While Simon studied the hors d’ouervres and cursed himself for not eating a real meal before he left, Casellas tapped him on the shoulder.
“Someone I’d like you to meet, Simon.” Figured instead of bringing Brett to meet him, Casellas led Simon across the room to be presented to the man.
“Pleasure to meet you, Simon. I’ve seen your games on tape, but I’ve never seen you play in person. I’m looking forward to it.” Roger Brett’s cold blue eyes pierced him like a dagger. If this typified Brett’s pleased-to-meet-you look, he’d hate to experience his you’re-a-bloody-wanker look.
Simon dropped Brett’s hand and allowed a lazy grin to curl his lip. “Well, since you own the Waves, it’s probably a good idea to see us play in person.”
“Oh you boys figured that out, did you?” Casellas licked his lips, his gaze darting between the two men, but Brett chuckled. “I told you these silent partnerships never remained silent for long, Pete. You’re right, Simon. I own you, and I am going to see you play.”
“You own the Waves.”
“That’s what I said.” The steely blue eyes flickered but never wavered.
“Are you here to announce your ownership of the team?”
“I’m in no hurry.”
“Surely you realize word’s going to get around after your appearance at this event?”
“I don’t have a problem with that.” Brett lifted one broad shoulder. The man looked like he could’ve played a little American football himself. “The silent part of the partnership did its job. I purchased the land for the new stadium, and I acquired you—all under the radar and away from the prying eyes and speculation that usually accompany my business deals.”
“So I have you to thank for my contract.”
“Me and that agent of yours. Evan Chase works hard for his money.” Brett flicked an imaginary speck of lint from his Armani sleeve. “Let’s just hope you live up to the hype.
And I do mean your hype on the soccer field, not in the ladies’ rooms of nightclubs.”
“I can handle both.” Simon tossed his empty champagne glass to a passing waiter with quick reflexes before turning on his heel. Shit. Now he knew where the directive to shore up the crashing Waves came from—that steely-eyed bastard, Roger Brett.
Since he didn’t have a date, Simon cut out when the dancing started. As promised, Ivo and Gemma had ordered another limo for him, and he hopped in the back, slouching in the seat.
He faced some hard choices. He could either blow off the football-playing part of his contract and concentrate on his endorsement deals, or he could work his arse off and try to be the player the Waves, and the new owner, expected him to be. He knew the easiest course, and the easiest course provided an added bonus. If he started hitting the gym, running, cutting out booze and partying, Jessica would hit the road.
She obviously didn’t care anymore about keeping her job. If he chose to follow the path of the righteous athlete, she’d find another bad boy to satisfy her cravings. And he wanted to be the only one to satisfy her sweet tooth.
He slipped into his lobby, and Jaworski waved. “Your sister and her young man went up earlier.”
“He’s still here?” He couldn’t stomach barging in on Ivo and his sister en flagrante.
“As far as I know, Boss.”
Great, could this night get any worse? He stabbed at the elevator button, and then made lots of noise getting off, making his way down the hallway, and fumbling at the door.
He stumbled across the threshold in the darkened room, lit only by the TV screen in the corner. His stomach rumbled at the smell of pizza, and he flicked on a light.
“Anyone down here?”
“Just me.” Ivo popped his head up from the sofa, holding a beer aloft. “Gemma went up to bed...alone...since she wasn’t feeling well. I decided to stick around in case she needed anything.”
Simon didn’t want to inquire too closely into what needs Gemma had that Ivo could fulfill. He shrugged out of his jacket and hung it on the back of a dining room chair.
“You missed all the excitement.”
Ivo snorted. “Did all those rich folks get into a fight over claiming the biggest tax deduction?”
“Not quite.” Simon swung open the fridge door and grabbed a beer. He settled on the edge of the coffee table, and watched Bruce Willis jump out of an exploding building.
“So what happened?”
“The not-so-silent partner of the Waves made an appearance.”
“The J and B of JB Enterprises?”
“Yeah, I don’t know who the J is, but the B is Roger Brett. I heard from the lads that he owns a couple of American football teams too.”
