by Vivian Wood
“The Abominable Snowman wouldn’t bring his ass out in this weather. And yet here I am.” Jesses motion for the scantily clad waitress. “This better be good, Sparrow. Otherwise, you owe me an Armani trench.” He glances down. “‘Cause this shit is sure to be ruined.” He knocks another inch of ice from its wool surface as he takes off his coat.
“When we’re done talking, I’m sure you’ll be able to buy twenty more just like it. I wouldn’t have dragged you here in the middle of the day, if it wasn’t worth it, Jesse.”
He nods. “I understand. So talk.”
Humming his agreement, Harvard’s most ruthless valedictorian smiles the same smile I’d seen him use to trip up nineteen year-old gang-bangers.
But we’re not nineteen anymore. And these gang-bangers are much more different now. Now? They’re in business suits.
Their gambles have grown more sophisticated, more calculated, betting a sport they now leave to their lawyers, risk a game they play better than roulette.
I order a whisky from the waitress, anxious to chase the cold away with its warmth. I stare at my old friend, wishing I had more time to tell him…that someone is after my family…or the firm.
“Is there a reason you called me down here on the shittiest day of the year?” He stresses. “We have bigger fish to fry. In case you hadn’t heard, our stock prices are…”
I cut him off. “I know about our stock prices. In fact…” I trail off, grabbing his drink and taking a sizable gulp. “That’s the reason why I called this business meeting.”
He gazes at the stripper still circling the metal pole, his stare swiveling back to me with a smile.
“This is a business meeting? And I’m guessing she’s your secretary, huh.” I glance over. “Wonder where she keeps the notepad…”
I glare “I’m serious, Jesse.”
“Me too. I don’t even want to think about where her pens are stashed.” My old college roommate clears his throat, and I’m tempted to jam my fist down it, impatience getting the best of me.
“Listen,” I snap. “I’m talking about a war, Jess. You should be familiar with this routine by now.”
He raises one eyebrow. “I’m listening.”
I sigh, leaning my head back, the red and violet lights bouncing off the edge of my dark liquor as I lick my lower lip. My mouth goes dry.
“What do you know about Violet Keats?”
Just saying her name shoots an arrow through my heart, but I barely blink. The waitress arrives, and I take my drink, not moving to sip it, straightening my back to better watch the expression of Jesse’s unsuspecting face. He shows nothing.
“Not much.” He finally takes a gulp of his own drink, his words scratchier than ever. “I barely know her.” He shrugs. “Do you?”
Except for the way she smells, the way she fucking tastes. I know the pitch of her breathy moans, her little sighs. In fact… I know every single, sexy inch of Violet Keats. But that’s none of Jesse’s business.
He leans forward in his dark suit, Violet’s name still hanging on the edge of his angular lips. His frown starts to deepen as he sits.
“I know she’s friends with your sister, Marilyn. Is that why you’re curious?”
My stare slants. “About what exactly?”
“About whether or not she was going to affect your decision to work on Chris Jackson’s case, of course. I know David wants to. Hell, he’s been holding secret meetings about it since Fitzgerald went in the hospital. If that’s the case…” He stares, setting his drink down. “Then I quit. Rep’ing a man like Chris Jackson isn’t the sort of…working environment I’m walking into.”
The word working sounds like a curse coming out of Jesse’s mouth. Or worse—a dirty word.
“We’re not representing Chris Jackson, Jess. Not on my fucking watch. But that doesn’t mean that someone isn’t floating around the rumor that we are to drive our stocks down, to bring the business my father built crumbling to the goddamned ground.”
Jesse shakes his head. “I’m still not following you, Heath.”
“I’ll make it simple…” I lean closer, my pulse playing along with beat of the loud music. “I’m talking about corporate espionage. I’m talking about big business corruption. Stock manipulation. The works.” I whisper lower. “Hell, Jesse, this goddamned club we’re sitting in is the site of so much fucking crime and extortion that it makes Alcatraz look like a private Catholic school. Any of this ringing a bell?”
