by Paige Rion
He glanced to Rachel. Her blond hair hung over her shoulder in soft waves, and he knew if he touched them they’d feel as soft as they looked and smell faintly of flowers in the sunshine.
His heart twisted. Get a grip.
“You’re right sir. I haven’t forgotten,” Colton said.
“So stay away from her. Break it off. Whatever you have to do,” Beaumont said.
He could sneak with Rachel behind Beaumont’s back. He didn’t need his approval, and it was only a matter of time before he convinced Rachel to bring him to her place, when her father wasn’t there. Then, he could retrieve the information he needed. But it was a different part of him that had him glaring at the mayor in defiance and had him saying, “I’m afraid that’s not possible.”
The mayor’s smug expression faltered. “Oh, I think it is.” Then, shaking his head, as if it was all irrelevant, he said, “It doesn’t matter. I already told Rachel she wasn’t to see you again. She’ll listen. She always does.”
Colton laughed. “How long do you think you can keep her under your thumb? Forever? She’s twenty-two. If you don’t mind me saying, sir, she’s a big girl. Quite capable of making decisions for herself.”
The mayor turned to him, his face aflame. The muscle in his forehead pulsed with disgusting regularity. “She understands what me being mayor means, what image means to our family. And she will do what’s right.”
Colton lifted the glass of water in front of him, taking a sip, needing something to busy his hands before they curled into a fist and met the mayor’s face.
He lowered the glass and shrugged, as if he didn’t care. “All I’m saying is that maybe we let her decide.”
And just as he said it, Rachel closed the last storybook and glanced to him and her father. Lines creased around her eyes, her expression uneasy. And as stupid as it was, as nonsensical, Colton found himself betting on Rachel. And as he smiled at her, his heart thumping in his chest, he prayed she’d choose him and not loyalty to her father.
The real reasons had little to do with his job and more to do with his heart.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The children were dismissed from the cafeteria, sent back to the suffocating confines of their hospital rooms. Rachel stood, finished with her goodbyes and feeling a pang of empathy for them and their families. How hard it must be watching a child cope with illness.
When she turned, Rex’s eyes were already on her. She felt her skin prick at the intensity of his gaze and that shocking green. Several yards away, her father spoke with a group of supporters, a few of whom were young, attractive men in their twenties. Their eyes assessed her from across the room as she moved toward Rex.
Half of them were likely dull. The other half were men who pretended to be these perfect relics of society, much like her father, but were actually quite the opposite. As wicked in bed as they were in all aspects of their lives.
Her father briefly glanced her way, giving her a look she knew well and a tiny signal with his fingers. She had been through this so many times before, so she knew exactly what to expect. He wanted her to join them, where he would introduce her and use her in some way to his advantage, likely pawning her off to one of the young men, as she was something to be won. “They’re all suitable matches,” he’d tell her.
Screw suitable matches.
Going with her instincts, Rachel ignored him and walked straight toward Rex, whose knowing smirk told her he knew exactly what she was thinking. She smiled at him. “How about a drink?”
She paused, and he offered her his arm, which she took. She could feel her father’s scorching gaze, but ignored it and left without another glance in his direction.
Ten minutes later, they sat at The Oasis. The dim light and scent of stale popcorn surrounded her in a comforting familiarity. Rachel waited in a cozy booth while Rex brought their drinks back from the bar.
He approached and slung his suit jacket over the chair across from her, and then sat down. She took in the loosened tie around his neck, the shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows. He clutched his beer, as he handed her a glass of wine, and for a moment she allowed her mind to drift, to wonder what his hands would feel like on her bare skin. Would they be warm? Rough? Soft or gentle?
His phone buzzed next to her at the table, and when she glanced at the screen, her stomach sank. When she slid it toward him, she cleared her throat.
“Uh, it’s Molly,” she murmured. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to look.”
“Oh.” With a frown, he shifted in his seat. “I should probably take this,” he said after a moment. Then he stood and moved toward the bar once more.
The entire time, her eyes never left him.
So, he did have a girlfriend, she mused. Or at least it certainly seemed that way. She tried to push back her disappointment. Knowing this thing with him was only temporary anyway did little to help with the flash of jealousy at the sight of another woman’s name on his phone.
When he returned, he made no mention of the phone call. Instead, he took a sip of beer and smiled at her.
“What’s your involvement with my father?” Rachel asked, not wasting any time.
“What do you mean? You already know.”
He smiled ruefully at her in a way that made her want to kiss him.
“Today, when we arrived, he was furious that I was with you. At first I thought maybe it was because...well, because of your connection with my mother, her owing you money. But when he was chastising me for seeing you, he said something curious. I keep thinking about it and although there’s a possibility he misspoke, my gut tells me he didn’t. Something tells me he slipped.”
“What did he say?”
“He said he worked with you.” She waited for a response from Rex and saw none. Instead, he just sipped his beer. “It seems an odd thing to say for someone who is indebted to you. And the more I think about it, the more it makes sense that something else is going on. He should be freaking out about the possibility this will get out at campaign time. He should be doing everything he can to pay you off so you’ll go away. Yet, other than what he has said to me, he seems relatively unconcerned. So, what did he mean and what is really going on?”
