by Soraya Naomi
This deepens his scowl, but he ignores my statement, making me wonder if and why he’s lying.
Why is he so angry?
Hurt, bewildered, and mad, I realize that I need answers, but because I don’t know what game he’s playing, I don’t trust this man at present.
Stay calm and get out. Be smart and go to Fallon to drill her – she’s close friends with Michael.
Unable to focus, I turn to leave.
“Where are you going, Duchenne?!” Michael snarls and I hear his footsteps coming after me, so when I reach the door, I pull it open and look back over my shoulder.
“Away from your horrible reaction! You’re much nicer when you’re drunk,” I reply, baited by his irritation before I rush to the staircase at the end of the hall.
“Brielle!” Michael roars right before I run through the door and descend the concrete stairs.
I hear Michael’s door slamming shut and a muffled curse, “Fuck!” which makes me tremble.
When I reach the fourth floor, I take the elevator up to Fallon and Luca’s penthouse, and as it stops, I push the button to ring her apartment in the highly secured high-rise.
“Hello?” Fallon’s voice comes through the intercom.
“It’s Brielle,” I say, but the elevator slides open immediately and Fallon greets me, standing in jeans and a blouse with a brush in hand and wet hair, obviously just out of the shower.
“I saw you on the intercom. How did you get up here?” Her lips curl up before she motions me inside. “And why are you wearing the same clothes as yesterday?”
I move forward into the spacious living room. “Are you alone?”
“Yeah, Luca’s out and the twins are asleep,” she replies, setting her brush on the black granite kitchen island and tilting her head as she studies the way I’m clenching my purse.
“I spent the night at Michael’s apartment,” I tell her, and her eyes widen.
“Did it not go well? What’s wrong? You look like you’re about to cry.”
“You know Michael well, right?” I probe, paying no heed to her questions.
“Yes...” she answers guardedly as I dig into my purse and take out the silver bangle and hold it up.
“Why does Michael have this bracelet?”
Fallon glances at it and then at me. “Isn’t that your bracelet?”
“No”—I bring up my wrist to show her the one I’m wearing—“this is mine. Why does Michael have the other one?”
“The other one?” she repeats incredulously, making me sigh in impatience.
So I ask point-blank, “Tell me – how does Michael know Rachel?’
A glow of concern crosses her face. “How do you know Rachel?”
“This is the bracelet we got each other when we were best friends in New York before she moved to the Upper East Side.”
Fallon assesses me while she hesitates to respond.
“Please tell me, because I have no idea what’s going on now.” I toss the bracelet back into my purse.
“Rachel was Michael’s fiancée,” she discloses quietly. “That’s all I know. I never met Rachel, but Michael moved back to Chicago after her death last year.”
The words hit me in the heart like an arrow. “Oh my god. He’s grieving his fiancée and not his mother.”
She wrinkles her nose in question. “Why would he be grieving his mother?”
“Because he kept asking me questions about how I mourned my parents, so I assumed his mom died recently.”
“His mom died a long time ago.” Fallon evaluates me intensely, which is unlike her.
“I get that now. So what’s going on? Because Michael’s furious that I spent the night in his apartment. I’m beginning to think that it was never his intention to flirt with me. Why didn’t he tell me that he knew Rachel? Do you know what his game is?”
“I don’t. I didn’t even know about the matching bracelets or that you knew Rachel. But honestly, Michael is still grieving and mixed up since Rachel’s death, so I’m sure he didn’t mean to lash out at you.”
“I think he did,” I say with conviction.
Fallon sends me a sympathetic look. “What did he say when you asked him about the bracelet?”
“I didn’t. I was confused when he was shouting at me since he was evidently shocked I was there, so I bolted. He doesn’t know I took it yet.”
“That might not have been smart.”
“I know, but I panicked. I needed to get out of there to organize my thoughts.” At that moment, my phone chimes in, so I take it out of my purse to see that an unknown number has texted me.
