Colton Undercover

by Marie Ferrarella

  The town seemed to finally be coming around to the fact that none of them were anything like their mother.

  Heaven knew that she certainly wasn’t, even though she had gone to visit her mother several times in prison. That was more out of a sense of filial obligation, more because she felt sorry for her mother than anything else. Everyone else in the family had abandoned Livia and turned their backs on her.

  Leonor supposed that she was the most sensitive one in the family.

  However, being sensitive didn’t mean that she was a pushover, she told herself fiercely, although there were some who undoubtedly thought she was.

  Even so, she had to give herself a pep talk before she entered the restaurant. Because she was the daughter of the “notorious” Livia Colton and because she hadn’t really been around these last ten years, she knew there would be those who would be looking at her with unspoken curiosity. She had to remind herself that she wasn’t that awkward, gawky girl whose body had taken its sweet time before all the parts were in equal proportion.

  She was who she was, Leonor reminded herself, and she had to own that no matter what. If being Livia Colton’s daughter made other people uncomfortable, that was their problem, not hers. People didn’t get to choose their family.

  Now all she had to do was believe that, Leonor thought ruefully.

  Happily, the restaurant, while doing a nice, brisk business, wasn’t crowded in the big city sense of the word. The restaurants she had gotten accustomed to in Austin were the kind that had lines curling outside the door even with reservations. Waiting was more or less a way of life in Austin.

  That wasn’t the case here.

  “Table for two, Ms. Colton?” the hostess asked as Leonor came up to the reservations desk.

  Leonor was surprised that the hostess knew who she was. But she knew she shouldn’t have been.

  * * *

  Standing not too far away, Josh heard someone being addressed as “Ms. Colton.” He looked up sharply.

  It was her.

  Leonor Colton. She looked just like her picture. Talk about luck, he thought. He’d just stopped to get something to eat and he’d struck the mother lode.

  As unobtrusively as possible, Josh made his way over to the reservations desk, trying not to appear to be in any sort of hurry.

  Leonor’s eyes met the hostess’s. The latter appeared to be friendly. There was no condemnation or curiosity in the young woman’s eyes. Leonor relaxed.

  “No, just for one. I’m dining alone,” Leonor told the hostess.

  “You know,” a deep voice directly behind her said, “I really hate dining alone, but I’m new in town so I suppose that I’ll have to. Unless, perhaps, you wouldn’t mind sharing a table with me.”

  “I’m sorry,” Leonor replied without bothering to turn around. “I don’t eat with strangers.”

  Rather than pretending to be put off, Josh circled around her until he was right in her line of vision. The hostess, who was looking on, seemed utterly charmed by him. But his target was not the hostess: it was Leonor Colton.

  “My name’s Joshua Pendergrass. Now, if you tell me your name, we won’t be strangers anymore.” He put out his hand, but Leonor made no effort to take it. Her hand remained at her side.

  “Look, Mr. Pendergrass,” she began patiently, “knowing your name doesn’t make you any less of a stranger to me.” She didn’t want to cause a scene, but she really wanted the man to go away or at least back off. Granted, he was exceedingly handsome, but so was David, and look where that had gotten her. “I don’t know the first thing about you.”

  Unfazed, Josh began to give her a thumbnail version of the bio that had been drawn up for him in the field office. “Easily taken care of. My father’s Elliott Pendergrass and he and his firm have built some of the tallest buildings in Dallas and Austin. Much to my socialite mother’s delight, my father loves finding new ways to build up the family fortune.”

  Leaning in just a shade closer to Leonor, he confided in a slightly lower tone, “He’s on record as being very disappointed in me because my interests lie in a totally different field. I’m an art aficionado, and for me heaven is either spending the day prowling about the halls of an art museum, or just sitting in my den, admiring my own rather small, but if I do say so myself, modestly impressive collection. There,” he concluded, flashing a rather world-class smile at her that caused the hostess behind her to sigh just a little, “will that do?”

  Leonor didn’t know whether to be amazed—or suspicious. David had done that to her, she thought angrily; he’d made her suspicious of things she would have once happily accepted at face value. He’d robbed her of her ability to be outgoing and friendly.

  Still, after what this man with the incredible smile had just thrown out there, she had to ask. “You’re an art lover?”

  The man who had asked to share a table with her laughed softly at her question. “I’m afraid it’s much more serious than that. It’s more like I’m obsessed with art. At least that’s the way my father puts it. He had really high hopes of getting me to follow him into the business.” The wide shoulders beneath the expensive jacket rose and fell in a careless shrug. “I’m afraid I don’t have a head for business. I do, however, know what I like, and I really like art.”

  “What kind of art?” Leonor challenged. She wanted to believe this was some sort of happy cosmic coincidence, but she’d learned the hard way that she needed to be cautious. “Abstract, modern, contemporary—?”

