Love, Money, and Lies

by Olivia Saxton

  “Okay, but what was the hold up? Were you getting a drink of water?”

  “No. I just had to . . . sort my head out for a minute,” she lied. The last thing Margo wanted to tell her best friend was that she had slept with the man who had ghosted her. She walked into the kitchen.

  “Oh, well, I wanted to partake in some girl talk. My boss has taken up a lot of my time lately. I just got home from the hotel where we meet at.”

  “Hotel? I take it he’s married.”

  “Yes. I feel kind of bad about that, but he claimed that his wife had no interest in him anymore. But you know how that goes.”

  “Yeah. He’s lying. Even if he isn’t, it’s very rare husbands leave their wives despite the fact that they are unhappy or bored.” Margo opened the refrigerator and took out a bottle of club soda.

  “True, but he’s nice, and he does give me gifts. Matter of fact, we have plans to spend a weekend on a yacht. It belongs to a friend of his that’s really rich. He claims it’s a hundred-footer.”

  “Nice,” she commented as she sat down on the sofa in the living room. She placed the bottle between her thighs and opened it with one had.

  “It’s this upcoming weekend,” Bobbi said. “He told me I could bring a friend. So, do you want to come?”

  Margo thought about it. “I appreciate the invite, but I don’t think it’s a good idea. After you upload . . . what you need to upload, you’ll have to disappear. Your boss might get angry that he spent a lot of money on you and then you up and disappear. The last thing we need is for him to be able to track you down through a friend.”

  “You can wear a wig. You’d look good as a dark-haired brunette.”

  “Maybe, but I don’t think it’s worth the risk.”

  “Oh come on, how often do you or I get invited to a weekend-long boat party on a really big yacht? I mean a hundred-footer! I know we can hang out on Aaron’s boat, but his is only forty feet. This is going to be epic.”

  Margo was tempted, but she didn’t think it would be smart. “I don’t know, Bobbi.”

  “I got it all figured out. I have a short, dark brunette wig that would be perfect for you. And you don’t have to tell them your real name. You can come up with something like Kat or Millie.”

  “Millie? That sounds like a name of a homely loser from the country,” Margo said with her nose turned up.

  Bobbie laughed. “Whatever name you want to choose.”

  “I need every second to work on the program.”

  “You still have plenty of time, and I have every confidence in you. Granted, I would rather you get it done so I won’t have to endure Daddy’s touch anymore. It’s the extra perks of being his mistress that keeps me motivated.”

  “Daddy?”

  “Yeah, that’s what he wants me to call him — outside of work, that is.”

  “Ugh. You really are taking one for the team.”

  “I am. So do you think you can find it in your heart to come to Dallas on Friday, and the three of us fly out that afternoon?”

  “I don’t know, Bobbi.”

  “Margo, this isn’t going to be some cheap trip with us bobbing in the ocean outside of Santa Barbara. The yacht party is in Monte Carlo.”

  “Are you serious?” Margo said with shock. She had always wanted to go to Monte Carlo, and she had studied French in high school and college. She loved the culture.

  “As a heart attack,” Bobbi confirmed.

  “Well, no, I can wait. After the caper, I’ll be able to go to France, including Monte Carlo, whenever I want.”

  “Yes, but we won’t be able to go together. You know Aaron was right. After the heist, we have to separate. We won’t be able to communicate or see each other ever again. Let’s take advantage of the time we still have together.”

  Bobbi’s statement hit her soul. She was going to miss Bobbi once all this was over. And she was going to miss Lacey and Lana, her buddies on Sunset Boulevard. “How many days will we be gone?”

  “Leaving Friday and coming back Sunday.”

  “The jetlag will be a bitch.”

  “Yes, but it will be worth it.”

  Margo licked her lips. She desperately wanted to go and to share the experience with her bestie. “I’ll have to use my real passport. Anthony doesn’t have time to make me one.”

  “Can’t you use the fake IDs that you used on the Coleman Bank score?”

  “Hell, no, I burned that stuff a long time ago.”

  “Burned what stuff?” he asked.

  Margo looked up.

