Naomi: Don’t forget! We shop for bridesmaid dresses Wednesday. I’m thinking all the fs. Fall, fun, and flattering!
Sloane: Lina, I think this means she’s going to dress us up like pumpkins.
Me: Pumpkin is not my color…or shape.
I didn’t enjoy wasting my entire morning fruitlessly checking potential properties off my list. Not when it felt like there was a ticking clock hanging over my head. I needed progress. I needed a break. I needed to stop thinking about Nash Morgan.
That meant banishing all thoughts of his offer, his confessions, and his hot, hard cock. Okay, that last one had already taken up permanent residency in my head. But the rest needed to vacate my brain immediately.
I was mechanically chewing my way through a Cobb salad at a diner forty minutes outside Knockemout when six feet four inches of sin in a suit slid into the booth opposite me.
Lucian Rollins wore danger like it was custom tailored for him.
“Lucian.”
“Lina.” That low timbre, those piercing eyes. Everything about the man was vaguely threatening…and therefore a reasonable distraction from my obsessing over all things Nash.
“What brings you to my booth?”
He stretched one arm across the back of the vinyl cushion, taking up even more space. “You do.”
The perky twentysomething server who’d brought me my food and chatted about my leather biker jacket for five straight minutes hustled up to the table holding a coffeepot at a precarious angle. Her eyes and mouth were wide. “C-coffee?”
“Yes. Thank you,” he said, looping a finger through the handle of the upside-down mug in front of him and flipping it over.
Her eyes got even wider and I wondered if they were about to pop out of her head. Just in case, I moved my salad out of the pop and splatter zone.
“Could I get some extra dressing, please?” I asked when she finally managed to pour the coffee.
“Extra creamer. Got it,” she whispered dreamily and wandered away.
“Great. Now I’m never going to get my extra dressing.”
Lucian’s smile had the bite of frost to it. “I’d hoped this conversation wasn’t going to be necessary.”
“I love it when men track me down and open with that line.”
“Nash Morgan,” he said.
I raised an eyebrow but said nothing.
“He’s going through a difficult time. I’d hate to see anyone take advantage of that.”
I pointed to myself. “Me?”
“Anyone,” Lucian repeated.
“Good to know.” Not about to make this chat easier on him, I speared another bite of salad with my fork. I chewed thoroughly, not breaking eye contact with Lucian, who didn’t move a muscle.
We stared each other down, willing the other to break first.
These were the kinds of social situations I excelled in. Making small talk about normal girly things? Nope. But going head-to-head with a cagey man when there was important information on the line? This was my Olympics and I was a goddamn gold medalist.
I took a theatrical sip of iced tea. “Ahhhh.”
His lips quirked.
“Are there any other vague statements you’d like to make or are you just going table to table issuing warnings?” I asked.
“We both know you’ve got ulterior motives for being here. I am aware of your employer just as I’m aware of the interesting timing of your arrival in town.”
I feigned shock. “Is there some town ordinance that makes it illegal to work in insurance?”
“Must we play games?”
“Listen, pal. You’re the one who decided to play cat and mouse, hunting me down out of town just to prove you can. I don’t like being toyed with any more than you do. So cut to the chase or you’re going to piss me off,” I said with a mean smile.
Lucian leaned in and interlaced his fingers on the table. “Fine. I know who you are, who you work for, and what happened on your last job.”
I kept my expression one of marked boredom even though that last bit impressed and unnerved me.
“Despite your low profile,” he continued, “you’ve built an impressive reputation for finding things that others couldn’t. You’re known for being fearless to the point of recklessness, a trait rewarded by your employer. You’re not in town for a weeks-long visit with your old pal Knox. You’re here looking for something…or someone.”
He let the accusation hang between us. I took another casual bite of dry salad.
“Why are we having this conversation now? Why not when I first came to town?”
“Because there’s the damage a bullet wound does and the damage a broken heart does.”
I pointed my fork at him. “Speaking from experience?”
He ignored my question. “Not only do you arrive in town just before Naomi and Waylay were abducted, now you just so happen to move in next door to Nash.”
“You don’t look like the kind of man who’s spent any significant time in roach motels, so I won’t waste time trying to explain the move. Though given the fact that you’ve got more money than some state budgets, you should really think about buying the motel and fixing it up…or maybe just burning it down.”
“I’ll take that under advisement,” he said dryly. “Now assure me Nash won’t come to further harm because of you.”
Feeling oddly protective of the man in question, I put my fork down.
“For the record, I had nothing to do with Nash’s shooting or Naomi and Waylay’s abduction. If I am in town looking for something, it’s none of your damn business or anyone else’s. And finally, Nash is a big boy. He can handle himself.”
“Is that what you told Lewis Levy?”
I was officially pissed off.
