by Vi Keeland
My cell phone buzzed as I pulled my door closed Friday night. It was after seven, and the office was quiet. Even Charlotte had left on time today for a change. Although that wouldn’t stop me from taking my indirect route out just so I could pass her office.
I locked my door and dug my vibrating phone from my pocket. Josh Decker’s name flashed on the screen. Josh was a retired NYPD detective turned private investigator who ran background checks on all our employees. Unfortunately, we’d gotten burned years ago when we hired a real estate agent without a sufficient check, and he basically used Eastwood Properties as a front to gain access to our wealthy clients’ apartments and steal. Our backgrounds were now so extensive it sometimes felt like we were crossing a line and intruding on a potential employee’s privacy.
“Hey, Josh. What’s going on?”
“Same ole, same ole. Working late so I have an excuse not to eat Beverly’s tuna casserole.”
“What if she saves you the leftovers?”
“Oh, she always does. And I toss it in the dumpster outside my building before I come in. I tried to feed it to the strays outside my office once, but even starving cats wouldn’t eat Beverly’s tuna casserole.”
I chuckled. “How did the Erickson investigation go?” I’d had Josh run a potential new leasing agent.
“He’s pretty clean. Got one arrest for smoking a joint in college that was expunged.”
“Expunged, huh? Doesn’t that mean it’s wiped clean from his record? Yet here you are, telling me about it.”
“There ain’t no such thing as wiped clean. There’s always fingerprints, son.”
I turned left and walked down the hall on my way to the office exit, slowing as I approached a certain closed door. CHARLOTTE DARLING. I stopped and read the gold nameplate on her door. Which made me wonder about what she’d added to her Fuck-It List lately.
“Josh . . . let me ask you . . . do you think you could find someone’s birth parents?”
“Found a woman her father a few months back. He’d sold his sperm during college twenty years ago and was homeless today, living under a trestle in Brooklyn.”
Wow. I stared at Charlotte’s name while debating it for a minute. “I have a job for you. I need to find someone. It’s personal—outside of Eastwood Properties. So I would want it kept discreet. No mention to my grandmother or anyone. Especially not our administrative staff. Is that a problem?”
“Discreet is my middle name. Email me from your personal account and give me the details.”
“Will do. Thanks, Josh.” I hung up and ran my finger over the nameplate. “Looks like we might find out who you really are, Charlotte Darling.”
CHAPTER 23
CHARLOTTE
All my clothes were in a giant heap on the couch when Reed buzzed to pick me up on Saturday at five thirty in the morning. I pressed the intercom before hitting the buzzer to unlock the door downstairs. “Running a little late. Come up and have some coffee.”
I cracked open the front door to my apartment and went back to frantically searching for the right thing to wear. I wanted to look nice—maybe even a little sexy—but I didn’t want it to look like I was trying to look sexy. Then there was the added complication of the outfit needing to be appropriate for climbing a damn mountain.
Reed rapped on the door before entering. I brushed past him in the kitchen wearing a frantic face and headed to the bathroom to get hair ties. He must’ve read my mood because his words were said with caution. “Morning, sunshine.”
“I have nothing to wear.”
Reed looked at the floor and shook his head. “Wear anything, as long as it’s comfortable.”
I growled at him and went back to ripping apart my closet. He fixed himself a cup of coffee and came to stand in the doorway and watch me struggle to finish packing.
Tilting his mug toward my already full suitcase, he said, “You know we’re only going to be gone one night, right?”
I glared at him. It was so easy for guys. He had on a pair of sweats and a fitted T-shirt. Which, by the way, fit really nice. “I don’t know what to pack.”
He smirked. “The little shorts you wore to climb the rock wall were a hit.”
My hands went to my hips. “I thought you said those were too revealing?”
Reed scratched at the scruff on his chin, which—by the way—I really freaking loved. “Let me ask you something. It’s Saturday, so I’m not technically your boss, correct?”
“No, the weekends aren’t part of my workweek. What are you getting at?”
“And we’re friends, right? Friends are protective of each other. That’s normal, right?”
“Spit it out, Eastwood . . .”
“Well, your hot pants were revealing because of the way your ass looked in them. Not necessarily because you shouldn’t wear shorts to climb. In fact, if you asked a professional climber, they’d tell you to wear tight clothes and even tight little shorts like you wore. But as your friend, not a man, I should tell you that you have a great ass, so if you don’t want men that are underneath you checking it out, you might want to wear something a little baggier.”
My brows arched. “So you didn’t notice my ass as a man. Only as a friend, then?”
He folded his arms across his chest. “That’s right.”
“Will you be climbing behind me today?”
“That’s the way it works, yes. The more experienced climber generally takes the rear. That way I can look forward and still guide you on where to grab. And if I fall, I won’t be hitting into you.”
It was difficult to contain my smirk. He’d just helped me decide what to wear. “That’s helpful. Be right back. Going to change.”
