Page 3 of Fergus
Up close and personal like this, Thea couldn’t deny the effect those harsh good looks were having on her own equilibrium. Not only was Fergus the most gorgeous man she had ever seen, but the aroma of his aftershave, something citrus combined with a male musk, warmed and aroused her senses in a way she could never remember happening before with any other man.
There was also that edge of danger which was never far from the surface. She had discovered the reason for that edge when she did her research on Fergus before coming to Paris.
He hadn’t always run a security business with his two brothers and cousin, and the years Fergus had been a part of the British Special Forces had obviously hardened and honed that edge of danger.
Thea hadn’t been able to find out anything more than that, because the information was classified. But she did know that soldiers drafted into the Special Forces were the elite, with a skillset far superior to that of a regular soldier. Fergus had only been twenty-two at the time, so his skills had to have been extreme in nature.
She also knew Fergus had been active on behalf of the family-owned company for the first five years after its conception. Until the company became so big that the three older members of the Wynter family had taken over as heads of the London, Paris, and New York offices. Fergus’s younger brother, Linus Wynter, was the tech expert, and he tended to live and work wherever he was most wanted. Currently, that appeared to be in London.
For the past twelve years, Fergus had sat behind a desk in the Paris office and instructed the many employees of Wynter Security on their next security assignment, rather than going out into the field himself.
But it was obvious just from looking at him and feeling the coiled tenson in his body, seeing his muscular arms and chest up close, and the hard glitter of his eyes as he glared at her, that he had kept his body and himself ready for a battle, if it became necessary.
Thea hoped he wouldn’t consider it necessary in regard to her. She really had come in peace. She already felt as if she was fighting an uphill battle at home against both seen and unseen threats. She didn’t want Fergus to become her enemy too.
Unless, as she was her mother’s daughter, he already was?
“Why have you been stalking me for the past two days?” Fergus now demanded to know.
“I’m not… I admit to following you,” she conceded when he raised challenging brows. “But I don’t consider that as me stalking you.”
“I think that depends on your point of view and what your intentions are,” he bit out. “Or were, I should say,” he added grimly. “Because you certainly aren’t going to be able to carry them out now that I’ve been forewarned and know exactly who is stalking me, even if I have no idea why.”
“I mean you no harm,” Thea assured.
“As I said, that depends on your point of view and why you’re here.”
Thea knew his only previous knowledge of her was as the daughter of Jessica Morgan, the woman he had briefly dated. It hadn’t ended well.
Thea gave an inward snort at what an understatement “hadn’t ended well” was in this case.
Her mother had, as usual, been too wrapped up in herself and her own selfish needs, while being attracted to that dangerous edge she had obviously sensed beneath Fergus’s surface charm. She had failed to realize he would never bend to a woman’s will or allow himself to be blackmailed.
Her mother had been so convinced, after meeting the handsome and wealthy Fergus Wynter, back in England for several weeks, that she had found “the man who will keep me in the life to which I wish to become accustomed, and the bonus is he lives in Paris” that she hadn’t looked any further than those surface good looks and the fact he was obviously wealthy. Their first date, at an exclusive London restaurant, had only confirmed Jessica’s decision that Fergus, whether he knew it yet or not, was going to be her second husband.
She had seemed to be just as enamored with him when she came home from their dinner together at another expensive restaurant.
Unfortunately, Thea had to call her mother on her cell phone in the middle of their third date because she was being taken to the hospital in an ambulance with suspected appendicitis. She had tried not to call the emergency services, but the pain had become so bad that she’d had no choice. The paramedics driving her to the hospital had insisted that her mother be called so that she could come to the hospital and give her permission for Thea to be operated on. Her mother had grudgingly agreed.
Which was when Fergus Wynter had learned how much Jessica had lied to him about even the fundamental things. The main ones being that she had a fourteen-year-old daughter and wasn’t aged twenty-eight, as she’d told him she was. She was actually thirty-eight and so six years older than him.
Fergus would perhaps have been able to forgive her for all those lies if he’d been in love with her. But he obviously hadn’t been, and once he knew the truth, he had made that clear to Jessica.
If Jessica had had the good sense to leave the situation there, then perhaps Thea wouldn’t now be able to clearly see the contempt in Fergus’s narrowed green eyes as he looked down at her. But her mother never had known when to give up on a lost cause.
Except maybe Thea.
But that was another story.
“I was sorry to read about your mother’s death,” Fergus now surprised her by saying.
Thea’s eyes widened. “You were?”
He shrugged. “It’s always tragic when someone dies at what is socially considered too young an age.”
“But not as young as you first thought, though, hmm?” she derided.
“No,” he grated at this reminder of Jessica’s lies.
