Covert Cowboy

by Harper Allen

  “I think so, Cap.” Con’s drawl was more pronounced than usual. “It’s about betrayal. It’s about abandonment. Mainly I think it’s about trust. You need it spelled out further?”

  “I forgot. You’re a businessman, first and foremost, so maybe I should have put it in business terms.” Marilyn took a breath, willing her voice to steadiness. “I spent most of today taking inventory—not of Mills & Grommett stock, but of my life. Somehow it seemed appropriate to assess what I’d almost lost. I realized that a lot of what I’d held valuable meant nothing to me…and to hang on to it I’d let the really important things slip away over the years. One of those important things is truth, Father. If you won’t admit you’re capable of sacrificing me to win the election for Josh, how about coming clean on your part in Sky’s kidnapping? You’re involved in that somehow, aren’t you?”

  No matter what she’d said to Con, even as the accusation left her lips Marilyn knew she’d been hoping against hope that her suspicions were wrong. She stared at her father, and saw a sick pallor muddy the healthy tan of his cheeks, saw the shutters slam down over those gray eyes just an instant too late to hide the guilt flashing through them.

  The pretty, sunlit room appeared suddenly dark and shadowed. In the fireplace a flame discovered a touch of pine resin, and the resultant hiss sounded malevolent instead of cosy.

  “Sky’s my grandson. I’d give anything—anything, do you hear?—to get him back.” Samuel’s declaration seemed wrenched from him. “If I thought the deal I made—”

  He stopped in midsentence. Slowly his hand came up to his face, and for a moment he held it there as if to shield his eyes from her gaze. Once upon a time those big hands had placed her on a pony, Marilyn thought. Once they’d lifted her high in the air and then swooped her down again.

  Once she’d been this man’s daughter—a daughter he’d loved and cherished and spoiled.

  She felt Con’s arm go around her shoulders. His touch didn’t take away the aching in her heart, but it gave her strength to ask her next questions. “What was the deal? Was it something to do with the election?”

  Samuel Langworthy dropped his hand, shaking his head as he did. “No, it couldn’t be,” he muttered hoarsely. “There can’t be a connection between the two—there just can’t be.”

  He drew in a deep breath. Then he lifted his gaze to Marilyn’s, and she saw that once again his brief smile was completely emotionless, distantly courteous.

  “Celia will be sorry to hear she missed you. Ever since you moved back to Denver she’s been hoping you’d take her up on one of her dinner invitations.”

  Her mouth dropped open. An incredulous little bark of laughter came from her before she could prevent it. “That’s it?” she asked. “End of discussion? For God’s sake, Father—this isn’t a meeting of Mills & Grommett’s board of directors. You don’t get to adjourn this with a quick show of hands. We just heard you as good as confess to being in on Sky’s—”

  “You didn’t hear me say anything of the sort, Marilyn,” Samuel interrupted crisply. “Ask Ducharme here.”

  “He’s right, cher’,” Con said slowly. “He didn’t give us anything we could take to the authorities. But he gave us more than he realized.”

  He narrowed his gaze at the older man, his grip tightening around Marilyn’s shoulders. “He’s the devil, Cap. Whatever he promised you in return for your cooperation, it wasn’t worth it, believe me. Deals with the devil never are.”

  This time the emotion that appeared and disappeared on her father’s features was fear, Marilyn was almost sure, but when he spoke his voice was harshly steady.

  “You sound like you speak from experience. Ducharme…with that name and that accent, you must be a long way from home, am I right?”

  “You right, Cap.” Con’s tone sharpened. “New Awlins, to be exact. What’s your point?”

  “No point. I believe I may have relatives there on my wife’s side, that’s all.” Samuel shrugged. “I have an appointment downtown in half an hour, Marilyn, so we’ll have to cut this short. Perhaps we can have a more convivial visit over Thanksgiving dinner? Celia was going to phone you this week with an invitation, although after the times you’ve turned her down I’m sure she won’t be surprised if you decline.”

  She’d come here expecting…what? That the man in front of her would break down and confess all? That he’d ask her forgiveness for every old hurt and wound he’d inflicted over the years? That he would say the three words she’d been waiting to hear from him for as long as she could remember?

