Forbidden Lover (The Diamond Club Book 7)

by Elizabeth Lennox

  Carly opened her mouth to say no, but then stopped and thought about it for a moment. “That’s an excellent idea,” she replied, tilting her head slightly. But shook her head and focused back on her brother. “But actually, I was thinking about building an obstacle course.”

  He looked back at her curiously. “We have one out back. And it’s brilliant.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Yes, it’s brilliant for people who liked to half-kill themselves during their workouts. I tried it and it’s nuts, by the way.”

  His eyes widened with that news. “When did you try the course? I hope you didn’t do it alone.”

  She didn’t bother to mention Ryker had been out there with her. Too many questions. Too many issues she hadn’t figured out yet.

  “That’s not the point, Oz. I was thinking that…”

  He leaned forward, his eyes once again intent on her. “It is the point. Carly, that’s a tough course.”

  “I know!” she snapped before he started in on a lecture about her safety. “I know! But my point is, when I got to the top of the wall, I felt a huge rush of accomplishment and triumph. It was as if I’d done something miraculous.”

  His eyes narrowed slightly as he looked at her. “How did you figure out how to get to the top of the wall? That thing is eight feet high with no footholds.”

  She refrained from rolling her eyes this time. Barely. “Would you focus please? Don’t worry about how I got over the wall. Focus on the fact that I did it and I was proud of myself. When I stood in front of the wall on Saturday, it looked like an insurmountable obstacle. But…”

  “You were proud of yourself,” he said, and his eyes narrowed slightly.

  “Exactly! But the course is too hard and too long for the people I’m thinking about.”

  “Our current course is designed to test military personnel. What you want is a confidence course, Carly.”

  Hadn’t she just said that?? “Exactly! Something that elementary and high school students could use to feel that same sense of accomplishment.”

  Oz leaned back in his chair, nodding. “I see where you’re going. And I like the idea. We’d have to figure out security. I don’t want a bunch of high school students thinking it would be fun to run the main obstacle course after a night of drinking and get hurt. But yeah, it’s workable. Talk to Ryker. He’s the expert.”

  Carly opened her mouth, wanting to argue with her brother, but he only lifted an eyebrow. “Unless there’s a reason you don’t want to talk to Ryker?” he fished.

  She knew when she was beat and straightened her shoulders. “No! Ryker is fine!” and she gathered up her papers. “You’re right. He’s the expert. Just thought I’d run the idea through you first.”

  Carly stood up, petting Betty to apologize for taking away her chin-pillow, then left Oz’s office. She didn’t go to Ryker’s office though. Nope!

  Instead, she went back to her own office, thinking she could figure this out on her own.

  With a sigh, she dumped her papers onto her desk.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Jayce stepped into her office, handing her several forms. She glanced down at them, but at the moment, they weren’t urgent.

  “Nothing.”

  He crossed his arms over his chest. With a groan, she recognized his stubborn stance. “That wasn’t a ‘nothing’ sigh. What’s going on?”

  Carly leaned back in her chair, laughing up at her sweet, overly-concerned brother. “I’m a big girl, you know. Some might even refer to me as an adult. And I’m fully capable of figuring out my own problems.”

  He moved closer, looming over her and she leaned back, wary now. Jayce wasn’t a man to mess with. Some of the pranks he’d pulled on her were legendary!

  “Don’t even start with me, little girl! You’ll always be my baby sister. And since I didn’t discover your existence until you were already old and sassy, I get to play big brother now.” With that, he draped his arm over her shoulders. “So, tell your favorite big brother what’s bugging you and I’ll fix it.”

  She laughed, and elbowed him in the ribs. It wasn’t even a hard jab, but he feigned injury, bending over and groaning.

  “Stop that!” she laughed, lifting her leg up and…she’d been about to nudge him with her shoe, but, being an annoying big brother, he grabbed her foot, slipped her red heel off and lifted the shoe into the air like a prize.

  “Oh, now you’ve done it!” he said, taking the spike of the shoe in one hand and the other half in his other hand. “Tell me what’s wrong, or these beauties are coming apart!”

