Read Magnate for Free Online Page B

him.”
    â€œI am. He’s annoyingly smart. Works himself to the bone nearly every day, practicing in the roughest parts the city.”
    â€œHe must find it rewarding,” she offered.
    â€œI suppose, though I keep reminding him he needn’t work. Save himself the aggravation.”
    â€œHe could, but some people prefer to work.”
    â€œI suspect you fall into that category as well.” He tapped his fingers on the edge of the table, his gaze shrewd. “Why stocks?”
    She shrugged. “I like the excitement, the risk involved. And I’ve always had a head for numbers. In fact, my best memories are of my father reading the stock tables to me during breakfast.”
    â€œHow old were you when he died?”
    â€œSeven.” A familiar ache welled up in her chest. “I remember not believing it, that he was truly gone. Even when I saw his body, I kept waiting for him to get up and tell me it was a big joke. I’m afraid I was a handful for poor Will.”
    For some reason, that made Cavanaugh’s lips twitch. “I can only imagine. You’re smarter than other women, probably were even back then.”
    She inhaled sharply, drawing the unexpected compliment deep inside her, to where uncertainty and self-doubt thrived. No one had ever called her smart—no one other than her brother, though he used the word as a way of discouraging her ambitions. Will tended to say things such as, “ You’re too smart to go into business, ” and, “ Let a husband appreciate your intelligence with money. ”
    It meant something that Cavanaugh thought her smart.
    She picked up the full glass of cold champagne, tried not to let him see how he was affecting her. “I don’t know that I’m so clever. Perhaps just more reckless.”
    â€œRecklessness is never a bad thing.” Something about his tone, the way the low, husky words rumbled from his chest caused her body to heat. Was he flirting with her? No, she must be misreading him. He preferred actresses, as everyone knew.
    She tried to return them to safer waters. “In business, Mr. Cavanaugh?”
    â€œIn everything. But there’s a difference between recklessness and stupidity.” He placed his fork and knife down carefully on his gold-rimmed plate. “And I think it’s safe for you to call me Emmett, at least during dinner.”
    â€œThat would hardly be proper.”
    Cavanaugh said nothing, merely reached one large hand toward his delicate champagne glass. His skin looked rough and tanned, with fine brown hairs on the knuckles. Strong, capable hands that were different from any she’d seen. She wondered what they would feel like, if they would be gentle.
    â€œDo you remember,” he said, “what happened when you Knickerbockers were determined to keep the new monied-types out of the Academy of Music?” He took a sip and leaned back in his chair. “Alva rallied everyone who’d ever been shut out, myself included, and raised the money to build the Metropolitan Opera House. And now what’s happened to your precious Academy? It’s become a vaudeville house.”
    â€œAnd your point?”
    â€œMy point, Miss Sloane, is that your rules don’t stand a chance, no matter how fervently Mrs. Caroline Schermerhorn Astor wills it to be so. Money always wins, and too many of us undesirables have it now.”
    Lizzie bristled, resenting that he lumped her in with the rest of the old families so desperate to retain the status quo. “They are not my rules. I was never in favor of keeping the Vanderbilts out of the Academy, not that I had anything to do with it considering I was fifteen at the time. The world is changing, and if you think I’m not eager for it, then you don’t know me at all.”
    His eyes glittered, and he pressed his lips together, as if amused but desperate not to show it. “Is it so hard to admit I’m