The Highest Bidder

There was no note.

Only pictures.

Dozens of them. Full color and black-and-white and they were all of the same man. Vance tensed as he flipped through them quickly. Every photo showed the same man wearing a different disguise. There was enough about the shape of his head, the way he stood, the way he squinted into the light, that all seemed familiar, again and again, despite the ways he was trying to hide his real identity. In some, he wore colored contacts, others, those magnifying glasses Vance had seen him in. In every photo, he wore wigs, sometimes a scar, sometimes an eye patch, always something to distract the viewer. But it was always the same man.

Charlie’s blackmailer.

“Who the hell took these?” Vance muttered as he found a shot of the mystery man talking to Charlie outside the Coffee Spot the day of their scheduled meet. Vance had been there. He hadn’t seen anyone pointing a camera, although, he’d been too busy focusing on Charlie to have noticed. He continued looking through the photos until he came to the last one.

Then he dropped the others and studied the photo of a good-looking man with wide, dark blue eyes. He tapped the photo with his finger as a flare of satisfaction shot through him.

“Dammit,” he whispered in satisfaction, “I knew you were familiar.” He knew this guy. Had known him for years.

Henry Boyle, one of two assistants to Dalton Rothschild, CEO of Rothschild’s auction house. “You son of a bitch. I’ve got you now. And whatever you and Dalton are planning—not going to work.”

He studied that photo for a long minute or two, reveling in the pleasure he felt at the knowledge that he could tell Charlie her problems were over. Now that he knew who was behind all this, he was going to the police. They’d have Henry arrested before end of business.

Then, as he continued to look at the photo, something else dawned on him. Something that he should have guessed. Who the hell else would have known all Charlie’s secrets? Who else would have known what to threaten her with?

“I know those eyes of yours, too, you bastard,” he said to the man in the picture. “I see them every day, in your son.”

Charlie’s blackmailer was Jake’s father.

It wasn’t easy to tell her. And once it was done, all he could do was listen as she poured out her fury.

“How could he do that to me? To his son?” she raged, prowling the confines of his office as if it were a cage she couldn’t escape. “What kind of man treats people like that?”

“A bad one,” Vance offered.

“‘Bad’?” she repeated, staring at him openmouthed. “He’s more than bad. He’s … evil. Disgusting. Appalling. He was using me to take Waverly’s down!”

“Yeah,” Vance said, “he was.”

If he had needed more proof that Charlie was in no way involved in any of it—which he didn’t—seeing her like this would have convinced him.

“And he’s my son’s father!” She stopped at that and turned wide eyes on Vance.

“What?” he asked, going to her, holding her.

“Jake. Oh, my poor baby. What can I possibly tell him about his father?”

He heard the pain in her voice and speaking only to that, said, “Tell him you loved him.”

“I thought I did, yes.” Her gaze shot to his. “And what does that say about me? What kind of judge of character am I that I could make a child with a man who could do something so hideous?”

Vance pulled her in tightly to him and closed his eyes as she wrapped her arms around his waist and held on. He didn’t like acknowledging that she had cared for the bastard. That some other man had had a shot with Charlie and then was fool enough to waste it. “It says you have a generous heart. It says you don’t look for the bad in people.”

“And that I’m an idiot. Don’t forget that part,” she muttered, her face buried in his chest.

He laughed a little and cupped her head in his palms, tipping her back so that he could look into her eyes. “You’re the smartest woman I know, Charlie. This isn’t about you. It’s about Henry Boyle and the mistakes he made.”

“But—”

“But nothing,” Vance told her, willing her to believe him as his heart broke at the sheen of furious tears in her eyes. “He was stupid enough to walk away from you and your son. He’s the idiot. Never forget that.”

Her lips twisted into a half smile. “You’re being nice to me again.”

“I shouldn’t be?”

“You should be furious. Because of me, Waverly’s might have been ruined.”

“It wasn’t.”

“Could have been,” she argued.

“Could-haves don’t count,” he said with a smile. “Besides, look at it this way. You started this scared to death, but you stood up to him. You fought back and you won.”

“You’re just trying to make me feel better.”

“Is it working?”

