by Alexa Davis
I guess that’s the way it’s going to be, though.
Right now, Nick and I are celebrating our engagement. I have to say, with all his money and taste, I was hoping for more than the standard down-on-one-knee with a ring proposal, but he’s got a while to make it up to me.
I reach over and snatch my champagne glass and take a sip.
It’d be great to say we never had to deal with Stingray anymore, but even as Jacque has brought the company all the way around and even started breaking internal profit records, he still calls Nick at least once a day to ask advice on how to deal with this person or that. At least they got him to talk in front of people without sounding like an angsty teenager.
It took a while.
Max is standing at the edge of the shore, biting at the waves as they come over him. Sammie’s pooping in the sand. This is the life.
Naomi steps to the side of my beach lounger and says, “Trevor has the car ready whenever the two of you would like to go.”
For the last six months, Naomi’s been my personal bodyguard. I know they say it’s not a job for family, but at the same time, she’s the most conniving person I know, and if anyone’s going to try anything, she will have already thought of it first.
“Are you just going to sit there drinking or are you going to acknowledge that I’m speaking to you?” she asks.
I look over at Nick. He says, “Thank you, Naomi. That should be all for now.”
My sister walks off with a grunt and I finally ask the question. “Why don’t you like Naomi?” I ask. “You’ve been civil with her for a long time now, but you didn’t like her from the first time I introduced you to her.”
“That was the first time you introduced me to her,” he says, “but it wasn’t the first time I met her. At Mulholland Junior High, the jocks were the worst to me physically, but she was the worst to me psychologically. It wasn’t even a race, either. She was just flat-out brutal.”
“Yeah, but what did she do?” I ask. “She must have done something to make you hold that grudge so long.”
“I’d rather not talk about it,” he says.
I clear my throat and hold up my left hand, making a big show of his diamond ring on my finger.
He sighs. “I was in drama class one day, and she was in there talking to one of her friends. She wasn’t even in the class, but she was always in there anyway. It always bugged me that the teachers just went along with it.”
“That’s it?” I ask.
His face goes a deep shade of red, but he says, “Yeah.” In a rushed voice, he says, “That’s what it was. They just let her get away with everything.”
“I don’t buy it,” I tell him. “What’d she do?”
“We had a substitute teacher one day,” he says. “Her name was Miss Trilby, and despite the fact she was teaching teenagers, she wasn’t too cautious about the way she dressed. So I’m sitting there and I have to ask her this question, but I don’t want to because I had a raging boner from staring at her chest from the back of the classroom and I didn’t want her to know. But I was a teenager, and she was wearing a very low-cut top, and it was making it impossible for me to pay attention to what she was actually teaching.”
“You’ve really come a long way, haven’t you?” I tease.
He rolls his eyes. “Long story short, Naomi noticed and she didn’t just blab, she pointed. I was there with my legs crossed and a coat on my lap, but everyone was laughing and Miss Trilby was up there with a red face, shaking her head.”
“Oh my god,” I say, setting my champagne glass back on the small table between and behind us. “You’re the kid Naomi was calling the lumberjack.” I start laughing. Even though I know Nick does not appreciate it, I can’t help myself.
“Yeah,” he says. “Was it the worst thing to ever happen to me? Probably not, but it sure as hell felt like it at the time.”
“So,” I say, “are you about ready to call it a night? It is getting pretty late if we’re going to catch that plane back home to New York.”
After much deliberation, I decided we should keep the beach house.
“Yeah,” he says looking at me, a smile crossing those tempting full lips.
He holds up his glass, and I don’t know what’s going to happen. All the forethought in the world wouldn’t have prepared me for any of this.
Picking up my champagne flute, I clink glasses with Nick.
I’m not sure what the future will hold. I’m just glad we’ll be meeting it together.
Somewhere behind us, Naomi is shouting, “Will you come on already? It’s getting dark and I’m wearing sunglasses!”
I have to chuckle as I say the words, “So I’m marrying the lumberjack, huh?”
Nick groans.
“It’s okay, honey,” I tell him. “I’ve got your back.”
I whistle and Max comes running. He stops just in front of me, his tail wagging.
I lean forward, saying, “Max, do you see Naomi?”
Max looks past me toward the car.
I ask Max, “Do you want to give her kisses even though we all know she hates that?”
Max licks my arm and wags his tail even harder than before.
“Good boy,” I say. “Now get her!”
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LAW OF SEDUCTION: THE COMPLETE SERIES
By Alexa Davis
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2016 Alexa Davis
PART ONE
CHAPTER ONE
ALICIA
Never in my twenty-seven years on this earth have I met anyone so infuriating. I was standing in the alcove of the ballroom at the annual Thanksgiving ball the partners of my firm put on and wondering what the hell was wrong with me. I’d let Adam drag me here when I should have known better. I had no idea why we had to hide our relationship. We didn’t start seeing each other until his wife had already moved out. I don’t understand why she still has so much control over his life. He and I had begun to fight about it almost constantly.
“What is wrong with you?” Adam asked me, mirroring my very thought, “You were rubbing yourself all over Nico on the dance floor. You made a spectacle out of yourself. Is this what you meant last night when you said you refused to play the other woman?”
