“You coming?” I glance up to find Cole leaning over the steel railing of a second level.
My eyes meet his, a probe in the depth of his stare, a question in the air he has yet to ask. What am I thinking about his life, his world, his home? How does that affect us? “It’s perfectly you,” I say. “And that’s a compliment.”
His eyes warm with my reply, but his reaction, his very need for answers, tells me that I have not said everything I need to say to him. I rush toward the elegant winding steel staircase in the far corner of the room, and quickly make the climb. The minute I reach the top level, I cut right, and bring one hell of a hot man, now dressed in black jeans, boots, and a black T-shirt, into view.
He leans on the railing, just in front of an open door I assume to be his bedroom. Watching me, tracking my every step, and I swear, I know how he wins over a courtroom and a jury. When this man watches you, when he focuses on you, there is just him; nothing else exists. I stop in front of him, and when he motions toward the bedroom, I catch his hand. “Cole.”
The minute I say his name, he turns back to me. I greet him by pushing to my toes and kissing him, before I confess, “I got something wrong downstairs.”
His hands come down on my waist, and he walks me closer. “You got everything exactly right downstairs, sweetheart.”
“No,” I say. “I didn’t. I presented my reasons for pushing you away, as if your success was a bad thing when that is not the case. Please do not think that any of my feelings about my life reflect anything but admiration for your success. Professional and personally.”
“I was born into money, sweetheart. In the end, I made my own, but I never had to question how I would pay for school. I never had to worry about taking care of a sick parent.”
He hits about ten nerves with that statement. “You’re setting me apart from you,” I say, “And that’s what I did downstairs. That’s not what I want.”
“I can assure you, Lori Havens,” he says, lowering his voice, “the last thing I want is to set you apart from me.”
“Then don’t.”
“I won’t,” he says.
That’s as far as I get. His cell phone rings in his pocket and he kisses me. “How much do you want to bet that’s the driver wondering where we are?” He glances at the number and nods. “That would be a yes.” He motions for me to follow him into the bedroom, which ironically is a signal that we have to focus on work.
“Five minutes,” he says into the phone, disappearing into the bedroom.
I quickly follow, entering a room that, much like downstairs, is all clean lines and masculinity, with a low king bed with a gray leather headboard and a seating area off to the left. Cole enters another doorway to my right, and almost immediately returns with a suitcase in his hands. “For you,” he announces, setting it by the bed. “Those bags you brought with you won’t transport easily.”
In other words, he knows I don’t have a suitcase. “Thank you,” I say.
He arches a brow. “No other comment?”
“Just that you miss nothing,” I reply.
“If that were true,” he says. “I wouldn’t have been cocky enough to believe that I’d won you over in that hotel room. And I damn sure wouldn’t have gotten in the shower without taking you with me.”
“You had me at hello, Cole. You know that.”
“And yet I didn’t.”
“You do now.”
“No,” he says. “But I intend to change that.”
His cell phone rings yet again and I’m left feeling that I might still be a challenge to Cole, and wishing we had time to really talk. Cole’s call is quick, but he’s only just disconnected when it buzzes again. “I’m never going to get packed at this rate,” he grumbles, answering the line with, “Cole Brooks,” which tells me he doesn’t know the number on his ID.
He listens a moment and then says, “Now what?” ignoring his suitcase as he focuses wholly on the call, which I soon decipher as the private airline flying us tonight, dealing with some sort of challenge. I walk to the items sitting on the bed by his suitcase and get to work.
He steps to my side, takes my hand, and kisses it, a smile in his gorgeous eyes that reads like a welcome into his personal space. Just that easily, my fears that I am still a challenge, and nothing more to Cole, fade. He turns away from me and goes back and forth on his call before he disconnects the line and scrubs his jaw. “There was a problem with the pilot who was taking us up,” he says, zipping up his bag before I can.
I frown, not a happy flyer, even without that statement. “What problem?”
“They have sleep regulations he would have hit mid-flight, but the on-call pilot called in while they had me on the phone. We’re good and if we leave now, we can be in the air in an hour.”
***
Three minutes later, we’re rolling his bags through the lobby. Once we’re at the trunk of the hired car, Cole helps me pack my bags into the suitcase, and then this time when we join the driver both of us settling into the backseat, our energy is different. We’re still sitting a professional distance apart, but there isn’t a world between us. Just the conversation we haven’t finished having, that we can’t have until we are alone, that he may or may not know, is important.
The car starts to move, and for now, I focus on the other important conversation we can have. “How far is the airport?”
“It’s a private strip,” Cole says. “About fifteen minutes.”
“This new pilot has slept his hours, right?”
He laughs. “I’m sensing you’re not a good flyer.”
“If you mean do I like sitting inside a big metal machine while some person I don’t know or trust, controls the wheel? No, I do not. And I already know that you’re a control freak. You don’t even like your files outside your office. How does it not bother you?”
“I’ll save us if we start to go down.”
