“Here goes nothing,” Jay said quietly when he knocked on the door marked thirty thirty-three. A long moment later, the door opened to reveal a young Chinese man.
“Yeah?” His expression became wary as he took in Jay and Don, both of whom looked very official in their business suits.
“We’re looking for Delaney,” Jay said.
“No one here by that name,” the guy said before quickly closing the door.
Don was quicker, however, maneuvering a foot and shoulder between the door and the wall and shoving his way in. “Told you that you needed me,” he grunted as Jay stalked past.
The doorman was grumbling something in Chinese as Jay entered the suite, which was littered with nearly twenty different laptops.
“Well, well, what have you gotten yourself into now, Delaney?”
The years had not been kind to his former roommate. Once upon a time she was a stunning, polished woman with thick, long brown hair and bright brown eyes. Looking at her now, she appeared washed out and haggard. Her addiction had done that to her, Jay reminded himself. He was not responsible for what she’d become. She looked startled, but certainly not surprised to see him.
“It’s okay, Li,” she said to the man who’d answered the door. “He’s not here to report us. Mr. McManus doesn’t operate that way. He just gathers intel and uses it for his own purposes. I suspect he’s here to make some sort of deal.”
Jay scanned the computer screens located throughout the room. All of them had betting odds for that week’s upcoming NFL games. “Interesting little business you’ve got here, Delaney,” Jay said as he watched. “Off-site betting on pro football games. I’d say you finally put your two best talents together: gambling and software development. Congratulations.”
“A girl’s got to make a living somehow, Jay. After all, you destroyed my chances to marry into one of the wealthiest families in Chicago.” Her hands went to her hips.
“You destroyed your own chances, Delaney. You were stealing from Blake.”
“Borrowing, Jay. From my fiancé. It was none of your business.”
Jay shook his head. “Actually, it was my business to let my best friend know his future wife had a gambling problem and was already taking him to the cleaners before they even walked down the aisle.”
“I told you before, I would have worked it out.”
He laughed then. “Before or after the thugs showed up to rough you up? Face it, Delaney, you were so far in debt you couldn’t have ‘worked it out.’”
She glanced over at Don, who was furiously snapping photos of the laptop screens. “You’ll want to pay attention to this part,” she said to Don. “This is where my old friend here claims to be my white knight.”
“I bailed you out.”
“You blackmailed me,” she snapped. “You made Blake fall out of love with me; then you used me yourself. All so you could get rich quick and get your damn vineyard. And a freaking professional football team! What did I get? Nothing!”
“Is that what your little blogger game is about?” Jay demanded. “You think I owe you something?”
Delaney’s laugh was harsh sounding. “You wouldn’t be where you are today without me.”
“And you likely wouldn’t be alive without me.” Jay’s words hung like stalactites in the stale air of the hotel suite.
Her lips formed an angry line but she didn’t refute his words. She couldn’t.
Jay scrubbed his fingers through his hair. “Look, Delaney, this has to stop. I’m not your enemy.”
“No,” she whispered. “But you’re not my friend, either. I sometimes wonder if you ever were. I loved you, you know. Almost as much as I loved Blake.”
“Get help, Delaney. And stop harassing Blake and me with trumped-up lawsuits and that ridiculous blog.”
She crossed her arms defiantly against her chest. “Or what?”
“Or we’ll turn your ass over to the Feds,” Don shouted. “Hell, I’ll turn you over to Interpol because I’m sure this is an international operation.”
“And here I thought your friend was a Fed,” Delaney said to Jay before turning back to Don. “You must not know Jay very well, because he’d never turn me in.”
Don glanced between Jay and Delaney, a glimmer of confusion in his eyes.
Jay sucked in a breath. “How much do you owe?”
Delaney grimaced and shook her head. “Enough to have me enslaved here for the near future.”
“So the blog and the lawsuits are how you’ve been entertaining yourself while you’re in this opulent prison?”
She shrugged. “I needed a diversion.”
“Make it stop,” Jay commanded as he walked close enough to whisper to her. “All of it. Find another diversion. I’d suggest solitaire but I’m sure you’ve found a way to cheat at that one by now.” He leaned closer so the other men in the room wouldn’t overhear him. “Perhaps you could spend your time calculating the interest accruing in that lovely Swiss bank account you have? Tell me, do the goons you work for know you’re skimming their profits, Delaney? I wonder how they’d feel about your secret retirement account. Maybe I should set up a blog and write about your creative bookkeeping.”
Delaney’s eyes grew wide before she narrowed them to slits.
Jay smiled smugly at her discomfort. He had no idea how long she’d been skimming money from the profits, but Delaney’s employers likely weren’t as smart as Jay was at detecting it. It was what had first alerted him to her backstabbing when she worked for McManus Industries, after all. Knowing Delaney, she was building herself a nice nest egg while she was “enslaved” paying off her debt. If it were anyone else but Delaney, Jay might have been impressed with her acumen.
He turned to Don and signaled him to proceed to the door.
“She won’t ever love you, you know,” Delaney called after them.
Jay halted, turning around to face her, his chest squeezing when he met her cold eyes.
