Sleeping With the Enemy

by Tracy Solheim

  “Of course it is. But you can’t tell anyone. Not even Jay.”

  A tremor of unease trickled up Bridgett’s spine. “Why do I feel like this is some sort of test?”

  Charlie grinned again. “Because it is. I need to know I can trust you. Jay doesn’t let many people in, but you’re here and that has to mean something. I don’t want to see him get hurt again.”

  Bridgett swallowed hard around the lump in her throat. “Again?”

  “Yeah.” Charlie’s face was grim as she navigated the sharp turns on the road leading to the vineyard. “He got his heart broken pretty good years ago when he was in Italy. Some Italian princess or something. My father had just died and I needed Jay, but—but he was different after that summer. Guarded, like he was protecting his heart. He’s been that way ever since.”

  Tears burned Bridgett’s eyes and she hid them from Charlie by studying the scenery outside her window. What happened in Italy had not been her fault.

  “So if he’s thinking of opening up to you, I need to make sure you’re trustworthy.”

  “You have it all wrong. We don’t have that kind of relationship.” Once maybe, but not now.

  “Says you. All the more reason for me to figure out if you can be trusted with my brother’s heart.”

  Bridgett wanted to scream. It wasn’t Jay’s heart that had ever been at issue. It was hers. Jay was the one who left her alone and pregnant without even a second thought. “I have no legal reason to need to know the identity of your baby’s father,” she managed to say through her tight throat.

  “But you have every ethical reason to keep it secret now that I’ve hired you.”

  “Don’t you dare tell me,” Bridgett warned, all but plugging up her ears.

  Charlie ignored her. “It’s patient number Z457.”

  Anger rolled through Bridgett and it took a moment to absorb what Charlie had blurted out. “What?”

  “Yep,” Charlie said smugly as the Range Rover passed through the grove of ancient olive trees. “My baby’s daddy is a sperm donor.”

  “I don’t understand.” Except Bridgett was beginning to think she did.

  Charlie pulled the car to a stop in front of the roaring fountain. “I Googled you this morning. You come from a big family. A close family. I want that. Now. Not later. I just told you that Jay has been emotionally distant for years. I have no idea if that will change. And my mother—” She shook her head briskly.

  Princess Charlotte wasn’t exactly the spoiled little rich girl as much as she was the lonely little rich girl. Bridgett heaved another sigh. “Your child’s fortune will definitely need some legal protection if the father ever comes calling, then.”

  “You see, I do need you, Bridgett. I was assured that the clinic was discreet and word wouldn’t get out, but nothing is bulletproof when it comes to the paparazzi these days.”

  “I’ll do my best to provide you both a shield of protection where I can,” Bridgett said solemnly. While she didn’t want to be involved with Jay’s family any more than necessary, she wouldn’t leave Charlie and her child unprotected. Clearly, Charlie had no intention of relying on her brother for that protection. He’d be devastated to know his sister had put herself at so much risk. Bridgett would just have to make sure the risk was minimal. “I’ll represent you on this.”

  “Good,” Charlie said, her body rigid in the driver’s seat. “Because I may need you to defend me for murdering my brother.”

  Bridgett glanced across the fountain at the foyer where an older woman waved at them. Dressed in a black knit dress and sensible shoes, her shoulder-length ash-blond bob blew slightly in the evening breeze. “Who is she?” Bridgett asked.

  “The mother I told my asshole brother I wanted to avoid.”

  • • •

  Jay leaned back against the high back of the leather chair in his office at McManus Industries. Housed in San Mateo, the northernmost part of Silicon Valley, the glass-enclosed building overlooked a man-made lake and a tree-lined jogging trail. From his suite on the twenty-second floor, Jay had a great view of the Santa Cruz mountains.

  He squeezed at the back of his neck. After four hours of meetings spent getting caught up on the day-to-day operations of his software company, he needed a drink. And a hot shower. Preferably a hot shower with a certain lawyer followed by a smooth glass of Scotch.

