LITMIR.BIZ

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yanked on his pants, ducked into the bathroom to ditch the condom and followed her into the den. She dragged on her top, shrugged on her jacket, snatched up her purse and briefcase and wasted no time hustling toward the door. She still hadn’t looked at him. That stung.

      “Aubrey, wait.” He planted a palm on the door, holding it closed.

      She paused with her hand on the knob. Her spine remained steel-girder stiff, and she kept her chin tucked as if she wanted to hide from what had just happened.

      Well, didn’t that make him feel like a damned prize?

      Her scent, a heady floral mingled with hot sex, filled Liam’s lungs as he inhaled. He battled the unaccustomed urge to smooth her tangled hair and straighten the tucked-under collar of her blazer. “We used protection and I’m clean, but if you need anything you have my numbers.”

      She turned and met his gaze. Panic and regret darkened her eyes. “I won’t call, Liam. I can’t.”

      “Yeah. I guess you’re right. My family’s in enough turmoil without throwing an affair with the enemy’s daughter into the pot.”

      Her mouth dropped open and a wounded expression briefly crossed her face before she blinked it away. “The enemy? That’s how you see my father?”

      He cursed his clumsy tongue. “Matthew Holt and my grandfather have had a few run-ins. Holt Enterprises and EPH don’t always see eye to eye on how we conduct business.”

      “No. No, they don’t. You’re right. I hope your mother likes the painting. Goodbye, Liam.” She yanked open his door and then quietly closed it behind her.

      Liam banged his forehead against the wood and then slowly turned to face the painting. Where was his brain? The afternoon shouldn’t have happened. He should have left the pub the minuteAubrey started with her prying questions. He shouldn’t have taken her to the gallery or brought her home for a lesson in Art 101. He sure as hell shouldn’t have taken her to bed. Because today he’d had the best sex of his life and there was absolutely no chance that he’d ever repeat the experience.

      He cursed all the way back to his bedroom. Aubrey’s scent clung to his skin and to his bed. Determined to remove all traces of her from his apartment, he ripped off the sheets. As he shoved them into the hamper for his housekeeper to wash, he caught sight of his watch.

      Damn. He hadn’t called work to tell them he wouldn’t be returning after his luncheon appointment. A first. He never missed work. Hell, for the past nine months he’d practically lived in the EPH building. He headed for the phone on his bedside table. A sliver of black sticking out from under his bed stopped him in his tracks. He bent and scooped it up. Aubrey’s thong. His pulse rate tripled. He should return it. But how?

      Mail? Nah, he didn’t think so.

      In person? Hell, no. That would be stepping right back into the fire. He couldn’t risk his family—particularly his grandfather, who believed appearances were everything— finding out about today.

      For several seconds he studied the black satin dangling from his fingers and then he crushed the lingerie in his hand and shoved it in his nightstand drawer.

      He couldn’t have Aubrey, but he could have the memories of this wild afternoon to fuel his fantasies when the only lover he had was his right hand.

      “Happy to have you home again, Mom. I brought a bottle of champagne to celebrate.” Liam set the champagne on the coffee table and bent over the chaise in the den of the family brownstone to kiss his mother’s cheek.

      She had a little more color in her face than she’d had when he’d visited her at The Tides a couple of weeks ago, and she’d lost some of the gauntness hollowing her cheeks. Short tufts of newly grown hair, more gray than before, peeked from the scarf she wore over her head.

      Liam nodded hello to his father. He and his father had never been close. Michael Elliott had spent too much of Liam’s childhood at work, leaving Liam to rely on his grandfather for mentorship as the years passed.

      “You and your wine collection. Thank you.” Karen Elliott shifted her legs to the side and patted the cushion. “Sit down, Liam. It’s good to be home. Your grandparents’ estate is a wonderful place to recuperate, but it’s time for me to get on with life. Besides, you’ve all spent way too much time worrying about me and traipsing out there.”

      “Glad to do it. I brought you a surprise.” He ignored her “you-shouldn’t-haves,” retrieved the picture from the foyer where he’d left it and rested the bottom edge of the frame on the sofa. “Dad, could you help me with this?”

      “Certainly.” His father stepped forward.

      With his father’s assistance Liam removed the paper. The memory of doing the same withAubrey yesterday barged front and center into his thoughts. He set his jaw and deliberately blocked the images as best he could. Which wasn’t so great.

      His mother’s gasp was reward enough for the weeks of phone calls Liam had made to nearly every gallery in the Northeast, his pleas with gallery owners and, finally, the letter he’d written to Gilda Raines and sent along with a picture of his mother gazing at one of Gilda’s paintings in the medical center. Seeing his mother’s eyes light up and then fill with happy tears was icing on the cake.

      She smiled up at him. “Gilda Raines never sells anything. She donates to hospitals, but she never sells. How did you convince her?”

      He shrugged. “I wrote her a letter and told her I needed a gift for a very special lady.”

      “Don’t waste your flattery on me, Liam Elliott.” His mother dismissed his words with a wave of her hand, but color seeped into her cheeks.

      He didn’t mention that the artist probably wouldn’t have sold him anything if Aubrey hadn’t been with him. He’d seen the refusal in Ms. Raines’s eyes until Aubrey had remarked about the painting being exactly what Liam’s mother needed. He knew because he’d been looking at Gilda instead of the art on the easel.

      Liam had a feeling he was supposed to know why the artist had selected this particular piece from her collection and what the painting signified the second he laid eyes on it, and when he hadn’t Gilda’s decision had been made. No sale. But Gilda had taken an instant liking to Aubrey, and Aubrey’s promise to explain the meaning behind the morning glory had changed Gilda’s mind. No doubt about it. He would have walked away empty-handed if not for Aubrey Holt. He owed her. Even the gallery manager had whispered her surprise over the sale— when she’d slipped him her phone number. Not a number he intended using.

      His mother carefully eased forward on the cushion until she could stroke the frame. “It’s beautiful. Absolutely beautiful.”

      Tears streamed from her eyes and she pressed trembling fingers to her lips. Those were more than happy tears this time. Liam stood by helplessly, but his father immediately took her into his arms and tucked her face to his chest. Did his mother’s emotional reaction have something to do with the way Aubrey had described the painting? Liam’s ears burned and he shifted uneasily. If so, then his parents deserved a moment of privacy.

      He propped the frame against the back of the sofa, shoved his hands into his pockets and retreated to the opposite side of the room to look out the window at the Brooklyn Heights neighborhood where he’d grown up. Until he’d moved away, he hadn’t paid much attention to the well-maintained nineteenth-century brownstones lining the shaded street, the wide bluestone sidewalks or decorative ironwork. He hadn’t appreciated that he was only a short train ride from Times Square, Coney Island and Shea Stadium and a Mets baseball game.

      While he’d been trapped under the weight of family expectations, his thoughts had been elsewhere. Traveling. Exploring. With his grandfather owning Elliott Publication Holdings, one of the largest and most successful magazine conglomerates in the world, it had been assumed for as far back as Liam could remember that each family member would start with EPH and work his or her way up. Liam hadn’t even left the area to attend college.

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