Breathless in Love

by Bella Andre

  If Harper knew what he'd been like as a kid, all the crimes he'd committed for his dad, the hellraiser he'd been even after the asshole went to prison and he'd moved in with the Spencers--would she ever trust him with her brother? Would she ever trust him with herself? She already doubted his motives with Jeremy. If she knew the guy Will was on the inside, all the lies he'd told, all the houses he'd broken into for his dad, all the cars he'd stolen, and then what had finally gone down with the Road Warriors...

  He ran a harsh hand through his hair, knowing Harper would run a mile to get away from him if she ever found out. And she'd take Jeremy, too.

  Because the hard truth was that with his father's blood flowing through his veins, no matter how far he'd come, Will would never completely be able to outrun the things he'd done.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  On Wednesday morning, the Mavericks gathered around the boardroom table in the main conference room of their headquarters in Palo Alto, near the Google campus. They'd be moving in the late fall, when Sebastian Montgomery's new high-rise production studio in San Francisco was completed.

  On the face of it, Sebastian was a self-help guru with a charismatic personality; a tall, muscular frame; and celebrity good looks that he'd channeled into a media empire. He spoke to vast audiences on anything from creating money in your life to finding your true destiny.

  Sebastian had achieved every goal he'd set the day they'd made their pact to get out of Chicago. But Will wasn't so sure happiness had been one of those objectives, except in terms of Sebastian being in control of his own destiny after being so out of control as a kid.

  For today's meeting, they presented a united front, all dressed accordingly in suit and tie--even Daniel, who was video conferencing from New York, where he was negotiating the site for another grand opening in his home improvement chain.

  They came together as the Maverick Group on various investment opportunities, had even financed movies, their latest being with Smith Sullivan. And of course, there was the Link Labs endeavor. Matt Tremont, the Mavericks' electronics genius, had brought them the prospect, since his interest lay in robotics. The group was also involved in real estate--selling, buying, renovating, developing--which was why they were all meeting today.

  "Ray's been waiting since ten o'clock." Will flipped his arm to reveal his watch. "Only ten minutes." They should have let the man stew for an hour. "Remember, I want to be the one to fire his ass." Because he'd been the one to hire him. It had seemed like a good choice at the time, but a year ago, Ray Passal's work ethic had nosedived. In the worst possible way.

  "I know you're pissed. I am, too," Daniel said, his voice as crystal clear as his image on their state-of-the-art conferencing equipment. For the meeting, he'd tamed his unruly wavy hair and donned a suit jacket over his big shoulders. "But we don't want to deal with the lawsuit if you beat the crap out of him. Even though he definitely deserves it."

  "Spoilsport," Sebastian said, lounging in his chair.

  "Personally," Matt said, "I'm willing to pay for a ringside seat."

  They all knew Will had been the fighter, even if he hadn't had a physical knockdown since he was sixteen, and he had to admit his blood was up today, itching to pound Ray into the plush conference-room carpet.

  Instead, he asked Evan, "What's the latest report?"

  A couple of days ago, Evan had discovered that the majority of the deals Ray was claiming commission on weren't Ray's at all--at least, not for the past year. He was stealing sales from the people who worked for him. More specifically, he was bullying his sales guys into splitting commissions and giving him credit for their work.

  "I've identified eight deals in the last year. Nothing prior to that." Evan had meticulously checked every project Ray had been involved in. "Carstairs reported working with Martin on the Castaway Ridge project. Hanson dealt with Barry on Midland." The list was long, all major multimillion-dollar deals. "And of course, there was Headley on La Verne. He worked with Drucker."

  The La Verne transaction had been Evan's first discovery when he'd spoken with Headley, who'd offhandedly mentioned he'd never met Ray Passal, despite the fact that Ray's signature was on the paperwork. He'd dealt exclusively with Drucker and was so impressed with the young sales guy's abilities that he'd told Evan the man deserved a bonus. When Drucker was questioned, he'd said Passal had made him sign a contract the first day of his employment, splitting all commissions fifty-fifty with Ray because, supposedly, all the leads came from him. It was take it or leave it, sign or lose the job.

