by Cari Z
Table of Contents
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2020 by Cari Z. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
Entangled Publishing, LLC
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Parker, CO 80134
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Brazen is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.
Edited by Amy Acosta
Cover design by Mayhem Cover Creations
Cover photography by svetikd and Dasha_Romanova/Getty Images
ISBN 978-1-64937-117-1
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition December 2020
Dear Reader,
Thank you for supporting a small publisher! Entangled prides itself on bringing you the highest quality romance you’ve come to expect, and we couldn’t do it without your continued support. We love romance, and we hope this book leaves you with a smile on your face and joy in your heart.
xoxo
Liz Pelletier, Publisher
This book is a true labor of love, and I’m honored to share it with you. I hope you enjoy the town of Edgewood as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Chapter One
Max
I glanced at my phone, which I’d just hung up a few minutes ago, and suppressed a groan. Why had I said yes to going back home? Why? My best friend had cornered me right before the most important meeting of my career, and I’d made some panicked, vaguely assenting noises. Agreeing under duress was grounds for invalidating any promise, but I didn’t think Hal would care about the legalese.
Get your head in the game, Max.
I stared at myself in the mirror of my boss’ private bathroom and adjusted my tie, a textured black silk with narrow silver stripes, for the fourth time. It was just the classy touch the suit needed, sober but not stuffy, which was the impression we were shooting for with this client. I shifted the knot the tiniest bit to the right then nodded. Good, it was fine, it was perfect, just like how this meeting was going to go.
Everything else would be perfect as well if I could figure out a way to get out of going back to Edgewood.
Maybe I’d focused so hard on just one thing for the past three weeks—this meeting—that my brain couldn’t comprehend anything else that got thrown at it. Like random requests from my best friend for me to spend Christmas with him and his family in my hometown, rather than them coming to stay with me like they often did. Gah, I hadn’t been back to Edgewood in over a decade. I hadn’t wanted to be there.
I still didn’t want to be there.
“Why didn’t you just say no?” I snarked at myself as I adjusted my tie yet again. Because it was Hal, that was why. When he blindsided me by asking me to come back for Christmas—the girls’ first major holiday since their mom had freaked out and left, and his reason for wanting them to be in familiar, comfortable surroundings instead of my tiny apartment in the city—all I could think to say was, “Yes.”
“Max, you almost ready?” Marcus called from somewhere in the office—probably at his desk. He might as well have been grafted to it for all he moved from it most days.
“Almost!” I replied.
It wasn’t every day I could say that my future literally hung in the balance of what happened next, but today was that day for me. This wasn’t just a potential client meeting. This was one that I had brought in and I was taking the lead on. The billables it would bring our firm had the potential to kick me into another tax bracket and net me a promotion as well if I shared enough of the glory with my mentor. Which, of course, I would—Marcus had shepherded me through the first three years of my career, and he deserved to share the credit once I started bringing in real money. Partner-level money.
If I got this promotion, I would be the first person hired in my year to get to the junior partner level in Staller, Weisz and Coast. If I got this promotion, I would have enough money to move out of my tiny top-floor apartment and live some place that didn’t somehow feel hot and cold at the same time. Some place where I wouldn’t have to put Hal on a fold-out couch and convince the girls they didn’t hear roaches in the walls at night when they visited. If I got this promotion, I would finally be able to take the vacation I’d been planning for what felt like forever—go down to Florida and visit my mom in the Keys then spend a solid week on the beaches of Miami getting a tan and finding a friendly guy to enjoy the evenings with.
Basically, I had to get this promotion, and that started with this meeting going well.
I smoothed my hair back one last time, turned my phone off and tucked it into the pocket specially designed for it inside my jacket—who even knew suits were made with pockets like that? I definitely hadn’t before I got to New York City—and exited the bathroom. Marcus was at his desk like I’d thought, but he was standing, shuffling through the brief I’d typed up last week for probably the fifth time today.
“Are you sure about this initial offer?” he asked with a frown. Marcus had the broadness of a football player well into retirement—wide shoulders, big chest, and a belly that he tamed with an aggressively fitted waistcoat. “It seems a bit low to me. Once you start dealing with players at this level, they care more about paying enough than paying too little.”
“It’s five percent above what they were paying before,” I said, shutting the bathroom door and coming over to the desk. “And there’s a clause for renegotiation after the first year on page fifteen.”
Marcus shrugged and made a meh sound then glanced up at me. “Hey—looking pretty good, Max. Is that one of the suits Clara helped you find?” Clara Staller was Marcus’s wife, a woman with a deep understanding of fashion and an uncanny ability to pick clothes that would make almost anyone look good. She’d cornered me at my first company holiday party and gently let me know that black—straight-up solid black, like the suit I’d been wearing at that very moment—was only for funerals and federal agents, not lawyers with big corporate clients. She’d given me some good tips and the occasional nudge in the right direction, and now I could swim with the sharks without looking like a tasty guppy.
