Drawn in Blood (Burbank and Parker 2)

“No appreciation is necessary,” Wallace assured Peggy. “All I did was provide the venue, the invitations, and the refreshments. Cindy’s doing all the rest herself.” He smiled, gesturing in Cindy’s direction.

Oblivious to the scrutiny, Cindy was drawing a rough pencil sketch on the back of a cocktail napkin for the wife of a former colleague and current racquetball partner of Wallace’s. Cindy’s enthusiasm was contagious, and her-soon-to-be client was listening intently, her whole face aglow.

“She really is something,” Peggy agreed, following Wallace’s gaze. “Her love for her work, her way with people, and of course, her extraordinary talent—once she’s completed a few projects, and word of the results gets around, she’ll be bombarded with clients.” Peggy’s smile was filled with pride. “Cindy is a rare gem. Beautiful, intelligent, gifted, and overflowing with a love of life few people possess.”

“I agree.” Wallace continued watching Cindy, listening to Peggy’s description as he did. Beautiful, intelligent, gifted, overflowing with a love of life…She might as well have been describing Meili.

At that moment, Cindy laughed at something one of the guests had said, simultaneously tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear.

That particular gesture…Wallace felt his chest constrict.

Meili. She’d been a bright light in his life at a time that was anything but bright. He and Beatrice were clashing daily, fighting over their vastly different views of what being a parent meant. Given how long and hard they’d tried to conceive, Wallace wanted to make Sophie the center of their world. He’d assumed Beatrice would abandon everything—her weekends at the spa, her evenings out with her girlfriends, her marathon shopping sprees—to be a full-time mother. It never occurred to him that she’d turn out not to have a single maternal bone in her body.

The situation had escalated to talk of divorce. At barely two years old, Sophie very much needed her mother. Wallace would have gladly traded places with Beatrice and raised their daughter. But it wasn’t feasible, not financially. Wallace earned several million dollars a year, and Beatrice earned nothing. She’d resigned from her job as a fashion buyer as soon as she married Wallace. That hadn’t bothered him—until now. He was fifty-four years old and way too entrenched in a career that made no allowances for throttling back. Beatrice was thirty-nine, six-plus years out of the fashion business—and therefore out of the game—with no motivation to return to the rat race, and equally little motivation to play in the sandbox with a toddler.

Wallace tried to make up for Beatrice’s attitude toward their daughter in any way he could. But he traveled so often, and worked such long hours, that it made it very difficult. So he’d compensated by hiring the most qualified and loving nannies money could buy, and augmented that by spending every waking hour he was home with Sophie. Adult companionship, intimate or otherwise, was shelved. For a vital, passionate man like Wallace, it was a very lonely life.

When he’d met Meili in Hong Kong, he was at his most vulnerable and lowest point. As it turned out, so was she. But to him, she was the epitome of joy—free-spirited, fiery, young, and full of life. She was also beautiful—petite, with fine, delicate features and an equally delicate figure. Looking back on it now, their love affair was like a real-life Pretty Woman. Except for two things.

Thankfully, Meili’s pride would never allow her to resort to prostituti

on.

And there’d been no Cinderella ending.

The first time Wallace laid eyes on Meili was in the lobby of the Conrad Hong Kong hotel in July 2002. He and his art partners were there on business, the first time they’d returned to Hong Kong since the sale of Dead or Alive—even longer still since all five of them had been in this city together. Matthew, Leo, and Phil were apprehensive as hell about returning. But it couldn’t be helped. The group was negotiating the purchase of a valuable painting from an elite art gallery. The owner refused to make the sale unless he met with the entire partnership. The profit made it worth the trip. Besides, they were staying in Hong Kong’s affluent business and shopping district, nowhere near Kowloon, where Cai Wen’s office had been.

As the established art connoisseur of the group, not to mention the investment banker with the most economic experience, Wallace made the preliminary visit to the gallery alone to view the painting and to meet with the gallery owner. While he was in the area, he stopped into a few other high-end galleries to check out the works being displayed.

He returned to the hotel to see Meili sitting in the lobby.

She clearly didn’t fit in with the wealthy business crowd who frequented the Conrad. She looked like a beautiful, misplaced waif, sitting on a plush chair, wearing a pseudosophisticated suit he suspected she’d bought secondhand, and trying to act natural—as if she belonged there. Sipping at a glass of wine, she kept one hand on the canvas of a painting she’d propped up against the chair.

Wallace would have approached her, but she approached him first.

“Excuse me,” she said in English. “But I understand you’re an American art collector. I have a valuable painting here I’d be interested in selling. It’s a Rothberg.” She held out the painting, which Wallace recognized as one of Rothberg’s earlier works. It wasn’t worth a fortune now—but it could be in the future.

That is, if it was genuine.

Wallace doubted that was the case. This had to be a con. Had Wallace not seen the desperation in the young woman’s eyes, he would have walked away. But he did. So he’d suggested she wait in the lobby while he went up and spoke to his partners to see if they were interested.

Of course they were interested, even though they, too, were certain this was a hoax.

It turned out not to be. Matthew had the painting authenticated, and it was indeed a genuine Rothberg.

The group had argued. Wallace didn’t agree with the strategy they came up with. It might be legal, but it was damned unethical. They were going to lowball the young woman. They saw a chance to make a killing on someone who had no idea of the painting’s worth but was clearly hungry for cash.

Wallace was outnumbered, and the offer was made.

Meili knew they were offering her tens of thousands of dollars less than the value of the painting. She’d told them so in no uncertain terms. And Matthew and Ben had told her to go home and think about it.

She’d called the next day to say she’d gotten a better offer. And that was that.

Except that Wallace couldn’t stop thinking about her.

He’d called her the next day at the phone number she’d given them. And after hearing his apology over the group’s behavior, she’d grudgingly accepted his dinner invitation.

If there was such a thing as instant, head-over-heels love, this had been it. There’d been an instant chemistry between them, and a gravitation to fill the very different, yet equally real, emotional holes in each of their lives.