by Nora Ash
“I have three sons left, Liam. I’m not risking your security,” our father said as he looked at Louis with that trademark William Steel gleam in his eyes.
Neither of us bothered pointing out that he’d gotten our names mixed up.
“It’s been two months. If anyone was going to try to get at us, it would have happened by now. And you know we can defend ourselves,” Louis said. But despite his words, we all knew what he truly meant—what we couldn’t just come out and say: It’s been two months. We’ve proven we’re loyal. Call your watchdogs off.
Our father sighed, flattening the napkin under his beer bottle with a couple of fingers. “Perhaps I have been over-protective. You’ll forgive a father for wanting to ensure his youngest sons are safe. Maybe one day, when you have children of your own, you will know. But you do have a point—and I could use the extra manpower to strengthen the watch we keep on the Bellucci Family, now they’ve openly sworn fealty to Mort.”
This time I didn’t bother holding back my grimace. Our Family’s supporters were deserting us at a faster pace than we could keep up with. It would have been a lot easier to keep under control if we’d still had all our brothers in town, but I didn’t say that out loud.
Our father rapped his knuckles against the table and got up. Wesley, who’d been standing by the near wall, straightened up the second Dad moved. Like a faithful dog, waiting for his master’s command.
No one’d thought he’d pull through the two bullets he took to the chest just a few months ago, but unfortunately he had. And Dad had kept him even closer since.
Lucky for me, none of his loyal men saw who pulled the trigger.
“I have business to attend. I trust I can see you two at the meeting tomorrow night?” our father said, giving each of us a firm stare.
Louis grinned. “You’re never going to let that go, are you? We said we were sorry. And we paid you back.”
“As you should have. One hundred grand down the drain because my horndog sons were too busy with a pair of floozies to get to a drop off on time.” He shook his head, eyes narrowed. “Perhaps it’s time I arrange a marriage for both of you. Blaine settled down well, after the initial drama.”
“No thanks, Dad.” Louis shuddered for emphasis. “We’ll be on time. Promise. No need to threaten capital punishment.”
“Just see to it.” Despite our father’s stern tone, a glimmer of amusement shone in his eyes as he turned to nod at Wesley before walking out of the pub.
I knew he had a softer spot for me and Louis than he did our brothers. Not that William Steel’s soft spot was actually all that cushy, and I was under no illusion that it’d save our hides if he ever found out what we were planning behind his back.
“Sometimes I still can’t believe he had Jeremy killed,” Louis said softly as we watched our father and his bodyguard cross the street through the pub window. “But then I remember what he tried to do to Marcus.”
“It’s pretty impressive that things could get any more fucked up than they were while we were growing up,” I agreed. Then, through sheer force of will, I pushed away the gloom threatening to settle into my chest and gave my twin a cheerful smile as I stole his last chip and shoved it in my mouth before he could stop me. “But all we have to do to fix that is to stage a coup, somehow not get killed in the process, and then gain control over twenty Families on the brink of rebellion. Who says we don’t have a solid plan?”
Louis grimaced. “Blaine, for starters. Something about covering our arses.”
“Blaine.” I rolled my eyes. “Blaine’s such a scaredy-cat. Mira’s lovely, but getting married really took the edge off our dear brother. She’s tough enough to deal with our family bullshit. He doesn’t need to fucking coddle her.”
“Indeed.” Louis stretched lazily and pushed away from the table. “But try telling him that. He nearly took my head off when I gave their kid that gun for his birthday. Get him prepped at an early age, you know?”
“Overprotective fucker,” I agreed with a smirk. “Who wouldn’t want their toddler playing with a handgun?”
“You suggested it, you prick,” Louis growled, but his eyes twinkled with amusement at the memory of our older brother’s reaction to his kid’s birthday present. “And it wasn’t like it was loaded.”
“As a joke!” I held my hands up in mock-defense. “How was I to know you’d be stupid enough to actually follow through?”
