The Trouble with Love

by Lauren Layne

  “Duke. I was goalie at the same time Cassidy here was striker.”

  “I’m surprised you two are on speaking terms after the game. The one that went to penalty kicks?”

  Benedict glanced at her in surprise at her knowledge of collegiate sports, and she gave a sheepish shrug. “Go Tar Heels?”

  “Holy shit,” he said, looking from her to Cassidy. “You both went to UNC? Did you know each other?”

  “We did,” Emma said, before Cassidy could open his fat mouth and say something horrid.

  “Wow, small world,” Benedict said.

  You have no idea.

  “Camille actually asked me if I thought you two would click,” Cassidy said, his expression all pleasantries.

  “Yeah?” Benedict asked.

  Cassidy’s smile was quick. “I told her absolutely.”

  Emma rolled her eyes, just as Benedict rested a casual hand on her waist. “Well, guess I should thank you then.”

  Cassidy grinned. “Call it me making amends for the way that last game played out.”

  Benedict laughed. “Do you know how many times I’ve replayed that moment? I was so sure you were going to go right. There was only a flicker of doubt that maybe you’d go left. . . .”

  Emma knew how this story went. Knew Benedict had done what most keepers would have done.

  But Cassidy had changed the rules. He hadn’t gone right. Or left. He’d aimed dead center, his kick securing UNC’s victory over one if its most bitter rivals.

  Emma couldn’t believe she hadn’t placed Benedict as that poor goalie from that epic night. But then, perhaps she shouldn’t be surprised that she hadn’t recognized him.

  Back then, she’d had eyes for only one guy.

  Emma was spared more soccer talk by the arrival of a cab at the curb. The doorman at Camille’s building opened it, and Cassidy’s attention shifted.

  A familiar brunette approached. Danielle.

  Emma smiled reflexively as Alex’s girlfriend turned their awkward threesome into an unbearable foursome.

  Cassidy’s hand found Danielle’s waist, mimicking the position of Benedict’s hand on Emma’s.

  For the briefest of seconds, his gaze burned into Emma’s and she felt herself go hot, before going cold. Very, very cold.

  She forced her gaze to Danielle, ready with a Nice to see you again greeting, but Danielle wasn’t looking at her.

  Nor was she looking at Cassidy.

  Her blue eyes were locked on Benedict, and she looked dazed.

  “Danielle, you remember Emma?” Cassidy said.

  “Sure, hi!” Danielle said, her voice a little sharp as she gave Emma a wide, false smile. Her gaze immediately went back to Benedict’s and then she glanced at the ground.

  Puzzled, Emma looked at her date and saw that he, too, looked shell-shocked before seeming to recover.

  “Benedict Wade,” he said, extending a hand toward Danielle.

  Emma’s nose scrunched in confusion. All night long, Benedict had been charming and jovial, but now his tone was almost reverent.

  Danielle extended her hand, and Emma could have sworn she saw sparks when their fingers made contact. Actual sparks.

  They both jerked back.

  Emma lifted an eyebrow and her gaze found Cassidy’s just as he looked at hers. For once, their eye contact was free of subtext. For the first time in a long time, they were on the same page.

  The page of confusion.

  “Have you two met?” Emma asked, unable to keep her curiosity at bay.

  “No,” Danielle said, still sounding dazed.

  Benedict wordlessly shook his head.

  Emma’s eyes met Cassidy’s again, wondering if he realized what was going on here. Emma was pretty sure that his girlfriend and her date had just stumbled upon the elusive insta-love.

  Also know as love at first sight.

  Also known as They are complete idiots if they ever think it will last.

  Still, Emma knew when she was beat. She and Benedict had gotten along fine. More than fine. But the air was practically sizzling with sexual tension, and it wasn’t between her and Benedict.

  Emma’d bet that even Camille hadn’t seen this turn of events coming.

  Emma cleared her throat, just as Cassidy glanced down at Danielle. “Shall we let these two get back to their date?” he said.

  “Oh! Sure!” Danielle said, forcing a smile for Emma.

  “It was nice meeting you,” Benedict rushed to say.

  “You, too.”

