His Ex's Well-Kept Secret(12)

"We'll avoid each other," Piper firmly stated, stepping away and crossing her arms.

In order to break the arc of pure attraction linking them, she walked  over to the drop-leg table where she'd put her bag, her phone and  Jaeger's tablet. Pretending to be interested in her phone and trying to  get her breathing and heartbeat under control, she ran her finger over  the screen and immediately noticed she had no signal.

Panic flared. "Jaeger, there's no cell service here. What if Ceri is looking for me?" Guilt flooded her system.

She shouldn't have been here, doing this. Her kid was sick with an ear  infection. What if they had tried to reach her while she was kissing  Jaeger?

Ty was her first priority, always.

"This room is reinforced, which drops the strength of the signal,"  Jaeger explained. "If you go back into the hall, you'll get a signal in  there." Jaeger pushed his hands into the pockets of his pants, his eyes  steady on hers. "You and Ceri agreed Ty was well enough for you to  accompany me. He didn't have a fever, he'd eaten earlier today and he  was definitely feeling better. When you last checked fifteen minutes  ago, Ty was sound asleep."                       
       
           



       

Jaeger's voice didn't hold reproach or irritation, and his recital of  the facts calmed her. She looked down at her phone and waved it back and  forth. "I'm still not comfortable not having a signal."

"Okay." Jaeger pulled out his phone and looked at the display. "I have a  signal. Not a lot, but some. Text Ceri my number and tell her to call  me if she can't reach you. Or I can call a taxi to take you back home."

She so appreciated his calm attitude. Piper looked at Jaeger standing  with his hands in his pockets, patiently waiting for her to make up her  mind. He wore a beige linen blazer over a light blue long-sleeve shirt,  blue jeans threaded with a burgundy leather belt. Designer sunglasses  rested in his hair.

"Look, Piper, if you don't want to stay, it's okay," Jaeger said. His  mouth lifted at the corners. "Of course, if you leave, I'll be at  Amelia's mercy, but I'm sure I can fight her off."

Piper managed a smile, but she sent an anxious look toward the hall. "It's just...he's so little and he's sick."

Jaeger lifted his hands. "It's your call."

Piper bit her lip. She really wanted to see Amelia's collection, and Ty  had seemed better. She wouldn't have left otherwise. Walking into the  hall, she sent Ceri a quick message with Jaeger's number. Ceri's  thumbs-up emoji was instantaneous. Her next message, Ty's fine, still  asleep, will text you and Jaeger when he wakes up, came a few seconds  later, and Piper exhaled her tension.

She dropped her hunched shoulders and walked back into the collector's  room. Jaeger was examining a pencil drawing on the wall next to the  reinforced door.

"We good?" he asked.

"Very. He's fine, and Ceri now has your number." Piper wrinkled her  nose. "I suppose you think I am a neurotic mother and overly anxious."

Jaeger's eyes dropped from hers to her mouth and back up again. "I think  you are a good mom who is, naturally, worried about her kid."

His easy acceptance touched her; it wasn't what she'd expected from  Manhattan's Main Man. She'd thought he'd be impatient and dismissive,  not kind and accepting. His eyes darted to her mouth again, and he shook  his head. "God, I could so take up where we just stopped."

"We can't," Piper murmured, touching her tongue to her bottom lip and sighing when she tasted him there.

"If you don't stop looking at me like that, I'm going to have you up  against the nearest wall," Jaeger said, his voice almost a growl. He  placed his hand on her shoulder and turned her so she faced the sketch  he'd been examining. "I think that's a Degas."

Instead of the ballerina the artist was famous for, this sketch was of a  naked woman lying on her back, her legs open. Degas didn't go into a  lot of anatomical detail, but her sprawling, boneless posture suggested  she'd been well loved. Piper had seen a lot of erotic art, much of it  designed to titillate, but looking at this sketch, knowing Jaeger was  watching her reaction, heated her from the inside out. Her skin  prickled, her saliva disappeared and she could feel the insistent throb  between her legs. Her libido screamed that she wanted this man. That she  had to have him. Again. Soon. Now.