  “A little bit of everything.” When suspicion creased her brow, he confessed frankly, “I’m rather eclectic. Tell you what, why don’t we continue this conversation over lunch?” he suggested. Looking over his shoulder, Josh nodded at the person behind him. “I’m afraid there’s a line beginning to form behind us and this lovely young woman—Kathy,” he said, reading the hostess’s name tag, “is just too polite to move us along. I wouldn’t want her getting into trouble on our account. Table for two, please, Kathy.”

  “Wait, I haven’t agreed to share a table with you yet,” Leonor protested, holding up her hand to the hostess to keep her from leading them into the dining area.

  Josh looked at her soulfully. “Would you deny a visitor to your town a little friendly conversation over lunch?”

  “How do you know I’m not a visitor, too?” Leonor wanted to know, although she had to admit that some of her resistance was fading.

  Josh’s expression was nothing if not innocent. It was a look he practiced in the mirror from time to time to make sure he could still pull off.

  “Are you?” he asked her.

  “Not in the strictest sense, no,” Leonor was forced to admit.

  Rather than challenge her ambiguous statement, Josh raised one eyebrow in a silent question as he looked at her. And then he repeated, “Table for two?”

  Leonor relented. What was the harm? After all, they’d be out in the open and she was free to leave at any given moment if she wanted to. So, nodding, she looked at the hostess and echoed his words.

  “Table for two.”

  “Right this way,” the hostess responded, leading them into the heart of the dining room. She took them to a secluded table that was off to one side. “I thought you might prefer this.”

  Leonor flashed a grateful smile at the hostess for what she assumed was the woman’s kindness. “Thank you.”

  The hostess nodded in response. “Someone will be back for your order,” she told them as she placed two menus on the table before them, and then discreetly withdrew, saying, “Take your time.”

  “And enjoy your lunch,” she added just before she slipped away.

  “Your father really builds skyscrapers?” Leonor asked the moment the hostess had retreated back to the reservations desk.

  “Dad seems to think so. I can give you the addresses o
f some of the larger ones, although I have to say, you don’t strike me as someone who’s interested in tall buildings—unless, of course, it’s to have your superhero boyfriend leap over them in a single bound.”

  “I don’t have a superhero boyfriend,” she informed him tersely.

  She was rewarded with a killer smile. “Sounds promising,” Josh told her.

  “Well, it’s not,” she said, making things very clear right up front. “You said I didn’t strike you as someone who would be interested in tall buildings. Just what do I strike you as? And I warn you, I can see a line coming a mile away.”

  “Good to know,” Josh responded, then said, “One won’t be coming.”

  Lacing his fingers together before him, Josh leaned his chin on them as he studied her for a long moment, his brown eyes sweeping over her slowly as if he was literally taking measure of every inch of her.

  Finally, he told her the conclusion he’d come to. “I’d say that you were someone who was interested in art. Passionately interested, would be my guess,” he amended.

  “And just how did you arrive at this ‘guess’?” Leonor questioned.

  “That’s easy,” he assured her. “By the way your pupils dilated just now when I mentioned my art collection. I definitely got your attention. Let me guess—you’re a collector yourself.”

  Eventually, she wanted to be. But that wasn’t in the cards just yet. For now, she was content to soak up knowledge and experience. “Not exactly.”

  Leonor paused just then as the server approached their table with a basket of bread sticks.

  “Would you like to order something to drink?” the woman asked.

  The idea of having something stronger than the water that was already on the table was highly appealing to Josh, but he knew he couldn’t afford to be anything but sharp right now. He looked at Leonor, waiting for her to go first.

  “Just a lemonade,” she told the server.

  “Make that two,” Josh said.

  “You can’t like lemonade,” Leonor protested, thinking the man was just trying to be polite.

  “I can’t?” Josh asked. He looked at her, puzzled. “Why not?”

  “Seriously?” she questioned.

  “Why? Does liking lemonade make me less of...an art collector?” Josh finally asked, although that wasn’t the first thought that came to his mind.

  His question made her laugh and he silently congratulated himself on managing to peel away the first protective layer that Leonor Colton had wrapped around herself.

  “Being an art collector has nothing to do with it,” she told him. “No, it’s just that I don’t know of any men who would admit to actually liking lemonade, say, over an alcoholic beverage.”

  His smile was easy, engaging and almost incredibly guileless, Leonor thought as he told her, “Then consider me your first.”

  Your first.

  The way he said the words had her catching her breath just for a second. She had no idea why she was putting a far more sensual interpretation on them, but just for a moment, she had.

  And then she forced herself to shake it off.

  Collecting herself, Leonor searched for something to say. “What are you doing in Shadow Creek, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “I don’t mind,” he assured her. He broke off a piece of his bread stick before saying, “I’m just taking in the sights.”

  She gave him a dubious look. He was trying to pull her leg.

  “Shadow Creek doesn’t have any ‘sights.’” She supposed that to some, that wasn’t entirely true. But there was nothing here that would make it to the pages of a “must see” section of any reputable guidebook. “At least not the kind that would be of any interest to you.”

  Josh deliberately looked at her for a long moment. Long enough to make her shift in her seat ever so slightly.

  And then he said, “You’d be surprised.”