  Bruce was standing in the middle of the staircase.

  “Oh, um, I have to go.”

  “Really? Why?”

  “I have . . . to go to the bathroom,” she blurted out.

  “Can you take the phone in there? It’s not like I’ll hear you.”

  Bruce started descending the rest of the stairs.

  “No. But, give me a day or two to think about it, okay? Bye,” she said and clicked off.

  “Who was that?” Bruce asked with furrowed brows. He was stalk naked.

  “That was Bobbi. I . . . I didn’t want her to know you were here,” she stuttered as she stood.

  “Well, I get that, but why were you talking to her this late? It’s almost three a.m.”

  “Bobbi’s out of town right now – she’s on a special assignment for her job. The hours are long, and she’s lonely. Besides, we’re girlfriends. We’ve talk from midnight to two o’clock in the morning before.”

  “I see. Well, you’re off the phone now, so come back to bed,” he said as he extended his hand out to her.

  ****

  Margo woke around nine a.m. Bruce and his clothes were gone. She figured he would be. She slipped her feet into her slippers, grabbed her cell, and went downstairs. As she walked down the steps, she smelled and heard bacon sizzling in a pan.

  “No way,” Margo mumbled. When she hit the final step and turned, her lips parted at the sight of Bruce cooking in her kitchen.

  “Good morning, gorgeous,” he greeted.

  “Morning,” she said as she made her way through the living room and to the open kitchen.

  “I was about to come up and wake you,” he said as he put slices of hot bacon on a plate covered with a paper towel. “I made coffee, too.”

  “I see,” she said with slight bewilderment.

  “I saw your waffle iron. I already got the stuff mixed up. I just got to cook it.”

  She nodded.

  Bruce noticed her demeanor. “What’s wrong?”

  “Well . . . I . . . to be honest, I saw that your clothes were gone, so I thought you had left.”

  He smiled. “You can’t get rid of me that easily.”

  Apparently not.

  Once Bruce finished cooking, they sat down in the breakfast nook and ate. They chatted about neutral subjects like the weather. Margo cleaned up the dishes since Bruce was nice enough to cook.

  She was washing the last of the dishes when Bruce approached her. He leaned his back against the counter. “Margo, I know you said that you weren’t looking for anything serious. I get that. Hell, I’m the same way, or I was until I took you out on our first date. I really like you, and I meant what I said last week. I think we should explore the connection between us.”

  Her hand that was holding the dish cloth froze over a plate in the water. Despite that when she first met him last year she thought he was a complete Neanderthal, she was surprised to realize that she liked him too – too much. “Bruce,” she began softly. “I . . . we have nothing in common other than sex.”

  “That’s not true. Both of us are interested in cars, and we love good food.”

  “That’s just a coincidence,” she said as she dropped the dish and the dish cloth in the water. She turned to face him. “Even if we have everything in the world in common, it would never work between us.”

  “Why not?”

  “It . . . I . . . it just wouldn’t.”

  “Look, I�
�m sure you’ve been hurt and disappointed in the past. I know you’ve been married twice.”

  “And divorced twice by the age of thirty-four, mind you. Plus, I’m not a spring chicken. A good-looking guy like you can get a young thing in her twenties – a woman who can and is willing to give you children. You should have a lady who isn’t past her prime concerning giving birth. I’ve noticed how good you are with kids.”

  He crossed his arms and gave her a serious look. “Yes, I’m good with kids. However, I don’t want any of my own. Hell, I like hanging out with them and then send them home with their parents. Second, you’re only a year older than me. You are definitely not past any prime.”

  “Bruce–”

  “Is there someone else? Is that why you keep putting me off?” he asked seriously.

  “No,” she answered quickly.

  “Then, there is nothing holding you back.”

  Margo exhaled with exasperation. She couldn’t tell him that a federal agent dating a professional thief was a bad look.

  “We may as well come to some sort of agreement because you know I’m not going to give up.”

  “Why?” she asked in a high-pitched tone.

  “If I didn’t know you liked me deep down, I would have given up when you hung up on me last week. But I know you do. What is going on between us – you can feel it too. I’m not sure what it is, but we would be fools not to at least explore it.”

