Love Unlocked by Libby Waterford

library!” Her unease had been replaced with delight at meeting her old friends again.
    “Is that a Wyeth?” Hudson asked.
    “Yes. Andrew.”
    “Gorgeous,” he said. “His use of color matches the drama of the Maine landscape to perfection.”
    He helped her pull out a larger piece. Together, they unwrapped it to find a mostly white canvas, with gray lines running in geometric patterns.
    “Richard Tuttle?” he guessed.
    “Agnes Martin.”
    “You have exquisite, if eclectic, taste.”
    Hudson seemed as excited as she to see what treasure would next emerge from the shipping container. His comments stoked her own enthusiasm and she eagerly brought out another to show him. Each painting revealed another aspect of her soul, whether he realized it or not, and bound them together tighter than all of the secrets left unsaid.
     
     
    Hudson stared at the charming oil still life of flowers and fruit as Eve finished unwrapping it. “I can see why you wanted all that security.”
    She shoved a pile of bubble wrap and newspaper back in the crate and held the painting away from her. “Yes.”
    “That’s from his later work,” Hudson said, much more casually than he felt. The artist was Paul Cézanne, the painting worth millions.
    “It’s my favorite,” she said quietly.
    As she placed it carefully next to the others, he rose, surveying the fortune in artwork that was lined up against the wall, wondering about their owner. This house was beautiful, modern, but not flashy or in a particularly expensive location. She had to be loaded to own a collection like this. He’d never speculated about her arrival in Chelsea, her casual spending of thousands to furnish her home in record time, to outfit it with the best security money could buy. His brother had been smiling for weeks with the boost having her as a client had brought his small company. Will had been talking about moving further into the high-end market, servicing the reclusive wealthy who lived scattered around the coast.
    Maybe she was a dot com investor, or inherited a wad of dough from an elderly millionaire she’d married for the money. Maybe she was a bank robber. Did it matter?
    Her silence when he’d told her not to lie to him led him to believe she’d acquired these pieces in a less than up and up way. That her past was unknown to him both excited him and made him worried for her. Why should he be afraid for a woman he barely knew? She brought out a protective side in him that he’d thought reserved for his nieces and sister.
    Though there wasn’t anything else that was brotherly about the way he felt about her.
    John rang the proverbial dinner gong and ushered them to the table. Hudson was glad for the distraction both from Eve and the mesmerizing pull of those priceless paintings.
    Dinner was surprisingly delicious, with the two bottles of crisp Chardonnay accompanying the meal helping conversation flow easily between the three of them.
    Though he’d been initially reserved, and, if he was honest with himself, a little jealous, he warmed up to John. The man was witty and kept the tone of the evening light.
    Hudson was surprised when he asked questions bordering on the personal that Eve and John answered as if they had nothing to hide. Perhaps he was imagining things, and they were simply two old friends, one passing through town, the other starting over in a fresh place.
    “So, how did you two meet?” John asked, between bites of pesto linguine.
    Eve glanced at Hudson, an amused look in her eyes. “You’ll never believe this, but I locked myself out the very first day I got here. Hudson came to let me in.”
    “A man of many talents,” John said.
     “Rather.”
    Hudson cleared his throat as a blush swept over Eve’s cheeks, reminding him of every wicked thing he wanted to do to her. “My brother’s a locksmith, I was covering for him,” he said. “So how far back do you two go?”
    “Oh, donkey’s years,” John said.
    “I don’t want