by Lauren Dane
Jordan was pretty impressed with Forest’s statement. He’d managed to use all those words and barely say anything. The man could be a lawyer. Then she remembered that was one of his degrees. Score one for overeducated people everywhere.
Forest pushed up to his feet and Wen joined him. “I don’t see a partnership happening.”
“Wait... I...” Ryan’s sputtering continued for a good thirty seconds. “What other reviews about me?”
Oh, Jordan could think of some. No fewer than four women had filed reports on Ryan and not one of them had a decent thing to say about the spoiled-kid-turned-businessman. Thanks to his father’s heart attack, he sat in the Big Boy office chair, but it was clear the company’s management staff was pressuring the family to put someone else in charge, which was why Ryan needed this deal. Which also explained why his face had turned an odd shade of purple.
Instead of answering, Forest turned to her. “Maybe now would be a good time for you to leave us.”
Fine with her. She had a date with a glass of wine and a pair of pink fluffy slippers. Her plan was to grab the few things off her desk and keep walking until she hit the metro. “Of course.”
Ryan stood with a jerk, and his chair crashed to the floor. “She doesn’t work for you.”
She actually didn’t work for anyone but herself, and that’s just the way she liked it. No strings. No crappy boss.
Forest slowly turned to face Ryan. “I doubt you want a temp hearing the rest of this conversation.”
With that, the air visibly rushed out of Ryan’s chest and he leaned hard into the table. “Right.”
That was her cue to take off and she was grateful. Without another word, she headed for the door. She hesitated when her fingers touched the knob. A quick glance over her shoulder clued her into the reason for the tickling sensation at the back of her neck. Wen and Ryan talked in hushed tones with bowed heads. But not Forest. Nope, he stared right at her. Green eyes, dark look and concentrated focus.
Her hand shook as she fumbled with the door. There were few certainties in life, but she knew without any doubt that Forest Redder could mess up her plans. She ran out before that could happen.
Chapter Two
Subject Report on Cam Matthews: When check came, he said dinner was on me. Then he said, “that’s real equality for you.” —Member 14
Need to Know admin staff: Confirmed payment.
FOREST CLAMPED HIS back teeth together to keep from shouting. He still thought about making a lunge for the keys jangling in Wen’s hand. After the messed-up excuse for a meeting with Ryan that lasted forty-five minutes longer than planned, Forest’s patience had expired.
He’d voted for delivering the bad news via conference call. Wen was the one who’d insisted they visit Ryan in person. As far as Forest was concerned, that meant Wen was solely to blame for the wasted work time and having to listen to a grown man swear, grovel and cry. The last part made Forest’s head pound. It also got him up and out of the conference-room chair in about two seconds. He didn’t need to be a part of that sort of nonsense.
He and Wen made it off the elevator and halfway to the guest spot in the underground parking garage before Wen started talking again. “That went well.”
Leave it to Wen to try to find the positive in a heaping pile of negative. “Not for Peterson.”
“I meant for us.”
“Then, yes.” But Forest wasn’t convinced that was true, either. Now they had to double back and restart the process with a new construction team. He wanted the project moving. The preparation meetings were pissing him off.
Their shoes clicked against the pavement as they snaked through the lines of parked cars. The steady beat echoed around them. Forest tried to concentrate on the hammering, but the face of Ryan’s temp kept edging into his mind. He’d caught only her last name—McAdam.
Not that he cared.
Sure, the long wavy brunette hair was hot. The slim skirt and pink shirt that skimmed her body all worked for him. And the face, round and pretty with big brown eyes... Okay, maybe he cared a little, but no way was he making a play for her.
He’d have to know her name. He could find it out easily enough. A few well-placed questions and a call or two to temp agencies would do it. But he vowed to let it go. Last thing he needed was a fling with a woman who made a living working in offices where he might have business meetings. That promised a bunch of awkward post-sex conversations.
No thanks. He’d settle for some heavy-duty sex fantasies about those spiky high heels and what she hid under that black skirt instead, then move on.
Wen stopped at the driver’s side of his sleek two-seater. “Word is, without our business, Ryan could be out of his own firm.”
A topic that didn’t involve Ms. McAdam’s long legs or high, round breasts. Yeah, Forest could handle this. “Last I checked we weren’t a charity.”
“He might have bigger troubles anyway.” Wen clicked a button and the locks chirped.
“Such as?” Forest got in, checking his cell and barely listening as he mentally planned the rest of his day. A quick dinner, then back to the office to plow through the stack of paperwork on the corner of his desk.
“Need to Know.”
It took a second for Forest to realize his second in command had gotten into the car and stopped talking. He hadn’t bothered to turn on the engine. He just sat with one hand balanced on the wheel and stared.
Forest stared back. “Excuse me?”
“Need to Know.”
Forest wondered exactly how many minutes of conversation he missed while unlocking his cell. “Repetition isn’t helping.”
“The website.”
