by Alice Ward
“If you’re talking about Bruno, he’s in Seattle until Sunday,” Howie pointed out.
While the news was hardly disappointing, it still didn’t make me any more likely to suggest to Tabby she participate in the auction. “Not just him,” I said vaguely.
I saw Howie frown in my peripheral vision, and then he let out a slow whistle. I glanced up and found him grinning at me again. “Oh, wait a minute. This isn’t about certain members. You just don’t want her with anyone else.”
My heart seemed to freeze in my chest for a split second. Was he really more insightful than I’d given him credit for?
“I can’t say I’m surprised,” he elaborated. “Any man in his right mind would want the first test drive before letting someone else get behind the wheel.”
The tightness between my ribs eased, but I wasn’t entertained by his analogy. I hadn’t told him I’d already slept with her, that I had started figuring out which buttons to push to drive her into the kind of insanity I craved to witness, and I wasn’t about to. Nevertheless, the suggestion that someone else would “get behind the wheel” brought out my fangs.
“I’m not going to test drive her then pass her to the highest bidder,” I snapped before I could stop myself.
He raised both eyebrows, causing a trio of lines in his forehead, and the grin didn’t completely die from his mouth. I turned away in my swiveling chair under the guise of shuffling more papers into their appropriate folders, though in reality I just didn’t want him to see the frustration blooming over my face because I’d done such a poor job hiding the feelings I was trying so hard to deny.
After a beat, I heard him ask behind me, “Did you hear back from her yet? About the invitation?”
“No.” I didn’t tell him I hadn’t included a number or an email to reach me. It was my hope the lack of a means of contact would drive her to accept the invitation and show up Saturday afternoon, and that was a hope I was going to cling to.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Tabby
It was an invitation. An invitation and a plane ticket. No phone number, no email, no address, nothing that gave me a chance to RSVP. It was like attendance was mandatory, and the invitation was just a formality. I’d stared at the ticket for at least ten minutes before it finally sank in that I had the chance to go back to New Orleans this Saturday and see Owen again and possibly learn more about the mysterious Blackjack Club. I was so stunned, and excited, and uncertain that I just dropped the envelope and all of its contents onto my kitchen counter and sat on my couch in awe.
And there they stayed. For days. Nagging me. Urging me. Whispering tempting suggestions and pressing me to pack my bags.
By the time Thursday rolled around, my bags still weren’t packed, and my mind still wasn’t made up. I had too many questions to jump in blindly, go to the airport, and show up. My curiosities surrounding The Club certainly hadn’t ebbed away like I’d hoped they would, but I wasn’t a flighty woman prone to impulsive decisions. In fact, my weekend with Owen had been one of the most impulsive things I’d ever done. There was a measure of thrill that came with the thought of hopping on a plane and showing up to the guy who was still managing to make my panties wet even though we were separated by a thousand miles. There was also concern, though. I wasn’t naive. I knew there were dangers in meeting up with a man I didn’t really know to go to a place I truly didn’t understand that he had admitted was fueled by those who possessed dark and dangerous interests. I would have been lying to myself if I said I didn’t have any desire to accept the invitation, but my questions were burning a hole in my spontaneity.
The thing I wondered most about was if the invitation was for me to participate in the auction or if it was simply to accompany Owen to The Club as his guest. That was a huge factor. I’d found the auction fascinating and even a little alluring, but I didn’t feel comfortable with the idea that anybody in that room had the chance to have me. I wanted Owen to have me… over and over again.
Late Thursday afternoon, I finally came out of my awestruck funk and decided to do a little digging for myself. I grabbed my laptop, opened the screen, and pulled up my Internet browser. He might not have left any contact information for me, but the Internet was a great place and I hoped I would be able to find a number somewhere.
My first search was the most obvious — Owen Driscoll. A slew of pages erupted in my search engine, including social media profiles, biographies on various websites, and a number of charitable event web pages. I saw pictures of him shaking hands with everyone from school principals to elderly people leaning one-armed on walkers. Nothing I clicked on, however, revealed anything more than a location, a brief history detailing the bits of his life he’d told me about, or grandiose thank yous for his generosity. I couldn’t even find a company name for his investment firm. Then again, I wasn’t even sure he worked for an investment firm. He might have been a freelancer like me, if investors could even be freelancers. I was frustrated by my lack of knowledge and made a mental note to learn more about his occupation.
The next searches I did were broader. The Blackjack Club, Driscoll investor, Maine Driscoll, and even the restaurant he had set up for me to photograph. Still, there was nothing to find out about how to contact him. I made a second mental note to mention to him, if I decided to show up, that it might be prudent for him to provide at least a phone number on a website somewhere to help gain more investment opportunities. Not that I knew anything on the subject, obviously.
The plane ticket cackled at me from the kitchen counter. I was either losing my mind, or Owen’s money had granted him the ability to send plane tickets with embedded sound devices.
There was only one option left.
A half hour later, a knock sounded on my door. I opened it to reveal my best friend of six years, Heather. Her chocolatey hair was thrown up in a messy bun, and the spandex leggings she wore indicated she had just come from the gym. I wasn’t surprised. Heather was usually at the gym.
