Forced Proximity (Content Advisory #7)

Chapter 1

One

In my next life, I’m coming back with money and good looks instead of all this sparkling personality bullshit.

—Apollo’s secret thoughts

DRU

“She’s a fat, lazy, ugly bitch, and I’m not looking forward to having kids with her.”

My teeth gritted hard, and I had to grab onto the table’s edge to keep myself from launching myself backward and use my feeble fists on the sack of shit.

I couldn’t believe that I was here, listening in on this, in Washington, DC, of all places.

But I’d gotten into a fight with my sister, again, about her stupid husband-to-be, and I no longer knew what to do.

That was why I was here, listening to this conversation, in the middle of a crowded restaurant that charged three hundred dollars for a six-ounce steak that wasn’t even prime cut.

Luckily, the water was free, and the chips and hot sauce—which were absolute shit because the north didn’t have nothin’ on Texas hot sauce—were somewhat affordable.

I surreptitiously glanced over at the man that was with Eugene and found his eyes on me.

I quickly looked away, my heart in my throat at being caught looking, and cursed myself for being so obvious. If I’d just acted normal, I wouldn’t have looked so suspicious.

I looked back, determined now to make it seem like I hadn’t looked away because I was suspicious.

And again, my gaze caught the man sitting across from Eugene.

This time when our gazes caught, neither one of us looked away.

I’d never in my life seen a man so damn sexy.

He wasn’t a massive guy. More compact and streamline.

He was wearing a three-piece suit, and he wore it very well. It was apparent that he’d had it custom made to fit his body. There wasn’t a single piece that didn’t fit him perfectly.

While I was watching, he leaned forward in his seat and took off his jacket, and my breath caught.

Because what I thought was a sexy man before just turned ten times hotter when he handed the jacket to a man that seemed like he appeared out of nowhere and started to roll up his sleeves.

That’s when I caught sight of the tattoos.

He had them all down the length of one forearm, while the other remained completely bare.

My gaze snagged on the watch, and I shook my head.

Patek Philippe.

I only knew the name brand because Eugene wore one and liked to shove it down my sister’s throat that he could afford one and Daniella couldn’t.

Hell, that watch cost more than I made in a single year as a charge nurse at Dallas Memorial.

I idly wondered if the sexy man with the tattoos, salt and pepper hair, and well-manicured beard shoved his successes in other people’s face like his lunch companion did.

I shifted in my seat and allowed my gaze to snag on the man’s hands.

His hands were rough-looking, letting me know that he wasn’t just a pretty face. He knew how to put in some hard work, too.

“…What is it that I can do for you that you can’t get from anybody else,” sexy silver fox drawled. “You could go to anyone for this bill and they’d gladly join your cause.”

Eugene leaned forward, acting like he was the man’s best friend when he said, “Because you’re new. And everyone likes you. They like that you’re down to earth and caring. You are this bleeding heart of a state representative that stands for all the causes that matter most to the American people.”

He kept talking to Eugene, but he allowed his eyes to roam the length of my body.

“Who are you…”

I looked away quickly, turning my back on the two men so that Eugene wouldn’t see my face and react to my presence.

I didn’t want him to know that I was here.

I needed some concrete proof that he was cheating on Daniella, or she’d never let him go.

I’d spent five hundred bucks on a last-minute ticket here, and I was not wasting that money.

Something had to give, and it needed to be Eugene.

If I just found some dirt on the man, Daniella would come to her senses. Surely.

Because if she didn’t, I’d be spending the rest of my life picking my sister up off the floor as her severe anxiety took over and held her hostage.

I knew how this would go.

Eugene would leave her. Daniella would spiral, and I’d have to deal with her stalking Eugene.

And she would stalk him.

Daniella had a disorder—obsessive love disorder.

When we were kids, it was directed at a couple of boys.

At first, everyone thought it was cute.

Then she started to fight over the boys with the little girls.

It’d only grown from there, and now when she meets a guy she likes, she hyper fixates on them.

Some guys really like it—she makes them the center of her world.

And some guys don’t.

Either way, it was always a bad thing when she obsessed over someone new.

They never worked out—and it was always them breaking up with Daniella.

Daniella would practically smother them with her love, and when they finally decided they needed to breathe, they chose to end it.

Sometimes it ended with them being cordial while Daniella secretly stalked them. And sometimes it ended with them breaking up, cutting ties, and the men moving so far away that Daniella had no choice but to let them go.

She always, always found someone new, though.

Eugene was just the newest man in a long line of men.

He wasn’t the first, and he wouldn’t be the last.

I loved my big sister.

I swear I did.

But she was a lot of work.

From a young age, Daniella had always had trouble being in public places, especially if those public places were with people that she didn’t know.

As time went on, that anxiety grew and she’d allowed it to start controlling her life.

She found solace in finding men that would take care of her and give her whatever she wanted.