The last threads holding Forest’s patience ripped apart. He turned in his seat and sent Wen a get-to-it-now scowl. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Didn’t you hear the guys at the club talking?”
His least-favorite place. Forest didn’t fit in with the “in” crowd and he was more than fine with that. “I go there for business lunches because I have to. The rest is pure bullshit and not how I ever want to spend a day.”
Wen smiled as he put the key in the ignition and the sports car roared to life. “Because you suck at golf.”
Something else that didn’t bother Forest. “I wear that as a badge of honor.”
“Anyway, it’s a website.” Wen put the car in gear and eased out of the spot.
At this point in the post-meeting process Forest usually dove into his work emails or his schedule. Small talk during car rides was one of the many things he had no interest in. Just like golf and charity events and Monday holidays.
But Wen acted like whatever he was saying mattered, so Forest didn’t turn off his attention just yet. “What is?”
“Need to Know. Stop frowning at me and take a look.” Wen slipped his cell out of his suit pocket, hit a button and handed it over.
“You’re showing me a member-login screen.”
“For an anonymous site where women post information on their dates with D.C.’s business and political elite.”
Now, that sounded a bit more interesting than anything Forest had heard today. He rested his cell on his thigh and reached for Wen’s. Forest tried the site’s home link and contact screen. It all struck him as some big puzzle that led nowhere. “You can’t access it without signing in.”
“But word is getting around. Some of our business associates are being named on it, and not in flattering ways.”
“It sounds like tattling, more in line with something a preteen girl would do than an adult woman.” Forest glanced up and realized the car hadn’t moved. They sat idling in the middle of a lane, a good thirty feet from the security gate at the parking exit. “Drive.”
“You’re not getting this.”
&nb
sp; Not for lack of trying. He used his own phone to search for information about the site while he poked around, but after a quick check he couldn’t track it back to a name. “Enlighten me.”
“The women have to be approved for membership. They’re vetted and then once online they post about their dates, rate the sex, even comment on a guy’s body and breath. They talk about whether a guy is financially viable or known for cheating.” Wen lifted his hands off the wheel and smacked them down again. “I’m telling you, nothing is sacred.”
Forest tried to imagine the whining the men at the clubs must be engaged in over this. Now, that made him smile. “Cheating isn’t sacred. Any man who is stupid enough to do it should get caught, but I get your point about the rest. Question is why anyone is paying any attention to some random site.”
“Because women can’t be too careful.”
Forest shot his friend a sideways glance. “Come again?”
“It’s the site’s motto or tagline or whatever you call it.” Wen drove up the ramp and handed the ticket to the attendant in the booth. “You know what I mean.”
Forest bookmarked the site on his cell and handed the other phone back. He vowed to investigate the site further. Kick back at his desk at home and pry into Need to Know’s inner workings. Just for a bit of fun and distraction. There was something about taking the pieces apart, examining them and putting them all back together again that intrigued him.
Talking about it didn’t. “I’m ready to end this conversation and get out of here.”
“Sure, because you’re not on the website.”
Forest shook his head. Clearly he was alone in wanting to end the discussion. Still... “How can you know who’s on it and who isn’t if you can’t get access to it?”
“I asked Bernadette.”
“Jay’s secretary?” The thought of his chief financial officer’s assistant spending hours of valuable work time talking about a guy’s size and bank account sent the temperature in Forest’s head spiking.
“I overheard from my assistant that Bernadette is a member of the website and appears to be sworn to secrecy, but she confirmed that neither of us is on there.” Wen snorted as he drove over a bump and out into the bright sunshine. Light pounded on the front window and the summer heat filled the car. “Some of our associates aren’t so lucky.”
Forest ignored the steady stream of cars on the street in front of them and the honking of horns as some moron tried to make an illegal left in the middle of rush hour. “I think you need more work to occupy your time. I’ll get on that tonight.”
“It doesn’t bother you? The site I mean.” Wen glanced over at Forest, then away again. “And I’ve got enough work. But thanks.”
Everything about the day bothered him. Ryan’s idiocy. The way Ms. McAdam’s hips swayed when she walked, and the fact he kept noticing. “No.”
“What if one of your dates posts something negative on there? Do you understand what that could do to your social life?”
That was just about the last thing on Forest’s mind. “I’m fine.”
“I know you well enough to know you’d tear the city apart if your name goes up on the site.”
“You assume the information would be negative.”
Wen barked out a laugh as he turned right and moved into the flow of traffic. “Two hundred bucks says it is.”
Pissing away money didn’t make sense to Forest, but this was a bet he could win. “Five hundred says it’s not.”
“Of course, you may get to hold on to your money anyway even if I am right, since we won’t be able to verify what’s on the site to know who wins.”
“I’ll handle that.”
Wen’s attention left the traffic for a second only. “You think you can get in?”
Forest found his first smile of the afternoon. “I know I can.”