  Perhaps it will be easier if I go along with what he wants. Besides, it’s more exhausting rejecting his advances. It’s not like I’ll be in Florida after the New Year, anyway.

  “Okay, we can try dating for three or four months and then we can . . . see where we are. Is that agreeable?”

  He smiled like he had won the Powerball. He uncrossed his arms and wrapped his hands around her waist. Water dripped from Margo’s hands to the floor.

  “You got a deal, sweetheart,” he said and kissed her.

  Chapter 13

  Margo was excited about her trip to Monte Carlo. First, she had to catch a flight to Dallas. Then she, Bobbi, and her boss were going to be picked up personally by the filthy rich billionaire who was their host. And if Margo wasn’t excited enough, the billionaire was going to let them fly to France with him on his private jet.

  Luckily, Anthony had finished one of her post heist personas, and he and Aaron thought it would be a good idea to show at least one legit trip on her fake passport.

  Margo was checking things off her list when her doorbell rang. She couldn’t imagine who it could be. Her question was quickly answered when she opened the door.

  “How come you didn’t tell me you were leaving town for the weekend?” Bruce asked.

  Her mouth dropped open. “It was a last-minute decision, and how did you find out so quickly?”

  “Last minute, huh? Then how come Lana and Alec knew before I did?” Bruce asked as he walked past her into the house. It looked like he had just gotten off work because he was in a full suit and tie.

  She closed the door. “Bruce, I wasn’t trying to hide anything from you. I had only decided to go yesterday evening. I hadn’t seen you since Wednesday morning when you left for work. And I told Lana in passing during my walk this morning.”

  “We’ve talked on the phone since Wednesday morning, Margo,” he countered.

  She opened her mouth and then closed it, realizing that he was right. She hadn’t mentioned it to him. “I guess it slipped my mind. I am sorry, Bruce. I was in such a rush to pack, I guess it slipped my mind.”

  “Yes, I see,” he said as he nodded to her carry-on and suitcase in the living room. “Lana told Alec this afternoon. He met her for lunch at the deli down the street from the office. When he got back, he asked me what I was going to do for the weekend since you’ll be in Dallas.”

  She approached him. “I am sorry. I guess I got so excited about . . . seeing Bobbi, everything else left my head.”

  Bruce shrugged. “I guess I can forgive you this one time.”

  Margo smiled and rose on the front of her feet to give him a kiss the cheek. He was at least six inches taller than her when she wasn’t wearing heels.

  “Considering you’ve been a bad girl, you can give me more of a kiss than that,” he remarked with a crooked smirk.

  She chuckled as she wrapped her arms around his neck. Their lips came together. His tongue pried her mouth open. She moaned as he tasted her. Bruce squeezed her bottom. They slowly broke the kiss simultaneously, yet they continued to hold each other.

  “You’re leaving tomorrow, right?” he asked in a husky tone.

  “My flight takes off at two-fifteen.”

  “Do you want a ride to the airport?”

  “Don’t you have to work?”

  “Yeah, but I can put off lunch for a couple of hours. I wish I could come with you. It would be a good opportunity for you to meet my parents. They live in Dallas.”

  She leaned her head back a little. “I thought you said they lived in Houston.”

  “No, I grew up in Houston. Six years ago, they moved to Dallas.”

  “Oh,” she said. Dallas was a big city. What were the chances of her running into Bruce’s parents?

  ****

  It was Saturday night, and Bruce felt empty and bored. He had half a mind to call one of his girls on his top ten list, but every time he was an inch away from doing it, Margo entered his thoughts. He preferred to be with her.

  Feeling like he was going to go stir crazy, he drove to Jimbo’s Steakhouse. When he got there, he grabbed a seat at the bar and ordered gin on the rocks; and he kept ordering them until he realized that drinking himself into oblivion wasn’t going to pep him up. Several girls had approached him, some of them he had slept with in the past. He turned down all their propositions. The owner, Jimbo, was attending the bar. He looked at Bruce like he had lost his mind when he watched Bruce turn down beauty after beauty.

