Page 5 of The Love Thief

“I called ahead to prepare your visit here,” Carly whispered as she pushed me toward a rack of dresses. She picked through the selection, piling one thing after another onto her left arm.

Carrying a stack of clothes, we entered the largest dressing room I’d ever been in.

Mirrors adorned three walls and a settee was neatly located against the fourth.

A delicate chandelier hung daintily from the ornate ceiling.

Looking at myself in the mirror, something I rarely did, reminded me of my teenage days when I often wished to be shorter, curvier, and sexier.

I had despised it when the boys at school teased me about my long, skinny legs, relentlessly calling me chicken legs or bird legs.

Mom often told me I was blessed to have been born with her legs, her brains, and her high metabolism.

I always knew that Carly was jealous of my ability to eat anything, at any time of the day or night, and never gain an ounce.

There, underneath the bright lights, I was pleased with my fashionably slim reflection.

For the next forty-five minutes, I became a living mannequin.

Juliet and Carly stripped me down to my bra and panties and had me stepping in and out of clothes all while speaking a language of color, print, texture, and fabric that was mostly foreign to me.

Every item they had me try on was something I would have never selected for myself and yet, I was delighted with how everything looked and enjoyed the feel of real silk and cashmere against my skin.

My favorite of the three outfits I bought included a pair of skinny dark brown leather pants topped with a pale gold, scoop-neck silk blouse, accompanied by the Hermès scarf, a navy Burberry car jacket, and gorgeous navy suede three-inch LK Bennett pumps.

It took both Juliet and Carly a while to convince me that I absolutely could not enter Budapest carrying my schleppy old brown shoulder sack. I was now the proud owner of a slightly used Celine calfskin shoulder bag.

For perhaps the first time in my life, I felt chic and classy and surprisingly comfortable. I also felt a bit nauseous, not just from the champagne, but also when it came time to pay up.

My shopping spree came in at just under $1,800. Even though I realized everything was heavily discounted from the original retail price, this was easily the most I had ever spent on clothes in one day.

Carly assured me that my new wardrobe was classic, timeless, and of the highest quality, and it would most certainly last me through dozens of future European adventures.

As I thrust the shopping bags into Carly’s trunk, my thoughts wandered to my pending travels with Barry.

I had never been on an airplane for longer than a couple of hours.

For a brief moment, I wondered if I could smuggle my yoga pants into my bag without Carly looking.

Closing the trunk, I saw a strange look cross her face.

Then it vanished without a trace. Had I just thought out loud?

“We’d better get you home, Holly,” Carly said in a quiet voice. “You have a big adventure ahead of you.”

The fourteen-hour nonstop Los Angeles business class flight to Budapest was my first adventure out of coach and out of the country except for my trips over the border to Tijuana and Rosarito by car.

The flight was mostly fun, except for Barry’s crazy notion that we should join the milehigh club, which I absolutely declined.

Instead, I tried to dig in and get some information on what kind of business he had to conduct in Hungary.

He explained that it was an annual trip to collect some art his parents had acquired through their broker and he would be hand-carrying it back home since it was so rare and precious.

After clearing customs, we found our driver with a sign that read “Tavers.” Fully decked out in a knee-length, double-breasted, brass-buttoned uniform complete with cap, our driver escorted us to a newly minted black Mercedes sedan.

In less than a half hour, we pulled up to our hotel, the Four Seasons Gresham Palace, a grand art nouveau building that promised extreme luxury.

There were definitely advantages to dating a wealthy man.

In our family, when we did stay in a hotel, it was generally at the Holiday Inn level.

As we walked up to the reception, a handsome gray-haired man dressed in a dark gray suit smiled and offered his hand to Barry with a warm, “Welcome back, Mr. Tavers. So nice to see you again. We have you in your favorite suite with the Danube view.”

Exhausted from the long flight and the time zone change, my mood brightened the moment I walked into the suite.

Long hot baths were my passion and I was completely smitten when I discovered the giant soaking tub in the pristine black-and-taupe marble bathroom.

Barry informed me that I had options for dinner.

We could order room service (he recommended his favorite dish, the Chicken Paprika with Kapaa Pepper Sauce and Baked Gnocchi) or we could take a short walk around the river and go to a casual café for a light supper.

As much as I wanted to see Budapest, a bath and room service was all I was up for. Having seen the itinerary for the next day, I figured I needed to rest up and get ready for prolonged cultural sightseeing.

Before I even opened my eyes the next morning, I could smell brewing coffee and feel the sun streaming through the window as it warmed my face.

I heard the crunchy sound of a newspaper page turning and assumed it was Barry.

I was incredibly cozy under the down comforter and was enjoying a few moments alone in bed, taking in the incredible circumstances I was enjoying.

It all seemed too good to be true and yet, here I was, wrapped in luxury with the man of my dreams—for real.

Barry brought me a small tray with coffee and a warm chocolate croissant (my number one guilty pleasure).

He had a gigantic smile on his face and the most loving look in his eyes as he said to me, “You are so beautiful and I love your adorable bedhead morning look. I don’t remember a time in my life when I was happier than I am right now. ”

I was speechless. The insides of my thighs were still moist from the pleasures of the night before. Moving the tray to the floor, I rolled toward him. He took both of my hands in his.

“This will be a trip you will never forget,” he promised. At that moment, I had no idea how right he was.

Our first adventure for the day was scheduled to begin at the very reasonable hour of 11 A.M. : a private boat tour down the Danube. As we were walking through the lobby, I saw a familiar face out of the corner of my eye. Without meaning to, I waved to him.

