Page 2 of Deadly Misfortunes

Gregory continued breaking down what he believed about her abilities. “You add your crystal ball and abracadabra, and voila, suddenly, you know something about the individual you’re doing the reading for.” Gregory arched a brow, waiting for her to agree with him.

“You’re very clever. Except for one thing.”

“What’s that?” He motioned to a waiter carrying glasses of champagne. When the waiter brought the tray to him, Gregory lifted two glasses of champagne off it. He handed her one of the tall, fluted glasses.

She took it and raised it to him. “I didn’t know your name.” She took a sip of the champagne.

“Sure you did. I’m well-known to most everyone.”

Sascha tilted her head to the side. Was he totally conceited or what? “What makes you think I know you from the man in the moon?”

Gregory’s sea-green eyes had a slightly more golden hue than hers, but his hair—they could have been considered twins—was the same rich red color. She imagined he’d had a fuzzy red head when he was a baby, just like she had.

She would have loved to have seen his baby pictures. He was tall, just like the Worthingtons. His broad shoulders looked like they could have carried her nicely to the bedroom, and she imagined that was just what he was thinking too. Though she shouldn’t have been thinking along those lines at all.

His lips curved up with amusement. His eyes sparkled as he toyed with her, as if he were a kid playing with an action-figure doll, making it do whatever he wanted.

Just like her cousins, Katrina and Lucy, Sascha was good at playing games, though. “Oh?”

“My face is in the paper all the time. My mop of red hair gives me away.”

“I kind of like the color. But I don’t read the paper or watch the news.” She curled a coil of her hair around her finger. Everything in the news seemed to be negative and she didn’t want it in her life. Plus, she felt her abilities were stronger if they weren’t clouded with all that was going on in the world.

His lips inched up further. “My hair is just like yours.”

“All natural too.”

“I can see that.”

As she sipped her champagne, the bubbles tickled her nose. She rarely drank and wasn’t sure what it would do to her palm-reading abilities. Though one drink shouldn’t do too much harm, she didn’t think. “So you already know you’re in danger.”

“Sure, and so do the police.”

Surprised to hear it, she lifted her brows. Unlike Prescott, she thought. Prescott wouldn’t tell the police he had been in trouble; he had been sure there was nothing to it. Katrina had to convince him before it was too late. So Sascha was glad that at least Gregory believed that someone was out to do him harm and had contacted the police.

“Then I don’t have to attempt to rescue you.” Which was good news for Sascha.

Gregory had just taken a swallow of champagne and choked on it as if the very notion made him laugh. Her face warmed with embarrassment at the thought that he would find her so amusing. Telling fortunes for real was a serious business. Besides, what made him think she couldn’t rescue him anyway? Well, maybe she couldn’t, but maybe a vision would come to her that could help him.

After coughing a couple of times, Gregory regained his composure, straightened his back and smiled at her as if she were the funniest thing he’d chanced to meet in a good long while.

Once he looked as though he would live, she took a deep breath of annoyance. “Why would somebody be after you?”

“That’s what nobody knows. Two attempts have already been made on my life. I thought maybe you might know why.”

“Nope, but I’m sorry your life is in danger.” She hadn’t heard anything about it. Surely, Prescott would have mentioned it. Or Katrina. Was Gregory keeping it hush-hush? “Do you have a bodyguard?”

He motioned to a guy with strawberry-blond hair and blue eyes, who smiled at her. “That’s Red. His name is Robby Redfern, so he goes by Red.”

He was wearing a black tux, like the other men there, but he wasn’t a redhead. His hair was dyed for sure, as she could see the blond roots showing his natural color. Why change his hair color when she was sure he would look fine as a blonde?

“Good for you,” Sascha said to Gregory. At least he was taking measures to protect himself.

Gregory cleared his throat, still trying to settle the champagne that had gone down the wrong way. “Your cousin, posing as a Landry at the Worthington’s ball held at Lemoyne’s only a few days ago, interested me. My parents wanted me to look into it when both the Worthington brothers asked them whether she was their daughter or a niece. Then, without any engagement period, party, announcement, or anything else, Prescott Worthington ups and marries her. It seemed kind of odd that it would happen like that.”

Sascha’s brows rose. “Do you own exclusive rights to the Landry name? She’s of the Landry family of San Antonio. I wouldn’t call it posing as a Landry exactly, since it’s her birthright as much as it is yours. Unless you’re not really who you say you are.”

He chuckled under his breath, sending a trickle of warmth down her spine. “I am who I say I am. I soon discovered her parents live in San Antonio. I also learned she resided next door to a cousin who lives here, Sascha the Sensation, known at fairs all over the great state of Texas, fortune teller extraordinaire. And that she, Lucy, and you were raised by another couple. Your Aunt Meg and Uncle Jimmy. Then I wondered what role you had in all this.”