Stir (The Sizzle TV Series Book 5)

Chapter 30 – Nic

“Two words: Knife shoes.”

Natalie rolls her eyes. “I will pretend to care about hockey if you want me to, Finn, but really. It’s okay. You don’t have to convince me.”

He’s spent the last ten minutes trying to convince Natalie to watch a hockey game, and while sports have never really been my thing, I have to admit, he makes a compelling argument.

“Knife shoes, Natalie. Highway speeds. On knife shoes.”

“We don’t have to like all the same things,” she points out reasonably.

“It’s not about liking the same things, it’s about you missing out on the greatest sport known to mankind.”

“I’m pretty sure around here that’s considered football.”

“Well, that’s not wrong.”

“So they’re both the greatest sport known to man? How does that work?” she asks, laughter in her eyes.

On it goes. We’re more or less on our lunch break, just waiting for the delivery guy. Their banter keeps me going, even as I keep my head down, trying like hell to finish this brief before the food gets here. Natalie is happier if we eat together, where she can personally witness me finishing a meal.

Which is a weird thing to be turned on by, but here the fuck we are. She takes care of me, of both of us, in a way I’ve never experienced in my adult life. It’s charming and delightful and surprising, and yeah, it turns me on.

The phone rings. Natalie glares up at Finn playfully, holding up her hand to interrupt whatever point he’s trying to make about somebody named Connor McDavid, who is apparently a player second only to Jesus Himself.

“Pendergrass Law,” she says. “Yes, of course. We’ll be right down.”

She hangs up.

“That was the front desk,” she repeats, standing up and grabbing her badge. “They said the delivery guy is downstairs, but he says he’s not allowed upstairs.”

“Since when?” Finn asks.

She shrugs. “Will you cover the phone? I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”

He catches her hand as she walks by, kissing it lavishly. Natalie rolls her eyes again, but her cheeks are flushed pink with pleasure. I could watch them all day.

I could spend the rest of my life watching them.

I shove that thought back into whatever corner of my brain it came from. Too much, too soon, Nic. Of course, I’ve known that about Natalie for over a year now. Somehow, Finn is part of that package.

Too much, too soon. Back off.

My cell phone vibrates from its charger on my desk. Dad.

My stomach sours, all the cheerful thoughts I’d been entertaining about a quiet lunch with my lovers going down the drain.

He’s called a few times over the last couple of weeks. I haven’t bothered to answer. As far as I can tell, there’s nothing left to say.

But he called twice yesterday and left voicemails both times, ordering me to call him back as soon as possible. My mother might be sick, or something equally serious may have happened to somebody else in the family, so this time, I answer.

“Hello?”

“About damned time,” he growls. “You answer your phone when I call you, boy. I won’t tolerate this kind of disrespect. Not from the likes of you.”

There are any number of things he could mean by “the likes of you.” I don’t ask him to clarify.

“Is Mom okay?”

“What?” He sounds legitimately startled. “Your mother is in perfect health. No thanks to you.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“For starters, you have no right, no right whatsoever, to go spouting off half-cocked the way you did at dinner. Do I need to remind you who paid for everything you’ve got, including that ridiculous office you insist on leasing?”

My firm—such as it is—has been in the black since my second year in business, but he’ll never let me forget he fronted me the money for that first year’s lease.

“You will not, under any circumstances, repeat any more of that filthy gossip in front of your mother ever again. Do you understand me?”

“Yes.” I’m frankly surprised he didn’t decide to deliver this lecture in person. But Nicholas Pendergrass Sr. doesn’t do anything without a plan, which means there’s probably another reason for this call. “Anything else? We’re about to go to lunch.”

“We?” The amount of sneering he packs into one syllable is almost impressive. “You wouldn’t be talking about that pretty girl in your office, would you?”

I object immediately, but he doesn’t even acknowledge the interruption, talking right over me.

“Oh, but I’m sure you are. So protective of your little Girl Friday last time I was there. And so offended on your mother’s behalf when all this time you’re just a chip off the old block.” My whole body goes cold.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

He laughs, viciously.

“I’m talking about you using that mall cop you hired to cover up the fact that you’re screwing your secretary,” he says scornfully. “Jesus, Nic. Nobody cares about that kind of thing. Covering it up is unmanly. Get a fucking grip.”

“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

“You and the delicious girl in your office,” he says. “You could have just told me you’d already cornered that lot. I know how it goes. But when you’re finished with her?—”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” I manage to say, my gorge rising.

He laughs again. At me, not with me. “Don’t be such a pussy, Nic.” His voice hardens. “And don’t be a fucking hypocrite, not when there are pictures of you all over the fucking Internet cavorting in public. You don’t get to play the saint, acting like I’ve somehow offended your delicate sensibilities.”

Cavorting in public.“What pictures?”

“Oh, knock it off. You went to that TV network thing a couple of weeks ago. Surely even you could deduce it’s a publicity stunt.”