  Whatever she’d been expecting from Samuel Langworthy, he hadn’t given it to her, Marilyn thought tiredly. He was right, it was time for her to leave.

  “I’ll probably spend Thanksgiving with Mother in Boston,” she said. “But let Celia know I appreciate the invitation. And tell her—”

  She hesitated. In some ways she was still her father’s daughter, she acknowledged. It was almost as hard for her to make up for a decades-old omission as it obviously was for him. She saw that one of the small, silver-framed photographs beside the cachepot was of herself on a pony, a smiling man’s hands around her five-year-old’s waist.

  “Tell her I like what she’s done with this room,” she said softly. “We’ll let ourselves out, Father.”

  “Very well.” Samuel turned away and lifted the lid of the humidor. The seemingly dismissive action didn’t match the raw emotion that lurked below the surface of his final words.

  “Take my advice and make sure your building’s management has a certified inspector approve the elevator before they deem it safe to use again.” He cleared his throat, as if to steady his tone. “I know from experience that these fellows try to cut corners on a weekend rather than pay for a qualified tradesman to come out.”

  Absurdly grateful for Con’s supporting hand on her elbow as they made their way to the front door, Marilyn didn’t trust herself to speak until they’d proceeded past the bayberry bushes lining the brick walkway and had reached the circular drive where he’d parked his rental SUV. Then she turned to him, and even though she realized he was aware of what she was about to say, she put it into words anyway.

  “I didn’t tell him about the elevator, Con,” she said hollowly. “I didn’t have to.” She fought back the nausea she could feel rising in her.

  “I didn’t have to because he already knew.”

  Chapter Nine

  “Tony was hired on Father’s recommendation.”

  Marilyn closed the dishwasher door with a thump. Since their visit to the Langworthy mansion a few hours earlier she and Con had gone over this subject a dozen times, but she couldn’t see they were any further ahead than they’d been when Samuel had inadvertently dropped his bombshell on them.

  “That must mean that even then Helio had some kind of hold on him, but we still come back to asking ourselves what that hold was. Or is,” she added. “And I don’t understand how you can think it’s possible Father wasn’t involved in the attack on me. You heard him. He knew what had happened.”

  She leaned back against the dishwasher in frustration and almost immediately pushed herself away from it again. She saw him lift a quizzical eyebrow at her actions and felt embarrassed warmth touch her cheeks.

  “The agitator’s off-balance,” she said, feeling foolish.

  “And?” His eyebrow rose higher.

  “And if I was peacefully dozing away in a cosy womb I wouldn’t want to suddenly wake up and find myself on the Teacup Ride at Six Flags,” she snapped. “It’s bad enough that the two of us were doing acrobatics in that elevator shaft last night.”

  “The doctor told you there was no harm done, cher’.” He took her arm and steered her toward the living room area. “But maybe now’s a good time to bring up something I’ve been thinking about today. You said you’re going to Boston for Thanksgiving. Why don’t you make plans to leave a little sooner—like tomorrow, say?”

  They’d reached the couch. She didn’t sit do
wn, but instead turned to face him.

  “I thought you might suggest something of the sort,” she said. “I just can’t do it, Con. Not while there’s a chance I can help you bring Sky home safely. And what can happen with you keeping a twenty-four hour watch over me from now on?”

  She lowered herself to the couch and tucked one silk-slippered foot under a thigh, the stretchy jersey of the yoga pants she was wearing—this pair in deep violet, to contrast with the soft rose of a long-sleeved, ribbon-tied chiffon blouse—a comfortable change from the wool pants she’d worn to her father’s house.

  “I still don’t think it’s necessary for you to sleep here tonight, for heaven’s sake. Those dead bolts on my door are top of the line, and the main entrance in the lobby is equipped with a card-entry system.”

  “It’s nonnegotiable, cher’.”

