Snoops in the City (A Romantic Comedy) (29 page)

"You think I told her about your part in that?" She was a good enough actress that she sounded incredulous.

"Didn't you?"

"No! I asked her to meet so I could let her know I wasn't going to tell her anything."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"It's the truth. After what you said this morning, I needed to find out why she wanted you investigated."

"Like you didn't already know."

"I didn't," she said. "Eddie never asked. He just took her money and assigned me the case. I'm not blameless. I should have refused to help, but I didn't know enough about private investigation to realize we should have had her reasons up front. Please, Grady. You've got to believe I'd never do anything to hurt you."

He felt as though hands were around his neck, squeezing the hope from him so he could hardly muster the will to form words. "And here I thought you were paid to follow me and compile information for a client."

She bit her lip, unable to deny it.

"Tell me this, Tori, was sleeping with me part of the assignment?"

"I slept with you because I fell in love with you!" she cried, grabbing the front of his shirt. "I know I should have told you about the investigation before now, but that's the truth."

"You sure as hell should have told me before last night."

"I meant to," she said. "But everything was so perfect I didn't want to ruin it. So I made up my mind to resign from the case first. I couldn't do that until I made sure I hadn't put you in danger."

"Now why am I having such a hard time believing that?"

"I'll tell you why," she said as tears streamed down her face. "Because you're protecting yourself from getting hurt. You want so badly for the world to be a place where the good guys prevail that you're afraid to believe in anything. You won't see with your heart. You only use your eyes."

"So now you're a psychologist," he said contemptuously, prying her fingers from the front of his shirt. "You don't have the right to psychoanalyze me, not after what you did."

"I'm starting to think the worst thing I did was fall in love with a man as intractable as you."

"You keep right on lying, don't you? The next thing I know, you'll be telling me it's not your fault because chronic lying is a disease."

"That's a terrible thing to say."

"I'm not feeling very charitable." He crossed his arms over his chest to keep the ache at bay. "I get that way when I find out the woman I thought I loved has betrayed me."

"Are you saying you don't love me anymore?"

The sun blazed down on her, throwing her tear-streaked face into stark focus. The tortured emotion stamped on her features looked genuine, but he'd already fallen for her act once. He didn't intend to be taken for a fool a second time.

He started to confirm that he no longer loved her but found he couldn't be as hypocritical as she was.

"I'm saying I never want to see you again," he said and walked out of her life, resolutely trying to ignore the pain in his chest.

Fifteen minutes after the Seahaven City Council convened for its bi-monthly meeting, Grady entered the building that served as the center of operations for Lazenby Cosmetics.

Photos of beautiful models wearing Lazenby products adorned the walls.
Wear our products
, their gorgeous smiling faces seemed to say,
and you'll look this way, too
.

Grady determinedly thrust aside the thought that Tori was more beautiful than any of them and focused on his surroundings.

One word — Lazenby — was boldly scrawled on the front wood panel of the reception desk. Behind it sat a receptionist with shockingly short black hair who was as stunning as any of the models in the photos. She looked up expectantly.

"Grady Palmer to see Margo Lazenby," he announced.

She examined a pad in front of her, then gave him a bland smile. "I'm sorry, Mr. Palmer. Mrs. Lazenby doesn't see anyone without an appointment."

At the receptionist's cool, polite professionalism, Grady's estimation of Margo Lazenby raised a notch. She knew enough to let a beautiful woman be the first thing visitors to Lazenby Cosmetics saw, and she'd made sure that woman had a brain.

"I respect that," he said. “Could you please let her know that I'm here anyway?"

"Certainly, sir," she said.

Grady waited while she called upstairs. She nodded as she listened to what was being said on the other end of the line, hung up and smiled at Grady once more.

"If you'll wait by the elevator, Mr. Palmer, Mrs. Lazenby's assistant will be down shortly to escort you upstairs."

He waited, which is what his contact at the FBI had wanted him to do before he contacted Margo Lazenby. Grady’s compromise had been to postpone the confrontation until after the council meeting had started.

He understood the FBI's case would be seriously weakened if the Seahaven City Council didn't award Palmer Construction the contract to build the community center. It was too late now for Margo Lazenby to alert city officials to choose another company.

Of course, if Tori had passed on the information about Operation Citygate, the FBI's case could already be sunk. He swallowed hard at the thought, not wanting to believe she'd betrayed him but unable to give her the benefit of the doubt.

Whatever happened, Grady's role in the sting operation was finally reaching an end. The government had failed to gather any evidence incriminating Honoria Black, but the FBI planned to ask the Grand Jury for indictments on other city officials tomorrow.

The elevator door slid open, revealing a man who looked like he'd been spit polished. His hair was black and as shiny as his black dress shoes. Although it was past five o'clock, his thin, angular face was devoid of even the hint of a shadow. His double-breasted suit, which was obviously expensive, engulfed his thin body.

"I'm Quincy Franklin, assistant to Mrs. Lazenby," he said in a nasal voice more irritating than chalk on a blackboard. "Aunt Margo has entrusted me to see you upstairs, but then she entrusts me with many things."

He kept his skinny index finger pressed on the elevator button as Grady entered the car, surreptitiously checking his reflection in the mirrored paneling.

The elevator had barely risen from the first floor when he presented first the right side of his profile and then the left. "What do you think?"

Grady backed up a step. "Think of what?"