“Yeah,” she said softly, “it is.” She laid her head down on his chest again and sighed heavily. “It’s over, isn’t it? Jake’s safe.”

“Yeah.” He wrapped his arms around her and held her as tightly to him as he could. “It’s over. Jake’s safe. And so are you.”

“Thank you.” Her whisper was almost lost, but Vance heard it and whispered a “thanks” of his own to whoever it was who had sent those photos.

A couple of hours later, calls had been made, charges filed and it was all over but for the last act.

“You’re sure you want to be here for this?” Vance kept one arm around Charlie’s shoulders, holding her tight to his side.

They stood outside Rothschild’s auction house in the late-afternoon sun. A police patrol car was parked at the curb and people passing on the sidewalk were slowing down to see what was happening.

“I’m sure,” she said, lifting her chin and stiffening her spine. “I want to see him arrested. I want to know that it’s over. Really.”

He understood that, though he would have kept her away if he could. Hell, just remembering the shocked, stunned expression on her face when he’d told her what he’d discovered had been enough to level him. But then he remembered how quickly she had shifted from shock to fury and his admiration for her soared.

No one would ever keep Charlie down. She had too much strength. Henry Boyle should have recognized that.

Vance came up out of his thoughts at the outraged shout.

“You can’t arrest me! You have no proof of anything!”

Still holding on to Charlie’s shoulders, Vance turned to watch as two police officers—one man, one woman—walked Henry Boyle out of Rothschild’s. The man was shouting and pulling at the officers, trying to get away, but with his hands cuffed in front of him, it wouldn’t be easy. A crowd was gathering on the sidewalk, but the traffic in the street was still a steady stream of movement and color.

Charlie stiffened against him when Henry’s wild gaze landed on her and he screamed in impotent rage.

“You stupid bitch! This is all your fault! All you had to do was give me the damn files!”

Vance’s fury was growing to match Boyle’s but he stood his ground and tugged Charlie half-behind him to protect her from the enraged man getting closer.

“Bitch! Stupid!”

“Come on now,” the male officer said as he reached down to open the squad car door. “Enough of that. Let’s go. You’ll get your say eventually.”

“Screw that!” Henry yanked free of the man’s grip, head-butted the female officer, and when she staggered backward, pulled free of her as well. With a last, frantic look at Charlie, Henry sprinted for freedom, pushing through the onlookers, rushing for the street.

He dodged a hybrid car and a yellow cab. Brakes squealed. People shouted. Horns blared. He was almost clear when he ran straight into the path of a city bus unable to stop in time.

Charlie choked out a cry as she turned her face into Vance’s chest. And as the street erupted into shocked screams, he held her there, sparing her from seeing what had become of Henry Boyle.

Twelve

Three nights later, Vance found Charlie on the terrace in the moonlight. Even in his too-big T-shirt that she’d been wearing to sleep in, she looked like a pagan goddess, standing in front of a bank of flowers with the star-filled sky and moon above her.

That wonderful hair of hers hung loose to the middle of her back and the breeze sliding over the Plexiglas wall lifted long blond strands into a dance around her head.

Her gaze was locked on the river, with the city reflected on the water in brilliant, wavering slashes of light and color. She was so still, so quiet, so entranced at staring out at the view, she wasn’t even aware of him. So Vance had time to get control of the raging emotions rushing through him. Just minutes ago, he’d awakened, reached out for her in their bed and found her gone. For one heart-stopping second, fear had closed his throat before he’d realized that she’d probably gotten up to check on Jake. So he had, too. He’d found the baby sleeping peacefully, curled up into a ball—but Vance had had to search out the baby’s mother.

Finding her here, in the moonlit darkness, shifted something elemental inside him. It was bigger, deeper than anything he had ever known.

Was this love?

God, he hadn’t even mentally jerked back from that word. Which just went to prove how far gone he was. His whole life, he’d never seen love last. People in his family didn’t stay married. His parents had split up when he was just a kid. Even his friends fell in and out of “love” with regularity, so it was never something Vance had had any faith in.

It was a word he’d never used with a woman because he didn’t want to say what he didn’t—couldn’t—feel.

