An Impostor in Town (Colorado Series) by Denise Moncrief Page A

traveled up and down her body. “Jeff sure had you going. He soaked you for all he could get, didn’t he?”
    “How would you know that?” She glared at him through squinted eyes.
    “He told me before he died.” He acted nonchalant, but she knew better. She bit her lip to stifle any more comments. She would let him do the talking. Some things were coming back to her. “You know what he didn’t tell you?” He leaned forward in the chair. “Your husband’s been dead for ten years.” Cruelty sparkled in his eyes.
    Her stomach lurched. “Mason’s dead?”
    “Isn’t that a hoot? You’ve been running for nothing.”
    Oh, but Cory was wrong. She’d been running from him as well. If she had the chance, she’d run again.
    “After a while I’m going to sneak into the lodge and get our son. I’m looking forward to being a real family like we should have been.” He stopped, perhaps to relish her reaction. He’d always known what buttons to push. She came unglued and attempted to attack him. He pushed her down easily. She was no match for him.
    “Leave him alone.”
    “He’s my son.” He jabbed his finger in his chest.
    She recoiled at the intensity of his assertion. She had to find a way to warn Pierce and Johanna. “I’m not going anywhere with you,” she said with more inner strength than she thought possible.
    He stood and towered over her. His blood pulsing the vein in his neck. “Oh, yes you are. And we’re taking the boy with us.”
    “I’m not going to help you kidnap him. Even if you threaten to kill me, I’m not helping you.”
    “Oh, yes you are.” He jiggled the gun at her. “You ruined my life. You owe me.”
    Heat crawled up her gut. “I didn’t ruin your life. You were doing a pretty good job of that on your own. I never made you do the things you did. You had a mind of your own.”
    He snorted. “I’ll never forgive you for what you did to me.”
    A quick angry outburst was on the tip of her tongue, but she quelled it. Some force from within stronger than her fear calmed her. She knew how to disarm him. He never could handle the unexpected. She had refused to forgive Cory so many years ago. It was what had caused the downward spiral of her life. She stared him in the eye. “I forgive you.”
    He laughed, a dry mirthless cackle. “You forgive me?”
    “I didn’t think I could ever forgive you. I realize now that I should have. Maybe none of the rest of it would have happened.”
    “Why should you forgive me?” He yelled in her face. “I’m not the one who was driving the car. I did you a favor.”
    She wasn’t going to argue with him. If he hadn’t goaded her into drinking and racing that night, her sister would still be alive. It didn’t minimize her complicity, but her involvement didn’t absolve his. The favor he had done for her was no favor at all. He had moved her sister’s unconscious body into the driver’s seat, dragged her from the scene, and rented them a room in a motel. It was the night Jake was conceived.
    The police suspected their involvement in the accident from the beginning. She cooperated with the Austin cops and they dropped the charges against her, but the police wanted Cory in jail. He had taken the full punishment for tampering with the evidence and leaving the scene of the accident. Mason spent an exorbitant amount of money getting her off the hook, while he left his nephew to the vagaries of the justice system. She married Mason when he asked because she felt she owed him. Her father tried to talk her out of it, but she was stubborn and Mason had promised to protect her.
    She didn’t realize she was pregnant with Cory’s child until it was too late.
    Cory still refused to admit his culpability in the matter. It broke her heart because she had once loved the man as much as any self-absorbed, teenage girl could love anyone.
    He stood up. Indecision marked his features. She refused to flinch or show any kind of fear or dismay. “I’m going to