“I hate you.” I laugh, cutting into a boneless wing.
She nibbles on a fry with a sly smile, her cheeks flushing. Gosh, she’s still thinking about it. I’ve seen Carson, and it’s no surprise he can be that good.
“Sorry, I have the best life.”
“You mean the best sex life?” I nudge her knee.
“Yes. But everything else is good, too.” She laughs. I laugh through my natural jealousy, healthy jealousy.
“Has it been that long?” she asks me. I shrug and stuff my mouth with a honey barbecue wing instead.
“Yes, it has,” I finally say.
She giggles, pouring me another glass of wine.
“Why don’t you date? Get out there.” Emily smacks her fries—it’s a thing she does. But she has perfect manners in public.
“I don’t have time.”
“You were home all day.”
The mention brings me back to that dreaded phone call. I guess it isn’t so dreaded, his life insurance will pay what needs to be paid, and it isn’t like I need the money for myself. Dad left me whatever he had left. After Dylan fired him, we lost our house, and I barely made it to and through college. He had no unemployment and people over fifty aren’t first in line for hiring. Him getting fired was a death sentence.
“Yeah, working.”
“On?”
I frown at her, and she laughs at me.
“What? You are so gorgeous. Any guy would die to have you. I don’t get it.”
I finish eating so I can enjoy my dinner before she starts hounding me. Emily is like a detective, a perky and persistent detective.
“I don’t want to date anyone. I’m focused on work and being alone.” I blink at her.
She tilts her head at me with her worried look in her eyes.
“Is it because of your dad? I still miss my mom a lot sometimes.”
“Yeah, well, you have Carson. You don’t have to open up and be all vulnerable. It sucks,” I scoff.
She crosses her arms and regards me carefully.
“I know. I get that… so no dating. Just sex then.”
I laugh with her until my belly hurts, and my eyes water.
“No.” I wave her off, sipping my wine through giggles.
“You know what would be funny? If you slept with Dylan. Maybe you two just have some sexual tension to get through?”
I want to both yell and laugh at her for that. It would be easier if I were angry that I was attracted to him. Physically, I am, anyone would be. But that’s so beyond acceptable because it feels like a betrayal to my dad and myself.
“Hell no.”
“Look. I know you hate him. But he doesn’t have anything against you, and doesn’t know why…”
“Emily, I know they’re like your family, but I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay, I was just joking. But still, Dylan is hot. And the whole bearded-man thing? Super-hot.”
I laugh. “Aren’t you with his brother?”
She shrugs. “Yeah. Doesn’t mean I don’t have eyes.” We laugh together, and I move on to another subject.
Emily means well, I know that. I don’t want to bring her down with my feelings anymore, and I’m sure she is tired of it.
Plus, I’m sure any information I give her is used to tell Dylan when she does see him.
But there is nothing to be fixed here. There is nothing anyone can do to eradicate what’s been done. Until I saw him, that was enough for me. I feel like I need answers now, like when I got old enough to know that Mom had left and wasn’t coming back. Things with Dad still aren’t settled, and the wound is still fresh. I don’t want to get even with Dylan because I would probably die trying, nothing would be equivalent to what I went through.
Emily leaves, and I fall asleep in bed immediately, tired physically and mentally. Emily’s crazy ideas run through my head as I do, and they make me smile a little, the absurdity of it.
What’s more absurd is that I actually consider it, just for a moment.
7
Dylan
“Remind me why we are doing this again?” Carson slides the papers across the table—expense reports, personnel lists, stock exchanges—and groans with a sigh as he does.
“For the advancement of the company,” Holden says, not looking up from his tablet.
“You use that line for everything,” Evan scoffs, also not looking away from what he is doing.
My eyes go back and forth between them as they argue. The three of them love to bicker. I usually have a good line to get them to either shut up or keep arguing, I can never tell.