But now, with Charlie … All right, he was the first to admit that he didn’t know jack about love. But he did know that this woman and her child had carved a place for themselves in his heart. That was saying something, wasn’t it?

She turned her head to smile at him and his breath caught in his lungs. Her eyes shone and the curve of her mouth was irresistible to him. Everything about her was. And with that thought came the realization that he was in so deep now, he didn’t think he’d ever find his way out.

“What’re you doing out here?” He stepped through the sliding-glass door onto the tiled floor of the terrace.

“I woke up,” she said with a shrug. “I checked on Jake, then it was such a nice night, I came out here to do some thinking.”

“Always dangerous when a clever woman starts thinking,” he said, walking toward her. He came up behind her, wrapped his arms around her middle and let her lean back into him.

Since the end of the threat against her, Charlie had been … thoughtful. She was sad about Henry’s death, but relieved that her son was safe. But there was more she wasn’t saying, Vance knew. And that bothered him more than he wanted to admit.

She laid her hands on his arms and her head against his chest. And Vance felt … complete.

“Want to tell me what you’ve been thinking about?”

Her fingers stroked the skin of his arms with a gentle touch. “That it’s time Jake and I went home.”

He took a breath and held it. He wasn’t even sure his heart was still beating. “Home? Why?”

She turned in his arms then and looked up at him, shaking her hair back from her face. “Because we don’t belong here, Vance. You’ve been wonderful. Helped us when we needed it. Helped me. But this was never supposed to be permanent, right?”

No, no one had said anything about permanent. But they hadn’t put a time limit on it, either. Frowning, he swallowed hard and instead of answering her question, asked one of his own. “What’s the rush? You’ve been happy here. Jake and I get along great—”

“You do,” she said wistfully. “But I have to go back to my life, Vance.” She took a moment and looked around the terrace, the view and even the sky above. “As beautiful as all of this is, it isn’t my home.”

“It could be.”

“Vance—”

“I’m just saying.” Hell, he didn’t know what he was saying. All he knew was that her talking about leaving had blown a hole through his insides. Even his heartbeat was ragged. “Stay a while, at least. Let’s enjoy each other without the threat of doom hanging over our heads.”

She smiled sadly. “That won’t change anything.”

“Why does it have to?” He let her go, took a step or two away, then turned back to face her again. “Do we have to classify this—whatever it is—between us? Why can’t we just go on the way we have been?”

“Because it’s not just me, Vance.” She didn’t sound angry. Just sad. “I have to think about Jake, too.”

“I am thinking about Jake,” he argued and didn’t care for the sound of desperation in his voice. “He’s happy here. He likes his room. He likes me.”

“Too much,” she said and those two words jabbed at him.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means he’s getting more aware every day. It means I heard him say ‘Dada’ this morning when you were feeding him his oatmeal.”

Yeah, Vance thought, remembering the little boy’s delight at mastering another word. Remembering also how happy he’d been when the boy reached out for him and said that word.

“If I don’t leave, he’ll start believing you are his father and then taking him away later will just hurt him that much more.”

“Why now?” Vance demanded, rubbing one hand against the ache that was dead center in his chest. “Why all of a sudden the talk of leaving?”

She pushed her hair back with one hand as the wind tossed it across her eyes. “It’s not all of a sudden. Ever since Henry … died, I’ve known I had to leave. You have, too, Vance. You just don’t want to admit it.”

“Ah,” he said tightly, “now you’re a mind reader.”

“Nothing so fabulous,” she countered. “But I recognize reality when it’s right in front of me.”

Vance’s brain was racing even as his heart seemed to be slowing down into a sluggish rhythm. She was wrong. He hadn’t even considered Charlie and Jake leaving. He’d gotten used to having them there. To tripping on the baby’s toys in the darkness. To the smell of oatmeal in the morning and, mostly, to the feel of Charlie, nestled in his arms every night.

He hadn’t been thinking beyond getting rid of the threat to her. Now he could see that freeing Charlie meant—freeing Charlie.

