Reverie

by Shain Rose

  “You’ll call Harvey? You have a direct line to the CEO of Levvetor?” Jett sneered from behind me. His breath was hot on my neck. Everyone in the room was watching us as I looked over my shoulder at him. He was closer than he should have been. Too close for a business relationship.

  I noted that. Noted that everyone in the room would be speculating on whether we’d had relations after this meeting.

  I sidestepped Jett dramatically, hoping our team noticed that too. “Yes, as I said, I’ll call him.”

  Bastian outright laughed at our exchange. Then he clapped his hands together. “Well then. You and I have business to discuss. Everyone else can go back to work.”

  Jett’s lip curled, his muscles bunching like he wanted to lunge for me. I’d seen them poised that way before, but this stance was filled with rage instead of desire.

  “We don’t make deals without my business involved, Victory. There’s a reason we’re in Stonewood Tower right now.” His words dropped rock after rock into the pit of my stomach. The blood rushed through my veins with my heart jackhammering under his stare.

  “You don’t want your business involved.” My voice sounded meek and timid. I lifted my chin and flipped my hair once to reinforce my confidence. “I think helping a company even if we can’t invest in them would be the best thing for everyone.”

  “So, now the Armanellis are a company to you?” He lifted an arm and extended it to look at his watch. “I don’t have time for you or this. The meeting is over.”

  Bastian cleared his throat and the bubble around Jett and me popped. “I’d like a word with Ms. Blakely alone.”

  Everyone filed out quickly, nodding or mumbling a thank you to their bosses and colleagues, excited to get out of the room before they got in as much trouble as I had.

  Brey walked by and grabbed my hand briefly while she leaned in to whisper, “Good luck.”

  Jett didn’t walk out with his team. He crossed his arms over his expansive chest and stood there with his feet shoulder width apart. He looked unmovable and protective. Hot.

  “Victory works for me.”

  “She does, but the business we have together isn’t a part of Stonewood Enterprises.”

  “Then you can have dinner with her outside of her working hours.”

  “Don’t be a prick, Jett. I just need a minute with her.” When Jett still didn’t move, Bastian sighed and ran a hand through his dark curly hair. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, I’m not trying to date her or get her into business with me. She’s safe, she’s yours, she’s untouchable. I get it.”

  “I’m what?” I stammered out. “I’m not ... We’re not …”

  “Don’t fucking forget it, Bastian.” Without looking at me, he stormed out and slammed the door.

  Bastian groaned and mumbled, “Jesus.”

  He sat back down in his chair and waved at the one next to him.

  I glanced around, searching for cameras or something in case he really did try something mobster-ish. Nothing looked remotely like security, and I found myself tensing back up.

  “I don’t want to hurt or scare you, Vick. It’s just me.”

  I nodded and pulled the chair out but moved it a little further away before sitting.

  He grumbled something low and then his hand shot out to the leg of my chair so fast I nearly jumped. He dragged the chair close enough that we were inches apart and said softly, “You danced with me a whole damn night, woman. And now I’m dating your friend. Katie isn’t scared of me. You shouldn’t be either.”

  “Katie isn’t scared of anybody.”

  A laugh burst out of him as he sat back. “Got that right. I’m fucking scared of her sometimes.”

  I slumped at his assessment of my friends. I remembered that laugh he had—so intoxicating, I told Brey to have fun with him in the club, not knowing a thing about him. Now that I knew so much more, I wondered how I could accept Katie dating him.

  News outlets consistently followed the Armanelli men, and while they never did the dirty work themselves, there was so much done in the streets of the city they controlled. Taking over for his father meant he could make a call and literally have someone killed. That power and feeling of godlike control could only lead to abuse.

  “Everyone should fear you. Power breeds fear.”

  “I don’t have power like you think.”

  “Don’t you though?”

  He stared out the windows. “It's a beautiful city. I’m not here to paint it red. My dad gave me power because he wants me to clean up the red that’s already been spilled.”

