by Cat Schield
“Catching crooks seems to be his passion.”
“Yes, but it’s grown into more of an obsession these last two years.”
“How come?” Lia cursed her curiosity. She should be fighting her interest in the elder Watts brother not delving into his psyche.
“His friend’s network services company was hacked and implanted with a bug that affected four million domains, causing them to leak sensitive customer data, including credit card details, for six months before it was discovered. The resulting bad press led to the company losing nearly all their major accounts and forced them out of business.”
“Did Paul catch the hackers?”
“Eventually, but not soon enough to stop what happened to Ben.”
Although she regretted that the topic had distressed Constance, Lia couldn’t stop herself from wanting the whole story. “What happened to his friend?”
“After losing everything, he died in a terrible car accident.” Constance’s expression turned grim. “Paul thought the circumstances were suspicious because there were no other cars involved. Ben lost control, went off a bridge and drowned. Plus, there was a cryptic email Paul received shortly before the accident. Taken together, he thought perhaps Ben killed himself.”
“That’s awful.”
Constance nodded. “Ben’s death hit Paul really hard. After that he became even more committed to shutting down hackers.”
Sympathy for Paul momentarily pushed aside her wariness of him. At the same time she recognized this complex man had the power to turn her inside out.
“You know, I can’t get over how much you look like your mother,” Constance said, the abrupt shift of topic catching Lia off guard.
Lia knew her dark hair and hazel eyes set her apart from the blond and green-eyed Wattses, Ava included. She’d seen pictures of the woman. Yet on Ethan’s word, the family had embraced her without question. At least most of them had.
“Tell me about her.” Lia couldn’t bring herself to say my mother.
“She was beautiful and talented.” Constance’s gaze turned inward. “She played tennis until she was fourteen at a level that she could’ve competed professionally.”
“Why didn’t she?”
“She had trouble staying focused on anything,” Constance said. “By the time she hit her teenage years Ava was a handful. She grew up without a mother and Grady indulged her terribly. Everyone did because she could be charming when she set her mind to it.”
“Ethan said after high school she headed to New York City to pursue modeling.”
“She and Grady had a terrible row when he found out she didn’t intend to go to college. He gave her a choice—get a degree or find a job. He had such high hopes for her future and wanted to motivate her.” Constance sighed. “After years of no contact, Grady hired a private investigator to find her. That’s when we learned she’d died. The police never contacted us because Ava did such a good job cutting her ties to Charleston. By the time we discovered Ava had given birth to you, you’d been adopted and the court records sealed.”
“And my...father.” The last word stuck in Lia’s throat. Never mind her fake father—she knew nothing about her own father because her mother had refused to discuss him.
Constance blinked in surprise. “We don’t know anything about him. Whatever your mother was up to in New York remains a complete mystery.”
Both women lapsed into companionable silence, each occupied with her thoughts. Lia was wondering how to extricate herself without seeming rude when Paul’s mother spoke again.
“It’s so good to have you here,” Constance declared with sudden vehemence. “I’m just sorry it took so long for us to find you.”
“I had a good life.” For some reason Lia felt compelled to defend her childhood. “A happy life.”
“Of course you did,” Constance said. “It’s obvious that you’re a loving, caring person. That sort of thing only happens if you’ve had the right upbringing. Your aunt Lenora and I were talking last night,” Constance said, “and we think that you should move into your mother’s old bedroom.”
“Oh, well...” Overwhelmed by the thought of having to maintain her deception all the time, Lia scrambled for some polite way to refuse. “I couldn’t impose.”
“You’re family. You wouldn’t be imposing. And we have purely selfish reasons to suggest it. We all feel that the more time you spend with Grady, the faster he’ll improve.”
“Yes, but...”
“He’s been without you for too long. You two have a lot of catching up to do.”
“Well, sure, but...”
“What are you two talking about?” Paul asked, coming up the gravel path behind them.
Lia turned to confront him, bracing herself for the heat of his displeasure when he found out what his mother had suggested.
“There you are,” Constance said. “Rosie mentioned you’d arrived. Have you been up to see Grady? His progress is absolutely amazing.”
“Quite amazing,” Paul echoed, his distrustful green gaze flickering in Lia’s direction.
“And we have Lia to thank.”
“So I keep hearing,” Paul muttered, his tone neutral.
Seeming unaware of the tension between her son and Lia, Constance continued, “I was just telling her that Lenora and I want her to move in.”
“And I was just saying that I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Lia inserted, hoping that he would give her credit for keeping his family at arm’s length.
“There’s no need to spend money on a rental when there’s so much room here,” Constance said.
“It’s only for a couple weeks,” Lia protested. “Then Misty and I will be on our way.”
“Misty?” Paul asked.
“She’s my camper trailer.” She and Ethan had decided to stick close to her original story to avoid slipups.
“You named your camper Misty?” Paul interjected, his lips twisting sardonically.
Lia glared at him. He could insult her integrity all he wanted, but disparage her home and she’d come out swinging. “She’s vintage.”
