“Charlize, would you mind staying a bit?”
Anderson’s question brought her up short. What now? She wondered.
“Ooooh, look boys!” Dan gloated. “The Baroness is in trouble…”
Charlie’s mouth didn’t normally get off the leash. That was more Rhiann’s style, but she’d had enough of Dan’s needling. Glancing over her shoulder at the group of retreating players, she scowled at Dan. “Bite me, Pearcey.”
A pin dropping would have sounded like a sonic boom—that’s how quiet it got. When she looked back at Anderson Merriweather, he was biting off a laugh. Despite his passive, laissez-faire approach, the guy in charge was clearly sick of this bullshit as well.
As soon as they were alone, she attempted to release some of the tension left in the room by taking some of the responsibility for what happened. After all, if she hadn’t been making out with a celebrity driver and been on the damn job, maybe just maybe she might have prevented at least some of the squad’s over-the-top antics.
“Anderson,” she said to get his full attention. “Even though those guys are barely manageable, I should have put my foot down when Will announced the invitation. I knew it was trouble,” she shrugged. Slowly rubbing her palms together, Charlie ended with palms up and said “What was I supposed to do?”
Anderson grunted, “Hmph.” Sitting on the edge of his desk, he gestured for her to have a seat. “Not your fault Wilde. Brad should have stepped in. The training schedule must be followed, or the lads will end up drinking and shagging their way across the continent.”
Charlie smoothed a hand down her skirt and wandered off in her mind as Anderson droned on.
Shagging. What a stupid word.
I wonder if those new kinetic sand kits came.
Where’s my phone and did I remember to charge the damn thing?
What was the name of that team Mr. Sexy Pants drove for?
Mr. Sexy Pants. Mmm. Nice lips. Good kisser, too.
Charlie squirmed in her seat. I let him touch my boobs. The boob thing was usually her line in the sand. The opposite sex had been lining up to have at her tits since she started wearing a bra. First, it was the boys in school. They whispered about her with words like boobalicious and Tits McGee.
It only got worse at the end of high school and continued through college. Hell. It continued to this day. Her sisters teased her that she had noise-cancelling breasts. They weren’t altogether wrong.
She snickered silently. Her tits were her Achilles’ heel. She wanted to be wanted, but not because of her D-cups. Usually, the second any boob action came into play with the guys she’d dated over the years, she tapped out. But with Mr. Sexy Pants and his peanut butter seduction? His big hand fit her curves perfectly. Remembering the passionate way he molded her flesh and caressed the …
“So, obviously they pulled rank, and I reluctantly caved. Just get us through the next two exhibitions and we’ll call it a day and a job well done.”
What? Was she being let go? Fuuuuuck. Maybe she should’ve been paying attention.
“Er, uh, excuse me? Say again.”
A slip of paper was being pushed into her hands. “Sylvia from the commission gave the green light. You’re to call that number and ask for a Robert Belster. He’ll take you through whatever it is that they want.”
Charlie glanced at the note in her hands. A local number, and a landline, not a mobile.
“I’m sorry. What is this about?” she asked with a wave of the paper.
“Crepuscolo. They’ve requested your immediate services. What I gather is, one of their top drivers is recovering from a race track injury.”
Injury? “What?” Charlie saw the way Anderson’s eyebrows furrowed at her sharp response. All she heard was Crepuscolo, driver and injury. They were talking about Cal Tyler. Cal Tyler injured. She felt sick to her stomach.
“Right up your alley, as you Americans say,” he assured her. “Something about too much focus on medicine hindering the man’s full recovery. The team physician seems to feel he would benefit from the left brain-right brain activities you preach.”
“Oh.” Real eloquent, dipshit.
“You must have made quite an impression on this driver. He went to considerable lengths to steal you away from us.”
Swallowing the lump forming in her throat wasn’t fun. She told him they’d meet again if it were meant to be. She hadn’t figured on him manipulating the outcome like this. Maybe the boob massage wasn’t that great of an idea.