I scoff and rotate to face him. “Do not joke about going down.”
His eyes meet mine, “I really will save you. I have my pilot’s license. My father was a pilot and I started flying when I was fifteen.”
“Did you really?”
“Scout’s honor, and yes, I was a scout. My father thought it would look good on a college resume, even though I was just a kid at the time. My mother thought it would teach me self-preservation and good manners.”
Now I laugh. “I saw those manners tonight,” I comment, lowering my voice, and repeating his words to Lance. “Who are you and why do I care?”
“An asshole gets asshole treatment.”
“You didn’t know that he was an asshole at that point, despite the fact that he is. You didn’t even know who he was.”
He reaches down and grabs my thigh, pulling me next him, and behind the driver’s seat, heat flaming between us instantly. His fingers flex on my leg and he leans in close, lowering his head near mine, his voice low, intimate, for my ears only. “I saw how he was looking at you. I knew he’d had you. I knew he still wanted you. I made sure he knew that wasn’t going to happen.” He cups my face, cheek pressed to mine. “I made sure he knows he has to go through me to get to you again.” He eases back, and even in the darkness and shadows, the flicker of passing lights illuminate the hard lines of determination on his handsome face and the heat of possession burning in his eyes. Perhaps I should push back. Perhaps I should worry that I will lose myself if I’m consumed by such a man, as I had that day on the street. But I’m not the same person, in the same situation.
I lean in and press my lips to his. He cups my head in that hot, possessive way he does, and kisses me to the point I really want to fuck him right here, in this car. And when he pulls back and gives me a smile, before sliding his arm around my shoulders to hold me close for the rest of the ride, I come to a conclusion: I’ve seen death and illness. Life is too short to feel what I feel with this man and walk away, especially when I trust this man, which is big for me af
ter feeling betrayed by my father, and even Lance for that matter.
That’s the bottom line to me; trust is paramount. As long as I can trust Cole, I can do this with Cole.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Cole
The car turns into the airport, but my mind is momentarily back in my apartment, in the moment when I’d opened my door to find Lori standing there. I’d been certain she was going to resign. I’d needed her to stay.
Need.
That word used to be about sex to me, at least where women were concerned. I’d have sworn that to be the case with Lori this morning, but not tonight. Tonight I know I need this woman in ways that reach beyond how much I want her.
This is new.
This is a first.
She is different.
And if I could take Lori back to my apartment and keep her there for a week solid to figure out what that means and where this is leading, I would, but duty calls and I’ll settle for her in a private jet by my side. The car pulls inside the airport hangar and halts. I open the door and exit the car, offering Lori my hand, when any other associate would be exiting on the opposite side of the vehicle, kept at a firm distance.
Lori’s hand presses to mine and I help her out of the car, but beyond a quick glance at her mouth that really needs to be kissed again, and soon, I quickly greet the driver, tip him, and coordinate our bags with an airline staff member. I motion Lori forward, and we fall into step, side-by-side in our walk toward the private jet, where for six hours I will have this woman nearly all to myself, much like I did that night in my hotel room.
We reach the stairs, and my hand settles at Lori’s back, which could be considered an innocent touch to a casual bystander, but of course, there is nothing innocent about the way I touch or think about this woman. I guide her forward and allow her to climb the short set of steps before me, also allowing me to enjoy the view of her heart-shaped beautiful ass in the process that only gets better naked and in my hands. Once we board the private jet, settle into luxurious side-by-side seats in the center of the plane, Lori by the window and me at the aisle, a flight attendant introduces herself. “I’m Katy. I’ll be taking care of you on the flight. Can I get you both a drink to start off the flight?”
I glance at her long enough to note her red hair, and age her at twenty-something, and only then because she’s offered us drinks. “Whiskey neat,” I say, glancing at Lori. “Are you a wine or whiskey girl this flight?”
“Coffee, please,” she says primly when we both know she’s far from prim. “Lots of cream and Splenda.”
The flight attendant hurries away and I turn to Lori. “We’re going to be in the air for six hours,” I remind her. “You can drink if you want to drink.”
“I’m a bad drinker,” she reminds me, lowering her tray table to set her MacBook on top. “Have you forgotten the wine?”
“I don’t remember anything bad about the night we drank wine together except you leaving, and you can’t leave this time.”
“I’m not leaving this time,” she says, which is the exact answer I’m looking for. “I’m going to stay around and own you this time.”
I laugh. “Own me, sweetheart,” I say, and I’m not above having a momentary fantasy of her naked body draped over my lap again, only this time her mouth is on my cock, which motivates me to add, “I’m looking forward to it.”
“Why do I know you just had a dirty thought?” she asks, opening her computer.
“Because I did,” I say, leaning closer. “Would you like me to share it?”
“No,” she says quickly. “You have a client to call, remember?”
“Never trust a flight attendant or much of anyone with our case work. We’re waiting until we have our drinks and they pull the curtain. And that’s not paranoid. I know an attorney who ran his mouth on a flight. He later found out that the flight attendant had been paid by opposing counsel to listen in on his conversations. Needless to say, the case took a brutally bad turn for him and his client. They lost.”
