What a Girl Wants (2 page)

The mere thought made her stomach twist. She couldn’t do that—she didn’t know how. It’d taken her so long to be successful at something, even on such a small scale—she wasn’t about to risk blowing it all by overreaching.

He touched her hair. “Just talk to him, Ariana. For me.”

She sighed. “So now it’s the guilt?”

“Whatever works, sweetheart.” He smiled. “Sebastian’s a smart man. He’ll have good ideas for you.”

“No doubt.” She just wasn’t interested—at least not in his business ideas. He himself? That was another matter. His voice was yummy. So yummy she’d kept his messages to listen to them over and over again. Not that she’d admit it—certainly not to her father.

She couldn’t help it; she had an aural fixation. One time she dated a guy only because his Australian accent was so delicious, despite the fact that he had bad body odor.

Sebastian Tate was probably ancient, and she wasn’t into older men—she already had one father—but she couldn’t help closing her eyes and listening to him whisper in her ear. His voice made her shiver just imagining it.

“You should listen to Sebastian,” her dad said with uncanny prescience. “Even if he says something about your image, like if you need to fix your hair color.”

What was it about her hair today that had people commenting on it? She liked her hair; it made her feel like a living canvas. Her dad had never loved it. Not that she cared. Much. “Is Mom in the kitchen?”

“Yes.” Her dad gave her a stern look. “We’ll continue to discuss this after lunch.”

“Sure thing, Dad,” she lied as she headed toward her mom and sanity.

Lillian Warren chopped vegetables in the kitchen. She wore yoga pants from Annabelle’s line, her feet bare on the hardwood. Her hair had become blonder over the years, and she had a few small lines here and there, but otherwise she looked the same as always.

The only way her mother was different was the faint smell of paint that clung to her now. After Belle went off to college, Lillian had decided to take up oil painting. She’d set up her own studio in one of the spare rooms and hadn’t looked back.

Her mom was talented too, in a way Ariana never had been when she’d thought art was her thing. It’d been for a split-second, but she knew she wasn’t good enough to do it for a living. She guessed the art gene missed her just like the business one had.

Her mom looked over her shoulder with a warm smile. “I’m roasting a chicken, honey. I hope that’s okay.”

“I love your chicken.” She grabbed a carrot from the cutting board. “Mom, do you know where the phone chargers are?”

“Try your dad’s office. In the top drawer.”

Because her dad was such a neat freak. He flipped out whenever there was too much clutter on the counters. She kept trying to tell him that a power supply wasn’t clutter, but he never bought it.

She walked into his office, pausing to peek in. “Dad? You in here?”

He wasn’t, so she went straight to his desk. As she reached for the drawer, she kicked a box just under the desk and knocked it over. The top came off and some papers and photos spilled out.

“Super,” she murmured, bending down to put it all back to order. She stuffed the folders and envelopes back in and gathered up the pictures that had spread on the floor. Picking up the picture of her parents on their wedding day, she smiled. They looked at each other like they couldn’t help themselves.

Slowing down, she looked at the other photos as she picked them up. She hadn’t seen most of them. There were some of her dad when he was a young man. Some had people she didn’t recognize. Maybe college friends, she decided. Her parents didn’t have any family left that they were close to.

She picked up the last picture, of a woman holding a baby. She was about to dismiss it when she did a double take.

That baby was her.

There was no mistaking her lopsided dimple. Her parents and Belle had teased her about it all her life.

So weird. She lifted the photo closer. She’d never seen a picture of herself so young. They’d all been damaged by water eons ago. It looked like maybe she was six months old.

But who was the woman?

Ariana studied her, wondering if it was her dad’s sister-in-law. His brother had died in Iraq sometime after she’d been born, and all she knew about her uncle’s wife was that she wanted nothing to do with them.

It had to be her, right? Ariana held the picture closer. Because the woman didn’t look like she wanted to be holding a baby.

Taking the picture—and her power supply—Ariana returned to the kitchen. As she plugged her phone in, she said, “Mom, look what I found in Dad’s office.”

“You know your father doesn’t like you going through his things. It disrupts his sense of order.”

“Then he should leave the chargers out on the kitchen counter like normal people.”

“Your father has never been normal.” Her mom glanced at her. “Will you hand me that platter?”

“I found a baby picture of myself.” She handed the fancy China plate to her mom. “Do you know who this woman is? Is it Dad’s sister-in-law?”

Her mom glanced at it. She went pale and the dish slipped from her hands, shattering on the kitchen tile.

“Mom.” She pulled her mom away from the broken shards. “Are you okay?”

Lillian pressed a palm to her forehead. “Where did you find that picture, Ariana?”

“I told you. In Dad’s office. I knocked over a box on the floor.”

“Give it to me.” Her mother held out a shaking hand.

“I don’t get what the big deal is,” she said, handing it over.

Her mother frowned at the picture, an array of emotions crossing her face.

“What happened in here?” her dad said as he walked in.

Before she could say anything, Lillian held out the photo. “Ariana found this.”

He took it and stared at it. Then he faced her, tension lines stark between his brows. “Why were you going through my things?”

“I only knocked over a box.” She put her hands on her hips. “What’s going on here?”

Her parents looked at each other and then her father strode to the trash, stepped on the pedal, and dropped the picture into the bin. When he faced her, his face was composed into the no-nonsense look he wore when he was trying to boss her around, which as all the time. “That was someone we knew once.”

“Who was she?” Ariana asked, glancing at the trash.

“Someone who chose not to be in our lives.”

“Was she your brother’s wife?”

“It’s not important.” The groove between his eyebrows deepened. “She’s gone.”

