Read Online HEAT Vol. 2 (Master Chefs: HEAT Series #2) by Kailin Gow - Free Book Online Page A

did you last see me?”
    “You
don’t recognize me, do you?”
    “No. 
Should I?”
    He
puckered his lips in thought.  “I guess I’ve changed a lot over the years,
too.  I’m Rial.  Does that ring a bell?”
    “Sorry,
but no,” I said matter of factly.
    He
smiled.  “I guess it’s just as well.”  Passing in front of me, he was silent
for a while.  “I have to admit I didn’t know you were in France.  All this
time, right under my nose.  Then again, I never would have thought you’d end up
in a convent.”
    His
knowledge of who I was and where I’d been made me increasingly uneasy.
    “I
have to hand it to your father… very smart.  Putting you in a convent.  Of
course he had to know I wouldn’t think to look there.  Then again, he made a
good show of letting us think you were in the States.  I don’t know how he did
it, but…”  He tipped an imaginary hat in honor of my father.  “But leave it to
the media to uncover your whereabouts.”  He grinned and peered at me from under
his thick brow.  “Fame has its disadvantages, doesn’t it?  You come up with a
great food item and the next thing you know your name, face and whereabouts are
plastered all over a glossy magazine.  Congratulations.  I read that article
and know everything you’ve been up to; a scientist… impressive.  Smart and
pretty.”
    I
nodded, but had little desire to thank him for the compliment.  “So now you
know, and I’m here, face to face.  What do you want?”
    “Right. 
Why reminisce when we can get straight to business?”  He came to stand directly
in front of me.
    I
had to tilt my head straight up just to look up at him.
    “I
need to contact your father.”
    I
let out a mocking little laugh.  “Then you need to have a séance.”
    “Come
again?”
    “You
didn’t do your homework as well as you thought.  He’s dead.  My father died the
year I went into the convent.  Why do you think I went there to begin with?”
    “Nice
try, Lilly.  Your father would be proud.  Now let’s have it.  Where is he?”
    “He’s
dead.  Don’t you get that?”
    Rial
clamped his hands together in front of him and stood looking down at me. 
“You’re a good little liar, just like your father.  I would have thought all
those years in a convent would have straightened you out a bit; made an honest
woman out of you.  Or was the convent and that postulant business all a
charade?”
    “Nothing
about my life has been a charade, and I’m telling you the truth.  I saw him
with my own eyes.  I went to the funeral service.  He was there in the coffin. 
He’s dead.  No matter how much you might want to find him, he’s still dead.”
    “Oh,
he’s very much alive.  I know all about that funeral service.  Very
convincing.  Your father did always have a flair for the theatrical.  He’s
always very smart, always a step ahead.  You know, there’s a part of me that
would like to give you the benefit of the doubt.  It’s conceivable.”  He looked
up at the ceiling.  “Yeah, it’s possible he deliberately left you in the dark
about all this.  It’s possible he wanted to protect you, keep you away from all
the danger that surrounded him.”
    “What
are you talking about?  What danger? My father was an accountant for an
architectural firm.”
    He
let out a sharp little laugh.  “An accountant.  That’s a good one.  Yeah, he
was an accountant all right, money laundering, blackmail, extortion, off shore
banking… yeah, he was good when it came to dealing with money.”
    I
stared at him, trying to digest what he’d just said, but none of it made
sense.  “I think you have the wrong person.  I think you’ve mistaken my father
for someone else.”
    “Oh,
it’s your father all right.  Anthony Cooke.  I remember him very well and I
remember you.”
    “My
father would never hurt anyone.  He would never do anything illegal.”
    “Your
father wouldn’t stop at anything to hurt someone,