“I hope you know I didn’t get a chance to do a circuit,” she complained as she stepped over the threshold, a strong gust of wind nearly thrusting her inside.
“Sorry.” I shivered and muscled the door closed. “I need to talk to you.”
“If it’s about that photoshoot you want me to do, forget it.” She began unwrapping herself, starting at the wool cap on her head, then scarf and gloves, on down to her thick puffy coat. She flung herself onto my couch, kicking off her Uggs, and draped her head over the armrest. Upside down, she glared at me. “I told you I’m not in shape yet.”
For Heather to say she wasn’t in shape was like Einstein claiming he was an idiot. She had the kind of molded body even celebrities drooled over. Her arms were slender but firm, her legs toned and smooth, and despite her frequent feverish workouts and immense calorie burns, her chest was still a size that reminded me of the produce section in the grocery store. I didn’t consider my body gross by any means, but being within a mile of Heather definitely called to mind my flaws. I decided not to chide her for her self-deprecation like I usually would have though.
“It’s not about the photoshoot.” I strolled to the wine rack I kept mounted on the wall next to the fridge — a studio required space-saving techniques like that — and plucked a sweet white from the selection. As I searched for two glasses, I accidentally brushed the envelope, the invitation, and the ticket. They floated to the floor, and Heather sat up to eye them suspiciously.
“What’s that?” Heather wasn’t quite as nosy as Ms. Marcheski, but she took it as a personal offense if she didn’t know something about my life. She called it being a concerned friend. I called it being a budding buttinsky.
“It’s a plane ticket,” I told her. “That’s why I called you.”
“You need advice on a vacation?” An eyebrow shot up toward her hairline. I was positive the woman didn’t sweat because she was wearing a full face of makeup that looked as flawless as if she had only applied it five minutes before. “A
nd didn’t you just go on vacation? For your snobby cousin’s wedding?”
I snorted. “Going anywhere with Grace can hardly be considered a vacation,” I retorted wryly.
“That’s true. Bitch.” Heather had always been jealous of any other friends I might have, and while I didn’t consider Grace a friend so much as an obnoxious family member I happened to have grown up with, the wedding had still been time spent with another girl. I often wondered if Heather was quite as territorial over her other friends as she was with me. “So, where’s the plane ticket to then?”
“New Orleans.” She opened her mouth, but I headed her off. “I know, I was just there. But I didn’t buy this ticket. A man did.”
Now, her perfectly lined eyes widened, and her jaw dropped a solid inch. “A man? But you don’t date.”
“Yeah, I’m not sure what we did constitutes as dating,” I said. A telling sparkle lit in her eyes. “I thought it was just a fling, but I guess he wants to see me again.” I held up the plane ticket. “Clearly.”
“Wait a minute. You mean you hooked up in New Orleans, and you’ve been back for over a week now, and you didn’t tell me?” She couldn’t have looked more offended if she’d tried.
“Like I said, I figured it was just a fling,” I tried to justify. “And it was so… weird that I thought it might be better if I just tried to forget about it.”
She straightened up fully and held out a hand as I walked across the small living space to give her a glass of wine. “Weird how? Was he bad in bed or something?”
“No.” The word rushed out of me like a bullet shooting out of a gun. “He was a god. It was incredible.”
She wrinkled her forehead. “Well, then, I’m not sure where the weird comes in.”
I wanted to tell her about The Blackjack Club. I knew she would have something to say about it, and I actually wanted to get her opinion on it, but I was also acutely aware that I had filled out an NDA and was not at liberty to discuss anything about it with her or anyone else who wasn’t associated. But I needed advice, so I was going to have to tread carefully.
“Owen is perfect,” I breathed, sliding onto the couch beside her and swilling my wine. “He’s handsome and funny and smart. And he’s rich, not that it matters. He invests in restaurants.”
“Yeah, nothing weird yet,” she pointed out.
“The weird thing is he admitted he is into certain things,” I expressed cautiously. “He said they’re dark, and kind of dangerous. And don’t ask me what these certain things are because, honestly, I don’t know.”
She squinted at me, penciled brows furrowing down to shadow her eyes, and I could see her thinking about what I’d said. “Was he talking about crime or something?”
“No…” I hesitated, biting my lip. “I don’t think so.”
“So, he has some mystery to him,” she said, shrugging. “Every woman wants a handsome, smart, rich guy with mystery. What’s the problem?”
“I just feel like there’s a lot of questions I don’t have answers to, and I’m not sure it’s a good idea to fly across the country to meet up with him without having those answers.” Heather rolled her eyes, but I kept confessing my worries. “I mean, what if he’s a psycho? It’s possible. People meet up with other people they’ve met online and horrible things happen to them.”
“But you didn’t meet him online,” she reminded me. “You’ve already gone out with him. You’ve already slept with him.”
My thighs seared with the memory. “I know. How stupid would I be if I went and something happened? Something bad?”
“How stupid would you be if you didn’t and you missed your chance at being with a highly desirable guy?” she shot back.
