Tempt The Hookup
Natasha Madison
Copyright © 2019 Natasha Madison. E-Book and Print Edition
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used factiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons or living or dead, events or locals are entirely coincidental.
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Cover Design: Melissa Gill
Editing done by Jenny Sims Editing4Indies
Proofing Julie Deaton by Deaton Author Services https://www.facebook.com/jdproofs/
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Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue
Books By Natasha Madison
Prologue
Luca
Seven years before
“This booze cruise is exactly what you need,” Jason, my roommate, tells me as he packs a small gray tote bag. “After those midterms, I need to be drunk for four straight days, and maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll have hot sex.” I shake my head at him. He’s not lying when he says those midterms were bad. They were fucking brutal. I lived on pizza, coffee, and Red Bull for five days straight. But I had one goal and one goal only—to ace those fucking exams.
“We still need to be reasonable,” I say to Jason while I open my drawer and take out five folded white T-shirts. That’s me—reasonable Luca. Luca with the highest IQ; Luca who will graduate first in his law class from Harvard if things keep going the way they are going.
Jason groans from his side of the room. “Dude, if you fuck this up for me, I’m going to glue your ass cheeks together.” He points at me when a knock on my door has us looking over.
The door opens, and Nick and Tom walk in both carrying black backpacks. “What the fuck are you guys packing?” Tom comes over and sits on my bed. “You know that it’s four days, right? And we will be in shorts all day long.”
“Yeah,” Nick says, going over to my desk and sitting in my chair. Holding out his hand, he starts counting with his thumb. “You need a bathing suit, sunscreen, two pairs of shorts, and five T-shirts.” He then looks at the three of us and smiles so big. “Oh, and two boxes of condoms.” He holds up two fingers and twirls around in the chair.
“It’s not a swingers’ cruise,” I admonish, tossing a couple of pairs of socks into my bag. “You are aware of this, right?”
“It’s called a booze cruise for a reason,” Nick says, laughing. “You booze, you sleaze. It’s a circle of life.”
“What happens on the booze cruise stays on the booze cruise,” Tom says. “We need nicknames.”
“Why?” I ask them, confused, while I pack a pair of dress pants, and all three of them look at me with their eyebrows pulled together.
“You never know if it’s going to get cold at night, or it’s fancy and shit,” I say. “Why do we need nicknames?”
“Oh my God,” Tom says, throwing his head back. “You can’t give your real name. What if you meet her, and it’s just a weekend thing?” he says with his hands. “Or she’s good enough for the cruise but not good enough for land?”
“Okay, and?” I ask, not getting it.
“Then you’ve got to be the asshole and be all like it’s not you, it’s me, but it’s really her and not you,” Tom says. “It’s just easier if we come up with code names.”
“We should have kick-ass nicknames like in Top Gun,” Nick says. “I’m Maverick.”
“I’m Ice Man,” Tom says, raising his hand and then pointing at me. “You’re Goose.”
“Why am I Goose?” I ask him, placing a dress shirt into my luggage. He comes over and tosses the dress shirt back out.
“That is why you’re Goose, always making sure we don’t fuck up or do anything stupid,” Tom says.
“Wait, didn’t Goose die?” I ask them, and they all look around, avoiding the question.
“Listen, the bottom line is you need to let loose for once. Take your hair down, or don’t fix your hair,” Nick says, winking at me. So I like to fix my hair every day and wear nice clothes. There’s nothing wrong with that.
“You mean be an adult? That has consequences,” I counter.
“He’s off the boat,” Tom says, looking at Jason and Nick who both nod their heads. “Sorry, dude, the tribe has spoken.”
“I’m Viper,” Jason finally says, looking up.
“The old guy?” I ask him.
“His name is cool, okay?” he says, slamming the carry-on bag he has. “Now I need to stop at CVS and get all the condoms.”
I shake my head. “We should also get aloe vera in case we get a sunburn.”
They all groan this time. “You know what?” I look at them. “Fuck you all. If you get a sunburn, don’t come crying to me.”
“Deal,” they all say, and we walk downstairs toward the front of the apartment building.
“This time tomorrow, we are going to be on the lido deck hopefully doing body shots,” Nick says, getting into the Uber we ordered. “And if you mention hygiene,” he says, leaning his head forward to look at me, “I’m throwing you overboard.”
I roll my eyes, looking out the window to take in the snow on the ground. I watch the buildings outside, and I had no idea that, that weekend would change everything. I had no idea that at the end of all this, I would leave half of myself on that boat.
