7/28/2019 mom.doc
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Hi I am an idiot becauseCHAPTER ONE
'WHAT the hell do you think you're doing?' As the harsh male
voice barked out viciously behind her, Aline swung
round nervously, scattering the wad of papers she had been
holding in a whirling arc round the feet of the tall dark'You made
me jump...' Her voice faltered to a halt as she took in e of the
big, taut body.
'I'll do more than that!' The man moved a step forward into the
room and she shrank against Tim's desk, her dark
brown eyes wide with fear. 'You're Tim's sister, aren't you?' He
glanced at the small photograph propped to one siof a pile of files
which showed her laughing into the camera, her thick by so much as
an iota. 'Sent you to do more
his dirty work?''I don't know what you're talking about.' Aline
drew herself up to her full five feet, ten inches as she glared in
her her heart-shaped face pale. 'Tim asked me to fetch some papers
for him, that's all. I well.'
'He isn't well.' He repeated her words slowly in icy mockery.
'And you, of course, have no idea what is wrong wit
him?'
'It's a virus of some sort.' She looked at the harsh face in
bewilderment, a faint unease beginning to grip her and quthe anger
With shadowy fingers. 'Flu, 1 suppose.'
'Flu!' He gave a harsh bite of laughter that made her flinch.
'I'll give him flu when I get hold of him. Youi dear
brother, Miss Marcell, is in a great deal of trouble, and if I
find out that you are involved, as I suspect you are, yougoing to
wish you had never been born.'
'Who exactly are you?' She was beginning to feel weak at the
knees. She had only returned from a month's holiday
Greece a few hours before, to find Tim firmly settled in her
tiny flat, pleading that the big house he shared with thfriends was
being painted and the smell and commotion was making him more ill.
She had beeii deeply shocked a
pale, sickly greyness of his skir and immediately fussed round
him, promising he eouk stay until he was feeling b
and she would sleep or the small sofabed in the lounge.'Cord
Lachoni.' The deep voice fairly spat the words at her.'Has Tim
mentioned my name?'
Had he mentioned the name! Cord Lachoni. The Bij White Chief.
Known far and wide for his ruthless efficiency a
cold-blooded business sense that hat brought him from relative
obscurity to the status of multi-millionaire in less
ten years. An entrepreneur to end entrepreneurs, hated and
feared as well as deeply respected among his peers. Atthirty-seven
he had the world at his feet, a broken marriage and a string of
much publicised one-night stands to hi
credit. A giant among men with a lifestyle to match.
'Well?' The stony hard voice was unrelenting. 'What are you
hatching in that nasty little brain of yours? I can fairl
hear the cogs whirring.'Look, Mr Lachoni, you aren't going to
believe this,' she began slowly, 'but I haven't got a clue what
this is all abo
He swore softly in a foreign tongue, the meaning unmistakable.
'You're right, I don't believe it,' he said crisply,moving to stand
in front of her, where he towered over her slender frame. His
height was terribly intimidating, six
six at least, with the sleek, broad-shouldered body of a prime
athlete honed to perfection. She could see that some
women would find such powerful raw masculinity attractive, but
the dark, rugged face held a touch of cruelty that
chilled her blood. He was like one of the big cats, fascinating
from a distance but in-timidatingly unnerving close 'Tim told bis
head of department he was ill,' she repeated desperately as tiny
shivers of fear sped down her spine.
sure he'll be back at work as soon as he can make it. Our uncle
works here; he said to-'
'Do you think I am a complete fool?' There was just a glimmer of
an accent on some of his words, an unusualpronunciation of certain
letters that, along with the bronzed darkness of his skin,
proclaimed he was not English.
tried desperately to remember everything Tim had mentioned about
this man as she sat with a small plop on the hsurface of the desk.
The hard grey gaze had her pinned like a butterfly on
cardboard.