  She gasped, horrified at his threat. But she knew that it wasn’t an idle threat because the man would do it! He’d break her beautiful red suede shoe with a flick of his fingers.

  “Don’t’ you dare!” she hissed.

  He tensed in a threatening manner. “Tell me what’s bothering you then.”

  She rolled her eyes. “At the moment, you’re bothering me! Give me back my shoe!”

  He laughed and shook his head. “No, that was a different kind of sigh. It wasn’t an ‘I have an annoying brother’ sigh. So give it up and just tell your brother and I’ll fix it.”

  “You are such a child!” she snapped.

  “Yeah, but you love me anyway. Tell me,” and he lifted the shoe higher, his arms flexing, ready to snap the shoe in half.

  “Fine!” she yelled! “Fine! Just don’t…don’t hurt my shoe! It’s one of my favorites!”

  He shook his head, looking at the shoe. “How can this be your favorite? I’ve never seen you wear it before today.”

  “I know! I just took it out of the box this morning. I’ve been waiting until the perfect day to wear them and today was it and please please don’t hurt the shoe because I paid too much money for them and I love them!”

  He blinked, trying to follow her comments. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

  “Nothing is wrong! I wanted to build a confidence course for teenagers who are struggling with personal issues!”

  Immediately, Jayce’s hold on her shoe relaxed and he tossed it to her. “That’s a brilliant idea, Carly. Why didn’t you just say that?”

  She groaned as she slipped her shoe back onto her foot. “Because sometimes, I want a little privacy!” she told him with sibling irritation.

  “Yeah, good luck with that.” He turned, heading out the door. “Talk to Ryker. He’s the expert at obstacle courses. There’s a whole psychology behind what you put into them and how they are laid out.” And then he was gone.

  Carly wanted to hit him, but ignored the urge. Not because she was afraid she might hurt him. Mostly because she didn’t want to be tied up in the gym downstairs, hanging by the hooks that came down from the ceiling. And she had no doubt that Jayce might do something like that, remembering some of the horrible things that her brothers had done to her dates in high school. One time, and she had no idea how they’d managed it, but she’d been standing at the window, waiting for her date to pick her up, only to find out the next day that the poor guy had been tied up and put into another family’s tree house, with food and a water bottle hanging down from the ceiling. The guy had had to sort of bob for his food. Another time, her boyfriend’s whole car had been disassembled and laid out in his backyard. And another time, her date in college couldn’t figure out how his shoes had been superglued to his feet. Even Carly hadn’t been able to figure that one out, but nor did she ask. Jayce and Oz had minds that were better left to someone else to figure out.

  It wasn’t even that she could keep her dates a secret from her brothers. They might be hundreds or even thousands of miles away, but too many times, she’d been excited about a date and…one or both of her brothers would show up, interrogating her date, following behind the poor guy’s car wherever they went, sitting behind her and her date in the movie theaters, sitting at the next table in restaurants. It was a rare occasion that she could sneak out to have a quiet date without their knowledge.

  The only reason she h
adn’t hired a hit man to take them out was because…well, because she loved them and she knew that they were only doing it out of love and concern for her. But also because Jayce and Oz were super scary men and the hitman wouldn’t survive an attempt. Although, that didn’t stop her from having fantasies about her brothers being tied up and gagged during a few of her date nights.

  She grabbed her purse and headed out of the office.

  “Leaving early?” Mike called out.

  Carly waved to him. “Yeah. If anyone asks, tell them I’m working from home for the rest of the afternoon.”

  “Will do!” he said as she pulled the door open and walked out into the bright sunshine.

  Her first stop was the office supply store where she bought a huge notebook. These babies were three feet long by two feet wide! Perfect for planning out an obstacle course!

  Her next stop was the grocery store where she grabbed something for dinner. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to eat, so it wasn’t a surprise when she moved to the cashier with ice cream and red wine. Protein and fruit, she thought. Dinner of champions.

