by Linda Verji
“And your contacts will do what?” Edya countered with a snort. “Try to say the story is a fake? No one will believe it.”
“You’re right. Which is why I won’t do that.” He threatened, “I’m going to spread articles about me with several other women. Maybe even doctor a few pictures so it all looks very real.” Ignoring his mother’s sharp gasp of dismay he continued, “By the time I’m done none of your cronies will let their daughters near me.”
His mother asked, “You would ruin your own reputation just to spite me?”
“You raised me.” He dared, “What do you think?”
His answer was a long silence on his mother’s end.
But Zeke wasn’t stupid enough to think that that was her way of conceding defeat. More likely she was strategizing about her next attempt to interfere with his life. So he warned, “Be careful, Mother. You don’t want to go to war with me over this. You may have more weapons, but I’m scrappy and willing to play just as dirty as you are.”
And with that he ended the call.
Damn Edya! He removed his glasses and set them on the coffee table then leaned back into the couch. Why couldn’t she be like other mothers? She just had to be this domineering, calculating pain in the ass. It was a miracle he’d made it to this age without ever seeing a therapist.
If she was pushing for him to get married because of grandkids or because she wanted him to find someone to love - his reaction would’ve been different. The fact that all this fuss about his marriage was just a marketing strategy for her - that he was a pawn in her game to be the biggest shark in the city - made it all the more annoying.
He stood up, headed back to his writing alcove and sat down to write, but couldn’t get a word out. He was too irritated. He needed a way to release all that irritation - needed someone to talk. He knew only one person who’d understand how he was feeling, so he called her.
“Hello,” London answered the phone on the second ring. Usually, she greeted him with a lot more fanfare. Maybe she didn’t know who it was.
“It’s Zeke.”
“I know,” she retorted sulkily. “What do you want?”
His forehead creased with concern. “Have I done something?”
“Ye-” She paused for a long moment. When she spoke again, her voice had lost its bite and was more resigned, “No. It’s fine.”
He knew women enough to know that ‘it’s fine’ was code for ‘it’s so not fine and if we don’t talk about it soon it’ll blow up in your face’. So he asked, “Can you come over to the apartment?”
“No,” she said. “I’m already home and I’m not feeling too good.”
His pulse leapt in immediate concern. “You’re sick?”
“Just a little headache,” London explained. “It’s nothing to be concerned about. I’ll see you on Monday, okay?”
“Okay,” he returned before she ended their call. But the conversation played on his mind for several moments after. It was probably the lack of proper nutrition getting to her. The more he thought about it, the more his concern grew until one thought took precedence over every other. He needed to make sure she was okay.
SIGHING HEAVILY, LONDON set her phone back on her nightstand then buried her head into her pillow. Zeke was damn lucky she’d even picked up his call. After that lovey-dovey display with Meredith Weinstein on the internet, he was the last person she wanted to talk to or listen to. Okay, fine! Hush-Hush wasn’t exactly the most reputable magazine in journalism circles, and all the ladies had quickly dismissed the article as rubbish. But still, what the hell was Zeke doing kissing Meredith’s cheek outside some restaurant? Even worse, why was the thought of him kissing that woman - even on the cheek - so annoying?
There was only one reason - jealousy.
So now London was angry at herself for being jealous, and angry at Zeke for making her feel jealous. She flipped onto her back on the bed, then reached for her phone again. With a few flicks of her fingers, she ended up on the article again and zoomed in on that damned picture again.
There Meredith was standing in front of a town-car, smiling brilliantly with her teeth all straight and perfect. Not a strand of hair was out of place, and her beige and white clothing ensemble looked elegant and as if it’d cost more than London’s annual paycheck. Then there was Zeke, pressing his lips to Miss Elegant’s cheek. He looked just as well-put together and affluent as she did in his tailor-made suit and perfect haircut. They looked perfect together.
“Ugh!” London flipped back to her stomach with the phone still in hand. A minute later, she turned back to the phone.
