The sneaky, sneaky man.
But if he thought she’d crumble that easily, then he didn’t know her at all. Agnes could resist this temptation. She had a backbone of steel. Logan had no idea what he was up against.
Agnes pulled the tray toward herself, whisked off the napkin, and gaped. It was the exact meal they’d had at the spa. There was no way the hotel kitchen had made this. No, this meal had been ferried in from the only other restaurant in town. As she sat staring down at it, there was a flash, and she looked up to find Bernadette aiming her phone at her.
“What are you doing?” Agnes demanded.
“Nothing,” she said. “I was just wondering if you’re going to the movies at the community center tonight.”
“No! And close the damn door.”
As her office door shut quietly, Agnes massaged the ache in her temples and groaned. Her phone lay on the desk in front of her, tempting her to just call Logan and tell him she was giving in. But, no, she could resist his onslaught. She was made of iron.
After switching off her phone, she dug into the meal, all the while trying not to breathe in Logan’s scent.
It was almost nine before Agnes finished up in her office. Dragging her tired body up the stairs to her room, she longed for a hot bath, some chocolate, and at least fourteen hours sleep.
Instead, her room had only a shower. And she had to be back at her desk by seven in the morning. At least she still had a bar of chocolate in her fridge. Chocolate helped everything. She opened her door, stepped into her room, and stopped.
Folded on the end of her bed was a massive, plush wine-colored blanket, an electrical cord wound in a circle on top. Agnes had seen those blankets in Invertary’s gift shop and had longed for one, but it’d been just out of her price range—until her wages came in.
Now here it was.
She ran her fingers over the sensual material, already eager to plug in the blanket, switch it on and wrap herself in its warmth.
A piece of folded paper sat beside it on the bed. Agnes picked up the note and read it.
I didn’t want you to be cold.
Agnes sat on the edge of her bed, pulled out her phone and dialed Logan.
She’d been wrong. There was no fighting this. This kind of temptation was too much to resist. All she could hope for now was that he was so terrible in bed it put her off him for life.
The call went straight to voicemail, so she left a message. Just three small words before she hung up.
“I want you.”
Chapter 13
Logan dried his hands, shut the dishwasher and reached for his phone. He’d been elbow deep in water so had let the caller leave a message. With a swipe of his screen, he accessed his voicemail and promptly lost the ability to breathe, because the message was from Agnes. And all she’d said was, ‘I want you.’
Damn.
He ran a hand down his face as his stomach filled with butterflies and his heart raced. All at once, he was a teenage boy again, nervous before his first date. Hanging his head, he muttered some curses under his breath. That woman was twisting him inside out.
“Who was on the phone?” Drew said as he sauntered into the kitchen.
Fighting to get his reaction under control, Logan turned to face his son. “I have to go out. I’m needed at the hotel, and I could be gone all night. Go next door and get your gran for me, will you?”
“You do know I’m old enough to look after Darcy, right?” Drew said, but he was already heading for the door.
“Not overnight you aren’t.” He didn’t care how many bolts they had on the door, or how sensible his kids could be, they weren’t spending the night alone.
He found his daughter lying upside down on the sofa, reading a book. He crouched beside her. “I’m going out. Gran’s coming over, and she’ll put you to bed, okay?”
There were no arguments about her being too old for anyone to put to bed. She just said, “’kay. Night, Dad.” And carried on reading.
With a smile, Logan kissed her forehead before getting ready to go out.
Her knitting under her arm, his mother appeared as he pulled on his jacket. “Work?” she asked as he kissed her on the cheek.
He wouldn’t lie to his family, but that didn’t mean he had to spill his guts to them either. “Let’s just say something came up.”
She stared at him, and he felt exactly the same as he had when he was a kid and tried to sneak things past her. He’d never managed it. Not once. She had a built-in radar for bullshit.
“Does this something have anything to do with a certain hotel manager?”
“I know what I’m doing,” he told her. And he was also old enough to do it without his mother’s input.
