Colton Undercover. Marie Ferrarella

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       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 statement. “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 СКАЧАТЬ