“Hmm, yeah, that doesn’t surprise me.” Ivo peeled the label off his beer bottle, and tossed the strips of wet paper onto the coffee table.
“You’re going to clean that shit up, aren’t you? Why doesn’t it surprise you that Brett’s the silent partner?”
“I don’t know. Guys like that always have money to throw around, and he has fingers in all kinds of pies.
Figures he’d want to jump on the soccer bandwagon.” He brushed the mess on the coffee table into the palm of his hand. “And that explains Jessica’s job as your personal assistant.”
“Jessica?” Simon’s hand jerked to a stop on its way to his mouth, and beer spilled onto his shirt. “Why does Brett’s ownership of the Waves explain Jessica’s job.”
“I thought you knew.” Ivo maddeningly dabbed at the remaining pieces of shiny label with his finger.
“Knew what?”
“Jessica is Roger Brett’s daughter.”
Chapter Ten
“No, you’ve got that wrong.” Simon took a swig of beer and shook his head. He had to set Ivo straight. “Her name’s Jessica Jones, not Jessica Brett.”
“Maybe she changed her name or something because I’m pretty sure she’s Jessica Brett. Married Jimmy Doe from Lot 49?”
“Jessica told you that when we went out together.” Simon poured a stream of beer down his throat, trying to drown out the uneasiness creeping up from his gut.
“No she didn’t. She never said a word about that. She never even told me her last name, but I know Jessica Brett was married to Jimmy Doe. So if your Jessica was married to Jimmy Doe, then she’s Jessica Brett. That’s just too big a coincidence for Jimmy Doe to be married to two Jessicas.”
His Jessica? He wished, but now it seems as if that wish just spiraled out of his hands. He still clung to the hope that Ivo didn’t know Jimmy Doe from Don Ho.
“Why didn’t you say something before?” Simon chugged the rest of his beer and jumped up from the table.
He paced in front of Ivo, feeling like a solicitor questioning a witness in a murder case.
Ivo squinted at the last bits of label clinging to his wet beer bottle, and then began scraping them off with his fingernail. Simon clenched his jaw along with his fists, a nanosecond away from grabbing that bloody beer bottle and chucking it across the room.
“Ivo?”
“Huh?” Ivo looked up from his task, shreds of paper sticking to his fingertip.
Simon closed his eyes and took a shuddering breath.
Did Perry Mason ever feel this way? “Why didn’t you mention before that Jessica was Jessica Brett?”
“Why would I? I didn’t know Roger Brett co-owned the Waves with Peter, and I figured you probably didn’t know Roger Brett anyway.” He flicked pieces of the label onto the coffee table, and then scooped up the whole mess into the palm of his hand. “One way to find out for sure.”
“What’s that?”
“You do have the Internet in England, don’t you?” Even before Ivo had finished his sentence, Simon rushed to the small room off the dining area that he’d claimed as an office. He grabbed his laptop from the desk and plunked it down on the coffee table, knocking over Ivo’s label-less beer bottle in the process.
After the thing booted up, he entered “Roger Brett” in a search engin
e. Loads of links popped up in response, including links to the two pro football teams he owned.
Simon had something more personal in mind and found a bio site.
“Click here.” Ivo hung over his shoulder, breathing beer in his ear.
Simon clicked on the thumbnail photos, enlarging a picture of Brett and his wife Joanna, the same woman on his arm at the fundraiser tonight. His stomach did a threesixty.
Joanna Brett, tall, slender, dark haired, gorgeous, looked exactly like another tall, slender, dark-haired, gorgeous woman he knew. No wonder Brett’s wife seemed familiar tonight.
“See, looks just like Jessica.” Ivo poked a finger at the screen, leaving a label shred on Joanna Brett’s head.
Simon clicked back to Brett’s bio and scanned the info.
His father had made a bundle in real estate, and Brett had been growing the fortune ever since. He played football at Yale, took the reigns at Brett Incorporated, bought his first football team, and married a model, Joanna.
Simon swallowed. Joanna Jones.
