"Wade-Intruders" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wade Susan)

would look like in silhouette.

He picked up his beer bottle and came over. "You in town on business too?" he
asked.

Most times she would have said yes. These things went better if there were no
complications, no phone calls next time he was in town and wanting company. But
this time she said, "I live here, actually."

He slid into the booth, facing her. "Fooled me with that briefcase."

She smiled. "Paperwork."

"I'd never have expected a classy looking lady like yourself to use bad words
like that." He winked. "I save mine and do it on the plane going home."

"Yes, I've noticed the men who work for me like to party during week, and worry
about the paperwork later." She tilted her head back and lowered her eyes,
feeling tension ease along her shoulderblades. "They call me a ball-buster
became I review everything before and after it's presented to the client." She
smiled slowly. "They may even be right. But I get results."

He picked up the last shrimp left on her plate and popped it in his mouth. His
teeth were large and a little dingy. A heavy coffee-drinker, she thought idly.
He didn't smell like a smoker.

"I'll bet you do," he said, and winked again. He added some remark about the
weather that Julia responded to automatically, the same kind of small talk she
always made with her clients. The liquor she had drunk had left her body warm
and softened, and she realized she was saying more than she usually would.

"Can I drag you away from your work long enough to have a drink with me?" he
asked.

She slapped a hand on the briefcase. "I've given up on it. Why don't we go to my
place for that drink?"

His eyebrows went up a bit. "Why, surely. I'd be much obliged."

"You'll have to settle for whisky," she said. "I don't keep beer in the house."

He smiled. "I can't turn that down. My daddy told me a long time ago, there's
two things you never say no to. A free drink and a good-looking woman."

He looked around the living room while she went to the antique pine cupboard in
the dining room to pour the drinks.

"These are some nice pictures," he said, squinting at two of the enlarged
photographs that hung over the sofa. "Real nice. I like nature pictures."