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She looked at the gorgeous old paintings again. One portrayed a mountainous landscape with beautiful maple trees. It soothed her nerves.
Wine would soothe her nerves, as well.Right. She needed to get upstairs to her office and grab her handbag, then get an Uber home.
Her cell phone rang and she unclipped it from the lanyard she wore at the museum. “Hello?”
“Change of plans, girlfriend,” a smoky female voice said. “Let’s go out and celebrate being gorgeous, successful, and single. I’m done at the office, and believe me, it has been agruelingday.”
Haven smiled at her new best friend. She’d met Gia Norcross when she joined the Hutton. Gia’s wealthy brother, Easton Norcross, owned the museum, and was Haven’s boss. The museum was just a small asset in the businessman’s empire. Haven suspected Easton owned at least a third of San Francisco. Maybe half.
She liked and respected her boss. Easton could be tough, but he valued her opinions. And she loved his bossy, take-charge, energetic sister. Gia ran a highly successful PR firm in the city, and did all the PR and advertising for the Hutton. They’d met not long after Haven had started work at the museum.
After their first meeting, Gia had dragged Haven out to her favorite restaurant and bar, and the rest was history.
“I guess making people’s Instagram look pretty and not staged is hard work,” Haven said with a grin.
“Bitch.” Gia laughed. “God, I had a meeting with a businessman caught in…well, let’s just say he and his assistant werenottaking notes on the boardroom table.”
Haven felt an old, unwelcome memory rise up. She mentally stomped it down. “I don’t feel sorry for the cheating asshole, I feel sorry for whatever poor shmuck got more than they were paid for when they walked into the boardroom.”
“Actually, it was the cheating businessman’s wife.”
“Uh-oh.”
“And the assistant was male,” Gia added.
“Double uh-oh.”
“Then said cheater comes to my PR firm, telling me to clean up his mess, because he’s thinking he might run for governor one day. I mean, I’m good, but I can’t wrangle miracles.”
Haven suspected that Gia had verbally eviscerated the man and sent him on his way. Gia Norcross had a sharp tongue, and wasn’t afraid to use it.
“So, grueling day and I need alcohol. I’ll meet you at ONE65, and the first drink is on me.”
“I’m pretty wiped, Gia—”
“Uh-uh, no excuses. I’ll see you in an hour.” And with that, Gia was gone.
Haven clipped her phone to her lanyard. Well, it looked like she was having that chardonnay at ONE65, the six-story, French dining experience Gia loved. Each level offered something different, from patisserie, to bistro and grill, to bar and lounge.
Haven walked into the museum’s main gallery, and her blood pressure dropped to a more normal level. It was her favorite space in the museum. The smell of wood, the gorgeous lights gleaming overhead, and the amazing paintings combined to create a soothing room. She smoothed her hands down her fitted, black skirt. Haven was tall, at five foot eight, and curvy, just like her mom had been. Her boobs, currently covered by a cute, white blouse with a tie around her neck, weren’t much to write home about, but she had to buy her skirts one size bigger. She sighed. No matter how much she walked or jogged—blergh, okay, she didn’t jog much—she still had an ass.
Even in her last couple of months in Miami, when stress had caused her to lose a bunch of weight due to everything going on, her ass hadn’t budged.
Memories of Miami—and her douchebag-of-epic-proportions-ex—threatened, churning like storm clouds on the horizon.
Nope. She locked those thoughts down. She wasnotgoing there.
She had a plan, and the number one thing for taking back and rebuilding her life wasnomen. She’d sworn off anyone with a Y chromosome.
She didn’t need one, didn’t want one, she was D-O-N-E, done.
She stopped in front of the museum’s star attraction. Claude Monet’sWater Lilies.
Haven loved the impressionist’s work. She loved the colors, the delicate strokes. This one depicted water lilies and lily pads floating on a gentle pond. His paintings always made an impact, and had a haunting, yet soothing feel to them.
It was also worth just over a hundred million dollars.
The price tag still made her heart flutter. She’d put a business case to Easton, and they’d purchased the painting three weeks ago at auction. Haven had planned out the display down to the rivets used on the wood. She’d thrown herself into the project.