"Not the most appropriate sketch to show me when we're trying to cool down the situation, Ballantyne," Piper pointed out.

"That is what a woman should look like after making love," Jaeger said,  his voice low and supersexy. "I want to make you look like that."

She was sure he had.

After Jaeger rocketed her from orgasm to orgasm in Milan, she'd felt  sexy and sated. He'd made her feel incredibly feminine and wonderful,  and if she turned and faced him, she wouldn't be able to hide her desire  from him. He'd know exactly how he'd made her feel then and how much  she wanted him now. He'd kiss her. They wouldn't stop. Because their  chemistry was so combustible, he'd take her up against the nearest wall.

God, that sounded so good.

Calm the hell down, Mills, and think!

Getting involved with Jaeger, even just for a hookup, was asking for a heap of trouble.                       
       
           



       

She had to keep her head on straight and her thoughts clear. The  priority was to sell the sapphires, buy her house back from her father's  estate. Then she would have security for herself and Ty. She'd be able  to stay in the house where she'd been raised, the place that held a  million memories for her.

It was her home, her link to the parent who'd adored her. The only home she, and Ty, knew.

Selling the sapphires was important. Buying her house was important.

Protecting Ty was vital.

Making love to her son's father was, sadly, not.

But, hell and dammit, she really, really wanted to.

Jaeger dropped a kiss on her shoulder before walking away. She slowly  turned and watched as he tossed his sunglasses next to her bag and  picked up his tablet. He hauled in a deep breath and made the shift from  lover to businessman.

He looked up and sent her a quick smile. "The jewelry isn't going to  value itself, so I'd better get to work." He opened the doors to a  floor-to-ceiling cupboard and pulled out a drawer. On the molded foam  rested a choker with five rows of huge round diamonds in descending  sizes from the center, separated by smaller emeralds.

Piper hurried over to get a closer look and whistled her appreciation. "Oh...wow."

Jaeger picked up the necklace, diamonds literally dripping from his  fingers. He tapped his tablet, activated the voice app and spoke.  "Five-row platinum, diamond and emerald necklace, 1980s, worth about  two-point-five."

Piper gasped, her eyes wide. "Two-point-five million?"

Jaeger grinned. "And that's just the first piece. I've heard rumors  there's a massive green diamond ring in this collection. First one to  find it buys pizza tomorrow evening."

Piper looked at him, puzzled. "Tomorrow? That's Sunday. What's happening tomorrow?"

"We're going through your mother's boxes, looking for documentation  about the sapphires." Jaeger replaced the diamond necklace and shut the  drawer. "Is that a problem? You did give me a two-week deadline to make  an offer, and the rest of my week is crazy. I don't have any plans  tomorrow except for the ritual Ballantyne Sunday evening supper at the  Den."

The Den, as everyone who read the society pages knew, was Connor's huge  brownstone on Eighty-Fifth Street. Sage Ballantyne and Linc  Taylor-Ballantyne-Connor, Piper remembered, adopted the Ballantyne  siblings and Linc in their teens-shared the townhome with Linc's mother,  Jo, and his son, Shaw.

"Tomorrow is good. Ty will be there, obviously."

Piper saw the muscle in Jaeger's jaw tense, noticed his grip on the  drawer tighten. Well, tough. Ty was a part of her life, and it wasn't  her problem if Jaeger didn't like being around kids. He'd simply have to  suck it up.

"Tell me something," Jaeger said, releasing the handle to the drawer and  leaning his shoulder into the collector's cupboard. Piper looked at  him, knowing an opening like that usually meant an awkward question was  about to follow.

"You were desperate to contact me last year," he said, "presumably  because you wanted to sell the stones. Then your calls and messages  stopped-"

"I was threatened with a restraining order if I didn't leave you alone," Piper interjected, her voice dry.

Jaeger winced. "Is that what happened? Damn, I'm sorry."

"I'm over it."

"Yet you didn't sell the stones. You could've sold them to Moreau's or  to another high-end jewelry store, but you didn't. Now you want to sell  them again, but this time you seem to have a very real deadline. Why?"