Messing with Miki (A MFM Ménage Romance) (Playing For Love Book 5)

by Tara Crescent

  “Let’s get the most shocking thing out of the way. It’s not one guy. It’s two.”

  Her eyes go round. “A ménage?” she asks. “Like your friend Wendy?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wow.” She gulps down nearly half her glass. “So, is it a fling?”

  “There was a moment when I hoped it would become a real relationship.” It’s the first time I’ve said that out loud, admitted that I wanted to be with Finn and Oliver.

  “So what happened?”

  I tell her the whole, messy story. She listens, forgetting even to drink her wine. When I’m done, I give her a questioning look. “If you were me, what would you do?”

  “Do you really want to know?”

  “Yes.”

  “Miki,” she says, “you’re obviously crazy about these guys. Your eyes shine when you talk about them. I can understand why you feel betrayed, but do you really believe everything they did was a lie?”

  In the corner of Wendy’s living room are the desk and the Aeron chair Lancelot and Merlin bought me. All because I’d complained about my neck hurting when I typed.

  Was that about Imperium? Not really.

  So many nights, Lancelot confided in me about his divorce and how it had wrecked his trust in women. That wasn’t a lie.

  They didn’t have to tell me that Lawrence Kent was User0989, but they had. They didn’t have to give me keys to their apartments, but they did.

  “It sounds,” Leah says, “that they started out doing the wrong thing, regretted it almost immediately, and couldn’t figure a way out of the situation. Can you tell me that’s never happened to you?”

  I look at my sister. “That’s exactly what I did at Imperium,” I murmur. “I started out doing the wrong thing. I shouldn’t have accepted the job offer, but I told myself I had to figure out what Ben was doing. Then I spent weeks trying to extricate myself from the situation.”

  And they’d forgiven me. On the forum, they’d tried to help me. I remember Lancelot even suggesting I talk to Finn and Oliver. You’re just a tool in this, Mouse, he’d said. If they’re smart, they’ll try and figure out what User0989’s end game is.

  “You can hold onto your anger,” Leah says gently. “Or you can let it go.”

  “Are you going to forgive Ben?”

  “Yes,” she replies at once. “I’m not saying it’s going to be easy. It won’t be. Our marriage has hit a rocky patch, and it’s going to take both of us trying really hard to get us through it.” She takes a deep breath. “But I love Ben, and our relationship is worth fighting for.”

  My baby sister is right. Love is worth fighting for.

  I need to talk to Oliver and Finn.

  27

  There is no love without forgiveness, and there is no forgiveness without love.

  Bryant H. McGill

  Oliver:

  I call Finn’s grandmother’s caregiver as Finn drives back to the city. Apart from the one woman that Mary recommended, Finn’s hired two more people so that his grandmother has someone to keep an eye on her around the clock.

  The woman who answers the phone tells me that Nana had been in some pain earlier in the evening, but is sound asleep now. I warn her that Finn’s going to be late, and she takes it in stride.

  The traffic is crazy, of course. It’s rush hour in New York, and it’s complete gridlock. The drive from Queens to Manhattan normally takes under an hour. Today, it’s half-past eight before we pull up in front of Miki’s temporary apartment.

  We ring her doorbell, and her buzzer sounds immediately. Finn frowns. “So much for security,” he says, entering the elevator and punching in her floor. “Anyone can walk right up to her apartment door.”

  I can’t disagree with him. “Let’s try not to open with that, shall we?”

  His lips twitch. “Fair enough.”

  He’s nervous, and I am too. Miki was the best thing that happened to us. Everything else pales by comparison. She was furious with us last Monday. What kind of reception will we get now?

  I barely knock on the door when it’s flung open. “What did you forget this time, Leah?” Miki asks before she realizes it’s us. “You’re not my sister.”

  “Can we come in?”

  I brace myself for a ‘no,' but she nods and steps aside. Encouraged, I step into the room, Finn at my side. On the TV in the living room, Matt Smith and David Tennant are frozen on the screen. “The Day of the Doctor again?” I tease before I can catch myself. “How many times have you seen this episode, mouse?”

