An Affair of Deceit
Read An Affair of Deceit Online
Authors: Jamie Michele
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Text copyright © 2013 Jamie Michele
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Montlake Romance
PO Box 400818
Las Vegas, NV 89140
ISBN-13: 9781611099560
ISBN-10: 1611099560
For my father.
CHAPTER ONE
H
UMID AIR AS
oppressive as a wet wool blanket enveloped Abigail Mason the moment she stepped outside of her Washington, DC, row home.
As she turned to close the door to her place, she shrugged off her suit jacket, revealing a pale-pink shell that she’d cover back up before she neared her office. It wouldn’t do for anyone she knew to see her arms exposed, but now, at the end of one of the hottest summers on record, she was willing to commute half-dressed. Slinging the jacket over one arm, she checked her watch, although she knew what time it would be. Calibrated to the second, her morning routine never wavered. She exited her home at twenty to six, which gave her five minutes to walk two and a half blocks to the U Street Metro stop. Every weekday, that was. For some absurd reason, Yellow and Green Line trains didn’t start until after eight a.m. on Saturday and Sunday. That meant she…
“Miss Mason?”
Her heart stalled out at the sound of a nearby male voice. Abruptly, she stopped thinking about train schedules and calculated her options for self-defense. While she lived in a safe neighborhood, a woman was never completely safe anywhere, not even in her own home…or while standing outside of it.
She wheeled around, holding her large tote bag to her chest like a shield. Its hard leather sides might deflect a knife or a fist, but they’d work about as well as cardboard against a bullet. Quickly, she tried to think of what she’d do if she saw a gun, but within seconds of turning to face the interloper, she realized that the lanky man standing on the steps to her small porch wasn’t holding a weapon. Moreover, he wasn’t threatening her. He wore a simple black suit, white shirt, and black tie, and was handsome in a disheveled way, with a head of short brown curls and a boyish grin. His teeth gleamed starkly white against his tanned skin.
Salesman
. She relaxed her posture just enough so her butt cheeks weren’t quite so clenched.
“You’ve got fantastic timing,” he said. “I was just about to knock. You’re Abigail Mason, right?”
Who would knock at a stranger’s door before six a.m.?
And why would he know her name?
Not a salesman, then. Abigail clutched her bag more tightly to her chest and scanned him for signs of weakness. She saw nothing obviously wrong with his slim frame, but his nose was a bit crooked, just like his smile. The unnatural asymmetry of that nose told her he was a fighter, despite his friendly pretense. Only a man who fought either for a living or out of habit didn’t bother getting a broken nose fixed.
She would go for his eyes if he attacked. His nose might have lost all sensitivity, but eyes were always vulnerable. “Do I know you?”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. I’m James Riley. I’m looking for your father.”
“My father?” She bit back a gasp as grainy images of a stern man she hadn’t seen since she was eight flashed like an old movie in her mind.
“Peter Mason is your father, right?”
Yes, that was his name.
Her mother had forbidden it to be spoken aloud, but Abigail recalled his crisp, dispassionate
signature on the checks he sent after he left. That had been their only connection with him in twenty years. The money had been necessary for their survival, especially in those early years after they left Taiwan for America as they struggled to establish a foothold in a new country. But money was no substitute for a parent, especially not one who had been so attached to his daughter.
Or so it’d seemed to her at the time. Abigail had long since revised her opinion of her father’s apparent devotion to her. A man doesn’t abandon his family when he loves them. “I can’t help you. Sorry.”
A wrinkle of uncertainty creased the space between the young man’s eyebrows. It satisfied her to think that he was confused by her lack of concern. But she was hardly going to talk to some handsome stranger on the street about a personal matter. And even then, she was more likely to chat with a squirrel about nuts than any human about her father.
He lifted his palms vertically in a plea for time. “No, I’m the one who should be apologizing. I know you haven’t seen your dad in a long time, and you’re not likely to want to talk about him, but he’s recently gone missing, and I think he may try to contact you. Has he called?”