Usually. A lock of my golden-brown hair fell across my face, still unruly after multiple applications of gel. I sighed and pushed it back into place. “Yeah, a few months ago.”
“It’s a good one. Unlike this clause.”
No, no, nope. I wasn’t even going to think about that clause right now or about reworking it. I had too many other things swirling around in my head. Like a trip to Edgewood I was most definitely going to find a way out of.
“The clause is fine,” I said firmly. “It’s standard for an initial presentation, and it’s
too late to take it out of the paperwork anyway.”
Marcus stared solemnly at me for a long moment before his square, ruddy face broke into a broad smile. He clapped me on the shoulder. “Way to stick to your guns, son. That’s what I’ve been looking for from you. That’s the attitude you need to win in this business. Be firm, but flexible, and don’t let the client or your co-counsel bully you into making rash decisions.”
“I learned from the best.”
He chuckled. “I’m happy to be sitting in on this meeting, but I don’t honestly think you’re going to need me. You’ve worked really hard on this, and it shows, Max. Trust me when I tell you that the other partners are paying attention to your dedication to this firm. Ever since Peterson left, you’re at the top of their list.”
That was a funny choice in words. Peterson hadn’t left. The twenty-seven-year-old guy had been carried out of here on a stretcher after suffering a heart attack in his office two months ago. His office that was the one next door to mine. He’d almost died while I’d been right next door, too focused on work to even notice.
I mentally shook myself out of it. Now wasn’t the time for that kind of recollection. Or for worrying about unintended promises—no way I was going back home. Now was the time to get my game face on and land my first big client.
“Even so,” Marcus said. “It never hurts to revise your paperwork.”
I chuckled and grabbed the second folder with my copy of the paperwork from Marcus’s desk and checked it one last time. I wasn’t the sort to swagger—at least I didn’t think I was—but I couldn’t help feeling confident.
I finished looking over the paperwork then closed it up in the folder and squared my shoulders. With a nod at Marcus, I led the way, marching down to the conference room.
I was going to close this deal and rake in the accolades from the firm’s partners while I hammered out the details of what this client wanted from us. Maybe I’d even go to a bar tonight and find a warm, willing someone to have a private celebration with—someone who didn’t mind lying back and letting me take the lead. There was no one special, but there didn’t need to be—I had been focused like a laser on my career for the past three years, and that focus was finally paying off. Finding a boyfriend could happen later. Getting the promotion that could catapult me to partner level?
That was going to happen right now.
…
One lunch meeting, two hours, and three signatures later, Marcus was grinning proudly and pounding me on the back as soon as the conference room door closed. “You nailed it,” he said, voice quiet so it didn’t carry to the clients, who were being seen out by Jessie, but still effusive. “I couldn’t have handled that meeting better myself. I thought by the end of it, they were going to beg to sign with you.”
I grinned back at him. “It did go well, didn’t it?”
“Like I said, couldn’t have gone better. What on earth did you do to impress the old man so much, huh?”
“I complimented his taste in movies.” Actually, I’d complimented his taste in classic cars, which had segued into a discussion of Bond films and eventually come around to talking about his business needs and how he might benefit from a different law firm representing him.
But that wasn’t the sort of detail Marcus cared about, and sure enough, he simply shrugged and said, “Well, whatever works is what I always say. I’ll approve the overtime so you can keep Jessie here late tonight to get things sorted for the next round of talks on Monday.”
“Of course,” I said, taking out my phone to write last-minute notes and set some reminders. The moment the screen lit up, it buzzed with an incoming call.
I was so startled I almost dropped it. Hal, the caller ID read. Why was he calling me? We’d just talked a couple of hours ago.
Actually…now might be as good a time as any to call off the trip.
“Sorry, I’ve got to take this,” I told Marcus.
Marcus gave me one more clap on the back and walked away, and I answered the call just before it tipped over into voicemail.
“Hal, hey, I’m glad you called back. Listen, things are ridiculously busy here. We just landed a major client, and I need to let you know that—”
“Hi, Max!”
Oh god, it wasn’t Hal. It was Marnie, his older daughter, newly turned eight and very proud of it. All the briskness dropped out of my tone as I replied, “Hey, sweetie! What’s going on? Why are you on your daddy’s phone?”
“I wanted to call you, Max! Daddy said he talked to you, but he forgot to let me talk to you, so I found your picture in his phone and pushed it. I put you on speaker so Steph can hear, too.”
