by Dani Collins
“Why wouldn’t I be? I have the wedding colors narrowed down to four schemes, depending on the date we set, I heard about an amazing venue while I was getting my nails done, we’re looking at a house I love and I found out something else that not only solves one immediate problem—” she had to fight cutting her glance to his phone herself “—but I bet will solve any futures ones that might crop up.”
Her giddiness at her discovery returned. Gabe was the Fixer. She could keep him on retainer until death did them part.
She’d been so nervous about dialing the number her aunt had given her, not quite believing that “little issues can be swept away quite easily.” From a young age, it had been drilled into Rachel that her actions reflected on her father. She’d gone to his sister with her concern that “a rival had her eyes on Luc.” Auntie was extremely well connected and knew how to play the long game. She said Rachel was absolutely correct to nip this in the bud.
Rachel had still been worried she was setting herself up for blackmail, but no. The Fixer had nothing on her, because she knew who he was.
“What kinds of future problems? What do you mean?” Luc asked.
She smiled and went on tiptoe to kiss his unsmiling mouth. “Maybe I’ll tell you on our wedding day.” Wouldn’t that be a kick? “I can’t wait to be married to you...” She slid her arms around his neck, hanging off him as she lightly bit his lip and tugged on it with her teeth, letting go to say, “Come on. Fuck me.” She glanced over to the island, then back at him, batting her lashes suggestively. “Me. All you can eat,” she added persuasively.
His gaze snagged on her bag, which had slouched open on the stool. His brows lowered into a perplexed line. “Are those binoculars?”
“I picked them up for Dad,” she lied.
“For his birthday? Why the hell did you open them?”
“I wanted to try them. Maybe we’ll keep them for, you know, looking at whales and stuff.” Like she gave one hairy rat’s ass about nature. “So...” She stepped back but held his gaze.
She wore a mock turtleneck in rust red with shots of brown and butter yellow, cropped to show her midriff, with shoulder cutouts. She took her time working it up her torso, keeping her eyes on him to ensure she held his attention.
He watched with the sort of rapt attention she was aiming for but stopped her before she could expose her aqua La Perla bra.
“Exciting as your offer is...” He glanced again toward the door as though tempted, then his phone pinged again.
Her. Once again, Rachel’s buoyant mood took a poke and deflated.
“Make up your mind,” she cajoled, dropping the straps of her bra down her shoulders.
He gave her a look of amused tolerance. “Your timing’s off, babe. Let’s finish this tour. I have to answer these emails.”
“You said it was just reading. You can do that later.”
“There are work ones, too. About that convention in Palm Springs, the one about Doctors Without Borders. I have a lot to prepare.”
“Humph.” She did what usually worked best when he was being a workaholic. She snapped open her jeans so he could see her neon thong.
“Do you have to go to that convention?”
He licked his lips—as he damned well should—and swallowed. “I’m the keynote speaker, so, yeah.”
But were there other reasons he had agreed to go out of town? She knew all about men and their business trips. Her mother had an entire box of jewelry to make up for her father’s “speaking engagements.”
“I miss you when you’re gone.” She locked her wrists behind his neck again, nudging her mons into his wood. “I don’t want to be left here, all by my lonesome, in this big house.”
He was wearing that arrogant look that said he knew when he was being played and intended to make her work for it. “It’s only a few days. You wanted to try that new spa with your mother, didn’t you? Book in there while I’m gone.”
Was he trying to mollify her? Distract her?
His gaze was making a thorough study of breasts and navel, but he hadn’t relented and set her on the island yet. That was unacceptable.
“Oh, sweetheart.” He chuckled with obvious enjoyment. “Keep frowning like that and I’ll have to Botox you before your next birthday.”
“If you don’t want this—” She backed off and hooked a thumb in the band of her thong, waited a beat but didn’t give him a peek. “Then I guess that’s that.” She released her thong and started to close her jeans.
He laughed and swooped forward, grabbing under her ass so she hooked her legs around his hips as he lifted her. Seconds later, the firm surface of the island—which was actually uncomfortable as hell and a bit too high—was under her butt. She opened her legs, inviting him deeper, but played coy, avoiding the chase of his mouth until he caught her chin and took.
“Mmm.” He did know how to kiss, and it got passionate fast, with open mouths and lots of tongue. One hand cupped her breast and massaged, palm scraping across her nipple until she moaned into his mouth. She grew wet and wiggled again, this time unconsciously.
“I was going to say you’ll hardly notice I’m gone,” he said in his sexy voice, sliding his hand under her jeans at the back, bringing her forward to increase the pressure where she was hot and achy. “We’re going to have our whole lives for this, Rach. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, you know.”
Did it? Or would it just leave her suspicious?
He pulled her jeans off, then slipped his thumb beneath her thong and slid it along the seam of her lips, bumping into the knot of nerves screaming for his touch.
It was the reassurance, and the attentiveness, she craved, but even as she tightened and wanted more, she knew his absence would bother her. She would always have this niggling suspicion that no matter where he said he was going or what he said he was doing, he was really meeting up with his lover.
It wouldn’t be enough for Vanessa to be out of town, she realized. She needed her competition well and truly gone.