  That was total bull. None of the Mavericks had ever approved such a contract. And the leads hadn't come from Ray. He was a bully with a pen and an authority complex.

  Which pushed all Will's buttons.

  Will had taken a short, fast ride in his Lamborghini Miura this morning to work out his tension before the confrontation, but his gut was still simmering with anger. He'd wanted to see Harper, drink in her sweet scent, steep himself in her like a balm. But he knew he couldn't let her see him like that, all keyed up and ready to rumble. He couldn't let her guess at the Road Warrior still lurking inside.

  Yet somehow, just the thought of her eased the churning in him. Enough for him to breathe, to close his eyes a single moment, and feel the touch of her hand on his arm. And help him calm down enough to act rather than react.

  "We'll start with Headley, Drucker, and the La Verne deal," he said.

  Sebastian grinned, but it was a smile that promised retribution. "Since we've got a fox in the henhouse, let's play cock of the walk with him."

  Will hit a button on the intercom, buzzing their executive assistant to usher Ray in. The man who entered was forty-five, but today he looked ten years older, his jowls sagging with the extra pounds he'd put on.

  "Hey, Will." His gaze jittered nervously around the room and up to Daniel's face on the video screen. "I didn't realize everyone would be here."

  "It's an executive meeting. That means all of us." Daniel hard-eyed the guy with a laser-sharp gaze.

  "Sit," Will commanded.

  There was only one chair on the opposite side of the table. Sebastian had lowered it so that when Ray faced them, he looked like an overgrown kid in a child's seat. He couldn't even rest his elbows on the table.

  "What's up, guys?" Ray was trying for friendly, but Will could hear his fingernails tapping on the arm of his chair.

  Will simply said, "La Verne."

  Evan opened a folder in front of him, withdrew a stapled sheaf of papers, and shot the package across the table. "The contract."

  Ray barely caught it before it hit him in the chest.

  "Your signature is on the last page," Daniel said, his crisp voice echoing out of the screen.

  "Ah, yes," Ray said slowly, hesitantly, his face reddening.

  "And you took half the commission," Matt added, specifically avoiding the word earned.

  "Funny thing." Will kept his tone mild. "Headley never talked to you. Only Drucker. And he was impressed with the kid." He paused two beats. "He never even met with you."

  "Well, no, that's, uh..." Ray started to splutter, then he sucked in a huge breath that made his shirt buttons look like they'd pop. "It's how I train my people, hands on, right from the get-go. We strategize together. I write the sales script for them. I monitor their progress every step of the way. The only thing they do at this point is the talking." He stopped to suck in another shirt-busting breath.

  "Ray, I have to ask," Sebastian drawled, leaning back in his chair, arms crossed. "Do we look stupid?"

  "No," Ray pushed out.

  Matt waved a hand. "Why don't we show him the other contract, Evan."

  "Sure thing." Evan looked like a big cat ready to pounce on a lizard.

  They hadn't scripted the meeting, but the five of them had been together so long, they didn't need a script. Right from the day they'd made their pact, they'd known exactly how to back each other up. Sebastian had gone to LA, where he'd founded a media empire, Ma
tt and Evan had gone to college, Daniel had turned his contractor's license into a billion-dollar home improvement kingdom, and Will had begun importing the right thing at just the right moment. But they'd all been there for one another with exactly what was needed right when it was needed.

  This issue with Ray was no different.

  Evan withdrew more papers from his magic folder and flicked them across the table.

  Ray missed and it slid to the carpet. His chair was so low, he disappeared for a moment to retrieve it from beneath the table. The only sound was the rustle of paper and his harsh breathing.

  His face was even redder when he popped back up like a buoy in the water. "What's this?" But he already knew.

  Matt stared the man down. The kid he'd been at ten was a distant memory. At thirty-four, Matt was formidable. "Drucker gave it to us."

