by Andre, Bella
Except the entrance we use is most definitely not one for the hoi polloi. Wouldn’t want the unwashed masses rubbing elbows with the richie-riches, right? My own bitterness surprises me, and I have a hard time looking at Declan for a minute or two.
His eyes shift; he sees it, and wants to say something, but doesn’t. Instead, the driver opens my door and Declan’s hand comes out to take mine.
My heart seizes with the touch of bare skin on bare skin. Jesus. If the man can get me this close to an O holding my hands, I’ll stroke out if we ever make it to a bed, naked.
And there I go again…what is wrong with me? I don’t do this. I don’t think like this. Not only do I not randomly strip strange men naked with my mind and have little porno movies in my head about them, I don’t even think about one-night stands.
The only guys I’ve ever slept with were friends first. Good friends. The slow, leisurely meandering to physical affection and something more, carefully measured out and talked through is more my speed.
I like to take things slow. To reveal myself layer by layer to men. To dip a toe in the water and pull back. I’m the kind of person who gets into a pool one inch of flesh at a time, pausing to shiver and acclimate.
Declan is the sexual equivalent of doing a cannonball. At 4 a.m. In March in northern Vermont.
As I climb out, my torn skirt shows so much thigh I might as well have given birth.
Declan’s eyebrow arches with appreciation. Controlling my breathing is becoming a second job. I stand and he reaches for me again, his hand on my back, and he smells like cloves, cinnamon, and tobacco. Not cigarettes, though.
“Do you smoke?” I ask as he leads me to an enormous oak door that opens suddenly, a concierge standing there in full tux.
“No. That’s Dad’s pipe you smell. We were working late at the office.”
It’s cardamon and Bengal tea spicy yumminess. I want to brew him in hot water and drink him.
We enter a room with an arched ceiling so high I expect to look up and see God with his finger outstretched. The dusky night shines through rounded windows at the peak. Dark mahogany covers the walls and muted lighting gives the restaurant a womblike feel. I can see past the front desk into the main dining room, where thick burgundy curtains frame each table.
This is a place designed for privacy.
“Ms. Jacoby.” The maître d’ appears, a man who looks to be about my father’s age, with gray hair and a salt-and-pepper goatee. He’s shorter than Declan, but lean, like a triathlete. Dressed in a tuxedo slightly different from the man at the door, he exudes luxury and service.
In his hand is a small white box with a bow and a gold paper medallion on it. He holds it out to me.
Puzzled, I look at Declan, who just smiles. I slide my fingernail along the gold seal and open the box.
It’s a corsage.
“What?” A sentimental laugh fills me, and suddenly I’m at ease.
“You missed your prom, so I thought…” Declan has been calm, cool, and collected until this moment. Right now, he looks like a nervous seventeen year old, though he covers it quickly, eyes going back to a hooded, careless look quite fast.
I pull it out of the box and pin it to my blazer. It’s a tasteful set of small red and white roses with a sprig of baby’s breath around it. Simple. Elegant.
Special.
I stand on tiptoe and kiss his cheek. My lips graze his jaw as I step down. He’s clean-shaven, but the rasp of my skin against his makes my entire body fill with instant lust.
“This is the nicest gesture anyone has ever done for me at a business meeting. Normally I’m lucky to have my own laptop outlet.” I can’t say what I really want to say, a mixture of gushing gratitude and joy that my babbling adolescent self is screeching inside. The words Thank you and He likes me! echo a thousand times a second through my mind and heart.
The box disappears as if the maître d’ were Dumbledore with a wand, and he leads us back to a table for four, shrouded on three sides by thick velvet curtains, a dim chandelier above us.
Declan pulls my chair out and I sit, scooching in, the press of cool leather a surprise on my upper thighs. Damn. My skirt’s split that high?
I’m unnerved again. A corsage? The heady scent of roses and caring fills the air around me. Declan’s looking at me with eyes that say this is not a business meeting, and my body responds to him like it has to no other man. Ever. Not even Steve made me feel like this.