Without a reason to stay, of course she would want to take her son back to their apartment. So all of them could get back to their lives. No more watching baseball games with Jake on his lap. No more glasses of wine with Charlie before dinner. No more laughter. No more anything. He would have his privacy again. The quiet of an empty penthouse. He’d see Charlie at work and this—whatever it was—between them would eventually shrivel and die.

That was what should happen, wasn’t it? He’d never meant for any of this to last. He’d only begun this thing to save Waverly’s, right? He looked at her now and felt everything in him go cold and still. Life without her sounded bleak. How the hell was he supposed to give her up?

“Vance?”

Flowers scented the warm air. They were high enough above the city lights that the stars were clear in the black sky. And the moonlight—God, she was made for moonlight—poured down over her like magic.

He didn’t want to talk. Didn’t want to think. He wanted to feel what he only felt with Charlie. He wanted to lose himself in her. And wasn’t that a sort of answer to her question?

He crossed the terrace to her, grabbed her hard and pulled her tight against him.

“No more talking,” he muttered, “and no leaving. Not yet. Okay?”

Charlie looked up at him and nodded. “Not yet. Okay.”

A stay of execution was all he could think of before he claimed her mouth in a soul-searing kiss that left him staggered and hungry for all of her.

In seconds, he had the hem of her nightshirt lifted, scraping it up along her luscious body, and then off and over her head. Moonlight kissed her skin and then he was doing the same. Lavishing attention on every square inch of her body, he turned her, laid her down on the cushioned chaise nearby and in the darkness heard her gasp of pleasure. “Vance—”

As his mouth covered the very heart of her and he felt her tremble, he thought, This is what matters. Before shutting his mind down and reveling in the glory of Charlie, he told himself that what they shared together wasn’t just important. It was everything.

Ann Richardson presided over the board meeting at Waverly’s the following morning. Standing at the head of the conference table, she looked at each member of the board for a moment or two before finally settling her gaze on Vance.

“Thanks to Vance,” she said with a regal nod of her head, “we managed to stop at least one threat against Waverly’s.”

“Never could trust a Rothschild,” George muttered darkly and Veronica shushed him.

“Dalton’s issued a press release denying any knowledge of what Henry Boyle was up to,” Vance put in, giving George a quick look.

The old man snorted. “Dalton knows everything that goes on in his house. You can take that to the bank. Dalton’s got two assistants. Henry was one of ‘em. You really believe that fool came up with this plan on his own? I don’t think so.”

“Neither do I,” Vance agreed. Dalton was no doubt behind the attempt at gaining information. But they’d have a hell of a time trying to prove it. He looked over at Ann, who nodded again. “I think all of us are on the same page there, George. But the bottom line is that Dalton’s denied it and the police have found nothing tying him to Henry’s plan.”

“Your assistant doesn’t know anything more?” Edwina’s voice sounded soft, concerned.

“No, she doesn’t,” Vance said. “She’s simply relieved that the threat is over.”

“As are we all,” Simon piped up from his seat, slapping one arthritic hand against the table for emphasis.

“The problem,” Ann put in, silencing everyone with her cool voice, “is that we can’t be sure the threat is over.” She waved away George’s objections before he could start speaking again. “Yes, of course, this particular incident is over. But that doesn’t mean that Dalton Rothschild will quit trying to take us down. We all have to remain alert. Aware of what’s going on in the house.” She looked at each of them in turn again. “We can’t trust anyone,” she said softly.

Vance knew she was right, but he was glad he and Charlie had already passed through their test of fire. He knew he could trust her with his life. Now if he could just bring himself to trust her with his heart …

“We have to stay together on this,” Ann was saying. “A team. To protect Waverly’s.”

“Of course, dear,” Veronica said, softly applauding Ann’s words. “You know you have our full support. Isn’t that right, George?”

The older man nodded grudgingly. “Yes, yes. We’re all a team. Rah, rah. Can we stop talking about Dalton Rothschild now? You’re giving me indigestion.”

Vance smothered a laugh and Ann rolled her eyes. “Very well,” she said, “if we’ve finished with the Rothschild portion of the meeting, I have an announcement to make.”

“Better news I hope, dear,” Edwina said.

“Much better.” Ann gave them all a wide smile. “You all know Macy Tarlington?”