  Chapter 6

  “Oh no!” Carly groaned as she pulled into her driveway. But instead of closing her eyes and banging her head against the steering wheel, she pasted a bright smile on her face, before turning off the engine and stepping out. Charlotte stood on her sidewalk with Jessa beside her and Deni just getting out of her car. All three ladies were here for their monthly “book club” meeting.

  “Hey there!” Carly greeted them, leaving her dinner in the car as she tried to think fast about what she was going to serve for dinner.

  “You forgot about book club, didn’t you?” Jessa grinned knowingly.

  Carly noticed that Charlotte watched her closely and forced her smile to brighten a bit more. “No! Absolutely not!”

  Charlotte, Deni, and Jessa shared an amused glance. “Come on, lady,” Charlotte said, throwing an arm over Carly’s shoulders. “You forgot. We know it. You know it. Let’s get this thing going and you can tell us all about your latest attempts to organize your pillow cases.”

  Carly cringed because she hadn’t thought about organizing pillow cases, but it sounded like a really great idea right about now!

  They moved into her kitchen, Jessa picking up the phone and dialing a number. “We’re getting pizza by the way,” she announced, then turned slightly to put in their order.

  “I know that you have drinks somewhere, don’t you?” Charlotte asked, opening Carly’s pantry. “Ah! You’ve arranged them by color this time.”

  Slipping her shoes off, Carly ignored her friends’ teasing. “I’m going upstairs to change. We’re doing our usual book club meeting tonight. No dissecting your favorite sister-in-law!” she called down to the ladies when she reached the top of the stairs. Grabbing a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, she tossed her black dress and red sweater on her bed. As she pulled the sweatshirt over her head, she heard a sound and, as soon as her head peeked out from the sweatshirt, she found Lucifer emerging from the pillows and clothes, his tail twitching with indignant anger.

  “Sorry, big guy,” she said to the cat. Obviously, Lucifer didn’t believe her apology since he turned his back on her. “Hey, do you want a treat?” she asked. Immediately, Lucifer jumped off the bed and galloped into the hallway, looking over his shoulder to make sure that his servant was following. “Give me a moment!” she called out to the cat.

  “Are you talking to Lucifer?” Jessa called up from the stairway.

  “What if I am?”

  “Because you spoil that cat! Come on. We’re all ready for book club. We just need your wonderful presence.”

  Carly laughed, pulled on her jeans, grabbed a pair of thick socks, then scratched Lucifer’s back as she headed down the stairs. Lucifer raced in and out of Carly’s legs, eager for his promised treat and tried to beat Carly to the kitchen where he stood meowing at the pantry door.

  “Good grief!” Charlotte laughed. “I think that beast gained twenty pounds since the last time I was here!”

  Carly ignored her and took the small jar of treats out, handing one to Lucifer who took it politely from Carly’s fingers. “You’re not too big!” Carly soothed, just in case Lucifer’s feelings were hurt.

  “You know he’s a cat, right?” Deni asked drily, handing Carly a glass of wine, then adding a bit of cucumber to Jessa’s seltzer water.

  “I know. But he’s my friend.”

  “Leave her alone,” Charlotte urged. “You should have seen Oz earlier tonight. He held Bethany in one arm while he petted Bart with the other and Betty with his foot. All three of them were in love.”

  Jessa shook her head. “Enough animal talk. Let’s do this!” and they all sat down at the kitchen table.

  “What’s the title of the book we were supposed to read?” Charlotte asked, while she picked up the cards Jessa dealt her.

  Carly handed out poker chips. “We put ‘The Odds of Celebrating’ on our calendars.”

  “Right.” Jessa picked up another card, concentrating on sorting them carefully. “What’s it about?”

  “I have no idea,” Carly said, tossing two chips into the pot. “Danielle e-mailed me some tips about betting though. So you ladies are going down.”

  They laughed and gossiped until the pizza arrived, then they took a half hour to devour the decadent treat. “Okay, tell us what the book was about,” Carly ordered, taking another slice of pizza. They didn’t actually read any of the books they put on their calendars. In fact, the books weren’t even real. A few months ago, life got too busy to actually read the books, so they all decided to simply make up a book and tell their husbands that they read the electronic versions of them. Oh, the joys of hiding their crazy pleasures!