  He was actually glad his mother hadn’t been in the office when he’d called earlier. Instead of meeting her for dinner, he’d left a message inviting her to the cocktail party on Saturday night. At least he’d made the effort. Now he’d let the traffic die down and then head back to the vineyard, where he could lure Bridgett into the tasting room beside the wine cellar. If all went as planned, he’d be tasting more than the wine in a matter of hours.

  His cell phone buzzed on his desk. Jay glanced at the screen to see a photo of Blake Callahan rock climbing down the side of a jagged cliff on some island somewhere. Blake was a bit of an adrenaline junkie—a trait Jay had always shared with his friend until Blake had begun taking on extreme sports that involved a lot more risk. Jay suspected there was some deep-seated reason behind his friend’s death wish, but so far Blake had been avoiding his probing.

  “Mac.” His friend called Jay by the nickname he had dubbed him back during their days as college roommates. “You’re slipping. You’re always bragging about keeping your private life private. First I read about a bunch of cheerleaders suing your ass. Then, every feminist group in the country has you on its most wanted list. There are whispers that the commissioner is considering sanctions. But imagine my surprise when I clicked on my computer this morning.” Jay could hear the pounding of Blake’s sneakered feet on the treadmill. “So how was it playing the comforting port in the storm for your sexy lawyer? I’ve seen her at a few fund-raising events in Boston. She’s fire and ice all in one designer package. So I gotta know, which one is the real Bridgett Janik?”

  “None of your damn business,” Jay growled into the phone. No way was he discussing his relationship with Bridgett. Not even with his best friend.

  “Whoa,” Blake said with a laugh. “Your answer just told me everything I need to know. Don’t tell me the guy who vowed during a two-day bender in Las Vegas that he’d never fall in love has finally succumbed?”

  That two-day bender had happened a few months after his return from Italy. Not only had he just been cut out of his stepfather’s will, leaving his plans of developing his winery uncertain, but the one person who could have made his life’s little detour more bearable had betrayed him and broken his heart. “Who said anything about being in love?” What he and Bridgett had was intense chemistry. Jay sure as hell wasn’t going to make the mistake of allowing it to become anything more. Not this time.

  “You better not be lying to me, Mac. You and I have been on People’s Fifty Hottest Bachelors list for nearly a decade. It’s actually become a badge of honor. Don’t you dare leave me hanging there alone. Every time I turn around, someone is getting married. I’m running out of excuses to avoid all the freaking weddings I’m constantly invited to.”

  The Callahan family was part of old Chicago money, making Blake the city’s proverbial crown prince. The fact that he remained unmarried and ran one of the biggest advertising agencies in the country made him irresistible to society hostesses. They considered him to be the town’s biggest catch.

  “You love having women throw themselves at you, Blake. Don’t lie.”

  Blake had obviously picked up his pace on the treadmill because his voice was more winded now. “Not when I have no idea whether they’re throwing themselves at me or my money.”

  “Have you looked in a mirror lately? They’re all after your money, asshole.”

  “Screw you,” Blake huffed as he ran faster. “Speaking of which, why have you been hounding me all day when according to bloggers, you’re entertaining yo
ur lawyer lover, who chased you out to your winery?”

  “Blogger, not bloggers,” Jay said. “And her information is not factually correct.”

  “So you’re not screwing Bridgett Janik? I’m disappointed in you, man. I wouldn’t mind getting to know her up close and personal.”

  Jay shot out of his chair and began pacing the room to calm the surge of anger toward his best friend. “Like hell you will,” he snapped. No one was getting to know Bridgett “up close and personal” ever again. She was Jay’s now.

  Blake laughed heartily. “Damn, Mac, you’re so easy. And from the sounds of it, you’ve got it bad for this woman. I never thought I’d see the day. I’d like to meet her.” Jay bristled at the thought of Bridgett meeting the man who’d been named Chicago’s Sexiest Bachelor three times in the past five years. “If she hasn’t dumped you by then, bring her with you when the Blaze come to play the Bears next month,” Blake teased. “You know my mom would love to show her around.”