His green eyes were cold and unforgiving. It’s hard sometimes to believe they are the very same eyes that I had melted into the first time I looked into them. I found it funny how Adam had the ability to morph in the blink of an eye from a sweet, handsome, charming man that I could barely resist into this arrogant, condescending person standing in front of me now. What I really couldn’t understand was why I was unable to just walk away. Instead, I reduced myself to playing stupid games like dancing with Nico and even letting him kiss me when I knew for sure Adam was looking. Of course, there was no “rubbing.” I was raised by a Lord and a Lady in the U.K. and taught how to be a lady from the age of two on up. “Rubbing,” as Adam had implied, was not even in my public repertoire.
“I’m not doing anything wrong,” I told Adam, trying to feel as strong and determined as I hoped I sounded. “I’m a single young woman. I have every right to dance with a single young man.”
Adam’s dark green eyes smoldered, “Single? That’s funny. I had assumed that since you’ve spent the better part of the last six months in my bed, we were in somewhat of a relationship.”
I sighed. This conversation was already giving me a headache. Forcing myself to keep my chin up and look him in the eye, I said, “Maybe you should tell Marjorie that,” I knew full well that if he wasn’t already angry, he would be now. I didn’t
care. I was sick of being the peacemaker.
“I have told you over and over that sharing our…intimate life with Marjorie will only cause her to fight that much harder to destroy me. She’ll want to take you down in the process of ruining me. I told you last night, I am doing my best to finalize this divorce so that she can be out of our lives once and for all. You know that I want nothing to do with her. The sight of her makes me sick. I don’t know what you want from me, Alicia.”
I could feel the tears forming in my eyes. I blinked them back. I refused to cry in front of him. My cheeks burned hot as I said, “If you don’t know what I want, then maybe we’ve been wasting our time all of these months.” I stared at him for a moment, and when he said nothing I went on.
I was angry now. I shouldn’t have to explain myself, but then again, I shouldn’t have put myself in this situation in the first place. “What I want, Adam, is you. I want your time and your attention. I want the Adam that you were when we first met, not the Adam who is constantly exhausted and angry from fighting all day with his soon to be ex-wife. I want a man whose arm I can be on in public. One that I can be dancing with at our own ball, instead of pretending like we’re only business associates in order to keep up appearances until your divorce is final. Imagine how it feels for me to have to watch you dancing with other women all night.”
Adam’s eyes softened and he said, “Maybe the same as it felt to watch you with Nico.” I felt a stab of guilt, but I wasn’t quite ready to give in. He reached for my hand. I let him take it and he said, “Alicia, I want all of those things, too. I am trying so hard to get Marjorie to agree to this latest settlement offer that we’ve drawn up. It’s that damn lawyer of hers. He keeps telling her to fight for more, that bastard, David Rogers. He won’t be happy until he’s goaded her into breaking me completely. He seems to have more than a professional stake in this. Maybe she's sleeping with him.”
I felt my anger ebbing away already. I’m a sap where Adam is concerned. “I know you’re trying. It’s just so damned hard feeling like we’re sneaking around all the time when we’re not even doing anything wrong. You’ve been separated for almost a year. You should be free to see whoever you want. My parents are visiting from England next month. I wanted so much for you to meet them as my boyfriend, instead of the head partner of the firm I work for.”
He pulled me in close to his chest. I felt him nuzzle his face into my hair and breathe it in. “I’ll work harder on it, I promise. Just stop going around kissing my associates, okay? I’d hate to have to beat him up after I fire him.”
Adam’s voice hadn’t changed from its somber tone, and when I stepped back to look up at him, I was a little worried that he was serious. I honestly hadn’t meant to goad him into fighting with Nico, or firing him. I’d feel so awful if I were to blame for Nico losing his job. When I saw Adam’s face, though, I knew I needn’t have worried. He had a handsome smile forming at the edges of his mouth. I knew then that he’d only been joking. I punched him in the arm lightly and with a smile of my own I said,
“You infuriate me sometimes, do you know that?”
“Yes, I know,” he said, still smiling. He caught me off-guard then as his sexy lips came crashing down on mine. My head was chaotically telling me to walk away and make him wait until he’d finished with his divorce, but as usual, my body told me differently. I rose up on my tiptoes and leaned my body into his. Against my better judgement I returned his kiss with the fervor welling up inside of me. Just about the time I was ready to consent to getting naked in the alcove and making love right there on the floor he pulled back and said,
“We better get back before someone notices us missing,”
“Maddening, maddening, maddening,” I whispered, mostly to myself as he straightened his tie and I smoothed down my rumpled gown.
“What was that?” Adam asked, pretending not to hear me.
“I said yes of course.” My voice had a sarcastic edge to it that I’m certain he didn’t miss.
“Fantastic,” Adam said, as if settling a business deal in his favor, “We’ll talk more about this later, but thank you for being so understanding.”
I rolled my eyes and as I left the room first, I turned back to him and said, “You can bet we’ll discuss this later.”
