By the time I got home, my mind was racing. I dropped my gear bag, tugged off my jacket, and fired up my laptop on the sleek dining table I’d never used for anything but work.
One new email blinked at me that actually seemed important. It was from the broke heir’s attorneys and I clicked into it immediately, my pulse spiking. After skimming through the “Dear Mr Westwood” crap, I finally got to the meat of it.
He wasn’t turning down my offer, but he wanted a meeting. Not with me, though. WithMr Harlan Westwoodand thenew investor.
Damn.
Harlan would bulldoze a meeting like that, and I saw a definite problem with it. I sat back, running a hand through my damp hair and weighing my options. Eventually, I realized I only had one so I picked up the phone and hit dial when I reached Aurelia’s name.
She picked up on the third ring, her voice cool and professional. “Westwood?”
“Yeah, it’s me. I think we’ve graduated to first names, though,Aurelia.”
I heard her let out a soft sigh. “Fine, Harrison. What’s going on?”
“We’ve got a situation,” I said. “Come over so we can strategize. We should get back to them sooner rather than later. We don’t know if they’ve got another line in the water.”
“When you say come over…”
“I mean, come to my place. Now would be good. We need to work this out or we might just be dead in the water.”
CHAPTER 8
AURELIA
When I pulled up in front of the address Harrison had texted me, freezing rain was coming down in silver sheets, glazing everything it touched. I skidded a little on my heels on the walkway, grabbing a railing to keep from falling flat on my face as I hurried up to the door, hugging my coat a little tighter.
Thankfully, he must’ve been waiting because when I reached the top of the walkway to a gorgeous little townhouse, the door opened. I didn’t know what I’d been expecting when he asked me to come over, but it’d probably been an overgrown frat boy’s den with a giant TV, a sofa that reeked of beer, and maybe a few hockey sticks propped in the corner.
The exterior had already surprised me, but when he raced me right inside and shut the door behind us, the interior came as a downright shock. Before I even looked at him, my gaze swept across his space and I quickly came to a few conclusions.
Harrison’s home was clean, modern, and furnished with a certain amount of intention. Dark wood floors, cream walls, and black leather furniture with sharp lines. A fireplace flickered in the corner—a real fire, not one of those electric-powered things—and he’d bothered to light it like he’d actually thought about ambiance.
Maybe the baby of the family isn’t such a baby after all.His house certainly made him seem a lot more mature than I’d have thought.
“Nice place,” I said, shrugging out of my coat as I finally turned to face him.
Immediately, those mesmerizing eyes latched onto mine, the man they belonged to obviously freshly out of the shower with damp hair, a hoodie bearing the logo of one of the charter schools on the outskirts of town, and navy sweats.
God, he looks good enough to lick. So damn gorgeous.
To make matters worse, his lips curved into a boyish smirk that drove me nuts. “Thanks. Can I make you something hot to drink or grab you a blanket? You looked frozen when you came in.”
I wandered through the open-concept living space to the fireplace and held out my hands to warm them up. “I should be okay. Thanks. What’s this situation we’ve got?”
“Alright, well, if you change your mind, just let me know.” His gaze lingered on me for another moment before he turned and padded over to the dining area of the far side of the spacious room.
I noticed then that he was barefoot, and something about that, about him being relaxed at home on a stormy evening, made him about ten times sexier.Nope. Shut it down, Van Alen.
Immediately yanking my gaze away from him, I looked around some more, running my gaze across the exposed brick walls, some of them painted a very dark gray to create accents, and admired some of the art mounted against them. I was surprised again when I realized that these weren’t expensive pieces by the old masters or the new obsessions.
I didn’t recognize even one of the names and I’d been known to frequent a gallery or two in my free time. “Who are the artists?”
He looked up from where he’d sat down behind his open laptop at the dining table, facing me. There were papers everywhere, but no chaos. Instead, everything was organized into neat stacks, highlighters, pens, and colored post-its lined up like soldiers waiting to be commanded into battle.
Again, not what I would’ve expected.
“They’re no one fancy,” he said, glancing around the room like he’d forgotten they were even there. “Mostly just stuff I picked up from local artists while I was traveling. Every piece has a story that I got to learn by talking to the artists themselves. A few are prints I picked up from the Sunday market down the block. I just liked them.”
