Page 124 of Enigma: The Complete Collection
I don’t have the heart to tell her I hate anything associated with pumpkin. Pumpkin is disgusting. Even with a whole heap of sugar and a super sweet pastry, I refuse to eat it, but even if she presented me a chocolate pie with a pile of whipped cream, I still wouldn’t eat it. My stomach is too twisted up about the anxious expression on Harlow’s beautiful face to handle food.
I curl my hand over Harlow’s clenched fist. “Do you want me to talk to Cormack again?”
I was hoping Cormack had taken Hugo’s advice and patched things up with Harlow, but from the expression on her face, I’m going to assume he hasn’t.
The pressure on my chest weakens when Harlow smiles. “No, we're good, but thank you for offering.” Her smile enlarges to a full-size grin. “The makeup sex was great, so I should probably thank you.”
Our giggles are more noticeable since the bakery is near empty. After blowing on my coffee to cool down its scorching heat, I take a swig. “So, what’s with the odd expression on your face? You look…” I stop talking, giving my eyes time to study the look marring her face. “… scared?”
Harlow is as shocked by my admission as I am. She’s a tough cookie. She handled the Tatiana incident with dignified composure and handles irate customers daily. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her rattled.
Hold on, yes, I have. She was skittish when we first arrived at the McGregor residence. Before I can ask if the incidents are linked, Harlow confirms it. “Did you know Clara is now living in Ravenshoe?”
Ignoring the tension in my belly, I shake my head. “But I didn’t have a clue where she lived.”
After swallowing a mouthful of sweetened black coffee, Harlow’s eyes meet mine. “She was residing in New York but moved to Ravenshoe permanently the weekend following our trip to the McGregor residence. She's living in a fancy building on Hyde Place.”
My heart stops beating. It could be a coincidence, but Isaac’sfuck padis in Hyde Place. Before I can work through my confusion, Harlow continues, “Do you remember me begging you not to leave me alone when you first woke up from your famous wine and Xanax blackout concoction?”
I jerk up my chin. “Yep. I just recalled that it was the first time I’d seen you rattled.”
Harlow rolls her eyes. “That was because of Clara. She doesn’t like me very much.”
“Is she creating trouble between you and Cormack?”
Her lips thin. “I can’t one hundred percent testify to that, but I’m reasonably sure she's narking in his ear at every available opportunity.” Her eyes lift and lock with mine. “The billionaire and the baker isn’t a story she wants plotted out.”
I make apfftnoise with my lips. “Then she's an idiot. Thousands of readers would gobble up a story like that. She just doesn't understand modern-day fairy tales.” Leaning over the table, I re-clutch Harlow’s hand in mine. “Give as good as you're getting, Harlow.”
She arches her brow. “That goes for the both of us, Kettle.”
“Yes, it does,” I agree with a nod. “And from here on out, I’m going to do precisely that.”
CHAPTER13
ISAAC
“That doesn’t look like the face of a traitor.”
I close my laptop screen, which is displaying an image of Isabelle leaning against my office door. In the photo, her teeth have caught her bottom lip, and her eyes are snapped shut as she battles not to let tears spill down her ashen face. The hurt projected in her beautiful chocolate eyes when I insulted her cut through me like a knife, so I’ve been torturing myself the past hour by watching the surveillance video of the incident over and over again. It only made me more confused. If she were paid to sleep with me, why did she react to my taunt?
“What Hugo told you is true, Isaac. If you wait too long—”
My vicious glare halts any further relationship advice Hunter is planning to give. “If you still want to be employed by the end of the day, keep your thoughts to yourself.”
Hunter, my head of security, pops his shoulder onto the doorjamb of my office. As he authenticates my threat, he scrubs his hand over the scraggly beard covering his jawline. His dark blond hair is pulled back into a low-riding man bun, and his tattoo collection is barely concealed by the checked shirt he’s wearing rolled up at the sleeves. He has what could be termed a rough-and-rugged appearance.
When I interviewed him for a position within my empire, I initially judged him on his outer facade instead of his impressive security capabilities. He soon proved his worth when he hacked into my supposedly unhackable security system to siphon my bank account of two million dollars. He was so brazen, he did it in front of me. I fired my head of security the day he joined my team. That was a little over four years ago.
“Was that Isabelle?”
Hunter pushes off the wall to stride into my office, his hurried pace slackening when my narrowed eyes land on him. “Yes, but if the search you completed on her had been more thorough, you’d be aware of that.”
Hunter dares to smirk. “I stand by my search—”
“Then, obviously, I need a new head of security.”
“When you find the guy who hid her information so deep not even I could find it, I’ll hire him myself as my replacement.” His tone relays the truth in his bold statement.
