Love Thief Read online

  “Mission, Darcy. Remember mission?” Ava said with a smile. “One handsome face and you’re ready to give up on us?”

  Darcy squinted, staring full-on at Hunter. “He’s too old for me; the guy must be thirty. I like my men young—never over twenty. They’re more trainable in bed. No bad habits, if you know what I mean. But I might make a temporary exception for him.”

  Ava had to agree that Hunter was gorgeous. But if the gossip was true, he was a player. Ava’s parents’ marriage had shown her the deep wounds that infidelity caused, and she’d have none of that. Foolish choices could ruin lives. When the time came for a serious relationship, she wanted a solid guy who wanted to be a one-woman man.

  Eric Drew, the IT guy for the museum, approached their group. Darcy scowled. She didn’t like Eric. But Darcy didn’t like any guy who knew more about tech than she did.

  “Miss DuBarry, the editor of the Gazette is looking for you,” Eric announced, his eyes tracing Darcy’s tattoos and curves. “She’s just finishing her interview with your mother.”

  “Would you tell her I’ll be over in ten? I want to check the lighting in the grotto.”

  Eric shot an I’m-interested-if-you-are smile at Darcy before strolling away.

  If eye daggers could be seen, the ones Darcy shot at Eric’s back would’ve been visible to everyone in the room.

  “Eric’s single,” Ava said.

  “Not in a million,” Darcy huffed. “And by the way, Mr. Gorgeous over there is still staring at you. I’m off to find more champagne and younger blood.”

  Ignoring Darcy’s jab, Ava strolled toward the grotto that held her mother’s prized statue. The diminutive 5,000-year-old sculpture was the guest of honor at tonight’s event. To Ava’s mother, the statue and the party represented hope and an attempt to restart her life. To Ava, the splashy unveiling represented her mother’s desperate efforts to deny the pain of her marriage.

  Ava spotted her cousin and waved her over. The room was hot due to the large number of guests crowding it, but Callie was wearing a long and voluminous evening coat.

  “Gorgeous coat, but aren’t you broiling?” Ava asked as she drew Callie into a bear hug.

  Callie stiffened and wriggled out of the embrace. “I’m cold. I think I’m coming down with something.” She stepped back. “I don’t want you to catch it.”

  “I’m glad you came; it’ll mean so much to Mother. But maybe Jensen should take you home if you’re not feeling well.”

  Callie had seen Ava through the roughest period of her life. Since those dark days, Ava had stepped up in any way she could to help her wayward cousin.

  Callie hugged her arms across her chest. The folds of the coat enveloped her slim frame, making her look like a Disney princess gone wrong. “Yeah, well, family solidarity and all that.” Callie glanced around the room. “I’ll head out soon. I can catch a cab. From the looks of Aunt Lesley, she’ll need your driver pretty soon.” She snagged a glass from the tray of a hovering waiter. “DuBarry parties have the best champagne.”

  Ava took the glass from her hand and handed it back to the waiter. “If you’re coming down with a virus, alcohol is the worst possible beverage.”

  Callie snatched another glass from the tray. “Champagne has vitamin C, you know.”

  Ava laughed. “Good try. You really should consider a career in marketing.” She watched as Callie took two deep swallows of champagne. She couldn’t help worrying about Callie. No one else cared about her orphaned cousin’s well-being. “How’re your classes lining up for this quarter?”

  “Good,” Callie said as she glanced around the room again. She snapped her eyes back to Ava. “I mean great. I’ll have one rather intriguing professor; I met him during the art department open house.” She paused. “I really appreciate you springing for the tuition.”

  Ava never liked being reminded of the financial gap between her and Callie. Ever since her cousin’s parents had died in a plane crash and Ava’s family had reluctantly taken Callie in, the disparity between their worlds nagged. It was only the luck of whatever drove the universe that determined Ava had been born into the wealthy branch of the DuBarry family.

  “There’s a hot new guy who just signed up at Time for Love,” Ava said, changing the subject. “He’s a scientist. I think you should—”

  “No thanks. I’ve met someone.”