* * *
AN HOUR LATER, Jordan stood at the breakfast bar separating her kitchen from the small family room of her condo. She kicked off her high heels and nearly groaned in relief when her bare feet hit the cool tile floor. Working from her couch in her yoga pants qualified as the best part of being self-employed. She cursed every minute she had to slip on a suit and three-inch pumps and head outside.
But she was home now, having dragged her body through waves of humidity on the four-block walk from the metro to the condo. She glanced through the window at the far end of the open room and spied the top of a building on the George Washington University campus two blocks over. She loved living downtown and ten floors up. The lights and the steady hum of life below worked for her.
When the sun finally went down and the traffic below slowed, she’d throw open her balcony door and plop down on the chair she set up out there. The space spanned only a few feet, but was wide enough for her to lounge with her feet balanced on the metal railing as the D.C. summer heat enveloped her.
A face appeared in front of her. Blond-haired and entirely too cute to be believed with those big blue eyes. Elle stood there, dressed in comfortable shorts and a sweatshirt, thanks to having the air conditioner cranked up on this hot early-September evening.
She reached across the counter and grabbed a wineglass and a bottle before taking off for the couch. “How was your day with the urinator?”
Jordan followed with a glass of her own, because this definitely was a red-wine night and no way was she letting that bottle out of her sight. She also brought the cell phone, because heaven forbid she be without it or not check the site’s stats for more than ten seconds at a time.
“Ryan refrained from peeing on my desk before I cleaned out and left, so I guess that was a triumph.”
With an expertise that was impressive for a twenty-two-year-old English-literature grad student, Elle had the bottle open and the wine poured in one grand sweep. “Are you done at that office?”
“Definitely.” Jordan cradled the glass in her hands and let the rich scent of red wine wind through her and relax each muscle. She sank back into the overstuffed chair and balanced her aching feet on the oversize ottoman that sucked up too much of her eight-hundred-square-foot condo but was too comfortable to give away.
“Did he play a game of chase you around the desk?”
The very idea of that made Jordan’s lunch curdle in her stomach. “He was too busy getting his butt handed to him.”
The glass stopped halfway to Elle’s mouth. “Is that code for something?”
“Forest Redder.”
Those blue eyes went all soft as her look turned gooey. “I’ve seen pictures of him in the paper. That guy is delicious.”
Jordan was withholding judgment and ignoring the fact she’d performed a lengthy internet search on him on her phone on the commute home. “You should meet the live version. Very potent.”
“Holy shit.” Elle’s voice took on a breathy quality. “You saw him in person?”
“Saw, talked to.” Jordan dropped her cell on her lap and tipped her head back. Closing her eyes felt good until Forest’s face swam in front of her and she had to open them again. Last thing she needed was a movie of that guy, X-rated or otherwise, running in her head. “Anything on him in the database?”
“You know there’s not. You have every last scrap collated, double-checked and memorized.”
And that’s what bugged her. There should be reams of reports on Forest. “There’s no way he sleeps alone.”
“If not, no one is talking.”
Jordan sat up a bit straighter and shifted to face Elle. “How is that possible? I know about the guy a building over who likes to wear Spanx under his suit so his stomach looks smaller, so—”
“How exactly?”
“—how can I not know about one of the most visible bachelors in the city?”
Elle swished the liquid around in her glass and s
hot her wine a naughty little smile. It took a minute for her to run through her entire he’s-hot facial expressions, but she finally got around to her point. “There are rumors.”
Wait a second.
Everything inside Jordan stopped. She doubted she had measurable blood flow at the moment. “No way is that guy gay. I’d bet most women hand him their panties when they first meet.”
Not that the comment applied to Jordan.
Elle was a neighbor and best friend, despite the four-year age difference. She was also the only person on the planet who knew what happened behind the scenes at Need to Know and about Jordan’s ownership of it. Elle reviewed everything that came in on the site and took care of coding and proofreading. She also did some background checks.
Right now she looked two seconds away from launching into a serious cross-examination. Elle may have dropped out of law school in favor of something she termed “more Arts and Science-y,” but those killer questioning instincts appeared to be alive and well.
She curled her legs up under her and leaned on the couch’s armrest. “I think I’m unclear on what kind of meeting this was with Forest. Explain.”
“The kind where Ryan tried to negotiate, but got outmaneuvered by Forest. The guy barely spoke and still led the discussion and demanded attention.” But Jordan knew that part. It was the private intel on Forest she wanted. “Now back to the rumors.”
“Confidentiality agreement.”
Jordan downed a healthy portion of the wine with a hard swallow. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“Are you trying to wow me with your legal knowledge?”
“The rumor is he has his dates, the ones that stick around for anything longer than a few nights, sign a confidentiality agreement.”
“I... Wait...” Jordan wondered if maybe she drank too fast. “What?”
Her gaze searched Elle’s face for any sign of amusement, but all Jordan got was a raised eyebrow. When the discussion was just between the two of them, Elle tended to spit out any information she had as fast as she could. She loved the gossip-oriented part of the site. Thrived on it. And Elle had never gotten her facts wrong. Jordan depended on that.