Billionaires Prefer Blondes by Suzanne Enoch Read Free Book Online

the Hogarth again. The secondHogarth, the one nobody here had set eyes on yet, wouldn’t be the most expensive sale of the night, but it would probably be the most noteworthy. If her dad had learned about it at the same moment the rest of the room had, though, it probably wasn’t what he was after.
    “Did you find what you were looking for?” Rick asked, bending sideways to look down at the page with her. “The Hogarth again? You do hate mysteries, don’t you?”
    “I like them when they’re solved,” she returned. “When’s intermission?”
    “After the Manet.” He gazed full at her, dark blue eyes curious. “What’s going on?”
    “Nothing.” She shrugged, refusing to let her eyes stray toward the figure in the shadows. “Okay, maybe I’m used to being more occupied at events like this.”
    “Do you want to bid on the new Hogarth for me?”
    Samantha blinked. “Christ, no. But are you sure you want to bid on it, sight unseen? What if you hate the look? Or what if it’s a scam?”
    “I generally like Hogarth’s works. And don’t worry, I’m going to get a verified provenance for the other painting before I do anything.” He took her fingers in his. “Would you look at it, too? You’re faster and more accurate at spotting fakes than anyone else I’ve ever met.”
    “Thanks, I think. Sure, I’ll take a look at it.” Crap. So much for spending the intermission talking with her dead father.
    Rick brushed his thumb along the inside of her wrist. “Relax, Samantha. The only thing you have to worry about tonight is me. Have I mentioned that I find auctions rather arousing?” He kissed her earlobe.
    Despite her distraction, she shivered. No matter what else might be on her mind, Rick Addison had the ability to makeher hot and horny every time she set eyes on him. When he was actually trying to turn her on, Jesus, everybody just get out of the way. “You made me wet,” she whispered, arching her neck to his mouth.
    “Christ,” he muttered back. “Let’s forget the Hogarths and get out of here. I want to be inside you.”
    Oh, God, she wanted to. But if they left now, she might never catch up to Martin again. And she needed some damned answers. “Keep your pants on, Brit,” she ordered in a barely audible tone. “You can have me later.”
    “I intend to. Now give me the booklet back so I can cover my lap and keep some dignity.”
    Samantha snorted. No, he wasn’t distracting at all. She handed him the catalog. “You’re so easy.”
    “Only where you’re concerned.”
    The Manet went for seven million and change, and as Ian Smythe called for a twenty-minute break, half the audience rose and headed for the covered display to one side of the room. Rick wasn’t the only one interested in a newly discovered Hogarth. As he took her hand and led her over to join the crowd, Samantha couldn’t help glancing in Martin’s direction once more. Her father hadn’t moved.
    If not for the tapping of his fingers, he might have been another piece of modern art. It was an old, effective trick, though. Stand still in an inconspicuous place, and people tended not to notice you. And then if you suddenly weren’t there any longer, those same people thought they’d probably been mistaken about seeing you in the first place. Or at least they thought so until the alarms started going off and the cops showed up. You were long gone by then, of course.
    Shock and disbelief still pushed at the back of her mind, but she shoved them out of the way. The how’s and what’scould wait until she had time to consider them. The why’s were what mattered at the moment.
    “Yes,” one of the Sotheby’s painting experts was saying, obvious excitement running just beneath the smooth saleswoman pitch in her voice, “it was about two weeks ago. Before auction we verify the authenticity and ownership of every item, and it was during that inspection that we discovered a second canvas tacked beneath the first. The first