  “We’ll see.” While Jay had no intention of letting Bridgett slip out of his life again, he certainly didn’t want to spook her with a weekend in Claire Callahan’s clutches. “As interesting as this conversation is, that’s not why I left you a message to call me. I have a problem that I might need your help with.”

  “If it involves the cheerleaders, I’m all in.”

  “It might involve finding Delaney.”

  Blake was silent on the other end of the line and Jay could no longer hear his feet pounding on the treadmill. “I thought we agreed we were never going to talk about her again?” his friend finally asked.

  This was going to be the tricky part. Once upon a time, Delaney Silverberg had been their third roommate—Blake’s lover for over two years. Brilliant and vivacious, she was ambitious as well. The trio had planned to open a winery together, with Jay handling the production component while Delaney, an industrial engineer and software wiz, handled the logistics. As heir to the Callahan Agency, Blake would, naturally, handle all their promotions. The plan, hatched over multiple deep-dish pizzas and beer, had almost become a reality. Almost.

  “Unfortunately, it might be unavoidable,” Jay said.

  He heard the beep of the treadmill being stopped before Blake released an explosive sigh. “That woman is toxic, Jay. She destroys everything in her path. Hell, she very nearly destroyed our friendship. I don’t want that to happen, and that means keeping her off-limits as a subject of discussion.”

  Jay squeezed at the back of his neck again. Blake was right—this was an old wound that didn’t need to be reopened. But he was sitting on a ticking time bomb and all roads pointed to Delaney.

  What had sounded feasible over pizza and beer had proved to be nearly impossible for the very reason that most start-ups never get off the ground: lack of money. Jay had hoped to convince his stepfather to invest in the winery, but when Lloyd Davis died, the trustees overseeing his fortune had emphatically denied the request. Blake landed safely in the boardroom of his father’s agency. Jay was offered a job with an investment banking firm in New York, where he would be near Charlie. Delaney would have survived unscathed, too, had her marriage to Blake gone ahead as planned.

  “Don’t tell me she’s in debt again and you’re going to bail her out?” Blake asked, his tone harsh.

  The problem was, Delaney had a serious gambling addiction, one that had come with dire consequences when two thugs destroyed her car in front of their house one night. Blake had immediately washed his hands of his fiancée, but Jay saw Delaney’s dilemma as an opportunity. The woman had a brilliant mind for software development. Instead of taking the job with the investment firm, Jay took the money he’d planned to use for his vineyard and started his dot-com venture. In exchange for paying off Delaney’s debts, Jay used her intellect to create his empire.

  “The last dollar she ever got from me was a paycheck and that was ten years ago,” Jay said.

  Delaney’s habits were hard to break, and when Jay had caught her trying to sell proprietary information to the Chinese, it had been the last straw. He’d fired her, threatening that if she tried it again, he’d report her to the Feds. In the ensuing years, she’d kept a low profile, presumably hiding from those whom she owed money to. Jay hadn’t concerned himself with her whereabouts. Until now.

  “Heath told me you’d been hit with a rash of sexual harassment suits lately?” Jay asked Blake.

  “My brother-in-law talks too damn much.” Blake’s anger about their topic was evident in his voice. “Sure. We’ve had a few at the firm, but all of them were unfounded.”

  “Were they all directed at you?”

  “Hey, screw you, man. I’m not a serial sexual harasser!”

  “But someone is making you out to be one.” Jay’s question was more of a statement, and Blake was silent on the other end of the phone.

  “What are you saying, Jay?”

  “I’ve had the same thing happening here. I didn’t give it any thought. It was just too coincidental,” Jay explained. “But the lawyer representing the cheerleaders claims to have information on all my cases. The leak didn’t come from here. I’ve checked very carefully. Which leads me to believe that she’s getting the details from the source.”

  “Jesus, Jay, you think that Delaney has something to do with this?”