Chapter One
Luca
Present day
“What do you mean, you can’t come over for Sunday dinner?” Nick says over the phone. “You never miss Sunday dinners. It’s a ritual, like going to church and eating no meat on Friday!” I hear mumbling in the background. “Mona says that you better not be ditching us for a date,” he says and then laughs. “But don’t worry, I told her that you are taking becoming a monk very seriously.”
I shake my head, drinking the last of my coffee. “It’s not like that. We are all invited to my boss’s house for a welcome back party. What am I supposed to do? Say no?”
“Who is he welcoming back?” Nick asks, and I hear him drinking.
“His daughter. Apparently, she’s been in Paris for the past six years. It wasn’t a suggestion either.” The invitation was given to all senior and junior partners, and it was basically thank you for joining us in welcoming back Eliahn.
“Ah,” he says. “The boss talks, and you have no choice.” And he isn’t wrong. I started at Coco and Associates straight out of law school. Graduating at the top of my class had some perks, and one was having every major law firm fight for you. It was a hard decision, and I visited the
m all, but I just felt different when I went in for an interview there. It felt like family and not just a case.
The law firm was started some forty years ago by Leonard Coco, and he only had a secretary. From what everyone says, he would sit at the courthouse day in and day out, trying to get clients. At first, he just did family law, but then his best friend came along and took the criminal cases. Slowly, they grew, and now, we handle it all from family law and criminal law to immigration law and environmental law.
Now it is the biggest law firm in the city, fuck, almost in the country. And I am a part of that. I couldn’t be happier or scared.
Nick, Tom, and Jason also graduated from Harvard, but only Nick and I felt the need to head west. Jason is still in Boston, no doubt freezing his fucking balls off during the winter months, and Tom is smack in the middle of New York City. His condo overlooks Central Park, and he says he’s never leaving.
Out of the four of us, Nick is the only one in a relationship. According to Nick, he isn’t tied down per se; he’s just half the chain attached at his ankle. He met Mona when they started at the same law firm. He went into the relationship with his normal no-strings-attached mantra, but that quickly turned into “yes, dear” within the first month of dating. No matter how much he complains about it, he loves every single second of it.
“So you have to go to this black tie event for your boss’s daughter. How old is she?” Nick asks.
“I have no fucking clue,” I say, walking to the backyard patio and sitting down. I look back at the house that I bought as soon as I signed on to be a junior partner. It was my gift to myself for all the years that I slaved and didn’t have a life. Now at least I get to look at something and see it paid off.
I usually only get to enjoy the backyard and its solitude on the weekends. During the week, I’m at my desk starting at seven, and I don’t get home until after nine on some days, but I have no one to answer to. I am about to talk when the noise from the neighboring yard starts up. Hammers go nuts, and when I stand to look over at the backyard next to me, I see that they have workers assembling something. They must be putting in a pool. The house has been vacant for the past six months, and now for the past week, the activity level has gone through the roof. I think I’m getting new neighbors, and from what I can see, they have kids. “From what I heard, she escaped the wrath of her father when she was twenty by going to Paris.”
“Fuck, a French girl?” he says, his voice going quiet. “You know that they do anal before anything, right?”
I shake my head, laughing. “Where do you get all these facts?”
“Pornhub,” he says, laughing. “Just don’t tell Mona. She gets all territorial about my big dick.”
“My lips are sealed,” I say. “Anyway, rain check. Are you going to play hockey this week?” Another thing we picked up living in Boston is skating and playing hockey. I mean, I can skate, which is about as far as I can go, but we do like to play and let some steam off.
“I think I’m going to go for Wednesday, you in?” he asks me about the beer league we joined. It’s a bunch of people from our firms who play.
I take another sip of coffee. “I have to check my caseload this week, but I think I can manage it.”
“Good. Last week, we had an old guy on the team,” he says, groaning.
“Your idea of an old guy is someone who is forty,” I say.
“He was actually forty-three,” he says matter-of-factly. “Dude, I thought he was having a heart attack on the bench.” He laughs now. “We had side bets going.” The phone muffles, and then he comes back. “Okay, I have to go. Mona is calling me.”
“Maybe she caught your history on Pornhub,” I say, laughing.
“Please,” he pffts. “You think I’m an amateur? I delete the history right after.” He laughs.
“Did you delete it from your hard drive?” I ask him.
“Gotta go,” he says, disconnecting, and I laugh.
I finish my coffee outside, the sound of hammers becoming louder and louder. I walk up the steps to go back inside, the cold air hitting me right away as I walk up the stairs to my bedroom. Grabbing my laptop, I decide to work for a bit before I have to stop to get dressed and head out to this barbecue.
The invitation said barbecue chic, and I’m not going to lie—I had to google. Which, by the way, shows you a man in a suit with flip-flops. That will never happen, so I’m going casual without a tie.
