The Coltons of Texas saga reaches its thrilling climax with a tale of Christmas justice!

Ex-cop Reid Colton is working double-time to help beautiful widow Penelope Barrington Clark. While investigating her dad, his family lawyer, the two are also trying to uncover who murdered Pen’s husband...all while keeping their relationship professional! But when a bullet and their forbidden attraction change everything, it’s Reid to the rescue, determined to guard Pen and her son with his life.

The last thing Penelope wants is to fall for a sexy Colton who’s not looking for forever. Yet as Christmas approaches and their investigation heats up, the three start to feel like a family. And the best present of all? Solving the Colton clan’s biggest mystery!

Penelope stared at him, her expression skeptical. “Reid, I don’t think this is—”

“Can you trust me on this?”

She lifted an eyebrow as if to say, Are you kidding me?

“Please,” he added. “I thought you believed me about what happened with Andrew.”

“Maybe. I...” Her shoulders slumped. “I haven’t really had a chance to process it. My hesitance is not really about what happened with Andrew. Not completely. I just...” She blew out a tired breath. “So much has happened today. My head is spinning.”

Reid closed the distance between them and stroked a hand down her arm. Grasping her elbow, he drew her even closer and held her gaze. “Can you at least believe I’m your friend? That I care about what happens to you and Nicholas, and I’m trying to do what is best for you?”

She moistened her lips, and just the glimpse of her tongue sliding along the seam of her mouth sent a shock wave of lust pounding through him.

* * *

We hope you enjoy this dramatic series:

The Coltons of Texas: Finding love and buried family secrets in the Lone Star State...

Dear Reader,

Over the years, I’ve had the pleasure of contributing to several Colton continuities. Like Harlequin readers, I love this passionate, engaging, often dysfunctional (LOL!) family, so it was a pleasure to write this wrap-up book for The Coltons of Texas. In addition, I love Christmas, so adding elements of the holiday to this story was a fun bonus!

Penelope and Reid have a bit of baggage to sort through before they can get to their happily-ever-after, especially when a shooter comes after them. But in true Colton style, Reid isn’t about to let Penelope or her small son get hurt, and he takes her to his private hideaway. Tucked away in Reid’s lake house, the sparks fly and it is soon obvious the shooter isn’t the only thing from which Penelope needs to protect herself. Can she trust Reid with her life...and her heart?

Happy reading, merry holidays, and all the best to you and yours,

Beth Cornelison

Colton Christmas Protector

Beth Cornelison

www.millsandboon.co.uk

BETH CORNELISON began working in public relations before pursuing her love of writing romance. She has won numerous honors for her work, including a nomination for the RWA RITA® Award for The Christmas Stranger. She enjoys featuring her cats (or friends’ pets) in her stories and always has another book in the pipeline! She currently lives in Louisiana with her husband, one son and three spoiled cats. Contact her via her website, bethcornelison.com.

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Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter 1

Andrew’s funeral was well attended, the burial full of the pomp and ceremonial rites traditionally on display for a fallen police officer. His brothers and sisters in blue packed the church and lined the street as the funeral procession made its way to the cemetery.

Through it all, Reid Colton tried to stay in the background. He knew his presence could prove a distraction from the send-off Andrew deserved, and he refused to be responsible for any disruption to the service. Seeing all the dress uniforms, the military-like formality of the service, made Reid glad he’d never made formal allegations that his partner was mixed up in something bad.

Whatever Andrew had gotten involved with in recent weeks didn’t negate the years of loyal service and heroism Andrew Clark had shown the community and the police force. Andrew had been a good friend, a great partner and a decorated police detective. Reid’s purpose in investigating Andrew, in making his quiet allegations of theft and drug use, was only an effort to rein in his partner, to bring him to his senses before he got in over his head. Before Andrew got addicted, got arrested, got thrown off the force in disgrace.

For his efforts to save his partner’s career, save Andrew’s life, Reid had become the one under investigation, the one whose career had been sacrificed due to innuendo and unsubstantiated claims of wrongdoing.

Hugh Barrington, the Colton family’s lawyer and Andrew’s father-in-law, had tried to salvage Reid’s reputation and position with the police department, but in the end, Reid had walked away in disgust. He’d given too many years, too much of his heart and soul to his post as a Dallas police detective to continue working under the shadow of suspicion. He wouldn’t put himself through the indignity of skeptical side glances, sneers of disrespect and walls of silence from his fellow officers. He’d rather leave on his own terms than wait to be cleared of the trumped-up charges or let half-truths end his career. He had his pride. He was a Colton, after all, and he deserved some modicum of respect for all his family had done for the community, if not for his years of service, loyalty and sweat.

Yet even knowing he was persona non grata, he’d needed to come today. He had unfinished business. And so, after the interment ended and the crowd of well-wishers had largely dispersed, he made his way toward Andrew’s wife, wanting only to extend his sympathies. Penelope Barrington Clark dabbed at her eyes as the chief of police spoke to her and gave her hand a consoling pat. Pen, as Andrew and her close friends called her, flashed a strained smile, the corners of her mouth quivering with the effort to be polite. Once the chief walked away and while Pen greeted an older couple, Reid stepped out of the shadow of the big oak tree where he’d lingered, waiting, and approached his partner’s widow.

He’d spent numerous Sunday afternoons in the Clarks’ home, watching the Cowboys with Andrew. He’d driven Andrew from a stakeout to the hospital when Pen had gone into labor a week early, and he’d been one of the first to hold their son, Nicholas, when he was born a few short hours later. He’d been to cookouts, birthday parties and the celebration following Nicholas’s baptism. He’d come to count Penelope Barrington Clark as one of his closest friends. After all, she was Hugh Barrington’s daughter. As the daughter of the Colton family’s lawyer, he’d known of Penelope even before he’d gotten to know her. He’d admired her from afar as a randy teenager and been the one to introduce her to Andrew at a police-department fundraising event seven years ago.

He never regretted that Penelope had chosen to marry Andrew. They’d been happy together, and he’d been happy for them. But he’d been a tad jealous of his partner. While Reid had his back turned and his womanizing interests focused elsewhere, Pen had grown from a shy but attractive teenager into a tall and willowy bombshell. More important, Pen and Andrew had built the kind of domestic partnership and loving home he secretly longed for. They may have been solidly middle class, living solely on Andrew’s detective’s salary after Pen’s falling-out with her wealthy father, but all of the Coltons’ billions hadn’t made his home life as harmonious and satisfying as what the Clarks had shared. Which, he knew, meant Andrew’s death was all the harder for Pen.

Reid kept a steady gaze on her as he approached, waiting for that moment when she first saw him. After years of studying people, their body language and emotional tells, he knew her first reaction to seeing him would be her most honest one. Penelope had always had a certain grace bred into her by her society parents. But today, with her silky auburn hair twisted up in a severe knot at her nape, her ivory skin blotchy from crying and her hazel eyes luminous with tears as she grieved her husband, she looked fragile. Vulnerable. Yet still as beautiful as a cherished china doll. Reid’s gut twisted seeing her so wrecked by her grief, so torn. Though she was surrounded by mourners offering condolences and had her father standing just behind her in a theatrical show of solidarity, Reid knew from the bleak look in her eyes, the wooden formality of her expression, she felt completely alone in her loss.

He wished he could simply push his way to the front of the crowd and pull her into a bear hug. But how would that impulse be received? Did she buy into the hype and lies that had been told about him since Andrew’s death? Was there any of the old respect and friendship left?

That instant moment of truth came as she dropped the hand of the older man, turned toward the last woman in the line of well-wishers...and her eyes met Reid’s. For one second, that first startled heartbeat, her one unguarded moment of recognition, she stared at him. He saw the raw emotion, the heartache and her longing for the refuge and support she knew he’d give her. And he prayed his eyes said all that was in his heart, because that one brief moment was all he had before her hazel eyes grew glacial.

Her shoulders stiffened and her back drew up straighter. Despite the hostile ice in her glare, he approached her. “Pen, I’m so sorry for—”

“You have a lot of nerve showing up here,” she spat at him, spots of color rising in her cheeks.

“Pen, I only wanted—”

“No!” She raised a trembling hand to ward him off. Then aiming her index finger at him like a gun, she snarled, “I don’t ever want to see you or your lying face again! Leave me the hell alone, Reid.”

