Read House Of Payne: Scout for Free Online Page A

Sliding into the corner booth at the back of Pig In A Poke, Scout put the flowers carefully on the table. “Thank you for buying them for me.”
    “It was my pleasure, and I am sure the flowers will keep.” To her surprise, Ivar didn’t slide in on the opposite side across from her. Instead he scooted in beside her, and she had to scramble to make sure she didn’t get sat on.
    “What the hell.” Annoyed, she pushed all the way to the corner, then stopped when she realized he kept eating up the space she was trying to keep between them. “What are you doing?”
    “Sitting down.”
    Duh . “You got a problem with sitting on all that lovely bench space over there across the table?”
    “As a matter of fact, I do.” Apparently not in the least bothered by her bid for distance, he slung an arm over the back of where she sat. It took every ounce of will she had not to move again. “I prefer the European way of sitting side by side while dining, rather than having an obstacle between me and my date.”
    “This isn’t a date, and you’re Canadian, not European.”
    “Ah.” His eyes lit up. “You checked up on me.”
    Oh crap. “Naturally.”
    “And here I thought you had not noticed me at all.”
    “I check up on everyone who shows more than a passing interest in House Of Payne.” No way was she going to admit she’d memorized his stats like he was going into her fantasy football line-up. “That’s what I do best—scouting out potential trouble and eliminating it before it ever becomes a genuine pain in the ass.”
    “Scouting out.” The lift of his brow was so insanely charming, it was hard not to just sit there and gape at him like some mouth-breathing idiot. “Is this, perhaps, the reason you have the nickname Scout? Or is that your real name, and your parents were fans of To Kill a Mockingbird ?”
    “My real name is Theresa, and both my parents were killed in a carjacking when I was a baby, so I have no idea where they got my real name.” As she heard the private information pour out as easily as if her inner censor had fallen asleep at the switch, she had to shake her head. How tragic it was, that she was such a sucker for a pretty face. “Your first name is unusual. It doesn’t sound like any French name I’ve ever heard.”
    “Ivar is Scandinavian. My grandmother named me,” he added when she tilted her head, and he looked away when Leo approached. “It is the only non-French name in the family tree, and designed to stand out.”
    Stand out, or not fit in? Scout felt the words crowd her mouth, but even after they’d given their orders of tea and coffee, she kept them imprisoned. There was something in the casual expression he wore that bothered her. It was almost as though he was trying not to move a single muscle in his face. It wasn’t that it was a tight expression. In fact, it wasn’t an expression at all.
    It was a mask.
    That’s it. That’s what wrong.
    What was it that he felt he had to hide behind a mask?
    “It’s a cool name,” she offered, watching him closely. The mask remained firmly in place as he tilted his head.
    “Thank you.”
    “Do you like it?”
    “Do you know, no one has ever asked me that? How strange.” If possible, his eyes grew even more shuttered. “It is merely my name. Liking it, not liking it—this has never been a consideration.”
    “If you don’t like it, you could always pick a nickname and roll with it.”
    “A nickname?” He said the word as if sampling its flavor, and the rigidity in his expression drained away as humor took its place. “I have never had one of those.”
    “I’m sure you had some kind of nickname when you were a kid.”
    “No.”
    “Really?” Briefly she remembered Frank Bournival, her benefactor, remarking that her nickname was a good sign; it meant someone had cared enough about her to give her one. “You’ve never been called anything but Ivar?”
    A hint of something—was it bitterness?—flashed through