Three Part Harmony

by Holley Trent

  “I burned the list into nothingness and salted the earth it’d sprung from, actually,” he murmured.

  Stacia snickered and raised her water glass to her lips. “Raleigh holds a grudge better than anyone I know.”

  He narrowed his eyes at her and pondered if their little team needed some adjusting.

  “Well,” Everley said. “I won’t take up any more of your time. I just wanted to tell you that. Oh! And that I saw the first of the television show tie-in covers, too.”

  “Yeah?” Stacia smirked.

  Raleigh had pretty good idea of why. She slept with that why.

  “Adrien Valliere was born to be that character. He looks amazing.”

  “Yes, he does.”

  “Well. Best of luck with it, not that you need to hear that from me.”

  Raleigh finally looked at her in time to see her wave at them both and turn on her heel.

  She was in a dark gray dress that hugged every curve, dark hose with seams up the backs, and studded stilettos that seemed as much a fashion statement as a warning. Who the warning was meant for, he didn’t want to guess.

  “It’s so unfortunate that she’s likable,” Stacia said. “I don’t want to like her, because that’s what friends do for their friends, but I gotta tell you, Ral, I don’t get the impression that she’s the snake you think she is.”

  “Oh, you don’t, hmm?” Raleigh liked to lie to himself that he hadn’t inherited that famous McKean temper, but the truth was that he was simply better at avoiding the sorts of confrontations that could ignite it. Suppressing outbursts had become second nature for him, though sometimes, he had to slow his tongue and shave the spikes from his words before he spoke them.

  Stacia was his dearest friend. She meant no harm. That didn’t stop her assertion from chafing him.

  “You’re only saying that,” he said in a controlled, quiet voice, “because she complimented your book and your boyfriend’s picture.”

  “I’m not going to take offense to that coldness in your tone right now because I’ve obviously touched on a sore spot, but no, I’m saying that because of how weary she looks around her eyes and how her smile doesn’t go all the way to it. I’m not an expert in body language and have never pretended to be, but I like to think I’m pretty good at what I do because I’ve got a knack for observation. And also...” She leaned back so the waiter could set down her soup and then accept her entree order.

  Raleigh put in his as well.

  “And also what?” Raleigh goaded when the server had moved on.

  “And I hate to even suggest it, but I’d eat my shoe if that woman isn’t attracted to you.”

  Stacia’s words didn’t land right. They were English. He was certain of that. In some way, she’d used them to mean things they typically didn’t. She did that all the time in her books and people never figured out what she was getting at until the next chapter. Everything became all too clear, and then someone would get abducted and stuffed into a car trunk or something else equally awful.

  “You don’t believe me?” she asked solemnly.

  “No, because I like for things to make sense, and that certainly doesn’t.”

  Raleigh assumed that he spent about as much time thinking about his appearance as the next man, but he didn’t gas himself up to believe that people enjoyed looking at him. He groomed for himself, dressed for himself. His intention was rarely to illicit attention, and he was content with being the instigator in new connections rather than the other way around.

  Had things been different—much different—he might have thought, Well, that’s a beautiful woman. Drinks might be nice and we’ll see what happens.

  But because Everley was who she was, her attractiveness was a deficit in his book. It made her more dangerous, and her supposed interest in him made her a live wire he wasn’t going anywhere near.

  One wrong move on his part, and she could go whisper to her father, and suddenly Raleigh would be out of a job. He’d worked too damn hard to get to where he was, and on his own merits, to tangle with her. Walking on eggshells around her while trying to assertively maintain his independence in the department was exhausting. One day, he’d slip up. He knew it.

  He dreaded it.

  “I’d actually guarantee she thinks so but would never come on to you directly,” Stacia said. “You’re not the most approachable of individuals. You’ve got that blue-blooded-coldness thing going on. Obviously, I can see right through it, but that’s because like attracts like. I know your history makes it damn near impossible, but try not to assume that interest means ill intent. I’m guilty of doing that, too.”

