Page 3

AXEL

The ice cubes clink together in the glass as I press the tumbler to my lips. Scotch whisky from the Isle of Skye, aged in smoked oak barrels, is usually my comfort drink, but tonight, even the smooth amber liquid does nothing to settle the restlessness inside me.

In front of me is a wall of screens showing feeds from the security cameras around my resort. It matches the observation bank in the security room behind the reception desk in the lobby, but this one is in my private quarters. I like to observe what’s happening at my resort, and this evening, I’m looking for one person in particular. One woman, the curvy woman with red hair tucked under a floppy sunhat, smooth skin, and plump lips. I didn’t catch her eye color because of the sunglasses she was hiding behind.

It was Ben, my security manager, who alerted me to her this afternoon. The way she was furtively glancing around, slouched over and hiding behind glasses, set off his Spidey-sense. We often get celebrities at the resort, and they come with their own set of problems.

But I can’t place the curvy woman with the red hair. She looks like that cartoon mermaid. If she’s a celebrity, then she’s not one I know, and I’d remember a face like hers. Mel at reception didn’t recognize her, and if my mystery woman is the kind who wants privacy, then I’m not going to ask anyone else to identify her.

The name she booked under is obviously fake, and she used a promo code that she admitted she found online.

Celebrities don’t use promo codes or make their own reservations.

Unless she’s running from someone.

I pause with the whiskey tumbler halfway to my mouth. My grip tightens on the glass. If someone has hurt my little mermaid, I’ll hunt them down myself.

My hand trembles as I place the tumbler on my desk. Someone scammed my sister once through a screen. I was deployed on the other side of the world, and I didn’t know about it for months.

I was looking the wrong way once, and I won’t let it happen again.

Whoever this woman is, she’s staying under my roof, which means I’m her protector now. I don’t even know her name, but I know whatever she’s hiding from is my problem now.

The protective instinct is fierce and intense. It’s been a long time since a woman affected me like this. I’m not sure why the vulnerability of this one has caught my attention, but there’s a voice inside me whispering that she is mine.

My fingers twitch over my keyboard. There’s no point in searching her fake name. Even I know who Elizabeth Bennet is, and my mystery mermaid is not a fictional character from Regency England.

I replay the camera feed from the entrance lobby and freeze on a frame of her oval-shaped face, a sprinkling of freckles poking out from under the wide sunglasses. Her soft pink lips have me wondering what they taste like. Beautiful.

I could take a freeze-frame of the video and do a facial recognition search online. It would tell me who she is and maybe why she’s here.

It’s tempting. But she’s come here for privacy, and I don’t want to breach that. Besides, it will be more fun to find out the old-fashioned way, by talking to her.

Which is why I’m here, watching the feeds and waiting for her to come out of her room. I’ve been waiting all afternoon and into the evening. She hasn’t emerged since she rolled her suitcase in and shut the door behind her.

She hasn’t come out to walk the grounds, to check out the lake, or to use the spa. She had dinner in her room: roast chicken with potatoes dauphinoise and an ice cream sundae for dessert. Comfort food. I intercepted the order and had Ben deliver it himself to ensure her privacy.

I want discreet security on her. If she’s a celebrity running from someone, we might get photographers. If she’s running from something more sinister, then we might get worse.

I check the feed that shows her corridor, but her door remains shut. It’s after midnight before I finish my last whiskey and turn in for the night.

Tomorrow, I’ll find out who Miss Bennet really is.

3

RUBY

My room is on the third floor of the hotel, and the view from the window looks over the lake and to the mountains beyond. I press my nose to the glass and watch the people meandering down the pathways leading to the lake.

After I checked in yesterday, I kept my phone and my laptop off and buried in my bag. In the evening, I ordered room service, then ran a bath and read a paperback that I picked up on the way out yesterday. I usually read on my phone, but I don’t want to have to turn that thing on for at least a week.

My stomach rumbles, and I check the clock on the bedside table. Another inconvenience of having my phone switched off is that I use it to tell the time. Thankfully, the hotel has a digital clock by the bed.

It’s fifteen minutes before breakfast ends, and I’m hoping I’ve waited long enough for the breakfast room to be empty.

I tuck my unruly curls down the back of my t-shirt and grab my sunglasses. I pick up my floppy sunhat and stick it over my head.

The corridor is empty, and I walk quickly, taking the stairs to the lobby rather than risk sharing the elevator. The breakfast room is past the lobby and down another corridor. The floor-to-ceiling windows look out over the gardens and up to the mountains. Staff in crisp white shirts and black pants are already packing away the buffet.