Feel The Fire (Unforgettable Series)

by Adrianne Byrd

  The bartender approached. “Can I get you two anything else?”

  “I’m good, she said.

  Her handsome storyteller simply shook his head, and the bartender silently drifted away.

  Toni glanced back at her companion with a million questions racing through her mind. His story had the makings of a soap opera. Did this Ophelia Missler really love her childhood friend, Solomon, or had Jonas, her current drinking partner, stolen her heart?

  “You know, I really don’t know why I’m running off at the mouth like this. My rehashing this story isn’t going to change how things turned out.”

  Fearful she wouldn’t hear the rest of the story, Toni carefully placed a hand against his arm. “Maybe not, but talking about things can be therapeutic.”

  His silence seemed to stretch for an eternity before he finally met her gaze. “I guess you want to hear the rest?”

  Toni nodded and leaned in close. However, the wedding turned out to be a disaster with the bride marching down the aisle; but unable to say “I do,” and leaving Jonas at the altar while the bride ran off to Las Vegas to marry Solomon.

  “Flight 1269 to Los Angeles is now ready for boarding.”

  “Oh, that’s me.” Toni dabbed her eyes and then slid her purse strap over her shoulder before she glanced at Jonas again. She didn’t quite know what to say to such a bittersweet love story, especially since he had gotten the short end of the stick. “It looks like I did a lousy job in cheering you up,” she admitted.

  Jonas’s adorable dimples flashed. “I don’t know about that. It felt good to finally talk about it. It’s been a year, and Lord knows, my brothers, though well-intentioned, have been unsuccessful in getting me to open up.” He met her gaze. “Looks like you are a good listener.”

  “A year, huh?” Toni’s interest perked.

  “Yeah. I heard Ophelia and Solomon had a beautiful girl last month. For the most part, I’ve been able to move on. I’m a little nostalgic because today would’ve been our one-year anniversary.

  Toni nodded as she studied him. “You know, I bet she was right about you,” she said. “One day you’ll make some woman a wonderful husband.”

  She didn’t know what possessed her to say that, but she meant it. Maybe it was something about his eyes. He had kind eyes, though now upon closer inspection and after hearing his sob story, she could see he was still very much a scarred man. Most likely, he had even thrown in the towel when it came to love.

  Pity.

  Then again, hadn’t she done the same thing?

  Jonas leaned back and crossed his arms while he studied her. “Is that right?”

  A delicious warmth swept throughout Toni’s body, and if she was standing, she was certain her knees would’ve buckled.

  “Now boarding 1269 to Los Angeles...”

  Reluctantly, Toni stood from her bar stool. She reached into her purse and withdrew a business card. “If you’re ever in Los Angeles, give me a call.”

  Still watching her, Jonas accepted the card. “I just might do that, Ms...” He glanced at her name and a wide smile eased across his lips. “Ms. Wright.”

  “Until then.” She winked, and then made sure she swished her hips in just the right way as she strolled out of the Crown Room.

  Jonas enjoyed the view as he pocketed the card. “Until then, Ms. Wright.”

  Chapter 2

  Jonas swore this would be the last time he would fly commercial. The airlines were always losing baggage, overbooking flights, delaying flights or just flat out canceling them. It was a wonder how any of the companies managed to stay in business. Not to mention, first class wasn’t what it used to be. The only thing it meant nowadays was that you’d get your drinks first.

  In truth, the last thing he needed was a drink. How many did he have sitting in the Crown Room talking to that attractive attorney-four? Five? Hell, he’d lost count.

  Settling into his seat and waving off the stewardess when she asked for his order, Jonas turned and glanced out of the window. How pathetic he must have sounded in that bar. A year later and he was still moaning about Ophelia.

  He had tried everything he could think of to get over her. He’d even been desperate enough to take Q’s advice and jump into bed with an extremely long line of faceless but curvaceous beauties. Sure, they gave him physical pleasure, but emotionally, he was still tangled in knots.

  It was better than getting emotionally attached. Hell, he’d take pleasure over pain any day.

  Then there were days when he wanted to track down Solomon Bassett and drag him into a dark alley and have an old-fashion fistfight. But what would that solve?

  It wasn’t that he was still in love with Ophelia. He wasn’t. It was just...he wanted to get even.

  Jonas pulled Toni’s business card out from his shirt pocket. For no particular reason, he just studied the stylish gold font promoting her as an associate partner of the law offices of Kaplan, Grey, & Kaplan.

  Maybe he hadn’t been too pathetic. She did give him her card after all, but what would be the point? He hardly ever went out to the west coast and he wasn’t interested in a long-distance relationship.

  “Just two ships passing,” he whispered under his breath, and tucked the card back into his shirt. “Miss?” He waved the stewardess back over to his seat. “I think I will have a drink.”

  Toni dreamed about a very naked Jonas Hinton during her five-hour flight back to Los Angeles. She pictured his entire body to be a smooth, even caramel glaze color, which would go perfect against her chocolate skin. Also in the dream, she had the brother bending in every direction imaginable and hitting all her hot spots.

