Nikki and the Lone Wolf Read Online Free

mother when he was eight years old, and this was all that was left. The garden she’d loved. The fence she’dalmost finished. He walked outside sometimes and he could swear he saw her.
    â€˜I’ll never leave you…’
    People lied. He’d learned that early. Depend on no one. But here…in his mother’s garden, looking out over the bay she’d loved, this was all that was left of a promise he’d desperately wanted to believe in.
    Emotional nonsense? Of course it was, he knew it, but his childhood house was a good place to crash when he wasn’t at sea. He had the money to keep it. If he could get a reasonable tenant for the apartment, then there’d be someone keeping the rooms warm, used.
    Go ahead, he’d told Dorothy.
    And then he’d met Nikkita. Briefly, the day she’d moved in.
    She didn’t look like an industrial engineer. She looked like someone in one of those glossy magazines Hattie kept leaving on the boat. She was tall, five nine or so, slim and pale-skinned, with huge eyes and professionally applied make-up—yes, he was a bachelor but that didn’t mean he couldn’t pick decent cosmetics a mile off. Her glossy black hair was cut into some sort of sculpted bob, dead straight, all fringe and sharp edges.
    And her clothes… The day she’d arrived she’d been wearing a black tunic with a diagonal slash of crimson across the hips. She’d added loopy silver earrings, red tights and glossy black boots that were practically thigh high. Low heels though. It was her moving day. She’d obviously thought low heels were workmanlike.
    Tonight she’d been wearing jeans. Skin-tight jeans and a soft pink sweater. She must be roughing it, he thought, and his thoughts were bitter.
    His head was thumping. He was trying hard not to think critical thoughts about ditzy air conditioning engineers who bush-bashed through the night with pokers.
    And suddenly she was back again—practically running, though if she’d tried to run in those shoes she would have runright out of them. She was panting. Her eyes were still huge and the sculpted hair was…well, a lot less sculpted. She had a twig stuck behind one ear. A big twig.
    â€˜Are you okay?’ she demanded, breathless, as if she’d expected to find him dead.
    â€˜I’m fine,’ he growled and struggled to stand. Enough of lying round feeling sorry for himself. He shook away the hand she proffered, pushed himself to his feet—and the world swayed. Not much, but enough for him to grab her hand to steady himself.
    She was stronger than he thought. She grabbed his other hand and held, hard, waiting for him to steady.
    â€˜S…sorry.’ For a moment he thought he might throw up. He concentrated for a bit and decided no, he might keep his dignity.
    â€˜Let me help you to the house.’
    â€˜Dog first,’ he said.
    â€˜You first.’
    â€˜The dog’s standing up to his hocks in the water, howling. I’m not even whinging. I’m prioritizing.’ He made to haul his hands away but she still held.
    He stopped pulling and let her hold.
    Two reasons. One, he was still unsteady.
    Two, it felt…not bad at all.
    He worked with women. A good proportion of his fishing crews were female. They mostly smelled of, yeah, well, of fish. After a while, no matter how much washing, you didn’t get the smell out.
    Nikkita smelled of something citrussy and tangy and outright heady. It didn’t make the dizziness worse, though. In truth it helped. He stood still, breathing in the scent of her, while the night settled around him.
    She didn’t speak. She simply held.
    Two minutes. Three. She wasn’t a talker, then. She’d figuredhe needed time to make the ground solid and she was giving it to him. It was the first decent thing he’d seen of her.
    Maybe there were more decent things.
    Her hands felt good. They were small hands for a tall