“What do you have for me?” I asked after we each ordered our food and drinks.
His brows rose as he sat back in his seat, and lifted the glass of water to his mouth. “How many clients do you have right now?”
He loved playing a game of cat and mouse before handing out cheese. I ran through my mental catalogue, knowing he wouldn’t meet me to give me bullshit stories about closed cases. He knew what high-profile divorces I was working on. With the media, it was impossible for anybody not to know. Something about the gleam in his eyes made me uneasy. I narrowed my eyes a bit.
“I’m not in the mood for games today. The pictures you sent me the other day were nothing.”
His expression turned serious as he set the glass of water down. “How much is Nicole Lane worth to you?”
My heart dropped. I stared at him for a long moment. “Her name is Nicole Alessi, and she doesn’t have a price tag.” I paused, feeling at odds with the situation for once. “Are you printing a story?”
“Not yet. I knew she was yours so I wanted to bring it to you first.”
Mine. Clearly he didn’t know the half of it if he was so nonchalant. I intended to keep it that way. He reached into the pocket of his jacket and took out a USB, setting it on the table and sliding it across.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“Compromising pictures.”
My throat tightened. I swallowed past the knot sitting there. I didn’t want to ask what kind of pictures they were. I took the USB from the table and put it in the pocket of my jacket. My chest burned in that spot.
“How’d you get it?”
Quinn shot me a look. “How do I get anything?”
“Who’s shopping this?”
“You know I can’t give you a source.”
Slow, hot anger started to burn through me. “This isn’t . . .” I stopped talking when the waitress came by and put the plates on our table. “I can’t have somebody shopping naked pictures of her right now.”
“It’s not just her that’s naked,” he said, taking a bite of the steak he ordered while I nearly choked on mine.
“What?”
Quinn nodded slowly. “I wanted to bring it to you first.”
“Who else has seen this?” I asked, taking the USB out and reaching for the laptop in my briefcase.
“No clue,” he said, shrugging. “As far as I know, I’m the only one. I usually get first dibs on things like this.”
I inserted the USB and waited for the items to load. Without even clicking and enlarging, I could already feel the burning anger returning. My ears felt like they were on fire. I was undoubtedly staring at a semi-naked Nicole sitting in front of Gabriel Lane. In the next picture, her head was thrown back, his mouth on her neck. I felt bile rise in my throat. I hadn’t expected for it to bother me as much as it did, but the longer I stared at the image, the hotter my blood simmered. I knew it was her ex-husband. I knew she was with me now. Sort of. But fuck, it hurt seeing her with him. It hurt knowing her lips, lips that belonged to me, were on his just short days, maybe weeks before they were on mine.
In the next frame, she was looking at the camera with a look of shock on her face. And in the next she’d stood up and was fixing her shirt. I felt sick. Physically ill. My stomach was turning in disgust. The shots were grainy, no doubt taken on a cell phone, but it was her. It was her curvy frame and her perfect tits, and that incredible mouth of hers. I took a deep breath. I needed to stop thinking about it before I made myself sick.
The next photo was one of her and me on the balcony of her house. It was similar to the one Quinn had texted me before, but these were less grainy, sharper, and from the angle they were taken it definitely looked like we were kissing. My heart pounded as I looked at them, at the way she was looking at me in the picture. I was uneasy about the way I was looking at her. It was as though nothing else in the universe mattered but us. If anybody got hold of it, there would be no sense in denying what was going on between us. Nobody would believe it. I cleared my throat.
“I’ll buy every copy of this. Every single fucking copy. And I’ll throw in a bonus if you give me your source.”
“Vic, you know I—”
“How long have we known each other, Q?”
He sighed, running a hand over his face. “People will want to see this. This is huge. They’re supposed to be getting a divorce, and they’ve been popping up everywhere together and now these pictures . . . this is the type of thing that breaks the Internet.”
