Page 29 of What Happened Last Night

“Is she? Is that the disrespectful thing?”

He wasn’t going to let this go. I wished I’d never started this conversation, but I was in it now. “She said she’s going to try and snag you,” I quoted, “and that she wants to marry rich.” I left out the get him into bed and the not bad part, because those were just rude.

“Ah.” There was not a flicker of surprise in Will’s reaction. He put the ball back in his desk drawer and closed it. His gaze went to the window.

“Does this happen to you often? Strange women trying to marry you?”

“From time to time. It isn’t because of my charm,” he said, shrugging. Then he turned back to look at me, and I wondered if I imagined the fleeting sadness in his eyes. “Are you hungry? Do you want to go for lunch?”

“That’s it?” I flung my hands up in exasperation. “We’re not going to talk about this anymore? You don’t think that’s weird?”

Will stood up. “I won’t do business with her,” he said. “I wasn’t planning to, anyway. We never advertise at Road Kings shows. I was just hearing her out. I won’t have a drink with her, I won’t date or marry her, she will not get her hands on my fortune, and you have permission to tell her I’m dead.” He came around the desk toward me. “Now can we go for lunch?”

He stopped in front of me, and we looked at each other. Did the few inches of space between us zing with energy, or was that just me? I could feel my pulse in my throat. I had the mental picture of stepping forward, pressing right up against him. How that would feel. How warm he would be.

I forced myself to remember his invitation, and I nodded. “I’m starving,” I admitted.

One of Will’s hands flexed at his side, and then he shoved it hard into his pocket. “How about the deli around the corner?”

“Yes,” I said, because of course yes. We’d have lunch and talk, and I’d savor every minute.

I wasn’t sure this was a crush anymore.

Will hesitated, and I wondered what he was thinking. Probably that his assistant had had a fit of temporary insanity.

“Lunch,” he finally said. “I’m buying.”

“No, I’m buying.”

That made him smile, and somehow the tension broke. The corners of his eyes crinkled in pleasure. He always looked so handsome when he did that, and he did it so rarely.

“Lunch is on you, then,” he said. “Let’s go.”

THIRTEEN

Luna

I rode on my first-ever private plane, accompanying a group of rock stars. It was eight A.M., everyone was sober, and we were only flying to Minneapolis—but it still felt wildly glamorous.

Will and I were accompanying the band for the first two shows, then flying home again while the rest of the crew continued on. I wasn’t a huge concert person—at least, I hadn’t thought I was. But the way the air hummed in the quiet plane, the way everyone—even the veterans of dozens of tours—felt the same subtle keyed-up excitement was impossible not to notice.

I sat next to Will on the spacious, cushy seats, both of us on our laptops. I glanced over at his profile, where he was a picture of concentration. “You’re not excited?” I asked.

He glanced at me with a smile. “This is the best part,” he said. “You’ll see.”

We landed in a blur, checked into the hotel—it was gorgeous—and barely paused to breathe. The band disappeared to do sound check. Will and I grabbed sandwiches, which we ate while he toured the venue, inspecting it and showing me around. We coordinated with the bus company about tomorrow’s departure time and checked in with Brad, who was overseeing a delivery of food for the dressing rooms. Then the venue’s senior manager appeared, shaking Will’s hand and fawning over him so obviously it was hard to watch. It seemed that my boss’s reputation as a rich genius preceded him wherever he went.

When the two men had walked out of earshot, the venue manager talking Will’s ear off, I turned back to Brad to see him shaking his head.

“What?” I asked.

“Sometimes I wouldn’t trade places with him, money or no money,” Brad said.

I looked back at Will. At the hotel, he’d changed into jeans, a long-sleeved tee, and Vans. He’d shoved his hands in his pockets and was blinking politely at the venue manager, who was talking nonstop. His watch glinted on his wrist. His expression gave nothing away.

“He tends to get accosted a lot,” I admitted.

“It’s always money,” Brad said bluntly. “Even backstage at a show, someone’s always angling for money. It would drive me crazy. Normally, I wouldn’t let the money guy come back here at all.”

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