Until You

"She lied?"

"Conor, I am not going to discuss this over this phone. Call me back."

Conor winced as Harry slammed down the receiver on his end. He flipped the phone closed and looked at Miranda.

"I forgot," she said. "For a little while, I forgot all about everything."

Conor nodded. For a little while, he'd forgotten, too.

* * *

Eva had been born in a little town in Colombia, not in Argentina.

But the rest of her story was true enough. She'd met a marine named James Beckman, who'd been stationed at the American Embassy in Bogota, and married him. He'd brought her to the States and they'd had a baby they'd named Miranda. Beckman died in an auto accident when the child was still a toddler, and Eva started selling a lotion she'd brewed up in her kitchen, door-to-door. Five years later, she'd hocked everything she owned to open the first Papillon factory.

Conor sat back on the sofa in Miranda's living room, put his feet on the coffee table, and crossed them at the ankles.

Okay, so she'd lied. So she'd bought herself a phony Argentinean birth certificate.

So what?

That still didn't explain why somebody had zeroed in on her and it sure as hell didn't explain why they'd zeroed in on Miranda.

Miranda.

He sighed and scrubbed his hands over his eyes.

Nothing had been the same since that phone call in the diner and it went beyond the fact that the call had tossed both of them back into harsh reality.

"There's something you're not telling me," she'd said, when they'd gotten back to her apartment. "Conor, what are you holding back?"

Everything, he'd thought.

"Nothing," he'd said, and the look on her face that said he was lying and she knew it, had been as sharp as a knife to his heart. "Miranda," he'd said, reaching out for her, but she'd brushed past him.

"I'm going to take a shower," she'd said, "and then I'm going to lie down for a while."

He'd known better than to argue with her or to take her into his arms and make love to her. Don't touch me, her eyes had warned, so he'd just stood there, feeling angry, stupid and helpless, watching as she scooped up Mia, went into the bedroom and closed the door.

Then he'd called Harry and gotten the details about Eva—which brought him back to the beginning.

Eva had lied, she'd been born in Colombia, not Argentina, but so what?

"Dammit," Conor whispered, "dammit to hell!"

His phone rang. He snatched it from the coffee table and jammed it to his ear.

"What else have you got for me, Harry?"

"Conor," John O'Neil said, "I've got some information for you on Moratelli."

"I'll call you back."

He went into the foyer, dialed his father's number on Miranda's phone. His father picked up on the first ring.

"I'm sorry if I called at an inopportune time," he said stiffly.