Page 4 of Dirty Deal

Ariq nods, tapping a message on his phone at lightning speed. The blue light washes over his face from below, making him look even younger. I don’t care if Ariq is fresh-faced, though. He’s loyal and his brain moves at a hundred miles per hour. That’s all I need.

“And the lawsuit?” Ariq asks.

I snort, leaning back in the chair until it creaks. “He’s bluffing. It would embarrass him far more than us.”

“But if he does sue and we lose—”

“Then we’ll pay,” I say, waving a hand. My tone is more casual than I feel, because this success took years to build, and yet I’m still not used to it. The muscle-memory of worrying about every cent runs deep. “The Merritt could pay off thousands of Lord Fraytons if it needed to, Ariq. Thousands upon thousands. But it won’t, because he has no claim. The man is an embarrassment, and he surely knows it.”

Ariq nods, tucking his phone back in his pocket. “I’ll handle it.”

“Good.”

The door shuts behind my assistant, and my chair swings around as I stare out at the city lights. They wink and glitter, so much brighter than the stars overhead.

I sigh.

There are documents for me to review. Contracts and purchase orders to pore over; forecasts and accounts to sign off. I knew exactly what I was getting into when I bought the Merritt from my old boss—hell, I’d done his job for him for years by that point—and yet the never-ending decisions still get to me sometimes. I push to my feet instead, striding over to the huge glass windows to stare blindly into the night.

I wouldn’t go back to those early days of living paycheck to paycheck, worrying about every letter I got in the mail. Not for anything.

But there was something morerealabout that life, something that kept me awake and energized. Fear, probably. Nothing good.

Still, for the last year, since buying the Merritt, some part of me has been dormant. Sleep-walking through each day, no longer interested enough to pay attention. So fuckingbored.

The office door opens again behind me. I don’t bother turning around—Ariq is the only staff member who comes in here, barring the morning cleaner.

“Problem?” I ask, peering down at the street below. A man who looks suspiciously like a drunk British aristocrat is weaving away along the sidewalk, shaking one fist in the air. “He seems to have gone without too much fight.”

“Weston,” a soft voice says. Afemalevoice.

My whole body turns to stone.

For a long moment, I don’t move. Don’t speak. I don’t even breathe, I just stare wide-eyed down at the city sidewalk, my heart slamming against my rib cage. There’s no sound behind me either, the whole room frozen with shock, and when I finally start to turn around, I half expect the office to be empty.

It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been haunted by thoughts of her. Surely won’t be the last, either.

Because Lena Merritt has lived rent free in my brain since the day I met her, paraded proudly through the casino on her twenty-first birthday. Her father ordered a glass of champagne, sat her down at the blackjack table, and bragged non-stop the whole time she was there. He was a puffed-up peacock, equally proud of his beautiful daughter and his inherited business, as though he could take the credit for either.

It was irritating as hell, watching her toss her hair back and laugh with the other patrons.

I couldn’t look away.

Now, as I turn to face Lena Merritt once again, the effect she has on me has not lessened at all. There’s still a lurch deep in the pit of my stomach, like I’ve been caught on a fish hook; my collar is still too tight, scraping against my throat. I’m dazed byher beauty, all too ready to crash to my knees and beg for a taste, and that makes me feel the same thing it always did.

Bone-deep resentment.

I’m fucking furious. How dare Lena Merritt slip into my office uninvited, as though this is still her family’s playground? How dare she say my name in that husky voice, like she’s been thinking of me too? How dare she stand in my office doorway, her dark hair tumbling over the lapels of her black trench coat, and stare at me with beseeching eyes?

No.

No.

This woman has had every advantage in life. Every single goddamn thing she ever could have wished for, she had with a snap of her fingers. I won’t fall at her feet too. There must be a line.

“You should knock,” I say, “when you barge into someone’s office late at night.”

“Sorry.” Lena gives me a wobbly smile. “I used to sneak up here and visit my father when I was younger. I know all the quiet corridors to slip by unseen.”

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