Page 37 of His Two Hidden Masks

“We are Street Entertainment,” Dylan said. “And I read the brief this morning, which is when I realized our rendezvous has added some complexity to this trip.”

“Complexity,” James repeated. “I would call it a fuck-up, not a complexity.”

“We all know that Acquisitions are your side of the business, brother. I am in Creative Development,” Dylan added, as if that explained everything.

“Creative Development,” I repeated. “What does that even mean?”

“I know, right?” Dylan said. “It’s terribly vague.”

James jumped in. “Street Industries has three divisions. Hospitality, which I run and largely consists of Acquisitions. Creative Development covers our music catalog, artists, and creatives.

That is Dylan’s expertise, and Investments is run by our older brother, Damian,” he paused, “who is not here. And who is not a triplet in case, you were wondering.”

“That was long-winded,” Dylan said, leaning his head back with an exaggerated stretch. “I like to say that James is the real estate man, I do music, and Damien is all about the money.”

“If this isn’t your thing, why are you here?” I said to Dylan. “You know, it’s bad enough that my father is selling out to you people. Now you’ve made it completely weird.”

James shook his head and gave what I considered his first genuine smile of the evening. “She’s not wrong, brother, you’ve made it weird.”

Dylan leaned across the table. “I came on this trip for Carnival. Truth be told, this was a rather spontaneous trip. I wasn’t supposed to be here at all.”

“That is completely true,” James said.

“Well, isn’t that nice for you.” I drained my glass. Without missing a beat, Dylan refilled it.

“So,” I said, “you are on vacation? You didn’t lie about that?”

“No, not exactly,” Dylan said. “It’s vacation, with a little work.”

“Do you know how to give a straight answer?” I asked. “One of you is here to take over my family’s livelihood, and one of you is here to vacation, do some work, fuck local girls at Carnival? What am I missing?”

I looked between them, my mind still reeling at their identical gorgeousness. I focused on Dylan and tried to remember that I would be better off staying angry at him. Staying angry meant I might manage to keep my panties on.

Our table quieted as the waiter approached and topped off our champagne, emptying the bottle. “Would you like to order dinner?”

“We will keep the menus, and I’ll have a whiskey, neat,” Dylan said. “Give us a few minutes.”

The waited nodded and retreated to the restaurant.

“What am I missing?” I repeated.

James shook his head as if exasperated, glanced at Dylan, and rolled his eyes. There was some sort of sub-conversation going on, and I was missing all of it.

“It isn’t often that I meet someone like you,” Dylan said.

“Someone like me? Gullible? Someone you can trick?”

“No, someone who doesn’t know exactly who I am,” Dylan said. “Someone who doesn’t already know who we both are.”

My gaze bounced between the brothers, but landed squarely on Dylan. His wicked smile attracted me like a magnet. “It’s like I have double vision, looking at the two of you. It’s very distracting.”

“You want distraction,” James said, taking a sip of his champagne. “Try having your twin brother a bit slow on thedetails. My God, the way the two of you are flirting. You should just knock the dishes right onto the floor and fuck each other right here on the table.”

His comment sucked the air out of my lungs. Dylan kept his eyes locked on me.

“And that is my queue to depart.” James placed two hands on the table and stood. “Good night, Isabella. My goal was to make you understand that it wasn’t me in your bed last night. I am all business this trip.”

“He isn’t joking about that,” Dylan said. “He is a man driven by the numbers, believe me.”

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