It happened often. I would get this hit—“Oh, I know them”—and I instinctively wanted to connect.

I remember thinking that this man was all-American with his standard beige khakis and blue button-down oxford shirt when I had first seen him yesterday at our departure gate.

In his mid-forties, he had attempted an earnest sweep of his thinning hair across his brow.

He looked away when he saw me wave and then Barry asked me who I waving at and I reminded him about my super facial-recognition abilities.

“Well, it’s not surprising that people on our flight would also be staying at this hotel,” he said a bit dismissively. Then he gave me a big smile, took me by the hand and guided me out the ornate iron doors of the Gresham Palace.

We walked the short distance to the dock where our own private boat awaited us.

It was a water version of a limousine, a sleek mahogany speedboat with super plush leather seats.

Barry let the captain do the driving while he became my personal tour guide and pointed out the landmarks on both sides of the river.

He regaled me with the history of the city and stories of the Habsburg royal family.

He promised he had a treat planned for later in the day when we would have an amazing cake loved by Elisabeth Habsburg at the 150-year-old Gerbeaud Café, known to have the finest pastries in all of Hungary.

We cruised under a variety of beautiful bridges, all of which had a different look and feel to them.

I found myself wondering if perhaps Barry had lived in Budapest in an earlier life because he seemed so at home here.

I giggled to myself that I was starting to think like my mom.

Did I believe in past lives after all? Blinded by the romance unfolding before me, I brushed off the thought immediately.

Later that afternoon, after an indulgent feast at the café, Barry insisted that we sit for charcoal caricature portraits with a street artist set up in front of St. Stephen’s Basilica.

He thought it would be fun to have the two of us pose together.

He sat down on a small metal chair and pulled me onto his lap and we snuggled together for fifteen minutes while we were being sketched.

The end result was surprisingly adorable and then Barry decided we should each have an individual portrait.

While I was seated, trying to hold still for the artist, I noticed a man standing under a tree across the street and, even though the sun was in my eyes, I was pretty sure it was the American who had been both on our flight and in our hotel.

Is he following us? I wondered.

Naw. Why in the world would anyone do that? I figured it was just another coincidence since we were hanging out in front of the basilica, one of the major tourist sites of Budapest. I decided not to mention it to Barry, since he was clearly not impressed with my superpower.

Our sightseeing included a visit to Barry’s favorite sculpture garden at the Koller Gallery, the oldest private gallery in Budapest located in the historic Castle District.

The gallery had a wide array of art for sale, but the sculpture garden was a permanent exhibition.

Barry had a particular attraction to a sculpture of two masks, a man and a woman puckered up for a kiss.

He positioned us to mimic the pose. I was quickly discovering that Barry had quite the sentimental side and wasted no time setting up selfies of the two of us to do what he called “capturing the moment.” They turned out brilliantly.

I loved everything about Budapest. It was beautiful, charming, romantic, and steeped in art and history.

Barry had been coming to Budapest since he was a teenager.

He grew up hearing exaggerated stories about his family connection to Hungarian royalty and he seemed eager to share the few stories he knew with me.

Barry’s parents had honeymooned in Budapest and Vienna in 1965 with directions from Phyllis’s mother to connect with the family still living in Budapest. What they discovered when they arrived in Hungary was that there was only one relative still alive, a young man named Laszlo Varga, whom everyone called Lassie (like the dog).

He was the son of Mrs. Tavers’s cousin, a woman of exceptional beauty and style named Ilona, who after World War II had an affair with a prominent art dealer, which resulted in a son.

Ilona died when Lassie was nearly twenty years old.

While his biological father never publicly accepted his son, he did see him a few times each year and, eventually, he made Lassie an apprentice in the family art business.

It was on their honeymoon that Mrs. Tavers acquired her interest in collecting postimpressionist art, but it would be many years before the Tavers had enough money to indulge her obsession.

Barry did mention that over the past decade he had made an annual pilgrimage to Budapest to bring his parents back a new piece for their collection.

When and where the Tavers struck it rich was still a mystery to me.

I had heard stories that they were slumlords in Detroit before selling off their tenement buildings for demolition to make room for a huge development project that made them zillionaires.

The next day we were invited to lunch at Lassie’s villa in the Castle District.

A three-story sandstone structure that had a castle-like vibe to it with seven bedrooms, six bathrooms, a gorgeous garden, and a swimming pool that was half indoors and half out.

The entryway had a soaring ceiling and an eclectic art collection that included a Flemish master, a Rauschenberg, and what might possibly have been a Pissarro just on one wall!

A surprisingly strange mix of art for an art dealer , I thought.

I was captivated by the gorgeous gold-veined, pale pink marble floor, and the peachy pink walls.

The carved furniture looked like mahogany with gold accessories everywhere.

Giant Chinese-style pots held massive indoor greenery.

High above, light streamed in from several skylights positioned in such a way as to not potentially fade the art on the walls.

It was unusual, feminine, and screamed big money and yet, it somehow felt warm and inviting.

The beeping machines shook me awake from my daydream, bringing me back to the cold hospital room.

Budapest now felt like a distant hallucination.

At the moment, I was hanging out in the seventh circle of hell trying to figure out was any of this real?

Did he ever love me? And, ultimately, who the hell was he?

I was strong. I could figure out how to endure the physical healing process. But of something else I was not so certain . . . would I survive what came after that?