“Not an honest love, anyway,” she continued. “Don’t forget how she dumped your ass when she found out you weren’t inheriting. Do you really think you can trust her?”
A throbbing started at the base of Jay’s skull. He didn’t trust Bridgett. But he trusted Delaney less. “To hear you tell it, I don’t have a heart, Delaney, so what are you worried about?” The fact that his heart wouldn’t be engaged with Bridgett wasn’t Delaney’s business.
She laughed again. “You may be ruthless and stingy with your money, Jay, but you have a heart. I should know. I’ve taken advantage of it a time or two.”
“Not anymore. Find another diversion, Delaney.”
“The same goes for you, Jay. Like I said, she’ll never love you.”
“Jesus,” Donovan muttered when the elevator doors finally closed behind them. “I hope your friend knows how much he owes you for saving him from that.”
Jay leaned his head against the back wall and closed his eyes. “I remind him every chance I get.”
“Now what?”
“Talk to Jennifer Knowles and get her to go on the record that the case was her sister-in-law’s idea,” Jay said. “I’ll get Hank to get the players to apologize to her and we’ll send everyone to sensitivity training. It should all blow over.”
The elevator doors opened and they stepped out into the tropical lobby. “Something tells me Alesha Warren won’t give up easily.”
Jay walked toward the doors leading out into the midday heat. “Alesha Warren can stew for years while the case gets stalled in court for all I care. Mimi has enough to refute any possible crap she leaks to the media.”
“And Delaney? Was whatever you threatened her with enough to make her stop blogging?”
Delaney. Jay pulled his sunglasses out of his breast pocket. “She’ll stop blogging. It won’t be as amusing to her now that I know she’s behind it.” His
threat to out her to her Chinese mafia bosses was enough to end her harassment of both him and Blake. Delaney knew Jay didn’t make threats lightly. Of course, that didn’t mean Delaney wouldn’t find a way to be a pain in his ass once she’d made good on her current debt. She liked messing with his head too much.
She’ll never love you.
Delaney thought she was scoring a wound with Jay by leveling her threat about Bridgett, but she didn’t realize how wrong she was. Bridgett had already destroyed his heart. He wouldn’t let her do it again. Jay told himself that his uneasiness over Delaney’s words had nothing to do with his heart.
“Call for the car, will you?” He handed the valet ticket to Don. “I’m just going to take a walk around the block.”
“Sure thing.”
• • •
The summer heat felt good after nineteen days of winter in New Zealand. Jay jumped out of the cab before it even reached a full stop in front of the Hyde Park house. He was eager to get a shower and get to a computer so he could finally close the deal with DiSantis. Selling the labels had been more agonizing than he thought, but at least now he had the cash for the fermentation formula. He’d take the job with the investment firm and raise the money for the vineyard on his own. His stepfather’s death was a setback, but certainly not one that would defeat him. Besides, he’d have Bridgett by his side.
Bridgett. It had been four and a half weeks since he’d last seen her. His cell phone service didn’t allow for international calling and finding a computer with AOL access had been impossible in New Zealand. Jay missed Bridgett’s soft smile and her sunny, positive outlook. He’d need that and more to get through the next phase in his life. Now that he’d taken care of business, it was time to take care of Bridgett. He couldn’t wait for her to return to the States.
The house was nearly empty when Jay bounded through the door. The lease was up at the end of the month and, from the looks of it, Delaney had already moved out, taking with her most of the furniture and likely everything in the kitchen. Jay was surprised to find Blake seated on the only furniture remaining, the old leather recliner. It was midafternoon on a Wednesday, a workday for Blake normally. His roommate had a beer in his hand and was watching the Cubs on a small TV.
“Look who’s home,” Blake said. “It’s the world traveler. I was beginning to think you’d stay in New Zealand.”
“Things took longer than I expected.” Jay glanced around the room. He took in the boarded-up window in the dining area. “What the hell happened here? Where’s your big-screen TV?”
“Delaney happened.” Blake took another pull from his beer, but he didn’t bother lifting his eyes from the television screen. “You were right. She didn’t deny taking the money from me.”
Jay swallowed painfully. He’d hated to rat her out to Blake, but he didn’t want his friend to go into the marriage without being totally prepared for his wife’s imperfections. “Did she tell you what she wanted the money for?”
“Didn’t have to,” Blake said. “A couple of guys came collecting the other night. They helped themselves to anything that wasn’t nailed down. Including my Porsche.”
“Holy shit!” Jay sunk down onto the floor. “Did you call the police?”
Blake shot him a look that said, What do you think, dumbass? “Insurance will buy me a new car, but I’m sure that’s what Delaney was counting on.”
“You don’t think she did this on purpose?”
“She’s a manipulative bitch with a gambling problem. She’s been using us for years. Everything that girl does is on purpose.” Blake’s whole body radiated anger.
“You don’t think they’ll hurt her, do you?”
Blake jumped from the chair. “That’s not really my problem, is it?” Blake’s face was ravaged with bitterness and pain. He’d loved Delaney. Her betrayal had obviously cut him deeply.