  She grins, but her smile disappears almost instantly. “Why are you here?” she asks stiffly.

  “Two reasons.” I explain what Detective Larson had revealed. “Until this is solved, we need to make sure you’re okay, Miki. I know you’re furious with us, but we have resources, and we can protect you.”

  “What’s the other reason?”

  Finn replies. “To tell you again that we’re sorry. You told me that Imperium was the only thing that mattered to me.”

  “Was I wrong?”

  “Yes.” Finn looks at her, serious and intent. “Do you have a pen and a piece of paper?”

  I pull a pen out of my pocket and hand it to him. Miki, with a curious expression on her face, gives him a pink notebook, one I recognize from the plane. This is Miki’s book of lists. It’s perfect for what Finn and I are about to do. “What are you doing?”

  “Showing you that I don’t care about Imperium,” Finn replies. He writes something on the sheet of paper and hands it to me. “You’re my witness, Oliver. I’ll get my lawyer to draw up proper documentation tomorrow.”

  Before I can sign, Miki snatches the notebook from me and reads aloud. “I, Finn Sanders, transfer my ownership stake in Imperium to Mackenzie Cooper.” Her head snaps up, and she stares at Finn, shocked. “Are you crazy?”

  Miki:

  They’ve lost their minds.

  Oliver takes the notebook back from me. “Finn’s right,” he says. “He’s always been the smarter one. You think this is about Imperium, about money. It’s not. It hasn’t been for a really long time. We fell in love with you, Miki. You are the only person that matters. I will do whatever it takes to try and convince you of that.”

  My heart stops. They said they loved me at the hospital, but lost in my shock and anger, I hadn’t listened. Now, happiness bubbles inside me. They love me.

  Oliver’s writing something in my notebook too. I rip it away from him again. “Will you stop that? I don’t want a grand gesture, okay? Just listen to me.”

  They look at me intently.

  “I did some things I’m not proud of,” I say. “You didn’t make me accept User0989’s offer. That was all me.”

  “What are you saying, Miki?” Oliver asks, his voice harsh. “Because if this is a really convoluted way to tell us to fuck off—”

  Men. Do I have to write this on a billboard outside their office window before they get the message? I roll my eyes at the two of them. “It’s not, you idiot. I’m trying to tell you that I fell in love with you. Both of you.”

  “You did?” Finn stares at me as if he can’t quite believe my words.

  “I really did. And what you did wasn’t great, but neither was what I did.” I take a deep breath. “I’d like to get back together.”

  “No.” Oliver shakes his head, and my mouth goes dry. Have I misjudged the situation? “I don’t want friends with benefits anymore. It’s not casual this time around. It’s the real thing.”

  A smile breaks out over my face, and I hug them, my happiness overflowing in my heart. “I think I’m on board with that.”

  This time, when we make love, it feels different. There’s hot sex, of course, but there’s tenderness too. When Oliver pinches my nipples between his thumb and forefinger, he follows it with gentle kisses. When Finn’s clever tongue swoops unerringly on my clitoris, his fingers lace in mine. When they shudder out their climaxes, they gasp out my name and cling to me as if they’re never goi
ng to let me go.

  Eventually, we order pizza. Finn wants his usual ham and pineapple. Oliver gets sausage and mushrooms, and I go gourmet with spinach and sun-dried tomatoes.

  “So, what are we going to do about Kent?” I ask after I’ve wolfed down two slices. “We still don’t know what his plot is.”

  Finn shrugs. “I don’t care about Kent.”

  Oliver and Finn have worked far too hard to give up now. Besides, I don’t like the oily CFO, and I really don’t want to see him succeed. “I do,” I reply sternly.

  Oliver gives me a wicked grin. “I forgot, it’s your company now. How can we help?”

  “Stop calling it my company,” I tell him, my eyes narrowed. “I’m going to tear that piece of paper up.”

  “Back to Kent,” Finn interrupts mildly. “The thing is, we can nail him now. He hired Miki to hack into our company.”