Pick up when I call you. Michael.
“Oh, shit...”
“What?” Fallon approaches me as I bring up my screen to let her read.
Then my phone rings, and we both jump in our spot while I’m afraid to ignore his call.
CHAPTER 20
Brielle
I’M AFRAID TO IGNORE his call, so I press the button and say, “Hello.”
“Where are you?” Michael’s tone is uncompromising.
“Why?” I retort, and I hear him typing on a keyboard for several seconds. Putting the cell on speaker, I mouth to Fallon, “Is he typing?”
She bends forward a little to listen carefully before she nods.
“I tracked your phone and know you’re upstairs at Luca and Fallon’s. I expect you in my apartment in ten minutes with the item you stole or else I’ll come and get you,” he finishes and hangs up abruptly.
Fallon and I look at each other in distress, and I mutter, “I told you he’s furious.” Tossing the phone into my purse, I plow my hand through my hair viciously, freaking out. “Oh my god. What do I do? How can he track my phone?”
“He’s a security director; he has access to Palermo’s system from his home computer,” Fallon explains and advises, “You have to talk to Michael because if he has to come get you, he’ll be even more angry. Do you want me to go with you?”
“Maybe...I’m a bit scared. There’s something dangerous about him – I’ve seen it.”
“What do you mean?” Her voice becomes harsh, and I frown when she straightens as though she needs to pay closer attention.
“I meant that I’ve sensed it.” Palming my forehead, I rack my brain. “He’s strange sometimes, commanding in a very intense way. Look at the message and his call, which was an obvious order. I get the feeling his moods aren’t only about grief, but I can’t put my finger on it.”
Fallon freezes for a split second but then acts nonchalant, so I observe her when she grabs her red purse on the island and reaches into it for her phone. But as her purse opens a bit, a shadow of sunlight falls inside and I swear I see the contours of a black gun before she quickly closes it.
Didn’t Michael say that only he has a gun? Why would Fallon carry one? Do rich people carry around guns so casually?
But Fallon distracts me by saying, “He is commanding; it’s his character. Regardless, you have to go now, Brielle. Should I come with you?”
“I’m worried it might set him off more if I take you with me for protection.”
She lets out a laugh. “I’d be more like a referee. I know Michael can be intense. Luca has the same quality. But don’t be afraid; you’ll be fine. Michael would never hurt you.”
“I think he already has – I need some answers.” I walk forward and she follows me with a despondent expression.
“Call me afterward, okay? And stay calm.”
“I’ll try,” I respond, stepping into the elevator and going down, the oppressive silence compounding my anxiety.
Unfortunately, when I get off the elevator, Michael’s waiting in the hallway, dressed impeccably in his black shirt and perfectly pressed pants. There isn’t a trace of our drunken escapade since he’s showered and clean shaven with his hair combed back, the long dark strands falling to the side and framing his tanned skin. Yet his ashy-grey eyes are like shards of silver when he strides forward to meet me halfway, and he sn
atches my biceps to drag me to his apartment and push me through the doorway. Kicking the door shut behind him, he practically tosses me inside and releases me, so I whip around, stunned at his level of ire. His gaze pins me to my spot, and I clench my purse, not willing to speak first. But Michael doesn’t say anything either. Instead, with scary calmness, he holds out his palm.
Swallowing, I take out the bracelet and place it into his hand, his fingers curling around it, and then he strides to the coffee table in the center of the room where we had sex. I notice that the rug has been straightened and the cushions on the leather couch are precisely arranged. He’s already erased every trace of our night together.
As he carelessly flings the bracelet onto the couch, which surprises me, he says in a low tone with his back to me, “When did you find it?”
“After my shower, right before I came downstairs.”
He moves to the kitchen and grabs his gun from the counter, turning around and stashing it in the back of his waistband. “What did Fallon tell you?”
“Everything.”