  “I don’t know if I can.” He wished he could, though. He grew weary of his own cynicism at times and wished connecting with people wasn’t always fraught with red flags—real and imaginary. Like when he’d gone home with Bruce. That had been easy, and lovely, until Raleigh was reminded of why he knew better.

  He wished he didn’t have to know better.

  Raleigh sneaked a peek over his shoulder in the direction Everley had gone. He could just barely make out the gray of her dress. She was sitting with her back to the aisle. Whomever she was lunching with was obscured by the half wall between their table and the ramp down to the lower level. As a matter of course, he didn’t pay much attention to her work schedule, so he couldn’t possibly guess who was sitting across from her. Perhaps it was her father, whispering encouragements about industry domination.

  There you go again, assuming the worst.

  He took a breath and refilled his teacup. He needed distraction.

  “Where are you going from here?” Raleigh asked Stacia, hoping to redirect both his malicious thoughts and the conversation.

  The slow blink she gave him revealed she knew the game, but was going to play it anyway. She spooned up soup. Slurped it. “Richmond for at least a couple of weeks, I hope. I miss my house. Obviously, Adrien’s doing stuff for the TV show and he’s too tied up to visit. Dara said she was going to split the difference between here and there. She’s going to hang out in LA for a week and then head east. The travel burden isn’t ideal. We’re all sort of getting short shrift right now, but that’s the life you lead as a public figure. As soon as Adrien goes on hiatus, we’re going to bunker down somewhere and not leave the house unless we have to.”

  “Sounds disgustingly domestic.”

  “Jealous?”

  “No.”

  “You’re a lying-ass liar.”

  “So what if I am?” he groused. He wanted off the subject. On the best of days, he was sensitive about his dearth of romantic prospects, and Stacia knew that. What she didn’t know was about his encounter with Bruce and how he still reeled from it.

  Why couldn’t he have found someone exactly that intense and passionate who didn’t come with a chaser of deceit?

  “If you get lonely,” Raleigh said dispassionately, “I’m sure you’ll start a new book series or something.”

  “Nah. I’m taking a break from writing.”

  That lie shook him out of his funk for the moment. Raleigh pushed his chair back from the table to give the heavenly lightning bolt sufficient striking clearance. When no electric singe immediately occurred, he scooted warily back up and dropped crispy noodles into his soup. “Huh.”

  “I mean it, Raleigh. My contract obligations are fulfilled for the moment. I can do nonwriting stuff like renovating my cellar, because it’s creepy as shit, and maybe getting the roof replaced before winter.”

  “I heard your agent was shopping your next book around elsewhere.”

  “I’m sure that’s what she wants you to think. You know the game.”

  He grunted. He knew it all too well. Loyalty had a cost. Athena had been paying handsomely for Stacia’s, but they all had to know that one day, some other house was going to take a chance and offer her something she co
uldn’t say no to.

  They sat in a comfortable silence until the entrees arrived. As always, they each immediately scooped healthy portions off their friend’s plate without comment.

  Raleigh had just stabbed his fork into a particularly succulent piece of beef when a shadow fell over the table. A sideward glance gave him dark gray wool. Everley again.

  He didn’t look up.

  “Sorry to interrupt again, Stacia. We’re heading out and he wanted to say hello.”

  For some damned reason, Stacia stood, so Raleigh had to look.

  She was shaking the hand attached to Bruce Engle, who was wearing one of those sheepish grins that managed to be half smug.

  What. The. Fuck.

  With the band coming and going from the office so much, Raleigh knew that Bruce would probably turn up. But not there. Not with her.

  Raleigh took several deep breaths and set down his fork. As a redhead, he couldn’t afford to show his passion in his skin. He looked like a spotted leper when he got piqued, and he was most certainly piqued. After all, he’d just been thinking about him, and there he was—a massive taunt bound into six feet of rock star costuming.

  Apparently, Raleigh had just been shoved into one of Stacia’s metaphorical car trunks.