With a sigh, Rex leaned back in his seat and clasped his hands behind his head. “You know how I told you that I run a veteran charity?”
Rachel nodded.
“Well, we donate to your father’s campaign. That’s it. I’m not your mother’s debtor.”
She sighed and took a sip of her wine. “That makes no sense. Then why lie to me? Why the rumors? I heard them from others in town first.”
Rex shrugged. “Part of the reason we donate is to garner his support for us. It’s a trade of sorts. That’s all I can really say. We have shared interests. As for why you heard the rumors and why he reinforced the gambling story to you, I have no idea. But I’m sure he had a reason.”
She bit the inside of her cheek, trying to make sense of everything he was telling her, but finding little rational in the explanation. “He really tried to sell me on the gambling thing. He said we were having financial problems. He even fired our housekeeper. That’s a great length to go to...” She trailed off as it hit her.
She needed to find Marietta. The key to what her father was hiding may very well lie with her. After all, if money weren’t an issue, if the family’s finances weren’t in jeopardy, why fire her in the first place? Why all the lies, the rumors?
Rachel was willing to bet anything Marietta knew something.
But first, she needed to know one more thing.
“So, why’d you go along with it? This loan shark persona?”
“Does it really matter?” he asked, the heat of his gaze scorching her.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Why?” she repeated, blinking as if he must’ve lost his head. “Maybe because I don’t like being lied to. I can handle the truth. I can handle pretty much anything you throw at me, but I hate being lied to or played like
a fool. And maybe, just maybe, because I’ve been spending a lot of time with you, with whom I’m starting to have...” she trailed off and Rex raised a brow.
“Don’t stop now,” he teased.
“Shut up.” She rolled her eyes.
“No way. What are you starting to have? I believe the word you left off might have been feelings?” His tone was teasing, but the seriousness in his eyes belied his voice.
“Maybe.” She couldn’t help it; she grinned at his silent fist pump.
He dropped his hand to the table and after a moment, his smile faded. “Look...You came into that casino, this glittering gorgeous thing, and when you said that’s how I knew your father, I just went with it. As I said, I do business with him. I figured if he told you that, he had his reasons. He’s powerful and I can’t afford to lose him as an ally. I figured you and I might go out, but I never expected to continue to see you.”
Mollified by his explanation, she took a sip of her wine, staring off into the distance and trying to ignore the fact that she had just let on that she was developing feelings for him.
“A lot of people support him. I just wish I knew why the lies.”
And as if punctuating her thoughts, Rex said, “I can’t say much about my connection to your father, but I hope that doesn’t change anything with us. You know how politics are, but what I will say is this. Why do people lie?”
“To hide the truth.”
“Right. So, if he’s lying about money. If he wants you to believe that you are in debt, then chances are likely that he’s—”
“Covering up something that probably has to do with money.”
He nodded. “And all I’m going to say is that a smart man twists the truth. He doesn’t entirely cover it up.”
“Are you saying that whatever he’s hiding does have to do with gambling?”
“If you really want my opinion, don’t get involved. Leave it rest. The truth will surface eventually; it always does. In the end, no matter what you or he might think, you are completely independent of him. You have your own life to live, to build apart from him. Let this go.” By the time he finished speaking, Rachel’s mind was already a million miles away, already focused on her father’s lies and what they really meant.
* * *
It was late by the time Rachel arrived back home. After she left Rex, she spent several hours scouring the cove, looking for clues as to Carma’s presence and finding none. That, combined with her growing suspicions about her father, left her feeling paranoid and a bit like she might be losing her mind, which was exactly why she needed to figure out what became of Marietta. She needed to find out where the housekeeper was and what her father was keeping from her, from all of them.
She stepped inside the house and made her way upstairs, careful not to make too much noise over the wooden steps. At the top, she cocked her head and listened for signs that her parents were awake. When she heard nothing, she moved past her father’s office, noting his absence with satisfaction, and then crept down the hallway to peer inside their bedroom. Because the door was closed, she pressed her ear to it. When she heard not a sound and was satisfied they were sleeping, she took a deep breath and risked cracking it open, hoping they weren’t doing anything intimate, which would mar her for life. Once her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she saw the shape of them in bed, along with the sound of her father’s soft snoring. Turning, she ambled back toward his office and entered, closing the door behind her.
No one ever went in her father’s office. It was a forbidden place, meant only for him, but Rachel knew if there were anything to find, it would be there. He wouldn’t risk storing any sort of secret or incriminating documents, whatever they may be, at the mayoral office.
Built-in bookshelves framed the room, the rich mahogany spanning from floor to ceiling. Hundreds of books lined the shelves, along with mementos, among plaques touting her father’s accomplishments. A hulking desk sat across from her, along with a leather club chair. She moved to the desk, where she began opening drawers, rummaging through the loose paper inside—calendars, bills, correspondence.