  Danielle and Benedict held each other’s gaze for just a second longer than necessary before she followed Cassidy toward the lobby.

  Danielle didn’t look back. If she did, she would have caught Benedict staring after her.

  Emma sighed. All chances of a perfect first-date kiss had just evaporated.

  His gaze swung back around to her. “They seem nice.”

  “Mmm-hmm,” Emma said.

  “They been seeing each other long?”

  Emma didn’t bother to dignify that with a response. Ten minutes ago, she’d been ready to offer this guy her lips.

  Now she offered him her hand. “Thanks for dinner. I had a really nice time.”

  He glanced down at the hand, then back at her face. He wasn’t so gauche as to look relieved at the lack of good night kiss, but he wasn’t exactly disappointed, either.

  Benedict took the hand and lifted it to his lips in an old-fashioned way that was sweet and gentlemanly, and did absolutely nothing for her.

  He made a noncommittal statement about calling her soon, and she made a similarly noncommittal murmur about looking forward to it.

  Five minutes later, Emma had poured herself a hefty glass of Merlot and an emergency handful of Goldfish crackers.

  She headed to the guest room she’d claimed as her own and curled up cross-legged on the bed, cellphone in hand as she nipped a Goldfish between her teeth and texted her sister. After Emma had moved to New York, Daisy used to call her every three to four days like clockwork. They’d talk about their respective jobs, men, and whichever singing/dancing TV show was hot at the moment, and Daisy would gently remind Emma that “blond highlights don’t maintain themselves.” Emma had eventually given up on highlights altogether, something that Daisy lamented every year at their annual New Orleans weekend together, since Daisy hated the city, and Emma hated anything having to do with North Carolina.

  But then Daisy had gotten married.

  Emma had never been a fan of Gary. And she really hadn’t been a fan of the way he’d somehow talked her sometimes prima donna sister into a quickie wedding at the courthouse. But Daisy had been happy, and Emma had been determined not to interfere in Daisy’s relationship the way Daisy had in hers. In hindsight, Emma wished she would have spoken up.

  At first Emma thought her sister’s phone calls had stopped because she was a distracted new bride, but when the text messages began, Emma knew it was the opposite. Daisy was miserable. She and her husband lived in a tiny apartment in Raleigh. Daisy’s only free time to talk was in the evenings after work, which was also when Gary was most likely to be home. So Daisy had texted. Casual complaints at first. He was irritable. Would get mad when she hadn’t made dinner, and then wouldn’t show up when she had. The television was always turned to sports and changing the channel was “not up for discussion.” Then things had gotten worse. He wouldn’t come home at all. He’d leave the room whenever he took a phone call. He’d yell at Daisy whenever she mentioned the prospect of starting a family. The best text Emma had ever received was the one saying Daisy was getting a divorce.

  But Emma and Daisy had never gone back to their hours-long phone calls. Daisy said it was because she’d simply grown accustomed to texting, but sometimes Emma worried it was something darker—almost like Daisy knew she could hide behind a text more than she could a phone call. Because if anyone could read into the tone of your voice, it was your twin.

  Still, when it came to griping about a bad dat
e, texting did just fine, Emma thought as she chomped her Goldfish and let her fingers fly across the screen as she began to her sister in on her evening.

  Just got back from the blind date.

  Daisy’s response was immediate. Uh-oh. It’s early. Was hoping for love at first sight.

  Oh, it was love at first sight all right, Emma texted back.

  Wait, what? Do I get a do-over on my maid-of-honor gig?

  Don’t buy your bridesmaid dress just yet. He fell in love with someone else. I think I actually WATCHED it happen.

  As Emma and Daisy texted back and forth, and as the wine level in Emma’s glass got lower and lower, something dawned on her.

  She was annoyed by the entire evening, true.

  But what was really eating at her wasn’t that she and Benedict hadn’t hit it off.

  It was that Emma couldn’t bring herself to care.

  Not even the tiniest bit.

  Chapter 7

  There was a knock at Alex’s office door.

  “Yeah?” he called.

  “Boss.”

  He glanced up to see Cole Sharpe standing in his doorway. Not who he’d expected.