  A drop of sweat rolled down from Ray's sideburns. "He couldn't have."

  "Did you really think you had the only copy?" Will asked.

  Ray's eyes flitted back and forth as if searching for a way out. Then, suddenly, he crushed the two-page contract in his hand. "This is standard operating procedure. I bring in the leads. I teach them the ropes. In fact, I'm devoting all my time to them rather than following the leads myself, which I could very well do. I'm actually the one sharing with them, not the other way around."

  Will leaned forward. "One--" He tapped his index finger on the table. "--we give you the leads. Two--" He tapped his middle finger. "--it isn't our standard operating procedure to let anyone skim off half of someone else's commission unless they actually do half the work. Which brings me to three." He brought his hand down on the table. "You're fired."

  "But I've got debts!"

  Ah, so it was debts that had turned him away from being hardworking and honest? Even so, Will didn't give a damn why Ray had turned rotten. He still wanted to grind the man down for taking advantage of kids fresh out of college who didn't know better.

  Will had seen it over and over again with his father and with the Road Warriors as they picked on the weak. It wasn't just a way of life for them, it was sport--and how they made themselves feel bigger than they were. And Will had been one of them until he was sixteen and had tried to leave all that behind.

  Now, faced with a bully like Ray Passal, Will felt the anger boil up all over again, the need to use his fists. "Get your things, Ray, and get the hell out. Now."

  Before Will let anything else boil over.

  "But what am I supposed to do?" Ray whined.

  Will stared him down. "How about thanking your lucky stars that we're not asking you to pay back the commissions you stole?"

  Ray blinked, swallowed, looked at the floor. Then, as if he saw it written down there how much worse things could get, he looked up and said two very simple words, "Thank you."

  It was only after the door closed behind the now shrunken and sweaty man that Will thought again of Harper. Finally, his fists relaxed. He hadn't pounded on the guy. He hadn't even humiliated him. He'd simply pointed out the facts.

  It was a far cry from the boy he'd once been.

  Sebastian slapped him on the back as he rose to pour himself a cup of coffee from the pot no one had touched yet. "Something tells me that's the last we'll ever hear from Ray. He won't want to have to slink back around any of us with his tail between his legs. Good job, guys. We were brilliant."

  "Right," Evan said. "Brilliant like all the crap we used to pull when we were teenagers."

  "Speak for yourself," Sebastian shot back. But Evan was right; they'd all had their less than stellar moments back then. Though Will's were worse than the rest.

  "And you--" Sebastian nodded at Will. "--didn't even tear him to pieces with your bare hands."

  It was meant as a joke, but Will felt the truth of it. That was how he used to do things. Talked with his fists. Back when he was a kid, he'd thought that was how he'd always be. But he'd held it together today--kept things above board rather than dragging his ex-employee into the back alley and teaching him a lesson street-style.

  "No Road Warrior justice today, I guess." Even from the video screen, Daniel's smile was wide, as he put into words what Will had just been thinking.

  "Come to think of it," Matt said, as the one who knew best what Will was capable of, "I can't actually remember you knocking anyone's block off in twenty years."

  For all his fears, Will was surprised to realize Matt was right. Even though fighting had once been all Will knew, he hadn't resorted to violence in two decades. He'd actually kept his cool with Ray today. And while that had felt pretty damn good--if something ever happened to Harper or Jeremy, Will couldn't imagine how he'd be able to keep from tearing apart the people who had hurt them...

  The guys all razzed him about the Road Warriors, but they'd each had their own way of dealing with the old neighborhood. Evan hid out with the library computers, sucked into his circle of numbers and equations. Matt loved his universe of books and gadgets. Sebastian got by on the power of persuasion and charm. And Daniel used his hands, not to fight, but to build things.

  Will was the only one who'd chosen a gang. Even after Susan and Bob had taken him in, he had still straddled those two worlds for years. The Mavericks versus the Road Warriors. He'd thought the gang was his family--at least, as long as he stole cars, won drag races, used his fists--and kept his mouth shut when they did stuff he hated. Don't step into the middle of someone else's business. He'd understood their rules and he knew where he fit in--the kid with the good eye who wasn't afraid to go really fast. But with the Spencers and his new non-Road Warrior friends...