“I’m getting you back, you wanker. Whenever Marcus resurfaces, I’m telling him you’ve been smack-talking his girl.”
Some of my amusement faded. Marcus, our other brother, had high-tailed it out of the country only a couple of months ago, after attempting to take down our dad to save his fiancée. He was protective to the extreme of the girl, and also nuts as fuck—and likely wouldn’t wait to hear me out before bashing my skull in.
“That’s not even funny.” I arched an eyebrow at Louis. “He’d murder me on the spot, and then what would you do?”
“Turn your bedroom into a cigar club and drown my sorrows in whiskey and pussy,” he said with an easy smile.
“Twat,” I shot back. I leaned back in my seat and spread my arms out in an all-encompassing gesture. “As if you’d ever pull any pussy without me. I’m the good-looking brother, after a—huh.”
“We’re identical,” my twin’s dry voice sounded, but I wasn’t paying him any attention, because my gaze had been caught by a vaguely familiar length of brown hair tied back in a tight braid. The woman it was attached to was standing at the bar to the pub with a couple of notes in her hand, dressed in a loose shirt and a fitted pencil skirt that emphasized her full ass and round thighs.
I leaned back a bit further to catch a glimpse of her shoes and smirked in recognition. Well, what were the odds…
“Speaking of pussy, huh?” Louis said. “Who’re you eying up?”
“Brunette chick with the arse,” I said with a happy smile, pushing my chair back so I could stand. “Saved her from a shoe-incident on my jog this morning—and a few hours later here she is, ready to fall all over my dick in gratitude. It’s gotta be Fate, right?”
“Not sure Fate’s in the business of setting up your one-night stands for you, mate.” He arched an eyebrow as he gave her a once-over. “She looks like the definition of a prude. In the mood for a challenge, I take it?”
“Always.” I gave him a wink. “Does this mean you don’t want a go once I’ve broken her in?”
He snorted. “We’ll see if she’s worth the trouble.”
Ha, he was so full of shit. I quirked my eyebrow at him before I shifted my focus to the brunette. At this point, doing a swap on our lady friends was practically tradition, and I was pretty damn sure it’d be a cold day in hell before he’d pass up on an arse like the one I currently had my sights set on.
It was funny, really—almost like Fate really did want me to fuck this particular girl. I’d not bothered this morning, since she was obviously late for work and I had plans with Louis and Dad anyway, but running into her twice in a couple of hours? Well, I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Not when I’d already pulled the knight in shining armor gig on her.
I walked up behind her, smirking at her complete obliviousness as she tapped the bar with an irritated finger, clearly annoyed with the staff not getting to her yet.
“I trust my craftsmanship is still holding up?”
She squeaked at the sound of my voice right next to her ear and spun around, nearly knocking her head into my face as she did. I pulled back a little and gave her a smile. “Hello again.”
“Oh, uh… hi. I didn’t know you worked in this area.” Her pretty face flushed. “I mean, of course I didn’t—we didn’t exactly exchange business cards. I mean… um…”
I took mercy on her awkward stuttering and tilted my head back in direction of my table that was half-hidden from the bar. “I’m here on lunch with my brother. And you? You work around here?”
“Yeah, just up the stree
t. I’m here on a business lunch.” She hesitated for a moment, and then indicated the bar with a nod. “Look, I’m actually glad I ran into you. You really saved my morning meeting. Can I buy you a beer or something? As a thank-you?”
“Hmm.” I pursed my lips to hide my smirk. Bird walked right into that one, bless her. “I’m just about to head back to the office, but what about tonight? After work?”
“Oh.” She looked surprised. “Yeah, okay, I guess we can do that. I won’t be off until some time after five, though.”
”That’s fine.”
She dove a hand into her purse and pulled out a business card, handing it to me. “Give me a call after four, I should know when I’m off then.”
“Will do,” I said, and then eyed the waiter who’d finally gotten around to my brunette companion. She turned her attention to him as well and paid her bill before she looked back at me.
