Golden Lies - Barbara Freethy [92]
An eerie shiver drew goose bumps along her arms. They weren't part of this curse. They didn't have the dragon, which had only just surfaced in Ned Delaney's attic. If anyone had felt the curse, it would have been Ned. But Ned Delaney and her grandfather had known each other. They'd posed for a photograph together. Was that all it had taken? Had just touching Ned Delaney's hand, the hand that had held the dragon, been enough to launch a curse? Or was all this foolishness?
Shaking her head, she pushed the disturbing thoughts to the back of her mind. She needed to concentrate on the present, not the past. Although, she might have to bring up that past in order to get to the present. Damn, she was going in a circle.
She raised her hand and rapped on her grandfather's door. A moment later, she heard his gruff, "Come in."
He stood in front of the fireplace, poised to hit a golf ball into a can of some sort. He raised a hand when she began to speak, and she waited patiently while he sank the putt.
"There," he said with satisfaction, reaching down to take out the ball. He finally looked at Paige. "What's wrong?"
Okay, so it wasn't the warmest greeting. She didn't need warmth; she needed answers. "Nothing is wrong. I just wanted to talk to you about something."
"Did something happen at yesterday's press conference?"
"I don't know. I haven't heard anything. But that's not what—"
"You weren't there?" he interrupted with annoyance. "Why weren't you there?"
"Mother wanted to handle it, the way she always does."
"Goddammit, Paige, you're the Hathaway, not your mother. When are you going to start acting like one?"
She was taken aback by the question. "I, uh, Mother is the CFO of the company. She outranks me."
"You let her outrank you."
"Excuse me?"
He sat down on the arm of the couch, golf club still in hand. "I haven't stepped down as CEO because you're not ready to step up. Maybe you never will be. Maybe you've got more of your father in you than I thought."
"I don't understand. I can't just take over. I don't even have a title."
"You don't need a title. You're a Hathaway."
"All I've been doing is planning parties."
"And that's all you will do until you stand up for yourself."
She stared at him in bemusement. "I didn't know you wanted me to."
"You're all I've got," he said in a tone that didn't sound exactly loving or appreciative. In fact, it was almost an insult. "If your father had had a son, that would have kept our line alive, but no, he had to have girls," Wallace continued. "He couldn't even do that for me."
His words cut her to the quick. "I'm sorry we were such a disappointment."
"You don't have to be. You've been well educated, well trained. You know what to do, so do it. Prove you're worthy of being a Hathaway."
She didn't know what to say, how to react to the challenge he'd thrown down before her.
"Well, cat got your tongue? Speak up, girl."
"I came here to ask you about something else." She needed more time to think about what he'd just told her. "There's a dragon statue that my father wanted to acquire. We got it in the store on Tuesday afternoon, but it disappeared along with Dad on Wednesday."
"Do you think I'm a fool, Paige? I'm eighty-two years old, for goddamn sake, but I can figure out what's going on in my own company. Your father was an idiot for taking it out of the store. Insurance won't cover the loss." His angry brown eyes held not a hint of concern for the son he'd almost lost.
"That's true, but we can't change what happened. Right now I'm more interested in trying to find the statue."
"How the hell will you do that? Whoever took it probably sold it the same day."
"Sold it to who? Do you have any ideas?"
"Could be thousands of people. Ask your father. He's the Chinese art expert."
"He doesn't remember what happened or why he even went to Chinatown." She watched her grandfather's face carefully, wondering if he knew about Jasmine and Alyssa, but he didn't give a thing away. "It's possible that this statue," she continued, "might have been