“I didn’t go to my prom either,” he says as we settle in. A waiter fills our water glasses and a bottle of wine appears. Before I’m asked, a glass of red is poured for me.
I hate red wine.
“I would have thought that you were prom king,” I say.
He shakes his head, eyebrows furrowed. Then he waves a hand as if dispersing a bad memory.
“What?” I ask. I feel bolder now, as if I have the right to make him tell me whatever it is he was about to dismiss.
“I…I missed it because of my mother,” he says, reluctant, as if the confession is against his nature.
“Your mother?”
“She was in the hospital.”
My mind races to recall all the details Amanda and I learned when we researched Anterdec after our meeting. I know the name is the amalgam of the three sons’ names: Andrew, Terrance, and Declan. An Ter Dec. But Mrs. McCormick…I don’t remember anything about her.
“She died the day after my prom,” Declan says softly. Our eyes meet, and mine must be horrified, because he reaches out for my hand to comfort me. He’s the one whose mother died.
“You lost your mother that young?” I can’t help it. My throat fills with sympathetic tears. My mom may be a pain in the ass, but I don’t know what I’d do without her.
“It’s been ten years,” he says thickly. “But thank you.”
“For what?”
“For reacting like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you care. Most people don’t let themselves have genuine reactions to anything emotional.”
“I’m not most people.” The words come out wrong. What I want to say is I wear my heart on my sleeve, but that seems too vulnerable. This is just a business dinner, right?
Right.
“I’m sorry,” I say, pulling my hand away with great reluctance. He squeezes it and begins to run his thumb along the soft skin of my wrist.
He’s not going to let me retreat.
“So tell me why you need more convincing to give this account to Consolidated,” I say, trying to change the tenor of this encounter.
I fail.
“Tell me why you’re so afraid of me.”
I reach for the red wine with my open hand and twirl the glass. The last time I drank red wine was with Steve, at our final work outing for him. He dragged me along to a big dinner with his firm and I choked down a glass and a half as he sent me a million nonverbal signals throughout the entire dinner.
Most of which involved scowls and eye rolls, because I did everything wrong.
Declan takes a sip of his wine and returns his attention to me.
“I’m not afraid of you.” I really want white wine. A battle inside emerges. Let it go, one part says. Speak up and assert yourself says another. Billionaire grandchildren says my mother’s voice.
I take a big sip of the red wine and choke it down.
“Maybe you’re afraid of yourself,” he says.
“Maybe I’m afraid you think I’m just being whored out by my boss so I’ll land this account.”
“Maybe I don’t need sex so badly I trade accounts for it.”
“Maybe that was never an option.”
“Maybe I’m more interested in knowing why you were perched on that toilet. You still haven’t answered my question from earlier.”
That makes me laugh. “Why do you think? I was finishing the last mystery shop of the day. Who do you think reports on the cleanliness of the bathrooms?”
That makes him pause and
take another sip of wine. “Never thought about it.” He’s still holding my hand, but his thumb stops moving.
“Of course not. That’s my job. Not yours.” I lean in, lowering my voice. “And thank you for not asking me to count the pubic hairs on the urinal cake.”
“You’re welcome, I guess.” He does a double take. “Our competitors do that?”
“And worse. Don’t ask what I have to do when I evaluate a manicure salon and detail their anti-fungal procedures.”
He closed his eyes, but he’s amused. “How romantic.”
“I wouldn’t talk like this if we were on a date. But this is all business.”
We both look at our clasped hands. Then our eyes meet and he starts to say something, but the waiter appears and introduces himself. A flurry of recited specials and then we order. I get the filet and Declan orders some complicated pheasant dish.
“No salad and fish?” he asks when the waiter leaves. We’ve dropped hands. It feels weird to be disconnected. We’re sitting next to each other, yet the table is large.