The Sizzle HQ Ball. Of course. We’d posed for that picture together.

“You don’t get to sit on your goddamn high horse,” he continues. “And I don’t ever want to hear you bringing up such bullshit in front of your mother ever again. Do you understand me?”

I hang up. There’s nothing else to say, and certainly, I’ve heard enough.

How I ever thought my feelings for Natalie—or Finn, for that matter—were anything like my father’s for his various women is beyond me. All the slinking around in the dark, the lies, the subterfuge, the inside jokes with his buddies… it was never about sex for him. It wasn’t even about power, I don’t think. It was about getting away with something.

Natalie and Finn, who they are, what they are to me… it’s none of that. Not the same at all, not even in the same universe.

I’ve been an idiot.

Finn’s been peeking around the corner from the front room since I answered the call. I meet his eyes, letting the full force of everything I’ve just realized, all my feelings show. Damn the consequences.

I’m not hiding anymore. They’re worth it.

“Boss?”

I stand up, circling my desk, eyes never leaving his. So blue, bottomless. All that competence, all that strength. All that, for me and Natalie, if we can keep it.

It’s time to try. No more being afraid. No more hiding.

Finn’s eyes widen as I cup his cheeks in my hands.

“What—”

The kiss tastes like frustration and desire and sweet capitulation. He groans against my lips, and for just a little while, I lose time.

This is what we should be from now on, all three of us together. When Natalie gets back up here, I’m going to tell them so. I don’t ever want to be without them again.

Finn’s expression when I pull away is dazed. It’s a good look on him.

“What was that for?” he asks, a little blurry, touching the corner of his mouth.

I straighten the lapels of his jacket, smoothing the fabric over the leather holster underneath. Weapons don’t turn me on, but knowing Finn’s protecting us turns out to be a kink I didn’t know I had.

“That was for me,” I say. “Where’s Natalie? Shouldn’t she be back by now?”

Finn frowns and checks his watch. “Yeah, she should.”

A call to her cell phone rings straight to voicemail.

“Her purse is still here.”

“And her jacket,” says Finn. “She wasn’t going out, just down to the front desk. Why did you let her go?” Finn glares at me.

“She wasn’t leaving the building.”

Right. We agreed days ago that as long as Natalie stayed in the building, Finn would stay in the office with me.

“Sorry. I’ll go,” I say, grabbing my keys.

“We go together.”

My stomach sinks as soon as the elevator doors open to the ground floor. There’s a fair amount of foot traffic, people coming and going for lunch. Natalie is nowhere in sight.

Finn heads straight for the front desk. I walk the length of the lobby, checking through the enormous windows just in case she’s stepped out on the sidewalk for some reason, but she’s not there.

“Any luck?” I ask, coming to stand next to Finn at the desk. He shakes his head.

“She came down here, but the food delivery guy told her he needed help getting the order out of the truck.”

We share a look.

“That’s not good.”

“No, it is not,” he agrees. “Sam’s checking the camera feeds for the front entrance, just in case.”

In case of what? “Maybe she ran into somebody she knows.”

Surely, we’re overreacting. She’s only been gone a few minutes.

It feels like hours before one of the security guys—Sam, I assume—comes back and says he’s got to get permission before he can show us the footage, but his boss is on his way. More waiting, and I can see Finn’s stress level going up with every minute that passes, heading for the red zone. At length, a burly older man lets himself in behind the desk, picks up a tablet, and starts tapping. He spins it around to show it to us.

“Six cameras outside,” he explains, mercifully brief in his explanation. We use the timestamp from when my father called, since Natalie would have been in the elevator at the time. The screen shows six frames, all views of the sidewalk in front of the building. People milling about, cars parking, pulling away, or just passing by. After just a few seconds, Natalie’s dark head emerges from the front door, following a man in a denim jacket and a black baseball cap.

“There!” Finn points at the frame. The burly man taps the screen as Finn notes the time. Tap, tap, tap.

Helpless and increasingly furious, I watch Natalie talk to the man. She laughs nervously at something he says, then her face just drops, her eyes going wide, her hair flicking back and forth as she looks all around her. They’re on the sidewalk next to a gray SUV.

The man opens the door to the back seat. Natalie bites her lip and starts to shake her head.

“No.” Finn is the one who says it out loud.

The man on the camera leans closer to her and says something. Natalie presses her lips together and nods once, slowly.

She climbs into the back seat.

“No!”

Finn’s already got his phone in hand, dialing 911. “Call your PI,” he orders. “I need a copy of that footage,” he tells the security guys. Then he’s connected to emergency services and reporting a kidnapping.

“His back is to the camera the whole time, but I can tell you what he’s wearing,” says Finn.

“Finn.”

He holds up a finger. I shake my head. He tells the operator to hold on.

“It’s him,” I say. “It’s Barry.”