Heiress's Defiance Read Free Page A

that beam of light.
    The light picked out her bone structure, highlighted the luminous quality of her skin and transformed the darkness of her hair intoa chestnut cloud flowing down her back. She was still Lucilla, but Lucilla as he’d never seen her before. The beauty of her hit him like a lightning bolt, stole the air from his lungs, sent blood rushing into his groin.
    He wanted to possess her. He wanted to erase that sadness from her eyes, and he wanted to strip that red dress from her body and expose the creamy skin underneath. The need to do so rocked him. And angered him.
    He had no time for this. Lucilla was an obstacle in his path, not a dalliance on the side. She hated him. Despised him for sending her brothers and sister away on errands, and for thwarting her ambition.
    Christos plucked two glasses of champagne from a passing tray and moved toward her. She’d turned to look at the painting again, and he found himself focusing on the swell of her hips, the curve of her back and the lush beauty of her hair as it tumbled over her shoulders in rich, reddish-brown waves. She never wore her hair down. He was suddenly thankful that she did not because the urge to plunge his fingers into it and feel the silky mass gliding over his hand was almost overwhelming.
    “See something you want?”
    She whirled to face him, clutching a hand over her heart. “Oh, my God, you scared me.”
    He held out the champagne. “Then I apologize.”
    She took the glass. Then she turned to look at the painting again. “Isn’t she beautiful?”
    Christos stared at the small portrait of a woman. It wasn’t an old painting, though it wasn’t recent, either. The woman was wearing a long gown, pearls and a mink, and she was laughing. It was not a staid portrait at all. Christos frowned as he scanned the portrait. This woman looked familiar in a way. He turned to look at Lucilla’s profile, saw the same lines as in the painting, and a new feeling took root in his soul: anger and even a modicum of pity. Gene Chatsfield had put a portrait of his missing ex-wife into the auction, and Lucilla seemed sad about it.
    No one knew where Liliana Chatsfield had gone, but one day she’d walked out on her family and never came home again. He knew the history, as so many did, but for the first time he could see how it must have affected at least one Chatsfield child.
    It made him feel almost tender toward her. A complication he did not need. “She is indeed. Your mother, I presume?”
    She took a sip of her champagne and he saw that her fingers trembled. “Yes.”
    “And does it bother you this picture is in the auction?”
    She sniffed. She did not look at him. “Of course not. It’s for a good cause, and my father is right to get rid of it. Graham Laurent painted it before he was quite so famous, so it will fetch a high price simply because of that. Obviously, my father knows this.”
    And Gene Chatsfield was marrying again, so his new wife-to-be probably didn’t want a portrait of the old wife still in his possession. Though why he didn’t gift it to one of his children, Christos couldn’t say. It seemed the logical thing to do.
    “You could buy it.”
    She turned to look up at him again, and he felt the power of that gaze down to his toes. The gold flecks in her eyes sparkled in the light from above. “Oh, no, I couldn’t. It wouldn’t be seemly.”
    He didn’t quite understand that logic, but it was not his concern really. If she didn’t want to buy it, what did he care?
    “As you wish, Lucilla
mou.
” He didn’t know why he called her
my Lucilla
, but the first time he’d done it, she’d seemed annoyed—so he’d kept doing so because it amused him toirritate her. He had not meant to irritate her now, but of course she could not know that. Her eyes narrowed.
    “Don’t you have some souls to collect elsewhere in the room?”
    Christos couldn’t help the laugh that burst from him then. Lucilla tried to frown but ended up