A Terrible Misunderstanding (A New Adventure Begins - Star Elite 6)

“Some friends of ours decided to pop around to see us,” Clara murmured. She didn’t dare tell him that they were at the house to see him. He looked angry enough as it was.

“How many of them are there?” Niall demanded.

Clara defiantly refused to explain herself to him, not after his determination to avoid all her questions. “A few.”

“A few,” he muttered and swore roundly. “All of them women, I suppose.”

“Of course.” Clara studied him and wondered who else he expected to call upon them. Her thoughts immediately turned to Erasmus, but she doubted Niall would expect him to visit them. “You know that man, don’t you?”

“No.”

“Why aren’t you surprised he is here, or wondering what he wants?”

“I will find out what he wants just as soon as you are in the house,” Niall assured her in a tone that warned her he would do what he said he would.

“You don’t seem all that surprised he is in your garden either,” he said, and quietly contemplated that while he waited for her to answer.

“That’s because Edith, one of our guests and the lady you met earlier this evening, thought she saw someone out here earlier.”

Niall bit out another curse.

“You do that a lot, you know.”

“What?” Niall slammed to a stop outside the kitchen door.

“Curse.”

“It comes with the job,” Niall grunted. He eyed the door meaningfully and waited. Because his hands were full, he couldn’t turn the knob himself. Clara didn’t take the hint.

Niall glared down at her. “Well?”

“Well, what?”

“Why did you come out here if you thought you saw someone lurking in the garden? Don’t you know how dangerous that is?” He was inwardly horrified that she might have come outside to see who it was.

“I forgot.”

“Forgot?” His voice was rife with disbelief.

“Yes, I forgot,” she snapped.

Niall bit back another curse and shook his head in disgust. Words failed him. There wasn’t much he could say or do right now. He had told her to be careful and she had ignored him. He had told her to stay inside but she seemed determined to put herself in the path of danger at every quarter. What else was he supposed to do?

Lose my bloody job if she gets snatched or, worse, killed because she won’t do as she is told.

It was the thought of what would happen to his colleagues that gave Niall the patience to persist in at least trying to keep Clara safe and, right now, the safest place for her to be was inside the house with her friends. The more of them there were the safer she would be because he doubted any man would be brave or stupid enough to try to snatch her out of a room full of women.

He wished he could just shove her inside and ride out of her life for good. It would take effort to forget her completely he knew, but he would manage it eventually he was sure of it. Inadvertently, Miss Clara Potter had rendered all his carefully laid plans useless in the space of half a day, and it was galling. Thanks to tonight’s events, it was going to be impossible to disappear back into the shadows and keep an idle watch over the woman’s rather mundane life of domesticity. That thought was confirmed when the kitchen doorway suddenly swung open and they both found themselves staring at a veritable sea of faces.

It was then that Niall realised he was still holding Clara.

CHAPTER NINE

“Mother of Christ,” Niall hissed beneath his breath when he saw them.

He knew in that instant that his mission had been ruined as had his entire investigation. Now, there was no earthly possibility that he was ever going to be able to hide and carry out his part of the Star Elite’s investigation in peace.

“Oh, Lordy,” one of them murmured in a sing-song kind of way. “Clara, my how handsome.”