She’d told him straight off that she wasn’t a bed-hopping celebrity fucker. She had said that, right? Nothing about this felt right.
I need to talk to Rhi, she thought with not just a little desperation. She’d know what to do.
Jumping to her feet, Charlie gave her soon-to-be ex-boss a polite handshake. “Thank you for everything. I’m sure we’ll be in touch at some point.”
While Anderson tugged at his tie and made a sheepish face, she gave up caring what anyone thought and almost ran out of the room.
Oh, my God. What am I gonna do now?
“You’re going about this the wrong way, Ty.”
His friend’s amused snort irked Cal. The fucker was having way too much fun needling him.
“Thalia agrees.”
He glanced heavenward then growled. “What the hell, JP! Why’d you tell your wife?”
They were playing pool after a grueling day working on routines with their pit crews that never went right. Though his Italian BFF swore up and down that he’d never been much of a billiards man before meeting Cal, he still managed to win almost every game. And this time around, JP’s opening break shot screwed Cal from the get go.
“I tell her, my friend, because when you find a woman like my Thalia.” He wagged his eyebrows playfully. “Sharing is fun times ten.”
“She’s got your balls in a jar by the front door,” Cal jeered. “Speaking of balls, three in the center pocket.”
He set up his shot, grinned when he made the play and then grumped when the cue ball followed.
“Scratch!” JP hooted. “And you are wrong about women, my friend. I don’t share with Thalia because she makes me. I enjoy her opinions. You’ll find out one day. Maybe with this Skippy girl.”
Another amused snort that rubbed Cal the wrong way.
“And then Cal Tyler, you will care very much what she thinks. About your favorite food. Whether that’s a bald spot growing on your head and whether your penis gets the job done.”
He reached for the top of his head on reflex and ran his fingers through hair thick enough to hide any spots. Asshole. Now he had him worrying about receding hairlines.
“How many times do I have to tell you? It’s dick, cock, shlong, wood, Mr. Stiffy. Anything but penis. Penis is a doctor’s word. Or the one your mom uses.” He shuddered at the thought.
JP grinned at him with an evil smirk. “What word do you have for a dick that’s been retired from lack of use?”
“Fuck you.” Cal gave him the finger and muttered under his breath as he chalked up his cue. “Not retired. Just taking a well-earned break, is all.”
“Ty,” JP said with such seriousness that Cal stopped what he was doing and met his friend’s gaze. “You have been a good friend, and I appreciate your influence when it comes to keeping me on the team.” The other man shrugged self-consciously. “I see the printing on the wall.”
Cal nodded but said nothing. He was uncomfortable talking about this subject, and he didn’t want the man’s gratitude.
“I worry about you,” he continued. “Ever since the accident you’ve been … different. And now this girl comes along, and she’s all you can think about. She’s different, my friend. The one’s that matter always are. Forcing her to come to you may be a stupid-ass move.”
Yeah. He knew that, but it felt like he had no choice. Her dancing away from him with a smile and a wave rattled his cage more than he wanted to admit. He’d been ready to move heaven and earth to find out who
she was, so he’d used what he had to sway things his way.
Getting the team’s doctor to sign off on some therapeutic relaxation was the easy part. After that, all he had to do was wait for Crepuscolo’s management team to do his dirty work and bring her to him. In actuality, his fingerprints weren’t anywhere on the situation. And he’d been patting himself on the back over what a ballsy plan it was.
Oh shit. Laying it out like that, even if just in his mind, made him sound like a huge dick.
Shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot, he met JP’s worried frown and muttered, “I didn’t know what else to do.”
“Well, you fucked up.”
“Really?”
“Si. Fucked up the pooch on this one.”
Should he correct his choice of words? Nah. He knew what screwing the pooch meant, and JP was right no matter how he phrased it.
Cal ran a hand through his hair and looked around the room. Ever since the accident, when healing meant slowing down and taking stock, he’d been twitchy and pissed off. All of this was fake. Every last inch. Just because he occasionally lived in this ridiculously, ostentatious symbol of his celebrity, didn’t mean it’d ever been a home.
