Six
Ransom
The door to my office opened without anyone knocking. Looking up to see who it was from the spreadsheet I was trying to figure out, I wasn’t surprised to see Than sauntering in. But really, it could have been any of the guys. None of them thought about knocking first.
He held up a large manila envelope. “This came for you. Ted just dropped it off,” he said, then looked at the back of it. “And it’s sealed.”
The wagging of his eyebrows was annoying.
I knew what it was, and I didn’t want him or any of the others to see it.
I’d hired Ted to do the job for a reason.
He wasn’t family. He was a criminal. The genius kind who hacked into systems all over the world and fucked shit up.
The family had our own guy who did this, but what I had needed wasn’t family business. It was my business.
“Put it on my desk and leave.”
He frowned. “What? Not gonna open it? See what he found?”
Yes, I would once he got his ass out of my office. I might even take it and leave. I didn’t want to be disturbed while I went over it.
“Than, I don’t have time for your shit today.”
“Testy, testy,” he drawled and dropped the envelope on the desk.
I fought the urge to snatch it up. He’d be more curious if I did.
“You haven’t told me how our sis is doing since getting back from DC,” he said, plopping down in one of the chairs across from my desk.
This was on purpose. He was testing me to see just how important the contents of the envelope were.
“She’s Opal. Living her life of politics among the privileged. What do you want to know? Go see her yourself.”
He sighed and stretched out his legs in front of him, crossing them at the ankles. “I want her to meet Montana,” he said. “Thinking of taking her to DC for a visit.”
“You do that,” I said. “But right now, why don’t you go do something? Try working.”
He rolled his eyes. “I’ve been working. All damn day. It’s after three.”
I hadn’t looked at the time in a while. “Then leave, but I have to finish this, and I can’t with you yapping.”
When he straightened, I wanted to sigh in relief but held it in until he stood back up.
“I’m out then. See you at the house. We’re coming to dinner tonight.” We meant him and Montana.
He’d moved out of the house with the rest of us and into a house he had moved onto Carver property so that she’d live with him. I was so fucking confused by that shit, but whatever. He had always been the soft one.
I nodded and stared at the spreadsheet like I knew what the fuck this all meant.
The moment the door closed, I lifted my gaze and stared at it as I listened to his footsteps fade away.
Getting up, I walked over and locked it, then watched the window for him to pass by on his way to his truck.
As soon as he was inside it and pulling out, I went to the envelope and broke the seal to slide out the papers inside.
Although I hadn’t asked Noa about the bastard who had upset her this weekend again, I hadn’t let it go.
It infuriated me that some piece of shit had upset her.
She’d had enough crap in high school—until I got to know her and shut it all down.
Noa might not have a lot going for her in the looks department, but she was kind.
She was fucking funny too. And she was smart. I enjoyed our conversations.
Thinking about her sitting in a small office all day with manuscripts that weren’t hers, editing them all the time, was depressing.
I knew she didn’t have a social life. She’d probably not changed much since high school.
Only gotten more reclusive. When she hadn’t answered my text, I’d been ready to hunt her down and make sure she wasn’t dead in her apartment.
She must have been upset to not text me back and to ignore that many of my texts.
Whatever had been said to her was bad and hurt her enough that she closed herself off.
That shit wasn’t going to happen. I mean, there was someone for everyone.
If she’d get out there and maybe fix herself up a little, she’d find a guy or girl—hell, I wasn’t sure what gender she was into.
I hated thinking of her alone. She deserved companionship.
Someone would be lucky to have her in their life.
Sitting down back at my desk, I put the papers in front of me. Smiling at the face I remembered. It was her senior picture in the yearbook, along with her former address, her mom’s name, no father listed. She never talked about her parents. I was curious now.
It went on to list her full-ride scholarship, which I had known about.
I turned the page to scan through most of the things I already knew until I got to something that wasn’t correct.
Her place of employment. It said she’d graduated from college and moved to New York City to work as a junior editor for Wilson Roe Publishing.
That wasn’t a small publisher. That was a fucking big one.
The same one that was going to publish Opal’s book.
Had Ted made a mistake? He never made fucking mistakes.
Then I stilled as I continued to read. The name of the senior editor she worked for was one I didn’t want to see again, especially on this paper.
It was the same motherfucker. Arden Neilson was her boss.
Why had she lied to me about her job? She’d made it sound like it wasn’t a big deal, but it was.
This was a huge deal. Her office wasn’t some hole-in-the-wall somewhere. She was on fucking Fifth Avenue.
When I turned the page, ready to text her ass and demand why she’d lied to me about her career, a photo of Juliette Romeo stared up at me.
