But that night the eight-block walk was a miserable slog. The summer night air felt hot and sticky on her skin, and she couldn’t help but think of the last time she had been hot and sticky, in Nathan Sinclair’s office with her back pressed up to one of his cold windows. An embarrassing wave of lust washed over her as she remembered what she had done. Embarrassing because she’d prefer to feel nothing but guilt where Nathan Sinclair was concerned. But when she thought about the way his chest had rubbed against her breasts as he pounded into her creaming slit, her breasts betrayed her better intentions by swelling underneath her scrubs.
What was wrong with her? The man had a wife for goodness sake. And no matter how wanton she had acted in his office, she knew she never would have had sex with him if she had known he was married. The sex had been good—better than good. Okay, it was maybe the best sex she’d ever had in her entire life. But it wasn’t good enough for her to abandon her general principles.
As she got closer to her apartment building, she noticed a low slung Maserati, parked about two doors down from where she lived. She wondered who the ostentatious car belonged to. It didn’t look like the kind of vehicle a college kid would drive, though she was aware a few of them had mommies and daddies who could afford to give their darlings a car that cost that much. Her thoughts drifted to Nathan Sinclair yet again. Yeah, this seemed exactly like the kind of car someone like him would drive.
Then as if her thoughts had conjured him out of thin air, his voice said, “It’s about time you got here. I thought I made it clear to you on Friday, I don’t like to be kept waiting.”
She’d been so busy wondering about the car she hadn’t noticed its probable owner, Nathan Sinclair. He seemed so out of place in his designer suit, sitting on the steps of her humble two-floor apartment building, holding a large brown envelope, that she nearly laughed. But then she remembered he was a low down cheating scoundrel and the smile died on her lips.
She decided to not to give him the dignity of a response and tried to rush past without speaking.
But he came to his feet and his free hand snaked out to catch her arm before she could get past him. “Where do you think you’re going?”
That electricity zapped her again when he took hold of her arm, but this time, Layla ignored it, picturing his lovely blond wife instead.
“Inside to my apartment,” she answered. “I’ve had a long day and I’m really tired.”
“I don’t care,” he said. “I think you owe me an explanation for your disappearing act.”
She squared her shoulders and glared at him. “The only person I owe an explanation is your wife.”
He screwed up his face. “I don’t have a wife.”
Layla’s mouth dropped open in offended surprise. The gall of him. “Where do you get off doing it with me then lying about being married?”
“I’m not married.”
“I saw your wedding picture on your desk. It was at eye-level.” She yanked her arm back from him. “Do not lie to me.”
The look on his face switched from angry to bemused. “You really don’t remember anything about me, do you?” he said. “That picture on my desk was from my brother’s wedding.”
Layla blinked, now confused herself. “No, he looked exactly like you.”
“Yes, because we’re identical twins. But you always used to say the only thing we had in common was our faces. Here I’ll show you.”
He pulled out his smartphone and tapped on it with his thumbs until he found what he was looking for. Then he held it up to show her a picture of him standing with a man that looked just like him. They were both dressed in tuxedoes, but the man standing beside Nathan had a much more conservative haircut. Now he was what Layla expected a CEO to look like.
She covered her mouth. “Oh.”
“Oh,’” he repeated. “I came out of my bathroom. You were gone without a trace. And then this morning I get a FedEx package with a check and no explanation for your disappearance whatsoever. And ‘Oh,’ is all you have to say?”
Layla folded and unfolded her arms. “I’m not sure what else I should say. I mean, yeah, I made a mistake. But maybe it was for the greater good, because I hate to point this out, but having sex with you probably wasn’t one of my brightest ideas.” She ticked it off on her fingers. “You’re insulting, you’re aggravating, and you don’t seem to like me very much. I usually prefer to engage with people who actually care about me.”
The shadow of a smile passed over his lips.
“What?” she said.
“Nothing, it’s just that you said something similar back when we knew each other before.”
“Care to fill me in on that?”
He actually seemed to think about it before saying, “No, I don’t think so.”
She threw up her hands. “Whatever. I’m done with this. The next installment will come in the mail.” She walked up the rest of the stairs to the front door.
“I told you, the deal is off,” he said behind her.
She turned on him with vicious determination. “Listen, rich boy. I sold my car to pay you back that money. I have been working my fingers to the bone to pay you back that money. I don’t care what you do with the checks, but I’m going to keep on sending them to you until I’ve paid off this godforsaken debt. So the deal is not off.”
That declared, she pulled out her house key, but before she could get it into the lock, he grabbed her hand. “That deal is off the table, but I have a new one for you. A much easier one.”
He held up the brown envelope. “Do you want to go inside to talk about it?”
“No,” she said. An image of him doing what he did to her last night, but this time on a bed, flashed through her mind. The truth was she didn’t trust herself to keep her defenses up if she let him inside her apartment. “You can explain it to me here.”