  Chapter 3

  Josh shifted the focus of the conversation away from him and back to her. “You know, you still haven’t told me your name,” he reminded her.

  She wasn’t convinced that this was just an accidental meeting and that he didn’t know who she was. Looking up from her menu, her eyes met his.

  “No, I haven’t.”

  He proceeded carefully. “Oh, a lady of mystery, is that it?”

  Amusement highlighted his rather rugged features. Leonor couldn’t make up her mind if the sexy stranger was having fun at her expense, or if he was just talking. Obviously he hadn’t heard the hostess call her “Ms. Colton.”

  “Why don’t I call you ‘Kate’?” he suggested gamely. “I’ve always been partial to ‘Kate.’ It’s my mother’s name,” Josh explained.

  “It’s Colton,” Leonor said out of the blue. She watched his expression carefully.

  It didn’t change. There was no enlightenment evident on his face.

  “First or last?” Josh asked casually.

  This being Texas and an era given to unique names, she supposed it might have been reasonable for him to assume that Colton could be a first name—but she still doubted it.

  “Last,” she told him. Pausing, she took a breath, mentally bracing herself for the reaction she expected to come, then said, “Leonor Colton.”

  There was no telltale smirk, no sign of recognition, no change in his expression whatsoever. Had the man been living in a cave? Her mother had made news in every sort of medium with her escape.

  “Doesn’t that mean anything to you?” she wanted to know.

  There was just the slightest regretful rise and fall of his shoulders as Josh apologized for his ignorance. “I’m sorry, should it?”

  She didn’t believe him. This had to be an act. “You’ve never heard of Livia Colton?” Leonor almost demanded.

  Looking just a touch embarrassed, Josh shrugged again. “There was something on the news the other day, but I have to confess that unless it concerns something of international importance—or the art world—I really don’t pay much attention to it.”

  “The art world,” Leonor repeated, still highly skeptical that the man she was sharing a table with was on the level. Granted, there were people who lived and breathed nothing but art, but they were men with forgettable faces, not men who infiltrated women’s dreams, the way this one surely had to have been ever since he had first started attending school.

  “I’m afraid so,” Josh told her. “I told you, I’m a collector and an art buff of sorts.” His smile widened in direct proportion to his warming up to his subject. “I find that there are amazing displays of discipline evident in the art world. Discipline that can’t be found in society these days.” And then he flushed, as if Leonor had caught him in an awkward moment. “I’m sorry. I probably sound like a nerd to you.”

  “No.” She quickly discounted his negative assessment of himself. “But you do sound too good to be true,” she admitted in a moment of fleeting weakness.

  His smile was almost dazzling as he said, “Why, Ms. Colton, are you flirting with me?”

  “No!”

  Realizing that she had almost shouted out the word, Leonor lowered her voice as she covertly glanced around to see if anyone was looking in their direction, watching them. She’d been trying really hard to maintain a low profile.

  No one seemed to be looking in their direction. It was as if they recognized her, but were giving her space anyway. Maybe there was a truce in place between the town and her mother’s offspring.

  She certainly hoped so.

  “No,” Leonor repeated in a much lower tone. “I’m not. I’m just saying that I never met anyone who proclaimed themselves to be an art lover—outside of the program at the college I attended,” she qualified.

  Josh laughed softly, amused at the way she had worded her state
ment. “It’s been a long while since I was in college.”

  “Where did you attend?” Leonor asked. She reasoned that if she asked him enough questions—and this man was lying to her—she could gather together enough ammunition to trip him up.

  His photographic memory pulled up the bio that had been worked up for him.

  “College of William & Mary,” he told her in the same matter-of-fact tone he might have used if he were telling her that he had attended some trade school in the area.

  “That’s in Mississippi, isn’t it?” she asked conversationally, waiting to see if he would agree with her.

  “No, it’s in Williamsburg, Virginia,” he corrected casually.

  Anyone could know that, she thought, pushing on. “What did you study?”

  “Not nearly as much as I should have,” he admitted with guileless honesty. “But I did manage to graduate with a degree in art.” A smile that was fond at the same time that it appeared resigned curved his lips. “My father was furious.”

  He was trying to reel her in and she knew it. Still, she heard herself asking, “He didn’t know what you were studying?”

  This time, the shrug was rather philosophical. “My father was hoping that if I didn’t follow him into the ‘family’ business, I’d at least become another Thomas Jefferson. He went to school there,” he interjected in case she didn’t know that.

  She wasn’t quite sure she followed the logic here. “Your father wanted you to become a president?”

  Josh took a sip of lemonade before answering. “Thomas Jefferson was that century’s version of a Renaissance man,” he told her. “I think my father was hoping I’d emulate Jefferson and become someone who was good at a variety of things, one of which would be at least related to the building trade.”

  This time she did follow his line of thinking. “Since Jefferson designed Monticello.”

  Josh grinned, nodding. “You’re catching on.”

  It took effort not to get caught up in the cheerful way her tablemate presented his facts. “You do spin a story,” she told him. Then, in case he thought he was charming her, she added, “I think around here, they call that telling tall tales.”