  Was he saying what I thought he was saying? This was for movies or books. Not my life. Not my carefully protected life.

  “Look, I don’t want to be involved in this thing between you and the Stonewoods.” I sighed. “Levvetor is a good company. Does that mean you should back it? I’m not sure. I don’t know if you are looking to corrupt it or help it.”

  “Help. Promise.”

  “I don’t know how much weight that holds. A promise between us is—”

  “Cross my heart, I’ll bleed out on the streets of Chicago for you if you find me lying.”

  I looked him up and down, took in his expensive suit, the way his body leaned toward me in a way that didn’t feel creepy but earnest. He wanted me to believe him, maybe even wanted me to be friends with him. Some yearning was there, but it was definitely platonic. “Why Levvetor?”

  “I could ask you the same question. Going up against Jett isn’t for the faint of heart.”

  “Meh …” I shrugged a shoulder.

  He smiled. “More to that story, I see.”

  “You don’t see because there isn’t anything to see,” I scoffed.

  “If you were just working under him, you wouldn’t have gone up against him.”

  “Yes, I would have,” I countered, and I meant it. “I believe in Levvetor.”

  He measured me up this time, and I didn’t shrink under the assessment. “Why?”

  “You first,” I blurted. I didn’t want to share my story, didn’t want to see the pity or the sympathy in his eyes. I didn’t share my story with anyone anymore. I’d learned quickly in high school that no one really wanted to hear it. No one wants to know how you’re actually doing when they ask the question. They want comfort, and it is completely uncomfortable to talk about cancer.

  He sighed. “Aside from the fact that it will make us all a lot of money, my father knows the founder. They are good friends of the family.” Before I could ask, he added, “And yes, I mean that in every sense of the word. We don’t want competitors shutting them down, and that means we need to pour more money into it when the government starts to back the bigger companies.”

  “Their drugs are working. The government can’t …”

  “Big companies can make smaller ones go away even if they are finding cures, Vick. You know that.”

  “Okay. So, if Stonewood Enterprises won’t back you, then I’ll lean hard on my mother’s company.”

  “Blakely Fashion? Interesting. You’ll be tanking your career at Stonewood Enterprises and doing something completely illegal. And ...” He dragged the word out as his eyes tracked over my face. “You don’t care one bit.”

  “Nope.” I stood up, ready for the conversation to be over.

  “I need an explanation.”

  “Can’t me wanting to save lives be enough?” I turned toward the door.

  “Nope.” He stepped in front of me, his height and presence worked to his advantage, overwhelming my space and my confidence. “Tell me why.”

  “I’ve used a drug they make,” I whispered the admission.

  His eyes jumped back and forth between mine. Then he scanned my body, surely looking for the evidence of my cancer.

  He wouldn’t find any. My cancer hadn’t left scars on the outside. It festered in my bones, flowed through my blood, and weighed down my soul instead. Cancer wasn’t always apparent but it was always lurking. If not in you, then it lurked in someone
you loved, morphing the way they looked at you, treated you, saw you. It morphed and marred every aspect of your life.

  “You don’t …” He stopped. “You aren’t sick. You don’t look …”

  “I’m in remission. Have been for years.”

  His brow furrowed. And his gaze turned harder, more solid. “You’re a fighter then.”

  His words, they weren’t a question but a statement, and I stood taller with it. The belief in his voice or possibly the cemented conviction made me want to hug a mafia boss. “I’m a fighter then.”

  We let the time pass. Minutes went by. I crossed and uncrossed my legs, fidgeted with my pen. I didn’t feel the need to make him feel comfortable or fold under the awkwardness of it all.

  “You don’t tell people.”

  “It doesn’t go over well,” I admitted.

  “That’s a lot of baggage for one person.”

  “I’m sure you have a lot of baggage for one person too.”