“I would have never been paranoid enough to worry about such a thing,” she admits. “Lesson learned and thankfully not the hard way.”
“It’s a good reason to never use your client’s name in public, and a lesson I’ve learned personally from experience, don’t say anything on the phone you don’t want recorded.”
“You’ve had that happen?”
“Once,” I say. “I almost lost the case over something that wasn’t at all what it was made out to be by the prosecution.”
“But you didn’t lose.”
“That’s the thing about a winning record,” I say. “Anyone who has one, has skill and luck.”
“Whiskey neat and coffee,” Katy says, reappearing with our drinks.
“How long until lift-off?” I ask Katy, accepting my glass from her, while Lori fires up the power on her MacBook.
“Another fifteen minutes,” she says. “That’s a slight delay, I know, but the pilot assures me we’ll make it up in the air.”
I glance at my watch, which now reads one o’clock in the morning. “Arrival time will be four in the morning LA time?” I ask.
“I’ll confirm the exact time after consulting the pilot’s flight plan,” she says. “Will you both be wanting snacks or sandwiches tonight once we’re in the air?”
“Yes,” I say, since I doubt Lori has eaten any more recently than me and to speed this up. “For now,” I say, “we need privacy to make a few private phone calls.”
“Yes, of course,” she says, hurrying away, and pulling the curtain shut behind her.
“Didn’t you say you represented this new client’s father?”
“Correct,” I confirm.
“Then why did she need to call Ashley in Paris to get your number? I assume with as high a profile as her father’s case was, you gave him your cell phone number. Are they estranged?”
Most people wouldn’t catch that little detail when they should. I’m impressed, but not surprised. “Her father is in Europe and apparently she couldn’t reach him,” I say, “or that’s what she told Ashley.” I motion to the computer. “Are you connected to the internet? Can you search his name for anything new I don’t know about?”
“I already did that while you were talking to Katy,” she says, “and on a cursory glance there is nothing worth mentioning.”
“How did you search him if I never told you his name?” I ask.
“She’s famous,” Lori says. “Her name got me there.”
“What did you find on her?” I ask, knowing at this point that she’s gone there, too.
“Still looking,” she says, glancing over at me. “I need more time to promise you there’s nothing beyond what we know thus far. Often, I find things are hidden deep inside a write-up, and it takes time to find those tidbits.”
“Fair enough,” I say, reaching for my phone. “I’m going to call her and then the detective in charge of the case.” I grab my phone and hit the number Ashley texted me for Tara. She answers on the first ring.
“Cole,” she all but pants out. “I need help. The police—”
“Stop right now,” I say. “Do not say anything to me on an open line and expect it to be private. Now, keeping that in mind, I’ll ask questions, you answer simple. Understand?”
“Yes.”
“First, I’m on a plane waiting for take-off. I’ll be there in the morning along with one of my associates. Two, they want to question you on the death of David Curry, correct?”
“Yes, but I—”
“Yes is enough,” I say. “Did you answer any questions without me?”
“Very few.”
“That’s a yes. I’ll need you to write down the details now while they’re fresh. Who’s the lead detective?”
“Josh Waller.”
“Text me his number. Does your father know this is going on?”
“No,” she says. “He’s in Europe and my bigg
est fear was that he’d rush back to protect me, which might be what the police want. This is about them using me against him.”
“But you told Ashley you tried to reach him. That was a lie.”
“Yes, but—”
“If you lie to me or my people, I will not represent you. If that’s a problem, tell me now, before the plane I’m sitting on takes off.”
“It’s not a problem,” she says quickly. “I’m sorry. I’m scared and overwhelmed.”
“I’m not a babysitter and I don’t offer sympathy, even when billed for the time. You lie one more time and it might land you behind bars. As for your father, he needs to know what is going on. Call him and tell him, but advise him to talk to me before he gets on a plane.” I pause for her confirmation.
“I’ll do it when we hang up.”
“Refuse to answer any questions from anyone until I arrive. That’s all until I see you. We’ll be at your home at eight. Text me the address when you text me the detective’s number.”
“I’ll make sure security knows you’re arriving.”
“Don’t make phone calls or talk about this to anyone,” I order. “Wait on me.”
“I’m innocent,” she says.
“Tell me tomorrow.” I disconnect.
“Well?” Lori asks when I hang up.
“She says she’s innocent and in my experience, those who are guilty make that statement ten times more often than the innocent.” I motion to the computer and her research. “Anything worth sharing?”
“She had a personal relationship with the deceased, as in fuck buddies, or more. I have photos of them together, dating back two years.”
“I would assume she would tell us that in the morning,” I say.
“Except that she told a reporter tonight that they barely knew each other.”
My jaw clenches. “She talked to a reporter tonight?”
Dirty Rich Cinderella Story Page 18