He leaned against the wall, a silent figure with messy blond hair, blue-green eyes that usually sparkled but at that moment smoldered, dark clothes and oozing sex appeal. Kenna did her best to ignore his sensuality and concentrate on his shortcomings. He looked for all the world as if she were reciting the shopping list, and it had nothing to do with him.
"What do you reckon, Nico? One month, nine weeks? Go on tell me how often. Or do you not care?"
"It's my job."
"Seventeen days."
"Hold on a sec, that's not—"
"I added—"
"It can't be."
She ignored his interjection. "It up. Seventeen bloody days. And even less nights. Even less than one month. Just over two weeks. One of those weeks we were allegedly on holiday in Barbados. You spent half of it in a studio."
"I had to—"
"I know what you said you had to do. I'm not deaf. Neither am I stupid." I am a shrew though. A shrew at the end of my tether. "But seriously, if I don't do something I will be stupid. My brain will have atrophied through lack of use." To say nothing of my pussy.
"Take up salsa dancing, or cookery classes. You do not work. We agreed."
We did? Not that she remembered, not in so many words. It had been more like 'unless you really want to carry on working, It's be better if you were around when I got time to just be with you'. She hadn't expected that time to be so limited.
You'd be vilified," Nico went on, "accused of taking a job someone else needed. It wouldn't do."
"Argh, how out of date are you. Why not? It's not as if I want to be a pole dancer. I want—"
"And I want to hear no more of it. Enough. You knew the score. We are not going to change the rules." He pushed himself up off the wall and ran his hand through his hair. The wavy locks fell straight back over his forehead. "Now how about we go for a drive?"
"With the top up and you in disguise? No thanks."
"So be it." He shrugged, seeming not at all bothered by her refusal. "I have to leave tonight anyway."
"You might as well go now, then. Never let it be said I get in the way of you and your job." Yeah, definitely shrew central.
"I never will." He turned and the door banged behind him
So that's that, then.
He hadn't even asked what she wanted to do.
****
'Hugh…es. Hu…gh…es!" The chanting was usually all he needed to get into the right frame of mind, to put on his public persona and show all was well in Hughes's world.
Not this time. Nico smiled but it was mechanical, and he knew fine well if he looked at himself in a mirror the expression wouldn't reach his eyes. Behind him, Ella and Ramona, his younger twin sisters, frowned. He was damned sure he heard Ella call him an asshole and tell him to bloody well move.
Ramona poked him in the rear. "Get your butt into gear mate, or you won't have a butt to move. Or a shirt, your kecks," she used their childhood name for trousers, "arms, hair on your head, anything. The security guys are having a bloody hard time holding the screaming hoards back. Ella and I value our skin, even if you don't value yours. Shit, Nic, you know we're the most hated women on the planet as it is. Don't make it easy for them, please."
"You're not, or probably not. Kenna is. Or would be, oh hell, okay on three. One…two…three…" He moved, scribbled his name a few times on goodness who knew what, smiled and waved at the crowds behind the straining security men, and then dived into the limo that waited, engine idling, next to the curb. Ella and Ramona had preceded him and as he tumbled into the interior, the door slammed behind him, just as the security line broke and people—mainly women, but a few guys as well—ran forward. The car moved. Ella fell back into her seat and let her breath out in a long whoosh.
"I thought this sort of thing died out in the Sixties."
"Not when it's Hughes," Ramona said. "What's all that about Kenna?"
"Nothing. Everything, nothing, oh forget I mentioned her." Nico shook his head and looked out of the window as the car sped off down the road and left the crowds behind. Why had he mentioned Kenna? Okay she'd been on his mind, and no one could find hair or hide of her, but even so, to say anything to his sisters was stupid. They'd grab the tidbit and run with it. Nag and tease and ferret out what was going on. And he hadn't really thought that through to discover the answer himself.
"Not a chance." Ella settled herself and put on her seatbelt. "Believe me, you are gonna talk. Two against one. Why not start now?"
Nico scowled, and blew hair out of his eyes. Damn, I must get this trimmed. "Why?"
"Well, we'll get it out of you sooner or later, and the sooner you tell us what's riding the black dog, the sooner we'll stop nagging and you can sort it out. So, I'm guessing it's something to do with your wife."
"I don’t have a wife."
Ramona's jaw dropped. "Sure you do, even if you won't admit it. We were there. Are you trying to tell us the ceremony wasn't legal? That the dreadlock wearing Rastafarian reggae singing Minister Macnamama Fosset was a fake? That you've been living in unwedded bliss for what, three years and counting? Bloody hell, Nico, what is the world coming to? You're a cohabitee." She roared with laughter. "And what's wrong with that?"
"Nothing if it were true. I'm legally married and my wife has left me."
Ella twisted in her seat. "Say that again, slowly."
Sisters, who'd have them?
"You heard," Nico said irritably. "My wife, the woman who said of course she understood how important my work is, the woman who now says I don’t need her, don’t value her and there's more to life than sewing a fine seam and waiting for her absent husband to make one of his rare visits, has decided she doesn't want to be part of my life anymore."
"Well, let's face it, Nic, she never really was, was she?" Ella said. "No, don't flare up, think about it. Yes, I know she agreed to it, but people and circumstances change. We need to move forward."
"She has. Without me."
"Plus, brother dear," Ramona said, "there is more to life, as she said. But if she doesn’t like to come with you, what else can she expect?"
Nico felt his cheeks warm. He grunted.
"Nico?" Ella poked him again. "She did say she didn't want to travel with you, didn't she?"
"She left all her cards and the house key. She didn't take anything I've given her." He ignored Ramona's hiss and Ella's question. "It's as if I don’t exist for her any more."
End of sample chapter
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DeAnne's Dilemma (Naughty Forties Book 2) Page 5