  A man making his way over to view the statue in the grotto jostled Ava, and she braced to keep from bumping into Callie. The man muttered a slurred apology over his shoulder as he passed by, but Ava was focused on Callie’s announcement.

  “And who might this awesome mystery man be?”

  “It’d be bad luck to say right now. You know, until . . . well, until I have a better sense of where the relationship is headed.”

  “C’mon, it’s me you’re talking to. And I work for a dating agency, for goodness’ sake.”

  Callie’s attention darted around the room again, as if she were looking for someone. “Nope. Like I said, bad luck.” She tilted her head, considering Ava. “I still don’t get why you of all people are working for a dating agency. You have talent, Ava. So many talents.”

  Callie was perceptive. They’d always been close, almost like sisters instead of cousins. Sometimes they knew each other’s thoughts before they were spoken. But the last thing Ava needed was for her cousin to discover her private mission with the Heiresses. “Helping people find true love is noble work,” she said, not sounding convincing even to herself.

  “Since I’m feeling the effects of love for the first time, I can’t argue with that. But I think your talents could be applied to better advantage.” Callie darted a look at her phone. “I think I’ll grab a bite before I head home. I heard the pot stickers are to die for. And by the way, if your high-class dating agency is so darn good, maybe it’ll help with your love life, cuz. You know what they say about all work and no play.”

  Callie waved as she slipped through the crowd and moved toward a food station at the edge of the grotto display. Ava shook her head. Callie was acting stranger than she normally did. And though her words had been playful, her tone hadn’t matched them. Ava was starting to play the exchange with Callie back in her head when a deep-velvet laugh had her turning.

  Hunter. His name hadn’t been on the original guest list. But Ava had been in Africa the previous two weeks—maybe he’d been a last-minute addition. Hunter’s eyes met hers again, and he shot her a high-wattage smile. Unnerved by the tumbling in her belly, she lowered her gaze and pivoted away. But moments later, a light touch to her arm had her turning again, and she found herself face-to-face with him.

  “Ah, the lioness and her keeper,” Hunter said.

  “Excuse me?”

  With Ava caught in his unwavering gaze, her mind raced to make sense of his words. Up close he was shockingly handsome. His tuxedo fit him as if it had been tailored to showcase every muscle in his body. He radiated maleness with a power that made her pulse jump. Ava tried to put space between them, but the press of the crowd gave her only inches to maneuver.

  He held out his hand. “Hunter Sterling.”

  Unable to politely refuse a straightforward social greeting, she clasped his outstretched hand. “Ava DuBarry,” she responded. The shiver of energy that jolted through her when he raised her fingers and brushed them lightly with his lips had her snatching her hand back to her side.

  His eyes crinkled in a smile that softened the chiseled features of his face. “I doubt there’s anyone in this room who doesn’t know who you are.”

  She’d spent two weeks questioning harsh and possibly dangerous men in the wilds of Africa on her recent fact-finding mission for the Heiresses, but Hunter’s soft-spoken words fired alarm in her belly and had her brain fighting to shut down her body’s response. She would not make the same mistake her mother had. She would not fall for a handsome face and spend the rest of her life paying the price.

  “Are you all right?”

  At the sound of Hunter’s voice, heat crept up her neck, flushing her face. She stuffed down her ridiculous thoughts. Hunter Sterling was no threat. She had full command of her choices and future. All Darcy and Callie’s talk about love must’ve put her on edge.

  “It’s just the press of all these people and the heat,” she said, regaining her composure.

  Hunter slid his gaze around the room and then back to her. “Your guest of honor has drawn quite a crowd.” He nodded toward the statue perched in the artfully lit grotto. “The Arundel Lioness,” he said as he pulled the exhibit flyer from the breast pocket of his tuxedo. “A Mesopotamian sculpture made by an unknown artist belonging to the Elam civilization,” he read in a whiskey-smooth voice that Ava knew no woman would ever tire of hearing. “Historians and art critics estimate that the statue was made around the time man invented the wheel and began constructing settlements,” he continued. “Very small, only four inches tall, the sculpture depicts a hybrid creature with human features intertwined with animal ones. More precisely, a lioness.”