  He hadn't been able to believe a good family could actually want him. So he'd kept screwing up, and screwing up, and screwing up. Until one screwup had been bad enough to finally set him straight. Or at least as straight as it could, when fighting his way out of problems was still fundamentally in his bones.

  "You were different today." Evan caught the mug of coffee Sebastian slid across the table to him. "It's Harper, isn't it?"

  It was the very thought of Harper that had helped him keep himself in check.

  "You've been holding out on us," Daniel added from the other side of the country. "Evan tells us there's a new lady in your life."

  Will had never had a lady in his life. He'd had women he dated, women he slept with. But there'd never been anyone like Harper.

  The Mavericks knew everything about him, from the day they'd met when he was in the sixth grade to the time he moved in with Susan and Bob at thirteen, to the night the Road Warriors imploded. They'd been there for everything in between and all the changes that had come in the two years after that. The truth was that they'd become his family in a way the Road Warriors had never been.

  Which was why, even though Will hadn't yet gotten used to the idea of not only wanting Harper, but needing her, too, in a way he'd never needed anyone else, he found himself telling his closest friends the same thing he'd told Susan.

  "She's special."

  So special that even if he didn't deserve her...he still couldn't make himself walk away.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Harper's nerves were at an all-time high the following Saturday as she drove up Will's driveway with Jeremy grinning like crazy in the passenger seat.

  "I've been waiting all week to come back here," he said.

  And the problem was, so had she. Because Will had gotten under her skin. Big time.

  All week long, Harper had tried to convince herself that she should be glad she hadn't heard from him since the previous Saturday. He'd talked with Jeremy over Skype about the car, but he hadn't asked for her. And she hadn't asked for him, either. Instead, she'd told herself a thousand times that she shouldn't let Will pull her in, shouldn't risk giving herself a taste of the pleasure he was promising her.

  She knew what he was trying to do with all that talk of his intentions, with the way he'd said Soon we'll both have want we want right after he made her forget everything but how much she
wanted his almost-touches and almost-kisses. He was trying to get her so worked up that she couldn't think straight, couldn't remember all her good reasons to steer clear of him.

  Knowing precisely what he was trying to do should have made her even more firm in her plan to keep things purely friendly for Jeremy's sake. She didn't want to shake up their lives. But even as she tried to convince herself that staying clear of Will was the only reasonable course of action, the truth was that she'd been feeling less and less reasonable as each day of that long week passed.

  And she couldn't stop wondering--if she didn't take this chance with Will, would she always regret it?

  As she stepped out of the car, she could see the gleam in Will's eyes, a wicked heat full of so many intentions that her heart felt as if it were about to race right out of her chest. And he hadn't even touched her yet.

  How was she going to keep resisting him? She had all her good, practical, sensible reasons laid out, yet whenever he came near...

  Fortunately, just as he came into touching range, her phone rang. She grabbed it from her bag and when she saw it was one of her clients, she leapt on it. "Sorry, it's work." She waved her phone at him as if it were a shield blocking his progress toward her. "Excuse me."

  She all but ran around the corner of the big barn, close enough that she could still hear Will's and Jeremy's voices as they got to work on the Maserati, but far enough away that she couldn't make out what they were saying.

  And it was a good thing she'd been looking for a big distraction, because the negotiation ended up being a long one. Over an hour, in fact, by the time she'd talked to both the employer and the new hire and achieved agreement on salary, benefits, and bonus.

  After she hung up, she spent a few moments working to center herself. She knew she was acting crazy. Which was silly, because crazy was the very last thing Harper had ever let herself be. This time, she decided firmly, she would keep it together. Will was just a guy. She could handle spending a little time around him on the weekends while her brother worked on the car.

  Taking a deep breath, she put a smile on her face, then returned to the barn. "How's the work coming along?"