Page 1 of Close Quarter
Chapter One
Rhys Matherton sipped his champagne, listened to the band play upbeat jazz on the deck of the ocean liner, and wondered what the hell he was doing. Taking a luxury cruise across the Atlantic wasn't at all his style, and it certainly wasn't what you were supposed to do right after you buried your mother.
Callous, one news site had said.
Disrespectful. And those had been the kindest of the words thrown at him.
Maybe he was a coldhearted bastard, but he didn't want to face his life yet, not with all that had happened. Flying back to New York from Vienna would have given him only fifteen hours of peace before he plunged headlong into the morass of friends, colleagues, and reporters. Never mind the creeping mass of people who wanted to be his very best buddy now that he was worth millions.
He swallowed the knot in his throat and chased it with the rest of the champagne.
Amazing what money did. Everyone wanted a piece of him. Even galleries that had snubbed their noses at his work now wanted to display his sculptures. Friends and ex-lovers called his cell phone so often he let the damn thing run out of power and hadn't bothered to recharge it.
He didn't even want to think about his e-mail.
A waiter offered to take his empty flute as the ocean liner slid past the waterfront at Southampton and made its way toward the channel. A second waiter came and offered a second flute, but Rhys declined. He wasn't about to add another spate of drunkenness to his exploits bandied about the press.
Taking the slow boat, literally, gave him an entire week to put himself back together, to have a little calm before he stepped back into his upturned life.
It wasn't his mother's death that had thrown him off. He had known that was coming. They had mourned her stage IV brain cancer together, that last month.
No, it was the aftermath. The lies. Seeing his father again. Facing that man's anger and loathing was one thing--he had done that most of his life.
But witnessing the utter relief on Derrick Matherton's face during the reading of the will had broken every wall Rhys had built over the years.
The contents of the will shattered what was left.
After it was all over, his father--Derrick--spoke his first words to Rhys in fourteen years.
"I always knew you weren't my son."
Rhys pressed his lips together and stared out at the tourists waving from the round block fort they passed. At least that secret had not been leaked to the media. But then, the solicitor had been from a very highly regarded firm, and Derrick had been given a tidy sum with the stipulation that he, too, would never reveal the truth.
Not his son.
Rhys inhaled the damp June air. Fuck the champagne. What he really wanted was a beer.
And a lump of clay to pound his fists into. The latter would have to wait until he was back in his studio. The former--well, the ocean liner had a wide variety of bars. He chose the one farthest away from the band and the mingling crowds watching the liner pull into the channel.
To his dismay, the lounge was not empty.
Several men and women stood at the dark wooden bar, more around nearby tables. A particularly loud group hushed when one of the women at the table saw Rhys. She whispered to her neighbor and then giggled.
Great.Rhys looked down as he walked, his face warm with anger. Which story had they read?
The one where he was a womanizer who slept with two a night?Derrickwould have greatly preferred that. It was so much better to have a son who went through women like tissue than a son who was single and gay.
"Sir!"
Rhys looked up in time to see the tray of glasses before he ran into it. Neither he nor the waiter could catch the tray as it tipped sideways. It fell, sending a shower of stemware and cocktails down onto a man sitting by the window.
Glasses shattered on the tile floor. One fell into the man's lap, spilling its contents and staining his dark trousers.
"Oh God, I'm sorry," Rhys said. "Oh hell."
Great, just great.He half expected a camera flash to go off.
The waiter shot him an exasperated look before addressing the man in the chair. "Mr. Quint!
