her in a sickeningly winsome way. “We’ve been talking over old times,” he said in a husky reminiscing tone of voice. “You know the kind of thing. The high school prom, the homecoming dance, old films, clambakes.”

      Tina eyed him cynically. “Time you went home, Gio. Byee!”

      “It was at a clambake,” he remarked idly to his rapt audience, ignoring her completely, “that Tina poured a half-gallon tub of melted chocolate ice cream—”

      “Please!” she protested indignantly.

      “—into the school bully’s gas tank,” he finished.

      Four pairs of astonished eyes turned on Tina’s flushed face.

      “You’ll give them ideas, Gio,” she muttered.

      “I could,” he said worryingly. “Shall we continue our chat indoors, Teen? I’m ready if you are,” he added with an encouraging lift of his eyebrow.

      She screwed her mouth up tightly at his misuse of her name. “I’m heading for the beach in a while.” Somehow she dug up a smile for the students’ benefit. “Aren’t you all off to the beach, too?” she suggested to them hopefully.

      Giovanni grinned amiably at the fascinated group. “Or you guys could take a moment to sit in the car,