Once Forbidden, Twice Tempted (The Sterling Wives Book 1)

by Karen Booth

  Tara had to wonder if that was part of what had made Grant so eager to step away from her the other morning. Setting aside the obvious conflict of their working relationship, and what had been the immediate threat of Astrid telling everyone she knew that Grant and Tara had slept together, perhaps it was Grant’s history with Johnathon that made him second-guess what they’d done. Grant was in a far different situation than Tara—his allegiance to Johnathon had gone right up until the moment he’d died. Much of Tara’s went away when he filed for divorce. It wasn’t the same. And perhaps she needed to give Grant some credit for not wanting to violate the trust that had come with his brotherly bond with Johnathon. Things like that didn’t simply dissolve when someone passed away.

  As she drove to work on Monday morning, it occurred to her that there might be something else going on here—perhaps she had underestimated Grant. Not only in the bedroom, but in the sphere of work. He’d shown himself as nothing less than a formidable man. He was not to be messed with. He’d also made it obvious that his allegiance was to Sterling Enterprises above all else. As to how much that was wrapped up in his friendship with Johnathon, she didn’t know. But still, the fact that he’d taken Tara to bed wasn’t about to slow him down with staking his claim on Sterling. And now she was in the position of having to stay away from him, when the reality was that he’d done nothing less than pique her interest by making love to her.

  But sex would solve nothing. Stay on your path, Tara. Get back to work.

  When she arrived at the office, she found Astrid in reception, looking absolutely stunning in a gray wool pencil skirt and black turtleneck. On anyone else, it would’ve looked a little too prim for the modern workplace. On Astrid, it was jaw-dropping.

  “You ready to get to work?” Tara asked.

  “Absolutely.”

  Tara guided Astrid through the maze of halls, passing her office, so she could lead Astrid to the one she’d be occupying. “This will be where you’ll be working for the time being. Everything’s in a state of flux right now, so I don’t think this is where you’ll end up permanently. I know it’s maybe not quite as nice as you might have wanted.” Tara braced for commentary on the small and spartan nature of the space. Astrid was accustomed to luxury and the finest of everything.

  “This will work fine. I don’t need a fancy office. I just need a place to sit and a desk. The window is nice.” Astrid offered a quick smile, seeming satisfied.

  Tara admired Astrid’s willingness to go with the flow. She hadn’t expected it, at all. Johnathon had always painted Astrid as being incredibly high-maintenance, the sort of woman who needed constant attention and adulation. That hadn’t been Tara’s experience thus far. Astrid certainly had a flair for high drama—showing up at the first meeting of the wives dressed as Widow of the Year, and then again turning up at Tara’s house and busting her on her tryst with Grant. But as for being needy, Astrid seemed nothing less than self-sufficient.

  “You’ll be working on the Seaport Promenade project with me,” Tara said. “Since you’re just getting started in the world of development, Grant thought it best for us to work together so I and a few other key people in the office can show you the ropes.”

  Astrid nodded eagerly and tucked her long blond hair behind her ear. “Yes, of course. I’m ready to learn.”

  Yet again, Tara was pleasantly surprised. Astrid might have owned seventeen percent of the company, but she sure wasn’t acting as though she was entitled to anything other than an opportunity. “Great. Let’s go chat with Clay Morgan, the lead architect on the project. I can explain everything to you on our way down to his office.”

  Astrid reached for Tara’s arm, her face now painted with concern. “He’s Miranda’s brother, isn’t he?”

  “He is. But you and Miranda have started to iron things out, haven’t you?”

  Astrid nodded. “Yes. But I’m still not sure she likes me.”

  Tara patted Astrid on the arm, wanting to reassure her. “She’s been through a lot. We’ve all been through a lot. All the more reason for us to have that dinner together. Does Friday still work for you?”

  “It does. I wouldn’t miss it.”

  “Great.”

  The two women strode down the hall to the suite where the architects’ offices were. She loved this part of the Sterling operation. It made her think of her dad, and his dreams. He would’ve been excited to see so many talented people hard at work. He’d always hoped to find himself in a place exactly like this, but he’d never reached that goal. All the more reason for Tara to keep striving for more in this new phase of her professional life. She wasn’t waiting to be happy. She was making her dad proud by going for it.

  Tara reached Clay’s door, which was wide open. Inside, Clay was hard at work at his drafting table. In the background, classical music played, but at a volume so low that it was hardly audible. Tara had met Clay a few times, and if she had to stick him with a label, it would have been intense. His hair was very dark, nearly black, just like Miranda’s. It was longish on top, and he was always threading his fingers through it, flopping it from one side to the other. His blue eyes were so dark that they sometimes looked like midnight. He was tall and broad, but quiet and reserved. There always seemed to be quite a lot going on under the surface.

  Tara hated to interrupt him, especially when he was so hard at work, but she had to make this introduction. She rapped on his door quietly. He looked up at her with those stormy eyes, but he seemed to quickly see past Tara to Astrid. Tara was accustomed to this response from men when she was with Astrid. The woman had graced hundreds of magazines and the runway for a reason—she was breathtakingly beautiful.

