by M. S. Parker
The broad smile on his face didn’t even falter and I could see the recognition in his eyes. He remembered me, too. “Well, hello to you, too.”
“Cut the bull,” I snapped. I wasn’t feeling too trusting at the moment. “Did you follow me here? How did you know where I was?”
“Whoa, whoa.” He held up his hands in the universal gesture of surrender. “Easy there. I’m not following you. I promise. I’m here to see DeVon Ricci.”
I eyed him suspiciously. “Why?”
He dropped his hands and stuck them in his pockets. He didn’t seem to mind that I was grilling him. “I have a proposition for him.”
“Really?” I didn’t bother to hide the skepticism in my voice. “I had no idea you were in show business. You never told me.”
The elevator doors opened and he made a sweeping gesture to allow me to go first. He followed and gave me a smug smile as he pushed the button for DeVon’s floor. “There are a lot of things you don’t know about me. After all, you disappeared after one amazing night.”
I started to relax. I supposed it could be just a weird coincidence. Stranger things had happened. I lightened my tone, letting it take on a slightly teasing note. “I never promised you it would be anything else.”
“That’s true,” he said. “You never did.”
The elevator doors opened and the two of us walked towards DeVon’s office. I paused at Melissa’s desk. If this guy had an appointment, I didn’t want to be rushed through my ‘apology.’ I could wait. To my surprise, Melissa didn’t ask for the man’s name or even check her book. She glanced up at him, nodded, then went back to what she was doing.
Before I could think about it much, he was turning towards me. “You can come in, too, if you’d like, rather than waiting out here.”
“That’s okay.” I gave him a polite smile. “I don’t want to intrude.”
“Please,” he said. “I insist.”
Now my curiosity was piqued. I nodded and followed him into the office.
“Franco!” DeVon sounded genuinely pleased.
Right, that was his name. I had to admit, I was slightly embarrassed that I hadn’t remembered. He was a good-looking guy and I hadn’t really been drunk when we’d slept together, just a bit tipsy.
“Krissy?” DeVon’s eyes went from Franco to me and back again.
I felt my cheeks heating up. Yeah, this wasn’t awkward at all, standing in a room with two guys I’d fucked and one I wanted to seduce again.
“We ran into each other in the lobby, and since we were both coming to see you, I figured why not expedite things.”
Something was going on here, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on.
“Well, I am glad to see you,” DeVon said.
“I came with a proposition.”
The corner of DeVon’s mouth twitched, as if this were a joke he knew the punch line to. “And what is that?”
“Lunch.” Franco grinned.
Now I was really confused. What was going on?
“Sounds great.” DeVon laughed and crossed over to Franco, his arms outstretched. He embraced the other man and gave him a kiss on both cheeks in that European way.
What the hell?
“I’ve missed you, brother. How is our father?”
My jaw dropped and I didn’t even try to stop it.
“He’s doing much better. As difficult as ever.” Franco ran his hand through his hair. “You know how he is.”
I could hear it now, the very faint hint of an Italian accent. I didn’t know if I’d caught it back in New York, but I had a feeling Franco had tried harder than his brother to lose the accent.
“You’re brothers.” I finally got the words out.
“I’m sorry.” DeVon seemed almost surprised to find me standing there. “I forgot to introduce you.” He gestured to Franco. “This is Franco Ricci, my kid brother. Franco, this is Krissy Jensen.”
I looked up at Franco who gave me a warm, but not sexual, smile.
“We’ve met,” he said.
For a horrifying moment, I thought he was going to tell DeVon that we’d slept together. Instead, his smile widened and he went a different direction.
“The elevator ride allowed us to share deep and meaningful conversation.”
“Ass.” DeVon punched his brother in the shoulder in that way that brothers had. He looked at me. “Would it be all right if we waited until after lunch to meet? Franco owes me an expensive meal since I haven’t seen him in almost a year.”
I nodded mutely. My head was spinning. I hurried towards the elevator, not wanting to get caught in there with both of them if they were following. As the doors closed and I was finally alone, I let out a shaky breath. What was I going to do now?
Chapter 22
DEVON
I leaned back in my chair and watched my little brother flirt with the waitress. I always called him my kid brother and thought of him as being much younger than me, but it wasn’t until now that I realized he was actually a few years older than Krissy. If the three of us had grown up together, I wondered if I would’ve even given her a second look.
I would’ve noticed her, I told myself. She was the kind of woman I couldn’t have ignored.
“DeVon.” Franco’s voice was tinged with amusement.
I pulled my thoughts away from Krissy and realized that it was my turn to order. I gave them my usual and ordered an expensive bottle of wine.