Why am I doing this to myself? she thought even as she navigated her way back to Google. If she had any kind of common sense, she would’ve stopped looking for more things to annoy her. Besides, she and Zeke were just friends - albeit with some extras on the sides. What – or who – he chose to do during his free-time was his business and it shouldn’t bother her. Yet it did. She typed Meredith’s name into the search bar. Immediately several pages of results came up;
Meredith Weinstein, daughter of Oscar Weinstein, graduates top of her class
Meredith Weinstein poised to join family business
Meredith Weinstein to donate jewels from personal collection to Child Alive Auction
On and on and on they went. The woman even had a her own Wikipedia page article which sold her as an affluent, well-connected, smart yet still generous business woman. She was perfect for Zeke.
“Tch!” London kissed her teeth and tossed her phone back to the nightstand. It slid across the wooden surface coming to a stop right at the edge. Somehow London doubted that she would’ve even cared if the stupid gadget fell to its death on the floor. Good riddance. It was the bringer of all bad news.
What the hell was wrong with her? Zeke had warned her about something like this happening, hadn’t he? And she’d thought that it wasn’t impossible. After all, who was stupid enough to become emotionally entangled with someone they knew couldn’t give them forever? Her, apparently.
Maybe this was her wake-up call, the thrust she needed to get out before she got in too deep. The thought of ending it with Zeke sent an immediate stab of pain through her. Boyfriend or not, he was the best relationship she’d had in quite a while. She loved how he held her, how protective he was of her, how generous he was in and out of bed. She really didn’t want to break it off.
However, the emotions she was beginning to have were dangerous. Sure, jealousy wasn’t love, but it was uncomfortably close. And if she let it go on…
“Looondon.” Farah’s whinny voice cut into London’s distressed musing. “Looondon, there’s someone at the door for you.”
“Who?”
There was a note of excitement in Farah’s tone when she said, “Zeke Landa-Hollis.”
London had never hopped off her bed so fast. What the hell was he was doing here?
“Looondon,” Farah called out again.
“Tell him, I’m coming,” London said in a rushed voice as she grabbed her terrycloth robe from the hook behind her door. Quickly, she stripped off her jeans, then tied the robe over her t-shirt. A quick check in the mirror revealed that her hair looked too neat to be that of a sick person so she ruffled it a bit, hooded her eyes then practiced her cough for a few seconds before opening the door.
She found Zeke in the living-room, seated on the couch. He turned in her direction the moment she entered the room and their eyes met.
“Hi,” she greeted in a deliberately gruff voice. “What are you doing here?”
“You said you were sick.” His normally blasé expression was fraught with worry as he gave her an intense head-to-toe once-over. “Have you seen a doctor?”
Faced with his obvious concern, she felt a spark of guilt. Coming towards the couch where he was, she dismissed, “It’s nothing. Just a little headache. Nothing aspirin can’t cure. You didn’t have to come over.”
“Yes, I did,” he said simply as he watched her lower he
rself on the couch next to him.
A sweet smell drew her eyes towards the white plastic bag on the coffee table. She motioned towards it. “What’s that?”
“I brought you some soup.” He smiled bashfully. “Sarah used to say soup could cure anything,” he said referencing the boys’ former nanny who now worked for Danny and Misha.
“Thank you. It smells lovely.” Now she really felt like a proper ass for refusing to talk to him. “I can’t believe you actually came all this way just to bring me soup.”
“Well…” He paused a few seconds before saying, “Yes.”
That brief pause was enough to raise London’s alarms. “What’s going on, Zeke?”
“You’re sick,” he dismissed. “I shouldn’t bother you with my problems.”
“You’re not bothering me. You’re distracting me.” She shifted closer to him. “What’s up?”
“It’s about my mother. She’s been up to her tricks again.” Zeke reached into his pocket, extracted his phone and scrolled through it for a few minutes before handing it to London. “Check this out.”
