Family Ties Read Free Page B

set in my ways now. And I want to spend holidays and vacations with the kids. A man would interfere with that. And it might upset them.”
    “Don’t you want more in your life than just being an aunt?” Whitney asked her sadly. It didn’t seem fair to Whitney that Annie had sacrificed her own life for her sister’s children, but she didn’t seem to mind, and she was happy as she was. Her own biological clock had run out of batteries years before, without a sound. She had three children she loved and didn’t want more.
    “I’m happy,” Annie reassured her, and she seemed to be. The two women met for lunch when Whitney came into the city, usually to go shopping. And Annie went to New Jersey for the weekend once in a while, after the kids were gone, but most of the time she was too busy working on weekends to go anywhere. And her work was beautiful. There were several handsome townhouses on the Upper East Side that she had renovated, spectacular penthouses, and several beautiful estates in the Hamptons, and one in Bronxville. And she had turned a number of brownstones into offices for clients. Her business was booming and continued to grow. She had just turned down a job in Los Angeles, and another in London, because she said she didn’t have time to travel. She was happy working in New York. And basically she was happy with her life, and it showed. She had done exactly what she wanted and what she’d promised. She had accompanied her nieces and nephew from childhood to young adulthood, and she didn’t mind the sacrifices she’d had to make at all. And by the time she was forty-two, Annie was one of the most successful architects in New York, and loved practicing on her own.
    It was the day before Thanksgiving, on a freezing-cold morning, as Annie walked through the gutted interior of a townhouse on East Sixty-ninth Street with a couple who had hired her two months before. The house represented an enormous investment for them, and they wanted Annie to turn it into a spectacular home. It was hard to visualize as they climbed over the rubble the workmen had left after taking out several walls. Annie was showing them the proportions of the newly enlarged living room and dining room and where the grand staircase was going to go. She had a unique talent for combining ancient and contemporary designs and making it look both avant-garde and warm, although it was hard to imagine right now.
    The husband was questioning her intensely about the costs, and his wife was looking anxious now that she saw the state of total chaos the house was in. Annie had promised them it would be complete in a year.
    “Do you really think you can get us in by next fall?” Alicia Ebersohl said nervously.
    “This contractor is very good. He’s never let me down yet,” Annie said, smiling pleasantly at them. She looked calm and unruffled, as she stepped over several beams. She was wearing gray slacks, stylish black leather boots, and a heavy coat with a fur-lined hood. She still looked considerably younger than she was.
    “He’ll probably bring it in at twice the price. I had no idea we were going to destroy this much of the house,” Harry Ebersohl commented with a look of dismay.
    “We’re just making room. You’re going to need these walls for your art.” She had been working closely with their interior designer, and everything was in control. “Three months from now you’ll start to see the beauty of the house emerge.”
    “I hope so,” Alicia said softly, but she no longer looked so sure. They had loved their friends’ house that Annie had done, and had begged her to take this job, and once Annie saw the house she couldn’t resist, although she already had too much on her plate as it was. “I hope we didn’t make a mistake with this house,” Alicia said, as her husband shook his head in despair.
    “It’s a little late to be saying that now,” he grumbled as they went back downstairs and headed toward the front door. When