Was this her fucking client? I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
I had planned on making a reason to see her again, but if Noa worked with her, which would make sense, then that fucked things up.
Made it weird. Arden was Juliette’s editor, so Noa would also work with her. Or at least know her.
I picked up the picture and stared down at the author headshot I’d already seen online when I googled her, forgetting for a moment that I was trying to find out who had hurt Noa.
Remembering that Juliette wasn’t my concern right now, I set the picture to the side, and I realized there was another photo of her.
But not a posed one. This was taken of her stepping out of the front door of the publishing house.
She was wearing a white sundress that hit at her knees, floating around her upper thighs as the breeze blew it.
Fuck, those tits in this dress were better than at dinner the other night.
But why had Ted given me another picture of her? Where was Noa? This was supposed to be about Noa. I kept getting distracted by images of Juliette.
When I moved that photo aside, there was yet another one of Juliette, but this time, she was laughing with her head thrown back, exposing her smooth, delicate throat as she leaned on some man.
I tore my eyes off her to see who it was she was cuddled up against, and the picture began to tremble as my grip tightened on it.
Arden Neilson. His arm was around her as if she belonged to him.
They hadn’t appeared that way at dinner the other night.
Was this why? They’d dated, and it was over.
Now he was being a complete dick to her.
Slapping the picture down hard, I glared at the papers. Why was there no photo of Noa?
My eyes scanned the new page until it got to the words that sucked the wind right out of my lungs, to the point that they began to burn.
Pen Name: Juliette Romeo
I reread it, then sprang up out of my seat, shoving my fingers into my hair as I stared in horror, confusion—fuck, I didn’t know what I was feeling. But this was wrong. This was messed up.
Ted had gotten some wires crossed. There was no way that Noa was Juliette. There wasn’t a shred of resemblance to the girl I remembered. Not to mention, she’d have said something. I had been right there in front of her.
Grabbing the author headshot of her and the one of Noa’s senior picture, I held them beside each other and studied them.
The idea that the girl with the big-ass duck lips that pooched out over braces and thick glasses with large black frames was the same person as the gorgeous blonde with the killer body seemed impossible.
I knew people grew up, but damn. Narrowing my eyes, I studied the shape of her mouth that awkwardly stuck out due to the braces, then looked at the plump lips that belonged to Juliette.
It was difficult to be sure, but they could possibly be the same.
When I looked at her eyes, it was hard to tell the color through those damn glasses she wore.
I couldn’t remember paying much attention to her eyes back then, but Juliette’s had been impossible to miss.
See, that was another reason this couldn’t be right. I’d have noticed those eyes if Noa had them … I thought. If I’d looked at her that closely. Had I?
I went back to the papers and read over the names of her books, their releases, the dates and stops of her tours, and then turned the page to see articles from magazines, pictures from television spots she’d been on, and the last was her address and phone number.
That number was one I knew. Even if it was saved in my phone under Shakespeare, I’d had it in my phone for over ten years now. I recognized it. Sinking back down slowly, I reached for my phone and pressed Ted’s number.
“Yeah, man.” His voice came over the line.
“Are you sure you didn’t get something twisted up?” I asked.
“About what? Noa Raines?”
“Yes,” I clipped out.
Who the fuck else would I be asking him about?
“Positive. I even did a double-check on shit. I had no idea we had some famous author who had come out of this town. Crazy. And, dayum, talk about a transformation. Fuck, she went from ugl—”
I ended the call, not wanting to listen to whatever he was about to say. He came in handy, and if I killed him for saying something that pissed me off, then Linc would be annoyed.
Pulling up our text thread, I read over our last conversation. Then I scrolled up, looking for clues. My head was reeling, making it hard to focus. How was this possible?
Noa was a friend. Someone I depended on. I needed her text to remind me that shit wasn’t always dark. But the image of her being much like she’d been in high school had made that possible. I wasn’t thinking about her tits or fucking her when we talked. It was platonic, and I enjoyed that.
Juliette was … well, her, I wanted to fuck in many different ways.
“Goddammit!” I snarled.
This messed it up. All of it. I couldn’t fuck her.
It would ruin what we had. But how did I talk to her, text her, and not get hard, thinking about what I wanted to do to her?
She was a female, and if we fucked, then she’d start expecting more.
Which would mess it all up. We’d lose what we had.
This link to someone else outside our day-to-day life that we could talk to when there was no one else we felt we could tell things to.
Wanting to slam my dick into her would hinder that.
Shit!
Picking up the stapler on my desk, I threw it against the wall and let out an angry roar of frustration.
I didn’t want them to be the same person.
The one person who managed to center me and give me a break from the demands in my life wasn’t supposed to be a blazing hot piece of ass.
But she’d turned into one, and … now it was all jacked up.