Her warning hit him in the gut, as painful and final as if she had fired bullets at him instead of icy words. “If you’d just hear me out, Pen, I only wanted—”

“You heard her, Reid.” A firm hand closed on his shoulder and pulled him away from Penelope. “I think you should go.”

Reid turned to meet the cool blue gaze of Hugh Barrington. Behind his silver-framed glasses, Hugh’s eyes narrowed. The man’s squinty-eyed glare reminded Reid of the teasing way he and his brothers had referred to the man as The Weasel as kids, because of Hugh’s narrow eyes and ferret-like swath of dark hair.

“I can handle him on my own, Father,” Pen grated, turning her chilly stare on Hugh. “I don’t need a keeper. And if I did, it certainly would not be you. Not after you defended a Colton, took his side over Andrew’s. I’ll never forgive you for standing behind a Colton instead of my husband!”

If Reid had wondered whether the strained relationship between Hugh Barrington and his daughter had been set aside during this family crisis, he had his answer. A resounding no.

Pen whirled away from the men and stalked off, her chin high and her mouth pressed in a taut line of fury. She made a beeline to the waiting black Cadillac, where the funeral director stood with the back door open. A woman Reid thought he recognized from one of the Clarks’ barbecues—a neighbor or college friend of Pen’s maybe?—stood next to the Cadillac, as well, holding Pen’s six-month-old son, Nicholas. Penelope took her son from the woman, kissing his forehead and cradling him close. She took a moment to hug the baby, her eyes closed and cheek against his hair. Reid could see her body visibly relax as she held Nicholas, her baby’s presence clearly calming her frayed nerves. Finally, she raised her head and sent one last backward glance to her husband’s casket. Where Reid still stood. Watching her.

Her chest heaved with a deep sigh or a sob that she’d tried to choke down, then she spun away and slid into the backseat of the Cadillac. The funeral director closed the door, climbed in the front passenger side and the black vehicle pulled away.

A hollow pang assailed Reid’s chest as the car carried Pen away. As inappropriate as it was, especially here at his former partner’s graveside, he couldn’t ignore the facts. Pen hated him, blamed him for Andrew’s death. And he still harbored an undeniable lust for Penelope Barrington Clark.

Eighteen months later

The bitter tones of a woman sobbing set off alarm bells for Reid as he left his suite one morning in December the following year. His family had endured no shortage of tragedy, danger and suspicion of late, and the fact that a woman was crying somewhere on the first floor of the mansion didn’t bode well. On the other hand, his mother, Whitney, was known for her theatrics and overreactions, and the voice sounded like hers. He’d never been close to either of his parents, and for the last several years, he’d demonstrated as much by addressing them by their first names.

“Now what?” he mumbled to himself as he closed the door of his upstairs suite and headed toward the kitchen to find a late breakfast. He hated the prickle of dread that bad news waited downstairs. Was it his father, Eldridge? Was there bad news on his whereabouts?

Early this summer, his elderly father had gone missing from his bedroom in the main house of the ranch. Foul play was suspected, and speculation and suspicion had been thrown about within the family for the last six months with little real progress other than to eliminate several of his siblings as suspects. Reid had dabbled at finding his father, kept abreast of the investigation, but he still had a bad taste in his mouth for the police and their crime investigations based on the way his own case had been handled. Frustration over how the search for his missing father had stalled ate at him most days, but he knew what local law enforcement would say if he tried to intervene. Leave it alone, Reid. You’re not a cop anymore.

But that didn’t mean he didn’t still itch to take over the investigation and show the incompetents handling the case how effective detective work was done.

The glimmer of winter sun streaking through the foyer windows told him how late in the morning it had gotten while he lolled in bed and took his lingering hot shower. He used to be an early riser. He used to religiously get up before the ranch hands and head out for a run before the sun was up. But then he used to have a job to get up for, stay fit for, start his mornings early for. In the last eighteen months, he’d begun sleeping later, skipping days at the gym and generally hating the tedium of spending his days at the ranch with little to occupy his time.

To pass a few hours in recent weeks, he’d chased a few rabbits concerning Eldridge’s case to no avail and worked with his siblings on a few matters where his expertise was useful. He’d spent some time this fall riding his horse, fishing and reading some of the dusty books in the ranch library. But for the most part these days, he was at loose ends.

He trotted down the grand staircase in his family’s mansion, the crown jewel sitting at the heart of their working ranch, Colton Valley Ranch. Although he’d invested in an apartment in Austin, a lake house that he used as a secret getaway and a condo in Aspen for weekends when he wanted to ski, he still spent most of his time at the family ranch.

Truth be told, he didn’t want to move out. The daily histrionics and chaos of the family mansion were better than any British TV drama or American reality show. And despite all their nutty, backstabbing, snobbish ways, he knew he’d miss his family if he moved out. How could he live alone after growing up in this twisted version of the Brady Bunch? He’d really be bored then. And lonely.

Seeing his siblings pairing off with their soul mates and moving on with their lives in recent months had sharpened his sense of being alone, even in the midst of the hustle, bustle and drama of Colton Valley Ranch. The coming Christmas holiday only emphasized his feelings of idleness and solitude. Reid didn’t do bored well. His restlessness was building, and he knew he needed an outlet for his frustrations over his stalled life and the stagnant investigation concerning Eldridge. Something had to give, or he’d lose it.

Speaking of losing it...he thought as he strolled into the kitchen in search of coffee and found his mother dabbing at her eyes and bawling into a napkin at the breakfast-nook table.

“Mother?” he said warily, not really wanting to get caught up in one of her tedious emotional rants, but unable to completely ignore her tears. “What’s wrong?”

Whitney raised her head and gave him a bleary glance from green eyes rimmed with smeared mascara. “What do you think is wrong? I miss my Dridgey-pooh.”

Reid clenched his back teeth. “I’ve asked you not to call him that around me. It’s a little too nauseating, especially at this hour of the morning.”

She lifted her chin and gave a haughty sniff. “Well, you certainly got up on the wrong side of the bed.”

Reid ignored her rebuttal and lifted the coffee carafe to examine the sludge that remained in the pot. “Bettina?” he called and the family cook scuttled out from the prep room adjoining the kitchen.

“Yes, sir? Would you like me to fix you some eggs or sausage?”

He shook his head. “Just some fresh coffee, please. I’m not hungry.”

Bettina got busy brewing a new pot of coffee, and Reid strolled over to the table where his mother sat with the newspaper.

“Was there something in the paper about Eldridge?” He nodded to the folded Dallas Morning News by her tea mug.

“No,” Whitney answered with a pout, still wiping her eyes and sniffling. “Everyone seems to have forgotten he’s still missing except me!”

“No one’s forgotten, Mother. We just haven’t had any new leads to follow up in a few days. Instead of crying, you should be happy the burned body they found wasn’t Eldridge.”

The previous month, thanks to a tip from Hugh Barrington, a body was recovered from a car wreck and was believed to be the Colton patriarch’s corpse...long enough for Eldridge’s will to be read. But further inquiries proved the body’s ID had been faked, putting the search for Reid’s father back to square one.

“I am glad the body wasn’t his,” Whitney replied, squaring her shoulders. “And don’t tell me how to feel!” She narrowed her eyes at him. “You could stand to be a little more upset over Dridgey—over Eldridge’s disappearance. He’s you father, after all. Don’t you care—”

“Save it!” he said holding up a hand. “I’m in no mood for a lecture.”

“Reid! Don’t you think—”

“Pardon me, ma’am.”

Reid silently thanked the butler, Aaron Manfred, for his interruption and sneaked back over to the counter to hover by the coffeepot. He shouldn’t have had Bettina brew a new pot just for him. He could have made a Starbucks run. It wasn’t like he had anything else on his calendar today.

“I was hoping I might be able to take the evening off tonight.”

“Again?” Whitney snapped.

“Yes, ma’am.” Aaron gave a quick nod, clearly unrattled by Whitney’s waspishness. But then, Aaron had been dealing with the moody and snobbish Coltons for as long as Reid could remember. “Moira will be here and will be happy to help you with anything that should arise.”

“But why? What do you—” Whitney clamped her lips together and flapped a hand at the man. “Oh, go ahead. It’s not like my husband is here to need you.”

And with that statement, she ducked her head and began sobbing again. “Oh, Dridgey-pooh!”

With an impatient grunt, Reid snatched the coffeepot from the maker before it finished brewing and poured himself a steaming mugful. “I’m going out.”