“If it’s good for the company, why are we hiding out doing it in here?” I finally say something. They stop and look at me. I widen my eyes at them for an answer. It’s the middle of business hours, yet we are having a meeting in Holden’s conference room instead of the nine others we have. Some of us have only come back in the middle of the holiday season because of this merger, otherwise we would still be anywhere but here.
“Uh, good reason.” Holden runs his fingers through his hair, always slicked back, showing his tensed temples all the time. He’s always tense, always thinking.
“Like?” I wave my hand. He chuckles and doesn’t say anything.
The only sound in the room is Evan typing on his laptop and Carson clicking his pen like he always does. It’s irritating, I reach across the table next to me and snatch it away from him.
“What the hell?”
“It’s annoying.” I toss the pen on the table and look at Holden. “Well?” I ask him.
“It’s… it isn’t a good idea to worry everyone. People talk, rumors start spreading. I don’t want the market to know either. This has to be under the table until it’s not.” Holden closes his laptop and turns his smug face to me.
I don’t want to be the boss, but sometimes I hate that he is the boss. He’s my older brother by five years which is a lot, but it makes it easier to have to listen to him sometimes. He wasn’t mean growing up, at least not as mean as Isaac. The two of them are Irish twins, the same age just months apart. Holden used to be the only one who could talk him down or any of us for that matter. We’re all legacy children. It was easy to get along just as easy as it was to fight. Or still is.
“I don’t know how long you can keep this under wraps. It’s a major company, second to us. And Emily—” Evan cuts off because Carson shuts him up.
“She won’t say anything.” Carson shrugs easily.
“And how about her little friend who also works for them?” I ask, referring to Forbes. I don’t even know her, yet I have a feeling it wouldn’t go over very well with her.
“Emily won’t tell her, she’s a professional. And according to her, she already asked about it, and she dodged the subject,” Carson adds.
“How would she know already?” Holden asks, his eyes widening with concern.
Carson chuckles. “Forbes works in acquisitions which is literally what this is. And Emily told her she didn’t know who it was when she asked. Plus, she doesn’t have the specifics yet. Emily is the only one who knows we are buying them,” Carson explains.
Holden relaxes a bit, the vein in his neck taking a little break.
“Fine.”
“So, what’s next? I mean how do you expect to keep a merger this big a secret?” I ask. A small part of me wonders if this is why Forbes is so indifferent to me, why she has such a negative opinion about me. But it wouldn’t make sense. It doesn’t seem that she would be so bent out of shape about a simple merger. No one loves the company they work for that much.
“Well,” Holden clears his throat, getting all serious with business. He talks about it like it’s the only language he knows, he has for a long time. Dad always knew he had a knack for it and started grooming him way before we knew about it to take over for him.
“We aren’t doing a split which means we have to buy out their board, trustees, everything. Then there is the restructuring, and at that point, essen
tial personnel will need to know. So, we move onto tangible versus intangible assets and start making the strips. Ultimately, that will be the point of announcement. And then when we acquire what’s left of them, we’ll have the capital we need to go global.”
Evan laughs. “Global?” Carson asks the same thing, so do I.
“Yeah.” Holden is almost sheepish. “After we do this, we can open our first international office. I’m thinking London. It’s friendly, but, of course, there will still be a lot of headway to get through.”
I almost smile a real one and not a smug one. Evan and Carson go off on their own tangents with Holden, equally happy about the news. I am too. If there is anything Dad didn’t do that he wanted to do, it was expand the company and be a global stronghold. He did everything else. And Holden, it’s all he ever wanted to do especially after Dad passed. I guess now he can, and I’m glad for that.
It’s good news.
“I’m not the one who’s going to move and run the branch in… wherever you put it,” I say.
Holden smirks at me. “Thanks for the support.”
“You’ve got all my support.” I hold my hands up. “But I’m not moving.”
“You’re the one who is single and staying that way. You’re the only one who can go, who should go,” Evan says.
“You don’t know that, and so are you.” I make a face.