  Hunter tucked the brochure back into his pocket and grinned. “That makes you a lion keeper.” He surveyed the grotto and the little statue. “For years I thought she was a myth. Wherever did you acquire her?”

  “She’s been in our family for three hundred years.” The muscles she’d been clenching relaxed a bit. During the flurry of press events, answering basic questions about the statue had become rote.

  “An equally pedigreed lion and lion keeper, then.”

  “Her history is far more significant than mine.” Ava hated discussing pedigrees. The press and public were fascinated by her family’s long history. Her mother had once told her she could trace her roots back to Artaxerxes, the famed king of Persia. Ava didn’t believe that, but t
here was documentation tracking her ancestors back to Louis II and the Carolingian Empire. But nobility and ancestry didn’t interest her. What mattered was what people were doing with their lives now, not what had happened in the past.

  Hunter’s smile faded. “Was she war plunder?”

  Though she wanted to tell Hunter such details were none of his business, his tone fired up her defenses.

  “The Lioness was bought by an ancestor of mine while traveling in what was then called Persia; we have documentation. But she was forgotten in one of our warehouses for over a century.”

  Over Hunter’s shoulder Ava saw Callie standing at the edge of the grotto. Callie pointed to Hunter with a pot sticker and gave Ava a thumbs-up.

  “The Lioness symbolizes the essence of Mesopotamian culture,” Hunter said, drawing her attention away from Callie’s antics. “But even I was astonished to hear that someone recently offered fifty-five million for her. I’m surprised your family didn’t consider selling.”

  No one in her family had expected the voracious interest the Lioness had stirred in the art world as a result of the press leading up to the exhibit. Her parents had fought for days after an anonymous buyer contacted them via a broker and made the shocking offer to buy the statue. To her father, art was a commodity, items to be bought and sold for a profit.

  “The statue is precious to my mother,” Ava said, her voice wavering. “She would never consider selling it. Not for any price.”

  “I admire your mother’s dedication to sharing treasures like the Lioness. Beauty shouldn’t be locked away for the pleasure of a privileged few.”

  Hunter’s praise snaked through her defenses. Ava couldn’t deny the deep pride she felt for her mother’s efforts to make art available to the public, for her dedication to the museum and its mission.

  “Perhaps you could convince my father. When news of the offer for the Lioness leaked to the press, the insurance company tripled the fee to insure the statue for this exhibition. He went ballistic.”

  “As a businessman, I can understand his concerns.”

  The spark of camaraderie she’d begun feeling dissolved with his words. “Art should not be a commodity.”

  “The art market is a wily beast with appetites driven by obsession and power. Insurance companies bow to the market. And the market bows to obsessions, whether driven by impulses good or bad.”

  The sudden gravity of his tone and the unnamable emotion in his eyes sent a shock of warning coursing through her. Hunter Sterling was more than the flippant playboy businessman featured in the tabloids.

  He held Ava’s gaze as he gestured to the grotto. “Critics say the Lioness isn’t beautiful, although I find her so.”

  “Nobody, including art critics, should be able to tell anyone what is beautiful and what is not,” Ava said, relying on words to create a distance that her regular boundary-setting practice had failed to maintain. “I don’t feel it’s important to debate why I think a flower, a painting, the sunset or the light streaming through a stained-glass window is beautiful. Their power creates an emotional reaction in me. I don’t concern myself with what others might think.”

  “Why am I not surprised?” His eyes crinkled with his smile.

  That smile reached into her and unfurled thoughts and feelings that had been locked up by grief and depression since Alicia’s death. How long had it been since she’d let herself truly feel? How long since art held a place in her heart, a place she’d since locked away?

