Receptionist Under Cover

Finally, she locked up her apartment and took a taxi across the park. She arrived at the office two minutes before the limo. Her father would probably have been more amazed than proud.

Patrick didn’t seem impressed with her accomplishment, though. She supposed he got ready for trips at a moment’s notice all the time. He gave her a casual hello as he climbed out of the backseat, then took her bag.

“Thanks. Be careful. It’s heavier than it looks.”

He raised one eyebrow at her, then picked it up as if it was filled with down feathers. He set it into the trunk next to his carry-on bag which looked beaten—if not tortured.

“I guess you travel a lot,” she said once they were in the car, heading for LaGuardia. She’d visited many countries with her family, but she imagined her parents’ idea of a vacation differed significantly from the kind of trips Patrick made.

“It’s my job to travel. It’s been my job for almost twenty years.”

“Do you ever get tired of being on the road all the time?”

“I’ve never thought about it, so I guess not.”

His expression was grim as he turned his gaze to the street ahead of them. She got the feeling that he would have been more comfortable driving than being the passenger.

She felt uneasy sitting next to him, and wished again that she could have gone on this trip without him. He was far too observant for her liking. She would have to be on her guard every instant of every day.

Soon they were dropped off at the airport, and since Patrick had their boarding cards downloaded to his BlackBerry, they just had to clear customs then go to the gate. She didn’t realize until they were being seated that they were traveling executive class.

“How nice,” she said, taking the window seat and stowing her briefcase under the chair in front of her. “I guess when you fly as often as you do, you deserve the little luxuries.”

“I almost always fly economy,” he corrected her. “But when I ask someone to leave their home to take care of my personal business, then I figure I owe them the courtesy of making the trip as comfortable as I can.”

“Well, I am comfortable. So thank you.”

“Good.” He leaned back into his seat and let out a long sigh. Then he turned to her. “I’m sorry if I’ve been a little tense this morning. I’m unbelievably nervous.”

“That’s totally understandable.”

“I can’t believe I’m about to meet my son. It could even happen tonight.”

Nadine felt obliged to lower his expectations. “But it probably won’t be tonight. We have three resorts to check, and no guarantee that he hasn’t changed his mind about working in Canada for the winter. For all we know, he met someone who suggested they apply for a job at Club Med so they could spend the winter on the beach.”

“Good God.” Patrick sounded appalled by that.

“There’s something else you need to prepare yourself for,” she added. “We won’t know for certain that Stephen Stone is your son until we get the results from a DNA test.”

He frowned. “Who said anything about DNA testing?”

“It’s standard procedure in a case like this,” she assured him.

He shook his head firmly. “If there was any chance at all that Stephen wasn’t my son, June wouldn’t have written that letter.”

“You trust her that much?”

“I do.”

How very strange, Nadine realized. I’m actually feeling a little jealous of this June. “You must have loved her very much.”

“I loved her,” he agreed.

She waited for him to say more and, when he didn’t, sighed with frustration. Then she immediately chided herself.

Lindsay had talked to her, over and over, about the importance of not getting emotionally involved in a case. And here she was suffering some sort of mild crush on her very first client.

But that aside, she had to deal with his expectations about this boy. She figured he would probably be willing to offer financial assistance to Stephen even if he wasn’t his biological son.

“I don’t want to insult June. You obviously thought very highly of her. But you’re paying me to be objective. It strikes me as possible that she might have seen that you’d enjoyed a degree of success, and if she was worried about her son’s future, she might be tempted to capitalize on a past friendship.”

“But that’s the whole point. We were friends. All she would have had to do is ask. Preferably before she died.”

“Maybe she felt too many years had drifted by with no contact.”

“She has only herself to blame for that. Those Christmas cards were the only time I heard from her.”

“Maybe she needed to move on. Or maybe she was worried you would find out about your son.”

“Yeah. She seemed pretty determined to keep that secret. I suppose I should feel grateful that she allowed me to pursue my dream career. But somehow all I feel is resentment.”

