His Purrfect Mate by Georgette St. Clair Read Free Book Online Page B

Italy and catalogue the collection for me. I want to know where it’s from,  what time period, what its significance is.  This might help me to figure out why thieves are suddenly targeting it.”
    “You want me to do what? School is still in session!”
    “You have one more week left before Thanksgiving break, and the dean told me that he’d find another professor to stand in for you as long as you need to.”
    “I bet he did,” she muttered.  Of course the dean had; he’d do anything to get the endowment that Kenneth had promised him.
    “But you still haven’t explained, why me, in particular? I would think I’d be the last person that you’d want to hire.  My family has a very unfortunate history with yours, and we have no reason to trust you.”
    “Trust me, how? I will pay for your services up front.” Kenneth looked genuinely puzzled, as if he didn’t know. “As for our family history, that’s part of the reason I specifically wanted to hire you. I know that your grandmother worked as an assistant to my grandfather when he brought back a collection of Sumerian artwork in the 1960s.”
    “You know…what?” the lie was so huge that it was like a slap in the face. His assistant? As if! Kenneth’s grandfather had been Sophronia’s assistant, when she was a famous antiquities dealer and professor at the University of Upstate New York in the 1960s.  He’d seduced his way into her good graces…and the rest was family history. Bitter, ugly family history.
    Chloe fell back a step.
    He kept going, unaware of the turmoil he’d stirred within her.
    “Hamish Stewart, who’s worked for my family for fifty years managing our art collection, says that your family has approached my family in the past, trying to buy that collection of Sumerian artwork.  Since your grandmother was working for – what’s wrong?” he finally noticed her horrified expression.
    “Working for him? Are you trying to tell me that you don’t know?”
    “Don’t know what?” He looked genuinely puzzled.
    “Your grandfather and my grandmother were fated mates, and they were engaged. He was working for her, not the other way around, and she owned the art collection.  Then he broke off the engagement, stole the collection of Sumerian artwork, and banned her from his house.  He threw her over for your grandmother, who was wealthy and had connections.   He hired security to keep her away from him; when she showed up at his house to ask why he was doing this to her, they tossed her out on the street. Physically. Violently.”
    “Chloe, that…that doesn’t make sense. That simply doesn’t happen with fated mates.” Kenneth looked genuinely shocked.
    “I’m sure she thought that too.”  Chloe was backing away from him now, heading back towards the mansion, glaring at him furiously. “Maybe he just convinced her they were fated mates.”
    “That feeling simply can’t be faked. You know that, don’t you?”  He stared at her intently, as if silently asking for an acknowledgement of how he made her feel.
    “And yet, he broke it off with her and broke her heart. Would a real fated mate do that?”
    “But…she got married to someone else. Obviously.  She had your mother.   Chloe, there’s got to be some mistake here, none of this makes sense.”
    “She remarried several times, she was widowed several times, and it doesn’t matter. She never recovered from the loss of your grandfather. She went crazy. Went crazy, is still crazy, thanks to your grandfather. Don’t talk to me again, Kenneth. I’m not going to work for you, or talk to you, or kiss you again, not now, not ever.”
    To her utter mortification, she realized she was choking on a sob.
    She turned and ran back towards the house, ignoring him as he shouted her name. Kenneth had made an utter fool of her.   He was probably doubling over with laughter right now; she couldn’t bear to turn and look. 
    She’d actually let the man kiss her.  No, worse,