He scoffs, sitting back, his broad shoulders slouching as he inclines. “Well, there goes my buzz…”
“I’m fucking serious here.”
“So am I, Heath.” Jesse leans forward, his nearly black eyebrows furrowing as he inspects me slowly, his green irises scanning my entire face. “So am I.” My old friend glares. “I want you to keep talking because I want to hear this. Because I think you’re getting ready to confess something I probably don’t want to hear, something you had to drag me miles away from the office just to show…” He hesitates. “Or am I completely wrong?”
He’s not wrong. And I hate that he knows me so well. Can see right through the bitter wall I’d tried to build. The emotional safe-guards.
I want to tell Jesse about the gamble. That fucking bet. I want to tell him that I’ve been bamboozled into taking a wager that was impossible to win. When some secret plot was behind the scenes manipulating the very integrity of King & Sparrow as we speak.
I want to tell him…that we’re being fucking set up.
But before I can say anything else—admit my dirty deeds, a curvy blonde with spiked bangs sashays in my direction, rocking a pink lingerie set thin enough to clean my teeth with.
She bends towards me.
“Would you like a dance, honey?”
It’s the last thing I want. But the dancer is already taking a seat in my lap as another two swing over to Jesse, spreading their manicured fingers across each of his Valentino-covered shoulders.
My oldest friend doesn’t move an inch. Then again, he was always that way.
Too honorable. Too good. Too caring to put up with the likes of me.
Or this place.
I consider that before I speak.
“Heath, I gotta be honest here…” He hisses as Pink Lingerie swings a circle against my crotch. “Your choice of meeting venue is a little…”
“Naked?” I shake my head, apologizing as I remove the manicured hands skimming over my body. “I know.” He nods to the undulating ladies, dismissing them. “An old friend of mine owns the place. I’d figured it was the last place the press would come looking for me.”
“You obviously don’t know these New York City slickers much now, do you?”
“I don’t,” I answer, the smile fading from my face. “But I’m beginning to. And because of you, I’m hoping to learn a lot more.” He glances over at me. “What do you say, Jesse? Can you hear me out?”
But my time is up. I’m feeling trapped. And the more I look at my surroundings, the more caged I feel inside the strip’s club VIP. Like, everybody is looking at me.
My pulse starts to pick up, paranoia working its way under my skin, and the paranoia solidifies into poison when the writhing dancer in my lap clamps down even harder, hissing softly in my now-reddened ear.
“Just relax, baby.” I can feel her smile spread against my skin. “David told me to make sure you stick around, have a good time.”
My mouth twitches. Stick around? Good time, huh?
This was looking more and more like a ploy—a plot. I watch as the waitress orders another whisky for me, convinced I’m too torqued up by the paid-for ten-dollar dalliance to notice. I don’t like where this situation is heading. I stand up immediately, setting the blonde stripper to the side, and she collapses against the pleather sofa with a soft thud, her pink mouth set into a surprised “O.”
I glare down at Jesse.
“Jesse, do me a favor.”
“Sure. Anything.”
“I’
ve gotta book it. Next round’s on me.” I take out a Franklin-printed bill, setting it at the table. “Next time, you’re tempted to meet me here for a business meeting…” I smirk, my voice lowering. “Don’t. It’s too fucking dangerous. Give me a five-minute head-start before you head out. Don’t talk to anyone on your way out.”
I shrug farther into my coat.
Without another word, I head down the stairs of VIP, storming towards the front door. But two bodybuilder-types in black block the front double-doors. I stretch to my full six-three height, tightening my fists.
Tie on or not, I’m every bit the street kid my spoiled father didn’t want me to be. I’ve never backed down from a fight. I meet their beady eyes.
“Boys…” I add on an exhale. “Let’s skip the ‘We can do this the easy way or hard way’ bullshit, and get right to it. Either move out of my way…” My eyes sink into slits, my pulse thrumming. “Or I’m going to make you move.” The room grows hot around me. “It’s your choice.”
The air thickens for a second, the lights seeming to dim. The bouncers at the door wait a few beats, as if processing what I’ve said, and as offense finds its way up their red necks and to their furrowed faces, they stomp slowly towards me, their chins jutted outward. Providing my fists with an easier target. I raise my hand to take aim.
