Playing the Billionaire's Game - Pippa Roscoe Page 0,9

her hand. ‘At least, not before it was stolen and replaced with a forgery,’ she concluded.

‘Now that would be a scandal,’ he said, as if impressed by the idea. ‘Though I can’t imagine for one minute an art house with a reputation like Bonnaire’s would be willing to admit to such a thing,’ he all but taunted.

Behind her smile, Sia’s jaw was clenched with anger. Because he was right. They weren’t. And that was why she was there, engaging in some insane cat and mouse game with an international playboy. Sia would have walked away, but Henri dug her heels in. Henri was the girl who had drawn on walls, who had laughed until she’d cried with her father, who had dressed up in the beautiful turquoise silks her mother had left all over their home in Peckham, who at the age of six had worn bright red lipstick and walked in too large high heels. It was time to see what she could do now as an adult.

‘I’m surprised that a hotelier has his fingers on the pulse of the international art scene.’

Sia had to bite her lip to keep the smile from spreading, seeing the outrage that crossed Sebastian’s features at the word ‘hotelier’ and at how easy it had been to pierce that clearly healthy ego of his.

‘My hotels are four-starred, the restaurants have Michelin stars, celebrities beg to stay in my penthouse suites. I have one in every major European city, more off the beaten track internationally and at least two that are so exclusive they are not even known to the press, one of which is on an island.’

Despite herself, and the arrogance with which the information was delivered, Sia was impressed. Because, if the articles she’d managed to read online before coming here tonight were right, Sebastian’s family had been exiled with little more than the clothes on their backs.

‘And Leighton comes into this...?’ she asked, as if bored of his list of achievements.

For the first time since he’d appeared at her side, Sebastian seemed to bite his tongue. ‘Family heirloom.’

‘You had a Leighton as an heirloom?’ she blurted out, unable to keep the awe from her tone or prevent her eyes from widening.

‘We had a couple,’ he said, shrugging, as if they’d just been lying about the house.

‘Anyone else I should know about?’ she asked, almost forgetting the game.

‘My father had a penchant for the Italian Renaissance—Giotto, Fra Angelico, Filippo Lippi... But my...mother preferred twentieth century artists. Rothko, Klee, Francis Bacon.’

Sia was so awed at the idea of growing up with authentic paintings by the artists he’d named, she’d missed the way that he’d stumbled over the reference to his mother. Without realising, he’d evoked her childhood fantasy and she imagined walking down grand mahogany hallways with the masters hanging on every wall. But she couldn’t prevent herself from asking, ‘Etienne Durrántez?’

‘Amongst others,’ he replied, without taking his eyes from her. She’d been watching closely for any sign, the smallest of movements, but there had been none.

Had she got it wrong? Before making the call to Célia she’d spoken to an old university friend who’d gone to work at Interpol. She’d not heard anything on the grapevine about a stolen Durrántez, and clearly Sebastian had no need for the money. She couldn’t even begin to fathom why he might have wanted the painting. But he clearly had wanted it enough to make several public and incredibly generous attempts to buy it. Though she’d not found any record of him trying to buy any of the other Durrántez for sale. There must have been something in particular about that painting.

‘I have a table. Would you care to join me?’

Sebastian half expected her to say no and half resented the slight burst of adrenaline he felt when she inclined her head and gestured for him to lead the way. Sebastian might have recognised her but, beyond knowing that Sia Keating had been sent by Bonnaire’s to Sharjarhere as a last-minute replacement to evaluate the Durrántez, he knew nothing. There’d been little or no point doing a check on her by that stage. Besides, she was sure to be just as corrupt as the rest of them. She’d arrived at the palace, done her job and left. If he’d known for even one second that she’d be as feisty, playful and smart as she’d proven herself to be in just a short conversation he might have done things a little differently.

Because she was proving to be