Best of Nora Roberts Books 1-6: The Art of Deception / Lessons Learned / Mind Over Matter / Risky Business / Second Nature / Unfinished Business

Food seemed to soothe Fairchild’s temperament. As he plowed his way through poached salmon, he went off on a long, technical diatribe on surrealism. It appeared breaking conventional thought to release the imagination had appealed to him to the extent that he’d given nearly a year of his time in study and application. With a good-humored shrug, he confessed that his attempts at surrealistic painting had been poor, and his plunge into abstraction little better.

“He’s banished those canvases to the attic,” Kirby told Adam as she poked at her salad. “There’s one in shades of blue and yellow, with clocks of all sizes and shapes sort of melting and drooping everywhere and two left shoes tucked in a corner. He called it Absence of Time.”

“Experimental,” Fairchild grumbled, eyeing Kirby’s uneaten portion of fish.

“He refused an obscene amount of money for it and locked it, like a mad relation, in the attic.” Smoothly she transferred her fish to her father’s plate. “He’ll be sending his sculpture to join it before long.”

Fairchild swallowed a bite of fish, then ground his teeth. “Heartless brat.” In the blink of an eye he changed from amiable cherub to gnome. “By this time next year, Philip Fairchild’s name will be synonymous with sculpture.”

“Horse dust,” Kirby concluded, and speared a cucumber. “That shade of pink becomes you, Papa.” Leaning over, she placed a loud kiss on his cheek. “It’s very close to fuchsia.”

“You’re not too old to forget my ability to bring out the same tone on your bottom.”

“Child abuser.” As Adam watched, she stood and wrapped her arms around Fairchild’s neck. In the matter of love for her father, the enigma of Kirby Fairchild was easily solvable. “I’m going out for a walk before I turn yellow and dry up. Will you come?”

“No, no, I’ve a little project to finish.” He patted her hand as she tensed. Adam saw something pass between them before Fairchild turned to him. “Take her for a walk and get on with your…sketching,” he said with a cackle. “Have you asked Kirby if you can paint her yet? They all do.” He stabbed at the salmon again. “She never lets them.”

Adam lifted his wine. “I told Kirby I was going to paint her.”

The new cackle was full of delight. Pale blue eyes lit with the pleasure of trouble brewing. “A firm hand, eh? She’s always needed one. Don’t know where she got such a miserable temper.” He smiled artlessly. “Must’ve come from her mother’s side.”

Adam glanced up at the serene, mild-eyed woman in the portrait. “Undoubtedly.”

“See that painting there?” Fairchild pointed to the portrait of Kirby as a girl. “That’s the one and only time she modeled for me. I had to pay the brat scale.” He gave a huff and a puff before he attacked the fish again. “Twelve years old and already mercenary.”

“If you’re going to discuss me as if I weren’t here, I’ll go fetch my shoes.” Without a backward glance, Kirby glided from the room.

“Hasn’t changed much, has she?” Adam commented as he drained his wine.

“Not a damn bit,” Fairchild agreed proudly. “She’ll lead you a merry chase, Adam, my boy. I hope you’re in condition.”

“I ran track in college.”

Fairchild’s laugh was infectious. Damn it, Adam thought again, I like him. It complicated things. From the other room he heard Kirby in a heated discussion with Isabelle. He was beginning to realize complication was the lady’s middle name. What should’ve been a very simple job was developing layers he didn’t care for.

“Come on, Adam.” Kirby poked her head around the doorway. “I’ve told Isabelle she can come, but she and Montique have to keep a distance of five yards at all times. Papa—” she tossed her ponytail back “—I really think we ought to try raising the rent. She might look for an apartment in town.”

“We should never have agreed to a long-term lease,” Fairchild grumbled, then gave his full attention to Kirby’s salmon.

Deciding not to comment, Adam rose and went outside.

It was warm for September, and breezy. The grounds around the house were alive with fall. Beds of zinnias and mums spread out helter-skelter, flowing over their borders and adding a tang to the air. Near a flaming maple, Adam saw an old man in patched overalls. With a whimsical lack of dedication, he raked at the scattered leaves. As they neared him, he grinned toothlessly.

“You’ll never get them all, Jamie.”

He made a faint wheezing sound that must’ve been a laugh. “Sooner or later, missy. There be plenty of time.”

“I’ll help you tomorrow.”

“Ayah, and you’ll be piling them up and jumping in ’em like always.” He wheezed again and rubbed a frail hand over his chin. “Stick to your whittling and could be I’ll leave a pile for you.”

With her hands hooked in her back pockets, she scuffed at a leaf. “A nice big one?”

“Could be. If you’re a good girl.”

“There’s always a catch.” Grabbing Adam’s hand, she pulled him away.

“Is that little old man responsible for the grounds?” Three acres, he calculated. Three acres if it was a foot.

“Since he retired.”

“Retired?”

“Jamie retired when he was sixty-five. That was before I was born.” The breeze blew strands of hair into her face and she pushed at them. “He claims to be ninety-two, but of course he’s ninety-five and won’t admit it.” She shook her head. “Vanity.”

Kirby pulled him along until they stood at a dizzying height above the river. Far below, the ribbon of water seemed still. Small dots of houses were scattered along the view. There was a splash of hues rather than distinct tones, a melding of textures.

On the ridge where they stood there was only wind, river and sky. Kirby threw her head back. She looked primitive, wild, invincible. Turning, he looked at the house. It looked the same.

“Why do you stay here?” Blunt questions weren’t typical of him. Kirby had already changed that.

“I have my family, my home, my work.”

“And isolation.”

Her shoulders moved. Though her lashes were lowered, her eyes weren’t closed. “People come here. That’s not isolation.”

“Don’t you want to travel? To see Florence, Rome, Venice?”

From her stance on a rock, she was nearly eye level with him. When she turned to him, it was without her usual arrogance. “I’d been to Europe five times before I was twelve. I spent four years in Paris on my own when I was studying.”

She looked over his shoulder a moment, at nothing or at everything, he couldn’t be sure. “I slept with a Breton count in a chateau, skied in the Swiss Alps and hiked the moors in Cornwall. I’ve traveled, and I’ll travel again. But…” He knew she looked at the house now, because her lips curved. “I always come home.”

“What brings you back?”

“Papa.” She stopped and smiled fully. “Memories, familiarity. Insanity.”

“You love him very much.” She could make things impossibly complicated or perfectly simple. The job he’d come to do was becoming more and more of a burden.

“More than anything or anyone.” She spoke quietly, so that her voice seemed a part of the breeze. “He’s given me everything of importance: security, independence, loyalty, friendship, love—and the capability to give them back. I’d like to think someday I’ll find someone who wants that from me. My home would be with him then.”

How could he resist the sweetness, the simplicity, she could show so unexpectedly? It wasn’t in the script, he reminded himself, but reached a hand to her face, just to touch. When she brought her hand to his, something stirred in him that wasn’t desire, but was just as potent.

She felt the strength in him, and sensed a confusion that might have been equal to her own. Another time, she thought. Another time, it might have worked. But now, just now, there were too many other things. Deliberately she dropped her hand and turned back to the river. “I don’t know why I tell you these things,” she murmured. “It’s not in character. Do people usually let you in on their personal thoughts?”

“No. Or maybe I haven’t been listening.”

She smiled and, in one of her lightning changes of mood, leaped from the rock. “You’re not the type people would confide in.” Casually she linked her arm through his. “Though you seem to have strong, sturdy shoulders. You’re a little aloof,” she decided. “And just a tad pompous.”