And given all she had learned today, she expected the Fixer to do exactly as she told him to.
Luc, too, for that matter.
“Yes, like that. Keep doing that,” she said into his mouth, and moaned as he complied.
* * *
Overheated and irritable, Mariella changed from camel-colored suede trousers to a silk wrap dress in dove gray. She was not having a hot flash, and she was not competing with her younger sister.
She might have glanced off her balcony to see Ana, sharing a drink with Gabe on the sunset terrace, had squeezed herself into a backless red cocktail dress that made her ass look like a pair of horsehair pillows, but honestly, who was she trying to impress? This was Sunday dinner with family.
And Mariella had never bothered fighting fire with fire when it came to her sister. She trumped sex appeal with class. Always. She left her hair loose—projecting a relaxation she didn’t feel—and chose a tennis bracelet for its simplicity. The fact it was one of her most valuable pieces, with its centerpiece twenty-carat diamond, was not the point.
With a final confrontation of her reflection, she reminded herself that she was allowed to be keyed up. Her husband was still unconscious in hospital. Secrets had come to light that could destroy her life. She herself was keeping one. Rumors of every description were circulating, and MSM was still on the brink of losing the contract for the awards ceremony. Steps had to be taken.
Detouring through the kitchen to check on things before she went onto the terrace, she found Joy standing over a colander full of shrimp. A distinctly pungent smell hung in the air.
“Those are off!” Mariella took in the fact they were in a colander, about to be rinsed. Her mouth dropped open in appalled shock. “You were still going to serve them?”
Joy gave her a flustered, exasperated
stare. “No, of course not.”
She was on the tall side, dark hair neatly tied back, and wore her chef whites. She had a pair of dimples that showed up even when she wasn’t smiling, making it hard to take her seriously at the best of times. Right now, seemingly caught red-handed, with her eyes swallowing her face, it was difficult to believe her.
“They were delivered this morning. I just opened them now. That’s when I realized—You came in at exactly the wrong moment.”
“Exactly the right one, in my opinion. You should have opened them this morning, when they were delivered!” She could hear herself sounding like a harridan, but couldn’t seem to stop herself.
“I had no reason to suspect they’d be off. It’s the supplier we always use.”
“You know I loathe excuses,” Mariella snapped. “I would far rather hear you accept responsibility and make the necessary corrections. Now, dinner is served promptly at seven. What can you prepare instead?”
“I was just trying to work that out.”
Clearly she had to do everything herself. “Please tell me the smoked salmon for tomorrow’s lunch was also delivered? Use that for the appetizer, but you’ll have to change the sauce, obviously.”
“I was thinking to wrap water chestnuts with prosciutto, with an alternative for Ms. Santiago—”
“The salmon will do.” Hadn’t she just said that? “Can you manage to serve dinner on time without giving us all salmonella?”
“Scombroid,” Joy muttered as she turned away.
“I beg your pardon?”
Joy drew a breath as though pulling patience from the pots suspended over the island. “Scombroid is the type of food poisoning that occurs from fish that’s turned,” she said with a flat smile. “Salmonella usually comes from dairy. Eggs.”
“Unemployment usually comes from insolence.”
Joy reddened.
“Mom,” Rafe said from the open door to the terrace. “I was looking for you. Can you come out?”
“Of course.” She clawed her composure back around herself, moving toward him to kiss his cheek in greeting. At the door, she turned back to give Joy a hard look. “Please send out a mojito.”
“I’ll have one, too, please. Thanks, Joy.” She caught the rueful glance Rafe sent to the chef, as though apologizing for Mariella. It got her back up afresh.
“Are you seriously taking pity on her?” she muttered as they moved onto the terrace. “Did you hear why I was losing my temper?”
He scratched his upper lip. “Pretty sure it was well and truly lost. Gabe mentioned a problem with a contract. That wasn’t just about shrimp. Was it?”
“Humph.” She took a slow, control-gathering breath before continuing to where Luc and Rachel had joined Ana and Gabe.
“Hello, Rachel,” she said, exchanging the necessary air-kisses with her future daughter-in-law. “I hear you’ve been looking at houses.”
“And discussing whether to have a housewarming or something more formal as an engagement party.” Rachel adjusted her ring. “Luc said we should combine them, since I’m already so busy with the wedding plans. You make event planning look so effortless, Mariella. What’s your advice?”
“Practice,” Mariella dismissed with a smile, quite sure she knew where this was going. Rachel might look like a socialite who was all ombré tones and ballooned breasts, but she was a far more lethal animal. She came from politics. Mariella had no doubt she would pressure Luc to run for Congress before he was forty. Washington would be their home, and Rachel would run it.
As an ambitious woman herself, Mariella couldn’t fault her, but she did prefer a more subtle touch.
“Your mother is an excellent hostess herself. Have you asked her if something at their beach house would be possible?”
“Renovations,” Rachel said with a sigh. “Luc is probably right. We should have something small at our place, but where do you draw the line on invites? Or we could do something at the hotel, perhaps?”
She was fishing for an invitation to host it here, eager to mark Casa Cat as Luc’s. Or rather, hers?