In the bottom drawer of my dresser was a bright-purple yoga outfit that I’d bought last year but never worn. I’d loved it in the dimly lit store, but when I got home, I realized it not only fit like a second skin but also had a shimmery sheen to it. Not to mention that it exposed my entire midriff and showed off a lot of cleavage for workout gear. I’d deemed it too sexy to wear to work out and tucked it away. But since Reed was only a friend and not a man this weekend, I was certain he wouldn’t notice. I stifled a giggle after I put it on and checked myself out in the mirror. The hot-pink shorts from my rock-wall climb looked demure compared with this getup.
Walking back to the living room, I did my best to act nonchalant. Reed was sipping his coffee and checking out the framed pictures on my wall. He did a double take when he got a load of my outfit.
“You’re wearing that?”
“Yes. Do you like it?” I did a girly twirl to show off that it was just as tight from the back as the front. “It’s a little tight, but you said that’s what the experts would recommend. And since you’ll be behind me all day, I figured it’s only my friend looking up at my ass in tight pants all day—not a man.”
I hadn’t given any real thought to what Reed’s day would be like, rock climbing with a first-timer. I guess I just pictured us both climbing Mount Everest today, rather than the reality of learning to climb outdoors. Since the group he’d signed us up for were all beginners, we’d spent all morning learning basic climbing techniques such as rappelling and belaying. We broke for lunch without anyone scaling more than five feet up during practice.
“I feel terrible. You’re stuck listening to all this training when you could be doing actual climbing.” The tour company we were with had brought bag lunches for everyone, and Reed and I went to sit on a big flat rock away from the group to eat.
“That’s okay. I haven’t climbed in a while. It’s a sport in which you definitely want to err on the side of caution, so the refresher course can’t hurt.”
I unwrapped a ham-and-cheese sandwich. Reed had picked turkey, and his looked really good, too. “Do you like ham? Wanna go half-half?”
“Sure.”
I took the biggest bite. “Oh my God. Is this the most delicious thing you’ve ever tasted, or am I just famished?”
Reed smiled. �
��Outdoor climbing makes you really hungry. I can be inside climbing a rock wall for hours and never get hungry. Yet if I do one climb out here, I’m starving. Must be the fresh air and added exhilaration of not having bolted synthetic rocks to grab on to.”
He was right. I had barely climbed a few feet during the morning training session, and it was already completely exhilarating. “How long has it been since you climbed?”
“Close to about two years, maybe.”
“What made you take a break?”
Something in Reed’s face changed. He’d gone from carefree and open to tense and shut down from one simple question. “It was time,” he said.
Since he had nowhere to run today, I pushed. “That’s vague. How about a more specific answer?”
He shoved a giant piece of his sandwich into his mouth. Definitely buying time to answer. I kept my eyes trained on him, letting him know I’d wait for his response. Plus, the way his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down when he swallowed was really damn sexy to watch.
“There’s been a lot of change in my life over the last year, so I guess climbing has sort of taken a back seat.”
“You mean because of Allison?”
“Among other things, yes.”
“What other things?”
“Charlotte . . .” Reed hit me with that warning tone.
“Don’t ‘Charlotte’ me. We’re supposed to be friends, remember? This is what friends do. They talk. They share.”
“A guy and a girl don’t sit around and talk about their lives and tell each other secrets unless they’re a couple.”
I straightened my spine. “So pretend I’m a guy friend.”
Reed’s eyes dropped to my cleavage, then returned to mine. “That’s not possible.”
I sighed loudly. “You know what happens when people open up to each other?”
Reed didn’t answer, so I continued via a demonstration. I cupped my hands together tight as if I was holding a ball inside them. “This is someone who is closed off. No one can get in. But nothing can get out, either.” I opened my hands and held them cupped side by side as if I were waiting for someone to place something in them. “See. This is open . . . you might have to let someone in that you weren’t expecting, but . . . it also allows the people that you had stuck inside—to leave.”
Reed stared at me for a long time, then abruptly got up. “I’m gonna take a walk. I’ll be back before the afternoon session begins at one.”
Reed returned just as we all gathered together again as a group. Which I assumed was the point. I couldn’t prod him in front of a dozen other people. Well, I could . . . but he was reasonably sure I wouldn’t.
He stood right behind me as the instructor spoke about the first climb we were going to do. My skin prickled, and it had nothing to do with the temperature outside. The man had a major effect on me. And I was certain that I wasn’t alone. I knew there were times when his body reacted to me, too. The only difference was, I didn’t want to fight it. I’d been burned by someone I cared about just like he’d been; yet I still wanted to explore what was going on between us.
I felt his warm breath tickle the back of my neck, and something dawned on me. I’d been going about things with Reed the wrong way. I’d been trying to get closer to him by making him talk to me, open up to me. But he was buttoned up so tight that he shut me down at every attempt. Maybe the way to get to him wasn’t through talking after all. Even a diamond has a vulnerable spot where the precious stone could be split open. Reed’s soft spot wasn’t in verbal communication—it was in his physical attraction to me. I wasn’t above working with the limited tools I had.
I took a step back so that my ass brushed against his front and turned my head to whisper—a seemingly innocent gesture. “I’m sorry I was so nosy before.”
Reed cleared his throat and whispered back. “It’s fine.”