  Should I bang the roof for help?

  Raleigh glanced stealthily around him in search of an easy exit.

  There were none.

  Fuck.

  “Your books are trippy as shit,” Bruce said with a chuckle.

  “Yeah, just like their author,” Stacia said. “I come by it naturally, though.”

  “Hey, me, too. I read them when I’m flying. I can always find them in the airports, except the third one for some reason. That’s the only one I don’t have.”

  “Yeah, that one has been in between print runs for a while. They were going to do it a couple of months ago, but with the television show starting, Athena figured they’d wait until closer to launch so they can sync the branding.”

  Raleigh caught the shift of the rocker’s weight in his periphery.

  Nervous? Him?

  Raleigh didn’t buy it. Men who took risks and exploited people the way Bruce Engle did wouldn’t be made nervous by five-foot-nothing Stacia Leonard.

  “You...wouldn’t happen to have a copy I could buy off you, would you?” Bruce asked. “I don’t like used if I’m going to keep ’em and I can’t read on screens. Need to be able to follow along with my thumb.”

  “Oh, I’ve got heaps. Here.” Stacia retook her seat, hauled her giant purse up to her lap, and rooted through the bag until she found a mangled sticky-note pad and a pen. “Just tell me where to mail it. I’m pretty sure I know where that box is.” She added in a mumble, “Dara would know better, though.”

  “Hey. That’s right decent of you. Thanks.”

  “Sure. It’s really no trouble.”

  While Bruce scribbled, Raleigh waited for Stacia to catch his gaze.

  He was going to have to come clean soon, or he’d be tripping into one humiliating scenario after another. The industry was too damned small and it seemed he wasn’t going to be able to avoid Bruce.

  “What?” she mouthed.

  He cut his gaze toward Bruce in a silent warning.

  Subtly, she turned her hands over in a “Huh?” gesture. Obviously, she didn’t get it, and Raleigh couldn’t be more direct just yet.

  She shrugged and turned to Bruce. “Are you recording any new music soon, Bruce?”

  He shifted his weight again and twirled a thick black band around his middle finger. He had on all the same rings as before, Raleigh realized.

  He couldn’t forget. Images of Theo’s—Bruce’s—libidinous hands wandering across his tan flesh and of them closing around Raleigh’s cock would probably be seared into his brain until his dying day. He’d practically given himself away wholesale to Raleigh.

  And for what? To get a stupid fucking book acquired?

  Passion like that always had strings attached.

  “I’m thinking about it,” Bruce said. “Not sure how to do it. Want to do it a different way. Not the rock band stuff. That’s over, you know?”

  “Why? I thought audiences responded really well to you. And you racked up so many awards. Don’t you want that?”

  “That’s all well and good, I suppose, but I’m not a rock star. They don’t make them like me.”

  It was a curious statement, and given the deep furrow of concern in her brow, Stacia thought so, too. She didn’t probe it, though.

  Nor would Raleigh. He couldn’t let Bruce be his concern.

  “My nan used to help me research things, but she’s gone, so I’m kind of out on a limb sometimes.” He crooked his thumb toward Everley. “Ev’s helping a lot.”

  Everley’s eyes widened at the sudden attention. “Um. Well, I don’t know nearly as much about the industry as his grandmother did. She was very meticulous and would call around finding out who was who. All I do is help Bruce brainstorm. He does all the figuring out on his own, given enough time to think.”

  “Must be quite busy,” Raleigh said blithely as his gaze fixed on the catch of her index finger around Bruce’s belt loop. That grasp, with her knuckles grazing his hip, and the marked lack of distance between the two of them, exploded any suggestion that their relationship was strictly business.

  Apparently, Bruce had found himself another sucker.

  And apparently, Stacia had been wrong. That hadn’t been attraction in Everley’s gaze, but trepidation she was going to get caught.

  Raleigh couldn’t possibly get any lower.

