Eye of the Beholder (12 page)

He smiled slightly. “I've got a feeling that it will take a little longer than that. But I can at least get started on the problem. We'll go to the country club, if that's all right with you.”

“I'm not a member of the club.”

“I am. The hotel has a corporate membership and guest privileges.”

“Oh.”

He watched her very steadily. “Is that a yes or a no?”

“I'm thinking about it.”

“I was under the impression that you wanted to keep tabs on my every move while I'm here in Avalon.”

“You mean you're
going to take me out to dinner and tell me all the details of your paranoid conspiracy theories?”

“Depends on how good a listener you are.”

Alexa took a deep breath. “Well, okay. I guess.”

“I like enthusiasm in a woman.” He inclined his head with mocking grace. “I'll pick you up at seven-thirty.”

He turned on his heel and walked toward the door.

“Hold it.” She met his eyes across the top of the King Tut mask. “Mind if I ask why?”

“I told you that I came back to Avalon to make some waves. I can't think of a better way to start than to have the country club crowd see me having dinner with Lloyd Kenyon's stepdaughter.”

She froze. “You intend to use
me
to stir up trouble?”

His mouth curved in a small, grim smile. “In exchange, you'll be in an ideal position to know exactly what trouble I manage to stir up.”

“What makes you think that taking me out to dinner at the country club will give you the kind of results you want?”

His eyes glinted with amusement. “Avalon may have become trendy in the past few years, but at its heart it's still a very small town. That means it runs on gossip, rumors, and speculation.”

She watched him uneasily. “How will stirring up a lot of wild speculation help your so-called investigation?”

“I'm here to find some answers. It's been my experience that there's nothing like a lot of rumors and gossip flying around to make people talk.”

“That's what you want?”
She stared at him. “To make people gossip about the past?”

“Gotta start somewhere.”

“I keep telling you, there is nothing sinister to uncover.”

“In which case, you'll get a free dinner out of the deal.”

Trask went out the door.

Through the front window, Alexa watched him walk back down the terra cotta path toward the parking lot.

Unsettling though it was to know that he had invited her out to dinner solely to roil the seas of old gossip, there was an even more unpleasant possibility.

Maybe Trask had invited her out to dinner in order to pump her for information on Lloyd. What better way to dig up inside data about one of his father's ex-partners than by dating said ex-partner's stepdaughter?

Any way you looked at it, dinner with Trask was a dangerous proposition.

It occurred to her that his scheme was potentially a double-edged sword. There was, after all, nothing to stop her from using the dinner invitation to do a bit of pumping herself. The more she knew about Trask and his plans for vengeance, the better positioned she would be to protect Lloyd.

Her stomach suddenly felt disconcertingly weightless. She wondered if her former therapist, Dr. Ormiston, would approve of her new, high-risk lifestyle.

11
 

The trip across the candlelit restaurant proved to be the longest trek Alexa had made since the day she walked out of the McClelland Gallery for the last time. The sudden hush that had fallen when Trask had escorted her through the doors of the Red Canyon Country Club soon gave way to a buzz of conversation that was just a bit too loud to be natural.

She glanced at Trask as the waiter pulled out her chair. The cool amusement in his eyes told her that, unlike her, he had been fully prepared for the reaction to their presence in the club.

This new, reckless approach to life might be all very well, she thought, but it was possible that she was playing out of her league. She probably stood a better chance of having an out-of-body experience during a Dimensions Institute seminar than she did of tricking Trask into spilling his dark secrets.

“Don't let it get to you,” Trask said as he opened the tasseled menu. “It's why we're here, remember?”

She leaned forward slightly and lowered her voice. “You knew it would be like this, didn't you?”

He looked up. “Do you want to go somewhere else?”

It was a direct challenge, one she could not ignore. She straightened her shoulders and picked up the menu as though it were a gauntlet.

“No, of course not,” she said, trying to focus on the appetizers. “It would only make things worse if we got up and left now.”

“You're right,” he said. “Trust me, the best way to handle this kind of scene is to ignore it.”

“I know.” She thought about the grim days after the McClelland affair, when she had been the subject of every speculative tongue in the Southwest art world. “I have, as the saying goes, been here and done this before. I had rather hoped not to repeat the experience, however.”

He smiled faintly. “If it's any consolation, most of the people who recognized us when we walked in a few minutes ago are probably genuinely concerned about you.”

“Me?”

His eyes did not leave her face. “I'm sure they're all wondering if I'm dating you because I've got some diabolical scheme to use you against Kenyon.”

She held his gaze. “Do you?”

His smile took on a thin, lethal edge. “What do you think?”

Folks who courted risks were supposed to be cool types, she reminded herself. “Let's just say I'm reserving judgment.”

“Hard to go wrong that way.”

“You sound as if you don't approve of that approach.”

“I was thinking that
our relationship would function as a partnership,” he said with a considering expression. “I was hoping for a measure of trust between us.”

“Trust?” She gave him amused disdain. “Don't talk to me about trust. You don't trust me any farther than you can throw me. You're still waiting for the reviews of your new art collection to hit before you decide whether or not I've defrauded you, remember?”

There was a beat of silence.

“You've made your point,” Trask said finally.

“Good.” It was a small victory, but, she discovered, a heady one. It emboldened her. “By the way, you may be wrong.”

One dark brow climbed. “About what?”