“It would have to be someone in this room, so we have to decide. Holden can’t go, he’s in charge here,” Evan says.
“Who says we can’t hire someone else?” Carson adds.
“You think some outsider can run this? A family business? Get out of here,” I scoff.
“I agree. But we can’t make this decision lightly, and we aren’t there yet either.” Holden sighs. “Let’s finish up. I want these reports clear today, so I know what we’re dealing with.”
“Sure,” Evan says. We all agree.
“Does Jackson Arnold even know about this?” I ask though I doubt he would be dishonest. This is the worst business to make enemies in.
“Of course, he does. This has been on the table for months. I kept it from you, so I could decide if it was even worth it yet,” Holden explains.
We nod in agreement and get to work.
As if I didn’t have enough to calculate and double check, this added on a boatload of crap. I use Excel for what I don’t want to do manually and what would take hours to do on my own. It’s calming. I could always trust math to be right even if everything else felt wrong. I spent years in school hating everything else but the math classes I took, so when I found a place here at the company with business math and statistics, I took it gladly. And I thrive at it even when I can’t stand to sit in the same room with my brothers sometimes. I enjoy doing it.
I can say what I want about Holden—things that are untrue most of the time—but he’s the best person for this job, and he does it well. I can’t complain there. And what I don’t want to admit most is that he is as equal a role model for us as he is to the employees, and even when I hate him, I want to follow him. I do follow him.
We bicker through the work for most of the time, but that’s no surprise. The only thing missing is Dad, but I feel he would be proud. His office, no different than how he left it even now, makes me feel like he is still here. I wish he were, so maybe I could make things right. If only we knew when the last day was, the last moment. But we don’t.
“This calls for drinks.” Carson stands up, shaking out his gray suit jacket. “Dylan, no excuses, you’re coming too.” He claps my shoulder, and I swat his hand away.
“I’m not buying.” I stand and follow them out. We were holed up in there for hours. It’s dark, almost eight.
“I’ll meet you at the bar,” Carson says, even though it was his idea, but we all know he is probably going to pick Emily up.
It’s weird that she doesn’t work here anymore, even after a year. It isn’t weird, though, that they’re dating now. We all knew it on some level before they did.
“Sounds good.”
We parked next to each other in the private parking garage for the board and us. My Beamer is the least conspicuous car out of my brothers. Carson has his thing with show cars and such, Holden is dramatic with his Rolls Royce and so is Evan with his Maserati. I’m fine with the same car I’ve had for years, not because my salary is the least out of all of them, besides the inheritance and trust.
The bar we always go to is downtown, pretty upscale and mostly filled with old people or young people dating older people. One of those places. We go pretty often, but we keep to ourselves in a private lounge in the back.
I sit on the end of the round table of the booth by myself, Holden and Evan go around to the other side. By the time we order a round of scotch and appetizers, Carson waltzes in with Emily, but they aren’t alone.
Glaring at me as hard as she can, Forbes walks toward us. I tear my eyes from her bright green eyes burning a hole in my head to the rest of her burning an image in my mind. The blue dress she has on is faux velvet, tight on her skin, and the neckline opens down to under her sternum showing off her cleavage incredibly well. The golden locks of her hair fall to one side of her shoulder and brighten her eyes despite how hard she is staring me down. I drag my eyes up her strappy black heels, sinuous tan legs and exposed thighs before her icy tone breaks my gaze.
“You lied,” she says to Emily in plain sight. Emily giggles and shrugs, clutching Carson’s arm before she slides into the booth before him.
Forbes makes a face at her and shakes her head, that side is full. The spot next to me is the emptiest between Evan and me. He snickers at me knowing most of the history behind it. Everyone knew before me. He laughs over his scotch glass and silences himself with a sip of it. I smack my teeth and smile with a closed mouth at Forbes.
“You can sit here, Forbes. And you look pretty.” Evan taps the space next to us. “Doesn’t she look pretty?” he presses me. I glance at everyone else in their own conversation.