Until someone grabs it. And I turn my head, my eyes disbelieving what I’m seeing behind me.
The dancer.
She’s younger than I noticed before, her eyes bright. Beneath her blonde curtain of bangs, she peers at me—all brown-eyed doe, and I lower my already-bruised arm, my gnarled knuckles dropping to my side as she squeezes them.
I see the plea in her eyes.
“Don’t.” She whispers up towards me. “That’s what they want you to do.” She lowers her lashes, flicking them up once again. “You’re being watched.”
She nods at Bouncers Tweedle-Dumb and Tweedle-Dumber, and they part ways. But not before she hands me a slip of paper.
I expect the name, Candy, to be printed on its surface along with a number. Tempted to chuck it away, I take it instead. And what I read on it makes every hair on my body stand on end, the very blood in my veins run completely ice cold.
I hit the double doors, running—my head pounding as loudly as my feet.
Chapter Twenty-Five
VIOLET
Why didn’t you change out of your skirt? my body screams at me.
My feet are cold. My hands are freezing.
My gloves are stuck to my skin, and as I try to pry the front door of the SparrowHead building open with my hands, the Burberry scarf around my neck nearly goes flying down the sidewalk.
The weatherman said it’d be snow; he never said there’d be a monsoon of it.
Light flurries at five o’clock turn to a steady fall, and five hours after Marilyn drops me at my cozy brownstone, I finally get back to work, my fingers buzzing to begin a night of research on the Fletcher case after getting caught in one of the worst traffic jams in Brooklyn.
My taxi was already in Manhattan by the time Jack Frost comes to kick ass, and one blistering cab ride later, I bluster onto the familiar Manhattan floor of the SparrowHead lobby, bundled up, my body shivering as I cross the shiny gray tile. Making a beeline towards the elevators to the oh-so-intimate sounds of Hanson’s “MMMBop” playing in my iPod headphones, I flash my badge at Security Guard Sam and flounce into the elevators, my mood better than it’s been in days.
Maybe it’s because of the smell of the snow. Maybe it’s the holiday season. Or maybe it’s because of the conversation in the cab with my Chicago realtor. An end to a chapter I should have closed two years ago.
I can’t stop the smile on my face.
Telling her to let my ex, Jeffrey, sell the whole damned condo is the best decision I’ve ever made.
With Marilyn’s voice in my head and the Hansons in my speakers, I try to exit the elevators onto the thirtieth floor of King & Sparrow, an extra pep in my step. But something stops me. I slam head-first into a brick wall, before realizing that it’s someone’s body. Built like cement and just as hard, the imposing person forces me to backtrack on my feet, my own body trembling as I glance up and into the face of anger itself.
I balk when I realize who it is. Heath.
He looks livid. And oh so handsome.
In a navy suit so deep it’s almost black, his dark copper-colored eyes burn down towards me, searing into my skin. His jaw tight, his hair windswept and tousled, he looks every bit of a blazing angel come down to earth. But when he opens his mouth, nothing but the devil himself comes out.
He locks me in against the elevator wall, his stare hot enough to singe. He places his arms above my head, and when he does, I can feel the emotion coming off him in waves. Snatching my earphones from my ears, I can think nothing, say nothing, as worry and rage radiates from his steady glare.
He grits his teeth.
“Where. The. Fuck. Have you been?”
I wince at his words, finding myself speechless. I place my hands on his solid body, pushing, and when I do, he grabs my hand, lightly squeezing my frozen fingers. He lowers them before asking again.
“I asked you a question, Keats. Where the hell have you been?”
“And I told you to stop calling me that,” I counter. “And how about none of your goddamned business, Heath. You’re not my dad.”
“No?” He lifts a dark eyebrow. “Guess that it’s good that I’m not. Because if I was, I’d put you over my fucking knee.” My breath hitches as he speaks. “Don’t you know how goddamned worried I’ve been about you all day?”