“You seem well,” Franco said.
I nodded. “I am.” It was only a half-truth, but I didn’t want to burden my brother with my love-life issues. “And Papa is doing better?”
It was Franco’s turn to nod. He watched the waiter pour wine for me to sample. When the young man left, Franco continued, “It took him a while to accept that he wasn’t going to gain back his full strength.”
I took a sip of my wine. Our father had always been an active man and his heart-attack, followed by a severe infection, had taken us all by surprise. To make matters worse, he’d moved back to Italy several months before it had happened, but my brother and I had remained here. We’d both flown out to see him after it had happened, but it had been Franco who’d volunteered to stay. The last few months, Franco had been gradually moving himself back to the States, but we’d both been reluctant to leave our father completely alone, and he’d refused to come back over.
“And Ana Lucia?” I tried to make the question seem casual, but Franco wasn’t fooled.
“He’s happy with her.”
I was grateful that the waiter chose that moment to return with our appetizers. I wasn’t sure I wanted to continue a discussion about our father’s girlfriend, a woman who was a year younger than me. Papa didn’t have a lot of money, but Franco and I did. We’d both been concerned that Ana Lucia was only interested in money, but the investigator we’d hired had found nothing suspicious in her past, and she’d never asked either of us for anything. Still, I was leery of her.
The thought made me remember what Krissy had said about me assuming the worst about women. Was I doing the same thing to Ana Lucia? I pushed the thought away. I didn’t want to be introspective. I wanted to have a pleasant lunch with my brother.
I deliberately turned our conversation to the more mundane things and those discussions flowed, one into the other, through our meal. It wasn’t until we were both almost finished that the conversation came around to my work again; more specifically, the recent insanity that had started to hit the news. I wasn’t a celebrity, but what I’d done over the past week had definitely been headline material during an otherwise slow week. I cleared up what had happened with Carter and Derrick while skimming over the deeper reasons for my actions. Any good employer would’ve defended the honor of his employee with equal fervor, right?
“Bastard,” Franco said. “I would’ve beaten the shit out of that Derrick guy.”
“Believe me,” I said. “I was tempted.”
“It almost seems like Krissy’s been more trouble than
she’s worth,” Franco said.
I scowled down at my plate, annoyed at his statement though I knew I didn’t have any reason to be. He didn’t know what she meant to me. Hell, I barely knew what she meant to me.
“She’s an excellent agent,” I said. Carefully, as if I hadn’t been wanting to ask this question for a while, I asked, “What do you think of her? You met her.”
Franco considered the question while he drained the last of his wine. “I think she’s a special young woman and that you better not screw this up.”
I stared at him. “What are you talking about? You met her for…like what? Two minutes?”
“Come on, DeVon,” he said. “I could see the chemistry between the two of you the minute we walked into your office.”
I considered denying it, but I needed to talk to someone about this, and I trusted Franco more than I trusted anyone. “It probably doesn’t matter how much chemistry there is between us,” I said. “I’ve really fucked things up and I think it might be too late to fix it.” I told him the full story this time, not leaving anything but the intimate details out.
“It sounds to me like you really care about her,” Franco said, leaning forward, his face earnest.
“I do.” For the first time, I admitted it to someone other than myself.
“Then don’t let some mistakes ruin what could be something special.”
He said it so matter-of-factly, I almost laughed. As if matters of the heart were that simple.
“But what if she won’t forgive me, or if she doesn’t feel the same way?” I struggled to voice my fears. Franco was the only person who’d ever seen me vulnerable, and even he’d never seen me this way about a woman.
“You’re worried that things are going to end up like they did with–”
I cut him off before he could say her name. “She cheated on me.”
His eyes widened. “You never told me that.”
“It’s not something I like to think about,” I said. The muscles in my jaw were tight. “I came home two days after our engagement and found her fucking Ronny.”
“Fuck, Ronny boy? He’s like your best friend.” Franco breathed.
“Was,” I said.
Franco sat back in his seat. “I always wondered what had happened between you and Ronny.”
“Now you know,” I said briskly.
“And now you’re scared to take a risk with Krissy.”
Leave it to my little brother to flat-out say what I was thinking.
“I promised myself I’d never let another woman get that close.”
Franco’s eyes narrowed as he studied me for a moment. “Seems to me you already broke that promise.”
I frowned at him, but I didn’t argue. He was right. Acting on what I was feeling didn’t really matter. I was already feeling it.
“Look, DeVon, you’re my brother and I love you, but you need to stop being an ass.”
“Excuse me?” That wasn’t what I’d expected him to say.
