by Zaires, Anna
“Great call on the place,” he says to Marcus as he takes a seat next to Kendall. “I’ve been meaning to try it, but you beat me to it.” With a megawatt smile, he turns to my friend. “Ashton Vancroft,” he says, his smooth, deep voice dropping another octave as he extends his hand. “And you are?”
To my surprise, instead of looking dazzled, my friend is outright glaring at him. “Kendall Bryce,” she says through gritted teeth, ignoring the proffered hand. When he lowers it, she flips her sleek dark hair over her shoulder and pointedly angles her chair so she’s facing partially away from him.
I gape at her in disbelief. I’ve never seen Kendall be so rude to anyone, not even that time in college when a drunk guy kept hitting on her throughout the entire party. What’s even stranger is that instead of taking offense, Ashton looks entertained, his smile widening to a wicked grin as he leans back in his chair and crosses his ankle over his knee in the ultimate man-at-ease pose. “So,” he drawls, as if Kendall isn’t a block of ice at his side, “what’s good here?”
Looking just as puzzled as I feel, Marcus says wryly, “Everything, I assume.” Then he cocks an eyebrow. “Do you two know each other?”
“No,” Kendall snaps before Ashton can get a word out. Her perfect features are arranged into the closest thing to a scowl I’ve ever seen on her face. With a jerky motion, she flags down our waiter, and when he hurries over, she orders a pitcher of sangria.
“Are you going to share that?” Ashton asks, glancing at her rigid profile. His eyes are gleaming with the same wicked amusement. “Or are you planning to drink the whole thing by yourself?”
I clear my throat. “So, Ashton, how is your business going?” I figure it’s best to step in before Kendall can deck him—because she looks like she really, really wants to. “Any luck slowing down that revenue growth?”
“Afraid not.” He grimaces, shifting his focus away from my fuming friend. “It’s like a snowball rolling down a mountain—just keeps gathering momentum.” His dazzling grin returning, he looks from me to Marcus. “How about you two lovebirds? How’s everything? Is the wedding date already set?”
I burst out laughing. “Oh, yes. It’s tomorrow night at Disney World. Six o’clock. Be there or meet Mickey’s wrath.”
I expect Marcus to join in the fun, but when I glance over at him, there’s zero amusement on his face. Instead, he’s looking at Ashton like he’d like to kill him. Slowly. After a few hours of torture.
Ashton must realize his joke didn’t go over well because he clears his throat and also motions to the waiter, who comes over with the same record-setting speed. “What have you got on tap?” he asks, and the waiter rattles off a list of beer names, most of which I’ve never heard of. Ashton orders one, and Marcus gets one too, leaving me the only one at the table without an alcoholic beverage—or a clue as to why everyone’s so tense.
To my relief, Marcus shakes off whatever mood came over him and takes over the conversation, asking Kendall and Ashton about their Christmas plans—both intend to go home to their families—before skillfully steering the conversation back to my cats and their shenanigans. By the time we’re done telling the story of Queen Elizabeth stealing a piece of steak from under Geoffrey’s nose, all of us are laughing, and most of the tension is gone—at least on the surface. Kendall is still avoiding looking at Ashton, and he seems to derive great enjoyment from her behavior, as if she were a sulky but cute toddler.
They must’ve met before. I can’t think of any other explanation.
When the appetizers come out, Kendall excuses herself to go to the bathroom, and I follow her there, determined to get to the bottom of the mystery. But it’s a single stall, so I end up waiting outside, and Kendall avoids my questioning gaze as she comes out and hurries back to the table.
Fine. I’ll have to interrogate her after.
“Any luck?” Marcus murmurs in my ear when I return to the table, and I shake my head with a rueful grin. Clearly, he’s as curious as I am—and has had just as little luck getting answers from his friend.
As the meal proceeds, Marcus and I employ every conversational gambit in our arsenal to keep the tension from returning, and we succeed—mostly because after three glasses of sangria, Kendall seems to forget about the man at her side and becomes her normal friendly, bubbly self. Laughing, she describes the ridiculous errands her boss sends her on before launching into a hilarious story about a recent date gone wrong. “He was determined to show me his ex-girlfriend’s picture,” she says, her hazel eyes sparkling as she cuts into her Eggs Benedict. “No matter what I said.”