********
I ended up going home alone that evening. Before the night was over, Adam received a call from the CEO of the large petroleum company our firm had begun representing recently. There was a large oil spill in the gulf, and Hanson and Partners were the attorneys for the defendants, a large and very rich company that was being sued for hundreds of millions by the EPA and others who had smelled money and jumped in on the bandwagon. Adam normally sent an associate or a junior partner when something came up late in the evening, but this new liaison with the Petroleum Company was sure to prove to be a lucrative one. Adam felt that while we were still in the courting stages at least, he should give them VIP service.
I had been disappointed at first, but once home and in my comfy yoga pants and cotton t-shirt, I decided that a night alone to think might be just what I needed to figure this all out. I made myself a cup of hot cocoa and called Kyla, my best friend. I knew she would be up because she’d been at the party I just left.
“Hi.” She always sounded like she had a smile in her voice. It was one of the many things I loved about her. “Missed me already?”
“Of course, I did,” I told her. I took a breath then and said, “I need some advice.”
“About Nico?” Kyla asked, playfully. She knew good and well that wasn’t the advice I was looking for.
With a groan, I said, “No! Did everyone see me make a fool of myself with Nico tonight?”
Kyla laughed. “Calm down, silly. I was only giving you a hard time. I saw Adam watching you and Nico dance, and I swear he had storm clouds in his eyes. Then you two disappeared for a while, and you both looked happier and a little flush when you came back. I suppose though that since I am the only one at the firm that knows the truth, I was paying much closer attention than anyone else.”
“Thank you, Kyla,” I trusted her with my and Adam’s secret because I knew she was too loyal to ever say anything to anyone. “I hope Nico didn’t get the wrong idea, though.”
“I think Nico indulged a bit much in the champagne fountain tonight. Odds are he won’t remember all that much in the morning.”
“Good. The last thing I need is another man at work angry with me.”
“Is Adam angry with you?”
“No, not anymore, anyways,” I told her. “I just don’t know what to do, though. I’m so tired of all this drama with Marjorie affecting his moods. I’m tired of pretending to everyone at work that I’m just another colleague of his. But every time I think of calling it quits, I look at him and I melt all over again. What’s wrong with me, Kyla?”
“Absolutely nothing at all,” my friend said, “You’re in love, that’s all. It can be the most wonderful, amazing, titillating, frustrating, maddening feeling you’ve ever had. It’s just confusing sometimes. I know it’s hard for you having to hide it.”
“Well, thank you for saying nothing is wrong with me, but you’ve told me what I already know. Don’t you have any special advice that will relieve this ache in my soul? It wants to reach out to him, but I feel like I have to keep it in a cage.”
“My advice to you is that if your soul is already involved, aching or not, you’re in too deep to get out now. Follow your heart, honey. You have a great head on your shoulders, but sometimes you get too analytical with that attorney brain of yours. Try not to overthink it, just do what your heart tells you to do. Hearts always know best in the end.”
“Thank you, Kyla. My heart loves you, too. Get some rest.”
“I will, you, too. I will see you bright and early Monday morning in court.”
“I can’t wait,” I said sarcastically with my lip curled. The case we had to be in court for on Monday had consumed every one of our waking
hours for months now. I wasn’t looking forward to facing the sleazy D.A., but I was looking forward to the surprise we had for him. “The NYPD and our tacky little D.A. are going to be dumbfounded when we present the motion to suppress the confession.”
“Yep, I can’t wait to see Dawson’s face,” Kyla said.
“Me, too!” I heartily agreed. Dawson was Robert Dawson. He was the D.A. for the Manhattan borough of New York, and he was also a short, balding, and pudgy little man with beady eyes and hairy arms that thought his position of prosecutor gave him some kind of clout with the ladies. He has hit on both Kyla and me more than once. He’s a pig, and I couldn’t wait to see the look on his face when I offered up the evidence that his police detectives had coerced a confession out of my client after he had asked for a lawyer.
Our client in this case is the son of a very wealthy contractor who was already a client of the firm. The kid’s name is Nelson, and he is not very likeable at all, which makes my work even harder. It’s not really his fault. He was the product of uber rich parents who had little time to help him develop his social skills and instead gave him every material thing he could ever want. I knew, though, that the kid hadn’t done what they were accusing him of. It was all part of a political game and I had no use for people who would play games with a young man’s life, whether he’s likeable or not.
After hanging up with Kyla, I headed for bed. Just before snuggling down underneath the soft down comforter that my mother had helped me pick out just before my move to New York, my phone rang. It was Adam.
“Hi, baby. Did I wake you?” he asked.
“No, I was just lying down. I’m glad you called.”
“I wanted to say goodnight. I hope you’re not mad at me still.”
I didn’t want to get into it again right then, so I said, “No, I understand. How did the meeting go?”
Adam sighed. “This isn’t going to be pretty. A reporter from the Times has zoned in on the story and is acting as if she has taken up the Cross. She’s hounding the CEO of Brigham Mobile, no matter how many walls the company puts up to protect him. This reporter, Rose Dugan is her name; I hear she's like a dog with a bone when she gets ahold of a story. She's digging into his personal life and personal finances. She has also started beating a drum about his connection to the presidential campaign.”