“Sorry, I really need to get back to my client. I’ll speak with you later.”
“Looking forward to it,” I said, and then she was off with a smile and a nod that I could only describe as professional. I glanced down at the business card in my hand, unable to hold back my grin. She’d been plenty into me this morning, I knew from her lingering looks and profuse blushing, but it was pretty obvious from how completely non-flirty she’d been while being asked out on a date that she probably didn’t realize my ulterior motives.
Which didn’t exactly promise an easy conquest—but I always loved a challenge.
Cheerfully whistling, I shoved the card into my pocket and strolled back to my table where Louis was waiting.
4
Audrey
I’d forgotten all about my lunch encounter with the redheaded guy by the time four o’clock rolled around. I was neck-deep in reports and business calls, and so when my private line rang, I assumed it was just another client remembering that oops, they needed me to finish a report today, or their entire damn company would go up in smoke.
“Caslik Consulting, Audrey Waits speaking,” I said as I picked up, without taking my focus off the Excel sheet I’d spent the past thirty minutes plowing through.
“Audrey. It’s Liam. Liam Steel.”
I frowned, trying to allocate the name, but with no luck. “What can I do for you, Mr. Steel?”
A small chuckle. “It’s past four—you asked me to call you.”
I did? Internally cussing, I grabbed for my diary and desperately flicked through the crammed pages, but no appointments were noted in for past four. Shit! The damn thing was my lifeline, but I’d obviously completely spaced on noting down this guy’s call.
“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Steel, but could you just remind me which report this is concerning?” I asked, doing my best to keep my tone as calm and don’t-you-worry-your-company-is-in-excellent-hands as I could while I frantically rummaged around my desk for any hint of which company he might be working for.
“Well, Miss Waits,” he drawled, and I got the distinct impression he was both aware of and enjoying my squirming, “it was about the very important meeting we set up earlier today. You wouldn’t have forgotten about it, would you now?”
“No, of course not, I’m just pulling your file up now, Mr. Steel,” I lied, sending my co-worker Eileen a desperate look as she stared at me with an amused grin from her desk next to me, being not the least bit helpful.
“I’m glad to hear it, Miss Waits,” my nightmare client said, and I frowned at the way he intoned my surname. Hadn’t he called me Audrey when I picked up? “When can I expect to pick up the package, then?”
Package? I stared in bewilderment at Eileen, who still didn’t offer me so much as the shakiest lifeline.
“Package, Mr. Steel?”
“The beer, love.” He sounded like he was smiling widely now, his timbre changing from stern business to something much warmer that made me blink in confusion. “It’s Liam, from the park this morning. You gave me your card at lunch.”
“The… beer? Oh! The beer!” I mentally facepalmed when my brain finally connected the dots. “Of course, I’m so sorry! I didn’t catch your name before.”
“That’s quite all right,” he said, and this time I was certain there was a laugh in his voice. “But what do you say, Miss Waits? Are you still up for it?”
“Yes, let me just check my schedule…” I flipped back to the right page in my diary. “I should be done about six. Is that all right?”
“That’s fine. Meet you at the pub?”
“Yes, I’ll meet you there.”
“That’s a date, then. Bye for now, love.”
“Bye, Liam,” I said, hanging up the phone.
It was only when I saw Eileen’s teasing smirk that I realized my lips were quirked up in an involuntary smile. There was something about that cheerful voice that made it impossible not to smile—as if he was overflowing with so much zest for life, it was impossible not to be infected.
“Audrey Waits… was that… a date I heard you arrange just now? And on company time, no less!”
I quickly pulled my mouth into a straight line and tried to ignore the faint blush on my cheeks. “No, of course not.”
“Really, though? Are you sure about that? Because from where I was sitting—”
“It’s just one beer,” I interrupted her, shooting an annoyed glare at her across my piled-up reports. “As a thank-you. He saved me from having to limp back home with a broken shoe and be an hour late for the meeting with Perkinson this morning.”