“I doubt that...” he returns arrogantly while a vast distance grows between us.
As close as I felt to him yesterday, I feel that far away from him now.
Michael glances outside before his conduct stiffens and he’s unable to hold it in any longer, so he spews, “I let you into my home and you steal from me?!”
Baited, I point at him. “No! You can’t do this! I was so shocked and only borrowed it. Why didn’t you tell me about Rachel?”
“Why didn’t you tell me?!”
“I didn’t know you knew her, but you knew I knew her. I remember you staring at my bracelet when we first met. What’s going on here? I’m so confused...”
He whirls around and grips the edge of the counter. “Nothing’s going on...This was never supposed to happen.”
“What do you mean by this?”
“Us, Brielle. I’m thirty-three and you’re twenty-one. You’re just a girl. Nothing can come of this,” he says, astonishing me as a stone sinks in my stomach.
“What?” His dismissal sets me off. “You kissed me. But I think you’re forgetting something – Rachel. How do you know her?”
When he turns around, he doesn’t seem pleased as he shoots me an icy glare. “Fallon already told you.”
“She only told me that Rachel was your fiancée. I don’t know how you met or why you befriended me – are you even my friend?”
“Christ, so many questions.” Michael expels a loud sigh. “This is why I avoid emotional entanglements.”
“Really? If you avoided them, you wouldn’t have sought me out,” I tell him, eliciting a moment of reflective silence.
But he holds my gaze steadily. “What do you want?”
“Answers. Start at the beginning, and you know exactly what I’m asking. Did you know me or about me?”
He raises one dark brow at my forceful tone, which makes him look lethal, before he spills everything, “I met Rachel in New York three years ago through a mutual friend. We dated and got engaged. She wore that bracelet often as well, so when we’d been dating a few weeks and I saw the inscription forever friends, I asked her where she got it, and she told me that it was a piece of jewelry she and her first childhood friend, Brielle, had. After she died during a robbery last year, I moved back to Chicago. Then, to my utmost surprise, it seems that the childhood friend is working at the same place that I am. I thought you might know of me.”
My anger tempers when he mentions her death around a distant expression. “I’m sorry for your loss,” I offer timidly, not knowing how to respond.
“How do you know her exactly?” Michael continues.
“Rachel and I grew up on the same block. Even though, she was six years older than me, we were the only girls in the neighborhood, and we played together after school until she moved to the Upper East Side, so my mom got us the matching bracelets. We promised to stay in touch, but we were young and didn’t. Then I heard from another friend in New York that she passed away last year. I wear this bracelet because it has sentimental value since it was a gift from my mom. Rachel hasn’t been a part of my life since I was twelve.”
“So you didn’t know Rachel was engaged?” he asks wearily.
“No. Like I said, she was an old acquaintance. I don’t know anything about her life.”
A frown settles into his face.
“Why didn’t you just ask me if I knew Rachel when we first met?”
Michael glimpses heavenward, as if he’s praying for patience before he says, “I didn’t know you were that Brielle until I saw your bracelet, or what your motive for working at Palermo was. It was strange how you showed up for the pastry chef position.”
“My motive? What are you talking about? I saw the job opening and applied for it, like I told you. This is...a huge coincidence,” I retort, recalling our interactions, and all of a sudden, the truth slams into me.
I’ve been blind. I wrongly believed that he sought me out because he was attracted to me. “You asked me if I had an ulterior motive twice, and I didn’t understand what you meant or why you’d be interested one moment and dismissive the other. But it’s because you had an ulterior motive. You could’ve merely asked me instead of putting on this performance where you pretended to be a nice guy to women, but you just wanted to verify what I knew.” I wave my hand dismissively as he clutches the edge of the counter behind him, as if he needs to occupy his hands to keep from strangling me.
