Christmas in the City - Jill Barnett Page 0,73

her with the teacup. "Care to join me, Miss Everdeane?"

The moment was lost and the room grew as icy as her expression. "You need to stop following me, sir."

He frowned. Following her? "I assure you, Miss Everdeane," Ed said seriously and stood, setting the cup down. "I have not been following you."

"Of course you have. You wish me to believe that you just happened to show up at my place of employment?"

"It's a department store, madam. Many thousands of people must show up there every day."

"On the 3rd floor--at the exclusive area of women's fashion and design?" she said in a facetious tone. "Why were you looking for a new tea gown?"

If she hadn't pissed him off he might have laughed at that. "I was with my niece and her nurse. You are aware the children's department is on the other side of the gallery."

She looked unsure then. "I saw no child. No nurse. I only saw your--" she cut off her words.

"My what, Miss Everdeane?" He couldn't resist taunting her. My mouth about to close over yours? Almost immediately he realized that was unfair and a stupid thing to do. She was perfectly serious. When she said nothing he added, "As a matter of fact, I bought this tea table and service for her when we were there. The store delivered it here by mistake. It should have come to my home."

"You deny you hired a man to follow me?

"I do."

She looked thoughtful, then said, "Your attorney was waiting at my home."

"I believe my business partner got your information from the police officer at the construction site that day and passed it on to our attorneys. I understood from him that everything was taken care of."

"I don't want your money, sir."

"Then give it to charity. The settlement money is part of the legal process."

She raised her chin and looked him straight in the eye. "Do you always try to buy people off?"

"Buy people off?" he said in a dangerously low voice that should have warned her to stop there. Clearly you do not understand how business works, madam."

"Believe me, I understand how business works, sir. If there's something you want, then you merely take it any way you can. I know because my sister paid the price with her life. Do not lecture me about how business works. I have met face to face with unscrupulous men who used their success and their money to wield power, whether it was morally right or not. It doesn't matter where the money came from, your attorney or from your own hands, sir, you were still buying me off and for a ridiculous amount of five hundred dollars."

"Yes, well, then. We bought you off," Ed said coldly. "You signed the release. Good afternoon, Miss Everdeane, I have work to do."

"Oh, what? More people to buy off or are you planning high tea?" She turned on her heel and walked away. "Good luck. I hope you get what you pay for, Mr. Lowell."

Ed leaned against the door jamb and said quietly, "Oh, I think filling my palms with your soft bottom, Miss Everdeane, was worth every penny."

She wanted to hit him with the hammer. Instead she walked out of the office building onto the breezy uptown sidewalk, into the colder air that signaled bad weather approaching, weather that felt like snow. The air burned her face because it was still so hot, and probably bright red. Her embarrassment was a live thing. Two more blocks, she thought, as she walked to the trolley like a logger--her mother's favorite expression when her girls forgot themselves and moved in less than ladylike steps.

The wind whipped down off the icy waters surrounding Manhattan, over the Hudson and dropping in temperature before they swept down the streets between the buildings like frosty breath of a monster nor'easter. She shivered as she jumped on the trolley, then switched to the closest El, which was enclosed.

By the time she got home the temperature had dropped below freezing, and she lit the stove as soon as she was inside, didn't even bother taking off her coat and hat.

Minutes later she was sitting at the table in the warm kitchen, a hot teacup warming her hands, her outerwear hung up and her feet encased in lovely fur slippers Jo had given her that last Christmas. That last holiday when any number of men of business and attorneys had followed both of them through the city incessantly. After Jo died, it had