Jay struggled to find the right words. “I’m sorry” didn’t sound like enough. Despite everything, he was also worried about their former roommate. Delaney was a product of the foster care system with no real family to fall back on for help. She’d obviously gotten in way over her head. He bit back the suggestion he was about to make, the one about them going to look for her, given Blake’s demeanor.
“Look, I’ve been on planes and in airports for the last thirty-six hours,” he said instead. “Let me jump into the shower and then we can go out and grab a beer.”
Blake shook his head. “I’m not very good company right now. I’ve only been hanging out here waiting for you to get back. I’ve got a place over in Wicker Park. You still headed to New York?”
Jay nodded. It seemed that his life was changing faster than he wanted. “Yeah. The job pays well and I’ll be close to Charlie.”
“Okay, then,” Blake said. “Both the Cubs and the Sox are in New York in September. I’ll get the corporate seats and we can catch up then. Dad’s still serious about lining up investors if you’re still serious about the vineyard.”
“Hell yeah, I’m still serious.” Jay had just sold off the only legacy he had from his grandfather in order to make it happen.
“I’ll help with the advertising, but I don’t think it would be a good idea for us to be partners.” Blake swallowed roughly. “It’s just not the same anymore.”
Jay nodded. Their dream was going to be only his dream, if it worked at all.
Blake clapped him on the shoulder. “Maybe it’s better this way anyway. You and your Italian girlfriend can crush the grapes with your bare feet without me getting in the way.”
“I need to call her and let her know I’m still alive.” He smiled sheepishly. “It’ll be good to hear her voice.”
“At least one of us should be happy.” Blake’s words were tinged with bitterness as he headed through the kitchen. Jay followed him out, stopping when he caught sight of an assortment of mail addressed to him that was piled on the kitchen counter. He fingered a letter with a Boston postmark and his gut clenched. Bridgett was the only one he knew from the entire state of Massachusetts. But she wouldn’t be home yet. Not unless something had happened. Heart racing, he tore at the envelope.
The handwriting was smudged but it was still lyrical and open like Bridgett herself. Jay suddenly wished they’d exchanged more letters. But he’d been traveling around trying to secure his lifelong dream and he’d had no real address to give her these past few weeks. He’d explained as much in his only letter to her.
Dear Jay,
I hope this letter finds you, wherever you may be. I’m sorry to have to tell you this at such a difficult time in your life, but I don’t want you to go on believing that our relationship is something more than it actually is was.
He must have made some sort of sound because Blake was suddenly beside him.
“What’s up?”
Jay shook his head furiously, forcing his eyes to focus on the words on the page.
I enjoyed our summer together. I really did. But I always thought that being in love with someone would mean I would do anything for them—including living in near poverty to start up a winery. But I find that I might not be suited for that life. I want more. My feelings for you just aren’t strong enough and if I’ve given you the impression that they are, then I’m sorry. To be in love with someone means it hurts to be away from them and while I’ve missed you these past couple of weeks, I’ve found I’ve missed someone else more and I’m returning to Boston to be with him. I hope that someday you’ll be happy for me.
I wish you well in your pursuit of your dream.
B.
“No,” he whispered. This couldn’t be from Bridgett. He didn’t believe it. She’d been as enthused about the vineyard as Jay had been, sketching the house they’d live in and the life they would have.
“And she’d never once mentioned a fucking boyfriend,” he yelled as he tossed the letter on the counter.
> Blake picked it up, scanning the page. “Damn. They’re all alike. Scheming bitches who only want money. She probably heard you didn’t inherit.”
Jay’s chest squeezed. How could she have? He’d never mentioned Lloyd Davis to her. But DiSantis knew. A roaring began in Jay’s head. He reached for the house phone.
“Don’t bother. I had it disconnected last week when I moved out,” Blake said.
Jay was having trouble forcing the words out. “I have to make a call. Something’s not right here.”
“She’s not worth it, Jay. No woman is.”
But she was. Or he’d thought she was. Jay didn’t understand her change of heart and he desperately needed to. “I need to call DiSantis,” he argued.
Blake sighed. “Yeah, okay. But only to close the deal on the fermentation formula, okay? We’re both finished with letting women screw up our lives, Jay.”
They drove to Wicker Park. The air was sawing through Jay’s lungs as though he’d run the twelve miles. He snatched the phone out of its base and was dialing before Blake had even shut the door. It took nearly eight rings before someone answered and Jay realized it was likely after midnight in Italy. Vincenzo DiSantis was not happy to be awakened and he sounded even less enthused that it was Jay on the line.
“Where the hell you been, eh?” Vincenzo yelled at him, his accent thick. “Your bambolina needed you!”
Vincenzo had dissolved into speaking only Italian and Jay was having trouble understanding his rapid tirade.
“Per favore, please, sir, listen to me,” Jay tried to interject. “I was in New Zealand getting the money for the formula. I have it now—”
The vineyard owner swore violently. “Is that your only care? The wine? Not your Bridgett? Or your bambino?”
Jay staggered to a chair and sunk down into it. Baby? What baby?
Sleeping With the Enemy Page 22
