"Roberts, Nora - Private Scandals" - читать интересную книгу автора (Roberts Nora)

depress the handle. Shoving through, she ran straight into Finn.
"Hey." Amusement came and went in a heartbeat. The moment he saw her face, his laughter fled. She was pale as
a sheet, her eyes wild and wet. "Are you hurt?" He gripped her by the shoulders, drawing her out into the sunlight.
"What happened?"
"Let me go." She twisted, shoving against him. "Goddamn it, leave me alone."
"I don't think so." Instinctively, he wrapped his arms around her. "Okay, baby. I'll just hold on, and you can cut
loose."
He rocked, stroking her hair while she wept against his shoulder. She didn't hold back, but let all the shock and hurt
pour out with the tears. The surging pressure in her chest eased with them, like a swelling soothed with cool water.
When he sensed her calming, Finn shifted his hold. With his arm around her shoulders, he led her across the lot to a
low stone wall.
"Let's sit." He dragged a handkerchief out of his pocket and pressed it into her hands. Though he hated a woman's
tears, escaping Deanna's would brand him as the worst sort of coward. "You can pull yourself together and tell Uncle
Finn all about it."
"Go to hell," she muttered, and blew her nose.
"That's a good start." Gently, he brushed the hair away from her damp cheeks. "What happened, Deanna?"
She looked away from him. There was too much concern, too much willingness to understand in his eyes. "I just
found out I'm an idiot. That I have no sense of judgment, and that no one can be trusted."
"Sounds like a resume for a television news anchor." When she didn't smile, he took her hand. "I haven't got any
whiskey on me, and I gave up smoking last year. The best I can offer you is a shoulder."
"I seem to have used that already."
"I have another one."



Instead of leaning on it, she sat up straighter, squeezed her eyes tight a moment. Maybe she was an idiot, but she
still had pride. "I just walked in on a woman I considered a friend, and a man I was considering as a lover."
"That's a big one." And he didn't have any clever words to smooth it over. "The psychologist?"
"Marshall, yes." Her lips trembled. With an effort, she firmed them. The tears she'd shed didn't shame her, but they
were over. She meant to keep it that way. "And Angela. In her office."
Muttering an oath, he glanced up to the windows on the sixteenth floor. "I don't suppose you could have mistaken
the situation."
Her laugh was as dry as dust. "I'm a trained observer. When I see two people, one half naked, pawing each other, I
know what they're up to. I don't need corroboration to make the report."
"I guess not." He was silent a moment. The breeze whispered through the plot of grass behind them and waved
through the bank of tulips that spelled out CBC in sunny yellow. "I could round up a crew," Finn considered, "go up to
sixteen with a camera, lights and a mike, and make his life a living hell."
This time her laugh was less strained. "Interview him at the scene of the crime? It's a nice offer."
"No, really, I'd enjoy it." The more he thought about it, the more he believed it was the perfect solution. "Dr. Pike, as
a respected family counselor, how do you explain being caught with your pants down in a place of business before
noon? Was this a professional call? A new form of therapy you'd like to share with the public?"
"They weren't down--yet," she said with a sigh. "I interrupted them. And while your offer's tempting, I'd just as soon
handle the situation myself." She pushed the used handkerchief back in his hand. "Goddamn it, they made a fool out
of me." Springing off the wall, Deanna wrapped her arms tightly around her body. "She planned it. I don't know why,
I don't even know how, but she planned it. I saw it in her eyes."
This news didn't surprise him. Nothing about Angela did. "Have you pissed her off



lately?"