Chapter 13 #2
Ronan whistled to himself. With everything Cross had to manage at once, that something so relatively small hadn’t escaped his attention was, frankly, very impressive. Ronan was reminded that his cher’s brother was not a man to be underestimated or trifled with.
Gail thrust one of the glasses toward him. “Here, take your drink and let me see that.”
Ignoring her, Teller kept reading. “It says that going to the Vidal Hotel voided the agreement. What the hell? I don’t remember anything like that.”
“Give it here,” she said again.
“And I can’t discuss it publicly, because if I do, I owe him money!”
She sighed heavily. “Take a drink. Relax.”
“Relax?” Teller snapped, crushing the papers in his fist. “Vidal isn’t going to distribute my demos! I told you it was a stupid idea to go to the hotel! You wouldn’t fucking listen. You just had to see if you could get Ireland to show up, and now the whole idiotic plan was a total waste!”
Tapping her foot, Gail flashed him a contradictory bright smile. “It was a brilliant plan. It worked, didn’t it? And I told you to stay home, babe, but you insisted on coming along.”
“Because I know you, Gail.” His eyes were bright with anger. “Keeping you out of trouble is a goddamned full-time job! And you never told me there were conditions on where I could go, or I never would’ve signed that damned agreement.”
Gail set his drink on the edge of the stage and took a long swallow of her own.
Teller shook his head. “This whole thing was your idea, and now you’ve fucked it all up.”
“I can fix it, baby,” she said calmly. “But not if I don’t know what’s in that letter.”
“It’s not a letter! It’s some legal bullshit.” Teller crouched again, bringing himself nearly to eye level with her. “You apparently didn’t read or understand the agreement, so what good would reading this breach crap do?”
Gail’s foot started tapping again, but her tone remained sweet and cajoling.
“You didn’t think you’d ever even be in a room with Gideon Cross, let alone force him to do what we want, but I made it happen, didn’t I?
And I’m not the one who screwed this up.
That bitch must’ve gone crying to her brother after she saw us together. How else would he know?”
Claudette leaned closer again. “I think we should get out of here.”
“But it’s just getting interesting,” Ronan drawled. Anger was beginning to sizzle in his blood and he let it, his mind taking the various pieces of information he had to form a much larger picture.
“She wouldn’t have seen us together if you hadn’t insisted on rubbing it in!” Teller threw the papers at Gail’s chest.
Gail caught them with her free hand. “She borrowed my man for weeks. Do you know how it felt, waiting around, knowing you were giving it to her instead of me?”
“You told me to fuck her!” He stood again and hopped off the stage.
“Don’t act like you didn’t like it. And you should appreciate what I’m willing to do to see you make it big. I doubt you’d let some rich dick plow me for weeks to make me famous.”
“Whatever.” Teller grabbed his drink and tossed it back, his throat gulping the liquid until it was gone. “You want me to make it, so I’ll be your rich dick.”
Gail sidled up to him, pressing her body against his. “I want you to make it because you’re gorgeous and talented and deserve to be a star. And this isn’t over. I have other things in the works, I told you that.”
Teller gave her a nasty smile. “But you won’t tell me what, so you’re probably full of shit.”
Pushing her drink into his hand, Gail reached between them and rubbed his crotch with her palm. “You’ll see.”
Claudette made a faint gagging sound and stood. “We’re leaving, Ronan. Now!”
Looking up at his sister, Ronan saw her tight face and thinned lips, and got up. “Bon. I’ve seen enough.”
He stepped back to let her pass him, then followed her. As they reached the doorway, Gail turned her head and caught sight of him, her coaxing smile for Teller turning into startled recognition. Ronan set his hand on Claudy’s back and urged her to a quicker pace.
“Hey!”
They exited out to the muggy, oppressive late-afternoon heat. Claudette stepped to the curb, searching the one-way street for a cab.
“You!” Gail’s voice called out behind him.
He glanced at her. She and Teller had spent their time in Jazzie’s taking selfies and scrolling through their phones, with hardly a glance at the stage. He hadn’t expected that they might recognize or remember him. “Are you talking to me?” he drawled.
Pedestrians were thick on the sidewalk, moving in a steady surge between where he stood at the curb and Gail’s position just outside the bar.
She gave him a wide smile, her eyes twinkling in an odd and slightly off-putting way. The papers were still in her hand, rolled into a cylinder. She used them to point at him. “You work at Vidal Records.”