He didn’t know where, but he had to get out of the claustrophobic atmosphere of the mansion. Maybe as a favor to his mother, to the whole family really, he’d check up on the progress of the search for Eldridge. Or better yet, he’d do some searching of his own. The case was growing as cold as their frost-dusted ranch pastures. No more procrastinating. The time had come for someone to break this case. If the police were going to drag their feet, then Reid would find his father by himself.

Chapter 2

Penelope Barrington Clark stood in the threshold of Andrew’s office/man cave and gathered her courage. She’d procrastinated cleaning out the room as long as she could. Immediately after his death, well-meaning friends had offered to help her with the painful task, but she’d put them off. How could she possibly throw out or give away all the things Andrew had owned, touched, cherished? Wasn’t it bad enough he was gone? Losing all of the possessions that cluttered his home office would have added salt to her wounds.

But the house had sold more quickly than she’d anticipated it would. She and Nicholas were downsizing, moving to a more affordable home. Ironic that she, a Barrington, needed to worry about finances, but she refused to take a dime from her wealthy father, and Andrew’s death benefit from the police department didn’t cover the mortgage and all her expenses. She knew she’d have to get a job, was all right with the idea, but she’d put it off. She’d wanted to dedicate as much time to Nicholas while he was young as she could. He would only be a toddler once, and she couldn’t stand the idea of missing any of his baby days.

The new house needed work, but it was in an outlying area with good schools and plenty of parks with playgrounds where Nicholas could run and climb as he grew older.

Andrew will never see Nicholas start kindergarten or jump out of a swing. The kamikaze thought shot straight to her heart with a sharp, piercing ache. She squeezed her eyes shut and balled her hands at her sides as she forced the stray thought down, tucked it away. If only she could pack up the random painful reminders and reflections like shards of a broken mirror to be discarded forever. Time was supposed to heal her wounds, but eighteen months after Andrew’s death, she still groped her way through the morass of memories and unexpected flashes of insight that dragged her down like quicksand.

She shook her head and steeled herself with a deep breath. Just do this. Get it over with.

Rolling the tension from her shoulders, Penelope strode into the man cave/office and moved an empty box to the top of Andrew’s desk for easier packing. She could start with the ugly stuff, the tacky things, the dear-God-what-were-you-thinking items. They would be the easiest to get rid of, she figured. From there, she could work her way up to sorting through the commendation awards for heroism from the police department, the family pictures, the personal papers and sentimental items that screamed Andrew.

She took the woman’s leg lamp, á la A Christmas Story, from the top of the bookcase and groaned, remembering when he’d brought the gag gift home from a Christmas party.

“It’s a major award!” Andrew had joked when she’d sneered at his party gift and tried to usher it straight out to the trash. Now that she had her chance to throw it away, she hesitated. Maybe one of the guys at the police station would like to have the lamp as a memento of Andrew’s quirky sense of humor.

“Oh, Lord. If I second-guess every item in this room, I’ll be here until Christmas.” She chucked the leg lamp into a box for charity and moved on to the trophies he’d won with the community softball league. She couldn’t bring herself to toss those, so she put them aside to go into storage.

The taxidermy-preserved fish was a no-brainer. Trash!

“Dead animals are not home decor,” she’d argued when Andrew had brought home the prize bass mounted on a plaque and intending to hang it on the living-room wall.

“Do you know how much I paid to have this mounted?” he’d countered, as if that made the bass any less hideous to her.

His office wall had been their compromise, so long as he didn’t put it on the wall opposite the door, where she’d see it when she walked down the hall.

She shuddered as she lifted the dusty bass down from the wall now, surprised by how heavy the ugly thing was. As she struggled with it, the trophy fish flopped backward and thunked against the wood-paneled wall.

Trying not to get dust in her nose, Penelope carried the bass to the discard box. The inscribed metal plate under the fish’s belly read Caddo Lake Largemouth Bass, 20 inches, 4.88 pounds, July 5, 2013. Andrew had been so proud of that catch. He’d bragged about it at cookouts for the rest of that summer and on occasion afterward, when the topic of fishing came up. Maybe she should... No! Get rid of it. The new house would not have room for all of Andrew’s valuable things, much less his junk.

As she strolled back across the room to continue the packing, she noticed a dent in the wall where the fish plaque had banged the paneling. Great. Something else to repair before the new owners took possession. Penelope lifted a hand to rub her fingers over the indentation, and as she stroked the wood paneling she found that the wall had unexpected give. When she pushed a little harder, a section of the paneling came loose and fell back into a recess behind the wall.

“Lovely,” she grumbled under her breath. “Now instead of a dent you have to replace a whole—” She stopped mid-gripe and furrowed her brow. Behind the section of paneling that had come loose, a thick file folder and a small box rested on a horizontal two-by-four inside the wall. A hidden file? What could that be about? Had Andrew put this file and box there or had the house’s previous owner?

Before removing the hidden items, Penelope wiped her hand on her yoga pants and mentally tried to quell the nervous jumble in her gut. Probably an old case file and piece of evidence. No reason to think Andrew was keeping secrets from her. Maybe it wasn’t even Andrew’s. Maybe it was a rare jewel or coin collection with papers of authenticity worth thousands of dollars.

“And your financial worries will be over.” She gave a wry chuckle. “Dreamer. And maybe the moon is made of cheese.”

With a trembling hand, she lifted the file folder and box out of the secret cubbyhole and read the inscription on the file’s tab. Hugh Barrington.

Penelope drew her eyebrows together in a frown. What in the world? She walked over to Andrew’s desk and set the small box aside as she sank into his office chair and opened the file. Heart pounding, she paged through the documents and photocopies of receipts. The pages all looked pretty routine. Copies of billing statements for her father’s time working for his clients, receipts for business lunches and hotels. Tax returns.

Penelope examined the tax return more closely and whistled. Her father still earned a boatload of money, most of it from his wealthiest clients. The Colton family topped that list, she noted, seeing how many billable hours he’d charged them.

“Suckers,” she grumbled, setting that document aside when a strange gnawing sensation bit her gut. Thoughts of the Coltons invariably led her back to memories of how Andrew had died. Reid Colton’s part in it. Reid’s appearance at Andrew’s funeral.

If you’d just hear me out, Pen, I only wanted—

But she’d shut him down, shut him out, walked away without listening. What could he possibly say to change things? He’d admitted he’d been the one to deliver the tainted shot that killed Andrew. He’d injected Andrew with potassium chloride, one of the chemicals used by states to administer the death penalty by lethal injection. He’d admitted to arguing with Andrew the morning her husband died. He’d confessed to making allegations against Andrew, claims he couldn’t prove, statements that tarnished her husband’s good name and reputation. What Reid had done was indefensible. What more could he have to say that would make a difference now?

You’ll never know if you don’t give him a chance to explain.

A chill raced through Penelope, and she quickly silenced the nagging voice that still unsettled her. The uneasiness inside her that wouldn’t let her close that chapter of her life and move on. Damn you, Reid Colton, for causing these doubts!

She’d once considered Reid a friend via his relationship with Andrew. Growing up, she’d thought Reid, the son of her father’s best client, was handsome, if rather spoiled and overbearing. She’d written off his snobbery as a sense of entitlement earned through his life of privilege. But his bossy and driven personality had proven to be assets as a police detective. Reid was smart, decisive and commanding, and he’d used those qualities to his advantage to rise quickly through the ranks at the Dallas PD. Andrew had often said he was lucky to be partnered with Reid. They complemented each other’s skills and had a good time together even outside of duty. All of which made Reid’s betrayal more difficult to swallow.

Penelope forced thoughts of Reid’s dastardly accusations and suspect actions out of her head. Clearing out Andrew’s office would be hard enough to endure without constantly dredging up the questions, heartaches and bitterness surrounding his death.

Rubbing her eyes with the pads of her fingers, she bent her head over the file again and studied the papers Andrew had collected about her father. At first glance, the file seemed innocent enough. But why would Andrew have hidden these papers in the secret compartment behind that hideous fish? She flipped faster through the pages of printouts and photocopies. What did it mean? Why—?

She stopped when she reached a spreadsheet Andrew had complied. God love him, Andrew had a thing about spreadsheets. They appealed to his sense of order, his nerdy perfectionism and love for analysis. She gave a sad chuckle as she scanned the grid of information, then froze when what she was reading penetrated the haze of her walk down memory lane.

The headings on the columns of data read: Evidence, Date, Research, Corroboration, Exclusions, Conclusions.

