“Sloan, you know damn well that’s not what’s going on here. Yes, Lucas can have his pick of women. He likes them powerful. He’s just playing with you, Sloan. As much as you might hate to admit it, you’re not the kind of woman who fucks a man at night and forgets them the next morning. He’s not the man who settles down with someone. You know that I’m right, but you’re ignoring it. If you get lost in whatever fantasy keeps playing in your head, you’re going to get hurt.”
I felt nothing but cold anger as I stared at her. God, I knew she was right, but this was something I had to prove to myself. “That’s my problem and not yours. Next time, mind your own damn business.”
She gasped, but I was already halfway to my room. Slamming the door shut, I leaned against it and tried not to cry. Deep down, I did want her to find out. I wanted someone to talk to, but it was obvious that Randi was not going to support me.
We’d never fought. At least not like that. We’d argued over music and noise levels. I sometimes lost my patience with her when she forgot to clean the dishes, and she’d snap at me when I forgot the groceries. But this was different.
This had actually hurt.
The shower started, and I knew that I wasn’t going to get the chance to bathe before class. The scent of Lucas and sex would follow me around all day.
I wasn’t exactly upset about that.
Stuffing the books in my bag, I tried to put the argument behind me as I grabbed a blueberry muffin from the kitchen and shoved it in my mouth. Opening the door, I walked straight into Matthew.
Matthew Rehn was my odd neighbor. He was handsome, but he worked odd hours and never spoke much. Randi and I had talked endlessly about our theories about him.
At best, he was a secret CIA agent. At worse, he was a serial killer.
But he was always nice to us, so we didn’t bother him much. I couldn’t hide the surprise from my face when I saw him.
“Matthew!”
The muffin was still in my mouth and muffled the sound. He lifted an eyebrow and smiled at me. “I’ve caught you at a bad time.”
Pulling the muffin out of my mouth, I swallowed. “I’m sorry. I do know not to talk with my mouth full. I was just on my way to school.”
“Right.” He handed me an envelope. “This was at my door last night. I tried to deliver it then, but neither you or your roommate were home. It’s addressed to you, but there’s no postage on it. Were you expecting something?”
I shoved the muffin back in my mouth and shook my head as I took the envelope. I could have put down my keys, but that didn’t occur to me until after I looked like a complete idiot in front of my neighbor.
“Right,” he laughed softly. “Have a good day.”
I stole a peak around the doorway as I watched him enter his own apartment. One of these days I was going to figure him out.
Shoving the envelope under my arm, I locked the door behind me and shuffled to the car. After only a couple of hours of sleep, I desperately needed coffee.
Although it made me late, once again, to Dr. Elliot’s class, I did stop for coffee. Luckily, my professor didn’t interrupt class this time to berate me.
After the lecture, I pulled the signed form for my thesis experiment from my bag and hurried down the steps. “Dr. Elliot?”
“Is your alarm clock still broken, Ms. Whitlow?” he said without looking up.
Damn. He did notice. “No. I just didn’t get much sleep last night,” I muttered.
“I assume that’s because you were working on your thesis?”
Only if my thesis included a gorgeous naked man on the couch. And the bed. And the floor. “I got permission from Surry Elementary school. I’m in the middle of speaking with Lab Rescue and High Tails Humane Society. They’re both looking over the information, but I think High Tails has already decided to work with me. They have until Monday to get back to me, and then hopefully I can start drawing up an itinerary.”
“Excellent. Keep pushing the way you are, and I know you’ll be ready for this summer. It will have to be a full twelve-week program. You won’t be able to cut it short in order to have more time for your analysis.”
“I know. I’m not going to take any short-cuts.”
“Good.” He finally turned to eye me. “Ms. Whitlow, I’m sure you’re aware that Montgomery Industries is a big supporter of the school.”
“What?” Surprised, I stared at him. “I didn’t know that. Why are you telling me this?”
He looked like he wanted to say something before he shook his head. “It’s not important. I’m sure you’re acting ethically and morally in your actions.”
Shoulders slumping, I stared at him. He knew. He knew that I was sleeping with Lucas, and he thought I was using that power to push my thesis along.
But how did he know?
More importantly, why did he think I was the kind of woman who would use sex to my advantage?
“You have nothing to worry about,” I said softly as I lowered my gaze. “I’ve worked hard to get where I am now, and there is nothing but hard work driving me.”
“Of course. I don’t mean to imply otherwise.”
But he did, and we both knew it.
“Have a good weekend, professor.”
“Email me if you need me for anything,” he said absently, but he didn’t look me in the eye.
For some reason, I couldn’t meet his eye either. I had nothing to feel guilty about, but that didn’t stop the knot from forming in my stomach.
Is that what everyone would think?
It wasn’t until I got back to the car that I remembered the envelope. Sitting in the stuffy heat, I pulled it out and ripped it open.
Nothing could have prepared me for what I found. Pictures. One right after the other.
All of them with Lucas and Iris. Naked and in different stages of ecstasy.
“It’s in the past,” I whispered. “It has nothing to do with me.”