George harrumphed. “Knew her mother,” he said with a knowing wink. “Tina Tarlington. Now that was a woman. Hell of an actress, too.”

“Her daughter hasn’t done as well, has she?” Veronica asked no one in particular.

“Hell, no,” George said. “Not a shadow of Tina.”

Tina Tarlington had been a rare beauty who’d died recently at the relatively young age of sixty-two. Famous all over the world, Tina was as much known for her three marriages and her collection of diamonds as she was for her acting skills.

Vance gave Ann a shrewd look. “You got it?”

“I got it,” she said and practically crowed with delight. Then, to the rest of the board, she said, “I’ve convinced Macy Tarlington, after much wining and dining, to allow Waverly’s to conduct her late mother’s estate sale. Tina’s jewelry collection alone will make the sale a not-to-be-missed event.”

Vance only half listened to the congratulations and the rife speculation on what might be included in Tina’s collection of mementos. Smiling to himself, he took his first easy breath in a couple of weeks.

The threat to Charlie was gone. It looked like Waverly’s was going to be safe and retain its well-earned reputation. The only thing left to do, he thought, was decide what he wanted and then to go after it. Charlie’s face swam up into his mind and everything in him jolted with excitement. Just thinking about her had his pulse pounding and his body tightening. She was what he needed. What he had always needed.

The answer was so simple. His heart had known from the beginning. It was only his brain that had refused to see the truth.

He loved Charlie Potter.

And he was never letting her go.

Charlie waited outside the boardroom for Vance to be free. She had a sheaf of papers requiring his signature and Justin had been haranguing her on the phone about them for the past half hour. Once Vance had signed them, she’d take them downstairs so Justin’s heart palpitations could stop.

Standing against the wall, she shifted from one foot to the other, uncomfortable standing too long in the high heels Vance liked so much. She smiled to herself as she remembered their first time making love when he’d insisted that she never get rid of them.

Silly, she knew. But he made her happy. Enough that she was postponing the inevitable by staying with him a few more days. She didn’t want to leave, but what choice did she have? She couldn’t love a man who didn’t love her back. There was no future in that. For any of them.

Her head tipped back against the wall and she stared up at the ceiling. How would she ever live without him? How could she continue to work for him knowing that what they had shared so briefly was over? She wouldn’t be able to and she knew it. The only sane thing to do would be to quit her job.

Then she would have lost everything.

Frowning now, she straightened up when the boardroom door opened. She heard George Cromwell speaking, his gruff voice unmistakable.

“That was a good job you did, Vance. Catching the blackmailer.”

“Yeah, thanks. I’m glad it worked out.”

Her stomach dipped and rolled in reaction to Vance’s voice, and she nearly sighed at the hopeless case she’d become.

“I heard the rumors about you and that cute assistant of yours. Clever of you, romancing her so you could get to the bottom of it so fast.”

Vance stepped out of the boardroom and saw her. He stopped dead and though he didn’t say anything, guilt was stamped so cleanly on his features, he didn’t have to speak.

Charlie felt as though she’d been slapped. Was that all she had been? A tool used to capture Henry? Had none of it been true? Ever? Reeling from the implications of George’s statement, and the fact that Vance hadn’t denied it, she hurried down the hall, away from the boardroom, away from the man shouting her name.

“What the—” George muttered as Vance took off after her at a dead run.

Charlie beat him to the office and turned to slam the door on him, but Vance was too quick. He slapped one hand against the door and hit it hard enough that it smacked against the wall.

“Don’t you even speak to me,” she warned, and threw the papers needing his signature at him. They fluttered like oversize snowflakes to the floor.

Hurt, humiliation and good old-fashioned temper were steering her course now. She felt as if she were going to explode from the pressure building inside.

“Charlie, dammit,” he said, slamming the door closed so no one could overhear them, “hear me out at least.”

“No. There’s nothing you can say to me now that I want to hear. That’s it. I quit.” And to think only moments ago, she’d been dreading that decision. Now there was no other choice.

She hurried across the room to her desk and bent down to yank open the bottom drawer. She grabbed her purse, kicked the drawer shut and stood up.