Minerva's Ghost Read Online Free

their mother in another and pulled out of the parking lot. After they were gone Moon stepped from the building. He stopped and drew a flask from his pocket. He took a long, apparently satisfying drink from it and then climbed into his own vehicle and left, too. Gabe knew he had no driver’s license, but he was still driving.
     
    The next day Gabe asked to meet with Amanda in her office at Au Natural. Because she knew Minnie had hired him, for something that her aunt considered important she decided to meet with him. She met him outside her office in the lobby of the building. He was   tall, dark and attractive in a rough sort of way, not classically good looking in the way blond men often were. Gena’s Pete was blond and did not turn her on at all, as much as he wanted her body or her assets…whichever it was that he wanted. She was all too sure that she herself as an individual mattered little in what Gena and her Whitfield offspring wanted from her.
     
    She wanted family ties. She was alone in the world except for her cousin Michael and desperately wanted a family. Still, she wasn’t desperate enough or dumb enough to mistake what Gena and her children were offering for even affection, let alone love.
     
    She watched Gabe walk toward her briskly, not really hurrying but as though he had things to do…responsibilities. Gabe looked dark and a little rough even in carefully pressed slacks and a starched shirt. His eyes were very dark and extravagantly lashed, big and expressive. He was well built and his clothes were perfectly tailored, but loose enough for comfort. His pants were a softly draped fabric with enough ease to disguise the details and give air to his package. She realized she was looking at his crotch, enjoying the view. He wore either hangers or no underwear. The thought of it was tantalizing. His shirtsleeves were rolled up revealing hairy muscular forearms and big masculine hands. She always looked at men’s hands…imagined them on her body. It was usually the first place she looked after their eyes. But she had looked first at Gabe’s crotch, not his hands. Not that it mattered. She wasn’t looking for love. She was avoiding it, if anything. Her fantasies were as close as she was getting to a real man. 
     
    He walked to her and she turned and led the way into her office. She was attracted and reluctant to shake his hand or touch him at all.
     
    “Can I offer you coffee?” she asked to cover her standoffishness.
     
    “No, I’ve had a few cups already.” He stood without restlessness and waited with apparent patience until she offered him a chair in the small conversation grouping that served as a conference area in Minnie’s office. He sat as soon as she chose a chair across from him.
     
    “You here working even before Minnie died?” she said. “She introduced us.”
     
    “Yes,” he confirmed. “I was here a couple of weeks.”
     
    “Why were you really here?” Instinctively knew she Amanda had to know, needed to know.
     
    “Minnie was concerned about some money that was missing from some of the company accounts. I had been called in to investigate, but did not find any answers before she died.” Gabe told her. I had placed some equipment in the main offices and just started some surveillance to increase security here. We were obligated to see that employees and customers were aware their conversations might be recorded for quality control and/or security. We didn’t make a big deal about it. We just wanted to be sure it was in employment contracts and all.”
     
    “What did the two of you think was going on here?” Amanda asked him.
     
    “She thought some money was being embezzled. I do, too, though I had not yet done the accounting checks.” Gabe told her. “I was going on what Minnie had told me, but we both know she would know what she was talking about.”
     
    Amanda felt her body tighten from shock. She thought, ‘Oh, Yeah, Minnie would know. She was a great