“You care about her,” he said. “Maybe even more than care, but you’re letting what one woman did keep you from something that could be great. Are you really going to let Haley ruin any chance at happiness for you?”
Hearing her name didn’t hurt like it once had. In fact, I found it easy to push the thought of her aside and think about the person I truly wanted. Franco was right. I couldn’t let what had happened years ago cost me Krissy. I had to win her back.
Chapter 23
KRISSY
If I kept this up, I was going to get fired. I’d been looking at the file in my hands for ten minutes and hadn’t gotten past the first couple lines. The sick feeling in my stomach just kept getting worse and I was glad I’d decided to work through lunch. I doubted I’d be able to keep anything down.
I’d slept with DeVon’s brother.
The fact kept circling in my head, each new rotation bringing with it a scenario in which DeVon heard the news. None of them were good. I knew how much trust meant to him and I didn’t know if a simple “I didn’t know he was your brother and it was before we met” would be good enough. No man wanted to hear that his...whatever I was to him had had sex with his brother. And DeVon was far more sensitive than his rough exterior let on. This could ruin everything.
For a brief and wild moment, I thought about not telling him, but I didn’t entertain that thought for long. Besides the fact that I was terrible at secrets, keeping it would definitely be a betrayal of trust. I also had to consider the fact that he might know already. There was a very good chance that Franco had told him as soon as I was out of ear-shot. For all Franco knew, DeVon and I were only employer and employee. He’d have no real reason to not mention to his brother that he’d banged the new Mirage agent. I thought about how he hadn’t mentioned New York when DeVon had introduced us. I hoped that meant he wasn’t going to say anything, but I didn’t have any way of knowing for sure.
I didn’t know if it’d be better to hope that Franco had told DeVon or if it’d be better hearing it from me. Not that there was a good way to say it. My stomach twisted again as I imagined the way DeVon’s face would close down when he heard. Then again, that was assuming that the signals I’d been feeling were real and not just wishful thinking on my part. This time, I really had fucked someone. What if this was damage I couldn’t undo?
I looked at the clock on my computer. Three o’clock. Even taking a lengthy and late lunch, DeVon should be back. Since he hadn’t come storming into my office with accusations about Franco, I was going to take that as a sign that I needed to come clean.
Before I could lose my nerve, I stood up, smoothed down my skirt and marched out of my office. “I’ll be upstairs for a bit.” I didn’t look at Tracy as I passed by. She’d been nothing but professional, but I’d known from the moment she’d seen me that she knew the story behind the bruises on my neck. I hadn’t taken a look at any media today, not wanting to see my face splashed under some headline that wondered what I’d done to piss off Derrick Johnson.
By the time I got to DeVon’s office, I’d all but forgotten about my injuries. My voice was still a bit rough when I spoke, but the Tylenol had done the trick today and I wasn’t in any pain. I paused in front of the door and took a deep breath to steady my nerves. I knocked on the door.
“Come in.”
DeVon looked surprised but not angry when I entered, so I took that as a good sign.
“What’s with the knocking?” he asked as he leaned back in his chair. “I thought you preferred to just barge in, angry at something I’d done or said.” His lips were twitching as if he was trying not to smile.
“Usually you deserve it,” I shot back. I resisted the urge to keep going with the banter. I hadn’t come for that.
“But that’s not why you’re here now,” he said.
I shook my head, then squared my shoulders. The best way to do something like this was to just get it out.
“Back in New York, before I came out here for my first interview, before I even got called for my first interview, I met your brother.” I twisted my fingers together. This was harder than I’d thought it’d be. “I didn’t know who he was. We didn’t exchange a lot of personal information, not even last names. But we spent the night together.”
DeVon’s eyebrows shot up, but all I saw on his face was genuine surprise. “You slept with my brother?”
I nodded, pressing my lips together. I wasn’t sure I trusted myself to speak. I hadn’t done anything wrong. It wasn’t like I’d even met DeVon before this had happened, but I still felt the need to apologize. I didn’t want to do that, though. It would be too much like admitting that my entire sexual history had been something to be ashamed of. DeVon and I both had our pasts. Disclosure was one thing, apologizing was something else.
DeVon stood and walked towards me. I’d stayed standing, needing to feel at least some measure of control. Now, as he slowly circled me, I began to wonder if it would’ve been better if I’d sat down after all.
“You didn’t know I was his brother when you came to work here?” he asked.
I shook my head.
“I don’t have the right to be jealous of the men you fucked before me.” His voice was low and made me shiver. “But I am.” He stopped behind me and ran his finger down my arm. “And I think something needs to be done about this news you’ve just given me.”