Honestly, wanting a man to take care of you wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. However, when you did it in such a co-dependent way, tailoring your life around a man that would one day leave because you asked him where he was ninety-two times in seventeen minutes, it wasn’t a good thing.

And for Daniella, I could literally see the erratic behavior building, and I knew this time, it wouldn’t end with them breaking up.

It would end with a restraining order, which Daniella would certainly break, because Eugene was a powerful man. And though he liked my sister’s utter devotion, one day he would realize that she was just too much.

I couldn’t take it anymore.

It was literally making me sick knowing what was coming.

She’d already quit her job at the apartments where she and I had once lived. Daniella had been the manager there and I lived there at a reduced rate.

And since she’d done it on such bad terms, the owners had decided that they didn’t want anyone with the last name Rossi at their properties, forcing Daniella and me to get out.

For Daniella, it hadn’t necessarily been a super bad thing.

She’d just moved in with Eugene—God help her.

However, for me, I’d had to move into a shitty apartment in the downtown area.

I literally had all of my valuables locked up tight in a storage facility in Plano while the stuff that I didn’t care about was at my apartment.

I wasn’t one hundred percent sure it’d even be there when I got home.

I quickly shifted my hair to cover the tattoo on the back of my neck, allowing my long ponytail to hang straight down the length of my spine.

I wasn’t tall. Wasn’t super in shape. Wasn’t overly attractive.

However, I did have great hair.

It was long and auburn, shone like whiskey fire in the sun, and I never had a bad hair day.

It looked great in a ponytail. Great down. Great in an updo.

“…are you looking at?”

I tensed.

I immediately cursed my stupidity for wearing something that showed off the windchimes on the back of my neck, inked in black and gray.

Normally I tried to keep it covered because those windchimes held a special meaning, and I hated when people asked about them because I then had to lie.

Eugene was one of the men that I lied to, but he’d studied them extensively when he’d walked in on me changing one day and hadn’t told me until I was half naked with him behind me.

At least the rest of what I was wearing wasn’t my normal garb.

I was in all black today, covered from head to toe in long sleeves, long black jeans, and ankle boots that covered the rest of me.

The only thing that was showing was my neck with the scoop-necked top and my hands.

I’d dressed as circumspectly as I could and hadn’t much thought about my neck until just now.

“Nothing,” the deep timbre of the man behind me drawled. “Thought I saw someone I knew.”

“Oh,” Eugene mumbled. “Anyway, can I have your support?”

The waiter stopped by and grimaced at me before saying, “Is there anything else that I can do for you today, Miss?”

I shook my head before whispering, “The check, please.”

“Of course.” He sped away, likely excited that I was leaving and he could get a paying table in my spot and disappeared around a corner.

The two men behind me started talking in low whispers, making it damn near impossible for me to hear, then the man with Eugene stood up and said, “Thanks for the lunch, D.”

“Anytime,” Eugene replied.

There was a slap sound, and then the man gave me a great view of his backside as he casually walked away, his hands tucked into his pockets as he walked out of the room.

The waiter came back with my check, and I handed him a twenty.

“You can keep the change,” I said softly.

He looked like he swallowed a lemon.

I was sure the man was used to getting bookoos for a tip since they charged so much for a freakin’ steak, but he wasn’t going to get that from me today.

I felt slightly bad when he walked away in a huff, but not bad enough to change anything.

“…hey, yeah. I met with Mr. Reins.” Eugene spoke into his cell phone, and I scrambled to hit record on my phone, hoping that he was speaking loud enough for my microphone to catch his voice over the dining room noise.

“He’s eating out of the palm of my hand.

There’s no way that he’s not going to side with us on that bill.

” There was a long pause and then, “Baby, no. I have it handled. You don’t need to come up here at all.

I can handle Mr. Reins. And when the shit hits the fan, there’ll be no more Mr. Golden Boy. ”

There was a lot to unpack with what he’d just said, but all my mind could focus on was the “baby, no.”

Mr. “I never call anyone baby because it’s overused.”

I remembered the one time that he’d accidentally used “baby” with Daniella, and he’d looked sick.

He’d never called her that again, and Daniella had been despondent when he’d told her a few weeks later that he didn’t like using that word and it’d just slipped out with her.

She hadn’t understood why, and now it was making sense.

Because he had another “baby,” and Daniella wasn’t it.

Damn, I sure hoped that I got that on my recording.

That would definitely hammer the point home with my sister.

At least, I hoped.

If that didn’t work, I didn’t think anything would.

The spiral was coming, I just hoped it didn’t reach peak with me anywhere around.

“Yeah, I’m on my way home, baby. I’ll see you soon.”

He stood up and rounded his chair.

I could feel him close, and I wanted to fidget and squirm, but forced myself to hold still.

I didn’t move a single muscle until the asshole was out of the building.

Only then did I make my move.

It was time to follow the lying scumbag.