I propped my elbows on the table and buried my face in my hands, closing my eyes to try to forget the image of her half-naked in front of another man. I needed to think of her as my client, not the woman I felt I could say anything to without second thought. Not the woman I’d had the most meaningful sex of my life with, because that’s what it was. Meaningful and hot as fuck.
“What’s going on with you and Nicole?” Quinn asked. My head snapped up. “Off the record.”
“Off the record, I want you to give me your goddamn source and help me make these pictures go away,” I said, shutting my computer. He studied me for a long moment.
“Yours or all of them?”
My eyes narrowed. “Every single one of them.”
Quinn smiled. “This one’s special.”
“Don’t start with your shit, Q. I don’t have time for it.”
“I’m not judging. She’s beautiful,” he said, raising his hands.
“Keep your fucking opinions to yourself. I’m having a hard enough time accepting that other people have seen this shit. And I don’t think you want anybody to know how much you’ve been visiting an unnamed married woman. We should probably keep that between us,” I said. “For now.”
His eyes widened, but his smile stayed intact. The reason Quinn and I got along so well is because we respected each other, and we knew not to call each other’s bluff. We were both ruthless. We’d claw the shit out of anybody who stood in our way, regardless of who it was.
“I don’t understand why you don’t come and work with me,” he said.
I chuckled at the thought, but got serious quickly. “One of us would be dead by the end of the first week. Now, give me the fucker’s name, and while you’re at it, I’m going to need a favor from a mutual friend of ours.”
NORMALLY I WASN’T one to dwell on reasons guys hadn’t called before their three-day quota, but with Victor it was all I could think about, mainly because he wasn’t the type of guy who played by any rules. I’d spoken to him just briefly after our weekend together and I’d been busy when he called, so it couldn’t even be considered a conversation. Over the weekend, half of the wardrobe on the movie set had been messed up, and luckily I was insanely busy working with two seamstresses to get caught up in making everything. Still, when I got home and soaked my hands in ice-cold water because they hurt so much from sewing non-stop, all I could think about was Victor. My phone finally rang with a call from him when I got home from work that night. I was soaking my hands in iced water, stumbling and spilling it everywhere to answer it.
“Hey,” he said, his voice making me lose my breath momentarily.
“You really stuck to the three-day rule,” I said. He was quiet for a beat.
“Sorry. I’ve been busy.”
“So have I.”
“Yeah, my mom said you left the car there until the next morning because you’d gotten out of work too late to call,” he said. “I need you to come into the office to sign the final papers so we can put this divorce behind you. Are you free tomorrow morning?” His voice was serious, all business, all Victor. I sighed.
“Sure. What time?”
“Nine?”
“I’ll be there.”
“Good,” he said, pausing to clear his throat. “And . . . you’re good? Everything is going okay?”
I made a face. He couldn’t see me, but he was acting really fucking weird. I chalked it up to his fear of everything being recorded. The guy swore he was Richard Nixon o
r something.
“I’m fine. See you tomorrow, Victor.”
“Looking forward to it, Nicole.” The way he said that made me stomach flip. Maybe I was just worrying for no reason. We were good. We were fine, and he said he was looking forward to seeing me.
When I woke up the following morning, my entire body ached. My hands, my head, my throat, and I was pretty sure I had a fever. I could barely open my eyes, and when I did I realized it was eight forty and I was going to be late. Before showering, I called Marcus because there was no way I could drive like that. By the time I finished getting ready, he was standing outside, his mouth dropping when he saw me.
“You look tired.”
“Thanks,” I muttered. At least he found a nice way to tell me I looked like crap. “We should be quick, and the quicker we go, the quicker I get back to bed.”
“Okay.”
He didn’t make small talk. Shocker. And for once I was completely glad for the silence in the car, which I think was a shock to him. He kept looking over, probably to make sure I was okay, but I was too busy blowing my nose and trying to keep my snot from going everywhere to care. I’m pretty sure he was completely disgusted by the time we reached Victor’s office.