  Bastian’s shoulders tensed. Then he cracked his neck, as if trying to release the secrets he had no doubt stashed away.

  “We follow your lead when it comes to Levvetor.” He licked his lips and buttoned his suit jacket.

  “I’m sorry?”

  He looked up at the digital clock on the wall. “We need your expertise.”

  My thoughts acted like hair full of static and shot in twenty million different directions. I could do this. It was the opportunity of a lifetime and a way for a pharmaceutical drug I believed in to move forward.

  Also.

  I would be working for the mob.

  I would be going against on Stonewood Enterprises. Jett would flip out. He would literally lose his shit.

  “I’ll do whatever I can.”

  “Get Jett to back it. I don’t want your mother’s company involved. Government can get dicey.” He licked his full lips. “Mean. Stonewood Enterprises has the manpower to handle mean.”

  “My mother’s company …”

  “Doesn’t know what mean really is, Vick.” He grinned, showing his teeth like a wolf all of a sudden, they held a sort of snarl so vicious I wanted to take a step back.

  “And you think I do? That I can handle this?”

  He walked to the door, opened it, and motioned me through. His smile was slow as I made my way through it. “You’re a fighter.”

  I met his gaze. “Damn right I am.”

  18

  Jett

  Vick and Bastian.

  Vick. And. Bastian.

  I opened my laptop but couldn’t focus. I rearranged the paperweights on my desk. My father had given me three of them, all perfectly round. All blown glass. All from a little shop in Italy. The colors rippled, flowed together, and then pooled in just the right spots.

  I liked the detail in them, the smoothness, the feel of the substantial weight in my hand. I grabbed one and fisted it.

  One of a kind. They were all unique, and they all had their purpose. I kept them on my desk, set up for every person to see when they came and sat there. Some would focus on the red one, some on the blue, but most were drawn to the colorful one fisted in my hand, the captivating one swirling its damn color everywhere.

  I needed to name that paperweight Victory Blakely. She was color, entertaining the whole world and not stopping for a second to think about all the attention she attracted.

  And the woman was one of a kind, that’s for sure. No one else on my team had the audacity to push a partnership forward with the Armanellis knowing I didn’t want to. Leave it to her. And leave it to her to grab the attention of one of the most dangerous men in the city.

  Sebastian Armanelli definitely appeared harmless. His charm was instrumental in sweeping his family’s business under the rug. And the man worked like a panther in antelope’s clothing. He was new mob, new money, new power. He didn’t technically do any dirty work. Most of the business he and his family did was clean, legal, maybe a little risky and hovering near criminal, but most often fighting for good.

  Even if that meant going up against the government.

  I had no doubt this backing would put me in a shitstorm with the FDA and other pharmaceutical companies. I didn’t have the bandwidth, my team didn’t have the bandwidth. Not with my father stepping down.

  I squeezed the paperweight, contemplating the place I worked at day in and day out. We moved companies forward, we pushed healthcare, we pushed tech. Hell, I’d found a company to navigate bottling water without plastic and instead using biodegradable material. Now, some of the largest brands were following suit.

  I had to work harder than ever to pave the way for good in my city, and I hoped it would spread to other cities across the world. I believed in my team. I believed we had the ability to change the world.

  Vick breezed in, bouncing about like a ball that was as pink as cotton candy. Everyone’s eyes tracked her around the office like she was some sweet as hell candy too. She stopped by Josie’s desk and they both laughed at something she said. Then she hovered by Bob as though she didn’t have a pile of work waiting for her.

  I waited for her to look up, I willed her ass to look my way.

  She didn’t.

  Fine.

  I called my dad. “What the fuck do I need to know about Levvetor and the Armanellis?”

  “Jett Stonewood,” my mother bellowed. “You’re on speaker and if you think I raised you to speak that way—”

  “Dad, why do you have me on speaker?”

  He chuckled. “We’re in the car, and she’s your mother.”

  “She’s an enforcer is what she is.”