  “Where’s Jake?” Alex asked.

  Cole entered the office uninvited and ambled toward Alex’s desk with the easy stroll of a man who never hurried anywhere. Why would he? Everything came to him. The prime stories. The prime women . . .

  “Jake Malone,” Cole answered, picking up Alex’s stapler and clicking it a few times as he sat down, “was last seen entering the stairwell.”

  “The stairwell?” Alex leaned back in his chair, not following.

  “You know . . . to meet Grace?” Cole said, wiggling his eyebrows.

  Alex clicked his pen. “They do that a lot?”

  “Maybe,” Cole said, reaching across the desk and snagging a PowerBar Alex had never gotten around to eating. “Why, got some voyeuristic tendencies?”

  Actually, Alex couldn’t care less whether one of his top columnists was copulating with his new bride in the stairwell, but he and Jake did have a meeting scheduled.

  And Alex needed Jake’s advice.

  More specifically, he needed Jake’s wife’s advice.

  But Jake wasn’t here, and Cole was, so . . .

  “I don’t suppose you’ve heard about me taking over Stiletto for a few months?” Alex asked.

  “Of course I heard that,” Cole said around a bite of PowerBar.

  Alex threw up his hands. “How? How did you hear that? You don’t even work here full-time.”

  Despite Alex’s best efforts, Cole Sharpe insisted on maintaining his contractor status. He was Oxford’s best sports columnist by a long shot. He had connections in the NFL, NBA, NHL . . . college sports, high school sports, you name it.

  Alex was dying to get Cole on an exclusive basis, but so far the man had clung hard and fast to his freelancer status. As far as Alex could tell, Cole Sharpe wasn’t the type of man to settle down in any aspect of his life. Tall, broad shouldered, with the slightly scruffy good looks of a Hollywood romantic comedy hero, he managed his career like he did his women:

  Enthusiastically and noncommittally.

  Still, Cole’s reputation with women might be exactly what Alex needed.

  There was an enormous stack on the corner of Alex desk. He pulled it toward him and rapped the papers with his fist. “You know what this is?”

  Cole glanced at the stack. “Your diary?”

  “Stiletto articles,” Alex said, thumping the papers again. “Page after page about exfoliants and multiple orgasms and lipstick.”

  Cole leaned forward and reached out a hand. “Lemme see the orgasm bit.”

  Alex ignored him, pulling a sheet of paper from the top and shaking it. “This one is two thousand words about push-up bras. About the brands, and the way they should fit, and listen to this: ‘The trick with the appeal of push-up bras is to know what kind of guy you’re dealing with. Is he visual? If so, he’s not going to mind that you had a little help to achieve that fantastic cleavage. But if he’s more tactile, you might want to consider skipping all that padding. . . . He wants to feel the real you.’’’

  Alex let the paper flutter to the desk in horror. “I just . . . I can’t even.”

  Cole shook his head. “They’ve got it all wrong. We’re visual and tactile. Do you have a red pen? Write that down in the margins.”

  Alex ignored him, continuing to shuffle through the papers, reading the headlines. “‘The Lipstick Trend You’ve Got to Try.’ ‘Runway Accents You Can Actually Wear.’ ‘Is Anal the New Oral?’”

  Cole stopped chewing. “Wait. Let me see that last one. Seriously? They can write that? Why doesn’t Oxford write that?”

  “We do write that,” Alex muttered, tugging on his lip as he studied the papers. “Maybe you should read something other than the sports section of your own magazine sometime.”

  Cole resumed chewing. “So while I’m dealing with the stench of the Yankees locker room to get my story, some other guy’s research is sex? I demand a job swap.”

  “You’ll have to talk to Lincoln Mathis about that,” Alex said, referring to Oxford’s current expert on all things women. “But do it later. I need help.”

  “Wondering if you can pull off the latest lipstick trend?” Cole asked, popping the rest of the PowerBar into his mouth.

  Alex reached across the desk to snatch up the discarded wrapper and drop it into the trash can. He looked pointedly at the crumbs on the desk, and Cole rolled his eyes and swiped the crumbs onto the ground. “Well, aren’t you fastidious? I’m guessing you’re not into anal or oral. Too messy?”