Acting like an infatuated teenager with a non-stop hard-on wasn’t his style even when he’d been one. But the girl was different. He didn’t just want her. He wanted … well fuck, he wanted so much it was hard to wrap his mind around what it all meant.
Massaging the back of his neck, he met JP’s intense gaze. “What did Thalia think I should do?”
Booming laughter filled the room, and his good friend gave him a hearty smack on the back. “Spoken like a man who’s just seen the light!”
“Suck my penis,” Cal drawled satirically to JP’s nodding delight.
“Maybe later,” the other man jested as he hung up their pool cues. “Let’s get a drink and enjoy a beautiful Tuscan sunset while I tell you what my wise and wonderful wife suggested you do.”
CHARLIE WAS ROLLING WITH LAUGHTER as her sister Rhiann went on and on, sharing a hilarious story about her and their older sister Brynn on a drunken night out in New York City.
“What were you drinking? Goblets of Fire? Oh my God, Rhi! What’s Dad done to us? We even drink literary references.”
“I know, right?” Rhiann’s distinctive laugh shot from the speaker on Charlie’s phone. “Mom sent me a cocktail recipe for something called a Book Boyfriend. Two shots and your panties come off.”
“Bwahahaaahhaaa.”
“Hey,” Rhi blurted out. “Wanna see something even more hilarious?”
“Of course,” Charlie giggled.
“Okay, hold on. Let me figure out how to do this.”
Ten seconds later her phone pinged, and a message box with a picture appeared. “You sent a picture?” she asked.
“Yeah. Go ahead and click on it but don’t disconnect our call. I know how tech-challenged you are little sis.”
Rhiann was certainly right about that. Charlie wasn’t a big fan of messaging and Instagramming. All that stuff seemed cool as shit at first but in her opinion, it was all too impersonal. Far as she was concerned, the ability to be always connected just ended up being a way for people to isolate themselves. Instead of communicating, most only interacted with a mobile screen. Face to face exchanges and relationships outside social media suffered as a result.
Careful not to hit the wrong set of prompts, she gasped when the picture Rhi sent filled the screen.
“Holy shit! Brynnie’s butt?” She was laughing harder now and then she saw something that made her stop and take a closer look. “Is that a handprint?”
“Yes!” Rhiann screeched with delight. “Big sis has herself a boyfriend. And a bad-boy type at that!”
“Uh, hold on.” Charlie’s laugh suddenly quieted. “He hits her?”
“What? No! Good grief Charlie. You can’t possibly be that naïve.”
“Ohhh,” she replied. “Does he wear a gray tie, too?”
“Nope. But apparently Mr. Buttwhacker has a penchant for wearing black leather and making our Brynnie swoon like a romance heroine.”
“This doesn’t have anything to do with Nana’s crazy scheme to marry her off, does it?”
“Oh. So you heard about that, have you? A Bryanna Charles special. Poor Brynn went apeshit. This guy though, he came out of nowhere, and she hasn’t been the same since.”
“Aw, that’s nice. And what about you, hmm? You find your Mr. Big yet?”
Silence. That’s never good, she thought. Not with Rhiann. She always had a quick quip at the ready or a pithy comment to share.
“Rhi?”
The sound of throat clearing hit Charlie like an electric current. Something was up and it probably wasn’t good.
“Yeah. About that,” her sister muttered. “I’ve got a new boss.”
Charlie gasped. A new boss? What the hell did that mean? Oh no! She thought with real dismay. Rhiann would never be that stupid.
“Oh my God, Rhi. Please tell me you aren’t sleeping with the boss.”
More silence. Charlie’s heart sank.
“Sleeping with? No.” There was a slight pause and then she muttered, “No,” again.
“Buuut?”
“Do you remember Liam? Liam Ashforth? Dad’s grad school assistant?”
Whoa. Liam Ashforth? Charlie could barely comprehend how or why the uptight asshole who secretly broke her sister’s heart was suddenly back in the picture.