He skipped a few more lines, but Ivo beat him to it. He read aloud, just to make sure Simon got the picture, “Brett and his wife have two children, a daughter, Jessica, and a son, Roger. Told you so. Your personal assistant is Jessica Brett, daughter of Roger Brett, co-owner of the Waves.
Lucky S.O.B.”
Simon slumped against the sofa cushions. He didn’t feel like a lucky S.O.B. He felt a right tosser. A total idiot.
She’d been stringing him along, probably doing Daddy’s dirty work. Spying on him. Protecting Daddy’s investment by making sure his star footballer stayed out of trouble...hold on.
After that first attempt with the games and the cards at home, she’d been doing her level best to lead him into trouble not out of it. Her actions didn’t fit the scenario he just spun in his head. Why would the boss’s daughter try to sabotage her father’s new acquisition?
The woman made his head ache.
Ivo’s head dropped to Simon’s shoulder as he let out a snore loud enough to wake Sleeping Beauty. He glanced at Ivo’s mouth, half-open, a little drool at the corner—no Prince Charming, this bloke. Simon pushed off the sofa, and Ivo tumbled to the side, grunting as his head hit leather.
Simon clicked the laptop shut and stretched before climbing the stairs to his bedroom. He’d fallen big time for his new boss’s daughter. Now he just had to figure out if she felt the same way or if she’d been playing him for a fool.
***
Gemma crept downstairs, her bare feet sinking into the carpet before they slapped against the cold tile. A light glowed in the foyer, barely illuminating Ivo’s slumped figure on the sofa. Her heart fluttered with the prospect of finishing what they’d started earlier in the evening before Simon came home.
“Ivo.” She crouched next to him and shook his shoulder.
His head fell back, and he smacked his lips, a beerscented burp bubbling up from his throat.
Gemma sat back on her heels and scrunched up her face. Not the romantic interlude she’d had in mind. She tapped his cheek, quivering with a snore. “Ivo, wake up.”
“What? What time is it?” He rubbed a hand across his mouth and hitched up on his elbow.
“It’s about one o’clock. I thought Simon would never go to bed. What were you two doing down here?” He peered into the darkened room, grinding a fist into his eye. He sat up and dropped his head in his hands.
“Had a few beers.”
“You sat up drinking with Simon, knowing we had unfinished business?” She punched his shoulder, and he fell back on the sofa. She stared at the clenched fist of her small hand. She packed more of a punch than she thought.
She planted her bum on the coffee table and scooted the laptop over with her hip. She glanced down. That wasn’t here earlier. Maybe Ivo’s passion had waned because he’d been surfing porn websites. With her brother? That just totally upped the ewww factor.
A little green light winked at her. Silly boys, they’d closed it without turning it off. She flipped open the laptop and shuffled the mouse to reawaken the screen. A website with an article about some old guy, a businessman, came into focus. Those two were sicker than she thought—
business not pleasure.
In fact, Ivo spent altogether too much time on business.
His work-outs at the gym and his long runs tired him out to the point where he vetoed any extra-curricular activity with her.
She sucked in her bottom lip. She was fooling herself.
A few bench presses wouldn’t faze a big, strapping stud like Ivo. The horrible truth had been needling her for a week.
Ivo didn’t want to shag her.
He seemed more enamored of her brother than her.
Not that she suspected the husky Ruskie of being gay-ski.
Nope, his hero worship of Simon prevented him from feeling anything more than...brotherly affection toward her.
He didn’t want to offend his hero by nailing his sister.
She had to score another friend—a friend with benefits this time. Someone who didn’t feel as if he owed deference to her brother. Someone who could show her a good time without that annoying protective attitude. Someone who didn’t know anything about soccer.
She powered down the computer and clicked it shut, a smile curling her lip. She’d bet just about anything that a rock star with black eyeliner wouldn’t know shit about soccer.
***
Jessica straightened the Native American rug on the polished hardwood floor in the entryway with her toe. Hands resting on her hips, she surveyed her living room. Her gaze stumbled across the colorful pillows tossed carelessly on the sofa, and she rushed over to punch them into place.
