is teeming with works of art,” he explained. “The people who come through those halls are almost anesthetized, accustomed to seeing the greats and near greats at every turn they take, every hall they walk through. I think my collection would be better appreciated displayed in a smaller venue. Someplace that isn’t quite as overwhelming.” His eyes met hers. “If you get my thinking.”
“I do,” she told him.
She was trying to play it cool, but she had to admit to herself that she was growing progressively more excited, with each passing moment, about the possibilities this man whose path she had crossed represented to her. To the art museum where she worked. She’d certainly had her share of bad luck, but this had to fall under the heading of the most fortuitous meeting she’d ever had.
Deciding to stop being so morbidly cautious, Leonor broached the subject of where she worked to him to see his reaction.
“You know, I work for an art museum.”
She expected him to look delighted, or at least extremely pleased. She hadn’t expected him to look disappointed—in her.
“Now you’re just having fun at my expense, Ms. Colton.”
“No, really, I work at an art museum,” Leonor assured him. “And please, call me Leonor. When you say ‘Ms. Colton,’ I expect to turn around and see my mother standing there.”
“All right,” he agreed, then tried her name out on his tongue. “Leonor.” It seemed to all but float between them. And then he got back to the subject under discussion. “I looked this town up before I came here. I don’t recall reading that there was an art museum in the vicinity. So, unless that guidebook is out-of-date—”
“It’s not,” she admitted. “You didn’t read anything about there being an art museum in Shadow Creek is because there isn’t one.”
Josh shook his head, his rather long dark brown hair moving ever so slightly. “I’m afraid you lost me. I thought you just told me that you worked for an art museum—”
“I do, but I don’t work here,” Leonor clarified before he could get any further. “I work for an art museum in Austin.”
“A museum, not a gallery?” he specified, watching her face intently.
She was beginning to think that a lot of people had tried to put one over on this man at one time or another. He came across as smooth, gregarious and charming, but at the same time he seemed rather subtly alert, as if he was waiting for things to go wrong before they eventually went right.
“It’s an art museum,” she assured him. “It’s not as large as some of the other ones in, say, the bigger cities like Los Angeles, and certainly nothing like the Museum of Modern Art in New York,” she allowed. Leonor looked down at the five photographs again. They were all truly beautiful works of art. “But we have several respectable collections on the premises, and I guarantee that we would do your collection complete justice if you wound up deciding that you wanted to display the paintings at our museum.”
He nodded thoughtfully, appearing to carefully consider her words. “I’d have to think about it,” he told her.
She’d expected nothing less and would have been suspicious if he had said otherwise. “Of course, I understand.”
“Meanwhile, I do have to eat,” he said matter-of-factly. “And a bread stick only goes so far.” He looked around the premises. “Tell me, does the server ever come back after she brings over the lemonade or are we supposed to just fill up on bread sticks? Because, if that’s the case, she’s going to have to come back with more bread sticks.”
“She’s supposed to come back,” Leonor told him.
Scanning the area, she spotted the young woman who had brought over their lemonades. She appeared to be talking to the two men who were seated at another table across the way. It didn’t look as if order-taking was involved.
Leonor was eager to be accommodating—yes, this man she was sharing a table with could still be a fraud, but if he wasn’t, the museum where she worked stood to gain a lot if Josh Pendergrass was kept happy.
As long as all it takes is a full stomach, she silently qualified.
Because if it took anything else, or if this was a case of something else being involved other than an art collector looking for a venue to display his collection, then she wasn’t interested in keeping this man content, no matter how exceptionally good-looking he was.
A good-looking man was why she had come home to regroup in the first place. Maybe if David hadn’t been as handsome or as charming as he was, she would have seen through his ruse a lot sooner and been spared a lot of heartache.
Well, she was never going to be that blind again, Leonor promised herself.
But she was just as determined not to allow what David had done to jade her or color the way she looked at things. That, she knew, would be as much of a tragedy as her running blindly toward making another really stupid mistake.
Catching the server’s eye, the next moment Leonor stood up. Raising her voice only slightly, she informed the young woman, “We’re ready to order now.”
The server looked only moderately embarrassed to have to be summoned this way. She quickly approached their table.
“Very good, Ms. Colton,” the young woman said.
Josh pretended to look at her with a measure of surprise. “So that really is your name?” he asked, taking the server as the final authority on the matter.
Why would he think that she had lied to him earlier? What was the point of admitting that she was part of a family that had the stain of infamy on it if she didn’t have to?
“Yes, Colton really is my name,” she answered Josh, and for the first time in a long while, she didn’t sigh as she said it.
“Well, you certainly look happy,” Mac said when she walked into the ranch house almost four hours later.
It was good to see her like this, the rancher thought. She’d been through a lot. More than her share. It was time for her to find something to smile about.
He crossed over to her. “I’m guessing that taking my advice turned out well for you.”
Leonor nodded. Since the outing had been his idea, she’d chosen to come into Mac’s house when she got back from town instead of going straight to the apartment over the stables.
Kicking off her shoes, she sank down on the sofa. It creaked slightly, like an old friend murmuring a familiar greeting as her body settled back against the creased leather.
“You were right, Mac,” she freely admitted. “It felt good to get out. And, surprisingly enough,” she added with a self-effacing smile, “no one felt compelled to throw rocks at me.”
That came as no surprise to him. “You were always the nice one, little girl,” Mac told her. “Nobody would throw rocks at you—any more than they’d throw rocks at