“I’m sorry, he saved you?” Eileen lit up like a damn Christmas tree and rolled her office chair out from behind her desk in classic gossip pose. “Do tell me more.”
I rolled my eyes, but nevertheless told her the story of my disastrous morning. Only when I was done, her face was still stuck in a wide grin.
“Sounds like you gave it as quite the damsel in distress,” she mused, flicking a pen between her well-manicured fingernails.
“I did not!”
“Tell me, was he handsome, this savior of yours?”
I paused, the image of Liam’s silver eyes and fiery hair—and the way all his rows of muscle had been so clearly visible through his clothes—flickering before my mind’s eye. “That’s neither here nor there. He can’t be more than early twenties, and I’m not exactly a cougar here. Nothing’s going to happen—it’s just a thank-you beer.”
“Mmhm,” Eileen hummed. She swiveled around on her chair to rummage through her purse, but before I could get back to work, she pulled out a string of foil packs and turned back around to me with a smirk, hand outstretched.
“You should probably take these, though. You know, just in case you slip on your way to the bar and land on his dick. It can be tricky for old maids like yourself to navigate around a hot young stud without stumbling.”
“Eileen, put those away!” I hissed, glancing out the open door of our shared office out of fear of one of our superiors seeing her lewd offering. “It’s not a date, and I’m certainly not going to need condoms! Are you crazy?”
“Just looking out for you and your cobweb-infested vagina,” she said, shaking the row of condoms at me. “Come on, Audrey. When did you even get laid last? You’ll let that young man take you home—and then you’ll ride him like a pony.”
“I most certainly will not.” I turned my attention back to my screen. “And I’m not taking those from you, either. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.”
When I walked into the same pub I’d run into Liam at earlier, it was with an obscene amount of condoms stashed away in the depths of my purse and a nagging fear that every other patron in the place had suddenly developed X-ray vision. Despite Eileen’s commentary throughout the afternoon, I wasn’t exactly a blushing virgin, but there was just something about walking into a pub to meet a guy with a purse full of condoms that made me feel like a perverted predator.
I had zero interest in the kind of things a guy like Liam had to offer, and besides—Eileen was just full of it. There was
nothing sexual in an after-work beer with the guy who’d saved you from getting chewed out by your boss. It was just a friendly thank-you. The end.
My train of thought halted when I spotted Liam’s red hair up by the bar. He was lounging on a bar stool, a pint of beer next to him.
He lit up in a smile the moment our eyes met, and my breath got stuck in my chest by the sheer force of his expression. I’d never met anyone who could do that—who could light up the entire room, pushing every hint of dark thoughts aside in an easy sweep as if they never existed, just with a smile.
“Miss Waits,” he rumbled, quirking a teasing eyebrow at me when I walked up next to him.
I flushed at the reminder of my blunder earlier and gave him a stern look. “Mr. Steel. I’m glad my panic was amusing to you.”
“Oh, it was, love,” he said. “I take it you thought I was some fancy client ready to throw a tantrum?”
“Yeah,” I said with a small sigh at the reminder of my current high-maintenance client, Perkinson. “We get some pretty highly strung managers on the line. The one I was on my way to meeting this morning is one of the worst, so I really can’t thank you enough for the rescue.”
Liam glanced down at my shoes. “It’s still holding up?”
“Yeah.” I wiggled my foot for emphasis. “Which is more than can be said for my feet.”
The smile that was never far away from his handsome face returned, bathing me in its warmth. “I never understood why women put themselves through such torture.”
“After this morning, neither do I,” I grumbled, earning me a low laugh.
“We should probably find a seat then, love, so you can give your feet a break, eh?” He winked. “Listen, would you mind if we grabbed dinner before we get down to the business-end of that beer you owe me? I’m absolutely starving.”
“Oh. Yeah, sure, I guess that would be nice,” I said, checking the time on my phone. It was close to dinner time, of course, and the idea of a nice pub meal made my stomach rumble in agreement. It would be a welcome change from all my takeaway, anyway.