Twice Kissed - Lisa Jackson [110]
Another jab of guilt. Dean’s parents were aging, his father recently confined to a nursing home, his mother living close to Jim and Connie. The only McCrae standing in the way of Jim inheriting all his family’s wealth was Becca.
“But if you don’t want her to see a specialist…” The innuendo was impossible to ignore. Once again, without saying a word, Connie was implying that Maggie put her own needs over those of her child.
“Just have Becca call me, okay?” Maggie couldn’t get off the phone fast enough. She gave Connie the number of the hotel and replaced the receiver. She’d been dealt a deck of grief from Dean’s family in the past; she didn’t need any more now. Even if Connie’s intentions were good, they were certainly misguided. The sooner Maggie found Mary Theresa and got this mess behind her and returned to her home in Idaho, the better.
And what if you don’t? What if you can’t find Mary Theresa? What if she really is dead? Or kidnapped by some lunatic? It happens to women all the time especially famous ones.
Her heart sank, and depression nagged at the edges of her consciousness. Suddenly, everything seemed impossible.
Thane rapped on the French doors separating her bedroom from the living area of the suite, then poked his head in. “I don’t know about you, but I’m starved.”
“Me too,” she admitted, needing to clear her head from the snare of her dark thoughts. “I’ll be ready in ten minutes.”
“Fine.”
She threw herself together, put on black slacks only slightly the worse for wear from being packed in her bag, a cream-colored angora sweater, black belt, and shoes. Touching up makeup that needed major repair, she settled on a fresh swipe of lipstick, a little mascara, and blush, then gave up. Her hair was unruly, she hadn’t packed any jewelry, and she didn’t much care. She wasn’t in Denver for dinner dates with Thane or anyone else; she was here with a purpose.
“Good enough,” she told her reflection, and ignored the lines of worry at the corners of her eyes. Grabbing her purse, she hurried into the living room and found Thane, in dark slacks and a long-sleeved shirt, pacing in front of the small couch. He looked up at her entrance and a smile tugged at one side of his mouth. “You clean up nice, Ms. McCrae,” he said.
“Ditto.”
They were out the door and down the elevator without much ado, and a maître d’ seated them at a corner table in a dining room divided by dark wooden panels topped with beveled-glass windows that glittered seductively in the glow of dozens of candles.
Thane recommended prime rib, Maggie ordered brook trout, and they sipped wine as the courses came and went. Small talk was the order of the day, and they spent some time eyeing the other patrons, wondering if any of them were part of the people who had been following them. “It’s weird,” she admitted, feeling warm inside from her second glass of Chardonnay.
“What is?”
“This whole case, if that’s what you want to call it. Mary Theresa’s disappearance and now being here with you. I just never would have expected it to happen.” She looked up at him for a split second, then glanced away, afraid she might get lost in the intensity of his gaze. “As I said, weird.”
“Could be fate.”
She nearly laughed. Thane Walker believing in kismet. That would be the day. “Sure.” She took a swallow of wine and winked mischievously. “That’s what it is.” She noticed a few of the patrons at nearby tables turn to look at her, their expressions puzzled as they talked to the other members of their party.
“They think you’re Marquise,” Thane said, as if reading her mind. “But they’re not sure, and if you are, then why haven’t the newspapers and television stations reported the fact that you’re alive and well? Why aren’t you hosting Denver AM with Craig Beaumont?”
“I know,” she admitted, and the seed of an idea that had been planted in her brain while she was searching through Mary Theresa’s house started to sprout. “Why aren’t I?”
“What?”
“Why aren’t I Mary Theresa?”
Thane’s expression changed, his smile fading.