Lifestyles of the Witch & Famous Read Free Page B

was panting up a storm. She didn’t blame them. What could anyone say?
    That was no pool before them. It was a lagoon , complete with waterfall, white sand beach, tropical flora and palm trees. Palm trees, for godssake, twenty feet high if they were an inch. Their feathery fronds swayed gently in an artificial breeze. The trees were possibly artificial, too, but they were darn good replicas. She stared up into them, half expecting to see automated parrots and toucans roosting in the greenery. Why not? The scene had everything else.
    Good Goddess, the man’s built Tahiti in the center of his house.
    Fang scrambled out of her arms, and she didn’t bother to retrieve him.
    Have at it, tiger-boy.
    The twins giggled while he scampered to the center of the sand, sniffed around, then scratched out a depression and squatted over it, obviously pleased as punch.
    “Wow,” she could almost hear him say, “this is the biggest cat box I’ve ever seen!” He was in heaven.
    Molly wasn’t. The section of the mansion they’d passed through to get here had given her cold chills with its opulent size and décor. This…this poolroom set her teeth on edge. It went beyond opulence. It was downright decadent. What was the power consumption for the air-conditioning and fans in here? How much water did that ocean of a pool require?
    Too much. And in arid West Texas no less, where there was hardly enough water to go around in the first place. It was sinful. All this for one man’s private retreat. A retreat he used only a few weeks a year, according to the paparazzi he was so fond of slugging. They said he’d built it as a “honeymoon hideaway” for his first wife. Or was it his fourth?
    Was that the Italian actress or the Swedish model? The fashionista?
    Honestly, even the celebrity sites couldn’t keep his marriages straight. How many had there been? Six? Seven?
    Whatever.
    If he’d wanted a tropical paradise, why hadn’t he just bought an island? Seemed like it would have been simpler than this. Cheaper, too, no doubt. But cost wouldn’t be an issue for him, would it? Control was, Molly guessed. Here he could orchestrate every detail of the setting – just the way he liked to control lives, it seemed.
    Her stomach knotted. The place was beautiful – if you went for this sort of thing, which she didn’t – but it was almost too perfect. Pristine. There was a sterile quality to it. It wasn’t real . What a stupid waste of precious natural resources, not to mention the personal resources involved. With all the suffering and need in the world, couldn’t Tyler James think of anything better to do with his wealth?
    Steve would have been appalled by this estate. More than appalled. Ashamed. He must have been heartsick to think of his own roots. How godawful ironic and sad. No wonder he’d barely spoken of those roots, never even hinted he had a brother, let alone who that brother was. James was a common name, after all. Who would have thought to tie the gentle artist-ecologist to the hard-hitting Tycoon Tyler? Where the latter obviously cared squat for the natural world, the former had fought to preserve it. How could two brothers be such polar opposites?
    “Miss?”
    Molly jumped at the voice, then realized it was only the butler, Hanson, who’d ushered them in here. She’d forgotten he was still near. She turned to see him standing at attention just inside the arched entranceway, his expression carefully blank, his dark suit impeccably tailored and pressed.
    The perfect English butler.
    On a Texas ranch.
    Of course, it wasn’t really a ranch, no cattle or anything. There was plenty of open prairie around it, but otherwise the place looked more like a palace. Lots of marble and mirrors and gilt. She’d noticed everyone called it the Ranch though. Maybe because the “Taj Mahal” had already been taken.
    “My apologies, miss. I didn’t mean to startle you.” Hanson inclined his head in a small bow, then held aloft the