  They were well into their poker game, the pizza consumed, and Carly was on her second glass of wine when Charlotte asked the dangerous question. “So…Carly, what had you so distracted that you could forget ‘book club’ night?” she asked.

  Carly had to swallow quickly. Neither Jessa nor Charlotte were looking at her and Deni was busy dealing the next hand. But these women were pretty intuitive. “Oh, I was just…” she thought back to the big paper she’d bought at the office supply store. “I was thinking about the obstacle course I texted you about. Remember that girl in your office? The one that couldn’t even lift her head high enough for us to see her face?”

  Charlotte cringed. “Yeah. Poor kid. What about her?”

  “I think we should take the parents out and…” Deni grumbled, shaking her head. “I don’t know. Do something mean to them.”

  Carly smiled, laughing because Deni was such a nice person, she couldn’t even come up with a suitable punishment for the parents who had said horrible things to their daughter.

  “Well, I had the idea of creating an obstacle course, but designed to increase a person’s confidence, something a bit easier than the obstacle course that we have at work.” She shifted her cards. “Oz also suggested that we offer self-defense classes for the kids.”

  Charlotte’s hands dropped to the table, almost revealing her cards. “You mentioned the obstacle course to me already, but I love the self-defense classes too. What an amazing idea!”

  Jessa looked at Carly as well. “I agree. How would something like that work?”

  Carly shrugged. “I’m not sure yet. I was going to design the course tonight. Which is why I forgot about book club,” she admitted, sifting through her cards. Because she was looking down at her cards, she didn’t see the other three share another loaded glance. “I bought some supplies to start, but I think I need to do some research first.”

  “Why don’t you just ask Ryker for help?” Jessa asked what her friends were thinking.

  Carly fumbled a card at the mention of Ryker’s name, but she quickly picked it up and shoved it back into her other cards. “Because…I wanted to try to do this myself.”

  “Yes, but he’s sort of an expert at designing things like that, isn’t he
?” Charlotte offered. “Oz is always talking about how Ryker shifted or moved things around, keeping the teams on their toes, so to speak.”

  Carly really hated it when they were right about something that she was pretending to ignore. “Okay, well, yeah. But this course has to be less complicated than what Ryker does for the teams. I tried running the course the past two weekends. It was brutal.”

  Deni turned Carly’s hand over, revealing the scratches and scrapes along her fingers and palms. “Is that why your hands are all messed up?”

  Carly looked at her hands, sighing with acceptance. “Yeah. I guess they aren’t used to the abuse.”

  “You should get some gloves if you’re going to do that course again.”

  Carly didn’t mention that Ryker had brought her a pair already. “I doubt I’ll do it again,” she said out loud. “There are too many ways to die on that course.”

  The ladies laughed. “I’ve seen some of those obstacles and they look impossible.”

  “I agree,” Carly said, tossing more chips onto the pile, then wondered why. She had nothing in her hand, not even a pair of matching cards!

  “Call,” Jessa announced, then laid down her cards. “Full house.”

  Charlotte groaned. “Pair of kings.”

  Deni laid out a pair of twos. “I don’t think I’m even in the running.”

  Carly cringed, then folded her cards. “Jessa, you win this hand.”

  Charlotte blinked. “What was in your hand?”

  Jessa didn’t bother to ask, she simply reached over and flipped Carly’s cards over. “You had nothing? Why did you keep raising?”

  “I just…” Carly didn’t have an answer. “I guess I’m more distracted than I thought,” she admitted.

  It was actually later than they’d all realized. “Good grief!” Jessa called out. “It’s after ten o’clock!” After a flurry of cleaning up, Charlotte, Deni, and Jessa headed out, each giving Carly a hug.

  “Talk to Ryker about the course,” Charlotte urged. “I know that you can do it, but he probably has some great ideas. You two would make a great team.” And then she was gone.