Marcus and I are both whooping by this point, but when I look at Ashton, I notice that his smile seems forced, his hand clenched tightly on his fork. It’s not until the conversation shifts to our favorite shows and movies that he relaxes, his easy charm returning as we debate the pros and cons of Avatar and Game of Thrones.
With skill and effort, we manage to keep the conversation flowing until the waiter brings the check, at which point the collective sigh of relief is almost audible. In a typical alpha male fashion, Marcus and Ashton argue over who pays before deciding to split the bill in half, with Marcus effectively paying for me and Ashton for Kendall. I fully expect her to be okay with that—my friend has never had a problem letting men buy her food and drinks—but she whips out her credit card and, glaring at Ashton, plunks it down into the waiter’s hand, instructing him to charge her portion there.
“This isn’t a double date,” she explains tersely when I look at her with eyebrows raised. Then she chugs the rest of her sangria, and as soon as the waiter returns with the credit cards, she grabs her card, signs her check, and, with a rushed goodbye to me and Marcus, runs away.
40
Emma
Over the next week, I do my best to pry some answers out of Kendall, but in a very un-Kendall-like fashion, she stonewalls me, claiming that she just thinks Ashton is an entitled ass. “I know his type,” she says with more than a trace of bitterness. “He’s a complete and total manwhore, a pretty boy who’s never had to work for anything in his life. Everything’s been handed to him on a silver platter, all the women always falling at his feet. Well, I see right through his bullshit, and I’m not buying that fake-charm act.”
And no matter how much I try to pin her down on the reason for that opinion, she doesn’t tell me more. Marcus doesn’t get anywhere with Ashton either, though the guy does let slip something along the lines of “a gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell,” confirming my impression that they’d already met… and possibly done more than talking.
The mystery with our friends aside, my second week of living with Marcus is everything I could’ve hoped for and more. Though on the surface we’re completely different, we mesh together seamlessly, as if all along we’d been two pieces of one whole.
After the brunch on Saturday, we spend the rest of the weekend by ourselves, doing a mix of fun activities and work. We view some modern art at MOMA, then brave the chilly weather to take a long walk in Central Park. When we get hungry, I buy us tacos from a food truck, and we eat them while strolling along Park Avenue, where Marcus shows me his office building. In the evening, we relax at home with a rented movie, then do a little work, sitting with our laptops on the couch side by side—that is, until a certain someone decides that my pajama tank top is a sexual provocation and drags me off to bed.
On Sunday, another icy storm blankets the city, so we don’t go anywhere, staying warm and cozy inside the penthouse with my cats. Marcus does his usual hardcore gym workout after breakfast, and because I have nothing better to do, I let him teach me how to properly lift weights. Afterward, we swim in the pool and eat lunch, then Skype for an hour with my grandparents. In the afternoon, we again do some work, and I covertly write another chapter of my secret project.
I now have five thousand words, and I’m getting seriously excited.
On the weekdays, we repeat the routine from last week, except Marcus convinces me to
swim with him in the evenings. At first, I’m reluctant—I’ve always been too tired for exercise when I get home from work—but the pool is so convenient and refreshing that by the middle of the week, I find myself looking forward to the activity. Not that I’m a skilled swimmer or anything—I do something between a dog paddle and leisurely frog style—but it’s enough for my sluggish muscles because by Tuesday, I’m seriously sore. Of course, it could also be from the weightlifting on Sunday; it was the first time I’d stepped foot inside a gym in years.
“Poor kitten. Let me see if I can help,” Marcus croons sympathetically when I complain that I hurt all over. Then he lays me face down on our bed and goes to work, massaging each aching muscle until I’m overcooked spaghetti in seventh heaven—at which point he turns me over and makes me sore in an entirely different way.
