Colton Baby Conspiracy. Marie Ferrarella

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      Marlowe entered the boardroom, crossing the threshold on legs that still didn’t quite feel as if they belonged to her.

      She was no longer clinging to the hope that this was all just a bad dream, but she had to admit that the scenario still didn’t feel as if it was real.

      Marlowe took in the immediate scene within the room. Her father was right. The rest of board was already there, and they were obviously waiting for her.

      Looking around, she quickly scanned all their faces. Her father; Ace; her half sister, company attorney Ainsley; and CFO Rafe all looked to be stricken to varying degrees. The only member of the board who did not look stricken was Selina Barnes Colton, the company VP and director of public relations, and coincidentally, her father’s second—and mercifully ex—wife.

      Not only was Selina not stricken looking, but if Marlowe hadn’t known any better, the auburn-haired viper seemed to be almost gleeful about this potentially dire situation threatening to unravel right before them.

      Marlowe had never liked Selina. None of her siblings ever really had, she’d discovered years ago. But truthfully she had never disliked the snide, smug woman more than she did right at this very moment. Why her father insisted on keeping his ex-wife not just with the company but actually serving on the board, giving her an equal voice when it came to decisions, was totally beyond her.

      The air in the boardroom was exceedingly tense. Out of the corner of her eye, Marlowe could see that her father was waiting for her to take her seat, so she did.

      Only then did Payne speak. The anger vibrating in his voice was impossible to miss.

      “Now that we’re all here, let me take this opportunity to say that this email, sent by a quivering coward who didn’t even have the nerve to sign his own name, is a complete and utter fabricated lie. It’s obviously a pathetic stunt pulled by some spineless, sniveling jackass who is trying to derail our company in any possible way that he can.”

      Listening, Rafe could clearly barely contain himself. “Of course it’s a lie,” he cried, agreeing. “But how can it possibly be able to derail a billion-dollar company? Even if what this jerk is claiming was true—which it isn’t—who cares?” he demanded. Rafe glanced at the man who was the center of this ridiculous email. “Ace is a Colton, blood or not. Right?” he said, looking at Payne.

      To Rafe, it was a rhetorical question that didn’t even need or expect an answer.

      But the opportunity was far too good to waste, so Selina was more than happy to offer an answer to her former stepson’s question.

      “Not to throw water on your theory,” Payne’s ex-wife murmured in a just barely audible voice. “But you, Rafe, of all people, being adopted the way you were by Payne and his kind late first wife,” Selina continued, her voice fairly dripping with a false sweetness as she circled back to her point, “should know that blood is everything when it comes to being a Colton.”

      Although there was a smile on the woman’s face, her eyes were cruel and ice-cold, looking not unlike those belonging to a cobra just before its fatal strike.

      “What are you talking about?” Rafe asked. “What is she talking about?” he repeated, turning toward the other people on the board for an answer.

      When his gaze landed on Ainsley, the woman shifted uncomfortably. Marlowe knew the last thing Ainsley would want to do was side with Selina, especially against someone she actually considered family. In this particular case, however, as odious as it seemed, apparently the law was on the woman’s side.

      Clearing her throat and avoiding looking at either Ace or Selina, Ainsley told the others, “The reason it would derail the company is because on page one, paragraph two of the Colton Oil bylaws, it clearly states that the company CEO must be a Colton by blood only.”

      Okay, enough was enough. Incensed, Ace shot to his feet.

      “This is crazy,” he declared, using, Marlowe thought, the exact same phrasing she had when she’d seen the results of her pregnancy test.

      This was crazy. They couldn’t oust Ace from the board, Marlowe thought. He belonged on it.

      And yet...

      “This ridiculous email is a lie,” Ace was saying. “A total fabrication meant to send shock waves through our entire company and undermine its very structure. I’m a Colton! I was born a Colton and I’ll always be a Colton.” He looked at his father. Though it wasn’t in his nature to ask for any sort of help or backup, this one time he made an exception. “Tell them, Dad.”

      It wasn’t a plea, it was a request for the older man’s verification about his birthright.

      Payne nodded so hard, his thick silver-gray hair shook and fell into his eyes.

      “Of course it’s a lie!” he declared with a fierceness that defied opposition. “Ace is my son. I was right there, in the delivery room, the day that he was born,” Payne said, looking directly at his oldest son. “Of course, he wasn’t quite this big at the time,” he added with a small, dry chuckle. “As a matter of fact,” Payne recalled, “he was pretty frail. Everyone in the hospital, myself included, thought it was a Christmas miracle that he even survived. But he did survive. Not just survive—he managed to thrive almost overnight,” Payne recalled with a nearly tangible wave of nostalgia. “And now just look at him!” the family patriarch cried.

      It took Marlowe a moment to realize that his small trip down memory lane had been received with surprise by the others around the conference table.

      This was part of the narrative that hadn’t been previously broadcast. This was the first she’d heard that Payne and Tessa’s big, robust firstborn had been born a sickly infant whose chances of making it through the night had been regarded as slim to none.

      Despite their obvious surprise, only Selina picked up the thread that had been dropped.

      “A Christmas miracle?” she asked in a slightly mocking tone. “Really? Or did you or your first wife at the time deliberately decide to switch that sickly, frail baby with a healthy newborn?”

      Payne’s face immediately turned a vivid shade of red.

      “How dare you insinuate,” Payne screeched, “that either I or Ace’s mother could do something so reprehensible as—”

      He couldn’t even bring himself to finish his sentence, he was so incensed.

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