I grab my blue dress pants and my white long-sleeve button-up shirt. Leaving the first three buttons open, I roll up my sleeves, then put on my silver Rolex, a signing bonus from Leonard Coco himself. I take out my brown belt and my brown shoes because no flip-flops for this guy. I run my hands through my black hair when I stand in front of the mirror in my walk-in closet, taking in how I look. I grab my beige linen dress jacket and slide it on. “This looks like what barbecue chic is.”
I grab my wallet and slip it in the inside pocket of my jacket. Putting on my gold Ray-Bans, I take the keys, and I walk out to my white BMW SUV. Starting the car, I enter the address in the GPS and slowly make my way there. The invitation said twelve thirty, and it’s now one forty. My goal is to make an entrance and get out.
I’ll be seen by some key players, schmooze a bit, eat a bit, and then bounce. I have court this week; family law is no joke. Thankfully, my parents are still married to this day—going on thirty-five years in two months—rare but it happens. Nowadays, it’s just so easy to say I’m out. No one puts the time and energy into marriages anymore. They all want to be done with it. I think my quickest divorce was ten hours before they realized it wasn’t going to work. The wedding cake wasn’t even cut.
The cases I hate the most are when kids are involved. People stoop to fucking low levels to keep from paying child support. Like the bottom of the barrel under all the grime and slime. I shake my head as I turn into the tree-lined driveway. When the house finally comes into view, it’s fucking massive. “Fuck,” I say, taking in the two-story brick house. It almost looks like a palace. I’m expecting to see flags raised and everything.
The driveway goes in a circle, and the valet is there waiting for me. I pull up, and he opens my door. “Welcome,” he says, handing me a ticket. Fucking valet. I look around and see everything from Bentleys to a Lamborghini lined up. I shake my head, following the path to the party. There are actual signs and arrows, and it’s almost like I’m at Ikea. Laughing to myself, I walk around the house and then stop dead in my tracks. “What in the fuck?”
It looks like I just walked into a carnival. My eyes fly around the huge backyard to take it all in. I shake my head when I see kids running everywhere. A lady, wearing a white button-down and red vest with a white hat sits behind a booth that says TICKETS, smiles at me. “Good afternoon. Welcome to the carnival.”
I smile at her and continue looking around as I walk a little bit farther into the yard. Round blue tables with white linen chairs fill the space. On the right side is a train, a fucking train, going around in a circle on its tracks. Kids sit two by two in the four train cars, and some are holding balloons while others wave their hands in the air.
Behind that is a fenced area with a green dragon mini roller coaster. Up and down it goes while the kids yell and laugh, and other kids line up at the fence waiting for their turn.
In the far back is a small Ferris wheel. Red, yellow, green, blue, orange, and purple cars go around and around. Carnival swings are next to them.
“Holy shit, is that a carousel?” I hear from beside me and look over at Noah, one of the partners at my firm. His divorce case was the first one I worked on at the firm. He took me under his wing when he was looking for his now ex-wife and I saved him a whole lot of time and energy. That’s a whole other story about how the playboy got played. Now he stands next to me holding his three-year-old son, Matteo, on his hip.
“Yeah.” Looking at Matteo, I say, “Hey, dude.” He smiles at me. “Fist bump.” He is a frequent visitor at the office, so he
knows me well. That and I also slip him chocolate every time I see him there. He puts his hand in a fist and bumps it with mine. “Where is Kaleigh?” I ask him, looking around for his hot as fuck wife. She’s a yoga instructor, and they met when his best friend fell for her sister, who then came to work at the firm. It’s almost like a soap opera.
“She’s home,” he says, “with morning sickness.” His face going full-on megawatt smile.
“No way.” Smiling at him, I grab his shoulder. “Congrats.”
“What can I say? My swimmers are on their A game.” He laughs. “She said let’s have another baby. My sperm said challenge accepted. And boom. Pregnant!” He leans down and kisses Matteo’s head.
“Daddy, I want to go there.” Matteo points at the swings, then moves his finger over to the little circus tents they have set up. One has balloons, and the other one has face painting. “Balloon!” he shouts and squirms to get out of his father’s grasp. Right past those tents, carnival games are set up to win stuffed animals. It’s like the state fair threw up in their backyard.
“I’ll catch you later,” Noah says. Walking to the balloon stand, he holds his son’s hand, almost being dragged by his thirty-five-pound body.
I make my way through the tables, smiling and nodding at a couple of people I know. On one side, you have the rides, and on the other, you have the food.
There is everything from popcorn, to funnel cakes, to corn dogs, and hamburgers. I watch the kids run around; some hold balloons, and some with face paint on them. A couple of them are having full-on hissy fits and tantrums along with one or two having breakdowns.
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