  Alex didn’t dignify that with a response. “How am I supposed to evaluate these articles? How do I know what’s good and what’s not? I don’t give a crap about mascara types or juice cleanses, but if these stories go to press and they’re shit, it’s on me.”

  Cole leaned back in his chair. “How many of the Oxford articles do you read?”

  “Every single one.”

  Cole blanched. “Seriously?”

  “That’s what an editor in chief does, Sharpe. We look at the issue in its entirety. Make sure it doesn’t suck.”

  “And you’re supposed to do the same with Stiletto?”

  “Apparently.”

  “Why didn’t Camille find a woman to do this shit?”

  “I have no fucking clue,” Alex said, slumping back in his chair and putting his hands over his face. “It’s like she hates me.”

  “Why’d you agree to do it?”

  It was a fair question. And one that Alex didn’t have a good answer to.

  Ordinarily, he didn’t have trouble saying no to anyone—not even Camille with her drill sergeant persona.

  He’d like to say he agreed because Camille’s logic made sense; she’d pointed out that finding someone with editor-in-chief experience on a short-term basis was nearly impossible. True. She’d also pointed out that he already had a relationship with the higher-ups and could go to bat for Stiletto if needed.

  But he wasn’t sure any of those were the real reasons Camille had pushed the task on him.

  And he definitely wasn’t sure that was the reason he’d accepted.

  As though reading his thoughts, Cole smirked. “What’s Emma’s story?”

  “Hmm?” Alex asked, carefully keeping his expression blank.

  Cole nodded patiently at the stack of Stiletto articles. “Emma Sinclair. What’d she write about?”

  Alex was about to shrug, but Cole stopped him with a look. “Don’t even pretend you don’t know.”

  Alex sighed and rifled through the papers until he came across Emma’s, flinging it across the desk. Cole glanced at it and then looked up.

  “‘The Lost Art of the Blind Date’?” Cole asked. “You have a real chance to get inside your ex’s head, and you let her write about her date with another dude?”

  Alex clicked his pen in agitation. “Sharpe, exactly how many people know
about my connection with Emma Sinclair?”

  “Um, everybody?”

  “Damn it. Jake can’t keep his mouth shut,” Alex muttered.

  “Yeah, cat’s out of the bag on that one.” Cole put his feet up on the desk and leaned back. “But what remains a mystery is why you two went belly up.”

  Cole cocked an eyebrow. Alex glared.

  Cole dropped his feet. “Come on, dude. Someone’s got to know. Jake? Grace?”

  Alex maintained his silence.

  The one thing he and Emma seemed to silently agree on, other than their mutual dislike, was their continued silence about their past. He hadn’t told a soul about what had gone down between them, and as far as he could tell, she hadn’t, either.

  Not even to the Stiletto girls.

  He didn’t know if they were protecting the other person or themselves. But whatever their reasons, he knew he didn’t have plans on running his mouth anytime soon. Especially not to Cole Sharpe, who, while admittedly a damn decent guy, was not the soul of discretion.

  Cole had apparently given up expecting an explanation from Alex and had turned his attention to Emma’s article.

  Cole glanced up. “She’s a good writer.”

  Alex grunted. She was a good writer. She’d always been a good writer. Back in college it had been all she’d wanted to do in her spare time, although back then, her passion had been fiction. She’d dreamed of writing a novel.

  He wondered what had happened to that dream. Did she still write for pleasure?

  “Sounds like her date went well,” Cole said with a smug smile.

  Alex leaned forward and snatched the article back out of his hand. “Nothing came of it.”

  “How do you know?”

  Alex didn’t respond. The last thing he wanted to explain was that he’d run into Emma at the end of this very date.

  And that he’d very much wanted to stick around to see if she got the kiss.

  He also didn’t admit to Cole that when he’d received the drafts of the Stiletto articles, hers had been the first one he’d reached for.

  And, lastly, he absolutely did not admit the stab of relief he’d felt when he read there’d been no first kiss. And no second date.

  “Fine, keep your secrets,” Cole said, standing. “But, seriously, do better next time.”