Her Enemy Protector Read Online Free

obedient daughter for as long as it took to keep that date with him.
    Finally, on a Saturday morning two weeks after the murder, her father agreed to let her out of the house under heavy guard for a night of dancing. Apparently, people were starting to ask questions. The maids smuggled the occasional Gavronese tabloid to her and rumors were circulating that her father was keeping her prisoner in his house. For once, she was truly grateful for her high-profile party-girl image. It might just save her life this time.
    She couldn’t wait to get out of the house for a few hours. And, good Lord willing, there’d be more than dancing waiting for her at The Last Tango.
    She had no idea who this Joe guy was. Whether or not she could believe his story and trust him was another unknown. But it wasn’t like she had any choice. Eduardo had murdered her only trustworthy friend in Gavarone.
    She prayed a dozen times that day that Joe had waited for her. She didn’t know if she could take another big disappointment right now.
    He had to be here. He had to.
    Curbing her impatience as the limousine pulled to a stop in front of the upscale tango club, she waited while Freddie and Neddie went inside to scope out the place. She knew the routine. They would check for exits and put a man on each one so she couldn’t make an escape, and they would make sure the customers didn’t include any known enemies of her father’s.
    By the time they finally came back to let her out of the car, she was a jangling bundle of nerves. “Gentlemen,” she asked the pair as politely as she could muster around the tightness in her throat, “may I please have a little privacy tonight to enjoy myself in peace?”
    The two men exchanged a glance. Freddie growled grudgingly, “You can go upstairs. There’s a bar and a small dance floor up there and only the one staircase for access. We’ll stay downstairs.”
    “Thank you, Alfredo,” she murmured gratefully. Please be here, please be here, please be here…
    A gaping Neddie lurched into motion as she practically ran past him. She stopped just inside the door. The place gave the impression of an old-fashioned ballroom, with abundant gilding, mirrors and crystal chandeliers. Thankfully, a high-tech lighting system, the modern bar and a stage for a band kept it from being an old-fogey joint. She looked around frantically and didn’t see anyone remotely resembling that shadowed face from the ocean. Her heart leaped into her throat. He had to be here!
    She’d been to this club a few times, but she certainly wouldn’t call it one of her regular haunts. It was more mature—classier—than the places she usually chose. She gravitated toward clubs that were wild, easy and, truth be told, a little raunchy. They aggravated the living heck out of her father.
    Freddie nodded toward the stairs and she flew up them like there were rockets on her feet. The bar was located at the far end of a wide mezzanine, on the far side of a long, narrow dance floor that ran the length of the balcony. True to the club’s name, about once an hour a set of tangos played, and one was in progress now. She dodged promenading couples and made her way over to the gleaming mahogany bar. She bellied up to it and leaned forward to talk to the bartender under cover of the tango playing behind her.
    “I’m here to meet a guy named Joe. Have you seen him, by any chance?” She prayed the bartender didn’t ask her for more details because she hadn’t registered much about Joe that crazy night.
    She needn’t have worried. The second she uttered his name, the bartender’s eyebrows shot up to somewhere in the vicinity of his hairline. He stared at her with open curiosity. “Over there,” he nodded with his chin and added, “I thought for sure you stood him up after all this time, but he kept saying you’d show.”
    Joe was here. He’d waited for her. Abject gratitude at this stranger’s perseverance flooded her, and she blinked away