Born in Fire Read Online Free PDF Page B

that he was described as just that by many of his acquaintances. If he expected long hours and hard work from his employees, he expected no less of himself. Drive and dedication weren’t merely virtues to Rogan, they were necessities that had been bred in his bones.
    He could have handed the reins of Worldwide over to a manager and lived quite comfortably on the proceeds. Then he could travel, not for business but for pleasure, enjoying the fruits of his inheritance without sweating over the harvesting.
    He could have, but his responsibility and thirsty ambition were his birthrights.
    And M. M. Concannon, glass artist, hermit and eccentric was his obsession.
    He was going to make changes in Worldwide Galleries, changes that would reflect his own vision, that would celebrate his own country. M. M. Concannon was his first step, and he’d be damned if her stubbornness would make him stumble.
    She was unaware—because she refused to listen, Rogan thought grimly—that he intended to make her Worldwide’s first native Irish star. In the past, with his father and grandfather at the helm, the galleries had specialized in international art. Rogan didn’t intend to narrow the scope, but he did intend to shift the focus and give the world the best of the land of his birth.
    He would risk both his money and his reputation to do it.
    If his first artist was a success, as he fully intended her to be, his investment would have paid off, his instincts would have been justified and his dream, a new gallery that showcased works exclusively by Irish artists, would become reality.
    To begin, he wanted Margaret Mary Concannon.
    Annoyed with himself, he rose from his antique oak desk to stand by the window. The city stretched out before him, its broad streets and green squares, the silver glint that was the river and the bridges that spanned it.
    Below, traffic moved in a steady stream, laborers and tourists merging on the street in a colorful stream in the sunlight. They seemed very distant to him now as they strolled in packs or twosomes. He watched a young couple embrace, a casual linking of arms, meeting of lips. Both wore backpacks and expressions of giddy delight.
    He turned away, stung by an odd little arrow of envy.
    He was unused to feeling restless, as he was now. There was work on his desk, appointments in his book, yet he turned to neither. Since childhood he’d moved with purpose from education to profession, from success to success. As had been expected of him. As he had expected of himself.
    He’d lost both of his parents seven years before when his father had suffered a heart attack behind the wheel of his car and had smashed into a utility pole. He could still remember the grim panic, and the almost dreamy disbelief, that had cloaked him during the flight from Dublin to London, where his mother and father had traveled for business and the horrible, sterile scent of hospital.
    His father had died on impact. His mother had lived barely an hour longer. So they had both been gone before he’d arrived, long before he’d been able to accept it. But they’d taught him a great deal before he’d lost them—about family and pride of heritage, the love of art, the love of business and how to combine them.
    At twenty-six he’d found himself the head of Worldwide and its subsidiaries, responsible for staff, for decisions, for the art placed in his hands. For seven years he’d worked not only to make the business grow, but to make it shine. It had been more than enough for him.
    This unsettled sensation, the dilemma of it, he knew had its roots in the breezy winter afternoon when he had first seen Maggie Concannon’s work.
    That first piece, spied during an obligatory tea with his grandmother, had started him on this odyssey to possess—no, he thought, uncomfortable with the word. To control, he corrected, he wanted to control the fate of the artistry, and the career of the artist. Since that afternoon, he’d been able to buy