“Let me give it some thought,” Mariella said, then used Rafe as an excuse to cut the conversation short.
“Elana and Thom aren’t here yet?” she asked him.
He started ever so slightly. “Why are you asking me?”
“No reason. I thought you might have talked to her today.”
She moved with him to gaze over the city lights. They were beginning to sparkle against the mauve sky.
“I was running late myself, actually. Thought I would be the last to arrive. Might have had a time-out for that, hmm?” He was teasing, clearly sensing she was still prickly and trying to draw her into a lighter mood.
“I use what works,” she agreed, unable to help smiling, more because she was touched that he understood her so well. She really couldn’t fault him for taking Joy’s side against her when his warm, loving nature was so precious to her. “Tell me what you’ve been up to.”
“A friend of a friend asked me how to warm up a mansion in Silicon Valley.” He made a face, then nodded as her mojito was delivered, along with one for himself. “Remind me in the future how much I hate those tech giants. They’re all function, no form. Fifty shades of concrete.”
She made a noise of empathy as she watched Rachel sidle up to Luc and insinuate herself under his arm. If only Rafe could find someone. Harrison would say something biting about how Rafe had limited his options by his own volition, but Mariella knew better. He had always been a quieter, more thoughtful soul. Her boys were all frightfully intelligent, but in different ways. Luc was book smart, Rafe was heart smart and Gabe was street smart.
If Rafe was limiting his options, it had nothing to do with being gay. He was looking for something genuine. Love, she expected. Sex for the sake of it wasn’t his thing. She would like to think he had gotten that discrimination from her, even as she was wishing she’d been able to invite her lover tonight.
Heat, both sensual and culpable, crept through her.
“I wish everyone could see you as I do,” she murmured, trying not to think of Joe. “You’re so talented, but so unassuming with it.”
“And you’re not biased at all,” Rafe drawled, sipping his drink, but his expression softened.
“Mothers see the faults and love in spite of them.” She happened to be smiling up at him as Elana and Thom arrived, or she might have missed her son’s reaction to the couple’s appearance.
At the sound of their voices, Rafe’s gaze flashed swiftly to Thom and some glint of something occurred, but in the low light it was difficult to discern. It was instantly disguised in the lowering of his gaze.
Whatever it was made Mariella look to her daughter and son-in-law. Elana was chic as always in a sleeveless silk jumpsuit, still able to wear such things because she was young and pert. Oh, to have a body unravaged by childbirth, Mariella thought with a brief moment of wistfulness.
Thom was looking very smart, too, in a shirt that clung to his sculpted shoulders over tailored pants belted to showcase his athletic behind. He greeted Gabe and Luc with a handshake, kissed Rachel’s cheek and seemed slightly uncomfortable under Ana’s fawning.
All the while, he seemed...she wasn’t sure. Aware? Like he was deliberately avoiding looking their way.
Rafe seemed to intentionally turn his back on them as he pasted a smooth smile on his face. “All here, on time. Good. I’m starving.”
Whatever she had thought was in Rafe’s demeanor was completely gone. He was his natural self, calling out to ask if anyone needed a fresh drink before they sat down. He walked over to shake Thom’s hand and greeted his sister.
Mariella thought she must have imagined the whole thing. They all sat down at the dining table a few minutes later.
They were eati
ng al fresco, on account of the unseasonably warm weather. Patio lights glittered around them, and the scent of mock orange in the ceramic pots mingled with the bay laurel below the balustrade. Candles floated in bowls of water on the table, providing extra warmth and a mood of conviviality.
For a moment, she was cast back to summer dinners when the children had been young, Elana smelling of coconut, the boys of seawater. Those innocent days were gone, the children grown and making their own lives.
And Harrison was not at the opposite end of the table, where he ought to be.
Her heart lurched. She took a swift sip of wine, quite determined she would hold it together. Breaking down was not on the agenda tonight.
“Mom?” Rafe said at her side, far too perceptive sometimes.
“Your father should be here,” she whispered, squeezing his hand.
“He should.” Lifting his glass, he said to the table at large, “Can we have a moment for Dad? We miss you, Dad, and we want you back. Sooner the better.”
They all clinked glasses, and a moment of solemnity followed. Luc took the floor shortly after, to bring them all up to speed on Dr. Aebischer’s preferred course of treatment.
Still disturbed by the options, Mariella listened without contributing, aware she would have to weigh in at some point, but she had had other reasons for bringing everyone together tonight, beyond Harrison’s care and their usual Sunday dinner.
She waited until the appetizers were removed, murmuring, “Tell Joy it was too salty,” before making her announcement.
“Joy of cooking?” Rachel said in a droll tone, glancing at Luc.
He didn’t acknowledge the joke, seeming distracted as Vanessa appeared to deliver a wrap to Ana.
“No, not that one. I meant the other black one. Oh, just leave it before I freeze to death,” Ana muttered, draping the cashmere around her shoulders.
Perhaps if you weren’t dressed like a streetwalker, Mariella bit back saying and took in the table, preparing to speak.
Gabe’s brows had gone up at the odd little exchange between Rachel and Luc, but he was staring at the candle in the bowl, cheeks hollow as if he was trying not to smile.