“It’s only natural that you’d wonder about the road not taken. You know…a wife and kids…”

“…and a beautiful home in Brooklyn Heights? Not my dream. At least it never was.” He turned to look at her in that special way of his that made her feel as if he was seeing her inner thoughts.

“Is personal counseling included with your fees?” he asked.

She felt herself blush. “Sorry. I should mind my own business, huh?”

“I have a feeling that’s something you wouldn’t be very good at. And I’m not suggesting that’s bad. It’s probably your curiosity about people that led you to this career.”

His smile changed, shifted into something intimate. She swallowed and realized she was breaking Lindsay’s rule again. No emotions. No personal involvement.

Heavens, this was so much harder than she’d expected.

PATRICK THOUGHT THE P.I. HE’D hired was the most feminine woman he’d ever met. Maybe it was because he was used to being with women who had similar interests to him. Women who enjoyed extreme sports, who climbed mountains, who skied out-of-bounds searching for that perfect, untouched bowl of powder.

The women he knew, the women he dated, had rough hands and sun-beaten skin—like him. They didn’t wear heels because they were too impractical. The same went for makeup and perfume. They dressed in Dri-Fit because it was comfortable and fleece because it was warm.

They talked about their sports, and the weather, their training regimes and…all too often…their injuries.

Nadine was nothing like those women and definitely not his type. But she kept drawing his eye and making him smile.

He couldn’t believe how slender her fingers were, or how gracefully her hands moved when she talked. Her teeth were perfectly white, and her eyelashes curled in the most adorable way.

And the way she dressed…

A few times when he’d been flicking through channels on TV, he watched bits of Sex and the City. He’d never met anyone who dressed like those women, until Nadine. Just look at what she had on for this trip. Fur-lined boots with heels, jeans so blue he’d swear they’d never been washed, and a ski jacket that looked way better than any ski jacket he’d ever seen before.

Every detail about her fascinated him, and he had to keep reminding himself that she was a legitimate P.I., a woman with her feet on the ground, who worked hard for her living. A woman who deserved his professional respect, not his secret, lustful desire.

In Toronto they changed planes and once again they were seated in executive class, with Nadine by the window. For this longer leg of their trip, he pulled out his laptop and started organizing his notes for the revisions.

Nadine opened her laptop, too. He noticed she was making case notes—his case notes—and he was tempted to ask if he could read them.

Then she switched documents and a map popped on the screen. He leaned over for a look, but a whiff of her softly sweet perfume momentarily distracted him. Damn, she smelled good.

“We’ll go to Sunshine first,” she said, clearly thinking he was looking at the map. “It’s about a two-hour drive from the airport.”

“We don’t have any rooms booked,” he realized belatedly.

“Don’t worry. The season hasn’t really kicked off yet. We shouldn’t have a problem getting something. They have units right on the ski hill. That’s probably the smartest place to stay, though we will need to leave the car in the parking lot and take a gondola.”

“How long do you think you’ll need in each place?”

“One day, tops. Maybe less.”

“Okay. Should be a short trip, then.”

“Really short if we get lucky and find Stephen at the first ski hill.” She smiled at him hopefully, and he actually got the sensation of something fluttering in his gut.

Was it nerves about the possibility that he might meet his son as early as tomorrow?

Or was it excitement at the idea of spending the next few days with this intriguing woman?

JUST BEFORE LANDING, the pilot came on the intercom to tell them it was snowing in Calgary. A chorus of groans rose up from the passengers. Nadine wondered anxiously about the roads.

Sure enough, once they’d deplaned and picked up the Subaru Patrick had reserved for their trip, visibility was getting to be an issue.

“I’ve driven in worse than this,” Patrick assured her, but as they left the city lights behind, Nadine was spooked by the utter darkness around her. It was only six-thirty, but at this time of year, this far north, the sun was long gone.

“I never thought I’d say this, but I wouldn’t mind a few streetlamps and neon signs.”

“You’re in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, sweetheart, and those words are blasphemy here.”

Maybe so, but between the blackness of the night and the hypnotic pummeling of snowflakes, there were times she couldn’t see the lines on the highway. Meanwhile cars were still traveling at speeds exceeding the posted 110 kilometers per hour limit.

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