  “Watch your mouth, young man,” she said but the tone was lighthearted.

  “Love you, Mom. Dad, I really need to know what I’m dealing with here.”

  He sighed. “I’m trying to enjoy my time with your mother.”

  “And I’m trying to not go into the lion’s den completely blind.”

  The silence on the other end told me all I needed to know. “Avoid it if you can.”

  Vick was back at her desk, typing away, and I could have been imagining it but I saw a new posture, a new purpose. “And if I can’t?”

  “Don’t go in blind.”

  I hung up when I heard him end the call.

  I stared out at the cityscape for a minute, glanced at the cotton candy below, then shoved away from my desk. “Screw it,” I grumbled as I walked out of my office and to her desk.

  “You want to discuss the meeting here or in my office?”

  She jumped like she’d anticipated my coming but still couldn’t prepare herself. Good. She needed to learn who was boss. The damn company had my name behind it, not hers.

  “Bob and I are working on another contract that—”

  “That can wait.”

  “I don’t think it can,” she shot back and eyed me with those whiskey-colored eyes that delivered the same bite as a shot of the liquid.

  “Vicky,” Stevie hissed, his eyes wide as they ping-ponged between the two of us.

  She glared at him for a second, and then she folded back into her old posture like Mr. Stevie wanted. She cleared her throat and clicked a window closed on her screen. “I’m sorry. Yes, we should discuss it in your office.”

  Stevie’s smile was instant, like a proud boyfriend. I filed away his look and my feelings toward it for another day.

  I turned on my heel and heard her shoes clicking after me.

  I opened the glass door and waved her in. She avoided looking at me and walked right to one of my chairs. I closed the door and sat behind my desk.

  The silence stretched between us. I made her wait while I pressed the privacy button. My windows tinted, and she rolled her eyes at the effect.

  “Why are you rolling your eyes, Vick?”

  “I’m not.”

  “Cut the shit. Time is money around here, you know that.”

  “Okay. Then we probably shouldn’t focus on my eye rolling.”

  I rearranged the paperweights
, trying to curb my temper.

  She eyeballed me while I did it, not looking at any of them for even a second. “Levvetor needs you to back them.”

  “Oh, really?” I sat back and folded my arms over my chest. “What about you finding Bastian a different company? I’m pretty sure an employee offering to hook a client up with a competitor isn’t in our handbook.”

  “You have every right to fire me, and I’m happy to resign if you feel I need to after my display in there.”

  I started to tell her I wouldn’t be firing her, but she stopped me.

  “I don’t care about my job.” She hesitated when I lifted an eyebrow. “Of course, I want to keep working for your company. It’s Stonewood Enterprises where la-di-da the sky’s not the limit. Although I must say, today, in that room, it seemed like your standpoint was the limit and no one wanted to overstep it or share a damn idea.”

  I tried to say why that was. People needed to know who the boss was, when to be innovative, and when to shut up, but she barreled on. “Either way, yes, I want to keep my job, but I’m happy to step down and move on if you want. I just want you to reconsider Levvetor.”

  “I won’t ask why. You know you need to explain yourself.”

  She nodded, wringing her manicured nails in her lap. “A couple of years ago, the government tried to shut them down. Now, of course, no one ever came out and actually said that, but the FDA released a statement after a meeting they had with one of Levvetor’s biggest competitors. Levvetor appealed, lost millions, and just barely scraped by. I followed the news of it all very closely. Coincidently, I was doing a thesis on the company at the time. Their drugs work, Jett. They are saving lives at an extraordinary rate.”

  “So do other pharmaceutical companies,” I said. It was the truth. But it was also the devil’s advocate in me. I had to come at it from all angles.

  “Yes. At extremely expensive rates and by monopolizing the market half the time and sometimes to the detriment of their customers’ health. That competitor has a higher death rate with more side effects than Levvetor ever had and they know it. That’s why they tried everything in their power to shut them down.”