  Bruce didn’t want them. He wanted the woman who had blown his penis and mind. Margo was totally different from any woman he had ever dated or screwed. She was confident, independent, and smart. Bruce wasn’t her type of smart. He had street smarts, but he didn’t have book smarts like her despite his education in college. He had been a B-minus student during a good semester. Country music hummed through the overhead speakers as Margo’s ivory skin, long legs, and lengthy blonde hair danced in his head.

  “Hey, cowboy,” Alec greeted as he sat down on the wooden stool next to him.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Bruce asked through his haze of tipsiness.

  “I got a call from Jimbo himself. He said you were here drinking yourself silly and rejecting what Jimbo called all kinds of fine pieces of ass, which definitely isn’t like you. Hell, when he told me that part, I got worried about you, too.”

  “No need, and I don’t need someone calling Mommy!” Bruce yelled the last few words in Jimbo’s direction. “I’m a grown-ass man!”

  The middle-aged, balding man looked at him and rolled his eyes as he dried a beer mug.

  Alec let out a low whistle. “What is wrong, Bruce? You’re not the brooding type. That’s what you got me for.”

  Bruce couldn’t help but snicker at that. “I’m fine, Alec. Go home to your sexy wife and pretty daughter.”

  “Can’t. When I told Lana that I had to come to Jimbo’s to see if you were all right, she pretty much told me I wasn’t allowed to come back home until I made sure you weren’t out here doing something stupid.”

  Bruce sipped his gin. “Can a man have a few drinks and be alone with his thoughts without the whole world going crazy?”

  “We’ve known each other since we were eighteen years old, and I have never known you to drown your sorrows. Talk to me, Bruce. What’s wrong?”

  “Fuck, man, I don’t know,” he slurred. “I’ve been feeling . . . off since I dropped Margo off at the airport yesterday afternoon. At first, I thought I was coming down with a cold, but my nose wasn’t stopped up or anything. Tod
ay, I’ve been feeling . . . lost, like I had no direction. I thought about calling some of my usual fun-time girls, but every time I went to make a call, Margo popped in my head. I figured I would be cheating on her if I fuck another woman while she was gone. We’re supposed to be dating, you know.”

  “Yes, I know. You told me Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday,” Alec replied with a crooked smile.

  “I called Vic to see what he was doing. He said he had about three girls at his place, and they were about to go skinny dipping in his pool. He invited me over, but I wasn’t in the mood for that.”

  “Shiiit,” Alec enunciated with shock as he placed his hand on his chest. “Hell, I think I need a drink. That’s not like you to turn down . . . an opportunity like that.”

  “I know, but how many times can you go skinny dipping with a group of women in one lifetime? I’ve been doing it since my senior year in high school. Anyway, everyone else I know, who are guys, are married,” Bruce enunciated as he nodded at his comrade. “So, I came out here.”

  “I see.”

  Jimbo walked over to them. “Alec, you want a drink?”

  “Yeah, rum and Coke.”

  “You want a refill, you crazy asshole?” Jimbo asked Bruce.

  “Yeah,” Bruce slurred.

  Jimbo nodded and walked away.

  “I’m not sure what’s wrong with me exactly, but I think part of it is Margo’s fault,” he garbled.

  “Why do you believe that?”

  “Because she’s the best piece of ass I’ve ever had, and I’ve had em all - or so I thought.”

  “Okay, maybe that’s too much information. I’m not a prude by any stretch, but Margo is one of my wife’s best friends,” Alec stated with a sour expression.

  Jimbo sat down their drinks and picked up Bruce’s empty glass and walked away.

  “It’s not just the sex. Her voice is so . . . sexy sounding yet kind sounding at the same time. She’s beautiful. Her hair cascades down her shoulders like . . . a waterfall. But it’s not just her looks either. It’s the type of person she is. She’s loyal to the bone. Margo went out to Dallas to spend time with Bobbi because she was lonely. Matter of fact, she wouldn’t have anything to do with me at first because of Bobbi. And she’s really smart. Did you know she speaks French?”