Page 34 of The Unknown Colton
Troy nodded. “Yeah…”
“Yeah?” Was that really the reason?
But Troy slipped out of the office before Mitch could question him further.
And the lawyer wondered. Was there another reason that Troy was worried about Lakin? Another reason that meant Mitch should be worried about her, too?
CHAPTER 10
Afew days had passed since Jasper Whitlaw had given Lakin the photograph that she stared at while sitting at her desk in the RTA office. She hadn’t told anyone but Troy about it yet. He’d wanted to bring Jasper Whitlaw up to Bobby Reynolds, but she’d made Troy promise to keep all of that quiet until she found a way to tell her parents.
Lakin didn’t want to upset them more than they already were about the recent murders. They were already worried enough about her. They kept calling to try to get her to stay with them. But after knowing that someone had probably followed her to their house the other night, she was determined to stay away. She didn’t want to put either of them in danger if she was.
But why would she be? It didn’t make any sense that someone would want to hurt her. Or want anything from her.
What did Jasper Whitlaw want?
Troy was convinced that the man had an agenda for seeking her out. He was even more worried abouther than her parents were. He’d insisted on staying with her, but he’d moved back to the couch, telling her that he didn’t want to chase her from her own bed like he had the other night. After they’d made love…
That had been a mistake. Making love with him again hadn’t brought her closer to him but had somehow highlighted the distance between them.
Usually after they made love, they would cuddle and discuss the future, making plans. But Troy clearly didn’t want to talk about the future at all.
Maybe that was just because of the uncertainty over his injury. But he was going to physical therapy; he seemed to be getting better. Still, he didn’t talk to her about the hotel or ask if she’d gotten the business loan yet. He didn’t seem any more interested in their future than in getting back into her bed.
Maybe he’d thought it was a mistake, too. And maybe not just making love but their whole relationship.
She wasn’t sure now if they had a future together. The doubts churned in her stomach, making her queasy despite the fact she hadn’t even had any coffee lately. After losing her mugs off the roof of the SUV, she hadn’t gone back to Roasters. She hadn’t wanted to risk running into Jasper Whitlaw there again.
But when she looked up from her desk, she found him standing over her. His sudden appearance startled her for a number of reasons, not least of which was that she’d thought she was alone in the office.Spence and Parker had left some time ago to lead hiking and fishing tours respectively. She must have been so lost in her thoughts that she hadn’t noticed him open the door and walk into the building.
“So you haven’t lost my number,” Whitlaw remarked, his dark eyes cold as he stared down at her.
She suddenly felt too choked to speak, like something was clogging her throat. She hadn’t even considered calling him over the past few days, not with what had happened to Troy and his suspicions about Jasper Whitlaw barging into her life. She wanted him to be wrong about the man, but…
She couldn’t bring herself to trust him, either, let alone believe anything he told her. While she wanted to know more about her past and the woman in that photograph with her, she had a feeling Whitlaw might not tell her the truth. Besides, learning more about her genetics didn’t seem to matter much right now when she wasn’t sure she and Troy had a future together, much less a future family.
“Why haven’t you called me, little girl?” he asked. “Don’t you care where you came from? Or do you think you’re too good for me because you’re a Colton now?”
She cleared her throat of the fear and dread that had caused it to clog. That fear wasn’t for herself now. “What do you know about the Coltons?” she asked.
Whitlaw smirked. “More than you probably think I know. Probably more than a lot of people in this town know about them.”
About the tragedy that had brought them here to start a new life in Shelby? Was that what he was alluding to? And how would he know about that?
She jumped up from her desk, sending her chair rolling across the polished concrete floor. “Stay away from them,” she said.
The older man snorted. “Why? Don’t you want them to know that your daddy’s come back for you?”
“I’m not a little girl anymore,” she said.
His beady gaze flicked over her in a way that a father should never look at his daughter. “You look so damn much like her…”
“Where is she?” she asked, wondering about her biological mother.
“If you’d called me, I might have told you,” he said. “But I’ve been sitting around this crappy town waiting for my phone to ring, and I’m not feeling quite so talkative anymore.”
“What do you want?” she asked. She was pretty sure that Troy was right now. Her father, or whoever this man was, hadn’t reached out to her because he cared about her. He didn’t even know her.