“What’s that asshole got to do with you, Rhi? Please tell me you’re just joking.”
“Ah,” Rhiann sighed. “I take it then that you do remember him?”
Oh hell yeah, she remembered. After all, she was only a couple years younger than Rhiann. She’d been a precocious teenager with a head full of romantic fantasies when the middle daughter of Professor Robert Baron-Wilde started sneaking around with the handsome but weirdly aloof grad student. Charlie remembered all too well thinking their clandestine love affair was the stuff of fairy tales. Until whatever happened that drove a wedge of silence between them. From that time on, she’d wondered on more than a handful of times just what Ashforth had done to devastate Rhiann so completely.
“Are you saying he’s your employer? The dude signing the checks?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying. His company bought the magazine. I now answer to Liam Ashforth.”
A thousand images and concerns swirled in Charlie’s thoughts but the only thing worth saying was to ask, “Are you all right?”
They were close, the three of them. Her oldest sister Brynn, who was characterized as being the smart and pragmatic of the Baron-Wilde daughters, was Charlie’s hero in every way that mattered. When life kicked her in the mouth, the irrepressible Brynn simply spit out some teeth, fluffed her hair for good measure and then went out and shook up her life. Nothing and nobody would ever get her down.
And Rhiann—the outspoken middle sister who Charlie worshiped and followed around like an adoring puppy when they were kids. It was Rhi who threw caution to the wind and stepped into the unknown by moving to the Big Apple and making a name in the fashion industry. Charlie loved Rhi’s balls because the girl had big ones.
They could tell each other anything. Charlie winced slightly because her flit to Italy really upset the sisterly status quo. So if she were missing the closeness they’d always shared, it was her own damn fault for hauling ass to another continent.
“To be honest, sis … I’ve um. Well, I’ve taken the coward’s way out so far. When the acquisition was announced, at first I didn’t realize that the huge corporation swallowing the magazine whole was Liam’s. Basically, I’ve been avoiding anything that remotely brings the possibility of seeing him.”
“You can’t keep that up forever. Do you think he knows, Rhi? That you work there?”
“Sweetie, I’m afraid of what the answer to that question is. If he doesn’t know, then my pathetic avoidance moves make me look like an idiot. If he does know, well I
can’t go there. Y’know what I mean?”
She blurted the first thing that came to mind. “Stay away from him, Rhi. He’ll wreck your dream. I just know it.”
“Ah, my sweet little Charlize. Dreams change. Life in the big city isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. And I miss you, you little shit.”
“I miss you too. And Brynnie. Nana tried to bribe me to come home. Did you know? Better watch out, Rhi. She’s already gone gunning for Brynn. Can’t imagine what she could entice you with but I’d sleep with both eyes open.”
Rhiann snickered. “If the old bat would crack open the vault and agree to let me write her autobiography, I’d pack my bags tomorrow.”
“Oh jeez. Is she still holding that one over your head?”
“Yeah. But you know what? Enough about big sis and me. You don’t come out of the woodwork all that often sweetie so tell me how fabulous Italy is and about all the men on their knees begging for your favors.”
“I met a boy,” she drawled. No use in beating around the bush. Waste of time and energy. Besides, she called Rhi just for this reason. She wanted her opinion on what to do.
“A boy? An actual flesh and blood male and not one of those book boyfriends you love so much?”
Charlie laughed. “No Mr. Darcys on this trip. But there is this one guy.”
“Oh,” Rhi laughed. “So … not a boy? A grown up with facial hair and everything?”
“He’s a race car driver.” She said it matter-of-factly, as though the simple explanation made the revelation perfectly understandable.
“For real?”
“Yep.”
“Where’d you meet a racer? Despite your drag racing past, I didn’t think watching guys tearing around a track at a hundred miles an hour was your thing.”
“Well, it’s not. I think it’s insane actually. We met at a party. I’ve been working with a rugby exhibition and the guys wanted to go, so we did. End of story.”
Wilde Magic (Wilde Women Book 3) Page 5
