Chapter 28
Colby felt as if the world around him had stopped.
As if all the problems, all the tensions, had vanished, as if the evil that was Liz had been boxed up, unable to escape to do her damage.
Some part of his mind knew it was temporary, that reality would come roaring back, but right now he didn’t care.
Right now, nothing mattered but the feel of Ali in his arms, and her lips against his, returning his kiss, stoking the fire, sending his heart hammering in his chest. It wasn’t just that she was the sweetest of heart and taste, or that she was doing so much for him and Grace, it was that she wasn’t faking this.
It was real, it was genuine, because he could feel it down to his very soul. She meant it, she wanted this, wanted him, and that quieted the part of him that hadn’t believed any woman ever would. The part that had thought maybe Liz was right about how…useless he was.
He felt her hands on his skin, realized his shirt had come—or been—untucked. He wondered if she could feel the pounding of his pulse. She must be able to, the way he could both hear and feel it in his ears. That touch, her fingers stroking across his abdomen nearly made him gasp out loud.
He knew he had to stop her, stop this. If for no other reason than there wasn’t time, not now.
But he couldn’t, he just couldn’t, not yet.
Not when he wanted to do the same to her, touch and stroke bare skin, more than he wanted his next breath.
But if he did, he was afraid what little control he had left would snap.
Finally, somewhere, he found the strength to break the kiss.
“Ali,” he gasped out.
“You stopped,” she murmured.
“I didn’t want to. No way did I want to.”
“Then why—”
A buzzing sound interrupted her. For a moment Colby couldn’t move, even though he knew he had to, because he knew too well what that buzz meant. Then, reluctantly, he pulled the Foxworth phone out of his back pocket. He looked at the screen.
She’s on her way back.
He closed his eyes and let out a breath, then showed the screen to Ali. Her brow furrowed. “They were watching her? Foxworth?”
He nodded. “I told them what I was going to do, and they jumped right on it.” His teeth clenched for a moment before he could go on. “I have to go. I need to be gone before she gets here. If she sees my truck—”
“I know. I hate it, but I know.”
“Do you? Hate it, I mean?”
“That you have to leave…now? Just when we were—” She broke off and looked down, a rather endearingly shy expression on her face. An expression he was certain Liz Hollen had never worn in her life.
“Yes,” she went on, still looking down. “Yes, I hate it.”
“Good,” he said.
He gave her a final, ardent hug, then reluctantly pulled back. And when he started to gather up his tools and the packaging debris, she pitched in and helped him.
“I’ll go the back way, just in case,” he said, referring to the much more complicated path down some narrow lanes that would eventually land him on the far side of Foxworth headquarters.
She was steadier now, and made a funny face at him. “I feel like a kid trying to hide from my parents.”
“I want to hear about them,” he said suddenly. “And about when you were a kid. I want to know everything.”
“Then we’ll trade. Because I want that, too.”
He winced inwardly at that. Because Liz had done so much damage there, too. But there was no time now, he had to get out of here, out of sight. For Grace’s sake, and right now nothing mattered—nothing could matter—more.
“Call me,” he said. “When they’re settled in next door. Maybe we can—” He cut himself off. “No, damn, we can’t. Because Cutter has to be here, in case Grace needs him.”
“I know.” He heard her take a long breath. “She has to come first, Colby. I know that. So we have to wait.”
“The last thing I want right now,” he growled out.
“Me, too. But if it’s real, it will keep.”
He stared at her for a moment. “It’s real,” he swore. “More real than anything I’ve ever felt. But I have to get out of here.”
“I know,” she said again. “Go. I’ll let you know when they’ve arrived, then try and make contact with her. Say I want to show her the greenhouse I had put up today.”
He wanted to grab her, to kiss her again, but he already knew if he did, time would spin out of control and he’d seriously risk being caught.
He got himself turned around a bit taking the unfamiliar back roads, and had to pull over to check a map on his phone and straighten himself out.
That’s not the only thing you need to straighten out.
Just because she makes you feel things you’ve never felt, solid, real, glorious things rather than the ridiculous fantasies your mind has spun about what life with Liz would be like, it doesn’t change the main priority.
Grace. Forever and always, it has to be Grace.
Once he was sure of his route again, he pulled back onto the road. And knew how close they’d cut it when a moment later a text came in from Hayley, saying Liz’s car had just gone past Foxworth headquarters. He saw it was cc’d to Ali, so she’d know they were nearly there.
And just as he was pulling into the Foxworth parking area, another text came in.