Before Paul could reply, his mother jumped in. “Everyone is coming here to have dinner tonight. I hope you can make it.”
“I came here straight from the airport,” he said, “so I need to run home first.”
“Take Lia. I’m sure she’d love to see your home. She’s been cooped up with Grady for days. A little sea air would be good for her.” Constance turned to Lia. “And on the way back you can pick up your things and get settled in.”
“Really, I’m not sure...”
“It will be much better for Grady if you’re close by.”
Lia caved beneath Constance’s firm determination. “Okay.”
“Dinner is at seven,” Paul’s mother said.
“We’ll be back in plenty of time.” Paul hard gaze flicked to Lia as he bent to kiss his mother’s cheek before striding off.
Lia hustled to catch up to him. As soon as they were out of earshot, she said, “I want you to know I didn’t put her up to that.”
“I know you didn’t. Everyone believes what you’ve done for Grady is a miracle.”
“I haven’t done anything.”
Paul surveyed her for several silent minutes before replying, “On the contrary. You’ve done plenty.”
Despite his rampant disapproval, Paul demonstrated pristine Southern manners by opening the passenger door on his Range Rover and waiting while she climbed in before closing the door and circling to the driver’s side.
“I know you aren’t interested in spending any time with me so if you want to just drop me at my place—”
“On the contrary, I intend to spend our time away from the estate getting to know the real you.”
It took Lia several panicky heartbeats to decide whether to be
alarmed or thrilled. Obviously, he hadn’t yet decided to go along with Ethan’s wild scheme.
“Awesome.” She managed the comeback without a trace of irony. “Does that go both ways?”
Paul stopped concentrating on the road and glanced her way. “What do you mean?”
“You want to know everything about me.” Something reckless had taken ahold of her. “Are you going to let me get to know you, as well?”
“Why would you want to do that?” While Paul’s tone remained neutral, a muscle bunched in his cheek.
“Because it’s what normal people do. They exchange information and feel each other out.”
Feel each other out? The phrase sounded flirtatious, and heaven knew she’d give anything if he’d just smile at her, but Paul didn’t seem to hear it that way.
“Is that what you did with Ethan?” The tightness in his voice took her aback.
“Why would you ask about him?”
“I still can’t figure out your relationship with my brother. How much is he paying you for this little charade?”
Now she understood where Paul was going with his questions. “He agreed to cover what I’m losing in income for a couple weeks.”
“How much?” Paul asked.
“I don’t know.” Lia scrunched up her face as she calculated. “No week is the same. I get paid by the client and that varies.”
“Ballpark it for me.”
“Including tips, it averages to about eight hundred dollars a week.”
For the first time Paul looked taken aback. “That’s it?”
Spoken like a man who drove a luxury SUV and lived at the beach. No doubt he couldn’t fathom Lia’s frugal ways any more than she understood paying more for a single pair of shoes than it cost her to eat for an entire month.
“That’s it.” Lia believed in the equitable exchange of money for goods or services. “All I want is what’s fair.”
Paul gave her a skeptical look. “What if I paid you fifty thousand dollars to go away and never come back?”
For several seconds Lia pondered the fancy truck she could buy with such an enormous sum. For six months she’d been stuck in Charleston while she saved enough to replace her wrecked vehicle. Accepting Paul’s outrageous offer would enable her to return to her nomadic lifestyle in a few days.
“You said you wanted to get to know me better,” she said. “Well, the first thing you should know is that I’m not motivated by money.”
“Which is exactly what you’d say,” Paul countered, “if your endgame would guarantee you a greater payout.”
“Are you suspicious of me in particular or people in general?”
“You have to see that I have good reason to doubt you,” he said.
“I really don’t see it at all,” she shot back, wishing that he’d stop toying with her.
Did he know about her past? Bile rose in her throat as she imagined his disgust. But if he’d dug up her secrets, he’d confront her directly. She studied his profile while her heart thundered in her ears and realized that fearing that he knew all about her background was making her come across as guilty. Lia breathed in for a count of four and released the air just as slowly. What did it matter if Paul knew her story? His good opinion shouldn’t matter to her.
Paul studied her the whole time she was striving for calm. “You didn’t answer me about taking fifty thousand to disappear.”
Lia considered what her mother’s reaction would have been to Paul’s offer. Jen Marsh had a complicated relationship with money and many of her attitudes had rubbed off on her daughter. Lia lived frugally, avoiding debt, buying only what she needed, living with less stuff. But Jen Marsh took her disdain for spending one step beyond obsessive after what she’d experienced growing up.
“You don’t have to pay me anything to drop this whole charade and vanish from your lives,” Lia said, noticing a subtle easing in the tension around Paul’s mouth. The desire to gain his trust prompted her to add, “Whatever you and Ethan decide is fine with me.”
Four
“So you’d really go?” Even as he asked the question, Paul recognized exposing her would throw his whole family into chaos. “If I convinced Ethan that you should?”
“Yes.” She cocked her head and studied him. “Frankly I’m surprised you haven’t done so already.”