As soon as we got there, paparazzi swarmed my car.
“What the hell happened now?” I asked, my voice nasally in my own ears.
“Stay in the car. I’ll go around,” Marcus said.
I did as I was told and kept my head down as he walked me to the front door. I couldn’t even make out their questions because of the pounding in my ears, but I did catch Victor’s name, which further confused me.
“What were they saying?” I asked Marcus as I buried my nose in a tissue.
He frowned. “I didn’t really understand them.”
“Me either.”
When I stepped out of the elevator, Grace looked at me with wide eyes and an open mouth. The last time she gave me that look was when rumors about my divorce began circulating. I smiled and waved at her as I walked down the hall, because even if I had time for her crap, I didn’t feel like dealing with it today. Marcus stayed behind as I walked up to Victor’s door and knocked. It opened and Corinne stepped out. She gave me a quick once-over and smiled.
“He’s on the phone, but you can go in.”
“Thanks,” I said, stepping in as she stepped out.
My blood was vibrating with nervousness. I’d been there a million times, but it felt different, though I couldn’t quite put a finger on why. Was it because of what we’d shared? Would things be weird now? Would he be weird toward me? Would I be awkward? We’d had sex, yes. Like in the past. But not like in the past. It felt like more. Something about what had been going on between us even before we hooked up this time felt like more. And he’d said he had the final papers. The final papers.
Victor straightened in his chair when he saw me. His eyes searching my face, wandering down my body and back up in a slow caress that made my breath hitch. Whatever Mr. Perfect saw now when I was makeup-less and wearing sweats was definitely good, because he was eyeing me the same way he did when I was in a skintight dress. I plopped down in the chair across from him and put my arms on the table to lay my head down, hoping to relieve the pounding in my head, because despite his very wanted attention, I felt beyond sick and very exhausted.
“I’m going to have to call you back,” he said into the phone and hung up. I heard the squeak of his leather chair as he stood up and walked around his desk, and felt his hand on my hair as combed it with his fingers. I moaned a little. “What’s wrong?” he asked, his voice soft as he crouched down beside me.
“I think I caught whatever you had.” I sniffled and shivered.
His hand stopped moving. I lifted my head up as he stood. “You should have told me. I would have come to you.”
“Maybe if you would have called,” I said. I closed my eyes momentarily, trying to regain composure. What was it about this guy that made me revert to my teenage self? “Just . . . let’s get this over with so that I can go back to bed.”
He sighed and took a seat beside me instead of going back behind his desk. He was quiet for so long, I accidentally dozed off in my chair. When I woke, it was with a start, blinking rapidly.
“I’m so sorry,” I said. “Please, just . . . do I need to sign something?”
“I should have called. I’m sorry. I just,” he paused to take a long, deep breath, his eyes looking pained, “just this.” He handed over a paper similar to one we’d gone over in the past. I signed and handed it back, when I did he held my gaze. The seriousness in his eyes made my stomach dip. “Nicole, we need to talk.”
An array of possibilities crossed my mind in a split second, and if I wasn’t already on the verge of crying because of how sick I felt, I would have cried over what he was insinuating. I closed my eyes. Those words were never a good sign. Flashbacks of how this had happened the first time assaulted my thoughts. We can’t do this anymore, he’d said then. If he said that now . . . God. If he said that now I wouldn’t know what to do, what to say, how to react.
“About what?” I whispered.
“This. Us,” he said, his voice firm, though his eyes looked anguished, and I knew he wasn’t thrilled about the talk either.
I swallowed, even though it hurt. “Are you kidding me?”
“I wish I was,” he said, letting out a sigh. He reached over his desk and placed some pictures in front of me. I squinted to look at them, and gasped when I saw the one of me on Gabe’s bed. It was from the drunken night when that girl had interrupted us. Bitch.
“Nothing happened,” I said, looking at Victor. They were taken before we got together, so I didn’t have to explain myself to him, but I still felt the urge to. “I mean, we made out, but I swear nothing else happened.”