I scoff, rolling my eyes up at him. “It’s called ‘Do Not Disturb’ mode on your phone. Look into it. And what are you so worried about? You made it perfectly clear that I should stay away from you.” I cross my still chilled arms. “Or did I mishear you last night?”
His jaw ticks, his stubborn chin set in defiance. The scruff along the sides of his sharp jaw seem darker in the dim elevator light—more pronounced, and as I look closer, I can see how pale his skin is. Looking like he’s aged ten more years in the past day, I almost reach out to him to soothe his sallow skin, but indignation—hard and fast—makes me stop.
I drop my hand, trying to wrench the other still set firmly in Heath’s grasp. He only holds on tighter.
“Let me go,” I throw at him. I incline my face to meet his dark stare. And I’m shocked when he says “No.”
“What do you mean no?” I try to step away from him, but can’t. He’s practically got me pinned. My back pressed against the cold elevator wall, my neck arched upwards to face him, I’m almost overcome by his presence, my pulse pounding as Heath crowds me in the small space, his broad shoulders like a barrier over mine.
He’s just…so tall. So damned built.
His body is like limestone beneath a Valentino suit, and just when I think he’s going to let me go, he takes a step towards the elevator doors, pressing them shut. He presses pause on the dashboard, stopping the elevator from moving, and in the deathly quiet cage, he returns to my side, glaring down at me, his tawny irises alive and full of heat.
He raises my hand to his lips and kisses it, his touch surprisingly tender.
“You’re fucking right,” he sighs. “That is what I said. I let my mouth say something it really didn’t mean.” He inches closer. “So let me show you, Violet, how I feel. I don’t trust my lips to tell the truth right now…but this?”
He places my hand over his heart.
“This…I can’t fucking hide from.”
He bows his head to mine. With my hand still on his heart and the sounds of Hanson no longer in my ears, I feel a beat that matches my own, a rhythm I didn’t expect. Heath’s heart races under my touch, playing a broken melody, and as he lowers his lips to meet my waiting mouth, I slip into his kiss letting it take hold of me, pressing my breast against his to make the music that only he and I ever could.
The mending of two broken sou
ls.
In that instant our mouths touch, I feel what he feels, fear what he does.
The connection between us is scary, fucking unreal, and in his arms, my last emotional wall comes crumbling down at his Italian leathered feet, my body heating from within as Heath deepens the kiss, sliding his tongue smoothly over mine to make me moan so loud I’m afraid the elevator will shake.
I’m hot and can’t get my clothes off fast enough. I reach for the Burberry scarf, letting it slide to the floor. The sound of fabric hitting the ground is soft, the noise barely audible. But the small move ignites some type of flame within Heath, and as he pulls out of the kiss, his eyes focused on mine, a fire scorching in his cinnamon gaze.
“Fuck this shit,” he hisses. And then he lifts me.
The headphones in my hand fall to the ground, my purse dropping with them as he presses into me. His fingers flying to my collar with deft skill, he removes my coat, slinging it to the side, and my gloves and heels are next to go as he removes my clothes, kissing at every bare inch he can find.
My breath picks up, my exhales turning into pants. My words are a whimper when I finally find the will to speak, and as the buttons of my cream-colored blouse go bouncing along the elevator walls, I huff in spurts, my hands dying to unearth the impressive erection I feel pressing at my hip. I grab Heath’s face.
“What—what are we doing right now?”
“What we should have done a long time ago. Showing each other how we feel…” He clutches my chin, facing me. “This won’t be a fuck, Violet. This will be more.” He speaks into my face, his halting breath minty and hot. “This is me talking right now. Not Mr. Tequila. Or Mr. Sparrow. Just Heath. And just Heath needs you to know that you are the only woman he can be just Heath with.”
He kisses me. Hard. And I feel it everywhere on my body. I tremble under his touch. Even more so when he pulls back, pressing his furrowed forehead into mine. “I’m fucking in love with you, Violet Keats. From the moment I met you. I’m tired of pretending I’m something I’m not—someone I’m not. I want to give you all of me—show you everything,” he breathes. “And by everything, I do mean every. Single. Inch.”