Page 1 of The Holy Grail
Prologue
Fourteen months ago
“The night of your birthday, I told that hot bartender I would go to the mattresses for you, and I meant it.”
The words, spoken by a woman with a rich, smoky drawl, somewhere off to Malcom’s left, broke through the white noise of the muted conversations around him, immediately capturing his attention withThe Godfatherreference.
Because …The Godfather.
He’d been coming to Kyoto—the trendy Japanese restaurant, not the city—at least once a week for the past year to eat dinner and not once had his attention wandered beyond whatever he ordered, or the current book he was reading. Yeah, he was the loner who read books in restaurants, partly because he really liked to read, but partly to make himself look less pathetic for dining alone.
Since the epic implosion of hismarriage six years ago (followed by a divorce two years later making it official), he’d sort of been existing on the fringes of life, only venturing out for work, good food, and the occasional quest for sex. Sadly, even the allure of sex had started to diminish, to the point where he was actually a little worried about his libido.
Intrigued, and trying to be as inconspicuous as possible, Malcom slowly glanced around in the direction the voice had come from, and knew he’d struck gold when he spotted a woman replying.
“The mattresses? Oh, I get it.The Godfather.”
He took in her pretty features, caramel-colored hair and brown eyes, then shifted his gaze over to her companion—the one who’d started all this—and froze, feeling like he’d been punched in the balls.
He couldn’t believe his fucking eyes.
The owner of the rich, smoky voice was stunning, with a mass of burnished, copper-red hair that glinted under the hanging pendant light over their table. She was wearing a red jumpsuit, of all things, and totally owned it. When she started speaking, his gaze homed in on her mouth.
“I was there when you had to get over David the first time and I wanted to make sure he wasn’t fucking around with you now,” she said and picked up a piece of her shrimp tempura, pointing it at her friend before taking a bite. “So you can stay annoyed with me, and David can staypissedat me, but I don’t regret what I did.” She chewed for a moment. “I do regret getting caught, though.”
The brunette’s expression softened. “Did you actually think you wouldn’t?”
“I didn’t know, to be honest. But when the two of you were going back to bed, I thought I was home free. I was going to just slip out the door and be gone, with no one the wiser. But, unfortunately, I was caught off guard at the end there and blew a clean getaway.”
“Not sure how clean it could’ve been, since my door sounds like a bank vault when it closes.”
“I know, but I was assuming the two of you would be focused on pink fluff sex. Speaking of which, how was that? Sticky?”
Malcom turned slightly toward the two women, now only pretending to read, because their conversation was so much better than his book.Pink fluff sex?
“It was …” The brunette adopted an exaggerated, dreamy expression, then abruptly shut it down with a fierce glare, which was pretty comical since she looked like a genuine sweetheart who wouldn’t be able to intimidate a kitten. “None of your business. That’s how it was.”
“Jeez,” the redhead responded with an amused blandness.
“So?” The brunette speared another bite of sushi with her fork while Malcom covertly continued to watch. “I’m assuming you didn’t think he was fucking around with me?”
“No, I didn’t. The exact opposite, actually.”
“What if you’d thought he had been?”
“I’m not sure. It would’ve been painful, though. And … likely made him sterile.”
At that, Malcom almost laughed out loud, because it was said with such conviction, and seemingly without any internal debate. It also made him want to go right over and introduce himself; he hadn’t felt this strong of a pull toward a woman in so long, it almost felt like the first time.
The brunette leaned forward and said, out of the corner of her mouth (but still just loud enough for Malcom to hear most of it), “There’s a guy off to your left checking you out.”
Assuming his cover had been blown, Malcom quickly looked down at his book and plastered what he hoped was a convincingI’m minding my own businessexpression on his face. Then, to his surprise, he heard the redhead say in a rather disgusted tone, “I know. And he’s totally on the douchebag spectrum. The way, far end, to be exact.”
Malcom blinked at that.Douchebag spectrum?He didn’t know what that was, but he didn’t think he wanted to be on it.
“You think so?” the brunette asked, sounding a little surprised.
“Yes,” the redhead insisted in a low voice, only to add a second later, “Oh, Jesus, here he comes.”