It’s all so perfect it frightens me. If things go south now, it won’t just break my heart—it will completely devastate me. With each day that passes, I fall deeper under Marcus’s spell, grow ever more addicted to his vital presence and the way he makes me feel like I’m the only woman in the world. When we’re together, his focus on me is so absolute I feel like he notices every blink of my lashes, every subtle shift in my mood. Even when we’re both working on our laptops, a change in my breathing is all it takes for those cool blue eyes to home in on me… and fill with familiar dark heat.
He’s so intense about me sometimes it should be a relief when we’re apart, but it’s not—because I start missing him within the first ten seconds.
“Stop being such a scaredy cat. Why would things go south?” Kendall says when I confide in her during my lunch hour on Wednesday. “You two are perfect for each other. I’ve never seen a couple so in love.”
“That’s the thing.” I prop up my phone so I have my hands free to unwrap my sandwich—another fancy concoction of prosciutto on thinly sliced rye with arugula and fig jam. “You see, I love Marcus, but I have no idea if he loves me.”
Kendall snorts. “Yeah, okay, please. That man worships the cat-hair carpet you walk on. Case in point: he’s carved out an evening for you two to go to dinner with Janie and Mr. Suck-Up.”
I grimace. “Yeah, don’t remind me.” Biting into the sandwich, I mumble through a mouthful, “I agreed to go last week, but I’d much rather cuddle with Marcus and our cats at home.”
“Our cats, is it?” Kendall grins. “Are they his fur babies now too?”
“They might as well be,” I say after I finish chewing. “Cottonball has changed allegiances completely, and Queen Elizabeth is warming up more to Marcus every day. Mr. Puffs is the only holdout, but I think it’s because he’s batting for the third team.”
“His father, Satan?” Kendall guesses.
I shake my head. “Geoffrey, Marcus’s butler. Those two are getting tight. My cat actually behaves in his presence. Doesn’t even try to steal food when he cooks in the kitchen, can you imagine?”
“No way.” Kendall sounds appropriately shocked. “Maybe he has a thing for British men.”
“He certainly seems to,” I say, then recall the mystery that’s bugging me. “Speaking of men—American, not British—how did you and Ashton—”
“Wow, real smooth, Ms. Sleuth. Now why don’t you finish your delicious-looking sandwich, and I’ll go get myself a boring salad for lunch.” And as she hangs up, I hear her mutter enviously, “A butler who cooks, my foot.”
* * *
To my relief, the dinner with Janie and Landon that evening goes smoothly, with the banker only briefly wrinkling his patrician nose at the patch of cat hair that got on my new, stylish outfit when Mr. Puffs ambushed us on the way out. After that, Janie’s boyfriend turns on the charm, and though it’s definitely on the slightly fake side, the four of us end up having a good time—even after Marcus has another sneezing fit from Janie’s perfume.
“I’m so sorry,” she apologizes for the tenth time as we say our goodbyes, with me prudently avoiding hugging her this time. “I swear, I would’ve never worn it had I known.”
“No, stop. It’s totally my fault. I should’ve warned you,” I say, feeling bad. “At home, we’ve got almost everything unscented, so I forgot.”
“We’ll be sure to avoid any and all fragrance the next time we meet,” Landon announces, shaking Marcus’s hand with a big, toothy smile. I picture him throwing out Janie’s perfume that very night, lest he repeat the error with another important business contact, and hide my grin.
One billionaire’s perfume allergy may spare the public—and Janie herself—from at least one overly strong smell.
“Do you think he’s going to throw out every perfume bottle they’ve got?” Marcus asks when we’re in the car on the way home.
“Oh, yeah,” I say. It’s scary how our minds are so often on the same page these days. “You better buy some stock in whichever company makes unscented products. Now that Landon’s on the case, it’s going to be the next big thing.”
And as we laugh in that way of two people perfectly attuned to each other, I finally decide how to handle the situation with my apartment.
I’m going to get rid of my old furniture and trust that what we have is real.
41
Marcus
When Emma informs me that she’s listing her remaining stuff on Craigslist and officially giving up her place, I feel both triumphant and relieved—and to my surprise, a little guilty.