  He was wearing the same dark charcoal suit he’d worn to the meeting with her father earlier, although he’d discarded the jacket while he’d been helping her prepare dinner. His vest—how many did the man have? Marilyn thought distractedly as Con sat in the chair across from her—was carelessly unbuttoned, the snowy white cuffs of his shirtsleeves casually rolled up against the tan of his forearms. He leaned forward, those same well-muscled forearms braced on his thighs, his hands hanging loosely down between his knees.

  “You and me, we’re gon’ be stuck to each other like lime syrup on a snowball, shug,” he drawled. “If you won’t go stay with your mère in Boston—”

  “Back up,” she interrupted. “I haven’t a clue what you just said, Ducharme. Snowballs and lime syrup? And what’s a shug?”

  “Short for sugar, sugar.” His grin flashed white. “And snowballs? Aw, honey, they’re pure heaven on earth on a hot New Awlins summer day when you’re nine years old and hangin’ around waitin’ for the streetcar with your friends. Shaved ice—that’s important, cher’, shaved, not crushed—and whatever flavor of syrup you want poured over it. Me, I was always a lime man myself.”

  “Oh.” She nodded. “We’ve got those, too, except here they’re called slushies.”

  He looked pained. “Naw, shug, nothin’ near. Just like what they call a po-boy outside of Awlins is only a sloppy sandwich. You got to come to my neck of the woods for the real thing.”

  A few hours before she’d been certain she would never smile again. Now Marilyn felt her lips curving reluctantly upward. “You’re homesick, aren’t you?” she accused softly. “Fess up, Detective—you hate being away from your beloved Big Easy.”

  “Like old Adam must have hated being driven out of Eden after he took a bite of that apple,” he agreed, a corner of his own mouth quirking up. “Like you must miss Boston.”

  “Oh, no,” she said swiftly. She groped for an explanation. “I mean, Boston’s home to the Van Burens. And there’ve been Langworthys in or around Denver ever since before Jefferson Langworthy, who helped turn Colorado from a territory into a state,” she went on more slowly, frowning down at her hands. “But I never felt either city was home.” She looked up at him. “I hadn’t quite realized that before.”

  “You’re wrong about Samuel, you know.” Con’s gaze on her was intent. “He loves you. My guess is he was told about the elevator incident after the fact—and I think it was presented to him as a warning about what might happen if he didn’t continue to toe the line.”

  For an instant hope flared in her. Quickly she extinguished it. “That’s ridiculous,” she said flatly. “For one thing, by his own admission my father made a deal with someone—probably Helio. He had guilt written all over him, Con.”

  “Yeah, I saw the guilt.” The silver coin was between his fingers, she saw. It flashed back and forth as he spoke. “But more than that, I saw fear, cher’. What if he had what he thought was a harmless arrangement with DeMarco, and by the time he realized what he’d gotten into it was too late?”

  “A harmless arrangement like what?” Her question was edged. “And again, what possible hold could Helio have over my father? I may not be close to him and I know he can play pretty rough in the business world and the political arena, but I’d swear he’s never done anything that would lay him open to blackmail. The only time he ever let his heart rule his head was when he fell in love with Celia—and even then he waited a respectable time after his divorce from Mother before he married her.”

  She shook her head, and this time her smile was wistful. “He and Mother never would have gotten back together, no matter what she’s always told me. Somehow it took me until today to realize that. I don’t think she was ever happy with him, but she turned completely against him when he decided to end the marriage.”

  “Divorce can get pretty brutal,” Con said thoughtfully. “You suppose the custody arrangement might not have been exactly how she told you, either?”

  “You mean Father didn’t want me used as a pawn in a messy court battle?” The idea was unsettling. Without realizing she was doing it, her hand slid over the pregnant swell of her stomach, her fingers spreading protectively. “But if that’s why he let me go, Con, then…”

  Her words trailed off. Her eyes opened painfully wide. He reached across the space between them.

  “Then he must have loved you so much he couldn’t bear to see you torn in two, cher’. By the time you were old enough to handle the truth, the gulf between the two of you was too wide to bridge. He’s not the most demonstrative man, I’ll give you that.”

  “But at the club last night he looked straight through me. Almost since the very day I came back to Denver he’s deliberately kept a distance between us.”