“If she doesn’t matter, why are you so upset?” she asked, curious. Her dad freaked out about specific things, like when his stuff was messed up; he never freaked out about someone rejecting him.

“I’m not upset,” he said loudly. He faced Lillian, glaring. “When is lunch going to be ready?”

Her mom shook herself, obviously still flustered. “A few minutes. I just need to clean up the broken dish.”

Her dad turned to her. “We should discuss your business then.”

“I need to help Mom clean up the mess,” she said quickly, hurrying to the supply closet to get the broom and dust pan and pretending to be seriously engrossed with sweeping. The last thing she wanted was to talk about Dew Me with her dad. Plus, she had the feeling he was trying to divert her. She wished she knew why, because it was just an old picture.

“Edward, maybe you could set the table,” Lillian said.

“CEOs don’t set the table,” he grumbled as he opened the silverware drawer.

“Yes, but you’re retired now,” her mother pointed out. “You need a hobby.”

He grumbled all the way to the dining room.

She shot her mom a grateful look as he left the kitchen. “Thanks,” she mouthed.

Her mom smiled faintly and continued to get lunch ready.

Ariana swept the broken pieces. She opened the trash to throw them away.

On top, there was the photo. Her baby self smiled back at her as the woman who held her glared.

Quickly, so her mom wouldn’t see, she picked it out of the trash and slipped it into her pocket.

‡

A
nother house. Another place that wasn’t his own.

Sebastian lounged in the solarium, his favorite room in the Taylor house because it reminded him of the orangery in the South Street house.

He missed London. He missed his Summerhill cousins—even Beatrice.

Like a hundred times before, he wondered if he shouldn’t just move and stay there, and like each time, he shook his head. He loved London but it hadn’t completely felt like home.

Then again, he wasn’t sure he knew what home felt like.

Taking his phone out, he called Ariana Warren again, even though it was futile. In the week he’d been trying to connect with her, she hadn’t picked up once or attempted to return his calls.

A few months ago, he wouldn’t have cared; he’d been content to sit around and wait for her because he’d had nothing better to do.

But now he was ready to move on.
Eager
to move on. Seeing his distant cousins all find love and happiness made him want to find his own heart.

Only first there was this last favor he owed from his advertising days.

He snorted. He hadn’t just been in advertising; he’d started and run one of the top agencies in New York. He’d been the king of martini lunches and mass manipulation.

And Edward Warren had helped him get there. Edward’s account was the one that’d put Sebastian’s company on the map. It’d been a coup, winning a large corporate account so quickly out of the gate. It’d been the propulsion he’d needed to shoot up to the top of the world, where he’d stayed for almost ten years.

Until they found the tumor.

Finding out he had a mass the size of a golf ball pressing on his brain was already harsh; but the surgery to extricate it left him like a baby, needing to learn how to talk and walk from scratch.

Worst: he’d lost all his “friends.”

He hadn’t known what lonely meant until he woke up from his surgery, unable to speak or move properly. He hadn’t realized how important family was, because family would have rallied around him, unlike his fair-weather friends.

At the time, he wouldn’t have called it anything but a tragedy. In retrospect, he was grateful to the experience for opening his eyes to what was important: people who loved him unconditionally.

He had the Summerhills now, and his host, Lara Taylor, had also decreed herself his protector. And soon he’d start working on his own family.

After he took care of this Ariana Warren situation. He left her another brief message and hung up. Then he called Warren himself.

Unlike his daughter, Edward picked up the phone on the first ring. “Warren.”

He sat up out of habit. “Edward, it’s Sebastian Tate.”

“Sebastian.” The man’s tone warmed. Edward Warren wasn’t overly demonstrative, but he was a good man—fair and plainspoken. He obviously cared about his family, which Sebastian respected. “I know you haven’t been able to talk to my daughter yet.”

“Ariana appears to be busy.” He didn’t think he could use the word
stubborn
without at least talking to her once. “I was wondering if you could give me the address of her shop. It might speed things up to talk to her in person.”

“That’s an excellent idea. I’ll text it to you.” The man paused and then said, “Sebastian, I have a confession to make. Ariana isn’t completely on board with the idea of you helping her.”

He almost laughed. Understatement of the year. “Is there a reason for her reticence?”

“She has her own visions of what she wants, but I’d like her to expand them. She won’t listen to me, so I’m hoping you’ll be able to show her the way. You were always effective with people who needed persuading. She doesn’t know what she wants. She’ll be happy when she’s in Whole Foods.”

Would she? He had doubts, but he knew how to schmooze a client. “Once I meet her I’ll be able to figure out a way to help her grow her business.”

“I trust you, Sebastian. Thank you for this.”

Shaking his head, he hung up. He had a feeling he had his work cut out for him.

“There you are, sweeting.” Lara Taylor swept into the solarium, looking like a rock diva in a vintage Fleetwood Mac T-shirt and torn jeans. “I’ve been looking for you.”

He smiled, letting go of the call and focusing on this moment with Lara. If there’d been one lesson he’d learned from his tumor it was that you had to live every moment like it was the most important one. “Have you decided to leave your husband and run away with me?”

She grinned as she curled up on the opposite end of the couch from him, lifting her long hair out of the way as she settled. “I think you can do better than an old lady like me.”

“I should be so lucky.” In the short time he’d known her, Sebastian had fallen in love with this woman. Not only was she was timeless, with the kind of beauty that radiated from within, but she lived on her own terms. She flipped off convention with her toe rings and the way she wore her hair long and flowing down her back.

Moreover, she had a generous heart. She’d welcomed a stranger into her home with arms wide open.

“You’re frowning, sweeting.” Lara watched him with her all-knowing gaze.