I didn’t take a step away after our short exchange. And Reed definitely didn’t back up. Something told me that when I worked on penetrating this man’s soft spot, soft would be the last thing I’d find.
“Oh my God! I did it!” After pulling myself up and over the top of the wall we had to climb, I stood and jumped up and down.
Reed was right behind me and flashed a genuine smile. “You did good.”
Even though the wall was probably only thirty feet to get to the plateau we stopped at, I felt like I’d climbed a full mountain. I raised both my hands into the air and screamed. “I’m a gecko!”
Reed laughed. “A what?”
“A gecko. You know.” I darted my tongue in and out fast a few times. “The lizardy thing from the Geico commercials—a gecko. They scale walls, right?”
Reed shook his head. “Well, you looked more like Spider-Woman than a gecko, but I can understand the feeling. It’s been a while for me, too. I forgot how alive it makes you feel.”
“Does the office have a Halloween party? I’m totally dressing up as Spider-Woman. And you need to dress up as Spider-Man!” I couldn’t control my random rambling. “Oh my God. That was so much fun!”
“I’m glad we take a half-hour break before climbing to the next plateau. You look like you might run up the wall, stepping on the backs of all the people ahead of you, you’re so full of energy.”
“I can totally see how this can become addicting. Something physical happens. I was terrified the minute my feet left the ground, even though I knew I was only two feet up and I wouldn’t get hurt if I jumped down. The blood started pumping in my veins and my chest started to pound, but then I forced myself to climb one more leg up, and an incredible feeling came over me. It was like I was drawn to the top of the mountain and had to climb it. The farther up I went, the more dangerous it became, yet the less I cared about the consequences of falling. I just craved reaching the top and couldn’t stop myself if I wanted to. Did you feel like that?”
Reed stared at me, his face less amused and more serious now. “Yes.”
I’d been wearing a light sweatshirt over my cropped yoga top, but the climb had made the heat accumulate in my muscles and my body temperature rise. Now that I’d stopped, the sweat began to pour out of me. It happened when I exercised, too. I would suddenly start to sweat profusely after I stopped moving. I unzipped my sweatshirt, slipped it off, and tied it around my waist as I spoke. “I can totally imagine being unable to think about anything else but this feeling for days to come. It must be tough to walk away from this and not obsess about it, huh?”
“You have no fucking idea.” Reed’s voice sounded funny, and when I looked up, I realized why. His eyes were glued to my sweaty cleavage. Finding that made my breathing almost as labored as it had been a few minutes ago, scaling rock. It also reminded me of Reed’s weakness. I took a step closer to him and leaned up on my tippy toes to plant a kiss on his cheek.
“Thank you for sharing this with me, Reed.”
He cleared his throat and blinked a few times. “You’re welcome.”
After another invigorating climb, our instructor called it a day. Reed and I had only signed up for today, but when the instructor said there was an early-morning intermediate climb tomorrow, I encouraged Reed to do it.
“You should go. I’ll sleep in, or maybe even splurge for a massage in the morning. I’ve used muscles I didn’t even realize I had today. I’m sure I’ll be sore anyway. But you’ve spent the entire day taking care of me. Go do the intermediate climb in the morning. You’ve earned it.” Before he could say no, I walked over to the instructor, who was packing up his gear, and told him I wanted to sign up my friend for the morning climb.
“Has your friend climbed before?”
Reed finished packing his own bag and walked up midconversation.
“Yes. He was an avid climber, but took a break for a while.”
“Okay. Tell him to meet us at the west hiking trail entrance.”
I grinned and turned to Reed. “Meet them at the west hiking entrance.”
The instructor looked back and fo
rth between us. “Oh. You meant Reed?”
“Yes.”
“You said a friend. I assumed you two were a couple.” He looked at Reed. “Seven a.m. start. I’m not the guide for the morning climb. Heath is. You met him earlier today when he dropped off the equipment we used.”
Reed nodded and turned to me. “You sure you don’t mind?”
“Not at all. I’ll find something to occupy myself. Don’t worry about me.”
The instructor hesitated for a moment but then said, “I hike on Sunday mornings. Not a tour or anything. Just me and nature, for fun. Why don’t you join me while your friend is on his climb.”
“Umm.” I glanced over at Reed and caught a vein bulging from his neck. “Thanks for the invite. But I think I’ll be too tired to hike.”
Oblivious of Reed’s death scowl, the instructor reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He fished out a business card and extended it to me with a flirty smile. “Cell phone is on the card. We could make it a short hike and have some breakfast after? Think about it.”
“Umm. Okay. Thanks.”
Reed was quiet as we walked to the car. As always, he walked around to the passenger side first to open my door. Only he didn’t shut it like he normally did. He slammed the damn thing. The awkwardness continued to grow as he drove to the hotel in silence. I knew what he was pissed at—it wasn’t like he could hide his obvious jealousy. But I was curious what he’d do with it. So I didn’t try to make any conversation, either. I let the discomfort continue to stew.
He parked at the hotel and finally spoke. Well, growl might be a more appropriate description. “Be careful on your hike tomorrow.”
Did he actually think I would do that? “Did you hear me say I was going?”