“Fine,” he said, handing her the envelope. “I don’t want you here, and I’m willing to pay to make that a reality. This contract states that you’ll leave the state within two months of its execution. In return, the money you owe my family will be considered null and void. We’ll also provide you with a generous moving stipend and assist you in finding a job in another city of your choosing.”
Layla’s mouth dropped open again as she flipped through the contract. “Anywhere of my choosing?” she said.
“Anywhere but Pennsylvania.”
She looked at the contract then back up at him in stunned disbelief. “Seriously, what did I do to you?”
“There’s no reason for you to stay here,” he said in lieu of answering her question. “You don’t have any ties to the community, and you haven’t been through a Pittsburgh winter yet, but trust me, I’m doing you a favor. It’s cold. And grey.”
Kind of like you, she thought as she continued to scan the contract, which was exactly what he’d said, a deal contingent upon her leaving the city and not coming back for a specified period of seventy years. “I can’t leave,” she said. “Not until I know why you want me gone so bad.”
“I don’t want to live in the same city as you, and I’m very rich, so I can make that happen. That’s all you need to know. Also, this deal is only on the table for twenty-four hours, so you’ll need to make your decision sooner than later.”
“I don’t need twenty-four hours to make this decision.” Layla put the contract back in its brown envelope, and held it out to him. “Sorry, but I can’t sign this.”
“You can,” he said.
“No, I came to Pittsburgh for answers. You obviously have those answers. So if you really want me to leave, give them to me. Otherwise, take your draconian contract and go home, please. Like I’ve said, I’ve had a really long day.”
He just stood there, jaw clenched, refusing to take the contract back from her. So she dropped the brown envelope on the ground and walked away.
***
Nathan watched her go, fighting the temptation to run after her. Part of him was angry she hadn’t accepted the
terms of his contract, another part of him wanted her to invite him in to finish what they’d started on Friday, and a smaller part of him felt vindicated. She could act as sweet and innocent as she wanted, but the Layla he’d known was still in there.
At that moment he wanted to push his hands up under her scrubs, to remove them himself this time while worshipping every curve with kisses, including the one in between her legs. But he was Nathan Sinclair. He didn’t and shouldn’t have to chase after women. Instead of following her inside, he picked up the contract and started back down the steps towards his car.
Still, he couldn’t resist one last look over his shoulder as he did so. However, what he saw through her apartment building’s glass doors stopped him in his tracks and made him turn back towards the building. On the other side of the lobby, he could see Layla standing outside her apartment door, both hands over her mouth as if she were trying to keep from screaming. Her eyes were wild with horror.
And as he came back up the steps, he saw why. Spray-painted in large red letters down the entire length of her apartment door was the word “LEAVE.”
CHAPTER NINE
“LAYLA!”
Someone was calling her name. Layla tried to answer, but she could not tear her eyes away from her apartment door, which seemed to be screaming the word written on it: “LEAVE!”
“Layla!” the voice said again. But Layla still couldn’t look away.
The voice got closer. “Layla. Layla, speak to me.” A pair of hands grabbed her around the shoulders and turned her around. “Hey, look at me.”
Her shoulders turned, but her neck strained to keep her eyes on the door.
“Look at me, Layla. Come on.” The owner of the voice palmed her face and made her look at him.
She blinked when she saw it was Nathan. “How did you get in here?” she asked.
“One of your neighbors heard me pounding on the door.”
She looked over his shoulder to see several doors stood open in the hallway and quite a few of her neighbors had come out of their apartments. A wave of embarrassment, tiredness, and confusion washed over her. It felt like her insides were crumbling into her stomach.
“Did you do this?” she asked him.
His eyes widened. “What?”
She shoved against his chest. “Did you do this? Were you the one behind my locker, too? You want me gone that bad?”
“No, Layla, I didn’t do this.” He bit the words out, like she had insulted him with her suggestion, even though he’d been trying to contractually obligate her to do exactly what the door demanded just that a few minutes ago. “I’m not married and I would never do something like this to you. Now could you stop accusing me of crimes I didn’t commit and come here?”
He held out his arms to her. And Layla, too tired to question what was happening, all but fell into them, hot tears spilling down her cheeks.
He held her tight. “I didn’t do this,” he said into her ear. “But I’m going to damn well find out who did.”
***
Less than an hour later, Nathan discovered this was actually the second time someone had left her an angry, spray-painted message. He sat next to Layla on the tiny couch in her ridiculously spare apartment while she answered questions from the two officers who had been sent to take down a report of the crime. The two officers were at least twenty years apart in age, and complete opposites. The older one was short and balding with sagging jowls, while the younger one was tall and Latino with sharp cheekbones and dark brown eyes that kept wandering back to Layla whenever he thought she wasn’t looking.
Nathan didn’t particularly care for either policeman, but he really didn’t like the younger one.
“So you don’t have any idea who might have done this?” the older cop asked. “You don’t have any enemies? Any disgruntled patients?”
“No, I get along with all of my patients. And I don’t have any enemies” Layla looked over at him. “None that I know of at least.”
“Why are you looking at him?” the Latino officer asked.