My hands shook as I shuffled through them. Even though I knew what it would do to me, I couldn’t stop.
There was a note at the end.
This is who he is with during every lunch break. You seem like a nice girl. I thought you should know.
Chapter 9
Lucas
“The expansion into Japan is going well. The factory should be up and running sometime next month,” I said tonelessly as I tried not to yawn. It wasn’t just that I didn’t get much sleep last night. There were easy moments with Sloan. Time where it felt comfortable and natural. But when she was in my bed, I gave her everything I had. I was driven by every moan, every quiver, every soft sound that I could wrench from her pretty little mouth.
It was perfect and exhausting.
“And Boston?” Jenson asked hotly. “We’re not here to talk about Japan. I want to know why you’ve halted the search for real estate in Boston. We projected next quarter using those numbers.”
Just two years ago, Jenson was nothing more than the irresponsible son of an extremely wealthy family. His mother was born into old money, and his father owned a pharmaceutical company. His mother died years ago of cancer, and he lost his father in a house fire. Jenson had immediately sold the company and had millions to play with.
He had a hand in several pies around the country, but he seemed to enjoy investing in me. I wanted to smack the smile right off the little asshole’s face, but his father and my father had been good friends. If he were older, we might have grown up friends.
I couldn’t fault him. He was just bringing up what everyone was thinking. I had to handle this carefully.
“I was given some new information last week, and it has caused me to reconsider the Boston project.”
Jenson smirked. “And what was that?”
“Some information that could greatly affect the Boston economy. That should play out over the next month, and then I’ll decide whether or not we should make the move or not.”
Addison cleared her throat. “What information would that be? Who
is your source?”
I smiled. “Mrs. Addison, I have always shared pertinent information with the members of the board. I only withhold now because if you knew, you could be a witness against me.”
There was nervous laughter in the room, and I knew I’d covered the issue for now. We concluded the meeting, and when it was just myself and Hamburg left, Torrence joined us.
“Did you see anything suspicious?” I asked in a low voice.
Torrence shook his head. “Nothing. If it’s a board member, they’ve covering their tracks. You handled the situation well.”
“That’s true,” Hamburg grunted. “Meeting was a damn waste of time. You didn’t tell us anything new.”
“That’s the point,” I said softly. “I hate to distrust my own board, but I can’t risk any sensitive information getting out.”
As soon as the words were out of my mouth, Torrence’s phone rang. I saw the tension in his mouth when he looked at the screen.
“Who is it?” I asked in a low voice.
He didn’t answer. Turning his back to me, he held the phone up to his ear. His shoulder’s tightened in anger, but he only thanked the caller and hung up.
“Torrence, what the hell is going on?” I demanded.
“There was a press release in the DC newspaper,” he said softly. “Something about a merger with Garland Software.”
I froze and stared at him. “That’s not possible,” I muttered in a low voice.
“Montgomery?” Hamburg growled. “What is he talking about? We’ve never discussed a merger.”
A shudder crawled down my spine. “That’s because the information never left my office. My private office. In my house.”
“God,” Torrence muttered. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“David Garland contacted me three weeks ago. He wants to retire, but he’s afraid his son will run the business into the ground. He wants to sell it to me so long as it could keep his name. I told him that I would think about it, but we both knew that I would agree. It’s a lucrative buy. The conversation never left the office. It never made it past the fucking phone. Torrence, you swept my home. You didn’t find anything.”
“No,” he said quietly. “So someone placed the bug and removed it without you knowing. They had access to your home, Montgomery. That’s incredibly dangerous.”
He didn’t have to tell me twice. My mind was already whirling as I tried to think of the people who had been in and out of the house. I had a cleaning staff. People to maintain the grounds and the pool. The cleaning staff had a key, but they were thoroughly investigated. They were also the only ones allowed in my house without supervision.
“Torrence,” I said softly.
“I’ll look into your staff. You still have your security cameras up and working?” he asked gravely.
I nodded. “I’ll stop by tonight and have a look at the monitors. Please let me send someone home with you until I can get there.”
“No. If I do anything out of the ordinary, they’ll know. Come when you can.”
“Lucas.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“What about the company that you keep,” he reminded me softly.
Sloan. “That’s a low blow, Drew.” But he wasn’t wrong. Sloan had spent the night with me. I’d licked every inch of her naked body, and for all I know, someone could have been listening.
It made my blood boil.
“It won’t be a problem. She won’t be setting foot anywhere near the estates.” I would not put her in danger. No matter how badly I wanted her. “Hamburg, you don’t breathe a word of this to anyone. I’ll speak to Garland myself and see what he wants to do next. His stocks are probably going through the roof.”
The older man watched me carefully. “You can’t keep this a secret for long. The board is going to know about the leak. DC isn’t some small town. News of the merger will reach them.”
“Nothing has been finalized. I’ll contact the newspaper and let them know they’ve made an error. Pressure them to retract the article. If the board asks, we can blame the leak on Garland.”
“Fine,” he muttered. I stared at him. Was it my imagination, or was he in a hurry to make sure news of the mole went public? He’d brought the first leak to my attention, but that didn’t mean that he wasn’t involved.