Ronan’s brows rose. “I think you have me confused with someone else.”
“Oh, no. I’m not confused.” She muscled her way through the stream of walkers to reach him. “I’ve seen you going in and out of there.”
Tension slipped into his muscles as he looked down at her. “Is that so?”
Claudette touched his shoulder. “Is there a problem?”
Gail grinned at Claudy in a way that had Ronan stretching out his arm to urge his sister behind him.
Teller stuck his head out of the glass-inset entrance door. “What the fuck are you doing, Gail?”
“Give me a minute, babe,” she told him over her shoulder, her attention and smile still directed at Ronan. “Finish setting up. I’ll be there in a minute.”
Teller pulled the door open wider. “Is this guy fucking with you?”
“No. I like his sister’s dress, that’s all.” Gail spared a quick glance at her man. “Don’t be late getting started. I’ll be right in.”
The growing sense of unease Ronan felt raised the hairs on his nape. The woman knew far more than he could explain.
Cursing, Teller stepped back inside.
“Did you come to watch Graham get served?” Gail asked, too amiably. “You should stay for his set. See what you’re missing.”
“And you should find less risky games to play with far less dangerous people.”
Her laugh was so delighted that it chilled him despite the heat.
She was so small in stature that he loomed over her, making any thought of her as a threat impossible for him to even consider.
And yet the contradiction between her easygoing, friendly tone of voice and the nastiness in her gaze was so defined that it reminded him of the most vicious prisoners he’d been caged with.
“How’s Ireland, by the way?” she queried with a tilt of her head. “I bet she’s banged up pretty good.”
Ronan took a bold step toward her. “There’s not a scratch on her. But you’ll have to take my word for it because if I see you anywhere near her, you’ll be dealing with me.”
She laughed so loudly that it drew attention. “You think you’re scarier than Gideon Cross? I guess we’ll see.”
Claudette grabbed his elbow. “We’ve got a cab. Let’s go.”
Gail started backing up, heedless of the people she bumped into. “And I know you’re lying, Ronan.”
“Allons!” Claudy ordered tersely.
Ronan allowed his sister to pull him to the curb and then into the taxi but kept his gaze on Gail—and Teller through the window—until they’d driven far enough away that the couple was no longer in view.
“You’re deliberately looking for tracas!” Claudette muttered.
He pulled out his phone and called Ireland.
“Hey,” she answered, sounding groggy.
“I’m sorry. Did I wake you?”
“No. I took a nap earlier, and it’s lingering. You know how that is?”
“I do, yes. I’m in a taxi now.” It frustrated him that they were moving at a crawl, locked in growing traffic in one of the densest parts of the city.
He knew that for the next half hour to an hour, they’d either be stuck at a light or waiting for a flood of pedestrians to cross a street.
“I’ll be dropping Claudette off at Valentin and Genevieve’s first, then I’ll be on my way to you. ”
“Okay.” She yawned. “You won’t have to cook after all. My sister-in-law brought over a casserole. Just have to heat it up.”
“Bon. Do you have a way to contact the detectives, cher?”
“Yeah. I’ve got their numbers. Why?”
Ronan’s knee bounced with impatience and aggravation. “I’ll tell you when I get there.”
Ronan exited the elevator into Ireland’s apartment vestibule, bristling with impatience.
He was damned near desperate to see his cher even if she was still angry with him.
He deserved her wrath. Not for taunting her father—he was owed at least that small pleasure—but for using the passion they shared between them to do it.
The way Ireland made him feel when they made love was too vital to have cheapened it as he had.
He’d texted her as the taxi had pulled up to the curb, warning her that he was coming so that she wouldn’t be frightened again.
He was now hyperalert to her fragility and determined to do nothing that would distress her.
He’d spent some time with the representative from the security agency discussing the known trauma that kidnapping victims dealt with in the aftermath.
It left him shaken and deeply concerned.
While the extra security at Vidal had been quickly executed, it would take a bit longer to build a personal team around Ireland.
It was vital that she meet with proposed candidates and ensure there was a rapport between them.
He was relieved to have learned that the agency used by Vidal had been originally hired by Cross and that the operatives were all highly trained former military or intelligence veterans.
The cost was eye-watering but certainly within his means, and Ronan accepted without question that if he wanted to share his personal life with a woman like Ireland Vidal, the expense was necessary.