They’re here. Grace looks fine, just cranky. The mother looks more smug than usual, so it must have gone well for her.
He couldn’t help it, he smiled at how easily she used Grace’s term for Liz. And that she had already realized smugness was Liz’s normal expression.
Just as he got inside, using Cutter’s door opener, he saw Hayley jump to her feet over at one of the desks.
“Sorry. I should have knocked.”
“No,” she said, with a smile now, “it’s just that when I heard the click of the opener my brain said Cutter. I miss that rascal.”
He’d been so glad the dog was at Ali’s to help he hadn’t really thought about that part. “I’m sorry about that, too.”
She shook her head. “Don’t be. It’s his call. He knows where he needs to be. And I’ll tell you, he wouldn’t leave even if we told him to, not if he’s made up his mind.”
“He’s…a different sort of dog.”
Hayley laughed then. “The tales I could tell you…”
At his request, since he seriously needed the distraction, they settled on the couch and she told him a few of those Cutter tales, until he was shaking his head in amazement.
“Are you sure he’s just a dog?”
“Not at all,” Hayley said blithely. “The only thing I’m sure of is that my whole life changed for the better the moment he wandered into it.”
“You sure he just wandered in?”
That made her laugh. “Actually, no, not at all.” Then sounding businesslike now, she gestured him over to the desk she’d been at when he’d come in. “I need you to take a look at some video, see who you might recognize.”
When he realized it was security video from the front doors of the hotel Liz had dragged Grace to today, he blinked and stared at Hayley.
“I’m not surprised anymore that you were able to get it, but this fast? Somebody there must owe you big-time.”
“A life or two, maybe,” she joked. At least, he thought she was joking, but then this was Foxworth, so maybe not.
He settled in to watch, with Hayley pulling over another desk chair to sit and take notes.
“I probably won’t be much help,” he warned her. “It’s been a long time, and I always felt so out of place at the few of these things I went to with her I didn’t pay much attention to anything except where to hide, and when I could get out of there.”
“Not expecting a roll call,” she assured him. “Just a name, first only if that’s all you have, a position, what deals they might be involved in, what she’s said about any of them, anything at all.”
She started the video rolling. He stared at the screen, and actually surprised himself a little, although the memories being stirred up weren’t pleasant.
“That’s Ben Owen. Runs a local ISP. That guy’s named Conway, a local developer, used to be competition, so kind of odd he’s there. I think those two are county officials, but I’m not sure. That’s Chuck Jeffries, her father’s right-hand guy…almost as ruthless. And there’s her father.”
“Is that Liz’s mother?” Hayley asked, indicating the blonde on Hollen’s arm.
“Yeah.” He left it at that and kept watching. Until he realized Hayley was now watching him, not the video. And then she reached out to hit the pause button.
“Why do I get the feeling she was even worse about you than Mr. Hollen was?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Because you never miss a trick?” He let out a long breath. “If that woman ever said a civil word to me, it was because she didn’t realize it was me until after she said it.”
“Sweet.”
“If it hadn’t been for her husband’s orders—he wanted the tool of having a grandchild—she would have wiped the marriage off the books, somehow.” His mouth twisted. “But I’m actually glad about Liz’s father. Otherwise Grace might never have been born.”
He watched until Hayley shut off the video when the entrance slowed to empty, but only came up with a couple more IDs, and most of them sketchy.
“No,” she assured him, “that’s good. You confirmed a couple we weren’t sure about.”
“Looked like a pretty standard Hollen power meeting,” he said. “Full of people they already own, and people they want to.”
“So, tell me, what does Grace do during all this?”
“She gets paraded around in some dress she hates that her mother picked out, to show what a loving, family-oriented group they are, then stuffed in a hotel room with a sitter.”
“Such fun,” Hayley said dryly. Then with an entirely different expression on her face, she leaned back in the chair. “So, how are you and Ali progressing?”
He blinked. Swallowed. “What?”
Hayley laughed. “Did you think we wouldn’t notice?”
He shifted his gaze away from her, not knowing what to say and afraid if he kept looking at her she’d read his mind. If she hadn’t already.
“Ever notice Cutter getting in your way when you go to sit somewhere, or nudging you when you’re standing?”
“Well…yeah, but…”
“Let me tell you about my brilliant dog’s other talents,” Hayley said, smiling so widely it was hard not to smile back.
He couldn’t even guess at what was coming, but after a mere two and a half weeks of dealing with Foxworth, he thought nothing would surprise him.
He was wrong.