Nine Lives - Danielle Steel Page 0,42

dress she had. The rest was all jeans and slacks, sweaters, and a peacoat in case it got chilly. She hadn’t planned to dress up.

Having seen the Lady Luck, Maggie was not surprised when she saw his plane, which was a sleek G5 jet, luxuriously appointed inside in beige cashmere and leather. It was supremely comfortable. This was not the way she had expected to travel, but it was undeniably pleasant.

“I feel very spoiled,” she said, as a stewardess served them breakfast after takeoff.

“My tax shelters allow me to lead a good life. I have a complicated corporate setup. It’s all legal, but it protects me from the IRS. And I discovered a long time ago that I like living well. I have no one to be responsible for, or to, so I can spend it however I want. The first thing I did when I made real money, in a killing I made in commodities,” he said. He wasn’t afraid of high-risk investments either, and they had done well for him. “The first thing I did was buy my mother a decent house, instead of that shit shack she lived in. My father never sent her a penny. She thought she had died and gone to heaven. She died a year later, but she spent her last year in a beautiful home. It was the least I could do for her.” He had a huge heart, and was very generous, even when he had nothing. Maggie had forgotten that about him, but remembered it now. The story about his mother touched her, and confirmed her faith in him as a person.

They talked about other things for the rest of the flight. He was intelligent and well informed and good company. As soon as they landed, he started making calls. He didn’t have time to talk to her on the way into the city. He dropped her off at her hotel with a wave, and she checked in and got a cozy, very English room with flowered chintz and an old-fashioned mirrored dressing table. She wanted to call Aden that afternoon. She hadn’t spoken to him in a few days, and he hadn’t called her either. She didn’t want to hound him. She knew he was busy.

She took care of her shopping needs first. She went to Harrods and bought a chic black dress and a pair of high heels. Then she did a little shopping for Aden, so she’d have something to bring him from the trip. She bought him a navy blue cashmere sweater and a warm black scarf. She bought a red wool scarf for Helen too. It would be freezing in Lake Forest soon.

After Harrods, she went to the Tate Britain and spent several hours there. She had her driver take her past Buckingham Palace, and it gave her a thrill when she saw the royal standard flying, which meant that the queen was in residence.

She went to the Tower of London, and saw a fabulous exhibit of the Queen’s jewels, and to Westminster after that. She was saving the Victoria and Albert Museum for the next day. And she had a proper English tea at her hotel when she got back. She called Aden and caught him between classes. She got Helen while she was on the way to pick up her youngest son at school.

Aden told her about ice hockey practice, and she asked about his classes. He seemed to like his professors, and he told her how much he liked Boston. There were so many colleges in the area that it was a city full of young people. He had met lots of students from other schools too. They didn’t talk long, but he sounded good to her. She could always tell if he had a problem, but he didn’t seem to at the moment. Helen asked her a million questions about Paris and Monte Carlo. She wanted to know everything. Maggie didn’t want to tell her about Paul Gilmore and had promised herself not to. It would make it seem too important when it was just a chance meeting with an old friend. Helen would try to make more of it than it was.

“Why Monte Carlo?” Helen was surprised at that and had never been there on any of her trips.

“I saw a brochure for it at the Ritz, and it looked like fun. It was. I went to the casino, played the slot machines for ten minutes, and