The Scandal (Billionaire's Beach Book 4) - Christie Ridgway Page 0,4
wall, a colorful, Impressionistic scene of a crowd on a beach that strangely went well with the more formal rug.
Then his phone trilled in his pocket.
The sound caused a too-familiar tightening of his muscles followed by another wave of exhaustion. “What now?” he muttered, pulling out the device to check the call. His assistant. A bench sat against the wall to his right and he dropped onto it as he answered. “Another problem, Patrick?” he asked, his voice weary.
As he spoke, he saw Sara glance over her shoulder, then glide away, giving him privacy.
His assistant had no such scruples.
“I’m nosy is all,” the other man said. “Did you make it safely to Malibu? What do you think about the house?”
“This isn’t about work? There’s not a hang-up, a glitch, a damn disaster that cries out for my attention?”
“Nope,” Patrick said, in a cheery tone. “It’s about my curiosity. And my natural concern for my boss, of course,” he added.
“You’re so full of shit.” But Patrick Douglas had also kept Joaquin sane during these last few months…for longer than that, really. He’d been Joaquin’s right hand for two years, ever since George Weatherford had died, leaving TempuCorp to his adopted son.
“Come on,” Patrick coaxed. “Tell me what you think of Nueva Vida.”
“What the hell is that?”
“Your Malibu place.”
It has a name? “I just arrived, and I haven’t found a bed yet. I think it’s too much house.”
“Maybe. Shortly before he passed, George bought it as an investment from someone who didn’t have the cash to finish the big renovation in progress. You’ll be able to sell it, if that’s what you want, now that I’ve employed the butler to sort things out and have it set to rights.”
“About that woman—”
“You’ve met Sara?”
Joaquin didn’t like his assistant’s sly tone. “She seems capable enough. How did you come to hire a butler, for fuck’s sake?”
“I was given her name, checked her references, and interviewed her via Skype since we were working out of Portland.”
Joaquin sighed. “I know I told you I wanted you to find me a place in Southern California where I could decompress before Mick’s visit, but…”
Another wave of tiredness rolled through him because there was no ideal somewhere that would prove sufficient for him to duck the dark deluge of fresh grief surely on its way—even if he traveled to deepest, darkest Peru. On another sigh, he pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Relax, Boss,” Patrick said. “Take a breather. Use the down time to check out the estate and then decide what you want to do with it.”
“It’s too much house.”
“Let me know if you still think that at the end of the month.”
Joaquin opened his mouth for another comment, but a second call came through. Noting the name on the screen, he didn’t attempt to stifle his groan. “I’ve got to go.”
Then he sucked in a calming breath and spoke evenly into the phone. “Good afternoon, Renata.”
“Darling. Are you finally out of the land of dreary skies and ugly flannel shirts?”
His mother wasn’t a fan of the Pacific Northwest, the place being too chilly for her Latin blood, and the sartorial atmosphere not up to her silks-and-cashmeres preferences. “I’m in Malibu.”
“Oh, that’s nice. Bohemian and a bit too beachy for my taste, but you’ll see sunshine for the first time in months. You’ve been working much too hard.”
“I’ve got a company to run.”
“I don’t know why George had to dump all that responsibility on you—”
“He saved me, Renata. When he adopted me, he saved me. You know that. Taking over his business is a privilege.” An old argument, and one he wasn’t ready to dive into again.
“Yes, but—”
“Where are you, Renata?” he asked to distract her from the discussion. She and Spouse Number Three made the rounds between a house in Bel-Air, another in Palm Springs, a three-story “cabin” at Lake Arrowhead, and a villa on the wild Pacific side of Mexico. “And is Martin well?”
“Martin is fine.”
And Joaquin breathed easier that she let the other subject drop.
“Obsessed with golf, as always,” she continued, but with an indulgent note that told her son the retired financier was keeping her happy—by keeping her in jewels and cocktails, Joaquin supposed. “We’re in the Springs for the weekend. Soon it will be much too warm to visit the desert.”
Renata was like a hothouse flower. She needed a specific and very short range of temperatures to remain in perfect bloom. The fact was, she looked damn good for a woman in her early