On screen was the article about him and Meredith. What in the world did his mother have to do with it?
“I thought I was going to lunch with Mother. Instead, I get to44 Club and there Meredith is,” he ranted. “Can you believe her?”
“Your mom set you up on a blind date?” London’s eyes widened.
“If you can call an ambush with a woman you’ve already expressed no interest in a blind date,” Zeke scoffed. “And that’s not even the worst part.” He pointed to the screen. “That is the worst part. My mother is the one who leaked that article to Hush-Hush.”
“What?” London’s voice rose with shock.
“Yup!” He sat back in the seat, his blue eyes glittering with unrestrained rage. “I wouldn’t even be surprised if she hid in a bush and took that photo herself.”
London couldn’t help it. She laughed.
Zeke shot her a narrow-eyed look. “It’s not funny.”
“Yes, it is.” London chuckled. “You gotta give it to the old lady. She straight up conned you. I don’t even know how you didn’t see that coming. I thought you were smarter than this, Zekey.”
“You are not helping at all,” Zeke berated.
“Aw, poor baby.” She cuddled closer to him and kissed his cheek. “Is that what you want from me?”
“That’s better.” He nodded sulkily. “But kissing the other cheek would make it much better.”
London chuckled again, but this time she was joined by another right behind her. She turned swiftly towards the direction that that squeaky giggle had come from, the archway leading to the living-room, but she couldn’t see the mouse behind it. However, she knew who it was. Farah!
Her narrowed eyes still trained on the archway, London said to Zeke, “Do you want to move to my bedroom for some privacy?”
“I do.” Zeke tilted his wrist to check his watch. “But I can’t. I’ve got an event in a few hours.” He lifted to his feet. “I need to get back to the hotel to get ready for it.”
“Oh, okay!” London said, more than a bit disappointed.
“You, work on getting better.” He leaned down to kiss her cheek. “I’ll check on you tomorrow morning before I head off to Milan.”
“Milan?” She turned startled eyes upwards to him.
“Didn’t I tell you?” “I need to check on some of our business interest there. I’ll be there for a week or so.”
No, he hadn’t told her. Not that he had to. But the thought of a week - a whole week without him was enough to send London’s spirits plunging. Somehow she managed to keep the jaunty tone in her voice as she said, “Okay, I’ll see you then. Bye.”
With a soft kiss to her cheek, he was gone, leaving her a tumble of confused emotions. She didn’t understand what was going on with her. One minute she was saying he was just a friend to her, the next she was jealous. One moment she wanted to be as far as possible from him, the next she couldn’t bear the thought of him being away from her for even a day.
Obviously, she was sick.
She was still in the living-room when she heard her phone ringing. Lifting from the couch, she followed the sound to her bedroom only to find that it was Enzo calling. Her first instinct was not to pick up the phone, but he was still her friend so she answered the phone, “Hi Enzo.”
“Hey, you at home?” he asked.
“No,” she answered a little too quickly. Though they’d had no more incidents in the last month, she was still wary of him.
“Oh.” He sounded disappointed “Anyway, you won’t believe what just happened.”
“What happened?” She injected some faux-excitement into her voice.
“I scored tickets to E-Hawk’s concert.”
“What? I thought the tickets were sold out.” This time her excitement was genuine. Though the tickets were way too expensive for her to afford on her limited budget, she’d been tracking their sale with watchful eyes. E-Hawk was one of her favorite rappers and in her book, he rated right up there with Whitney, Johnny Cash and Aretha.
“They were,” Enzo said enthusiastically. “I have a friend who’s friends with E-Hawk’s daughter, Olivia, and she got them.”
“You are sooo lucky.”
“No, we are sooo lucky,” he corrected. “I have two tickets. Unless you don’t want-”
“Are you kidding me?” She started dancing around her room. “Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes, I’ll take the ticket.”
Screw avoiding Enzo! This was E-Hawk. No way was she losing a chance to see him in concert.