  Oliver shakes his head. “User0989 hired Miki,” he says. “All we have linking User0989 to Kent is that an Imperium IP address was used to access User0989’s account. There were three people in the conference room at that time. I know it’s Kent, but Ambrose is going to want more definitive proof than that.”

  Finn’s lips tighten in annoyance. “Fucking Ambrose,” he says under his breath. “Yeah, you’re right.”

  I frown in puzzlement. “What I don’t understand is why he wants the list anyway. Lawrence stands to make money from the IPO. He even went to look at a fancy Upper East Side penthouse. So he can’t intend for Imperium to fail.”

  “He did?” Oliver asks, his eyebrows raised.

  I tell them what I heard at Leah’s party, and Finn nods, unsurprised. “Kent likes that kind of thing,” he says, reaching for another slice of pizza. One of mine. Hmm. Maybe I can cure this pineapple thing after all. “Let’s start with what we know,” he suggests. “Claudia threatens Oliver with naked photos. Why would she do that?”

  “For the money,” Oliver replies promptly.

  I shake my head. “No, if she wanted money, you’d have paid her off. She asked for Imperium stock. That wasn’t Claudia’s doing, that was Fitzgerald’s. Why does Fitzgerald want Imperium stock? Does he want to force a merger between the two companies?”

  “I doubt that,” Finn replies. “Sebastian’s not that clever. He just wants Oliver to fail.”

  “Why?”

  Oliver rolls his eyes. “Evidently, back in freshman year, we were both at a party, and I left with the girl he wanted. I don’t even remember this incident.”

  Finn leans back in his chair. “Okay. Sebastian wants Oliver to fail, so he gets Claudia to ask for Imperium stock, knowing that Oliver won’t pay up. That makes sense. But where does Kent come into this story?”

  “Our technology gets leaked to Kliedara,” Oliver says. He gets up and fills a glass with water from the tap. “You think Kent’s doing it.”

  I stare at the two men. “You do?”

  Finn nods, a surprised expression on his face. “You didn’t know? No, of course not, how could you? Someone at Imperium has been leaking our technology to Kliedara for the past year. So far, we’ve been able to innovate and stay ahead of the game, and it hasn’t mattered too much.”

  “But you think it’s Kent?” I probe.

  “Just a gut feeling,” Finn replies. “I’ve personally gone over every file Lawrence has downloaded to a thumb drive, and there isn’t a connection there. I don’t see how he’s doing it.”

  Something nags at the back of my mind and then it strikes me. “Janine,” I blurt out. “She was printing something for Kent. I remember her grumbling about being asked to do it.” I steal a piece of sausage from Oliver’s pizza and think out loud. “I’ve only been at Imperium for a month. In that time, Kent’s computer has been down twice. What if he’s faking it and getting people to print out documents for him? Nobody’s going to question the CFO.”

  Finn’s eyes brighten. “That’s it, Miki,” he exclaims. “I bet you’re right. That’s exactly how he’s doing it. I’ve seen Sachin print out documents for Kent before.”

  “And I’ve seen Chris Wilcox take him something,” Oliver says. There’s a grim expression on his face. “Son of a bitch. Right under our noses.”

  “Okay, so we know that Kent and Fitzgerald are working together.” I chew on my lip, my thoughts all over the place.

  “Kent wants to be the CEO,” Oliver says.

  Finn frowns. “If Oliver’s discredited, the board won’t pick Kent to be the CEO. They’d pick me.”

  Oliver lifts his head. “Unless,” he says, “you screw up.”

  That’s it. The last piece of the puzzle clicks into place. “If that client list is leaked, Finn will take the blame. Kent hired me to clear his path to the top.”

  We stare at each other. “What now?” I ask.

  Oliver’s lips curl into a smile, one that doesn’t reach his eyes. The normally good-natured man is furious, and I don’t blame him. “Let’s call his bluff,” he says, his tone clipped.

  “What?” I stare at him, wondering if he’s lost his mind.

  A slow smile curves over Finn’s lips. “I agree with Oliver,” he says. “Miki, you’re going to hack into Imperium, and you’re going to give Kent a client list.”

  A client list.

  A strategically modified client list.

  Of course.