“Evidence? Corroboration? Andrew, what were you doing?” But the further she read, the more obvious the answer became. Her husband had been building a case against her father. Andrew had been keeping a secret file of evidence that pointed toward malpractice, tax evasion and other crimes against his clients. Double billing. Padded expense reports. Extortion.

A chill crept through Penelope. Was her father really guilty of all the wrongdoing laid out in Andrew’s file? Did Andrew have proof or were these just allegations he was investigating?

She slapped the file closed and rocked back in the swivel chair. Dear Lord! She’d never had a good relationship with her father, especially after the cold way he’d treated her mother before her death.

Hugh had acted as if his wife had gotten cancer merely to annoy him. He’d treated her as if he saw her as a burden and financial drain rather than the loving spouse, mother of his child and woman in physical and emotional pain that she was. Many other times through the years, Hugh had made it clear that he put the needs and wishes of his hoity-toity clients over the needs of his family. Sometimes Penelope couldn’t believe she’d survived the superficial and warped-priority world of Hugh Barrington and his cronies. Her life with her blue-collar husband had shocked her father, but she’d found a happiness and rootedness high society had never offered. Andrew had never been a fan of her father’s, either, but this...

She lifted the file and frowned. If Andrew was investigating her father, that was enough for her. She trusted he had probable cause, sufficient evidence to suspect Hugh. But what exactly had set off the warning bells for him? What should she do with the file Andrew had collected?

She couldn’t ignore it. If Hugh was doing something illegal, didn’t she have a responsibility to turn in the information to the authorities?

She chewed her bottom lip and sighed. If, just if Andrew was wrong, she didn’t want to be responsible for tarnishing her father’s name, no matter how bad her relationship with him was. And if Andrew did have a strong case against Hugh, why hadn’t he exposed his crimes? Did Andrew’s silence mean he hadn’t proven anything yet? Did he—

Her cell phone buzzed with an incoming text, interrupting her ponderous thoughts. The message was from her dry cleaner. Her clothes were ready to be picked up. She huffed another sigh of frustration. She’d taken her dresses and pantsuits in to be refreshed and ironed, knowing she couldn’t live off Andrew’s life insurance money forever. She either had to get a job...or suck up to her father for the money to pay her mortgage. She grunted. Never!

Begging her father for money would be admitting defeat, in her view. And if Andrew’s suspicions were on target...

She had to know. Surely Andrew had confided his suspicions about Hugh to someone. But who?

The obvious answer made her gut roll, and she balled her hands in irritation. How could she call the one man she wanted to avoid even more than her father? She couldn’t! She wouldn’t!

She...had no real choice if she wanted answers.

Growling in defeat, she raised her cell phone and scrolled through her contacts for his number. Why hadn’t she deleted him months ago? His sandy brown hair, deep blue eyes and charismatic smile popped up on her screen when she tapped his contact icon. She tried to deny the swirl of feminine appreciation for his chiseled good looks that tickled her belly, but the sensation was as undeniable now as it had been when she was a teenager. The man was flat-out hot. Which also annoyed her. Why couldn’t he be an ogre?

Her finger hovered over the green phone. Just call him. Ask what he knows and be done with him. Then delete him from your contacts and your life for good.

She tapped the screen, held her breath and raised the phone to her ear.

After two rings he answered, “Reid Colton.”

Chapter 3

Just hearing Reid’s voice rattled her. Penelope had to purposefully draw a calming, centering breath.

“Pen? That you? Is something wrong?”

She startled a little when he said her name. Damn caller ID. Now she had no choice but to talk to him or look foolish. “Hello, Reid. Do...do you have a minute?”

“For you? Always. Is everything all right?” His baritone voice was like a rich dark-chocolate liqueur, sweet and sultry with just a little bite. Sneakily intoxicating.

“I’m fine,” she said automatically, hearing the defensive edge in her voice.

“Okaaay,” he drawled. His tone told her he’d heard her snappishness, too. “So then this is a social call?”

“No. I—I just have a question for you.”

His grunt sounded disappointed. “Ask away.”

“Did Andrew mention anything to you about a file he was keeping on my father?” A brief silence answered her. “Reid? Did you hear me?”

“Yeah, I... Andrew was keeping a file on Hugh Barrington?”

Now it was her turn to grunt. “Hugh Barrington is my father. Yes,” she said sarcastically, as if her tongue had a mind of its own. Stop it! No reason to be so snarly. “Shall I take your surprise as a no? That he didn’t tell you about his suspicions?”

He was silent a beat. “What sort of suspicions?”

She pinched the bridge of her nose. Tension coiled behind her eyes, and her temples gave an achy throb. “I don’t know for certain. I only just found the file and haven’t read it in depth but—”

“Where was this file? What does it say?”

“He’d hidden it in his office, and—wait. Just answer my question. Did he ever mention suspecting my father of any wrongdoing? Did you know he was keeping a file on him?”

“No,” Reid said flatly. “Now answer my question. What is in this file?”

“I told you I haven’t read it carefully. It may be nothing. I just... It surprised me and...” Damn it! What had she done? Had she stirred up trouble over nothing? “Oh, never mind. Forget I said anything.”

“I want to see it.”

“Reid, no. I shouldn’t have called you. Can we please just forget—”

“If Andrew was keeping a secret file on Hugh, he had a good reason.”

She agreed. Andrew had been a good cop, and he wouldn’t have undertaken something as serious as an investigation of her father without cause. But Reid’s concurrence settled the issue. She should have been relieved to have been vindicated, but Reid’s assessment left a hollow pit in her stomach. The truth hit her like a rock to her skull. Andrew believed her father was corrupt.

Cold, snobbish and unloving toward her—she knew already, but...corrupt?

She muttered an unladylike curse as a tremble started at her core.

“I want to see that file. Your father has far too much influence and knowledge of my family’s business for me to ignore any suspicions Andrew had.”

She rolled her eyes. How typical of Coltons to think first of how any revelation affected them. Their bottom line. Their secrets. Their precious reputation. “Oh, of course! The Colton family must be protected from scandal at all costs!”

“Really?” Reid said dryly. “Is that what you think?”

She didn’t reply. The file sat on the desk before her, mocking her. She could almost hear the alarm bells, the blaring computer voice. “Danger, Will Robinson!” She knew with a certainty that whatever Andrew suspected her father was guilty of was enough to rock her sheltered life. She did not want to expose the skeletons in Hugh Barrington’s closet. And yet...

“Pen, the last thing I want to do is cause you any more pain,” Reid said, bringing her attention back to the phone call. “But if Andrew was working on something...” He paused. “I need to see that file. I can be there in ten minutes.”

She stiffened her spine and blinked rapidly. “Come here? But—”

When she’d called Reid, she hadn’t considered the idea that he’d want to review the documents. That she’d have to see him.

“Is that a problem?” he asked.

Yes! her head screamed, while she stammered, “Uh, I... No. But...”

“All right. Good. Ten minutes, then.” Reid hung up before she could think of an out.

* * *

Reid pulled his truck to the curb in front of his late ex-partner’s ranch-style house and huffed out a breath. In months gone by, he’d parked in this same spot and headed into Andrew’s modest but comfortable home to spend hours watching football, or discussing cases, or sharing meals with the family. Andrew had joked that because Reid was a bachelor, Penelope seemed to think that meant he always needed a home-cooked meal. Forget the fact that he lived at the family ranch where Bettina Morely, the Colton’s full-time cook, was at his beck and call and elaborate dinners were prepared most evenings for him and the rest of the Colton clan.

But Pen was something of a mother hen, even before she had Nicholas, and loved nothing more than to have people gathered around her table for a big dinner. Her nurturing extended to animals, as well, and the Clarks always seemed to have at least one foster dog and a few stray cats they were caring for in addition to their own elderly beagle, Allie.

Reid had always suspected her love of such domestic events as family dinners and cookouts on football afternoons stemmed from a lack of such familial events as a child. Penelope’s father, Hugh Barrington, had never struck Reid as the home-and-hearth type, and on his few visits to the Barrington estate through the years, Reid had found the mansion cold, more of a showcase than an inviting home. Not the kind of place he thought Pen would have felt comfortable or warmly loved. Especially after her mother died when Pen was a young teenager.

Andrew’s few comments on the matter had confirmed as much. Pen had shaken the metaphorical dust of the Barrington estate from her sandals as soon as she could. Nor was there any love lost between Penelope and her father.