  “Doing that and working on the Outward Reaction book at the same time,” Raleigh said through clenched teeth, “Well. Must have been a rare treat for you to come out for some air during your lunch break.”

  Stacia kicked his shin under the table.

  He swallowed his grunt of pain.

  “I’m...actually not planning on doing any work on that,” Everley said. Her cheeks had turned a conspicuous shade of penitent purple. “I’ve been to a couple of strategy meetings but I suspect someone else will be doing the busywork.”

  “Must be nice to pick and choose,” Raleigh said.

  “Like you don’t?”

  Raleigh was so stunned by the retort that he was rendered speechless. Granted, he had walked right into that one.

  Letting go of Bruce’s loop, Everley shook out her hands, then took a deep breath and let it out. “I’m trying not to take on any major projects right now.”

  Raleigh really did try to hold his tongue, but he couldn’t look at that lying face and pretend everything was fucking fine. “Big promotion coming?”

  Stacia kicked the other shin.

  He gripped the table edge hard and tried to tell himself that Bruce’s arm snaked in such a possessive fashion around Everley’s waist didn’t mean anything. Bruce was handsy. He probably touched everyone that way. After all, there was nothing special about the way he’d been with Raleigh. He’d only been a means to an end. Certainly, Everley could expect the same from Bruce. Maybe she’d deserve it.

  “I wouldn’t know,” Everley said. “Anyhow, we’ll let you get back to your meal. Nice talking to you again, Stacia.” She nodded vaguely in Raleigh’s direction, and then left.

  Bruce didn’t leave. In fact, his feline gaze tracked pointedly to Raleigh and he practically vibrated with annoyance.

  “Don’t,” Raleigh preempted.

  “You’re kind of a jerk, you know that?”

  “Only when I have to be.”

  “You didn’t have to be.”

  “Then or now, Theo?”

  “I—” Bruce bit off the words that should have come next. He raised both middle fingers at Raleigh, spit out an emphatic, “Fuck you,” and then scrambled after Everley.

 
“Don’t. Say. Anything,” Raleigh snapped at Stacia.

  She stared at him without blinking for so long that he wondered if he’d pissed her off enough that she’d gone into a trance state. Then, she said, “Fine,” and shoveled kung pao chicken into her mouth.

  Raleigh sat back, arms folded over his chest, fuming.

  Things weren’t fine. Nothing was fine. The person he’d foolishly let his guard down for was probably screwing the woman who made his blood pressure spike every time he looked at her. It was like the universe was having a laugh at his expense. Raleigh would be alone by necessity, and the two people he trusted the least would flaunt their newfound connection.

  “Just fucking say it, Stacia.”

  “You told me not to speak.”

  “But you’re going to anyway, so let’s go ahead and kill the suspense. Say what you have to so I can do the same.”

  “If you say so. Don’t get pissed if you don’t like where the line of questioning goes, though.” She angled her fork across the top of her plate and twined her fingers. “Bruce is the band guy you diddled with, I take it. I didn’t think to ask at the party because I was in such a hurry to get back to Dara. I should have asked. Maybe we could have talked it out then so that you’d be over whatever it is that’s setting you off now.”

  “He lied.”

  “About what?”

  “He knew who I was. I met him at a concert. He recognized me as an employee of Athena. He sent his manuscript to every active email account at the company. The guy was hungry for a publishing contract. The night we met, he told me his name was Theo. I didn’t recognize him.”

  “What?” Stacia’s pitch was practically in the stratosphere again. “How can anyone who hasn’t been living under a rock for the past ten years not recognize Bruce Engle?”

  “He was incognito.” Raleigh pushed his noodles around his plate with his fork. “And maybe I was distracted. It was the night I arrived in LA to check on you.”

  Stacia sat back, and after a moment of introspective silence, made one of those little conciliatory oh sounds.

  He didn’t deserve the pity. He waved it away like he always did. “Anyhow, you know how I have to be. If I know people are trying to leverage me for some other goal, I immediately cut ties.”