Lucas stopped beneath the portico outside the front entrance of the Sinclair House to brush moisture from his coat and glower at the precipitation. Sleet meant slippery roads and an atmosphere of doom and gloom. Bad for skiing. Bad for tourism. Bad for the Sinclair House. Perfect weather for ghosts, though. He entered the lobby to find Corrie Ballantyne occupying a chair near the registration desk. She was only pretending to read a novel. He watched her for a few minutes as she stared at one page, never turning to the next. After all the trouble she was causing, how could he still want to look after her? Protective instincts warred with his natural wariness of women. The whole situation was so preposterous that his normal decisiveness had deserted him. “Ms. Ballantyne,” he said softly. “Would you come into my office, please?” A guilty start was her first reaction. Then she complied with his request. Lucas’s inner sanctum was furnished much as it had been in his great-great-grandfather’s time, with a massive oak rolltop desk, chairs covered in garnet-colored leather, and framed maps showing nineteenth-century street plans for the state’s major cities.
What do You think about Relative Strangers (1997)?
