Page 1 of Heated
CHAPTER ONE
ZORA
“Well, aren’t you the brave soul today.”
I glance up from my study of the ad layout for my company’s latest planned social media blitz to look at my brother. As usual my older twin by two minutes is impeccably dressed in one of his gorgeous, immaculate three-piece suits. I don’t know. Tom Ford, maybe? Honestly? I can’t tell a Tom Ford from a Tim Gunn, but Leviticus—Levi, for short—Nelson makes it work.
Oooh. See what I did there?
“I’m brave every day. I work with family, don’t I?” I switch my attention back to my monitor.
Hmm. The colors are vivid and eye catching, but the image of the couple standing back to back, arms crossed, doesn’t exactly fit the brand and mission statement of our company.
Yes, Breaking Up, Reversing Nuptials & Evading Disasters—BURNED Inc., for short—is a full-service breakup company, but we’re all about aiding people in a hopefully peaceful, drama-free termination of their relationships. Whether it’s with a text or video. Or a quiet dinner. Or even a singing telegram—yes, a singing telegram. We’ve done it all. Don’t judge. At BURNED, we’re about what the client needs, andwe want to prevent them ending up in a relationship that resembles the Battle of Antietam.
Look. I might not recognize a Tom Ford suit, but when you have a high school social studies teacher who’s obsessed with the Civil War for a mother, you tend to pick up a few facts. Such as the Anaconda Plan, Mary Lincoln was a swindler, the North got its ass kicked at Bull Run, and Abraham Lincoln wasnota vampire hunter.
And when you have a Civil War–obsessed social studies teacher mother and a Bible-thumping sports-apparel-store-owner father who spent your entire child- and adulthood fighting over everything from the power bill to whether pork isreallythe other white meat, you and your siblings open up your own breakup-service company.
Some might say Levi, Miriam, and I have mommy and daddy issues. And there’s probably some truth to that. But if so, we’ve constructively addressed them by taking the war zone we grew up in and turning it into someone else’s Switzerland.
Much more lucrative than therapy.
“Brave or insane,” he mutters, sliding his hands into his pants pockets and exposing his pinstripe dark-blue vest and flat abs. I try not to glare at them. But seriously, we’re twins. Not even one small belly roll to even things up? So unfair. “Even after three years I’m still trying to figure that one out.”
“You’re still here.” I stop wishing a glazed-donut curse on him long enough to drag my attention back up to meet the long-lashed dark-brown eyes I greet every time I glance into the mirror. “Why? What’s this about?” I fall back in my chair and draw a figure eight in the air, encompassing his tall frame. “You never make casual visits.”
My brother, God love him, doesn’t ... people. The story goes he came out my mom’s vajayjay giving the doctor his ass. And that attitude hasn’t changed at all in our thirty years.
I, on the other hand, emerged headfirst, following the birth rules, offering the doc and Mom no trouble. Again, setting the stage for our lifelong roles.
Levi glances over his shoulder, frowning at my closed office door. “I know, and believe me—I don’t want to be here. I have more important things waiting on my desk.” Ah. My brother, the charmer. How a real, breathing woman let this curmudgeon’s penis anywhere near her vagina will forever be a mystery to me. “But on my way to drop off an outgoing package to Deanna, I passed by Dani’s cubicle ... and saw Miriam there.”
“Oh shit.”
A dark eyebrow climbs halfway up his forehead, and if Levi wasn’t the human equivalent ofStar Trek’s Data, I’d say that one gesture contains a whole lot of smug “I told your ass so.” But that can’t be so because this is Levi, the emotional mushroom.
“Exactly. Especially since I overheard alarming phrases such as ‘Not dirty enough,’ ‘Start from scratch,’ and my personal favorite, ‘Money is no object.’”
For the love of ...
He’s the chief financial officer of BURNED and a man who makes ol’ tightwad Scrooge look like Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter, so those last four words probably have him breaking out in vicious hives beneath his three-thousand-dollar suit. But hell, I’m not even in need of a late-night visitation by three spirits in order to save my immortal soul like Levi—that situation’s not looking too good, by the way—and I’m cringing.
Our younger sister, Miriam, is—in a word—brilliant. And I’m not just casually throwing that word out there. It’s true. She graduated from high school at fifteen, entered college at sixteen, and graduated five years later with a BA in graphic design with a double minor in marketing and contemporary women’s rights and also a master’s in graphic illustration. So yes, brilliant. But what’s the saying? There’s a fine line between genius and madness? I’m not saying my sister’s crazy, but ... let me put it this way. If the CIA raids our building and uncovers a secret laboratory in the basement where a mastermind has invented a chip for a global hivemind, well ... I’m not going down for my sister. Natural curls like mine don’t fare well in prison.
“It’s your day to babysit her,” I accuse, stopping just short of jabbing a finger at him. I do narrow my eyes on him, and he’d better thank God, Allah, Buddha, and Zeus ’n’ ’em that I don’t have heat vision, or he would be an unrecognizable lump right now.
“No.” Levi raises an eyebrow. “It’s Tuesday. It’syourday.”
“Shit.” Itismy day.
Again, no verbal “I told your ass so,” but the room rings with it like the Ebenezer First Baptist Church’s choir on Easter Sunday.
“Right now, Miriam’s with our marketing department, single-handedly dismembering our ad campaign so it looks less ‘How can we be of service to you at this vulnerable and difficult period in your life?’ and more ‘Reverse cowgirl is my favorite hashtag on Pornhub.’”
“One.” I pop up a finger. “Never in life sayreverse cowgirlorPornhubto me again. Two.” I add another finger. “Since Dani is the only marketing personnel we have, technically, I don’t think she can be considered a department. And three.” Yet another finger. “Why in the world didn’t you stop her right then? God knows what havoc she’s wreaked in the”—I turn over my wrist, glancing down at my watch—“ten minutes you’ve been in here lollygagging.”
His chin snaps back toward his neck. “Excuse you. I’ve neverlollygaggeda day in my life.” Wow. That’s what he took away from all three very valid points. “And like I said, it’syourday. So I came to you. Handle her.”