I smiled. “You’re like a little kid showing off the terrible finger painting you did at school expecting me to be impressed. If I hang it on the refrigerator, will you go away?”
“Sooner or later, someone else in your circle is going to get hurt and it better not be Nash.”
“What are you going to do about it? Give him a bodyguard to go with his U.S. marshal?” I suggested flippantly.
“If that’s what it takes. I know you spent the night at his place.”
“Don’t worry, Dad. We’re both consenting adults. I’ll have him home before curfew.”
Lucian slammed a palm down on the table, rattling the spoon on his saucer and sloshing coffee over the rim. “Do not make light of this,” he said coldly.
“Finally. Geez, how far under the ice do you hide the human in you? I thought I was going to have to threaten an ‘accidental’ pregnancy to get you to crack.”
He swiped my napkin and mopped up the spill with it before returning it to me. “Congratulations. If my team was here, you’d have won someone a lot of money.”
“A how-long-before-he-cracks pool? Don’t tell me Lucian Rollins has a sense of humor.”
“I do not.”
I leaned back in the booth. “Here’s what I’m seeing. You either think that I’d be the easier target to manipulate, or you’re afraid to have an open, honest conversation with your friend. Either way, your bad judgment is showing, Lucian.”
He let out what sounded like a low growl. But the man knew I was right.
“Look. You’re right to be worried about your friend. He’s not telling you or anyone everything about what he’s going through. That includes me, because we barely know each other. And what he has told me stays between me and him, because unlike some others at this table, I know how to respect the privacy of others. Yes, I spent the night at his place last night. No, we didn’t have sex. I’m not telling you that because I think it’s your business. Because it’s not.”
“Why are you telling me?”
“Because I know what it’s like to have people so worried about you they do stupid things behind your back.”
The muscles in his jaw flexed and I wondered what sore spot I’d just prodded.
“Nash is a good guy, which automatically makes him not my type. But that doesn’t mean I won’t make an exception.”
“You’re not helping your case.”
“I’m not building a case,” I told him. “I don’t give a shit what you think about me. You think I’m the problem in the situation but it’s not me. It’s you.”
“I’m not the one positioning myself to take advantage—”
“I’ll stop you there before you make me angry. If you think that I’m taking advantage of your friend or that he’s keeping things from you, you have two choices.”
“And what might those be?”
“You either trust your friend to handle himself or you have this conversation with him. At the very least, have the decency to have his back to his face.”
Lucian’s frown was downright chilling, but I had the heat of temper to protect me.
“You couldn’t possibly understand our history,” he said coolly.
“Oh, but I could. You’re good at collecting information? Well, I’m good at reading people. You three grew up together without ever really growing all the way up. Knox tried to hide from love so he’d never get hurt again. Nash doesn’t trust either one of you enough to have his back so he’s not going to talk to you about what’s going on in his head. And you… Well, let’s save that for another day.”
“Let’s not.”
I shrugged. “Fine. You asked for it. You’re a shadowy political consultant who has been linked to the downfall of several prominent men and women in our nation’s capital, not to mention the force behind the rise of several others. ‘Machiavellian’ is the word most often whispered in your direction. And you like it. You like that people fear you. I’m guessing because you had the taste of fear once and it made you feel powerless. So now you’ve got the power to pull all the strings you want. But you’re still not happy.”
His eyes narrowed.
“You allow yourself one cigarette a day probably just to prove that nothing has a hold on you. You’re loyal to your friends and I get the sense that you’d do anything for them. And that ‘anything’ definitely doesn’t end on this side of the law. But would you want Knox or Nash ‘handling’ things for you behind your back?”
“This is different,” he insisted.
“You’d like to think it is, but it’s not,” I said. “Let me put it in terms that I think you’ll appreciate. The amount of time and energy you’ve wasted going behind your friend’s back trying to ‘fix’ things for him could have been saved with a ten-minute conversation. Imagine how many politicians you could ruin or city blocks you could buy if you didn’t have to hunt down innocent women to vaguely threaten them.”
His stony expression changed not one iota, but I still caught it. A flicker of something like amusement in his icy eyes. “I’d never apply the term ‘innocent’ to you, and my threats were more overt than vague.” he said.
“Semantics,” I said breezily.
He watched me finish my salad. “I suggest we keep this conversation between the two of us.”
Keeping secrets. It was what I did. Only I’d been in Nash’s shoes before. My parents hadn’t trusted me to handle anything bad. I hated how it felt to have people discussing my well-being behind my back as if I weren’t strong enough to take part in my own life. I guessed Nash would feel the same.
“Which one of us are you trying to protect, Luce? Can I call you Luce?”
“I hope you’re not out to hurt my friend, Lina. Because I’d hate to have to destroy your life.”
“Looking forward to seeing you try. Now go annoy someone else.”