  “I don’t know. It could be just coincidence. I haven’t heard from her in years, but she’s the only link between the two of us. I think whoever’s behind our recent spurt of sexual harassment suits might be that blogger, too. You know, the Girlfriends’ Guide to the NFL.”

  Blake blew out a whistle. “What makes you think that?”

  “Last year, Brody Janik’s wife, Shay, pulled together a spreadsheet about who the blogger had been targeting. I had Linc add to it with the more recent data. It’s very telling. The majority of her targets are on my team or are players repped by the sports public relations department of the Callahan Agency. The very same firm that you head up.”

  Jay’s statement was met with more silence before Blake answered. “How sure are you?”

  “I e-mailed you the spreadsheet. Check it out yourself.”

  Blake swore viciously. “You never should have bailed her out in the first place.”

  It had been a brash risk to do so, Jay admitted to himself. But at the time he had been desperate to succeed at something. To show his stepfather that Jay would have been worth an investment—even a small one. What he’d gotten in return from Delaney had been invaluable. Sure, he’d turned the tables and used her but Jay believed in survival of the fittest. Blake wouldn’t understand the necessity to prove himself because his father believed in him, supported him, and made room at his company for him.

  “Regardless of what I should or should not have done, Blake, I’ll take care of it now. She’s done hurting those people I care about.”

  “Bridgett Janik must really be something else if you’re willing to go to all this trouble to protect her reputation,” Blake said.

  Jay’s friend didn’t know the extent of the damage to Bridgett’s reputation Delaney could do if she put two and two together. He’d told both his friends about his summer affair, the baby, and how it had all ended, but fortunately, he hadn’t ever mentioned any names. Given Delaney’s monstrous brain, Jay didn’t want to take any chances. He had to cut her off before things went any further.

  “I’m protecting your sorry ass, too,” Jay said. “And don’t bother saying ‘I told you so.’ I know exactly how you feel on the subject.”

  Blake tsked. “I was going to ask if you needed any help but since you’re in Avenger mode, I’ll just leave you to it. Just don’t do anything stupid, okay?”

  “I’m just going to present her with a very good reason to cease and desist.”

  “Yeah, but she has a bit of a fearless streak. Desperation makes her take risks. Just be careful.”


  “I’ll be sure to call if I need backup,” Jay said.

  Blake chuckled. “That’s your problem. You’ve been flying solo for so long, you don’t even think about depending upon someone else. But I’m here if you need me. Just don’t put me in the same room with the woman, because I would probably kill her.”

  Jay’s phone vibrated with an incoming text message. “I’ll call you after I’ve spoken with her,” he told Blake. “I’ll see you next month when my team comes to put a whupping on your team.”

  Blake laughed and then hung up, and Jay skimmed the screen to view the text, hoping it was from Donovan with some more news about the case. A small part of him wished that he was wrong and he didn’t have to confront Delaney. Unfortunately, the text was from Linc. Jay unleashed a string of obscenities when he read it:

  Your mother has arrived at the vineyard.

  Fourteen

  Jay’s mother hugged her daughter tightly as she eyed Bridgett over Charlie’s shoulder. “I had no idea you were back in the States, sweetheart.”

  Charlie scoffed at her mother. “Right. Jay called you, I know.”

  “Actually, I wouldn’t have known Jay was in town had it not been for some gossip blogger,” the woman said.

  “Oh come on,” Charlie said so sharply it made Bridgett cringe. “You don’t read anything unless it’s a journal or a textbook.”

  The woman’s only reaction to her daughter’s harsh accusation was a slight downturn in the corners of her mouth. “Actually, the only way to know if my children are alive is by Twitter and tabloid-stalking them.”

  A touch of guilt flashed in Charlie’s eyes before she hid it behind her usual veil of disdain. “What are you doing here, Mother?”

  “I came to speak with your brother, but now I can visit with both my children at the same time. It’s been nearly a year since we’ve all been together.” She glanced over at Bridgett. “Charlotte, where are your manners? You haven’t introduced me to your friend.”