  “Clay. Hi,” Tara started. “I wanted to introduce you to Astrid Sterling. She’s going to be project manager on the Seaport project. You and Grant talked about it, right?”

  He took a quick survey of his workspace, which was littered with pencils and large sheets of drafting paper. “Yeah. Sure. I’m sorry. I would’ve cleaned up if I’d known you were coming.”

  Astrid walked past Tara and helped him with the pencils. “It’s okay. I’m good at straightening up.”

  Clay was a proverbial deer in the headlights, not saying a thing and frozen in place. Men did all sorts of strange things in Astrid’s presence. “Please. Don’t.” He stopped Astrid by clapping his hand down on hers. He’d apparently snapped back to attention.

  Astrid shook off the rebuff, but her cheeks were red with embarrassment. “I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I just like to have my office a certain way.”

  Tara was eager to diffuse the sudden tension in the air. “So, Clay, as you know, Grant wants you as lead architect on the project. Astrid will be learning along the way and managing the day-to-day. I’ll be dealing with the city, with help from my assistant, Sandy.”

  Clay picked up one of the pencils from his desk and rattled it back and forth between his fingers. “I’ve already done my own research on the specs. We’re behind the eight ball. The first plans are due in five weeks. If we don’t pass the initial phase, we’re out of the running. And my workload is already considerable, so this is going to be a big challenge.”

  Tara decided that getting Clay on her side was of paramount importance. Grant would think she couldn’t handle things if Clay went complaining to him about the timeline or the project in general. “You have a daughter, right?”

  Clay’s eyes narrowed. “I do. She’s five.”

  “One of my prime objectives in our version of the project is to make it more kid friendly. There’s not enough for families downtown. I think your knowledge based on that alone is crucial.”

  “There are other dads in the department.”

  “But none who are doing it all on their own as a single dad. I’m guessing you bring a specific set of ideas to the equation. Plus, Grant swears up and down that you’re the top a
rchitect in the firm. I want the best for this project.”

  Clay pursed his lips, the pencil still wagging in his hand. “Okay. We need to have a planning meeting as soon as possible. A site visit. I’d like to hear some ideas outside of my own. It’s important to have more than one perspective.”

  “That’s perfect because I have lots of ideas. Grant really seemed to like them.” Just thinking about presenting her ideas to Grant was making her sad about the other night. They’d both been so caught up in the moment, feeding off each other’s enthusiasm. It had felt only natural that they’d ended up in bed together, and in the moment, it had been so right. She and Grant fit together like two puzzle pieces. But that was not to be. She had to stay focused on what was ahead of her.

  “Okay. Sounds good,” Clay said.

  Tara breathed a sigh of relief. “Fantastic. I’ll have Sandy bring you the official specs this afternoon. Perhaps we can meet first thing tomorrow morning?”

  “That works,” Clay said.

  “Is this your daughter in the picture?” Astrid asked, picking up a frame from the credenza.

  “It is. She was a flower girl when my sister and Johnathon got married.”

  Astrid admired the photograph and Tara stole a glance over her shoulder. Clay was standing next to bride Miranda with his arm around her. Clay’s daughter was in a pretty pink dress with a basket of flowers. It made Tara’s heart ache to think about how happy everyone was in that photograph, but it also made her equally sad to think about what Astrid must be thinking while looking at it. She hadn’t been told that Johnathon had remarried. This was a piece of history she’d only recently learned of.

  “When was the wedding?”

  “Late May last year. Memorial Day weekend. They were barely married for a year. It’s so sad,” Clay answered.

  “Was it a short engagement?” Astrid asked.

  Tara found the question odd. Why would Astrid want to know these details? “A few months, I guess,” Tara answered.

  “Sounds right to me,” Clay added.

  Astrid tapped her finger against the frame, then promptly put the photograph down and made for the door. “Thanks, Clay,” she said, hardly looking at him before she disappeared into the hall.

  “Is she okay?” Clay asked.

  Tara didn’t know the answer to that question, but she had a good idea. “I’m sure she’s fine. Thanks for letting us steal some of your time today.”

  “Yeah. Of course.”

  Tara rushed out into the hall. She expected that she’d have to chase after Astrid, but she was just outside the door, leaning against the wall with her face buried in her hands.

  “Come on,” Tara said, urging her ahead with a gentle tug of her arm. “Let’s you and I get some privacy.” She and Astrid filed into the ladies’ room. “Was it the photo from Johnathon’s wedding to Miranda?”

  “Yes.” Astrid’s voice was soft and unsteady.

  “I’m sorry you had to see that, but maybe it’s better that it finally happened. You and Miranda are becoming friends. It was only a matter of time before she invited you over one night.”

  Astrid braced her hands on the bathroom counter, staring into the mirror and shaking her head. She wasn’t tearful, but the color was definitely gone from her face. “I can’t believe it.”

  “Believe what?”

  Astrid looked Tara right in the eye via her reflection. “Johnathon cheated on Miranda.”

  “Wait. What? How do you know?”

  Astrid turned around and crossed her arms over her chest, leaning back against the vanity. “I know because he cheated on her with me.”

