A Beauty For The Billionaire

“Even so, that didn’t give me the right to be such an elitist. My parents just taught me their philosophy well. It took me years to figure out I was wrong.”

Now there was a loaded statement. Wrong about what? Wrong about the prejudice her parents taught her? Wrong about some of the comments she’d made? Wrong about their social circles never mixing? Wrong about leaving him for the senator’s son?

Probably better not to ask for clarification. Not yet anyway. He and Anabel had rushed headlong into their relationship when they were kids. The first time they’d had sex was within days of meeting, and they’d almost never met without having sex. He’d sometimes wondered if maybe they’d gone slower, things would have worked out differently. This time he wasn’t going to hurry it. This time he wanted to do it right.

“So how have you been?” she asked him. “How are your folks? I still think about your mom’s Toll House cookies from time to time.”

“My folks are gone,” he told her. “Mom passed five years ago. Dad went two years later. Cancer. Both of them.”

She looked stricken by the news. She lifted a hand to his shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Oh, Hogan, I am so sorry. I had no idea.”

He covered her hand with his. “You couldn’t have known. And thanks.”

For a moment neither of them said anything, then Anabel dropped her hand. She crossed her arms over her midsection and looked at the door. Hogan told himself to ask her something about herself, but he didn’t want to bring up her divorce, even if she didn’t seem to be any the worse for wear from it. Her folks, he figured, were probably the same as always. Maybe a little more likely to invite him into their home than they were fifteen years ago, but then again, maybe not.

But for the life of him, he couldn’t think of a single thing to say.

“I should probably get going,” she said. “I have a thing tonight. My aunt and uncle are in town. We’re meeting at the Rainbow Room.” She expelled a sound that was a mixture of affection and irritation. “They always want to meet at the Rainbow Room. Which is great, but really, I wish they’d expand their repertoire a bit. Try Per Se or Morimoto sometime. Or Le Turtle. I love that place.”

Okay, she’d just given Hogan the perfect opening. Three different restaurants she obviously loved. All he had to do was say, What a coincidence, Anabel, I’ve been wanting to expand my repertoire, too. Why don’t you and I have dinner at one of those places? You pick. And they’d be off. For some reason, though, he just couldn’t get the words to move out of his brain and into his mouth.

Not that Anabel had seemed to be angling for an invitation, because she didn’t miss a beat when she continued, “Ah, well. Old habits die hard, I guess.”

Which was another statement that could have been interpreted in more ways than one. Was she talking about her aunt and uncle now, and their dining habits? Or was she talking about her and Hogan, and how she still maybe had a thing for him? It didn’t used to be this hard to read her. And why the hell didn’t he just ask her out to see how she responded?

“It was good to see you again, Hogan,” she said as she took a step in retreat. “I’m glad Philip Amherst’s attorneys found you,” she continued as she took another. “Maybe our paths will cross again before long.”

“Maybe so,” he said, finding his voice.

She lifted a hand in farewell then turned and made her way toward the exit. Just as she was about to disappear into the hallway, Hogan thought of something to ask her.

“Hey, Anabel.”

She halted and turned back around, but said nothing.

“If I’d grown up an Amherst...” Hogan began. “I mean, if you’d met me as, say, a guy named Travis Amherst from the Upper East Side who went to some private school and played lacrosse and was planning to go to Harvard after graduation, instead of meeting me as Hogan Dempsey, grease monkey...”

She smiled again, this one definitely nostalgic. “Travis Amherst wouldn’t have been you, Hogan. He would have been like a million other guys I knew. If I’d met you as Travis Amherst, I never would have bothered with you.”

“You bothered with the senator’s son,” he reminded her. “And he had to have been like those million other guys.”

“Yeah, he was. And look how that turned out.”