obvious effort to relax her features. “I’m sorry if you find this situation difficult, child.”
Morgan wanted to say she was a fully functioning adult. Instead, she murmured, “I’d be justified in going back home and reporting that the client isn’t being cooperative.”
Alarm clouded Janet’s face, and the strength of the woman’s reaction startled Morgan.
“Please don’t leave.”
Morgan folded her arms across her chest. “Give me a reason why I should stay here.”
“Because he needs you,” she said, sounding like she was struggling to keep her voice steady.
“Then why did he run?”
“He’s not running.”
“What is he really doing? What can’t he get in St. Germaine?”
Janet set down the vacuum cleaner on the hall floor, looking resigned. “Blame it on me. I told him I couldn’t have a visitor here and not be able to bake. The oven thermostat is way out of whack, and I’m afraid I’ll burn the house down if I use it. I need a new one, and the only place to get it is an electrical supply company in New Orleans.”
“Couldn’t you order it?”
“That would take weeks. You’re here now.”
Morgan nodded, sorry that she’d made an issue of Andre’s absence.
“He should be back this afternoon. Then you can tear into him all you like.”
Morgan nodded. Before she could ask if she was going to get honest answers, Janet picked up the vacuum and marched down the hall. After waiting for several moments to make sure the woman didn’t pop back into the doorway, Morgan opened the book again. Feeling guilty, she took out the maps, then slipped them under her tee shirt.
In her room, she stuffed the papers inside the false bottom of her suitcase before using the toilet so Janet would hear it flushing.
Back downstairs again, she began looking through more books, hoping to find more hidden treasure. After finishing with the history section, she moved to another shelf of old volumes.
The first one she picked up turned out to be The Erotic Art of Japan, published in the first decade of the twentieth century. Despite the copyright date, many of the stylized illustrations were quite explicit. They showed Japanese couples engaged in sexual acts of various kinds, some of which looked like they might require the skills of a contortionist. Next to it was a book called A Day in the Country, An Artistic Study. The title might be innocuous, but inside were what looked like early twentieth century photos of men and women, most of them naked or scantily dressed, picnicking and enjoying other pleasures in a bucolic setting.
The images were very erotic. Like the naked woman holding out a bowl of apples to a naked man, with her rosy breasts resting on the top of the fruit.
She studied the picture, responding to it on a sensual level, thinking about what made it a turn-on. Not just the breasts and the apples. The couple were looking at each other like they were going to be each other’s next meal.
She was so absorbed in the picture that the sound of someone stepping up behind her made her jump—thinking Janet had snuck up on her again[RG3].
“Interesting pictures,” a deep voice said behind her.
It was Andre; she knew that even before he spoke because she caught the familiar scent of his body.
“You didn’t tell me you collected antique porn,” she managed to say, still with her back to him, partly because her face was red with embarrassment at having been caught with this particular book
“I don’t,” he answered “This is my father’s private stash of sexually explicit material. All of it ‘collector’s items.’ I have records of his sending away to dealers around the country.”
“Charming.”
“Actually, these are some of the books that I was thinking about selling. I imagine they would be quite valuable—to certain book enthusiasts.”
“Yes,” she murmured. He moved closer to her, his front coming into contact with her back as he lifted the book from her hands and set it on the table. Reaching around her, he flipped the pages, then stopped when he came to a photograph of a naked woman sitting in a swing suspended from the branch of a tree, her head thrown back and her face a study in pleasure.
“This is one of my favorites,” he said, his voice low and thick.
Morgan focused on the picture. The ropes of the swing were artfully twined with flowering vines. But it wasn’t the foliage that drew Morgan’s attention. A naked man was holding the ropes. He wasn’t behind his partner. Instead, he was