her long blond hair worn in twin braids. Oddly enough, in all this time he hadn’t run into her in town. He supposed he might have seen her from a distance, but couldn’t say for certain. He’d never been one to pay that much attention to the Colton family’s coming and goings. Those folks operated on a different plane than the rest of town.
Despite the overcast morning, the unseasonably warm temperature enabled him not only to go without a jacket, but to wear short sleeves. Texas weather, always unpredictable. Eighty degrees one day, a hard freeze the next. As far as Cord was concerned, he preferred heat over cold.
Driving out to the flea market, he realized Piper hadn’t been exaggerating when she talked of the crowds. A mile from the flea market and he sat in a traffic jam that rivaled Dallas’s early morning rush hour.
Finally, he spotted a parking lot with openings. Handing over his ten dollar fee, he parked his truck. Now to find Piper Colton and talk her into returning home.
Long lines formed at the entrance. Realizing people were waiting to purchase tickets to get in, he muttered a curse. Whoever heard of paying admission to an oversize garage sale, which was all a flea market was as far as he was concerned.
Bypassing the lines earned him several frowns and glares. He ignored this, scanning the crowd for a woman in a yellow shirt.
Of course, there were several. The first, he discounted immediately as she had to be at least eighty. The next could be the right age, but she had three kids in tow.
And then he saw her. Piper Colton. Slender and beautiful and much sexier than he’d expected. She stood tall and confident, occasionally glancing up from her phone before returning her attention back to it. Though still athletic, she had curves in all the right places. She’d cut her blond hair short and tipped the spiky ends with hot pink, giving her an edgy look that he found erotic as hell. The stylish cut went well with her heart-shaped face, showing off her high cheekbones and making her green eyes appear huge, despite the large black eyeglasses she wore.
The pale yellow of her T-shirt made him smile. He’d pictured lemon yellow, not this watered down version that suited her coloring so well.
Striding toward her, he kept that smile on his face. She looked up, met his gaze, and he felt his entire world shift on its axis.
What the hell? Pushing away the momentary sense of disorientation, he held out his hand. “Cord Maxwell,” he said quietly.
“Pleased to meet you.” Though she slid her fingers into his and shook his hand, he noticed she didn’t offer her name. The fleeting firmness of her cool grip on his fingers pleased him. There was nothing tentative in this woman, which was good. She’d need all of her strength to face the days ahead.
“I need your assistance,” she began. “As I’m sure you’ve probably heard, my adoptive father has disappeared. Since you’re a private investigator, I want to hire you to help me find out who kidnapped him and where he is.”
Though he tried, he couldn’t quite contain his shock.
“What’d you think I wanted?” she asked, her dry tone warring with her serious expression.
He gave her the truth. “I thought you might ask me to help you find information to beat the murder charge.”
A subtle flash in her eyes before she looked down. Anger? Resignation? Maybe both. “You know about that.”
“Yes.” Debating if now would be the right time, he exhaled and went with it. “Your brother Fowler paid me a visit.”
A combination of distaste and pain reflexed back at him in her expressive eyes. “What did Fowler want?”
“He hired me to find you.”
She froze. “Do you think you might have mentioned that when I first contacted you?”
“I thought maybe we could talk first.”
Barely had he gotten the words out when she spun to take off. He grabbed her arm. “Wait...”
“Let me go or I’ll scream.” She spoke through clenched teeth.
“Please. Hear me out.”
“Release. My. Arm.” She spat. “You’re hurting me.”
That last did it. Even though he doubted his tight grip was painful, he let her go.
Of course she took off. A fast walk, then a jog. He hurried along right behind her. No one in the crowd waiting in line to enter the flea market paid them any attention—if they did, Cord figured they’d assume a lovers’ spat.
Piper’s jog became an all-out sprint. As he did the same, he couldn’t help but feel proud of her. She had no way to know he ran every morning. Or that he’d completed many marathons, too many to count.
Instead of catching her, he kept pace with her, keeping a few feet away. When she reached a white BMW, evidently her vehicle, she stopped and fumbled in her small shoulder bag for a key.
He made his move, stepping between her and the driver’s side door. “Ten minutes,” he said. “Just give me ten minutes of your time. I just want to talk.”
Gaze raking over him, she shoved her glasses back up on her nose and considered. “I don’t see what good that will do. If you’re working for Fowler, you can’t help me. Conflict of interest and all that.”
“Maybe I can do both,” he said. This got her attention.
“Fine. Ten minutes.” Unlocking her car, she gestured at him to get in. “Start talking.”
As he folded himself into the passenger seat, he realized she smelled like peaches. Which made him think of summer, his favorite time of the year. Biting into a plump, ripe peach with the juice running down his chin. And she, completely unaware of her appeal, eyed him with skepticism plain in every tense line of her body.
“I believe you,” he told her. “I remember when we were kids on the ranch. You wouldn’t even kill a bug.”
She nodded, but didn’t speak.
Neither did he. He could wait her out. Sam had drilled into him how patience solved more cases than anything else.
“But?” she finally prompted.
He hid his rueful smile. “When’s your court date?”
“I have no idea. My sister said she was told I’d get notice in the mail. She is going to hire an attorney to represent me.”
“Fowler said to tell you he’ll pay all your legal fees.” Might as well put that out there.
Her lovely eyes narrowed. “Why would he want to do that? He and Marceline made it clear they think I’m guilty.”
“I think Fowler feels bad. He paid me a lot of money to find you and bring you back home.”
Her pointed look told him what she thought about that. “And that’s your cue to get out of my car.”
“My ten minutes aren’t up yet,” he protested, keeping his tone