“Was I supposed to? Is this a mystery shop and that’s the required meal?” I’m teasing, but it occurs to me that this is the first time I’ve dined out in a long time where I get to choose exactly what I want.
He cocks his head and studies me. In the low light of the restaurant, I can see auburn highlights in his hair. “Tell me about your life.”
“Wow. You start small, don’t you?”
He smiles wide, flashing those perfect teeth. “Tell me.”
“I’ll tell you about the account,” I insist, trying hard to bring this back to business.
He sighs. “You have the account.”
“I do?” I squeak.
“Of course. Now I want more.”
Chapter Ten
“Wait. Why did you ask about salad and fish?” First things first.
“Because that’s what every woman I date orders when we dine.”
“Seriously? There’s a meal code? I’m breaking some rule by getting beef?”
“You ordered what you like. I find that appealing. No pretense. No affect. You’re just being Shannon.”
Which wasn’t enough for Steve. “I’m being the marketing coordinator for Consolidated Evalu-shop, Declan. You’ve just told me we have the account. Thank you.”
Deflect deflect deflect.
“No—thank you. Once I realized what you were doing in that men’s room, I knew we needed to give your company the account.”
I almost drop the wine glass in shock. A tiny splash of red wine stains the white tablecloth. It looks like blood. “You knew who I was?”
“Not quite. I figured you were with Consolidated, though. We knew your company would perform shops this week. It’s one of the reasons I was there. Just spot-checking stores.”
“And you didn’t say anything?”
“I said a lot of things. You kept your cover as much as possible. Even to the point of hilarity.”
“And embarrassment.”
“That, too.”
“Most people find me uncouth.” Okay, Steve found me uncouth. Why am I thinking about Steve right now? I should be pretending to need to use the ladies’ room and running in there to frantically text Amanda and Greg the good news.
“Anyone who thinks that is an ass who doesn’t know an authentic human being from a blow-up doll girlfriend.”
“I never said anything about a boyfriend,” I protest.
“You didn’t have to.”
I am torn between being offended and being attracted to him, the professional in me screaming that this is inappropriate, but the woman inside wanting to press myself against him and explore.
All I can do is make a funny whimpering sound of defeat and confusion.
A flicker of movement in the corner of my eye catches my attention. A couple has come in to the restaurant, the woman with long, straight blond hair that reaches the cleft of her ass. She’s willowy thin and wearing a tight white dress with a bright red silk sash as a belt. Her date is bent over, face out of sight, but I stiffen as I recognize the body, knowing those broad shoulders, that nipped waist, and the cut of the Armani suit with the fraternity pin at the lapel.
And then Steve stands up and looks into the dining room. Craning his neck, he’s playing the room, searching for someone he can network with and impress. Building a client base is important, he always said. But who you run into a dinner or a bar or the gym is worth so much more. His eyes land—
Directly on me. His face turns to the right as if he can’t believe he sees what he sees. His hand on his date’s waist tightens, like he’s saying I’m taken.
No shit, Sherlock.
Declan follows my stare and his eyes narrow. He reaches for my hand again. Predatory. Like he’s claiming me. Staking out his territory.
Maybe, Steve, I’m taken, too.
“Who is that?” Declan asks.
I watch as Steve’s eyes move over to Declan. Instant recognition kicks in. Steve is an opportunist at heart. He appears to know exactly who Declan is, and this is a script I can write, too.
“That’s my ex,” I say without moving my lips.
“Good ex or bad ex?” he mutters. I break away and stare at Declan now, because what kind of man gets the landscape of dating that well?
“Social climber ex. Mendon girls aren’t his thing. He traded up for a nicer model,” I whisper, my insides going cold.
Declan shifts his chair a tiny bit closer to me and says through a serious expression, “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?” Steve and his date are still chatting with the maître d’, though Steve points to us. Her eyes light up when she sees Declan, and she chats animatedly with Steve.
“Let him dictate how you view yourself.”
I snort. “Like it’s that easy.”
“It can be.”
