Fixer: A Bad Boy Romance (40 page)

"Because I have some self-control?" I managed, holding my glass up in case she slapped the table again. "Just because I want to get past Barry, that doesn't mean that I'm going to throw myself into the bed of the first guy to show some interest-"

Portia made sure that I saw her roll her eyes at me. "You need to take a break from that high horse of yours, maybe get onto a different thing to ride," she said, ignoring how I blushed and hit her with the back of my hand on her shoulder at this crude comment.

"It's always weird to hear something like that come out of your mouth, you know that?" I told her.

"What? Why?"

"You know, because you look all classy and sophisticated, sitting there in your expensive outfit with your perfect hair and sipping at wine, and then you just casually throw out something about how I need to get laid. It's jarring."

Instead of looking embarrassed, Portia leaned in towards me, waggling her eyebrows. "Want to hear me talk about the last guy I brought back home, then?" she asked, grinning. "You know, I wasn't expecting it at all, but the curve of his-"

"Nope, nope, nope!" I yelped, cutting her off and holding my hands up over my ears.

"Oh, relax," she said after a minute, when I showed no sign of wanting to hear her sordid tale. "But really, you need to see this as a good thing! You've got two men, and this means two different ways for you to get past Barry!"

"I'm not going to be past Barry until I've gotten him out of my life," I stated firmly. "And that means that I need to sell this stupid statue. So right now, the only man that holds a special place in my life is Richard Albrecht - what?"

I stopped and frowned at Portia, whose eyes had widened at this last sentence.

"What was that name again?" she asked, brushing back her hair.

"Who, Richard Albrecht?"

"How in the world do you know Albrecht?" Clearly, the name meant something to her, although I couldn't quite read her reaction, couldn't tell if it was positive or negative.

I shrugged. "He just wandered into the gallery and started looking at the Onyx pieces. I mentioned that there was another one, a larger one-of-a-kind piece back in the man's studio, and he sounded interested. He gave me his card and I promised that I would send him some pictures."

"How did he look?" Portia pressed.

I gave another shrug, trying to think back. "I don't know - he wore faded tweed, kind of threadbare. I didn't actually peg him as someone who would be able to afford most of the art in the gallery, honestly, much less have the wealth to buy a big piece like the one back in Onyx's studio. But I went back and looked through the old purchase orders, and he's bought some stuff - expensive stuff - from the gallery before."

"I'll bet he has," Portia said, and my remaining patience slipped.

"Okay, you clearly know this guy. Who is he? Why did you practically jump out of your seat at his name?"

"You really don't know him?" Portia quickly kept talking as she saw my eyes narrow. "Fine, fine. You know that big skyscraper downtown? The glass one with the fountains out front?"

I knew exactly which building Portia was talking about; the glass-covered skyscraper was easily the tallest building in the city, with an iconic pointed top that had come to define the skyline of our little city. There had been fierce protests against it being built, several years ago, but the measure to permit the tall building passed, and it now brought in professional interest - and lots of revenue in business taxes - for the city each year.

"What about it?" I asked.

She sighed. "The building is owned by Richard Albrecht. The guy spent millions of dollars on lobbying the city to let him put it up, more to actually build the thing, and he's probably made it all back at least a dozen times over. He's the richest guy in the area, a total catch for any young woman if he wasn't so weird!"

So that explained why Albrecht had the money to buy art from the gallery whenever he wanted, without batting an eye at the price! "Weird?" I echoed back, focusing on that last word.

"You probably picked up on it from talking to him, but yes." Portia tossed her hair back. "I got to find out about it firsthand, a couple years ago. Remember when I put together the bachelor auction?"

I just shook my head, drawing a blank on any sort of auction.

"Right. You were still with Barry, and your little soap bubble of marital bliss hadn't yet popped." Portia finished off her wine, but didn't yet get up for a refill. "Well, a couple of years ago, my firm wanted to organize a bachelor auction for charity. Whole nine yards. We'd invite all the elites and wealthy debutantes of the city, ply them with lots of free champagne, and then we'd get a couple dozen of the city's most eligible bachelors and bachelorettes and auction them off. All the money that we raised would go to charity, some sexy people would get dates, some rich people might get laid, and our firm would get a nice bit of publicity from arranging the whole thing."

I nodded. This sounded like one of Portia's ideas - everyone benefited, including her own self-interest.

"Well, we approached Robert Albrecht, managed to get him to sign up to be one of the bachelors that we'd auction off. After all, I'm sure a lot of girls are willing to look past a thirty year age difference if there's enough zeroes on the guy's bank account balance. I mean, I wouldn't have said no to him."

"Eww," I said, remembering Albrecht's mostly white hair.

She twinkled at me. "I'm sorry, am I ruining your sophisticated mental picture of your best friend?"

"Just keep telling the story."

"Fine. Well, auction went well up until Albrecht got up on stage for his turn to be auctioned off. We were doing well, keeping ahead of our goal, had a good turnout. But Albrecht is up there, we start the bidding, and there's this older gal really gunning for him." Portia grinned as she thought back. "I mean, this woman was a real spitfire! I'd say that she was in her fifties, rather round, hair like a big old beehive on top of her head, but she had half a dozen strings of pearls around her neck, and her bidding paddle didn't even sit still. She wanted Albrecht, and she wasn't taking no for an answer."

"So what happened?"

Portia laughed. "So Albrecht takes one look out at her, sees that she's winning, and he grabs a paddle and starts bidding on himself! Of course, that woman - Doris, I think her name was - she's not at all happy about this, and starts yelling out that Albrecht can't bid on himself. He, though, isn't going to take it - he grabs the microphone from me and yells out that he's got more money, he's going to choose who takes him home, and he'd rather go back to a bottle of scotch than to her! She's steamed, he wins, but he definitely didn't make a lot of friends that night."