Was that the reason behind this mysterious file Pen had found? Andrew’s attempt to keep tabs on the man who’d been such a disappointment to his wife? Or was Andrew onto something more?

Reid climbed from his truck and walked up the front sidewalk, admitting to himself he had a few nerves about this meeting. He hadn’t seen or heard from Pen since Andrew’s funeral, even though she’d crossed his mind many times in the intervening months.

The front door opened before he could ring the doorbell, and he met Penelope’s stormy expression. “Hey, Pen. How are—”

“Don’t ‘Hey, Pen’ me.” She braced her hands on her hips, lips taut in classic ticked-off-woman mode. “Just because I called to ask you a question doesn’t mean you can invite yourself over or think I’ve forgotten or forgiven what you did.”

Reid drew a slow breath and released it. He’d had to deal with plenty of bad moods in his life, from his own pissy and entitled family members to suspects high on any range of chemicals. He raised a conciliatory hand. “But you did call, and the best way for me to make sense of the file and why Andrew may have kept it, and hidden it, is for me to take a look at it.”

He hoped once she’d had a chance to voice her spleen, they could set the ill will aside long enough to get to the bottom of this mysterious file on Hugh Barrington. She held his stare for several silent seconds, returning his petitioning look with unmoved hostility. Not that he expected anything else.

Reid was too realistic to fool himself into believing he could magically change her opinion of him. Not in one day. Maybe not even if given weeks to plead his case and counter the false information and supposition fed to her by the police department and media following Andrew’s death. True—he had been overheard in a loud altercation with Andrew the day his partner died. And he had administered the injection that proved fatal to Andrew. But there was so much more to the story...

Then her expression seemed to crack. Her pert nose flared, and her sculpted eyebrows dipped as if she were fighting tears. Her chin wobbled and she turned her face away just as moisture sparkled in her hazel eyes. That brief flash of vulnerability and grief sucker punched Reid in the gut. He was prepared to deal with her anger, but a widow’s multilayered emotional quagmire was beyond his skill set. Especially the fragile emotions of a woman he cared about.

Without comment, she spun on her heel and marched into the house, leaving him to follow. He caught the door before it closed and stepped out of the chill December air. The house looked much the way he remembered it, but different, too. Instead of Andrew’s sports magazines and accent pieces reflecting Penelope’s feminine taste, the living room was littered with toddler toys and piles of tiny-sized laundry featuring dogs, giraffes and trains in primary colors.

Penelope had disappeared down the hall toward the bedrooms, and Reid considered whether he should follow or wait there. Playing it safe—he didn’t want to cause more strife than his presence already did—he took a seat on the couch next to the folded clothes.

When Pen returned with a fat manila folder in her hand, he stood again and held out his hand for the file. “Is Nicholas asleep?”

She shrugged and replied curtly, “Don’t know. He’s not here.” She jabbed the folder toward him, scowling.

Taking the file, Reid frowned his confusion. “Where is he?”

“Mother’s Day Out.”

He arched an eyebrow. “Come again?”

She rolled her eyes as she sat, smoothing the seat of her yoga pants with her hand as if they were fine linen pants. She perched on the edge of the nearest wingback chair, sitting primly, with her back straight and her ankles crossed, as if she were at etiquette class instead of in her own home. Apparently the social training from her youth kicked in when she was stressed. Or else she was purposely refusing to let herself relax around Reid, a choice wholly contradictory to her yoga pants, oversize sweatshirt, sock feet and sloppy ponytail. “He’s at Mother’s Day Out, a program the Methodist church down the road offers three times a week,” she explained. “They watch young children from ten o’clock to three so that mothers can run errands or do...whatever. I needed time without Nicholas clinging to my leg to get Andrew’s office sorted out.”

Reid balanced the folder on his lap. “Oh.” He nodded as he opened the folder cover. “Okay.”

As he glanced over the top sheet in the file, he realized another oddity. No dog had barked when he came in, and no beagle was sniffing around him asking for a head scratch even now. He glanced toward Pen. “And where’s Allie?”

A shadow crossed her face and he regretted the question instantly. After all, the dog had been quite old and suffering from arthritis when he’d last visited the Clarks’ house eighteen-plus months ago.

“Never mind. I can guess,” he hurried to say as her eyes brightened with tears. He made no comment on the fact that there didn’t seem to be foster animals around at present. Clearly that was a scab that needed to be left alone.

Schooling her face, she shifted on the seat and flicked a hand toward the file. “So...what do you think?”

Returning to his reading, he gave her a wry grin. “I think I’m still on the first page and need a minute to see what’s here.”

She rubbed her forehead and snorted. “Sorry. Of course. I’m just...”

“Antsy. I understand.” Reid dropped his gaze to the first document again and tried to focus his attention on what he was reading—which was difficult with Pen watching him. For the next several minutes, he paged through the folder. He gave each document a cursory look at first, then went back to study the information more closely once he had an impression of what Andrew might have been trying to establish with his file. Finally a pattern emerged, though Andrew had marked spots with sticky notes where there were gaps in the data.

Reid drew a slow, deep breath, clenching his teeth in anger and disgust as he lifted his gaze to Penelope.

“Well?” she asked, perched on the edge of her seat. “What do you make of it?”

“I think what we have here—” he held up the file and tapped it with his index finger “—is not enough to make a case.”

“But?” She turned up both palms. “You see something incriminating there. Don’t you? I can see it in your face.”

“If these records are real, not fabricated, then yes. They point to a long history of theft and deceit. There are two sets of records for every client, including my family. I see evidence of overbilling, falsified records, probable tax evasion—”

“Now, wait just a minute!” Penelope shot to her feet and glared at him, hands balled at her sides.

Reid set the file aside, prepared to defend his conclusions. He’d known she wouldn’t like what he had to say—implicating her father in felony crimes—but she’d asked his honest opinion and—

“What do you mean, ‘if these records are real’? You think Andrew made up those documents? Some of what’s there is on my father’s official office stationery! If you think I’m going to let you use this as an excuse to deride Andrew—”

“Penelope.”

“—and throw more mud on his good name—”

“Penelope!” Reid stood and moved around the coffee table toward her.

“—then you can get the hell out of my house, right now! I only asked your opinion because—”

“Pen!” He had to raise his volume to match hers, but he kept his tone nonconfrontational.

Taking her by the shoulders, he gave her a quick, interrupting shake. Beneath his hands, Pen felt fragile. Her willowy limbs were surprisingly thin under his large hands, and he felt the tremor that raced through her. “Time out!”

She blinked at him, her expression wounded, offended, then shrugged roughly from his grasp. “That’s what you said. ‘If these records are real, not fabricated.’ As if you think Andrew was trying to frame my father for something!”

“Yes. If. I said all that about fabrication as a qualifier of my assessment, not as an accusation against Andrew.” He stepped back and wiped his hands on the seat of his jeans. “The fact of the matter is, I believe Andrew was onto something. I think...” He hesitated, not wanting to set her off again and not finding any way to soften the blow for her. He respected Pen too much to sugarcoat what he suspected. “Pen, it looks like your father was stealing from his clients. Is stealing from his clients. He’s hiding income from the government. Falsifying records. God knows what else, but...”

He stopped as she sank slowly back onto her chair, her eyes wide and her mouth slack with shock. “You really think my father is doing all this? What I mean is, you think he knows about it? Couldn’t it be someone who works for him? Or...” She let her voice trail off, as if she knew the truth without him answering.

He said nothing, taking his seat again and giving her a moment to process the stunning bomb he’d dropped. He knew well enough that Pen had never had a good relationship with her father, but learning Hugh was likely guilty of criminal activity was another matter.

“So...now what?” She sounded as stunned as she looked, her voice an almost breathless whisper. “What do I do...” she motioned weakly toward the papers in his lap “...with those files? What do you think Andrew planned to do with them?”

“Andrew was a good cop. He wouldn’t have sat on incriminating evidence like this long. Chances are he was waiting for the case to come together to spare you the strain of a drawn-out investigation.” Noticing her befuddled look, he asked, “What?”

“So now you think Andrew is a good cop?”

He clenched his teeth, measuring his words. “Pen, I’ve always thought he was good at his job.”

Her mouth pinched, and one thin eyebrow lifted in skepticism. “That didn’t stop you from trying to sully his name before he died.”