  Abruptly Con let go of her hand. He stood.

  “That’s it.” There was suppressed excitement in his tone. “Two questions, cher’. First, was Corso already working at M & G when you arrived?”

  “He’d been hired a few weeks previously.” Marilyn frowned. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

  “Maybe nothing. Maybe everything.” Con’s expression was grim. “Secondly, how did you get the position of vice president of sales?” He saw her confusion. “Was anyone fired to free up the job for you? Did someone retire?”

  She shook her head, her puzzlement growing. “No. In fact, I’m not sure Father would have come to me if he hadn’t been left in the lurch. Janet Bukowski, the woman who’d held the position forever, simply failed to show up for work one Monday. When Elva, my father’s secretary at the time, tried to contact her she learned Janet had moved out of her apartment over the weekend without telling any of her friends. Foul play might have been suspected, Elva told me, except for the fact that an acquaintance of Janet’s ran into her by chance in Aspen a few days later. She refused to talk about why she’d left Denver so suddenly, but she said she was never coming back. I had the qualifications for the job and the firm I worked for in Boston wasn’t in the greatest financial shape, so when Father offered me the position I took it.”

  “The Bukowski woman was a loose end.” Con sounded as if he were talking to himself. “I’ll lay you good odds she’s not in Aspen anymore, sugar. When the authorities look into it, I think they’ll find out she met with a fatal accident not long after she ran. She was blackmailed into leaving,” he said tightly, meeting Marilyn’s shocked gaze. “Blackmailed or threatened.”

  “But why?” Appalled horror ran through her. Suddenly the notion of having the big man in front of her as a twenty-four-hour-a-day bodyguard no longer seemed a needless precaution. “What was the point?”

  “The way I see it, your father was approached by DeMarco to hire his nephew, Tony.” A muscle jumped at the side of Con’s jaw. “Who knows what he offered Samuel to sweeten the deal—maybe a contribution to the election fund, maybe a promise of political support from one of the unions DeMarco controls. Whatever it was, to your father it would have seemed like a pretty good trade-off for merely adding another salesman to his roster. But what DeMarco was really after was to get Corso into the V.P. of sales slot.”

  “Because that would m
ake it easy for Tony to steal the viral stock Helio needed.” Marilyn closed her eyes sickly. “But before Helio could tell Father that was the second part of the deal I’d been hired.”

  “And they couldn’t get rid of you like they did the Bukowski woman—not if they still hoped for Samuel’s cooperation.” Con swore with quiet vehemence. “So they went to plan B, which was for Corso to use your password and steal the viral stock that way. Dammit, cher’, you were close when you said Sky’s kidnapping was a distraction for the real crime. Your father must have put two and two together at some point—probably after the Silver Rapids incident. He confronted DeMarco with his suspicions, but before he could act on them his grandson was abducted.”

  “And with Sky’s life at stake, Father would have no choice but to let Helio call the shots.” Marilyn bit her lip. “If we’re right, he’s been keeping me at arm’s length for my own protection, Con. He doesn’t want to give Helio another weapon to use against him.”

  “Hostages to fortune,” Con supplied bleakly. “But despite Samuel’s careful avoidance of you—he was even afraid to acknowledge you at the club—DeMarco guessed how he really felt. You were supposed to die in that elevator shaft last night, but though you survived, the result was the same. Your father was informed of what almost happened to you and reminded that Sky’s continued safety depended on him. If there was the slightest chance he was thinking of going to the police with what he knew and suspected, last night brought him firmly back into line.”

  “Helio doesn’t miss a step, does he?” Marilyn heard the bitterness in her own voice. “He’s like a chess player, always five moves ahead of his opponent.”

  “No, he’s like a poker player,” Con contradicted her. “Which means he’s always ten moves ahead, cher’. But you were the wild card he wasn’t expecting to come up against in this game—you, and the fact that you’re carrying his nephew’s child.”

  Actually, that’s not quite true, Con. You see, Tony isn’t the father of my child at all. He couldn’t be. Because the one and only time we got anywhere near any kind of physical intimacy I backed off—and when I did, I found out what kind of man he really was.