Read Online Playing His Dangerous Game by Tina Duncan - Free Book Online Page A

around.’
    Shara stared at him with big wide eyes, ‘I think I’m beginning to believe you.’
    Shara could hardly believe those words had come out of her mouth, but they had.
    Royce’s confidence was reassuring. So too was the strong sense of justice he’d just been talking about.
    But talk was cheap. Actions always spoke louder than words—and the way Royce had come to her rescue this morning, paired with the way he’d backed down when he realised he was frightening her, were ample evidence that he meant what he said.
    She could, she was beginning to realise, trust Royce—at least to some extent.
    She pushed her empty mug away. ‘It’s still a big leap from dealing with a couple of schoolyard bullies to operating your own business.’
    He flashed her another of those bone-melting smiles that made her heart turn over. ‘I know. In fact it’s a bigger leap than you can even imagine.’
    ‘Go on.’
    ‘My career transformation started when I was hauled up to the headmaster’s office one day and accused of hacking into the computer network to change the grades of some of the students.’
    ‘But you didn’t,’ she said without hesitation.
    Royce raised an eyebrow in her direction. ‘You sound very sure.’
    ‘A man with a strong sense of justice wouldn’t cheat like that.’
    ‘Well, your instincts are right. I had nothing to do with it.’
    ‘So what made them accuse you?’ Shara asked, resting her chin on her cupped hands.
    It was only human nature to be curious about someone you were going to be sharing a house with for the foreseeable future, Shara assured herself. It wasn’t as if she was interested in him or anything like that.
    ‘They had no proof, if that’s what you’re asking. Their excuse was flimsy, to say the least.’ She gave him an enquiring look. ‘They thought I was the only student capable of hacking into the system.’
    ‘Obviously you weren’t, since it was someone else.’
    He nodded. ‘Exactly. I can understand why they thought it was me, though. I have a knack for computing. Since it was one of my subjects they knew that. Still, I was furious at being unjustly accused with so little evidence.’
    ‘I can imagine.’
    It was the kind of injustice that Shara could understand. When Steve had first turned on her shortly after their wedding she’d been bewildered. But quickly on the heels of her confusion had come the question: What have I done to deserve this?
    ‘So guess what I did?’ Royce asked.
    The question dragged Shara back to the present. ‘I wouldn’t have a clue.’
    ‘I offered to find out who the hacker was,’ he said, with the same panache as someone pulling a rabbit out of a hat.
    Shara sat back in her chair. It was an idea that hadn’t even occurred to her. ‘That’s a unique solution—but how on earth could you do that?’
    ‘Actually, it was quite easy. The hacker was an amateur compared to me, so tracing him wasn’t difficult.’ Royce pushed his chair back from the table and crossed an ankle over a knee. ‘But it gave me the idea that maybe it would be challenging, not to mention more interesting, doing that kind of thing for a living instead of straight computer work. So I decided to find out. I approached a well-known security company to see if they’d give me a part-time job.’
    It was a logical step, although Shara very much doubted it would have occurred to
her
. ‘And did they?’
    ‘No, they laughed in my face. They thought it was hysterical that a schoolkid thought he had something to offer them. But that was a mistake.’ Another of those heart-melting smiles flashed across his face. ‘What they didn’t realise was that, one, I don’t like being laughed at, and, two, defeat is not a word in my vocabulary.’
    Shara was beginning to realise that—which meant that he was a good man to have on her side. ‘So what did you do?’
    He leaned conspiratorially closer and beckoned her to do the same with a crooked finger. He waited