“Recently gone missing?” Abigail nearly choked on her laugh. But it wasn’t funny. To say that her father was
recently
missing was an insult to everything she’d been through. She cleared her throat and stared hard at the man in the government suit. A tiny American flag graced his left lapel. Naturally. “Mr. Riley, my father has been missing from my life for some time. You’ll excuse me if I don’t feel much concern for his whereabouts now.”
“I understand your reluctance to assist us. I’m aware of your long-standing estrangement from him. But he hasn’t been missing all this time. He’s continued to work for the State Department. We only lost track of him in Arles four days ago.”
She clenched the muscles in her jaw to keep it from gaping open. Every phrase he’d said inspired a question, but only one presented itself in the voice of a child:
Do you know why my father left me?
Her throat constricted. Damn it all! She’d tried so hard to stop thinking about her father. But as tough as she’d become, she would always be the little girl who still worried that her daddy had gone away because she’d been bad.
No
. She exhaled firmly. She was no longer interested in where he was or why he’d left. She refused to be.
“I’d like to help, but I know nothing about him,” she said, and glanced again at her watch. Two good minutes gone forever to this pointless conversation about a man so disconnected from her that he might as well be dead. “Good luck with your man-hunt. If you don’t mind, I have a train to catch.”
She straightened her shoulders and walked forward, headed down the steps of her porch, intending to march straight through him if he didn’t move out of her way. But as she reached the first step and came almost nose-to-nose with the man standing on the one below, the smell of lemons and something darker and muskier tugged at her senses. She breathed in, distracted by the unusual yet familiar perfume.
How odd. How lovely.
This government man with the crooked nose smelled like a perfect cup of hot black tea.
Her eyes flew to his, which in the warm luminescence of dawn had become the bright yellow-green of Spanish olives. He smiled that crooked little grin he’d given her when she’d first noticed him.
She wouldn’t be charmed by him, even if he did smell like her favorite beverage. Had he known? Or did he always spritz Lipton and lemon on himself in the morning?
It didn’t matter. She didn’t care, and she had to go. Making the train was now in doubt, but Abigail Mason had no room in her world for doubt. She looked pointedly to the street. “Excuse me.”
“Sorry.” He stepped out of her way, sweeping his hand toward the road, as if he’d been escorting her instead of accosting her. “You’re certainly free to leave.”
“Of course I am.”
“But I hope you’ll call me if he tries to get in touch with you.”
“I can’t imagine that he has my phone number or a clue where I live. If you really want to find the man, I suggest that you move on to your next lead. I have nothing to give you.”
Dropping her chin an inch, she gave him her most frigid angry-schoolmarm glare. The chilling expression usually had the effect of making the recipient feel like they’d done something very, very wrong.
Not on this man. His cheerful smile didn’t fade. As she passed, he slipped a business card into her tote bag. “Just call me if you think of something, OK?”
She ignored him and strode to the sidewalk, doing her best to keep her ankles steady as she pretended that someone hadn’t just poked a sharp stick into the very softest part of her heart.
Father?
More like betrayer, traitor, or liar.
But mostly: coward.
Those and several more livid descriptions of her father came to Abigail’s mind as she walked briskly toward the Metro stop at U Street.
Back when she still called him “Daddy,” Peter Mason had worked for the US State Department as a liaison with the American Institute in Taiwan. A career diplomat, but that description hadn’t fit the man she had known. Peter Mason had been hard and exacting, and sparing with his praise. He was hardly the type to negotiate treaties or host cocktail parties for foreign dignitaries. She’d never given it a lot of thought, but he really hadn’t been a diplomatic sort of man. Back then, though, diplomacy in the Taiwan Strait wasn’t a game for aristocrats. It was more like a slowly simmering pot that could boil over at the slightest provocation, and it was only held in place by the expert grip of America’s best military and intelligence chess players.
Her stomach flew into her throat as she felt the sensation of falling. Startled, she flailed her hands for support, and found the tacky rubber handrail of the subway station escalator.