“Wow, that’s…you’re…” Unexpectedly good with her dad’s phone. “It’s so nice to hear from you, Marnie. Listen, I’m still at work and have some things to finish, but I’ll call you tomorrow, and we can—”
“Max, you don’t have to call me!” She giggled. “You’ll be here already. Daddy said so. You can just talk to me in the face!”
Oh damn…I loved the way she mixed her metaphors, but I was less enthusiastic about letting her down. “Well actually, sweetie, that’s one of the things I wanted to talk to your daddy about. See, it’s so busy here right now that I don’t think I’ll be able to get up to see you this holiday.”
There was a long silence, finally broken with, “But…but Daddy said you would.”
“Daddy” had ambushed me with the invitation in a moment of distraction, and I’d given in. Now I needed to extricate myself as painlessly as possible, but it wasn’t going to be easy. I glanced at the clock on the conference room wall and winced. “I know, girls, but that was before my schedule got so out of hand, and now—”
“But you told Daddy you would come!” Marnie’s voice was getting shrill and a little distant, like she was rearing back from the phone. “First Mommy won’t come back and now you won’t come at all, and we can’t go and see you, and Christmas is going to be so sad!”
I could picture her little face crumpling, and I didn’t even want to know what Steph looked like—she’d almost completely stopped speaking since her mom left.
Oh my god, I was the worst person ever.
I was the Grinch who stole Christmas.
“Okay, okay. Please don’t yell. I…I’ll be there,” I said recklessly. There had to be a way I could do it. Even if it was just one night, I could do that for Hal and the girls. “Tonight, okay? I’ll be there tonight.” I could be out of the office by three, pack up and be on the road by three thirty, get to Edgewood by seven thirty, and have a little time with the girls before they went to bed.
We could drink hot chocolate, open the presents I’d sent them ahead of time, and I could talk with Hal once they were asleep and see how he was really doing with the divorce. Maybe convince him to bring the girls up to the city for New Year’s, once the furor over this deal died down a bit.
I could do it. Given the way Marnie was crowing right now, so excited I could make out the sound of her feet hopping against the floor, I’d better do it. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” she shrieked. The hopping got louder—maybe Steph had joined in.
“Anything for you two.” I was wrapped around their little fingers, case in point. “I’ll see you soon, okay?”
“Okay, Max, bye!”
I ended the call then pressed the edge of my cell phone to my temple and sighed. I really didn’t want to go to Edgewood, but I didn’t have a choice anymore. I couldn’t let the girls down, yet I also couldn’t throw away months of work on this client.
“Max? You okay?”
Jessie, my assistant, stood uncertainly at the conference room door.
I forced a smile. “I’m fine. I know it’s unusual, but would you be available to help me do the prep work for Monday’s meeting tomorrow afternoon? I’ll make sure you’re paid overtime.” I’d make sure of it if I h
ad to pay her myself—the partners didn’t tend to approve overtime on weekends for admin staff, but screw that. I needed the help, and Jessie knew her stuff.
“That’s fine, Max. I’ll be around. Just give me an hour or so’s notice, okay?”
“Great, thank you.”
She nodded then grinned. “It sounds like the meeting went well. Are you happy with the results?”
I grinned back. “Very happy.”
Unfortunately, Marcus was not happy when I told him of my sudden plans.
I did my best not to wince at his disapproval. “It’s a family emergency,” I added when Marcus’s frown verged on turning into a scowl.
“Is someone dying?” he asked bluntly.
I shook my head.
“Then how is it an emergency?”
Given that he hadn’t made a single birthday party his wife had thrown for their sons since I started working here, I knew this wasn’t hyperbole on his part, but it didn’t matter. I’d made a promise to Marnie and Steph, and I wouldn’t break it.
“I have to go. But I’ll be back tomorrow,” I assured him. “There’ll be plenty of time to get the preliminary work done before the meeting on Monday.”
“Max.” Marcus shook his head heavily. “You’re this close to securing a real future for you in the firm, and the last thing you want is to falter right before the finish line. You can’t afford any distractions right now. You’ve signed the client to a preliminary agreement, but that’s not going to be enough to hold them here if they feel undervalued.”
“I’ll make sure they don’t.” But I also wasn’t going to make my best friend and his family feel undervalued, especially not this close to the holidays. I couldn’t go back on my word now, I just couldn’t. Not after talking to Marnie.
Besides, it was just one night.
“I’ll handle it, sir.”
It wasn’t the first time Marcus had been angry at me, and it wouldn’t be the last. Experience had taught me it was better not to dwell on other people’s feelings, especially when I had no hope of changing them. Right now, I needed to get home, pack, and get on the road. To Edgewood, land of a dozen decent memories and a thousand bad ones. Well, really only a few bad ones, but they took up so much space in my brain that they felt limitless.