“I hope so,” she muttered. “Be sure to tell her that if she breaks you, she buys you.” With that, she headed into the living room.
“Night,” Logan shouted as he opened the door. “See you all tomorrow.”
There were grunts for replies. Good to know they’d miss him.
Sleet hit the car windshield as he drove through town, telling him that, just like Agnes, the weather couldn’t make up its mind either. Instead of rain or snow, they were getting both.
Clenching and unclenching his hands on the steering wheel, Logan negotiated the narrow old roads down to the loch. He shouldn’t jump to conclusions over Agnes’ call. Just because she’d said she wanted him, didn’t mean she wanted to get physical with him. She probably meant she wanted to talk to him. Aye, that was probably all she meant.
He shifted in his seat, adjusting himself in his jeans to get more comfortable. Why was it taking so long to get there? You could drive right across the whole of Invertary in fifteen minutes, yet this trip was taking a lifetime.
“I want you,” she’d said. Damn it to hell. He wished she’d been more specific. What kind of want were they talking about exactly? Friends? Friends with benefits? Just benefits? Could he be a booty call for her if that’s all she wanted? Hell, yes!
At last, the pub came into sight, its walls glowing yellow under the uplighting. Logan parked behind it and was out of his car in two seconds flat. They would have locked the hotel doors by now, with only guests having a code to open them, so he’d have to go through the pub. His stomach sank. The last thing he needed was somebody stopping him to chat.
Keeping his head down, Logan prayed no one would notice him as he aimed straight for the interior entrance to the hotel. Of course, he wasn’t that lucky.
“Logan,” Dougal boomed. “What can I get you?”
There weren’t enough curse words in the world for his reply. “Nothing. I’m just cutting through. I have a meeting with Agnes.”
Dougal’s bushy white eyebrows shot up. “At this time of night?”
“It’s barely half past nine,” Logan pointed out, still walking toward the hallway that led to the hotel.
“It must be important if she called you in this late in the day,” Dougal said. “I’d better come with you.”
“No!” Logan almost tripped over a stool. “No need for you to leave the bar. I can handle this.”
“Not at all,” Dougal said before turning to one of his staff. “Grace, watch the bar. I need to have a word with my manager.”
Fuck. Fuck. Damn. Hell. Shit. Crap.
Taking a deep breath, he pulled out his phone. “I’ll send Agnes a text to ask where we’re meeting.”
“I expect she’ll be in her office if she called you in,” Dougal said as he came around the bar.
Logan shot off a text: Dougal thinks we have a meeting. He’s coming with me.
He received no reply. Nothing. Now what?
“As you know,” Dougal said as they headed into the hotel, “we’ve had a few more thefts this past week, but nothing on the level of Mrs. Edwards’ ring. I don’t understand it myself—it’s as though the thief can’t tell the difference between a diamond and cheap glitter.”
Logan glanced at his phone. No message. He quickly typed ano
ther: Dougal is with me!!!!
“Everything all right?” Dougal said.
“Absolutely.” The phone was a burning coal in his hand, his jeans were strangling the erection of the century, and Santa was cockblocking him. But apart from that, everything was just hunky-dory.
“That’s strange,” Dougal boomed as they rounded the corner to Agnes’ office. “The lights aren’t on. She can’t be in there. Are you sure you’re meeting her tonight?”
“Pretty sure,” Logan said, checking his phone again. Still nothing.
“You don’t think she’s working in her room again, do you?” Dougal frowned. “I’ve told her to stop doing that. I don’t expect her to work in her sleep. She needs time off, the same as everybody else. That girl just doesn’t take care of herself. Come on. We might as well go see.”
“I don’t think it’s wise to call her a girl. She might take offense at that, seeing as she’s a full-grown woman.”
“She’s a girl to me,” Dougal huffed. “I’m old enough to be her grandfather.”
“She’s thirty-two.”
“Okay, then a late-in-life father.”