He exhaled slowly, struggling to keep his frustration in check. “I wasn’t trying to sully his name. I was trying to intervene, bring him to his senses, before he sullied it!”

“Fine way of showing—”

“Pen, stop!” He raised both hands, palms toward her. His voice was louder than he’d intended. “This is a conversation for later. I will explain to you everything that happened eighteen months ago, if you’re willing to listen.”

She firmed her mouth and folded her arms over her chest. Classic body language saying she was closing herself off to what he was saying. He knew better than to press on with the topic if she wasn’t ready to hear him out.

“Later...” He tapped his finger on the files. “We need to address this, right now.”

He didn’t tell her this insight into Barrington cast a new light on issues involving his father’s disappearance. Hugh Barrington had been very vocal of late, claiming to have seen Eldridge being kidnapped, claiming a burned body must be the missing Colton patriarch—which it wasn’t. And, not the least of which, pushing forward a reading of Eldridge’s will, in which Hugh Barrington was named the heir of a controlling interest in Colton Inc. As a detective with the Dallas PD, Reid had learned not to believe in coincidence. If it looked like a dirty rat, smelled like a dirty rat and squeaked like a dirty rat, he didn’t need an exterminator to tell him he was dealing with a dirty rat.

If Hugh Barrington was as corrupt as Andrew’s files seemed to indicate, Reid had to wonder what role the family’s lawyer may have played in his father’s disappearance. Had Eldridge gotten wind of his lawyer’s disloyalty and theft? Had the senior Colton threatened to expose Hugh?

Or, Reid thought with a twist of dread in his gut, had Eldridge been mixed up in his lawyer’s illegal practices and crossed the wrong person?

She glared at him silently, stubbornly, for several moments, and he used the time to formulate a plan.

“Are you with me on this, Pen? For Andrew’s sake? Because I’m going to need your help if we’re going to get the proof we need to either finish building this case or disprove it.”

She blinked slowly, turning her gaze away. “How?”

Gathering together the papers he’d spread out on the floor to review, he tapped the stack into order and stood. “We need to look at your father’s personal files. We need to see what’s saved on his computer, what’s locked in his safe.”

Penelope scowled her disagreement. “He’s hardly going to just stand aside and let us search his office—especially if he has something to hide.”

“So we don’t ask.” He jammed a hand in his pocket and shifted his weight uncomfortably. He was crossing a line, and he knew it. They’d have to tread carefully.

Her expression was incredulous. “You want to break into his office and steal his files?”

“I doubt he’d keep the incriminating stuff at his office where his staff could come across it. We’ll start at his house. Your old home.” She opened her mouth as if to argue, and he added quickly, “If we are freely admitted to the house, then it’s not breaking and entering. If we only snoop around and don’t take anything, it’s not stealing.”

“I don’t know.” She bit her bottom lip and rubbed her hands on her pants. “You’re playing rather fast and loose with the definition of legal, Colton.”

He flashed her a wry grin. “Hey, that’s what my family does best.”

* * *

They’d laid out a plan and were in Reid’s truck ten minutes later.

“You’ve been to my father’s house before, right?” she asked in a tone that said she knew he had.

Reid dipped his head once in reply.

“Then you don’t need my directions?”

He lifted a corner of his mouth. “No. But thanks.” He pulled away from the curb and drove toward the highway that would take them out of the Dallas city limits and toward the affluent area where Hugh Barrington lived.

A stilted silence filled the cab of his truck, but Reid resisted the urge to turn on the radio. If Pen decided she did want to talk, he didn’t want anything to interfere with an open communication between them.

In fact, he really ought to be the one to broach the topic of what happened to Andrew. She should know why he’d started his investigation of his partner and his theories about what really happened that fateful date last year. He might not get another chance like this one to explain his side of events to her.

Penelope’s body language didn’t invite conversation, however. She sat as far away from him as her seat belt would allow, and with her body stiff, she kept her head turned toward the passenger window.

He cleared his throat and started, “Pen, about what hap—”

“We need to be through with this junket by three p.m.” She cut him off so deliberately and sent him such a quelling glare, her intention was obvious. “That’s when I have to pick up Nicholas at the church.”

He held her stare for a moment, waffling between pushing his agenda and letting her have her way. Since they still had the task of searching her father’s home office and anywhere else in the house she thought might prove worthy of attention, he backed off. For now.

“Three p.m. Got it.” He glanced at the digits glowing from the dashboard. 11:14. That left plenty of time to conduct a search, keep Pen with him long enough to have the conversation he wanted to have and still get her to the church to pick up her kid.

His heart drubbed a slow, heavy beat. He rather hoped he had an excuse to go with her to pick up Nicholas. He was curious to see how big Andrew’s son was now and reconnect with the boy. Not that he expected the kid to remember him. Nicholas was still a baby last time Reid had seen him.

“Nicholas must be talking pretty well by now. Does he—”

“Why are you turning here?” Another quick change of subject and determined look. “The turnoff to my dad’s street isn’t for another mile.”

“Fewer traffic lights this way.”

She shrugged and turned back to the window.

“So, Nicholas...” This time he let his words trail off, allowing her to fill in the blank. Or not.

“Is none of your business.”

He frowned and scoffed a laugh. “Ouch.”

She drew a breath and faced him with narrowed eyes and a dented brow. “This is not a social outing. You lost the right to personal information and any relationship with my son when you killed my husband.” He opened his mouth to defend himself, but she raised a silencing hand. “Correction. You lost that right when you accused Andrew of being corrupt. Of stealing drugs from the evidence room or whatever cockamamy bull you dreamed up!”

“It wasn’t bull. At least I had good reason to believe what I said at the time.” Reid braked for a stop sign at a busy intersection and had to give his attention to traffic. Once he’d pulled onto the crossroad, he shook his head and gave Pen a pleading look. “Listen, this is a conversation we need to have. But we’re almost to your father’s place. Can we put a pin in it and—”

“It’s the next turn on the right. Where the brick entry gate is,” she said unnecessarily, but again effectively cutting him off.

He sighed and let the matter drop. For now.

Because they were at Hugh Barrington’s estate, he would need to stay on his toes and not raise any red flags as to why he was there with Hugh’s estranged daughter.

Reid pulled in the long driveway to the redbrick mansion, and when he would have parked on the section that circled near the front door, she directed him to the back. At his querying look, she offered, “I’d rather not call attention to the fact that we’re here.”

From the front, everything about the Barrington estate was symmetrical, formal and unimaginative. The house was little more than a large brick box with an equal number of windows on either side of the main ground-level entrance. Boxy shrubs framed the entry, and black shutters were the only relief to the three-story brick edifice.

Reid glanced around the backyard. The swimming pool was still crystal clear and free of leaves despite the December chill. He knew the detached four-car garage contained at least one antique Rolls-Royce—a status symbol Hugh liked to show off at high-society events. But Reid was unfamiliar with the cottage sitting behind the main house. In all the years Hugh Barrington had been Eldridge’s lawyer, Reid had only been to this house a few times, and then always through the front door for dinner parties that kept him in the formal guest areas. As he studied the smaller house, deciding if it was a pool house or something else, one of the venetian blinds swayed and a shadow crossed the window.

He nodded his head toward the cottage. “What’s that building?”

“That’s where Stanley lives.”

The name rang a bell, and Reid searched his memory. “Stanley?”

“Father’s butler.”

“He lives on-site?” That shouldn’t surprise Reid. After all, Aaron Manfred, the Colton family butler, and his wife, Moira, lived in the staff wing of the mansion at Colton Valley Ranch. He’d simply not realized Barrington had any of his house staff living on the grounds.

“Of course he does. Where else would my father’s right-hand man live?”

He heard more than a little sarcasm in her tone. Maybe even some hurt. And he had to admit, he was a tad surprised by the idea behind her sentiment. “Your father is especially close to Stanley?”

She cut a startled look toward him. “I just mean he trusts Stanley like no other person in his life. If my father weren’t such a snob, he might even call Stanley his best friend. He depends on him. Heavily. And having his butler living right behind his house seemed a no-brainer to my father.”

But he could tell from the tension in her body and her tone that she wasn’t nearly as unconcerned about her father’s reliance on his butler as she pretended. Perhaps what he sensed was jealousy? Was she upset that the butler had the trust and closeness she’d never had with Hugh? Or that Hugh had never had with her mother?

