Page 53 of The Rancher's Wedding Deception

He moved on to the next cluster of guests, and she pressed herself against the wall. Through the archway, she could see her aunt Joyce laughing while in conversation with another guest, the sound tinkling like music.

Nothing like the woman who’d picked her up from the airport six hours ago, complaining about traffic.

The Bernard mansion overwhelmed her senses. In Kansas, the richest family in town lived in a farmhouse with a wraparound porch. Here in San Antonio, December meant a tree that scraped the ceiling and enough gold ribbon to wrap her entire apartment building.

She tried, she really did try to make herself feel comfortable, but everything and everyone around her seemed to belong to a completely different planet. She couldn’t understand anything they were talking about, and trying just made her head pound, more painfully by the second.

She needed air.

Or at least somewhere quieter.

A hallway stretched into darkness, promising escape. She slipped away, her flats silent on carpet thick as a mattress. With each step, the party sounds faded.

Thank goodness.

A door stood ajar. Beyond it, darkness and the smell of leather.

Perfect.

She pushed inside without thinking. Moonlight slanted through tall windows, revealing bookcases that climbed toward shadows. The sight drew her in, her fingers running over the textured spines. These books felt real and familiar, the one thing in this house that she could relate—

“This room is off limits.”

She nearly jumped out of her skin at the sound, spinning around but finding nothing. The voice came from nowhere. Everywhere. Dark and smooth with an accent she couldn’t place, like smoke given sound.

Her heart slammed against her ribs as the silence stretched, ominously. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt—”

“It was a joke,koukla mou.”

A figure detached itself from the deepest shadows, and she found herself gulping as she came face to face withthe devil someone scary

Stop being a scaredy-cat, Andie!

The stranger was tall, taller than anyone she’d ever seen, and moved with the kind of grace that made her gulp anew. Maybe itwasn’t that she was scared, but there was just something about this man that made her think of sin...come to life.

She squinted in an effort to see him more clearly, but the moonlight proved frustratingly inadequate. But even though angles and shadows were all she could see, the weight of his gaze was palpable, and it became a struggle to keep still.

The man lowered himself onto the couch with deliberate grace, ankle crossed over knee. A desktop lamp was next to the couch, illuminating his features, and her throat tightened when she finally saw his face.

‘Too beautiful’was Andie’s first thought.

This man was too, too beautiful, foranyone’s good.

His fingers tapped the cushion beside him once, and her body jerked at the unspoken command.

“Come sit next to me.”

No way.

“Or are you afraid I’ll bite?”

Absolutely.

But because she could be stubborn and proud—-

Her legs moved without permission, and she ended up seated at the far end, her back against the arm. She was playing with fire, but at least she was sensible enough not to draw too close to it.

“You can come a little closer, you know.”