Free The Right Side of Mr Wrong by Jane Linfoot

done snorting, she’d already fired the next question.
    ‘So what’s in
your
bags?’
    Tactical error.
Damn.
He’d blown this one. ‘Supplies.’
    She cocked her head at him in query.
    Bulk buy of condoms – how would summer-day-Shea take that one?
    ‘Believe me, you don’t want to know.’ He flashed her one wicked grin. ‘How about we look at the pudding menu?’
    * * *
    By the time they’d rounded everything off with coffee, it was mid-afternoon when they staggered back to the car. They’d called in the local outfitters, and bought Shea some wellies with matching welly socks, a thick parka coat, and a couple of cashmere cardies. At least she was going to be warm now. Warm and hopefully open to suggestion.
    ‘This is what I mean about the car being impractical,’ Shea pointed out ruefully, as he posted the bags through the car door, and piled them on top of her.
    Brando tried to look nonplussed.
    ‘This car is perfectly fit for its purpose. It’s made for driving, not for shopping, simple as!’ He snorted dismissively, though for the first time in his life he could see her point. ‘Can’t say it’s ever been used for shopping before, or that it ever will be again! Shea, what’s that round your neck?’
    As he slotted the box of wellingtons under her chin, and snatched an unscheduled bird’s-eye view down her top, he’d caught sight of something hanging from a gold chain, nestling between her breasts. He watched her hand shoot to clutch whatever it was, saw a crimson flush creep over her cheeks.
    ‘Just … ’ she faltered.
    ‘Just what?’ His idle enquiry was hardened by her guilty tone.
    She cleared her throat, and her voice was stronger, more assured now. ‘I’m not sure it’s any business of yours, but it’s something I wear all the time. My grandmother’s wedding ring.’
    She turned to face him now, with a slow, deliberate grin. ‘Brownie’s motto – “Be prepared.” Never know when I might need it! Waiting for Mr Right and all that!’
    Of all the … 
    He flung her door shut, hurled himself around the car and into the driving seat, and slammed his own door.
    Now he’d seen it all!
    A husband-hunter who travelled with her own ring! How perverse was that?
    He revved the engine until it screamed, did one crazy reverse out of the parking space, then banged the car into first gear, and accelerated away like a madman.
    Fifteen miles down the road, the fast driving hadn’t done anything to reduce his stress. The engine’s violent roar had drowned Shea’s early protests, and now she was hunched and silent.
    Small, vulnerable, unthreatening.
    Which only served to underline how misleading appearances could be.
    She was very different from the usual hard-nosed party socialites with whom he rubbed shoulders, and lots more. Overtly brash and shallow they might be, but at least they did what it said on the tin. Hell, they were pussy cats compared to the woman beside him. She may not have their veneers of sophistication, but with her girl-next-door looks combined with her predatory personal agenda she was ten times more dangerous.
    What exactly was she hiding beneath that high class organiser exterior of hers?
    She was ambitious and calculating enough to propel herself into the unknown in the hope of hooking herself a random billionaire. Her sights were firmly set upon his house and his wealth, but it suddenly hit him she could be looking for a whole lot more. He was used to women whose ambition in life was to party, whose main aim was to drink until the champagne ran dry.
    But this woman was looking for Mr Right, and that was a whole other ballgame.
    The thought hit him like a bucket of icy water.
    Who would go round searching for that from random strangers? All the more justification to take her down before he sent her packing. His knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel. Someone definitely needed to show this uptight, calculating woman there was more to life than happy