Marie Ferrarella - The Coltons - Nick, Clay & Jericho

Damn, there it went again, that blaze that he seemed to be able to ignite within her. She should be sated, for heaven’s sake, and yet, she wanted more. She wanted to take another wild ride before the night was over. What had come over her?

“Are you starting up again?” she asked, turning her body to his. And then she smiled before he could answer—because another part of his body had answered her question for him. The smile entered her eyes and seemed to simply glow everywhere. “I guess so.”

Damn but she was beautiful, he thought. “Anybody ever tell you you talk too much?”

She seemed to roll his question over in her mind, her smile widening as she did so, pulling him in. “You wouldn’t be the first.”

“I didn’t think so.” But something inside of him, as he brought his mouth down to hers again, whispered that he wanted to be the last. And telling Georgie she talked too much had nothing to do with it.

Chapter 11

In order to keep his word and satisfy Emmie, who popped up like toast the next morning to remind him of his promise to “make everything right for Mama,” Nick spent the first part of his morning at Georgie’s computer, tracking down all the charges incurred on her credit cards. Just to play it safe, armed with the user names and passwords Steve had sent him, Nick decided to go back over the last five months.

One by one, he secured the information, then printed it out for her. When he had the charges in a rather overwhelming stack, he gave the pages to her and left it up to Georgie to decipher, separating the piles into charges she had run up and the ones that could be attributed to the “Georgie” doppelganger.

Having lived up to his part of the bargain, Nick got down to his real work. He decided that it might be advantageous to find out as much as he could about the man who had fathered Georgie and her brothers, the mysterious and, from what he’d gathered, self-centered Graham Colton.

It took some digging at first, but once he had some key pieces of information to work with, the rest came more easily.

An hour after he’d gotten started, hopping from screen to screen and from site to site, he found himself staring at the information the winding trail had brought him to. And discovering something he would have rather not found out.

Because what he’d found out unearthed another battery of questions and, more importantly, doubts.

Away from Georgie and the attraction he experienced whenever he was within ten feet of her, Nick felt uncertainty taking root again.

Had he been played?

Or was there some outside chance that she actually didn’t know that her father, Graham Colton, was the Senator’s younger brother? After all, not even he had known that the Senator had a younger brother, much less what his name was.

But then, Graham Colton wasn’t his father. Wouldn’t Georgie have connected the dots? Or was politics something she blocked out, the way so many other people did? After all, it wasn’t as if Graham Colton had been a doting father. All the evidence he’d come across so far pointed to the fact that he’d been, probably still was, a womanizing, narcissistic, greedy scum. In Georgie’s place, he wouldn’t have wanted to have anything to do with the man either. But did not wanting contact mean ignorance of his family background?

He wasn’t sure.

With a sigh, Nick stretched out his legs beneath the table, debating his next move. What he’d just found out wasn’t something he could keep to himself.

But if he told Georgie, one of two things could happen. If she didn’t know, this would be a hell of a shock for her. And if she did know and had lied to him, he wasn’t certain how he’d deal with that particular scenario.

He supposed that he could hold off telling her. There was time enough to discover whether he’d made love with an innocent or a scheming witch. He’d just begun to entertain illusions, he didn’t want to have to risk losing them already.

There was one person he did have to tell. The one person who deserved to be apprised of anything he found out as soon as possible.

Nick shifted in his chair, sitting up straight again as he took his cell phone out of his pocket. He pressed the single button that would connect him to the Senator’s private cell.

Waiting, Nick counted off four rings before he heard the sound of a phone coming to life on the other end of the line. A dynamic, resonant voice said, “Hello?”

Even the man’s voice inspired him with confidence, Nick thought. “Senator Colton, this is Nick Sheffield.”

“Nick.” Pleasure flooded the Senator’s voice. “I was just wondering when I’d be hearing from you. I was beginning to get concerned that you decided to forget about the campaign and just settle in.” There was almost a wistful note in his tone. “Awfully pretty country down there.”

“If you like the rustic life,” Nick responded, not quite able to get himself to agree to the Senator’s assessment. He was just not the rural type. Nick was fairly certain that his voice gave him away on that count. “I’m calling because I found where the e-mails were coming from.”

The Senator immediately heard what wasn’t being said. “But not the person sending them?”

No doubt about it, Nick thought. The Senator was quick on the uptake. “Well, there seems to be some doubt about it,” he told the man. “The woman whose computer was used to send the e-mails was out of town during the period of time we’ve blocked off.”

“Is someone else in the family doing the sending, then?”

“I’m looking into that,” Nick told the man. Uncomfortable with what he was about to say, he shifted in his seat. “Senator, there’s something else.”

“Go on.”

There was no easy way to say this. Since the Senator didn’t talk about his brother, Nick assumed that there was bad blood between them. Or hard feelings. The Senator was a successful, powerful, well-liked man. Maybe his brother, who hadn’t seemed to have amounted to very much in his lifetime, was resentful of his success. “The woman’s last name’s Colton. Graham Colton’s her father.”

“It was Georgie’s computer that was being used to send the e-mails?” Joe asked, surprised.

So much for catching the man off guard. But then, that was part of what he admired about the Senator. The man was as savvy as they came and literally seemed to be on top of everything. No one had ever managed to catch him sleeping.

“You know about her, sir?”

“Yes. And about her brothers, Clay and Ryder, as well. I know all about my brother’s other family, Nick.” Nick thought he heard a stifled sigh on the other end. “Proud woman, Mary Lynn. After Graham had deserted her, I tried to give her money but she refused to accept my help.”

Nick wondered if the Senator had kept tabs on the family through the years. “She’s dead, sir, according to the daughter.”

“Yes, I know. Terrible shame. Graham loved her in his own way. Probably the one actual love of his life,” he speculated. “Unfortunately, he loved his wife’s money more.” Nick heard the Senator sigh on the other end. “Don’t waste your time with Georgie. She wouldn’t have sent the letters or the e-mails. She’s just like her mother, proud and filled to the brim with integrity.”

He’d had no personal dealings with the young woman, but nonetheless, he had kept tabs on her. After all, she was family. It wasn’t her fault that her father had turned out to be so shallow.

The Senator’s tone changed. “Listen, since you’re down there, I was wondering if you might do me a favor and look in on a Jewel Mayfair. She runs a branch of the Hopechest Ranch. A foundation that, as you know,” he added quickly, “is near and dear to Meredith’s heart. My wife’s afraid that Jewel might not be quite up to all the challenges running something of that nature entails. Let me give you Jewel’s number,” Joe offered.