  Let the games begin.

  28

  Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  Miki:

  “Miki!” Janine greets me with a wide smile when I walk into Imperium Tuesday morning. “You’re back. How are you feeling? Still flu-ish?”

  It turns out Oliver and Finn told everyone I was out sick last week, which is an advantage right now. “It’s mostly gone now,” I reply, lying through my teeth. A couple of members of the finance team are within earshot, and I want to make sure that Lawrence Kent finds out I’m back. “I spent most of the weekend in bed. I probably would have been fine coming to work yesterday, but I didn’t want to give everyone my germs.”

  She grins. “I appreciate that.” She looks at her computer screen. “Lawrence has been asking for an update on the finance work you’re doing. Can you meet with him today?”

  That’s perfect. At this point, because of my silence on the DefCon forums and my absence from work, Kent’s nerves must be on edge. Meeting with him and calming his suspicions is exactly what I need to do.

  “Ms. Cooper. Nice of you to show up to work.” Kent gives me a supercilious smile, his tone laced with sarcasm. “I sent you a couple of emails last week, but didn’t get a reply back.”

  I refuse to kiss this guy’s ass. “I had the flu,” I tell him. “I wasn’t checking my email.”

  He gives me a hard look. “With that kind of work ethic, you won’t get far at Imperium.”

  This guy is such a jerk. He’d make a terrible CEO. My determination to foil his plot increases. “Yeah, well, I’m not interested in getting very far at Imperium,” I murmur sulkily.

  He takes the bait. “You aren’t?”

  “How would you like sitting in the same office as your bosses?” I ask bitterly. “Two weeks ago, my mother called me for five minutes, and Finn suggested I limit my personal calls at work. Now, Mary MacDonald is hounding me for a doctor’s note because I was out sick. I don’t want to work in a place that treats me like a child.”

  Of course, none of this is true, but Kent needs to believe that I’m ready to burn my bridges at Imperium.

  He doesn’t look entirely convinced. “I thought you were getting along quite well with Prescott and Kent.”

  “So did I.” I manage to make that short sentence sound petulant and whiny. “I guess I was wrong. I asked Oliver about the doctor’s note, and he just mumbled something about company policy and ran away to another meeting.” I shrug. “Ah well. There are other jobs. You wanted to talk about your project, right?”

  For a brief second, there’s a triumphant look on h
is face. My work here is done.

  I don’t log onto the DefCon forums until seven in the evening. Oliver, Finn, and I are at Finn’s place. I was a little nervous about meeting his grandmother, but I didn’t need to be. Mrs. Sanders is lovely and kind and is honestly the most cheerful sick person I’ve ever met. She must be in an incredible amount of pain, but there’s not a word of complaint from her.

  She retires to bed early. Once she’s gone, I look at the two men. “Kent totally bought it,” I tell them. “He’s convinced I hate you.” I take a deep breath and click on User0989’s icon. “You’re sure about this?”

  “Absolutely,” Oliver replies.

  Finn nods as well. “One of these two men,” he says, his voice hard, “put Alessandra in hospital. She could have been killed. This isn’t about the IPO anymore. These guys are dangerous, and we need to stop them.”

  He’s right.

  I start typing a message. I have good news.

  User0989’s reply comes within seconds. You have the list?

  Yes. Do you have my money?

  Of course. You can trust that you’ll get paid.

  I’m not in the habit of trusting strangers, I reply. I name an escrow service that’s popular on the dark web. I’m going to send the list to them. They’ll release a sample to you. If you’re satisfied, then the exchange happens.

  Fine, User0989 types. I’m transferring the money to them now.

  “He’s in a hurry,” Oliver comments dryly. We wait around Finn’s kitchen island, too tense to speak, until I receive a notification from the escrow service that the money is in place.

  “This is it.” I take a deep breath and send Lawrence Kent the client list Finn created for me. Will Kent spot the changes we made to it? We’re about to find out.

  He doesn’t. I get a reply in less than five minutes. Perfect, User0989 types. Nice doing business with you.

  We have Kent exactly where we want him. Time for the final stage of the plan.