eyes, capturing his look of shock and terror. She struggled to contain the laughter that was bubbling up inside her.
“Are you alone in there, Harry?” She looked past him but didn’t see any movement.
“Who are you?” he demanded, as he snatched a white hotel robe from the back of a chair. “Why are you taking my picture? Gimme that.” He lunged forward and reached out to grab for her camera, but she stepped back and slipped it into the waistband of her jeans. She felt safe in assuming he wouldn’t come out into the hall after her.
“Uh-uh, Harry.” Emily chuckled and shook her head. “Your wife hired me to find out what you were doing at this hotel every Monday night. She thought you were having an affair. She’ll be happy to learn that isn’t the case.” Emily chuckled again.
“Please, lady, don’t show that to her,” he hollered.
“Look, Harry, your wife already paid me for this job—I have to. How about you come clean with her tonight? Before I give her the picture. Believe me, she’ll be thrilled you weren’t with another woman—you just like wearing women’s clothing.”
“I can’t do that, she won’t understand.”
“Enough of the lies, Harry. Don’t keep secrets—they’ll eat you up. Trust me, I know.”
“Please…” he begged.
“Do you love her, Harry?”
“Yes.”
“Then be honest with her. Tell her you love her, but tell her why you do this.” Emily gestured toward his outfit. “Work it out, because you can’t keep doing this and trying to hide it from her. The lies will destroy your family.”
Emily turned and ambled down the hallway. “I’ll give you forty-eight hours before I give her the photo,” she said over her shoulder.
CHAPTER 6
On the drive home from the Hilton, Emily phoned Isabel, describing what she’d witnessed in the hotel bar and her concerns for Maggie.
“I’m definitely going to do a background check first thing tomorrow,” Isabel asserted. “Just something in my gut tells me this guy is not what he seems.”
“You might be right. Let me know what you dig up. Until then, not a peep to Maggie.”
“Better not mention it to Camille either,” Isabel warned. “That resort presentation tomorrow night will give us an opportunity to watch him and Fiona in action.”
“Hey, were you able to talk your husband into going?”
“Alex actually was happy to go—said some of the partners at his firm were excited about going. He even suggested maybe we should buy one of the condos for ourselves, as a nice weekend retreat.”
“It would be nice for you two to be able to get away from your work once in a while. Perhaps you could even loan it out to a friend now and then,” Emily hinted.
“As much as I don’t trust Lucas,” Isabel said, “the thought of a weekend retreat does sound enticing.”
“It does, doesn’t it? Skiing and snowboarding in the winter, sipping hot cocoa by the big stone fireplace in the Lodge. Golf, tennis, swimming and boating the rest of the year,” Emily suggested.
“And don’t forget the hiking, biking, and picnics. Oh, and the upscale restaurant they’re planning to build up there,” Isabel added.
“Listen to us! We sound like we’re making a commercial to promote this resort,” Emily chided.
“I can see why this project could be a huge hit around here. There are a lot of people with money in this town just burning a hole in their pockets. No doubt they’ll be lining up to plunk down their twenty-five percent for a piece of that mountain, just as fast as Lucas can rake it in.”
“We’ll see tomorrow night, won’t we?”
“Say, how did your stakeout go tonight?”
Emily giggled.
“What happened?”
Just then Emily noticed another call coming in on her cell phone. “Hey, Colin’s calling me. Can I get back to you later?”
“No fair, you can’t leave me hanging like that!”
~*~
“Hello, Colin,” Emily answered, the lilt in her voice giving away how happy she was to hear from him.
“Hello, my hot lady PI.”
Colin’s deep, sexy voice always made Emily sigh. “What happened to smokin’ hot?” she joked.
Colin’s police detective buddy in New York City had dubbed her the smokin’ hot lady PI when they had flown there to interrogate a suspect a few months before. Somehow the nickname stuck for a while, until Colin’s departure to San Francisco.
“Well, I didn’t want to go overboard, give you a big head or anything,” Colin replied.
“I’m hurt.”
“I bet you’re pouting, aren’t you?”
She giggled.
“Doesn’t mean I don’t still think of you as smokin’ hot, Emily.” He laughed, then his voice turned sensually serious. “If