Savage Beauty - Peggy Webb Page 0,56
a suspicious bone in her body.
He almost chuckled at how easy it had been to hide Cee Cee right under her nose and use her for the Margaret without Lily knowing a thing. She was gorgeous but gullible, a quality he’d sensed in her from the beginning.
He congratulated himself on that, too. She’d give him a handsome son, and when her usefulness was over, she’d make the most amazing rose in the Allistair collection. He almost salivated at the thought of burying his face in her silky hair and then shaving it off for his creation. There’d never been a rose in the world like his Savage Beauty. And unless Lily lived long enough for him to create two roses from her, there never would be another.
He turned to her daughter, smiling. “Are you ready to go to Mary Mahoney’s to eat?”
“I don’t want to eat at a fancy French place. Why don’t we grab a couple of hot dogs and go home so I can show Mom what we got for Cee Cee?”
The ungrateful urchin. Couldn’t she show the least modicum of gratitude?
“I don’t eat hotdogs. When I dine out, I always eat at an upscale restaurant.” He walked toward the front of the car, and she lagged along behind. Deliberately, he decided. “Besides, we made a plan on the way over here. If you’re going to be successful, you have to learn to follow through with your plans.”
He opened her door, an indication that he was not going to stand in the parking lot arguing with a teenager. Fortunately, she crawled inside.
She was quiet as he drove toward the art district on Rue Magnolia, but he was seething. By the time they arrived at the historic restaurant, he was too angry to appreciate the wrought-iron balcony railings and the brick-paved patio shaded by ancient live oak trees dripping in Spanish moss.
He wanted to wring her neck on the spot and throw her into the bay.
An Allistair is always in control.
How many times through the years had Clive said that, particularly in the beginning when he was showing Stephen the Allistair secret? At first he’d struggled to recognize the necessity of not letting the girls go after they’d contributed all they could to the roses. Thankfully, by the time he was sixteen, he’d learned to appreciate the genius of the compost pile.
An artist never reveals his secrets, nor allows others the chance to discover them.
Stephen was a true genius, and his roses were art, worth any price.
As soon as he was finished with this business tonight, he’d have to make sure Cee Cee’s IV contained a little something extra. Though it was unlikely she’d ever remember a thing, he couldn’t take that risk. If it hadn’t been for bringing Lily back under his control, he’d have killed Cee Cee before he left her in the alley.
Annabelle turned to him before she barreled out of the car. “Mom will be mad if she finds I out I argued with you about the restaurant. And I didn’t even thank you for the Christmas gifts. I’m sorry.”
“That was nicely done. Apology accepted.”
A waitress led them to his usual table, a perk of being famous. Heads turned to look at him, and a few eyebrows lifted at the sight of Annabelle. She was even more bedraggled than when they’d started, if that were possible. Her ponytail was a mess. She hadn’t even bothered to fix it after trying on sweaters to find the perfect one for Cee Cee. And was that a snag on the front of her sweatshirt? It appeared she could just walk down the aisle of a department store, and stray coat hangers would leap out to grab her.
Maybe it was all for the best. People seeing them tonight would remember how he’d smiled at her in spite of her appearance, how he’d so gallantly pulled out her chair and told the waiter loud enough for the couples nearby to hear that he was treating his daughter after a big holiday shopping spree. Only the best was good enough for her.
The story, retold later, would give credence to his grieving father posture, his televised pleas for help finding her.
The trouble started after she’d finished her entrée, dripping part of it on her shirt, of course. What did he expect?
“I don’t want dessert,” she said.
“Fine. We won’t order any.”
“Can we skip the marina tonight, too?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because we made a plan. Remember? You are and I are going to make sure the boat