“It can be,” I mimic. I reach for the wine glass and chug it all down in a few gags.
“If you let it, Shannon.” His eyes are serious.
“Why did you go all cold billionaire at the end of the meeting earlier today?” I ask. What do I have to lose? Might as well just give in and be me at this point. My day started in the crapper, and as Steve walks slowly across the enormous dining room toward us, it looks like it’s ending with a piece of shit.
“Because I learned a long time ago that it’s better to have people react to you than to react to them.”
Stunned, I sit and ponder this, his words reverberating in my head as Steve appears, gushing and complimentary.
“Shannon! What a wonderful surprise!” Steve’s doing his best Tim Gunn impression. “Don’t you look fantastic!” Air kisses follow as he bends down and awkwardly embraces me. I get a mouthful of blue wool lapel.
His date looks like she just ate a lemon.
“Jessica Coffin, this is…” Steve pauses. Declan’s hand clasps mine hard. “…an old friend, Shannon Jacoby.”
Old friend? All righty, then. If you call the woman you went shopping for engagement rings with and fucked for the better part of two years an “old friend”…
I don’t stand. She reaches out and shakes my hand with a cold salmon she pretends is a palm and fingers. Coffin is an old New England/Mayflower family name. It fits her.
Steve looks at me, then Declan, then me, then Declan, clearly expecting me to introduce them. His eyes land on our clasped hands.
I’ve never seen a coyote at the moment its ears pick up the sound of doomed prey, but as I watch Declan watching Steve, I feel like I’m pretty close right now. It’s like When Animals Attack: Boston Brahmin Brawl—coming soon on The Learning Channel, right after Honey Boo Boo!
Steve clears his throat. Jessica looks like a Scandinavian Barbie, bored to tears. Finally, Declan stands and lets go of my hand, but plants a very territorial paw on my shoulder. He gestures with his other hand.
“Why don’t you join us?” I swear he growls. Just a little.
Chuckles would be so cowed by the
look I give Declan. In fact, I think I’m channeling my cat via astral projection, because I become pure evil via my eyes.
Declan just winks.
Winks! How can he wink when I am killing him with my laser death stare?
Steve rushes to sit down next to Declan, leaving Jessica to stand there, the right corner of her lip twitching. Or a bubble of Botox broke free. Hard to tell.
She clears her throat. Steve ignores her, about to open his mouth and say something to Declan. He looks like a golden retriever puppy who can barely control himself from pissing all over the foyer as he waits to be let out.
“Ahem,” Jessica says again, looking at Steve with an icy glare that even he can’t ignore.
Declan remains standing the entire time and gallantly walks over to her chair, pulls it out, and inclines his head. Her face cracks into chunks of ice the size of glaciers, and a smile that could act as a backup disco ball emerges from her head.
Steve is oblivious. It’s his job to remain so. He’s a player, a mover and shaker, a guy with one foot on the next rung of the ladder no matter where he’s at—as he reminded me a million times while we were together—and he’s got his eye on the prize, and the prize isn’t Jessica any longer.
It’s Declan.
Who looks at Steve like he wants to deworm him.
Meanwhile, my heart is dancing the cha-cha and my legs start to shake from nerves. Just then, the waiter comes to offer wine.
“We’d love to get another bottle of whatever Declan’s ordered,” Steve says in an arched tone, one he reserves for interacting with “the help” when we’re in front of bigwigs. That makes Declan pause and look down at Steve, who is now sitting across from me with a look that says, Don’t blow this.
Declan recites a few words of French to the waiter, who turns as if to go.
“One moment,” I say. The waiter stops. “I would prefer a lighter white wine.”
“You ordered the beef,” Steve says, frowning. “Of course you drink red with beef.” He knows I’m a steak girl, but the way he says it makes me bristle, a streak of self-loathing fury rising in a straight line up from belly to throat. The assumption that I’m a rube who can’t possibly know what she’s doing was part of the foundation of our entire relationship.