CHAPTER 16
It was midnight in Milan and the city was alive with Saturday night revelry. Zeke stood at the balcony of his fifth-floor room, staring down at the city lights and listening to the sounds of the city alive with happiness. Yet, he couldn’t bring himself to be excited by it. Not when he was missing London so terribly. It’d been a week since he’d last spoken to her, seen her, touched her. A whole week. And judging from the unexpected meetings that had come up at the last minute, he still had at least three more days until he could go home - and see London.
Sighing deeply, he vacated the balcony and entered his room. It was seven p.m. in New York right now, wasn’t it? What was London doing? If he knew London well, she was probably dancing away in some club. Or maybe she was missing him like he was missing her? What would it hurt to find out? Maybe talking to her would get rid of some of the irritation and restlessness pulsing in his blood. So he picked up his phone and called her.
“Hello,” she answered, in a too loud voice. Which was appropriate considering there was some very loud music banging in the background.
“London?” Zeke asked, just to be sure that he was really talking to London and not some over-excited version of her.
“Zeke, is that you?” He could hear the excitement in her voice as she yelled, “Enzo say hi to Zeke.”
Zeke had what sounded like Enzo shouting a ‘Hey, man’ over the loud music. Trying not to sound as put off as he felt, Zeke said, “Sounds like you’re having a great time.”
“Best. Time. Of. My. Life,” she yelled. “I’m at an E-Hawk concert.”
“Woooo,” a loud chorus of voices cheered behind her.
Who the hell was E-Hawk? Feeling even more annoyed than he did before he’d called her, Zeke said, “Okay, I called you because-”
“Wait! Wait! Wait!” London cut him off. She must’ve taken the phone off her ear because her voice seemed to come from farther away when she yelled, “E-Hawk just brought Suzuki Han on stage. Oh. My. God.”
“Han. Han. Han,” the crowd began to chanter away.
“London? London?” Zeke tried but seconds later, the line went dead and he was left holding a dead phone.
Unbelievable! All this time he’d been sitting around doing nothing but thinking about her, and there she was enjoying herself - not missing him at all. Or if she was, she was being consoled by Enzo. Enzo. Zeke wasn’t a man
driven by violent tendencies but even thinking that name was enough to make him want to throw something at the TV.
“Ugh!” Zeke plopped down onto a recliner and leaned back onto the seat. This was crazy. Why was he so upset over London having fun? An image of her dancing her ass off as she’d done the night she’d taken him clubbing flitted into his mind. It was quickly followed by an image of her - now drunk - kissing Enzo. Then…
“Damn it!” He needed to stop this. He and London were not dating - or exclusive. What she chose to do with her time - with whoever she wanted - was her business. And he didn’t give a damn!
Or so he tried to tell himself.
However, the moment he landed in New York on Tuesday evening all he could think about was finding out what she’d been up to over the weekend. As soon as he’d sent Charlie up to his apartment with his luggage, he went looking for her. He found her singing her heart out on stage. Perhaps talking to her while he was so agitated was not the best idea and he should’ve waited until the Xin Monsters finished their set for their night, but Zeke couldn’t help himself. He wanted to know what exactly she’d done in his absence. Now.
The instant the band took a breather, he sent a waiter to ask her to come over to his table. The waiter whispered in London’s ear and pointed in Zeke’s direction. London’s gaze followed the waiter’s pointing, and when she spotted Zeke, her expression transformed into one of genuine happiness. She turned to say something to Saif and Enzo, then started towards Zeke’s table.
Zeke watched her meander through the other tables with an impassive expression, but inside he was brimming with annoyance and something else… something darker.
“You’re back!” She smiled in greeting.
“I am.” He set his drink on the table, as he studied her. “I bet that cramps your style.”
“I’m sorry, what?” Her brow crinkled in confusion.
“So you thought that since I was away you could play hooky?” He sat back in his seat. “I’m paying you to entertain my guests. Not to go off to E-Sparrow or E-whatever’s concerts.”