Turning to the gym bag he kept in the backseat of his truck, Reid unzipped a side pocket and fished out a flash drive, a small flashlight and a screwdriver. Just in case. Jamming all three in his pockets, he followed Pen to the back door where she punched in a code on the security system, receiving a quiet beep from the door pad signaling admittance.

“You’ve been gone from this house for how many years? And your father hasn’t changed the security code?”

She gave another one-shoulder shrug. “He did change it once a few years ago. But he couldn’t remember the new code after years of the same one, and he kept setting off the alarm when he put in the wrong numbers. He gave up and went back to the old code after three months.”

“And you know this how? I thought you weren’t on good terms with your dad.”

“With my dad, no. His maid, yes. After my mother got sick, Helen and I became closer. We still talk every now and then.”

Reid glanced back out to the butler’s cottage. Had the blinds moved again? He couldn’t shake the prickling sense that they were being watched. As a detective with the Dallas PD, he’d learned to trust his gut instincts. More often than not, that sixth sense was correct. He may not be with the police department anymore, but he still had his training, his experience and the instincts from his years on the job. “You had me park in the back to avoid attention, but we’ve been seen nonetheless.”

Chapter 4

“Seen?” Pen jerked up her head, sending him a look of dismay, then shot a glance around the backyard. “By who—”

Reid put a hand on her shoulder and moved to block her view. “No, don’t look. You’ll only look more suspicious. Carry yourself in a manner that says you have every right to be here, that you don’t care who sees you.”

She straightened her back. “I do have a right to be here. It’s my childhood home. I—” She stopped, pitching her voice lower, and twisted her mouth as if rethinking her assessment. “Well, if I’m not welcome to come as I please, he could take away my key. But he hasn’t, so...”

Before she could unlock the back door, the knob rattled, and the door swung open. A woman in her late fifties with graying brown hair and a black maid’s uniform gave them a curious look. “May I help...? Oh, Miss Penelope! I thought I heard someone back here.”

“Helen.” Pen sounded breathless and nervous, but squared her shoulders. “Hello. I didn’t want to bother you, but I just needed...”

Reid tensed when Pen hesitated. It seemed they were about to test Penelope’s welcome at her father’s estate.

“Um...to look for something from my old room. Something of my mother’s.”

Reid hid his relief over Pen’s smooth lie. He hoped Helen hadn’t heard the same flutter of nerves in her voice that he had.

“Of course. Is it something I can help with?” Helen waved a hand down the back hall as she stood aside to admit them.

Reid mentally scratched B and E off the list of crimes they were flirting with.

“No. No, I don’t want to bother you. Reid can help me look.” Pen smiled at the maid and waited for Helen to return to whatever she’d been doing before heading down the long dark hall. He followed her as she moved quietly through the house, bypassing the kitchen where the clank of dishes and a woman’s humming could be heard. She led him up a back staircase not nearly as grand as the wide marble one with polished wood banisters he remembered from past visits to the house. Their footsteps were muted on the thick white carpet, and he could imagine Penelope as a teenager, sneaking up these quiet and more hidden stairs after her curfew.

Pen led him down the upstairs hall, past numerous closed doors, and she paused, casting a surveying glance around before crossing the landing at the top of the grand staircase in the foyer. Reid looked over the balustrade to the cold marble entryway he remembered from previous trips to his family lawyer’s house. A sparkling crystal chandelier hung over the foyer and replicas of Greek statutes in white stone and Italian urns in hues of gray and black were positioned around the walls. For all its opulence, the foyer lacked color and gave visitors no sense of warmth or welcome. Much like the other rooms Reid had visited. Much like the man who owned the home. In Reid’s opinion, Hugh Barrington loved the idea of being respected, admired, even envied for his position and wealth, but did little to earn it on a personal level.

The man might have been one of Eldridge’s closest advisers and confidants, he might have come to Reid’s defense when suspicion was thrown at him following Andrew’s death, but Hugh Barrington was a hard person to feel any affection or warmth for. Appreciation, maybe. Polite friendliness out of respect for his alliance with and assistance concerning Eldridge, but hardly the sort of Hallmark greeting-card feelings that engendered real esteem. Hugh’s priorities simply seemed oddly skewed. Case in point, his disregard for Penelope, while he fawned—rather obsequiously, in Reid’s opinion—over the Colton family.

“Is there a problem?” Penelope asked in a hushed tone.

He shook himself from his thoughts and caught up to her. “No. Why?”

“You seemed preoccupied and so...serious.” She waved a dismissive hand and gave her head a brisk shake. “Never mind. Come on. That’s his home office.” She aimed her finger down the hall to a door that stood ajar. “The second room on the left.”

He nodded. “After you.”

She balked, and he lifted a corner of his mouth in a wry grin.

“Are you scared to go in there?”

Penelope scowled. “No.” Then after a beat, “Not...really.” But she still made no move to enter Hugh’s study.

“You said you had a right to be here,” he teased.

“I do!” She squared her shoulders, then glared at him. “It was your idea to come here and search!”

“Hey, you called me when you found that file.” He folded his arms over his chest. “Do you really want to stand out here and waste time arguing over who is more responsible for us being here? Or do you want to get in, find the evidence we need to incriminate—”

“Or clear!”

“Or clear him,” he conceded, though he was skeptical. “We should get busy.”

She glanced guiltily at her father’s office door, but straightened her spine and, wiping her hands on her yoga pants, marched into the room.

Reid paused at the threshold of Hugh’s office, taken aback by the contrast of the man’s study to the other parts of the house. As stark and colorless as the entry and living room were, Barrington’s private study was dark with deep browns, crimsons and polished brass. The room reeked of masculinity, right down to the lingering musky scent of Hugh’s overpowering aftershave. The walls were wood paneled and the matching desk, bookcases and file cabinets were made of darkly stained hardwoods. The couch and desk chair were a rich burgundy leather. A slight patina of age dimmed the brass of the grommets on the seat coverings, the furniture hardware and the lampstands. He drew two pairs of latex gloves from his pocket and held one out to her. “Here. Wear these. You may feel you have a legal right to be here, but let’s not leave fingerprints, just in case.”

She eyed the gloves he handed her, then with a furrow of worry denting her brow, she worked her fingers into the latex encasement.

“Look at all this. This could take forever,” she said pulling out a drawer of his filing cabinet.

Reid closed the office door behind him. “If there is information here somewhere that incriminates him, my guess is it won’t be anywhere obvious like a file cabinet or desk drawer.”

She gave him a dubious look. “We’re talking about a man who hasn’t changed his home security code in twenty-five years. He’s smugly overconfident about his security. Andrew tried to talk to him numerous times about safety issues, but he insisted his status quo was good enough.”

Reid nodded. “His hubris may work in our favor. Just the same, check for out-of-the-way cubbyholes. Even an overconfident old-schooler probably has hiding places for sensitive stuff.”

Pen slid closed the file drawer she’d opened and quirked a moue of agreement. “Why not? Andrew had a secret hiding place in our wall I didn’t know about. Why not my father, too?”

Reid’s first task was to boot up Hugh’s desktop computer. He plugged the flash drive into a USB port and rolled the mouse to wake the screen. The computer started up and asked for a password in order to continue. “Any guess what his computer password might be?”

“Try 12-18-46. That’s the house security code.”

Reid arched an eyebrow. “Let me guess. Also his birthday?”

She shot him a deprecating, can-you-believe-it smile.

He tried the numbers. “No dice.”

“Maybe...MavericksFan? No spaces. I think that was the password on the parental-control blocker on our television when I was in high school.” She put a finger to her lips and whispered, “Shh. Don’t tell him I knew it. That’s how I learned he had a Playboy TV subscription.”

“My lips are sealed,” he replied with a chuckle, and typed in MavericksFan. Nothing. Mavericksfan and mavericksfan also failed. So not an issue of capitalization.

“Nada.” Next, he tried Penelope and hit enter.

From behind him, she scoffed. When the error message popped up again, she strolled back to the bookshelves. “I coulda told you that wouldn’t work. Aren’t passwords usually something important to a person?”

The hurt and resentment was back in her voice. He’d never realized how deep her wounds were, how wide the gulf in her estrangement with her father.

Reid scrubbed his face and thought. “Any other suggestions? We’re losing time here.”

“Sorry. No. Not unless it’s something stupid like password or 1234ABCD.”