I discreetly flip him off before I stand, straightening my black blazer.
“Of course, you look beautiful,” I say to Forbes. When I stand, I get closer to her, enough to inhale and take in her sharp, floral perfume scent. I lick my lips, and my mouth waters at her until she opens hers.
“Thank you,” she snaps and slides in the booth.
A few seconds go by as I look at her before I sit down. My knee brushes hers on purpose, and she jerks away. I chuckle under my breath at her and clear my throat. Conversation ensues at the other end of the table. I barely pay attention.
“I meant it, you know.” I lean down to whisper in Forbes’ ear. She leans away but only to look up at me. Her eyes are rimmed black, eyeshadow matching her dress coats her eyelids. Her lips are painted a nude color, pursed as always.
“What?” She humors me.
My lips turn up in a smirk. “You look beautiful. You are beautiful. Mean as hell but still.”
I think she almost smiles, but it’s short-lived.
“I know that.”
I laugh once. “What?”
She reaches across and picks at one of the stuffed mushrooms. I watch her chew it down—she chews like she learned how to at an immersion school or something. And she doesn’t answer me until she takes my drink and finishes it.
“That I’m beautiful. And mean, but not to everyone.”
A laugh escapes me. “Oh, just to me then?”
Her eyes stare into mine, normally and not an evil glare this time. Her lips turn up with a slight smile as she nods once.
“Just you.”
8
Forbes
Dylan is exquisite.
Terribly and inevitably.
He’s… magnetic.
From a distance, I knew nothing of him other than my feelings.
But since I have seen him, heard his voice, looked in his eyes… I almost want to change my mind for one night, so I can give my body what it’s asking for. It’s been too lo
ng, and my body doesn’t care less about how my brain feels about him, how my heart wants to stab back. Only one part of me is throbbing in the wrong way, and it’s increasingly difficult to ignore.
I sit between him and Evan, but Evan is engrossed in the conversation Holden and Carson are having with Emily. I can’t get my thoughts to land long enough to contribute, so I sit and hold my body tightly to keep from doing something I might regret.
His cologne is its own aphrodisiac—it should be bottled and celebrated—a woody floral, sharp sandalwood, and ambergris. I imagine a mix of a young Richard Gere and Nicolas Cage. I can tell part of the strong aroma comes from his beard and full hair. Nothing is out of place, all trimmed and cropped to the strong lines of his face.
As we sit, I busy myself with the food that keeps coming—all very tasty, expensive, seeping through my tongue. The alcohol is so top notch I don’t even feel it go down my throat or soak into my pores until it’s already making my muscles go lax. I stick to the straight vodka and club soda with a few limes to tone it down. My dress is too tight to eat or drink much more anyway.
Dylan, whom I glance at over and over as time goes on, doesn’t eat much himself. In fact, he is so engrossed in his phone that he doesn’t do much of anything. It’s obvious his brothers dragged him here as Emily dragged me here. She texts me as she talks since she is across the table.
Emily: Say something.
Me: Something.
Emily: You’re so annoying. You look nice, though. Dylan keeps looking at you.
Me: No, he isn’t.
I bite the inside of my lip at the thought, but I don’t dare check to see. Emily wouldn’t lie. And I have felt his curt little glances a few times.
Emily: Why wouldn’t he, you look super-hot. I can barely see the scar.
Me: Thanks, it took some work.
She takes a while to respond when Carson indiscreetly nibbles at her neck and ear. I smile to myself and shake my head at her.
When another round of drinks come, I take mine down in a few sips deciding it will be my last when I fight the urge to giggle at nothing—or Evan sliding an olive through his lips. Dylan leans back, the motion makes his arm brush against mine, and I can also see his phone more clearly when I glance at it. I thought he was reading emails or something, but it looks more like…
Wilde About Dylon: The Brothers Wilde Series — Book Four Page 5