Logan shook his head—this conversation wasn’t the one they needed to have. He’d gone off track. “I can deal with this on my own,” he said. “I expect you want to get back to the bar, anyway.”
“Nonsense, it’s no trouble.” Dougal started up the stairs. “After all, this is my hotel, and I like to keep abreast of everything that goes on in it.”
“A breast?” Logan was thirteen again, blushing at words with even the vaguest sexual connotation.
“Don’t tell me you don’t know what abreast is?”
This was not happening! Aye, he knew what a breast was, and he’d been hoping to get his hands on a couple until Dougal butted in.
“It means keeping up-to-date on a situation,” Dougal said with disgust. “Young people today, you’re so busy texting, you’ve forgotten real words. When I was your age, I had an amazing vocabulary. Still do, mind you.”
“I know what abreast means, Dougal.” Logan shot off another text as he spoke: URGENT Dougal and I are outside your door. They weren’t, not yet, but they were damn close.
“Then why did you ask about it?” Dougal huffed.
Still no reply from Agnes. All Logan could do was hope she checked her phone before opening the door. Otherwise, this could go south pretty fast, and any plans she had of keeping things between them off the town’s radar would be gone.
“Good,” Dougal said, “there’s light coming from under the door, so she must be in.”
Before Logan could come up with anything else to derail Dougal, the hotel owner thumped Agnes’ door. For a second, Logan thought he might faint from the stress of the situation, but then the door swung open, and Agnes beamed at both of them.
“Good, you’re both here,” she said as though she’d been expecting them. “That saves me the trouble of updating you separately. Come on in.”
Agnes had been in the shower, shaving her legs, while Logan was sending her desperate messages. She’d barely had time to throw on some clothes, and even then, not all of them, as she had nothing on under her buttoned suit jacket, when there was a knock at the door. After twisting her wet hair into a knot and clipping it in place, she slipped her damp feet into her shoes, kicked her bra under the bed and opened the door, all the while praying that this wasn’t happening.
Bloody Dougal. He should just go back to running his own hotel. It would be more efficient than poking his nose into everything she did.
Not that this get-together was about the hotel. No, this one should have been about her and Logan. Who was currently eating her up with his eyes while Dougal waited for a nonexistent report.
“What’s this all about then?” Dougal boomed.
“Well.” There was nothing she could do but start talking in the hope that something would come to her. “I was going over the list of stolen items, and I found a…”
What? What the hell had she found?
Logan cleared his throat. “Is this about that pattern you mentioned?”
“Yes, yes, the pattern!” What pattern? “Perhaps you could explain about the pattern while I switch off the monitors. They’re very distracting.”
That’s when she realized the monitors weren’t on. And that Dougal didn’t know about the cameras. For a second, she just stood there, frozen midstride, completely at a loss as to what to do next.
“What are you talking about?” Dougal boomed again. “And why do you have so many screens in your room anyway?”
“About that pattern,” Logan said loudly, attempting to save her. “Agnes mentioned that all of the items have gone missing during daytime hours. So we can definitely rule out night people. I mean people at night. As in, hotel guests.”
Agnes bugged her eyes at him. That was the best he could do?
Judging by the look on Dougal’s face, he was about as impressed as she was with Logan’s explanation. But there was nothing she could do now but go with it.
“Yes.” She nodded solemnly. “It means the thief has to be someone who has access to the place during the day. I think we can rule out guests because, as Logan pointed out, they would be better off stealing at night.” Holy crap, that sounded worse. “Also, I noticed all of the stolen jewelry was shiny. And small. So that means we’re looking for someone who likes small shiny things.” Damn, she was dying here. She shot Logan a desperate look, but he just stared at her in bewilderment. “Isn’t that right, Logan?” she prodded.
“Aye, that’s right.” He cleared his throat. “And didn’t you mention that you thought the thief must be keeping everything because nothing had turned up in any pawnshops or online sales sites?”