  Ten

  Tara cursed her ex-husband for days. Nearly an entire work week, to be exact. Damn you, Johnathon. How could he have done that? Sleep with one ex-wife weeks before marrying the next one? It was unconscionable. It was also a little crazy that Tara had such a burning desire to find out why he’d done it. Leave it alone, she kept telling herself. But she couldn’t.

  Tara had a vested interest in keeping this secret buried, even if it killed her to play a part in Johnathon’s misdeeds. If Miranda found out and blew up over it, the wives’ majority interest in the company would be compromised. There was no telling what either Astrid or Miranda would do in that situation, but Tara could imagine some terrible scenarios. They might feel pitted against each other and sell to one of the other shareholders, leaving Tara with very few options. If they sold to Grant, it would be game over. Tara would lose her chance to run the company. Miranda and Astrid might even band together against Tara. Crazier things had happened.

  The wives needed to be a unified front, but beneath the surface, things were beginning to splinter. First there was the pregnancy and now, the infidelity. Beyond that, Tara was responsible for some of the uneven ground they were walking on. It had been foolish to sleep with Grant. It had been shortsighted to allow herself to get caught up in the moment and give in to those carnal desires, and her own deep-seated curiosity about what it might be like to sleep with him. She couldn’t beat herself up about it though. She refused to do that. He rocked her world a week ago. On some level, it had been worth it.

  For now, her most pressing problem was that Astrid would not stop asking Tara if she thought Grant knew about the infidelity. It bothered Astrid greatly, and she’d been unable to get a meeting with him. His schedule was ridiculously full. Tara kept putting Astrid off, but she couldn’t do it forever. And it benefitted her to ask the question before Astrid had the chance to do it herself. If Astrid unleashed her anger on Grant in the office, Clay might find out about it and that would all lead back to Miranda. It was a risk to ask Grant, but she needed to do it. Luckily, she not only had access to his calendar, but she’d befriended his assistant.

  She showed up at his office just as he was getting off a call. “Do you have a minute?” she asked.

  “Sure,” he answered, typing away at his keyboard.

  Tara closed the door behind her. She couldn’t let anyone hear their discussion. The rumor mill would gobble up this delicious morsel of gossip and it would spread like wildfire.

  “Tara. We talked about this. About the door,” he said.

  “I know. But we need privacy.” That one word—privacy—and the accompanying knowledge that they were now alone did a number on her. It made her face and chest flush with heat. It made her legs feel rubbery. Being in his presence heightened the memory of his touch. It boiled it down to a potent serum that streamed through her body. What would have happened if she and Grant hadn’t had their hands forced the morning after? Would he have wanted more? Would she have agreed? She knew she would have. It would have been impossible to turn him down.

  “The whole office will talk about it,” he said.

  “Let them talk. We have bigger fish to fry.” Tara went to the window and looked out over the city skyline, her mind running too many disparate pieces of information at one time. Astrid. Johnathon. Miranda. It was such a mess. And it was time to crack it open. “You knew, didn’t you?”

  Grant sat back in his chair and crossed his legs. He’d removed his suit jacket at some point during the day, and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt. God, he had sexy forearms. Strong and long, with the perfect amount of dark hair. “Sorry. You’re going to have to be a little more specific than that.”

  “Johnathon and Astrid. The real reason he never told Astrid about marrying Miranda.”

  Grant cleared his throat and averted his gaze. That told her all she needed to know, but she still wanted to hear it.

  “Tell me,” she said.

  “I didn’t find out about it until after the fact. I swear that if I had known ahead of time, I would have tried to talk him out of it.”

  “What happened?”

  “I guess he just never had the nerve to tell Astrid when he met Miranda and they got involved. He couldn’t bring himse
lf to break her heart. He and Astrid still had a very on-again, off-again relationship after the divorce. She went back to Norway and he went there several times trying to reconcile.”

  This was news to Tara, and it hurt to hear it. Johnathon had no problem moving on after shuttling her out of his life. Astrid was on his arm in what felt like the blink of an eye. “I had no idea.”

  “It was heartbreaking, really. They both wanted children so badly, but they’d never been able to conceive. Years of trying and waiting every month and never having any luck took its toll on the marriage, but I think they still loved each other deeply.”

  Tara knew it had been rough for them, but she hadn’t been privy to the details. “What about after he and Miranda got engaged? That wasn’t enough to keep him away from Astrid?”

  “Apparently not. I thought he was flying to London to meet with a potential partner on a project. He didn’t tell me he was stopping off in Norway on the way there.”

  “From what Astrid said, it was only weeks before the wedding. What prompted it?”

  Grant shrugged. “You know what he was like. He sometimes simply let the wind carry him in one direction, even when he knew he should probably go the other way.”

  Tara did know that firsthand. She’d felt like that had been the case when Johnathon jettisoned her from Sterling and pushed her into real estate. It all happened so suddenly. One day she was working at their fledgling operation and the next, he was insisting she do something else and get her real estate license.

  Grant pinched his nose and shook his head. “It’s hard for me to know what was going through Johnathon’s head at that point. All I know is that he went to Norway and he and Astrid slept together.”

  “He told you when he got back?”