I wasn’t surprised by Heather’s reaction to what I was telling her. She was definitely the kind of woman who could have received a plane ticket in the mail, thrown together a bag that night, and booked it across the country to see a man she didn’t know much about. She was also the type of woman to encourage her friends to do the same thing.
I was stale. I was boring. My life was simple and regimented and predictable.
In short, I was bored. And Owen was exciting.
“Okay,” I agreed. “I guess I’ll go.”
Heather hopped off the couch, almost sloshing wine over the rim of the glass, and held out a hand to me. I took it, and she tugged me effortlessly to my feet. “Good. I’ll help you pack, but only if you tell me every last detail about the sex while we do.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Owen
People were everywhere. Swarms of them flooded the curb performing failed attempts at grabbing an available taxi. A steady stream trickled out of the automatic doors, never allowing the broad passage to close. Several loitered around benches and smoke bins with cigarettes hanging out of their mouths and blissful relief strewn across their faces. Yet, amongst all those people, I didn’t see the one face I was hoping to see.
“What time is it, Stephan?”
There was a pause rather than an immediate response, and I knew why. I never asked my driver for the time, as I always had my phone on me and simply checked for myself. My phone was on me now, but I wasn’t about to take my eyes off those doors. I felt Stephan’s eyes on me momentarily through the rearview mirror before he responded, “Half past three.”
“Her flight was supposed to get in at quarter after,” I muttered unhappily under my breath. If Stephan heard me, he didn’t say anything.
I had tried not to delude myself into thinking Tabby’s arrival was imminent. The invitation had been just that… an invitation. Whether she’d decided to accept or not was a whole different matter, and in my desire to tempt her with mystery by omitting a phone number at which she could RSVP to me I’d also robbed myself of the opportunity to find out if I was wasting my time sitting in a limo beneath the concrete canopy outside the baggage claim. My stomach apparently hadn’t gotten the message from my head, though, because it was rolling around in anticipation. Part of me was expecting to see her, and that part of me was becoming almost sick with anxiety.
A sea of couples puttered onto the sidewalk wheeling brightly colored luggage behind them. I groaned inwardly. It seemed like everyone — excited tourists, traveling executives, homebound locals, stressed families, affectionate couples, adrenalized college kids — had decided to come to New Orleans on this particular Saturday. Everyone except Tabby.
“Stephan, get out of the car and stand next to it on the curb, would you? I want her to recognize you in case I don’t see her coming out.”
His door immediately opened. “Of course, Mr. Driscoll.”
I wasn’t a fool. To see Tabby making an appearance through those taunting doors was a longshot. She’d only left Louisiana a little less than two weeks before, and what on Earth would she come back for so soon? Me? It was a nice thought, one that made my gut churn, but an unrealistic one. People didn’t often travel cross-country to spend time with someone they’d only met a couple of times.
There was her job to consider too. Being a freelancer, she obviously had the luxury of a more flexible schedule than others, but I’d gotten the impression she needed to maintain a constant flow of gigs to keep herself financially stable. I’d paid her gratuitously for the photography at the restaurant, of course, but I wasn’t privy to how she’d spent that money, or if she even had. It seemed highly unlikely she would’ve been able to make the trip down here a second time after already finagling time off for her cousin’s wedding, not to mention the extra day I’d roped her into staying.
“If you care this much about her time and finances, you should just employ her yourself, you jerkoff,” I admonished myself.
Stephan, now posed outside my door, turned and bent to peer through the window with a confused face. I rolled it down, letting the cool December air pour in.
“Did you say something, Mr. Driscoll?”
“No,” I said before realizing that wasn’t entirely true. “Well, yes, but I was talking to m
yself.”
“Ah. Please pardon my interruption, then.” He bowed his head slightly, and I caught a glimpse of a seedling smile on his lips. I might not have ever discussed my life with him on a deeper level than that which his job entailed, but he always had a knack of knowing what I was dealing with at any given moment.
On a whim, I decided now was as good a time as any to open up about myself a fraction to a member of my staff.
“She probably won’t come,” I said. I tried to sound nonchalant, but even I heard the disappointment emanating from the core of my tone, and the vocalization of my worry brought with it an unprecedented hollowness that swelled in my belly.
“Well, if she does, we are here ready for her,” Stephan assured me.
His positivity was like a tonic to my soul. The muscles in my neck relaxed, and my stomach acid stopped trying to erode away necessary organs. “Did you confirm with the hotel?”
“Yes, sir.”
I nodded and tried to think of something else to say in the realm of casual conversation. “Did she happen to mention anything to you about flying, if she prefers it to driving? I didn’t think to call and ask before arranging a plane ticket for her,” I rambled.
Stephan smiled, and there was a measure of understanding on his face. “Mr. Driscoll, I am no expert, but I feel fairly confident in saying the young lady was quite taken with you,” he said. “I sincerely doubt a distaste for air travel would have prevented her from making the trip if she was able.”
He was right. If she wanted to see me again, she was going to walk through those doors any minute with a bag or two in tow. If she didn’t… well, I didn’t like thinking about that. Neither my ego nor my nerves were willing to venture into that territory of misread signals quite yet.