“Torrence, do whatever you need to do here. Send someone to campus to keep an eye on Sloan. She’ll probably be at the library until they close. I do not want her to know what’s going on.”
“How many times do I have to call you an idiot before you realize that I’m right?” he rolled his eyes but left the office.
Hamburg faced me, and I saw the troubled look in his eyes. “Montgomery, I’m afraid this is getting personal. We should call the police.”
“I can take care of this on my own.”
“You are your father’s son. It’s going to get you in serious trouble one day,” he said with a sigh.
I was my father’s son. And it made me millions. I wouldn’t let anything slow me down now.
I walked through the house slowly and wondered why the hell I stayed here. I barely used a quarter of the rooms. Most of the house only saw the footsteps of my cleaning staff.
It had never really felt like home. Even when I was a kid, it didn’t feel like home. My father was meticulous about what could and couldn’t be touched. I’d spent most of the time in my room, and even though I was master and sleeping in the biggest room of the estate, some things hadn’t changed.
The night lounging with Sloan on the couch was the most fun I’d had in the house in years.
Now that I knew someone had violated the house, it felt like mine. My home. My domain. My personal space.
Cold anger fueled me, but nothing looked out of place. I moved quietly from room to room and it wasn’t until the doorbell sounded that I finally stopped.
Opening the door, I glared at the gorgeous blonde. Iris. “What the hell are you doing here?” I snapped. “I thought I made it clear that I didn’t want to see you anymore.”
She just gave me a smug smile and pushed past me. “Calm down, darling. I’m just here to talk. The least you can do is offer a girl a drink.”
I didn’t budge. “What do you want to talk about?”
She ignored me and walked through the foyer. With a sinking feeling, I closed the door and followed her. “Iris,” I said in a warning voice.
“You always did have the best scotch,” she said as she pulled open the wet bar in my living room. “I didn’t hear the rumors until I got back to the states. The rumors that you were monogamous. It wasn’t until I saw you with her that I believed them. She’s such a mousy little thing. Easy for you to control? I bet she’s a submissive bitch in bed.” Her eyes glazed over. “Oh, we could have so much fun with her.”
“Enough.”
The anger in my voice snapped her back to attention. “My, my,” she purred. “You don’t actually have feelings for her, do you?”
“My feelings are none of your business, Iris. We had a couple good months together, but we both knew it wouldn’t be more than that. You left to do God knows what in Europe, and that should have been the end of it.”
She tossed the scotch back and bent over as she searched the bottles on the bottom. I knew the move was deliberate. Her short skirt rose high enough until I could clearly see that she wore nothing underneath. “If you’re here to seduce me, you’re wasting your time.” There was a time when I would have eagerly sunk into her, but she just didn’t do it for me anymore.
She straightened and smiled. “I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I was hoping to have a little fun today. I have some information, and I thought that maybe you could pay me for it. The way you used to pay me.”
“I don’t require your information anymore, Iris.”
“Really? So you’ve successfully ferreted out that mole yourself?”
That got my attention. I watched her as she sat on the couch and patted the sea
t next to her. “Come on, baby. I know you want to.”
I didn’t move from the doorframe. “I do want your information, but I’m not about to fuck you for it. If you want money —“
She waved her hand dismissively. “I have plenty of money,” Iris said with a pout. “What I really want is to feel that cock in my mouth again.”
“Not going to happen. Get out.”
Sighing, she rolled her eyes and leaned back. “Fine. But I’m a good person. I’ll still give you the information.”
A few second passed. “I’m waiting.”
“Really? You can’t even sit next to me?”
Knowing damn well that it was a bad idea, I crossed the room and sat on the other end of the couch. I’d get the information and haul her ass out of my house. If there was one thing Iris was very good at, it was discovering people’s dark secrets. If she had information, it would probably be good.
I heard the front door open and turned my head. “Hang on,” I muttered as I moved to push myself up.
Before I could even blink, Iris straddled me and pushed me into the couch.
“Iris? What the fuck,” I muttered as I grabbed her hips.
She slid her damp pussy over my and moaned just as I saw the figure walk through the door.
“Oh my God.” Sloan stared at me, her eyes full of pain. Papers fell from her fingers and fluttered to the ground. “I am such an idiot.”
“Goddammit, Sloan, wait,” I shouted as I threw Iris off me and stood. Iris yelled in indignation as she hit the floor, but I didn’t care. I ran for Sloan, but she was already down the hall and out the door.
“Sloan!” Bursting out of the house, I watched helplessly as she made a beeline for her car.
“Don’t,” she shouted as she turned. “Just don’t come near me. I don’t do this. I’m not this woman that just sleeps with a man, but I gave you everything that you wanted. I asked you for one thing, Lucas. Just one, and you couldn’t do it.”
“Sloan,” I growled as I started towards her, but she was already slipping in her car and starting it. By the time I reached her, she was pealing down the driveway.
As she drove away, I saw that she never even looked back.
Montgomery Billionaire Series Page 13