The merry band of revelers wouldn’t be here long anyway. Simon had called earlier with the surprising request that they pick her up for the night’s hijinks. Actually it came across more as a command than a request. She hadn’t allowed him to cross her threshold yet. She had too many secrets to keep, and she didn’t want Simon picking up any clues in her lair.
With Ivo and Gemma in tow, she’d save her seduction for later when they got back to Simon’s condo. The way Simon had been dropping hints as big as meteors, she wouldn’t even have to dip into her bag of tricks. She wanted to slip between the sheets with Simon one more time before someone blew her cover sky high.
And the way her father was gallivanting around town, that prospect seemed inevitable. Dad had attended the Waves’ charity auction last night, and although he didn’t announce his co-ownership of the Waves, the sports world had raised its collective eyebrows at his appearance there.
The roar of a car engine echoed on her quiet street, and she rested a knee on the window seat in the living room and twitched open the chintz curtain. She sucked in a breath. Simon, dressed casually in faded jeans and the ubiquitous World Cup t-shirt, ducked out of his Ferrari, all shiny and new.
Looks like she hadn’t cornered the market on deception. She dropped the curtain and raced to the door, sliding on the previously straightened rug. She yanked open the front door, surprising Simon bending down to sniff a pink rose.
“Oh, hello, Jessica.” He straightened up, the blush on his cheeks matching the rose.
“If you intended to snap off a few of those roses to give to me because you forgot to bring something with you, forget it. I tend those babies myself and carry a complete inventory up here.” She tapped her head.
“Ye of little faith.” He swept his arm from behind his back, presenting her with a spectacular array of lilies. “You liked the lilies at my place so much, I thought of you when I passed a flower shop on my way over.” Her gaze meandered from the flowers to his face. The grin he wore for the masses softened into a smile just for her. Her heart fluttered and then twisted in her chest. Why did this man have to come with warning labels slapped all over his Adonis-like body? Property of Roger Brett.
Proceed with Caution. Entanglements Ahead.
Feeling a tear gather at the
corner of her eye, she swept down in a curtsey. “Why thank you gallant, sir.”
“From what I can tell, your southern accent bites as much as your English accent, but you sure have that curtsey thing down. Must be those years as a child beauty queen.”
“Why are we standing out here?” She stepped back toward the door and pushed it open.
“I like it out here.” He turned his head toward her enclosed courtyard with its brick walkway and tangle of flowers and shrubs.
“Where are the others?” She held her hand out for the flowers, and then turned to lead him into the house.
“Ivo went to visit his parents before practices start, and Gemma decided to stay in tonight.”
“Really?” She spun around. That’s not the impression Gemma gave when she called earlier to see if Jessica could get them into a new club popular with the rock ‘n roll crowd. She shrugged. “Judging by your casual attire, I guess clubbing is out tonight.”
“I thought we could talk instead.” He followed her into the kitchen, hot on her heels.
Uh oh. She stuck her head in a cupboard to look for a vase. She didn’t want to talk. Conversation presented a thorny patch of lies and misrepresentations, and she didn’t want to get stuck. She grabbed a vase and popped up from the cupboard, flowers clutched in her other hand.
“Do you want to order in? I’m afraid there’s nothing like Il Diavolo on this side of town, but there’s a good Indian place nearby.”
“Followed by éclairs and strip poker?”
“Hell, who needs poker to strip?”
Simon’s eyes popped open and he gulped, but he recovered quickly. He peeled his t-shirt over his head, revealing his rippling abs, and tossed it over his shoulder.
“Not me.”
“Apparently, you don’t even need an invitation to strip.”
“That was an invitation—one I’ve been waiting on for two weeks.”
“H-has it been that long?” Who was she kidding? It felt like an eternity since they shared kisses and explored each other’s bodies. An eternity of small intimacies that left her with an aching need in the pit of her stomach. An eternity of glances and feather-light touches and whispered innuendo that led to a raging desire to abandon herself to this honeyed god flexing his pecs in front of her.
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