  “Art portrays the artist’s most profound emotions, whether they be pretty and bright or dark and sinister,” she said as the embers of long-dampened emotions flared to life.

  Hunter raised a brow. “Is our Lioness sinister?”

  Sinister.

  She hadn’t used the word in years. But something about Hunter had called it out of her. “No, not to my eyes. She’s powerful, but not sinister. I think she symbolizes the union of humans and the natural world. I find her bone-rattlingly beautiful. And mysterious.”

  “Beauty assumes many mysterious guises,” Hunter said, riveting her with his midnight-blue eyes. “But I think its power is primarily a force of allurement. Beauty—allurement—draws together previously separate elements into a new whole, which then has a life of its own. Even physicists acknowledge that attraction is a transforming power of the universe.”

  His words were cascading through Ava like the first rain in a desert. She’d never met a man who shared her views on beauty and its importance to art and life. And though she fought the attraction drawing her to him, she couldn’t deny its powerful tug.

  But she wasn’t in the market for having her universe transformed by him or any man.

  “I’m glad to hear some scientists are finally coming out of the closet and admitting they feel,” she said, adding a laugh that didn’t dissolve her discomfort. “Societies ignore the voices of artists at their peril. Art keeps diverse voices from being silenced, and diversity is the ultimate strength of a culture. Art drives the development of civilization as both a beacon and a warning.”

  Hunter tilted his head toward the grotto. “Thus the value of your Lioness. Thousands of years after she was fashioned, here she is, communicating beyond language and time.” His eyes darkened as if a cloud had passed through him. “Perhaps if more people engaged with a broader variety of the world’s artistic traditions, there’d be greater tolerance and mutual respect.” He paused and then added, “And maybe less greed and violence.”

  Though Ava agreed, she couldn’t help but think that there was something personal, something deep, that made Hunter add that bit about violence. She waited, but he didn’t elaborate.

  She nodded toward a couple discussing one of the paintings nearby and spoke to fill the uncomfortable pause in the conversation. “To me, a true work of art evokes questions. And the answers can point toward deeper questions such as who are we and why are we here?”

  “Precisely the questions I’m currently asking myself.” An enigmatic smile curved Hunter’s lips. “An art historian once said that art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.”

  “You’ve studied art history?” It wasn’t really a question since he clearly knew plenty. But she found herself wanting to know more about the man behind society’s rumors.

  “At first I learned on the job. I found that I could learn a lot just by being in the presence of masterpieces. My early days installing security systems gave me loads of time to view works few people will ever see. But, yes, I did do some formal study.”

  “Where?”

  “Harvard. I was fortunate to get a scholarship. I know you attended Stanford. And did two years of museum apprenticeship at the Louvre after that.”

  A six-year-old with a computer could’ve discovered the same information about her. Her father had no sense of privacy and told the world everything about the family. He would’ve announced her grade point average if she hadn’t stopped him. But having Hunter know details about her when she knew so little about him set a creeping unease knotting in her chest.

  He again surveyed the statue. “I applaud the museum’s efforts to display the Lioness in an authentic-looking setting, but the lack of security puts her at risk.”

  “My mother wanted her to be displayed as she would’ve been seen in her original culture.” She didn’t add that the exhibit design had been completed before the family discovered how much the statue was worth.

  “An admirable goal. But it could’ve been accomplished with better security.”

  His all-business tone snapped her out of the captivating spell of their earlier conversation. “Our perimeter security systems are the best in the country,” she said, defending the museum and its practices.

  “An impressive perimeter can fool us into thinking that what’s inside is safe,” Hunter said. “Thieves are more clever than most people think.”

  His condescending tone pissed her off. “You needn’t worry. If any threat arose, in less than a minute this entire room would be gated shut.”

  “For an expert thief, a minute is a long time,” Hunter said.

  One of the beautiful actresses her father had invited—ingénue Carrie Anston—sidled up and threaded her arm through Hunter’s, drawing him close.

  “I need to borrow this gentleman for a bit if you don’t mind,” she said, slanting a smile at Ava.