Love and Liability (Dating Mr Darcy - Book 2) Read Online Free

panelling and the quiet, hushed atmosphere of a library. “That’s because I was expecting someone, erm, a bit…different.”
    “Someone,” he observed with a quirk of his brow, “older?”
    “Yes! That’s it exactly. I was expecting a man named Henry, who combs his hair over his bald spot, has a high, shiny forehead, and who wears sock suspenders and a regimental tie.”
    “Well,” he said, amused, “I may not fit that very detailed description, but, I assure you, I’m fully qualified, despite my non-regimental tie and full head of hair. Please, sit down.”
    Under his dark navy-blue suit he wore a shirt pinstriped in paler blue. A wafer-thin watch flashed on his wrist as he indicated one of two wing chairs angled in front of his desk.
    Holly sat down. They certainly liked wing chairs here at the Grosvenor Financial Group.
    He resumed his seat behind the desk as his secretary appeared. “Ah, here’s Jill.” As she entered and set down a footed silver tray with coffee, milk, sugar, and cups he turned to Holly. “Is something wrong, Ms James? You look puzzled.”
    “Wrong? No.” She accepted a cup of coffee with cream from his secretary. “I thought your name was Henry. Not Alex.”
    “It is. Alexander is my middle name. Hence—” he smiled a brief but nonetheless devastating smile “—Alex.” He placed the cup of tea with lemon Jill handed him to one side. “Now — what can I do for you today, Ms James?”
    “I…er…” All intelligent thought fled as she met those velvety brown eyes. His lips looked as firm and inviting as a Greek statue’s, but better, because they weren’t carved of marble, but were made of warm, kissable flesh…
    “Ms James?” he prodded.
    Holly mentally shook herself. She couldn’t remember a single thing she’d planned to ask him. “I…like your red handkerchief,” she stalled as she dragged her gaze away from his lips. “It looks very stylish with your navy-blue suit.”
    “My red handkerchief?” he echoed. “But I’m not wearing a handkerchief.”
    “Yes, you are.” Her glance strayed to his breast pocket.
    He glanced down. The red thong peeked saucily out. Alex reddened and thrust the offending bit of silk deeper inside his pocket. “I’m very busy this morning, Ms James. If you’d be so good as to tell me what this is all about…?”
    “I’m here to interview you,” she said, and set her mini-recorder on the edge of his desk and switched it on, “for
BritTEEN
magazine.”
    “You want to interview me — a solicitor — for a teen magazine?”
    Holly nodded. From his tone of mild distaste and his slightly raised eyebrow, he obviously equated teen magazines with porn.
    “Why, for God’s sake?”
    “I’m not sure,” she admitted. “I asked my boss the exact same question. ‘Who’d want to read about some boring old solicitor?’ I asked her. ‘Teen girls want to read about lip gloss, and boy bands, not barristers and
quid pro quo
…’”
    When she caught sight of his forbidding expression, her words faded away.
Oops
.
    “Are you implying that we in the legal profession are — or, more specifically, that
I
am — boring, Ms James?”
    “Oh, no,” she hastened to say, “not at all! It’s just that…legal stuff, and stocks and bonds — well, those aren’t things the average teenage girl is interested in, are they?”
    Oh, God
, she thought,
please let the floor open up and swallow me whole, right now
.
    But God wasn’t listening, because she remained where she was — sitting red-faced with embarrassment on the chair in front of Henry Barrington’s immense, and vaguely intimating, desk.
    “No, I expect not,” he agreed, and leaned forward. He gave her a roguish smile. “Perhaps we should sex it up a bit.”

Chapter 4
    Holly blinked. “I-I’m not sure I know what you mean.”
    “Go ahead,” he commanded, “ask me a question. I’ll do my utmost to make the answer interesting, despite my tragically dull life as a member of