Rarities Unlimited 03 - Die in Plain Sight

Can’t be, she reassured herself. I’m hallucinating because I’m nervous.
    Then the man smiled at something Susa said and Lacey’s nerves ratcheted up several notches. Different clothes, same heart-stopping smile,same man: Ian Lapstrake. Under other circumstances she’d be happy to run into him again, but not now, not with her arms full of paintings she’d promised couldn’t be traced back to her. The fake name she’d invented to go with the e-mail wouldn’t do any good if Ian remembered her.
    Maybe he won’t recognize me. Or if he does, maybe he’ll forget my name. He sure wouldn’t be the first man to do that.
    Watching him from the corner of her eye, Lacey tried to decide if Ian was one of the Donovan family Susa’s biography had mentioned. Maybe a son-in-law. Then Lacey remembered the outline of a shoulder holster beneath his jacket and wondered if he was Susa’s bodyguard.
    The crowd heaved, pushing Lacey a foot closer to the table where her grandfather’s work would be judged. Susa looked very elegant with her short, silver-streaked dark hair and sleek black pantsuit. An unusual twisted rope of semiprecious gems hung around her neck to her breasts. Deep green gems winked in her earlobes.
    Lacey wished she’d taken time to do more than gather up her hair and clamp it in place with a holder the size of her hand and the colors of the rainbow. At least it was a match for her paint-stained jeans, ankle boots, and the vivid, loosely swirling blouse she’d fallen in love with at a garage sale two weeks ago. A bulky, colorful jacket hung over her arm beneath the paintings. The jacket was a wild patchwork of velvet scraps. It didn’t actually “go” with anything in the fashion sense, but seeing it always made her smile.
    I’m not here for a wardrobe critique, Lacey told herself. The paintings are on display, not me.
    And thank God her mother wasn’t in the auditorium. She would have been mortified by her daughter’s outfit. Appearance and the lack of a country-club husband were the two major reasons mother and daughter fought. Every time Lacey thought her mother had finally gotten used to the idea that the oldest of her three daughters wasn’t the cashmere-and-pearls type, she’d get another lecture on her pitiful fashion sense.
    Must you look like you just crawled out of a paint tube?
    Do you really style your hair with a hand mixer?
    If you can’t afford anything but garage-sale shoes, I’d be happy to take you shopping.
    “Lacey? Ms. Quinn? Hello? Anyone home?” Ian fanned his fingers in front of her face.
    “Oh. Sorry. Is it my turn?” Then she blinked and focused on the manwho was talking to her, calling her by name. Hell. There goes Ms. January Marsh . “Ian, right? Neighbor Lapstrake?”
    “At your service. Susa will be finished with the two folks in front of you real quick. Why don’t you step up to the table and let me help you unwrap your paintings. Things will go faster that way.”
    When he reached for the paintings, her arms tightened protectively around the canvases.
    “I’ll be gentle,” he said gravely. “I promise.”
    The humor underlying his reassurance flustered Lacey. Or maybe it was the smile. She stuck out her lower lip and blew a stray curl away from her eyes.
    “Family treasures?” he asked, waiting for her to release the bundles.
    “No! I found them at a garage sale.”
    Again Ian smiled even as he wondered why the pretty lady with the summer-garden shirt and clear brown eyes was lying. All the “tells” were there—looking away, defensive posture, restlessness.
    “Whatever,” he said. “Take them over to the table and unwrap them. Unless you trust me to help?”
    Lacey felt like a fool. “Sorry. It’s just—” She blew fiercely at the curl that kept tickling the corner of her eye.
    With a motion too swift and impersonal for her to take offense, he tucked the stray curl back in place.
    “It’ll just come unsprung again,” she said. “I’m a walking fashion disaster.”
    “Good. I hate models.”
    Her quick smile changed her features, adding an electric element to her face that was both intelligence and intensity. “Here. Take the top one. I’ll handle the other two. And don’t mention my name to anyone, okay? If it turns out badly, I don’t want, um, the wrong publicity for my…um, shop. Just call me…” Hurriedly she tried to remember her e-mail pseudonym. “January,” she said, “January Marsh.”
    Ian barely managed not to