For good measure, Reid tried both. To Hugh’s credit, neither of those obvious codes worked, but when he tried MavericksFan1, the computer continued to start up and took him to the home screen. “I’m in.” He started opening files and sending documents, internet history and financial data to the flash drive. It was too easy. Reid shook his head and mumbled, “Jeez, and this guy is our family lawyer?”

When they found Eldridge, he’d need to have a talk with father about trusting Hugh with family business. If they found Eldridge.

He pinched the bridge of his nose. No. He couldn’t think that way. He would see to it his father was located and brought home, one way or another.

Pushing back from the desk, he turned his attention to a physical search while Hugh’s computer dumped information onto the flash drive.

He opened a file drawer and felt the underside, scanned the labels of the drawer contents. Across the room, Penelope pulled a painting down from the wall and pushed at the wood paneling behind it. When she found nothing, she rehung the picture and moved on to the next.

Reid watched her for a moment, mesmerized by the way the soft stream of sunlight from the office window made her auburn hair shine with coppery highlights. Her Dallas Cowboys sweatshirt was unflattering, too big for her—probably one of Andrew’s—but her blue yoga pants fit snugly and showed off her shapely bottom and long legs. She moved down the wall to the next painting, checking for a hidden safe, a spot of color in the otherwise darkly masculine room.

A niggling guilt bit him. What right did he have to be ogling his late partner’s wife? Especially when, intentional or not, he’d had a hand in Andrew’s death.

She glanced his way, caught him staring and tilted her head. “What? Did you find something?”

Scrubbing a sobering hand over his face, he turned back to the file cabinet. “No. Just...thinking.”

“Anything you want to share?”

“Not at the moment.” He moved to the next file drawer, found nothing suspicious, and repeated the process, being careful to replace any file he pulled out in the exact manner he found it.

Finding nothing behind the pictures, Penelope moved on to the bookcase, pulling books from the shelves and flipping open the covers of larger books. “I heard about your father, that he’s missing, presumed dead. I’m so sorry.”

Reid paused and jerked his gaze back to her. “So you heard, huh? Guess I shouldn’t be surprised. We’ve tried to keep it out of the news but...”

“Actually, Helen mentioned it when we talked last time. She said they found a burned body in a car they think is your father. She said the house staff has been all abuzz about it and the reports that my father thought he’d seen him before the body was found.”

“Yeah, well, thanks. He is missing, but the burned body they found proved not to be him.”

“Oh!” She flashed an awkward smile. “Good. That’s... I’m glad.”

“Yeah, that was a relief.” Reid didn’t really want to talk about the disappearance of his elderly father. The five months of crazy twists and unexpected turns to his father’s case would take more time than he and Pen had and would only renew his simmering frustration. Still...if it opened a line of communication with Pen, he’d indulge her with the abridged version. “Needless to say, it’s been a stressful few months, and we don’t seem any closer to finding him.”

“The police have no leads?” Pen crossed the floor toward him, her arms folded loosely over her chest. “You’d think, as high profile as his case must be, that there’d be pressure on the cops to find him. To do more. To leave no stone unturned.”

“You’d think. There’s been no shortage of suspects, but nothing that’s been substantiated. A few clues, and numerous theories, but nothing that’s been proven helpful.”

“My father’s sighting—”

“Hasn’t panned out yet. But it’s worth further investigation.” Reid turned to Hugh’s massive desk and began sliding open drawers, searching for a key that might indicate there was a safe in the house or any other indication he’d secreted information somewhere.

She strolled to a window seat and knelt to lift the pillows and the lid of a storage space. “Well, you have my sympathies and prayers that he’ll be found soon and well.”

“Do I?” He paused to study her again, wishing he could get past the distance she’d put between them in the past year.

She sat back on her heels and sent him a puzzled look. “Of course. I may be angry with you, not trust you, feel betrayed by you, but I’m not so uncaring as to wish you or your family ill. I have no grudge against your father.” She dropped her gaze to her lap and frowned. “Not much of one, anyway.” She huffed softly, then added, “But then, my father’s preference of you Coltons over me isn’t your fault, I guess. Coltons are wealthy and powerful clients.” She gave him a bitter smile and waved a dismissive hand. “I’m just family.”

Reid sighed. “Pen—”

More hand waving as she pushed back up on her knees and dug into the window-seat storage again. “No, no. Don’t start. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. My troubles with my father aren’t for you to worry about.”

But he couldn’t write off her feelings of disappointment and jealousy so easily. When Andrew was alive, she’d managed to set aside her feelings toward Reid’s family and enjoy his company at face value. This return of her hostility toward the Coltons showed him just how high the wall she’d built had become. He didn’t want any barriers between them. Especially something he had no control over, like the family he belonged to.

Having the name Colton was a mixed blessing. Along with the prestige, the wealth and the opened doors, his family connection carried a lot of baggage. The Coltons had made enemies in a variety of ways, unintentionally rubbed some people in the community the wrong way, while some folks disliked them simply because of what they represented. They were a part of the infamous 1 percent. The .01 percent even. Not a popular distinction with the other 99.99 percent these days.

“Thank you,” he said quietly, “for your prayers and well wishes. I still have hope he’ll be found. A man like Eldridge Colton doesn’t just disappear without someone knowing something. We just haven’t found that someone yet.” He rubbed a thumb along the beveled edge of Hugh’s desk as he pondered the circumstances surrounding his missing father. “Or we haven’t provided the right incentive to make that someone talk.” He opened a desk drawer and rifled through the files, felt the bottom of the drawer for anything suspicious.

They worked silently for another minute before Pen glanced in his direction. “Do you suspect foul play, or is it possible he left on his own terms, that maybe he doesn’t want to be found?”

Reid twitched a grin. “Yes.”

She frowned at his evasive answer, then shook her head and continued her searching.

“Anything is possible. The truth is we really don’t know.”

Reid looked on the underside of the desk for a file taped to the unfinished wood. Nothing. He gritted his teeth. Hugh Barrington didn’t strike him as the cleverest man. Devious, perhaps. Intelligent, yes. But the man had a twenty-five-year-old passcode on his house security system. Surely Reid could figure out where Hugh might have stashed incriminating information. If there was any to find.

And he believed there was. Because despite how things had gone down in the last months of his time on the police force with Andrew, he trusted his partner’s intuition and insights.

Pen climbed to her feet, abandoning the window seat, and moved down the wall to another bookcase. “But you’re a cop, Reid. Surely you have some gut feeling about what happened to your father. Haven’t you done any investigating on your own?”

He snorted. “I was a cop. I’m not privy to all the details of the case. The family knows some, but not all of what the detectives have learned. They have to keep a few tricks up their sleeve to stay a step ahead.” He moved on to a bottom drawer, big enough for hanging files. The drawer rattled but wouldn’t open. A locked drawer. Not uncommon, all things considered, but...

He felt the underside and checked the smaller top drawers for a key. Nothing. The matching file drawer on the opposite side of the desk slid open easily, and Reid walked his fingers through the contents of the drawer, scanning tab labels. “All that said, I—”

His gaze snagged on a file with the heading Penelope. He stilled, his line of thought forgotten. Furrowing his brow, he pulled out the file and flipped it open. The file was full of legal documents. A few medical records. A picture or two.

The last document was a petition for adoption. Hugh and his wife had signed as the adoptive parents and two names were scribbled on the lines for the birth parents. He blinked and reread the opening lines.

We the undersigned do permanently relinquish all claim and parental rights for our biological child, Lisa Umberton, to Hugh and Constance Barrington of Dallas, Texas...

His breath snagged in his chest, and the thump of his pulse grew in his ears. With fumbling fingers he flipped back to the front of the file to the first documents. A court order to legally change Lisa Umberton’s name to Penelope Lisa Barrington.

“You what?” Penelope prompted, dragging his attention away from the file. Her expression shifted when she glanced at him. “Reid, what’s wrong? Did you find something?”

Uncertainty and shock fisted around his lungs. He swallowed hard and scrubbed his cheek with his palm before stammering, “Uh, no. N-nothing...relevant.”

Did Pen know she was adopted? He thought back through the many meals he’d shared with Andrew and his wife through the years, game-day parties and birthday celebrations. Had she ever mentioned being adopted? She’d talked about how hard her mother’s death had been on her, how distant she felt from Hugh, how alone and out of place she’d felt in the large, sterile home growing up. She talked about her envy of Reid’s large family, how she’d hated being an only child.

But she’d never mentioned adoption.

“Reid,” Pen said, a note of excitement in her tone. “I found a safe.”

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