He closed his eyes momentarily and breathed out. When he opened them back up he looked as torn as he did before he took a break to think.
“It’s . . . it doesn’t matter. It’s not about that.”
He paused, reaching out and flipping to another picture. The picture was one of him and me on my balcony. Before I signed my lease. The day I signed my lease. My eyes snapped up to meet his. This was the reason for the we need to talk speech. The sinking feeling threatened to return. It was his biggest fear come to life. We’d been caught and now anything said about him, about us, about this case, would come back and haunt him when the time came for his promotion. His promotion. Dammit.
“Can we make it go away?” I asked, my voice a croak.
“I’m working on it. Trust me, I’m working on it. These,” he said, pointing at the ones of Gabe and me, “will never see the light of day.” He pointed at the ones of us. “These, unfortunately, are already circulating. My guy couldn’t stop them. I’m trying to get to the bottom of it.”
My heart squeezed in my chest.
We’d had our fun.
I kept telling myself that to keep the tears at bay, because despite going through this once before, it felt different this time. It felt personal. It felt . . . wrong. I didn’t feel just a little crushed by this. This felt like a boulder was sitting in my throat, making its way to my heart.
“We can’t see each other anymore,” I whispered, meeting his gaze. “I get it. This was just a fire we needed to put out. And we did that.”
I wiped my nose with the tissue in my hand.
But I didn’t get it. I didn’t get it and I felt the intense urge to cry. I was losing him. I was losing him and there wasn’t anything I could do about it because now there were pictures of us together. Proof of what was happening between us. Things that could rip apart his career and mess up my divorce. I expected to feel something when we ended it. Last time, I’d felt hurt. This was worse.
Annihilated.
I never expected to find a man so soon after Gabe. I hadn’t. I’d set my mind to having fun and working on myself, which I did. But I also hadn’t expected for my life to collide with Victor’s again o
r to feel so connected to him.
“Nicole, please don’t,” he said, his voice quiet, his eyes pleading. “Don’t belittle this.”
I blinked, trying to stop impending tears. Blinked again when I felt one escape through my lashes. I wiped it quickly.
Don’t belittle this.
“It’s okay,” I whispered, standing from my chair. I took one of the pictures with me and shoved it into my purse. “I know how this goes. I hope you know that even with these pictures, I’ll deny it. You don’t have to worry about me. I would never do anything to jeopardize your job.”
He stood up and reached for my wrist, squeezing. I yanked my arm quickly. I couldn’t bear his touch right now. Not when it hurt this much. His eyes widened, his broad shoulders sagged a bit.
“I’m sorry. Had this happened under different circumstances—”
“Stop apologizing. It’s fine,” I said, interrupting him. “Been there, done that, bought the shirt.”
“That’s not funny, Nicole,” he said, his face serious. I dropped my head, unwilling to look at him anymore.
“I’ve learned to deflect.”
Despite how weak I felt, I started walking toward the door, and he followed, holding me by the shoulders possibly when he saw me sway a little. I tilted my face to look at him, and cursed the stir in my heart when I realized our faces were so close.
“Please don’t touch me,” I whispered.
“I don’t know how to stop,” he whispered back, dropping his forehead to the back of my shoulder.
“You’ll learn.”
I left his office, heard him follow behind me, and when I reached Marcus, I could barely keep my legs moving. I practically threw my arms out for him to catch me. Thank God he did.
“Let’s get you home,” he said, looking over my shoulder.
I turned my head and saw Victor standing in the hall with his hands in his pockets looking as defeated as I’d ever seen him. I tried to smile, tried to reassure him that he was doing the right thing, but I couldn’t find the energy to do it. I let Marcus lead me away, back to the car, and drive me home. On my way there, I got a call from Meire and answered straight away, which I rarely did.
Elastic Hearts (Hearts #3) Page 21