“Yes!” She pointed at him. “That too.”
“That’s it?” Dougal sounded incredulous. “This is why you called Logan all the way down here? I have to say that I’d expect more from my manager.” He looked like he was gearing up to give a lecture on how to run a hotel properly, possibly including how she wasn’t cut out for management. Yeah, he had the look of a man who was wondering why he’d hired his staff.
She had to salvage this situation. And fast. “Of course, that isn’t everything. I could have told him that in an email. There’s also the…”
The what? What was there? A missing plastic bracelet? Still no sign of the diamond ring?
Her eyes came to rest on the screens, and her shoulders slumped. It was a dumb idea, but she’d run out of options. “There’s also the new security cameras I’ve installed.”
“Cameras?” Dougal shouted, his head turning red with outrage.
“Fantastic idea.” Logan slapped Dougal on his back. “Don’t you agree? I told Agnes the best way to deal with this situation was to set up cameras. Of course, she wasn’t keen on the idea, kept going on about guest privacy, but you and I both know that guest security is also important.”
Dougal didn’t look convinced, but he’d stopped blustering.
“I know you don’t want a permanent system,” Agnes said. “I just got the cheapest stick-up cameras. That way, we can take them down as soon as we’ve found the thief. Also, I only put up half a dozen and, to ensure guest privacy isn’t invaded by anyone else on the staff, I plan to monitor them myself.”
“That’s going above and beyond,” Logan said. “When do you sleep? Dougal was just telling me that he thought you worked too hard. Isn’t that right, Dougal?”
“Well, aye, but I didn’t think she’d be watching cameras all night long.”
Logan clapped him on the shoulder. “It’s hard to find staff this dedicated. You’re a lucky man.”
It was all Agnes could do not to roll her eyes. At least now it was clear where Darcy got her gift for acting, because her father was seriously bad at it too.
Dougal opened and shut his mouth a few times before he spoke. “I agree. The cameras are a good idea in this instance, but, rather than having my manager watch them, maybe Benson Se
curity could take that on board. It would free up Agnes’ time for more important things.”
“That’s a fantastic idea,” Logan said.
“Why didn’t I think of that?” Agnes said.
They both smiled at Dougal.
“What I still don’t understand—” Dougal started to say.
But desperate to head off any other lines of inquiry she didn’t have answers for, Agnes cut him off. “Wait, let me show you the camera feeds.” She switched on all the monitors. And there, in the hallway outside the kitchen door, was Dougal’s pup peeing on the skirting board.
“Arnold!” Dougal shouted. As though the dog could hear him from the second floor.
Agnes had never loved a dog more in her life than she loved that peeing, farting ball of fur right then.
“I need to deal with this,” Dougal said. “I’ve talked to him about doing his toilet outside. This is not on. Not on at all. Good work, Agnes. I expect we’ll get to the bottom of these thefts in no time. Come on, Logan. I’ll walk you out.”
As Dougal strode toward the door, Logan held up his hands and shrugged.
Agnes dug in her pocket, grabbed her room key with its security fob for the main door, and thrust out her hand to Logan. “Thank you for coming out so late. I appreciate it.”
He took her hand in his, palming the key as he did so. Shivers went right through her body as his eyes darkened. “It’s no trouble at all. Call me tomorrow if you find anything.”
“Will do.”
And then he turned around to join her boss, who waited impatiently in the hallway.
“Don’t stay up too late,” Dougal said. “We’ve got a busy few days ahead of us.”
Agnes said nothing, she just cast one last glance at Logan, and shut the door.
Chapter 14
Agnes’ key burned in Logan’s hand, branding him. All he could think about was getting straight back up to the room without Dougal in tow. How he managed to carry on a polite conversation while they walked down the stairs, he’d never know.
“Do you want a drink before you go?” Dougal said when they reached the lobby.
Can't Buy Me Love: Romantic Comedy (Sinclair Sisters Trilogy Book 3) Page 12
