A PERFECT RENDEZVOUS

A Breakfast in Paradise

Katherine slid a pan of sourdough biscuits into the oven and glanced up in surprise as the intercom at the front gates began to buzz insistently on the kitchen wall. Wiping her hands on a dish towel, she pressed the button. "Yes?"

"Is this Miss Cahill?"

Pointedly ignoring that, she said, "Who is this?"

"Louis Tomlinson," the voice replied impatiently. "Is Harry Mathison with you?"

"Mr. Tomlinson," Katherine said darkly, "it is seven-thirty in the morning! Harry and I are still in our robes. Go away and come back at a civilized hour, say eleven. I should think the FBI would teach its agents better manners," she added, then she gaped at the intercom speaker because she thought he actually chuckled at her reprimand.

"Uncivilized or not, I have to insist on seeing Har—Mr. Mathison."

"And if I refuse to open the gates?" Katherine persisted stubbornly.

"In that case," he said drolly, "I'm afraid I'll have to blow the lock off of them with my trusty service revolver."

"If you do," Katherine said, irritably pressing the switch to open them, "you'd better keep that trusty revolver loaded, because two of my father's shotguns will be pointed right at you when you get here."

Cutting off any possible reply, she released the intercom button and walked quickly down the hall to the library where she found Harry huddled in a chair watching the morning news. A picture of Zayn Malik was on the screen and the expression of naked tenderness and longing on Harry's face as he smiled at him made Katherine's heart ache. "Is he okay?" she asked.

"They do not have the slightest idea where he is," Harry announced with unhidden pleasure. Wryly he added, "They also do not have the slightest idea whether or not I'm still a suspected accomplice. They make it seem like my silence and the FBI's silence on the subject is practically an admission of guilt. Are you ready for me to give you a hand with the omelets?"

"Yep," Katherine said cheerfully, "however, we have an uninvited guest, who'll probably be joining us for breakfast. Such rudeness as his does not warrant our combing our hair or changing into street clothes," she said when Harry looked askance at her long yellow bathrobe.

"Who is it?"

"Louis Tomlinson. He thinks of you as 'Harry' by the way. He let that slip on the intercom and tried to cover it up."

The long talk they'd had the night before, combined with all the sleep he'd gotten, had greatly restored Harry's strength and spirits. "Just so he doesn't think of me with numbers across my chest," he joked as the doorbell began to peal. "I'll answer that," he said, tightening the belt on his robe.

Unceremoniously, Harry yanked open the front door, then stepped back in shock as Louis Tomlinson held his arms up and pleaded in a comic voice, "Don't shoot. Please."

"What a delightful idea," Harry replied, but he was biting back a smile at his humor. "May I borrow your gun?"

He grinned, his gaze roving over the shining chestnut hair tumbling over Harry's shoulders, then shifting to his bright eyes and soft smile. "A night's peace and quiet seems to have done you a world of good," he remarked, then his brows snapped together and he said sternly, "Don't pull another disappearing act like this one again though. I told you before that I want to know where you are at all times!"

Buoyed up by the television news that Zayn was still safe, Harry accepted his reprimand without protest. "Have you come to lecture me or arrest me?" he asked cheerfully, knowing instinctively it was the former, as he turned and walked with him down the hall.