"So he's a bit strong-willed," I summarized.

Portia nodded. "Maybe even a bit of an understatement. He goes for whatever he wants, and he's not afraid to piss off a lot of people in order to get it."

"Well, that could work out for me," I said after a minute of consideration. "I mean, if I can get him to want this statue, he'll dig in his heels and buy it, even if someone else doesn't think that it fits with his other decor?"

"Or he'll put it out at his mansion," she added.

I frowned. "Mansion?"

"Oh, didn't you hear about that? He's got a big house out on the edge of town. Real big place, totally overdone. Even has gardens like it was a real palace; he pays half a dozen gardeners to keep it looking perfectly groomed, even though he apparently never ventures out into them." Portia shook her head. "Weird guy, but richer than Croesus."

"Croesus?" She'd lost me with this comment.

"Yeah, he was this rich old king of Turkey. Really wealthy."

I decided not to ask how Portia knew about the wealthiness of Turkish kings. "Look, the point is that Albrecht can both afford this sculpture, and he really wants it. Both of those are good for me!" A smile bloomed across my face. "Portia, I might actually pull this off after all, get Barry out of my life and this whole divorce finally finished and behind me!"

She beamed back. "I hope so! And then, with Barry no longer around at all, you'll be free to finally pursue both of these sexy men who are interested in you, and you can come here and tell me all about how they seduced you and made you finish in ways you've never come before!"

Instead of protesting against this foul language, I let it slide, I was so excited. "I just have to close the sale, and I'll be golden!"

"Well, let me know if I can help," Portia promised. "Or if he ends up backing out on the sale, let me know so that I can come help you throw toilet paper all over his mansion. It will be good payback for how he acted at my charity auction."

"You know, maybe you could help out with the guy problem, too," I said after another minute. "When's the last time that you went out with someone?"

"For more than just getting a bit of relief from the built-up sexual pressure?" Portia sighed. "Too long, I'll admit. I wish I could just say that it was because I was too busy with work right now, but..." She toyed with her hair. "Actually, maybe I will stick with that as an excuse, because it sounds better than the truth."

"So, I've got two guys interested in me, and you need a date - this seems perfect!"

"Which one do I get?" Portia asked.

I opened my mouth, but frowned and closed it after a minute. "I, um, I'm not sure."

For some reason, Portia didn't look surprised by this. "Right. Like I said, Becca, you need to try them out, at least to just figure out which one you like the best. Once you've made up your mind, let me know."

"Yeah, right," I said, mentally insisting once again to myself that I wasn't going to let either Onyx or Carter seduce me before I'd finished this sale. If I was going to be forced to resign in ignominy from my job as manager of Uncle Preston's art gallery, I'd at least leave without any more debts to my name.

First, sell Onyx's giant dick statue. Then, I could start thinking about which man would win me over.

Chapter Twenty

*

I woke up the next morning to more good news - a response from Albrecht sat in my email inbox.

I opened the email as I filled my thermos with coffee, trying to keep my hand from shaking with nervousness as I poured the hot liquid into the travel container. Please be good news, I prayed silently, closing my eyes for a moment before opening them and focusing on the electronic text.

"Dear Miss Grace," I read off. "Thank you for sending the pictures - they provide an excellent representation of the power and virility of the piece. I will admit that I am quite interested, but I would like to consider this for another day or two before I make a final decision. I would request, however, that you hold the piece for me and do not show it to other buyers - and yes, you may regard this as a sign of interest."

Well, that sounded like fairly good news! He wasn't yet ready to commit to buying the piece quite yet - but then again, it probably took some time to work up to dropping six figures on a giant stone penis, I considered to myself. And if he wanted me to hold the sculpture for him, maybe he just wanted to figure out where it would, erm, fit in best on his property before he went ahead and placed the order.

With a light heart, I headed out of my apartment, off to open up the gallery and get ready for the day.

My next happy surprise strolled into the Halesford Gallery a few minutes after I'd turned on the lights and settled in behind the front desk to enjoy my coffee. "Looks like I didn't need to bring this for you," he commented, holding a cardboard container with two cups of steaming Starbucks coffee sitting nestled inside.

"Gimme!" I exclaimed, pushing my thermos of drip-brewed home stuff aside without a second thought.

Carter laughed, half-leaning, half-sitting on top of my desk and dangling the cup of coffee he'd brought for me just out of my reach. "First, tell me that you're glad to see me back from my trip."

"I refuse to give in to torture," I insisted stubbornly, even as my mouth watered at the thought of that coffee.

"What if I told you that I also brought you a chocolate scone?"

"I'm so glad that you're back, I totally missed and thought about you every second that you were away," I immediately burst out, rising up from my seat so I could lean forward and finally get my fingers around the insulated paper cup of coffee. "Now, hand it over!"

Carter laughed again, but gave up his grip on the coffee cup, letting it drop down into my hands. I immediately took a long pull, sighing at the smoother, much cleaner taste. Somehow, the already-ground beans that I used at home just didn't create nearly as satisfying of a mouthful.

"Now, where's my scone?" I asked once I'd swallowed my gulp of coffee, holding out my hand like a child waiting for her allowance.

Carter popped open the zipper on the messenger bag he wore slung over his shoulder and withdrew a crinkling little paper bag. I tugged the scone out from inside, loving how the pastry already began to flake apart in my fingers. My mouth watered at just the sight of the chocolate swirls that cut through the brown dough. The thing was probably horrible for me, but all that artery-clogging fat was irresistible, and I took a big bite.