Midnight Jewels

the shop again the next morning. Six-day work weeks were normal for small business entrepreneurs. After two years of working them, Mercy was accustomed to the hours.
    When she left for Colorado on Monday morning she would be taking her first real vacation in two years.
    Not everyone would count the trip as a vacation, Mercy reflected wryly. After all, it was definitely a business venture. But she was as excited as if she were about to embark on a cruise. The sale of
Valley of Secret Jewels
was a milestone in her new career as a bookseller. A whole new world was opening up to her. If she played her cards right, she would actually be entering the rarified atmosphere of antiquarian book dealership. Ignatius Cove had been good to her.
    Life had changed a lot in the past two years, Mercy thought with satisfaction. Exactly two years earlier she had been learning how appalling her judgment in men was. She'd been busy canceling wedding plans and quitting her job in a public library. Now she was far more cautious with men, happily single and successfully established in a new career.
    Mercy's thoughts returned again to dinner as she stretched on tiptoe to reach a book high on the shelf. Her fingers closed around the volume when she suddenly had the strange feeling that she was being watched. The sensation was unnerving, especially since the bell over the door had not rung as it was designed to when anyone entered the shop. She knew with a sudden, sure instinct that she was no longer alone. Mercy went very still.
    "I'm looking for Mercy Pennington."
    Mercy yelped and spun around. A man stood at the end of the long aisle of books. Her first impression was of darkness… unsettling, overwhelming darkness. Her shop had been invaded by a midnight phantom, a lean, somber ghost with hair the color of a raven's wing. He wore black chino trousers, low cut black boots and a black twill shirt that was open at the throat. Even the sound of his voice invoked the night and all its mysteries. The echo of her own name was as deep and dark as the bottom of the sea.
    Only his eyes offered a sense of light. They were a strange shade of hazel set in a bronzed face. The intelligence in his gaze was coupled with a strangely detached quality that was disturbing. Mercy looked into his eyes and wondered how any man could achieve such a degree of deep, remote calm.
    She wondered what it would take to put ripples into the quiet seas of such eyes. Some primitive, feminine part of her longed to discover the secret. For a tempting instant Mercy found herself wanting to slap the man or kiss him to see if she could jar that remote expression.
    Mercy was shocked when she realized that her reaction was a direct response to her attraction to this stranger, which had sprung into life without any warning. Never in her life had she met a man who had instantly awakened such a violent sense of awareness within her. The feeling was so strong and unsettling she clutched the nearest shelf for support.
    She imagined he must be in his mid-thirties, perhaps older. His face was fierce angles and planes; high cheekbones, a rock hard jaw, an arrogant nose. No softness anywhere. But he stood in front of her with a poised, almost erotic grace that seemed to assault her senses.
    His mouth was a firm, unyielding line. That mouth should have promised a total lack of emotion, but for some reason Mercy got just the opposite impression. She saw the potential for emotion there, saw too that it was under a rigid self-control. The problem was she couldn't begin to tell if it was passion or violence that lurked beneath the surface of his cooly set mourn.
    Any emotion this man chose to focus on a woman would be overwhelming, Mercy thought. She shook off the paralyzing awareness.
    "I'm Mercy Pennington. You startled me. I didn't hear you come in." She took a firm grip on her shaken nerves. "The bell over the door must be broken."
    The man glanced back toward the door. "It's not broken."
    "But it always rings when the door opens."
    He shrugged. "It didn't this time." He dismissed the matter completely. The mystery of the non-ringing bell was obviously not a mystery to him. "If you're Mercy Pennington, then you have a book for sale. I would like to examine it, and if it's the one I want I'll meet your price, whatever you're asking."
    "A book?" Her mind went blank. Something about this man was totally disorienting. He was asking her about a book, but she had the oddest sensation they should