  Judging by the sheepish grins from the passengers around her when she woke, she guessed she had been talking in her sleep and have given everyone quite an earful. However, she exited the plane with her head held high and an extra pep in her step.

  Toni had lived her whole life marching to a slightly different beat. She wasn’t quite wild child, but she was by no means a goody-two-shoes, either. She quite simply worked hard and played hard, too. When it came to men...well, they were like a box of chocolates. She never knew which one she was going to get.

  As long as she kept replenishing the box, she was happy.

  It was late when she finally made it home to her overpriced studio flat and she was more than ready to dive into her bed and get some real sleep. However, her ringing phone prevented her from fulfilling that wish.

  “Hey, Maria,” she answered without even looking at the caller ID.

  “Well, thank heavens you’re alive,” Maria barked in her thick Spanish accent. “You don’t know how to pick up the phone and call?”

  “Sorry. I know I was supposed to come to your party, but my flight was delayed and I’m just walking through the door.”

  “You’re just now getting home?” she questioned dubiously.

  “Yes. I swear,” Toni assured. “Next Botox party, I’m there.” Toni loved Maria to death and she was a beautiful woman, but she hated how vigorously her girl fought aging. If Maria wasn’t pumping silicon, collagen or Botox into her body, she was lasering, tucking and stretching her skin to the max. In the two years since Toni moved to Los Angeles, she noticed this behavior was the norm. California women were obsessed with youth.

  Toni, once again, offered up a prayer of thanks for her good genes. Her skin was just as smooth and supple as any twenty-year-old’s. Her casual workouts and active sex drive kept her curves tight and cellulite nonexistent.

  “Okay, girl. Next party, be there.” Maria paused for a moment and then asked, “How was your trip back to Atlanta? Did you see him?”

  Toni sighed as she kicked off her shoes and finally dumped her bags onto the sofa. “I saw him. We screwed. I left.”

  “Toni!”

  “What? We were both mature adults about it. We were there, we were horny, so we did it. There’s nothing wrong with having sex with an ex, as long as both of you know that’s all it is.”

&
nbsp; “So does he know?” Maria asked.

  “Does he know what?”

  “That that’s all there is?”

  She thought he did; but after a few drinks, Brian made it clear he wasn’t over her. “It doesn’t matter,” she finally said, shrugging off the guilt. “It’s over now.”

  “Code for: you’re just not going to take his calls.”

  “Wow. Why are you taking this so personally? You’re acting like Brian is your brother or something.”

  “You stay the hell away from my brothers.”

  “What?”

  “C’mon. If you were a guy, you would be what we call a dog. You’re a wham-bam-thank-you-sir kind of girl.”

  “That’s not true. Brian and I had a little office fling a few years ago and it just didn’t work out. End of story.”

  Maria laughed. “You have to have more than sex to have a relationship, Toni.”

  “When you’re as busy as I am, it’s hard to find time to have more than just sex. I work ninety hours a week in a law office that expects a hundred and the only vacation I get is our annual December weekend trip.”

  For the past twenty years Toni and her college friends Brooklyn, Maria, Ashley, and Noel would travel to New York for holiday shopping and Broadway plays. Like her best friend Brooklyn, Toni didn’t think the girls got together enough, but as each of them had such busy lives, one weekend was better than nothing.

  Toni and Brooklyn had once lived just miles a part in Atlanta, but once Brooklyn remarried and moved to Texas, Toni decided it was time for a change as well and high-tailed it to L.A and now lived just miles from Maria.

  Ashley still worked at the American Embassy in England. Noel resided in New York but was no longer “the only white girl in rap,” as they once teased.

  The only evicted member from their group was Macy Patterson and that was only because she had broken a golden girlfriend rule: sleeping and then stealing Brooklyn’s first husband.

  Maria laughed and brought Toni’s thoughts back to the present. “Hold on. Let me get my violin out.”

  “Not funny.” Toni made her way to the kitchen and grabbed a soda. Maybe she shouldn’t have slept with Brian. He was always the overly emotional type. She was only in Atlanta to help her practice with one of her old cases, but one night one thing led to another.

  “Did you at least win the case?”

  “Of course.” Toni popped the cap off her soda and took a deep celebratory chug. “Toni Wright never loses a case.”

  “I got to hand it to you, Toni. You are good.”

  “In six months, I’ll be a full partner at Kaplan, Grey &Kaplan. Mark my words.”

  Maria sighed as if indifferent to the idea.

  “What?” Toni asked defensively.

  “What what?”

  “C’mon, what’s with the long sigh?”

  “Nothing,” Maria lied unconvincingly.

  “Spit it out.” Toni left the kitchen and made a beeline to her bedroom and then the bathroom. “If you have something to say just say it.” She plugged the tub and turned on the water.

  “Well, it’s just that everything is always business with you.”

  “A minute ago you said it was sex.”

  “All right. Business and sex. What about romance? When are you going to find a guy and just settle down?”

  “Oh, not that again,” Toni moaned and took another swig of Diet Pepsi before reaching for her bath salts.

  “Yes that again. Don’t you ever get lonely?”