“You did what?” Ashton gapes at me in disbelief when I meet him for coffee near my office on Thursday and fess up about the situation.
I scrub a hand over my face. “I just told you. I got Long to buy her landlady’s townhouse in Brooklyn at above-market value.”
“To force Emma to move in with you,” Ashton clarifies, staring at me like I’ve lost my marbles.
“No, to nudge her to move in with me,” I snap. Fucking Ashton; I was really counting on him being on my side in this. “She has all these hang-ups about money and not wanting to take advantage of me, and I screwed up with her once before, so she’s got trust issues… We were heading there anyway, and I just wanted to expedite things, okay? Is that so fucking wrong?”
“Not if you’re Machiavelli.” He props his elbows on the table, looking fascinated. “What else have you done to this poor girl?”
“Nothing.” Then some demonic creature—Mr. Puffs, perhaps—tugs on my tongue, and I grudgingly admit, “I may have also had her investigated when we first started dating.”
“What the fuck?” He straightens. “Why? Did you think she’s some kind of criminal?”
“Of course not. She said she didn’t want to see me after a particularly great date, and I needed some information to figure out how to— You know what? Never mind.” I don’t like the way he’s looking at me—like I’m admitting to murder.
Hasn’t every man in love done at least a little stalking?
“Oh, no.” He picks up his cup, dark amusement curling the corners of his mouth. “You’re not getting out of this so easily. If I understand it right, you pretty much stalked Emma until you got her to date you, and now you’ve also made sure she has no choice but to move in with you.”
“Bullshit. She has a choice. She could’ve gotten a different apartment. She decided to live with me of her own free will.” Which is why I don’t understand why I feel any guilt over this situation whatsoever.
“Yeah, sure.” Ashton is full-on laughing now, the bastard. “So how are you going to get her to marry you? Blackmail? Torture? Kidnapping?”
“Fuck you, man. One day, you’ll meet a woman who won’t put up with your bullshit, and then you’ll see what measures you resort to.”
A strange expression crosses Ashton’s face, but I’m too pissed to dwell on it. Picking up my cup, I down my coffee in a few long gulps and stand up. “I’ve got to go.”
“Marcus, wait.” Ashton jumps to his feet and steps in front of me before I can walk away from the table. “Listen, I’m sorry, man.” He sounds genuinely contrite
. “You just caught me off-guard. You have to admit it’s kind of ridiculous that you’re The Herald’s most eligible billionaire or whatever, and you have to resort to this kind of shit to get a bookstore clerk to be with you. But”—he raises his palm before I can plant my fist into his face—“having met Emma twice now, and seen the way you two are together, I understand why you’re so hung up on her.”
Some of my anger eases. “You do?”
“Oh, yeah.” He gets back to his seat, and after a moment of deliberation, I sit down as well. “I’ve always admired your drive, you know,” he says, picking up his coffee cup. “Remember that first time we all went to a bar, after our Corporate Finance exam? Barry was there, and his girlfriend, Lina? Anyway, we’d all had a few beers, and then you told us you were going to be a billionaire. Remember that?” He takes a sip.
I force my tightly curled hand to unclench. “I do, yeah.” It was a few days after Ashton and I had been partnered up on our Corporate Finance project, before we really got to know each other and became friends.
Ashton sets down his cup. “Right. Well, here’s the thing. As drunk as we were, no one laughed at your proclamation. No one was even tempted to laugh because we all knew you’d make it happen. You radiated ambition; it practically oozed from your pores. You were like a fucking missile, locked and loaded and on the way to your target. Nobody doubted that you’d get there—not our teachers, not our fellow students, and certainly not me.”
I frown. “So?”
“So I envied you that.” Ashton’s face is as serious as I’ve ever seen it. “You knew exactly what you wanted out of life, and I didn’t have a fucking clue. But recently, having observed you over the past couple of years, I realized something. That missile-like determination, that ambition that propelled you forward, you couldn’t turn it off. You made your billions, and you just kept going, unable to stop, unable to appreciate any of it.”