“He’s not taking my calls.”
Paul gripped the steering wheel and contemplated Lia’s declaration. Would she really leave the decision up to him and Ethan or would she act behind the scenes to win Ethan to her side?
“So you don’t know.”
“Don’t know what?” Paul asked, wondering what else had gone wrong in his absence.
“How this whole situation came about.”
Paul glanced her way. “And how’s that?”
“Ethan put me in a position where the only choices I had were to go along and pretend to be Grady’s granddaughter or tell the truth and risk that he might not recover from the blow.”
Although he wasn’t surprised that she’d blame the whole situation on Ethan, Paul asked, “Why don’t you tell me what happened.”
“Ethan set me up. I thought I was visiting Grady as myself. Instead as I stood beside his bed and held his hand, both he and Ethan ambushed me with this whole thing about being Ava’s daughter.”
“So you’re blaming my grandfather for this situation, as well?”
“No. Yes. Sort of. Ethan told me Grady came up with the idea on his own.”
“You didn’t mention that Grady might be inspired to improve if his granddaughter miraculously appeared?”
Lia’s mouth dropped open. “To what end?”
“The Wattses are a wealthy, old Charleston family. We wield both power and influence in this town. You might’ve liked the idea of being a part of that.”
“Hardly,” she sniffed. “In fact, it sounds stressful and intimidating. Not to mention having the threat of a simple DNA test hanging over my head all the time.”
“Yet here you are.” Distracted by their conversation, Paul almost missed the turnoff to Sullivan’s Island. “And here I am. Damn it. I hate having to lie to everyone in my family, but most of all to Grady.”
“I feel the same way. Your mom and aunt have been welcoming. And your cousins are really nice. It’s horrible that I can’t be truthful, but then I see how happy Grady is and watch him get a little better every day, and I think the whole messed-up situation might work out okay.”
Paul refused to be persuaded by her feel-good justification. “I’m sure this is the logic you and Ethan have used to justify what you’ve done, but lying is wrong.”
“A lot of the time it is, but not always. What about lying to protect someone’s feelings? As long as the lie isn’t malicious it doesn’t do any harm.”
It all sounded like a bunch of excuses to Paul, but he’d invited her on this trip to his house to gain insight into her and this conversation was teaching him a lot. “So you don’t believe the truth can set you free?”
“Not always. Sometimes it can be painful.”
“That doesn’t justify lying.”
Lia shrugged. “We will just have to agree to disagree.”
Paul glanced her way and saw that she was staring out the passenger window at the passing landscape. Despite their opposing opinions, he couldn’t shake his fascination with her.
“I guess we will.”
An unrelenting silence fell between them that didn’t break even as Paul turned the SUV into his driveway and stopped before his house. Switching off the engine, he glanced her way. Lia radiated disappointment and hurt, but Paul refused to be drawn in. Despite her positive effect on Grady, Paul couldn’t shake the notion that Lia Marsh was going to cause trouble for his family.
She was working an angle. He just needed to figure out what it was.
Which was why he’d decided to move into the carriage house, located near the back of the estate, for the next two weeks so he could keep an eye on her. He intended for Lia to understand that he wasn’t taken in by her do-gooder act.
“I’ll just be a few minutes,” he said. “Do you want to wait here or come in?”
“I’m sure you’d prefer I stay here.”
He dismissed her sarcasm with a shrug. “Suit yourself.”
But as he headed up the stairs to his front door, he heard her footsteps on the wood boards behind him. The electronic lock on the entrance disengaged as he neared. He opened the door and gestured Lia inside. After suggesting she check out the view, Paul left Lia gawking at the beach beyond the towering floor-to-ceiling windows that made up one wall of his spacious great room. In his bedroom, he unpacked his luggage, swapping the tailored suits he’d worn to the conference for the slacks and button-down shirts he favored for the office.
Before he’d done more than replace his suits in the closet and dump his dirty clothes into the hamper, Paul’s phone began to ring. He glanced at the screen, saw Ethan’s name and the disquiet he’d been feeling at his brother’s snub eased slightly.
Despite their family’s expectations, it was Ethan and not Paul who was following in Grady’s footsteps as family mediator and key decision maker. Ethan had always been the empathetic brother. Outgoing and social, he tended to be more in touch with the emotions. And despite being the younger brother, everyone turned to Ethan for advice and support.
In contrast, Paul was more comfortable as a lone wolf. He liked technology because of its logic and predictability and had chosen to become a cop because he thrived on the challenge of catching criminals. That doing so also helped people was a bonus, but it didn’t drive him. No doubt Ethan would say this attitude made him a jerk.
Would Lia agree?
Paul couldn’t imagine what made the question pop into his mind. Nor did he care about some interloper’s opinion about him.
“It’s about time you called me back,” Paul said irritably into the phone, closing the master bedroom door in case Lia decided to eavesdrop.
“Before you go all big brother and start lecturing me about how much I messed up, tell me you don’t see a huge change in Grady.”