On top of that, the muscle in his forehead ticks while I’m lost in my woes. Oh, god, I really liked him, but apparently, I mean nothing to him, which makes me feel used. Though I shouldn’t have ignored the signs. He was hot and cold, like he didn’t know how to handle me, yet in truth, he didn’t know how to interrogate me for simple answers.
I palm my forehead. “This is a mess. Clearly, all I did for you is amplify your guilt toward the one you love. Why did you let it go this far? Why didn’t you leave me alone? I told you I didn’t do one-night stands and now you’ve made me one of yours.”
“I told you I don’t date.” His voice becomes flat and hard while we both breathe raggedly as resentment makes its way through my limbs.
“Because of her,” I blurt out and regret it instantly when Michael stalks toward me, so I move backward, matching his steps.
“I’m fucked up, Brielle. I’m not a man to fall in love with. Do you know how she died? She died in my arms. I was going to be her husband and I didn’t protect her! I don’t want relationships anymore. That’s why I’m livid. This”—he stops within a foot of me and motions irately between us—“is exactly what I don’t need now.”
“I’m so sorry, Michael, but you should’ve been honest. Then none of this would’ve happened.”
“I warned you to stay away from me.”
“No, you didn’t. You’ve been so caught up in your grief and thinking that I might be hiding something that you just used me – to find out if I had an ulterior motive. And meanwhile, you had sex with me!”
“That was a mistake and shouldn’t have happened.”
“You don’t have to keep repeating that,” I reply, watching his gaze flicker before he sears me with a glare.
“Stop overthinking this. Yes, I should’ve asked you how you knew Rachel, but that still doesn’t change that I’m twelve years older than you. And this is too dangerous!”
“Why do you keep saying that? I know how old I am.” Then I realize that he’s expecting me to have a juvenile reaction, to pout and fight him like a young girl. But even after everything he said to me just now, I want him to see me as a woman, one he threw away.
With all my power, I try to finally assemble my thoughts when he finishes, “Whatever the reason was that I talked to you in the first place, nothing will happen between us again. I was drunk.”
My throat burns when he gives me the one justification a girl never wants to hear. “That’s it?”
“Yes. I told you everything
.” He takes in a deep breath, schooling his features, yet he keeps clenching his fist.
I fight back tears while emotions rebel within me as I look at this handsome, distant stranger before me. Is my judgment so impaired when it comes to Michael? Because he simply seems like a tormented man – a man who I should’ve kept far away. The man in black is a man with a black heart. A heart that already belongs to another.
Michael watches me, and I slowly see his fist loosening and his eyes widening when my lips begin to tremble and moisture pools in my vision. But I refuse to let him see me cry.
Looking down, I mutter, “Okay.” And I shoulder past him.
“Brielle...” Michael speaks when I reach the door and open it, but I continue on and ignore him, shutting it behind me after I cross the threshold.
I lean back against the surface as a tear scalds my cheek because I’ve fallen for Michael, but evidently, it’s not reciprocated.
CHAPTER 21
Michael
“BRIELLE...” I SAY AS she struts to the door in her coat that ends at her waist and that tight blue dress that consistently drags my attention to her curvaceous backside.
Suddenly, I’m accosted by a vivid image of her lying beneath me and pushing her hips up as I thrust inside her. But when she disregards me and disappears through the doorway, it takes enormous willpower not to go after her. Particularly since I didn’t anticipate her being on the verge of tears.
At that point, I snap. I’ve been fighting to keep my emotions in check ever since Rachel died four months ago, yet when I discovered the bracelet missing from my closet, everything shattered within an instant. Sweeping an arm over the kitchen counter, I fling off my phone and keys, letting them clatter on the floor. I loathe how I’ve absolutely lost control over a situation that shouldn’t have occurred. However, I realize that Brielle’s right. If I’d been honest, these repercussions could’ve been avoided. Especially since I figured out she didn’t have an ulterior motive, but I still gravitated toward her.
“Fuck!” I roar, realizing that I should never drink so much again.