  “I don’t have time to get lonely. Besides, marriage isn’t for everyone. If I see too much of someone I just break out in hives.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “It feels true.” Another chug. “You want to know the truth?” she asked.

  “Please.”

  “I get claustrophobic in relationships,” she admitted. “Seeing someone day after day, night after night. I don’t see how people do it.”

  “Oh, God. Are you sure you don’t have a penis?”

  Toni laughed and shut off her bath water. “I’m sure.” However an unexpected image of Jonas Hinton floated across her mind. “Besides, love is a woman’s greatest downfall,” she quoted her mother.

  “I don’t believe that. But if you’re happy, then I’m happy.”

  “And I am,” she reaffirmed; but after she ended the call, the apartment’s silence bothered her.

  It was too quiet.

  Then just as quickly, she laughed the whole notion off. “Don’t let all that relationship talk get to you, girl. You like your life just the way it is.”

  Chapter 3

  “The best thing for a hangover is another drink,” Q announced, handing Jonas a tall, stiff one.

  Jonas moaned, waved off the glass and stumbled to his feet. How did he allow himself to get in this condition? He was doing so well.

  “Whatever you do, don’t tell me you were drinking over her again,” Q said, keeping the vodka for himself and eyeing his oldest brother. When Jonas didn’t respond, he had his answer. “See? This is what I’ve been trying to tell you and Sterling,” he continued. “When it comes to women, keep your emotions out of it.”

  “Somehow I keep forgetting you’re an expert.” Jonas wavered on his feet but managed to make it to his adjoining bathroom and, more mercifully, the shower.

  The icy water was more than enough to quell his nausea and clear his foggy head while he repeated the vow he’d made over a year ago. “Never again.”

  By the time Jonas stepped out of the shower, he’d nearly transformed into a human Popsicle. But at least he wasn’t hung over.

  “I don’t know how the hell you do that,” Q said, draining the last of his drink and standing up from the leather chaise inside his brother bedroom.

  Jonas didn’t know how his brother always had a way of looking like he was ready for a GQ photo shoot. His hair and clothes was always picture-perfect and his eyes were always clear despite a hangover.

  “Why are you here?”

  “I need a favor.”

  “If it involves money, the answer is no.”

  “C’mon. I’m good for it.”

  “No, you’re not. When mom and dad cut you off, they didn’t mean for you to come crawling to me to support you. Get a job.”

  Q shuddered repulsively and held his fingers up like a crucifix.

  “Not funny. Get a job.” Jonas finished toweling off and pulled out a pair of silk boxers. Every week they had this same conversation about Q’s financial situation and the result was also always the same: Q would avoid joining the work force by finding some gullible, wealthy woman to take care of him.

  “Look, everyone will be a lot better off if they just accept I’m not like you and Sterling. I have no business in Corporate America.”

  “Then do something else,” Jonas responded without sympathy, and selected a suit from his closet. “Find something you’re good at and do it.”

  Q fell silent.

  “There has to be something,” Jonas added, though he was hard-pressed to thing of anything himself.

  “Well, I am good with the ladies,” his little brother bragged with a jiggle of his eyebrows. “I haven’t had a dissatisfied customer yet.”

  Jonas stopped and looked at him.

  “I’m talking about bedroom performance only,” Jonas amended. “I’m no good with that sticking around stuff.”

  “Q, grow up. You’re thirty-three years old, still trying to live off Mommy and Daddy’s money.”

  “Spare me the speeches, Jonas. A simple yes or no to the loan will suffice.”

  “Then the answer is no.”

  “Big surprise.” Q turned toward the door.

  “You want a surprise, ask me a different question,” Jonas said.

  “What—and miss out on our precious brotherly chats? Not on your life. Same time tomorrow?”

  Jonas laughed. Q would never change. Their parents, an eccentric ex-Broadway actress and a much older real-estate tycoo
n were fair as far parents went, and they always encouraged their sons to work hard and pursue their dreams. It worked for Jonas and Sterling who were both wealthy men in their own right; however, Quentin only pursued having a good time.

  His father’s new strategy was to cut Q off. Jonas and Sterling agreed not to offer any financial support. Six months later, Q was still living the high-life. All in all, he was one lucky son of a bitch.

  Jonas, however, delved in an array of business adventures. Once upon a time, BusinessWeek magazine had hailed him as the CEO with the Midas Touch. Lately? Not so much.

  Since his disastrous wedding, he seemed to have lost his mojo. No matter what he did, he was unable to get it back.

  He would, he vowed. He had to.

  Jonas quickly finished getting dressed and as he grabbed his keys and wallet from his clothes from the day before, Toni’s business card flittered to the floor. He stared at it and then slowly reached for it. Instantly a smile curved his mouth, just thinking about the attractive attorney with the come-hither eyes and seductive perfume.

  Her casual attire just hinted at the curves that lay beneath and he had to admit, although grudgingly, he was curious.

  Turning, he walked to the phone next to the bed and started dialing the number on the card. On the first ring, his conscience asked: what the hell are you doing? On the second ring, he realized he didn’t know. By the third ring, he started to hang up when the call was transferred to voice mail and Toni’s sexy, almost husky, voice greeted him.