"My makeup. I'm trying to convince Aunt Margo to market cosmetics specifically for men. We could either call the line Lazenby for Men or, better yet, La
men
by. Get it?"

Grady made a noncommittal noise.

"I told Aunt Margo more men wear makeup than she might think, either to hide blemishes or when they're having a bad-face day." He lowered his voice to a whisper. "I think she's weakening."

The elevator stopped at the upper floor. It consisted of another reception counter and more photos of gorgeous women with stunning cheekbones and amazing eyes. If Quincy Franklin manned this station, Grady needed to revise his previous impression about Margo Lazenby's brilliance in surrounding herself with good people.

"Be sure to mention to Aunt Margo that you'd buy the La
men
by products," he told Grady before he opened the door to the inner suite.

Margo Lazenby waited for him off to the side of her desk in a leather sofa in a buttery lemon color. She'd changed from her black ensemble to a sapphire-blue dress that called attention to eyes as blue as his own.

"Aunt Margo, Mr. Palmer is here," Quincy Franklin announced. "And he has something to tell you about La
men
by. He thinks it's a fantastic idea, which isn't surprising because—"

"Thank you, Quincy," she interrupted as she put down her martini glass on a gleaming end table and stood. "You may go now."

"But—"

"I said that will be all, Quincy," she said without looking at him, those strangely familiar blue eyes fastened on Grady.

The click of the door announced her assistant's departure, leaving Grady alone with the woman who claimed to be his grandmother.

"I'm Margo Lazenby." She came across the room and took his hand, holding it while she examined his face. "And I hope like hell you don't really think men should wear makeup."

Grady almost smiled. Almost, not quite. "I don't."

"Thank the heavens." She released his hand and dramatically wiped a hand over her brow. "Would you like a martini? I don't usually drink before six, but your visit has come as quite a shock."

"No, thank you," he said.

She indicated a leather chair that matched her sofa. "Have a seat, then, and tell me what brings you here."

She walked back to the sofa. He held his ground.

"I want to know why you hired Tori Whitley to investigate me," he said, his voice snagging on Tori's name. How long, he wondered, would her deception hurt?

Margo waited until she was settled and the martini glass was once again in her hand before saying, "You're assertive. I like that. Jane — that's what I like to call Tori — says you're also honest and trustworthy. I must say, though, I'm disappointed in her for telling you my name."

"She didn't tell me," he said, compelled to protect Tori and angry at himself because of that. "I followed her and had your license plate run."

"You're clever, too. You don't know how much that gladdens me. Quincy's a boob, which is why I'm glad you met him."

"I don't see how that concerns me."

"It will help you understand why I wanted to make contact with you."

"I don't follow."

"Sit down and I'll tell you."

"I'd rather stand."

"Very well.” She took a sip of her drink. "A few months ago, I had a heart-attack scare. It turned out to be heartburn, but it got me to thinking about my mortality. I can pass for sixty, but I'm seventy-one. If I died tomorrow, Quincy would inherit my company."

"What does that have to do with me?"

"Oh, come now. We've established that you're a bright man. Surely you know I'm your grandmother."

Hearing her state their relationship aloud jolted him. Grady strived not to show it. "So you say."

"So I know, and you do too. We look alike. Quincy's related to me by marriage. You're related by blood."

"Where are you going with this?"

"I'll get to that in due time." She crossed one elegant leg over the other. "Your mother's name was Melanie. She was my only child, and I wanted the best of everything for her. She was smart but defiant and very beautiful. Lazenby was already a force in the cosmetics industry, and I was grooming her to eventually take over the company. Then she got pregnant with you."

Grady stiffened, not sure he wanted to hear the rest of the story but unable to object.

"Melanie was dating a man I disliked. I thought he had no ambition or drive. She said she loved him. She caved soon enough when I threatened to cut her off if she didn't give you up for adoption. I stipulated she couldn't tell her boyfriend about you." She stated the facts without emotion.

Grady winced. "How could you do something like that?"

"I thought it was for the best at the time. Now I see I preyed on Melanie's weakness." Margo sighed, and Grady saw that she wasn't as unemotional about the terrible thing she'd done as she appeared. "She was a child of privilege. She couldn't bear the thought of doing without."

"What happened to her?"

"That's the ironic thing. About five years after you were born, she was dating a wealthy Boca Raton entrepreneur I approved of without reservation. He was rich, handsome and ambitious. I didn't know he was also reckless until he crashed his private plane with my daughter as a passenger."

A lump formed in Grady's throat. He walked to the armchair and sank into it, grieving the mother he’d never know. After a moment, he managed to ask, "Why look me up now? Why not then?"

"I was still under the delusion that I'd done the right thing. And I still had my husband. Harry didn't have a head for business, but I loved him. And he loved me."

Her eyes filled with tears, and she wiped moisture from under them with the pad of her thumb before gathering herself once again.

"After Harry died two years ago, it occurred to me I was all alone. Harry and Melanie were gone, and I effectively sent you away before you were born. Except you were out there somewhere. All I needed to do was find you.

"I got your name and address without much trouble. But I'm a cautious woman. Before I let you into my life, and possibly my will, I wanted to know what kind of man you were. That's why I hired Sassenbury Investigations."

"I don't want your money."

"I wouldn't give it to you if you did. There's plenty of time to talk about that later. For now, I'm wondering if you'd give me something else: Your company. And, maybe one day, your forgiveness."

He considered her request. "After what you did, why should I agree to that?"