“About the possibility that everyone here tonight is concerned with your intentions toward me. I suspect that quite a few people may be wondering if I'm with you because I've got a deep, dark scheme of my own.”

His eyes gleamed. “Did you agree to go out with me in order to seduce me into agreeing to abandon my plans?”

She felt herself turn very warm and was suddenly grateful for the low light level in the restaurant. “What do you think?”

“I think it might be interesting from my point of view, but not particularly effective from yours.”

She closed the menu with a smart snap. “Okay, we'll take it as a given that I can't talk any sense into you. I can promise you that I'm not going to give
you any inside information that concerns Lloyd Kenyon, either. Guess we're even, hmm?”

“Sort of limits the scope of the conversation, doesn't it?”

“Yes, it does.” She gave him another cool smile. “So what are we going to talk about?”

“Us?”

The suggestion caught her completely off guard. “Us?”

“Why not?”

“Uh…”

“We'll stick to strictly neutral territory.”

“Well…”

The return of the waiter rescued her from having to come up with something more intelligent. Unfortunately, the reprieve did not last long. When they were alone again, Trask looked at her.

“Let's get the basics out of the way,” he said. “I'm not married and neither are you.”

She stared at him. “How do you know that I'm not married?”

He flicked a glance at her left hand. “My first clue is that you don't wear a wedding ring. Just to be on the safe side, I asked around.”

“You asked around? About
me?”

“Don't worry, I was discreet. Now, moving right along—”

“Stop right there.” She eyed him narrowly. “What do you mean, you were discreet?”

“Don't go getting paranoid. It was just a simple precaution.”

“A precaution?”

He watched her very steadily. “I don't date married women.”

“I see.”
She wanted to accuse him of something, but she was not sure what. She could hardly fault him for his policy.

“Are you going to tell me that you didn't know whether or not I was married when you accepted my invitation?” he asked.

She hesitated and then shrugged lightly. “I'm aware that you're divorced.”

“Who was your source?” he asked very casually.

“Edward Vale mentioned it in passing.”

Trask nodded. “Fair enough. As I said, moving right along, care to tell me why?”

“Why what?”

“Why you're still single?”

She summoned up a breezy little smile. “It's a matter of opinion. My therapist, Dr. Ormiston, whom I saw for two whole months, told me that I'm not very good at commitments. She said that I'm overly cautious and risk-averse, especially where men are concerned.”

“Risk-averse?”

“Uh-huh. Means I'm afraid to allow myself to be vulnerable. A result of having had an unreliable father.”

“Ah.” Trask nodded wisely. “Risk-averse. Got it. What did you say when she came up with her diagnosis?”

“I told her that I just hadn't met the right man yet.”

“I see.” He eyed her with a considering gaze. “Which opinion is the correct one? Yours or Dr. Ormiston's?”

“Danged if I know.” Alexa decided it was time to turn the tables. “Why did your wife leave you?”

“Let me see.”
He looked briefly thoughtful. “As I recall, she said that I was obsessed with building an empire, that I didn't understand her needs, and that I failed to share my deepest feelings.”

Alexa cleared her throat. “But other than that it seemed like a pretty good marriage?”

“Yeah. But I didn't have much to compare it with.”

“Was any of it true? The empire building and the failure to communicate, etc., etc.?”

“Probably. But personally, I think the real reason she walked out was that she never really forgave me for insisting on a prenuptial contract.”

Alexa slowly lowered the chunk of bread she had been about to put into her mouth. “I see.”

“She left me for a software zillionnaire from Seattle who retired at forty and bought a house in the South of France. She said that he might be a nerd, but he was more of a romantic than I would ever be.”

“Meaning he didn't insist on a prenuptial contract?”

“That seemed to be the bottom line as far as I could tell. “

Alexa hesitated. “Why did you insist on one?”

“I'm a businessman. I believe in contracts, not fairy tales.”

“Funny you should say that.”

“Yeah?” He looked intrigued. “Why?”

“I never discussed it with Dr. Ormiston, but I think one of my problems with men revolves around the same issue.”

“A prenup contract?”

“Yes. I received a rather hefty inheritance from
my grandmother on my father's side. It came to me after Dad was killed. Mom turned it over to Lloyd to manage.” She paused. “Lloyd is very good at managing money.”

“So I hear,” Trask said softly.

“Early on he convinced me that no matter whom I married I'd better make certain that I had a prenuptial agreement. I agreed with him. But wouldn't you know it? Every time I bring up the subject with a date, the relationship always seems to cool off in a hurry.”

“Hell of a coincidence,” Trask said.

“Struck me that way, too.”

“How come you never explained the facts of life to that therapist who told you that you just couldn't commit?”

“Like your ex-wife's zillionaire, Dr. Ormiston was, at heart, a romantic. I didn't think she'd understand about prenups.”

Trask grinned slowly. “Well, I'll be damned. Looks like you and I have something in common, after all. We're both afraid of being married for our money.”

The sort of silence that could be termed pregnant descended. Alexa felt the immediate onset of panic. Mercifully the waiter chose that moment to show up with the cilantro-and-lime-laced avocado salads.

When he disappeared again, she fumbled to change the conversation.

“I think that's enough on the topic of marriage,” she said in a voice that sounded too brittle, even to her own ears. “Let's find something more interesting to talk about.”

Trask picked up his fork. “Such as?”