Nathan rolled his eyes. “Because she thinks I might know something about this incident that she doesn’t. But I don’t.”
The older cop looked between the two of them. “She might be on to something, there, Mr. Sinclair. Are there any ex-girlfriends lurking around who might have it out for your new one?”
“We’re not—” Layla started.
But Nathan cut her off with a simple, “No. I don’t do ex-girlfriends.”
“What does than mean?” the younger cop asked.
“I don’t stay with anyone long enough for it to be considered a relationship.” Before the younger cop could ask a follow-up question, Nathan lobbed one of his own. “Why wasn’t a detective sent to take her report? She’s been threatened twice now. Shouldn’t we have someone with actual investigative skills on the case?”
The younger cop’s back went up when he said this, but the older cop just answered, “I’m sorry we don’t meet your standards, Mr. Sinclair.”
Layla laid a hand on his arm. “Nathan, don’t be rude,” she said. “I’m sorry, officers. He’s just a little upset. We both are, but I’m really grateful you came out. And I wish I had more for you to go on.”
She smiled at them, and the younger one relaxed his stance. As always with Layla, Nathan wondered if she knew the effect she had on men, or if she just wielded that wide smile of hers with unthinking abandon.
“We know this is hard for you. Here’s my card,” the younger cop said. He gave her a smile, one which probably came off to Layla, who liked to believe the best of everybody, as gentle, but which Nathan could clearly see for the flirtation it was. And as if to confirm his suspicions, the cop said, “Maybe we can swing by here tomorrow just to make sure everything is okay.”
Nathan stood up and took the card before Layla could. He drew himself up to his full six feet, three inches, which put him at a couple inches taller than the younger cop. “That won’t be necessary. Layla’s coming home with me. I don’t think it’s a good idea for her to stay in this apartment alone.”
“There wasn’t any breaking and entering,” the young cop said. “She’ll probably be fine.”
Hot anger burned inside his chest at the thought of this man using this crime as an excuse to romance Layla.
“Probably isn’t good enough for me,” Nathan said. And much to his surprise, he realized it wasn’t. Sure he wanted her gone from Pittsburgh, but he wanted her to leave in one piece. “I’ll see you two out now.”
***
Layla’s first thought had been to reject Nathan’s offer to spend the night at his place. But she really didn’t want to stay in her apartment, at least not until the door had been repainted. And the landlord had already come by and said it would take at least a couple of days for that. Actually, at first he had said a couple of weeks, but before Layla could stop him, Nathan bullied him into getting it repainted within forty-eight hours.
Nathan Sinclair, she thought to herself, seemed to have a gift for pressuring others to get his way. And Layla again wondered what could have possibly gone down between them back in the day. Was he the Pittsburgh boyfriend her father had mentioned, and if so, what had she done to make him want her out of his life so badly?
She watched him at the door, instructing the two police officers to interview her neighbors and found it hard to believe he had a twin brother, that there were two guys as gorgeous as him running around the city of Pittsburgh—
Wait, the brother! It suddenly occurred to her that if she wanted information about what happened during the year she’d lost, there might be one more path open to her. According to Nathan, she’d once said he and his brother only had looks in common. Maybe that meant his brother was nicer than him. Maybe he’d be open to answering her questions. She had to find him. In fact, the longer she thought about it, the more it seemed finding Andrew Sinclair was the only answer to her current set of problems.
“Do you want to pack an over
night bag?”
Layla looked up. Nathan stood in the open doorway, having apparently sent the police officers on their way and was now waiting for her answer.
***
To Layla’s pleasant surprise, Nathan didn’t live in a large house or a high rise, but in a converted warehouse loft in the South Side, near historic East Carson Street. However, that pleasant surprise didn’t last long. While the red brick warehouse seemed quaint and vintage on the outside, when he slid open the heavy steel fire door, he revealed a five thousand square foot space that looked like the home version of his office. It was filled with heavy black furniture. In the open-plan kitchen, nearly every appliance, large and small, was made out of grey stainless steel, including the square knobs on the wood cabinets, which had been painted over with black lacquer. There wasn’t anything in the entire place that couldn’t be described as either sleek or modern down to the slate grey cork flooring.
“Wow,” she said, looking around. “This is certainly…you.”
But he wasn’t listening, because he was too busy typing on his smartphone in the office area on the other side of the kitchen.
“The guest bathroom is over there if you need to freshen up,” he said. His voice echoed slightly in the large space.
“Thanks,” she called back. Layla wouldn’t mind a long bath after the night she’d had. “But, um, where’s the guest bed?”
He still hadn’t looked up from his phone. “I don’t have one.”
Layla’s eyes went from side to side. “You have two bathrooms, but you only have one bed?”
He shrugged. “I’m not big on entertaining guests or sharing my space.”
Layla held up a hand. “So let me get this straight. You bought an obnoxiously large loft, filled it with black furniture, and only got one bed, so you wouldn’t ever have to put up with anyone who wasn’t here to have sex with you?”
The Owner of His Heart Page 5