What the Lady Wants

What the Lady Wants
Jennifer Crusie

Mitch Peabody was learning pretty fast that the life of a private detective was nothing like the movies. He'd envisioned a world of tough-talking detectives and smart-mouthed, stunning dames. Instead he saw case after case of cheating husbands, suspicious wives and unsuspecting mistresses…until she walked through the door.Right down to her stilettos, Mae Sullivan was a knockout with a lethal body–and a lethal family to go with it. There was something not quite on the up-and-up about her, but she came with a case he couldn't afford to refuse…and left him with a case of lust he hadn't had since high school. It didn't take long for him to fall for her, hook, line and sinker. But was Mae interested only in catching the double-crossing crooks who murdered her uncle…or did the lady want to catch him?

Critics are hooked on

Jennifer Crusie!

“Crusie has a gift for concocting nutty scenarios and witty one-liners…. Genuine laughs.”

—People

“Few popular writers handle light romantic comedy as deftly as Jennifer Crusie.”

—Boston Globe on Bet Me

“Crusie seems incapable of writing a boring page, or one that’s not aglow.”

—Kirkus Reviews on What the Lady Wants

“A beach book for your brain…a sexy intellectual read.”

—Redbook on Faking It

“A nontraditional couple (he’s 30, she’s 40) and a dog with a true personality make this one of the funniest, sexiest romances of the year.”

—Library Journal on Anyone But You

“Ms. Crusie has written a funny, sexy tale about two strong, loving, but completely opposite characters…not to be missed.”

—Paperback Forum on Strange Bedpersons

“Crusie displays a real knack with witty dialogue and develops a fun relationship with engaging sexual tension.”

—RT Book Reviews on Manhunting

What the Lady Wants

Jennifer Crusie

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

This book is for my parents,

Jack and JoAnn Smith of Wapakoneta, Ohio,

because they gave me values, books and love

What the Lady Wants

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER ONE

MAE SULLIVAN frowned up at the grimy old office building and shifted from one aching spike-heeled foot to the other, trying to keep the weight off her blisters. From the looks of the neighborhood, her chances of getting mugged were only slightly greater than the chances of the building falling on her. Only a loser would work in a place like this.

Good.

It hadn’t been easy finding an incompetent private eye on such short notice in a midwestern city like Riverbend. But now there was Mitchell Peatwick. She could picture him, leaning back in his office chair, balding and overweight, slack-jawed and beady-eyed, no brains to speak of.

He’d patronize her because she was female.

She’d play him like a piano.

All she had to do was convince him that he was investigating a real murder case, and he’d swing his paunchy weight around, creating noise and confusion until whoever had taken her uncle’s diary would be forced to either give it up or bury it forever if he didn’t want to be accused of murder. Yep, that was all she had to do. So go do it. She took a deep breath and winced as the waistband of her borrowed pink skirt cut into her flesh. Then she pulled the veil on her hat over her eyes and walked toward the cracked glass doors of the old building, watching her reflection as she climbed the steps.

Even through the dumb pink veil, she really did look sexy. It was amazing what clothes could do.

Now, if she could just get this damn interview over with before the waistband of June’s skirt cut her in two and June’s heels made her lame for life, she’d be on her way to solving all of their problems.

Please let Mitchell Peatwick be dumb as a rock with a weakness for women in tight skirts, she prayed as she rang for the elevator. Please let him be everything I need him to be.

THE WINDOW behind him was cranked wide-open, and the ceiling fan above him stirred the air, and Mitch was sure if he got any hotter, he’d die. As it was, he was pretty sure that the only thing that kept him alive was the fact that he wasn’t moving. If he moved, his body temperature would rise, and he’d melt right there in his office chair.

He didn’t want to move, anyway. He was too depressed to move. He leaned back in his cracked leather desk chair—sleeves rolled up, hands laced behind his head, heels crossed on his battered metal desk—and thought about the way he’d planned things and the way they’d turned out. Big difference there. Anticipation was a lousy preparation for reality. That’s why he was giving it up for fantasy. Fantasy was not particularly productive, nor was it lucrative, but it beat reality hands down.

Reality sucked.