Kneeling on the floor, she opened the bottom drawer that served as a filing cabinet, flipping through the tabs on the folders. None of them seemed to be anything questionable. But when she got to the back, there was a file that seemed smaller than the rest. Sunken clear into the back of the cabinet and obscured from view, no one would find it unless they were looking for something suspicious in the first place. Unlike all the other files, it wasn’t labeled.
She removed the folder, glancing at the door to make sure no one was coming, and then opened it. Shuffling through the papers, she realized that they appeared to be contracts of some sort. All contained signatures, a second party along with her father’s sloppy scrawl. She leafed through them, looking for something of significance, when she got to the last paper and gasped. The name jumped out at her.
Marietta. Their housekeeper.
She skimmed the document quickly. This contract, in particular, seemed to be for her silence on mayoral—Charles Beaumont’s—business matters. Stapled to the back of the letter was a bank receipt. She examined the slip, unable to believe her eyes.
Her hand shook as she continued to stare at what must be a mistake. Because if this slip was correct and Rachel was reading the contract right, then her father had wired $200,000 to Marietta in exchange for her silence.
But her silence on what?
CHAPTER NINE
The one advantage to living in a small town was the fact that you couldn’t hide much without it eventually coming out, including the presence of newbies in town. Finding Rex’s address was quite easy. Johnny at the general store knew within minutes who Rachel was talking about. Young man, mid-twenties, muscular build, kept to himself....
All night she tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep with the image of the bank slip and the huge six-figure sum seared into her every thought. Her father left for the office first thing, and so for hours, she drove about town, trying to decide what, if anything, she should do with the newfound information. She had no concrete proof of anything, really. Other than a contract and what she believed to be evidence he paid off their housekeeper, she had little more than speculation he had done anything wrong. Whatever he was hiding remained unclear, and although Marietta held the key to that information, Rachel had been unable to locate her despite her best efforts. It was as if she had vanished from Callaway, which made Rachel all the more suspicious.
She finally resigned herself that Marietta had probably left town, where Rachel would never find her.
Once she gave up her search, the urge to find Rex had started almost immediately, growing from a grain-size need into full-blown desire, and it dawned on her just how much time she had been spending with him. The past week had been filled with nothing but time spent either in his presence or planning for the next time she would see him. Wanting him to be around had become a reflex. Needing to see him an automatic thing. And though it made no sense to her after only a few days, she couldn’t help the way she felt any more than she wanted to.
She had never experienced such a draw to someone before, and it scared her. Not only because of their connection, but the uncertainty of his true connection to her father. Whatever her father’s secret, it had to involve him in some way. Otherwise, why use him in the lie? If Rex really was who he said, why would her father be angry at their involvement with each other? Nothing added up. And something told her Rex was the key to everything.
Needing answers from him didn’t explain why she sat outside of his place, or why she wanted to see him so bad. Her need for information couldn’t possibly put into words the way he made her feel when she was around him. Why her pulse leapt at his touch. How she felt like she could tell him anything without fear of judgment—her insecurities and fears. In such a short time, he understood her completely.
She felt free when she was with him. As if she could be whoever she wanted to be. Her future sudde
nly seemed wide open and limitless—anything was possible—as opposed to the dark hole she had been living in these past years.
Nothing explained how, in such a short time, he seemed like an essential part of her life—a part she hadn’t known she was missing until a week ago.
She stared up at the high-rise of condos and drew in a deep breath. Stepping out of her car, she made her way up the plank stairs to the second level, trailing her hand along the whitewashed banister, noting the pale shade of blue that stained the siding, the cottage feel of these lakefront homes. She had never been to the Lake View vistas, and as she made it to his front door, noting the lakefront terrace, she saw their appeal.
She knocked and waited, nervously twisting the hem of her sweater in her fingers. What if he was angry at her unannounced visit? Or unhappy to see her? What if he felt not a stitch of what she did for him?
Several seconds passed before she heard footsteps behind the door, along with Rex’s muffled voice. “Got it.”
The realization that he wasn’t alone hit her, just as the door started to open. His eyes widened as he took her in and then glanced behind him. Then, stepping out onto the deck, he closed the door all but a crack and crossed his arms in front of his chest. He wore a T-shirt and jeans. His dark hair was disheveled, and the thick stubble on his face indicated he hadn’t shaved that morning.
“Hey. What are you doing here?” he asked.
The words practically split Rachel’s heart. A knot formed in her chest, as she tried to think of what to say, but nothing came to her. Before she could speak, Rex shot another glance back inside the house. Lines of tension creased his mouth and forehead, and Rachel’s stomach sunk as she imagined the woman that must be inside waiting for him.
It must be his girlfriend. Or worse yet, what if he’s married?
The thought had never crossed her mind, and now that it had, she was terrified.
Rachel glanced down at his left hand, noting with little satisfaction the absence of a ring. “I’m sorry. If this is a bad time, I can go. I can tell you have company.”
