Chapter 22
ADRIANA
Luna knows the second I sit down.
“Oh my God.” She leans across the table at our favorite bistro, her eyes blowing wide. “You slept with him.”
“Hello to you, too.” I casually pick up the menu even though I've been coming here for years and always order the same thing. “How are you? How's work? How's—”
“Don't you dare deflect right now.” She snatches the menu out of my hands and drops it on the table. “I can see it all over your face. You're glowing. You never glow. You have resting CEO face twenty-four-seven.”
I roll my eyes. “I do not have resting CEO face.”
“You absolutely do. It's intimidating as hell, and I love you for it.” She folds her hands on the table like she's about to conduct a deposition. “Now spill everything. I want all the hot and dirty details.”
The waiter approaches and Luna waves him off without breaking eye contact. The poor guy backs away, eyes downcast but she doesn’t even bother to notice.
“There's nothing to spill,” I say, but the heat creeping up the sides of my neck betrays me.
Dammit. All those salacious replays of our night and morning after keep looping through my mind, and Luna raises an eyebrow like she has a front row seat to the show I keep denying happened.
"No, no, hell no, Adriana Maria DiMicheli.
" She only uses my full name when she means business. “You are a horrible liar, so do not even think of holding out on me. I have waited too long for this, and you’re not going to take it away from me by thinking some flip comment is going to stop me from getting what I want.” She gestures at my face with a flourish.
“You've definitely had really good sex, and I want to hear all about it.”
I press my lips together, fighting back the smile that wants to break free. My cheeks ache from the effort and I lose the battle epically.
“I knew it!” Luna slaps the table hard enough to make the silverware rattle and a couple at the next table shoots us dirty looks.
She ignores them completely, practically bouncing out of her chair.
“Finally. I've been waiting for this since the wedding. The tension between you two was so thick I could have sliced it with a freaking butter knife.”
“You’re being dramatic. It wasn't that obvious.”
“It was painfully obvious. Mom even noticed, and she's been so distracted with Dad that she barely notices anything these days.” Luna leans back in her chair, a smug smile on her face. “So? How was it? Give me something to work with here.”
I take a sip of my water, trying to process my thoughts.
How do I even begin to describe what's happening between Lochlan and me?
It's not just sex; although, that part has been incredible.
It's the way he looks at me like I'm the only person in the room.
The way he stands behind me instead of trying to stand in front.
The way he makes me feel like I can actually do this impossible job I've been thrust into.
My chest tightens at the thought of him. At the memory of waking up in his strong arms this morning.
“It was good,” I finally say.
Luna's face falls like an overdone cake. “Good? That's all I get after waiting weeks for this moment? Good?”
“Okay.” I smirk. “It was really good.”
“Adriana, I swear to God, I will reach across this table and throttle you if you don’t tell me. I’m going out of my mind here.”
“Fine.” I glance around to make sure no one is eavesdropping, then lean closer.
“It was incredible. He's incredible. And I don't know what to do with any of it because this whole marriage was supposed to be a business arrangement.
Now I'm feeling things I didn't plan on feeling, and it's terrifying me.”
Luna's jaw drops. “Oh my God,” she murmurs, reaching across the table and squeezing my hand, her fingers warm against mine. “That's not terrifying, Adri. That's falling in love.”
“What? No.” My stomach drops like I've just stepped off a cliff. “I didn't say anything about love.”
“You didn't have to. I can see it written all over your face.” She tilts her head, studying me with knowing eyes that have always seen right through me.
“You've spent your whole life keeping people at arm's length.
Building barricades topped with barbed wire so nobody could scale them.
Making sure no one gets close enough to hurt you.
And now someone's actually breaking through, and you have no idea how to handle it.”
I grit my teeth, hating that she knows me so well. I also love it. Sister relationships are complicated that way.
“But what if it's just the situation?” I ask in a small voice. My throat tightens around the words because I don’t want to say them, but I can’t deny that they’ve been dancing on the top of my mind.
“The forced proximity. The danger. The adrenaline of everything we've been through together. What if none of this is real?”
Luna takes a sip of her water. “What if it is?”
The question hangs between us. But I don't have an answer for her.
Luna squeezes my hand again. “You deserve to be happy, Adri. Even in the middle of all this chaos. Especially in the middle of all this chaos.” She pauses, her eyes searching mine for details I still haven’t given her. “Does he make you happy?”
There’s the million-dollar question.
My mind trips back to waking up in his arms this morning with Reaper cuddled at the foot of the bed.
It was comfortable, relaxed, and yet, my stomach did little backflips the whole time I was wrapped in his arms. My lips lift at our breakfast banter and how he teased me about his culinary skills.
And my God, I’ll never forget how he looked at me after the capo meeting…
like I'd just conquered the entire world. It’s branded into my memory forever.
My heart swells against my ribs.
“Yeah,” I admit. “He really does.”
“Oh, sweetie. I’m so thrilled for you.” Luna's smile could light up the entire restaurant, it’s so wide and bright. “Now stop overthinking everything for once in your life. Just let yourself feel something without analyzing it to death.”
“That's easy for you to say. You're not the one who—”
My phone buzzes where it sits on the table. I glance at the screen and my stomach clenches when I see Jayne's name appear.
“Sorry, I have to take this.” I swipe to answer before Luna can respond. “What's going on?”
“The Henderson Group pulled out of the merger.” Jayne's voice sounds strained, like she's bracing for my reaction. “They're going with Blackwell Consulting instead. And Adriana, there's also someone here waiting to see you. He says it's urgent and he's not leaving until you get here.”
My blood ices at the tension in her tone. “Who is it?”
She pauses and my pulse pounds against my throat. “Eamon Molloy.”
I ball the fingers of my free hand into tight fists. Every muscle in my body goes rigid. The smile fades from Luna’s face and it’s replaced by a look of concern.
“I'll be there in twenty minutes,” I say and hang up without another word.
“What's wrong?” Luna asks, sitting up straighter. “Your face just went from glowy to ghostly.”
I clench the phone in my hand. “I just lost the Henderson account. Forty-million dollars down the drain.” I grab my bag from the back of the chair, my mind already racing through the implications and the press fallout that will inevitably follow.
Colonna Consulting just lost a forty-freaking-million-dollar deal.
That is not going to give my other clients a warm and fuzzy feeling about working with my firm.
And no matter how we spin it, the business world will come up with their own take.
Which will most likely crush my company.
“Oh, and to make matters worse, my father-in-law is camped out at my office demanding to see me.”
“Eamon?” Luna's face darkens, her expression etched with distrust and disgust. “What the hell does he want?”
"Nothing good, I’m sure. That man is pure evil. Selfish, self-centered. A total bastard. But we already knew that, didn’t we?" I stand up and drop some cash on the table to cover the meal we never ordered. “I'm so sorry, Lulu. Raincheck on lunch?”
“Go.” She waves me toward the door. “But call me later. I want to know what that snake is up to.”
I kiss her cheek and rush out of the restaurant. My heart pounds against my ribs the entire way to my car, and by the time I slide behind the wheel, my hands are trembling against the steering wheel.
I make it back to the office quickly enough, but before I head upstairs into whatever shit storm Eamon is about to unleash, I pull out my phone and open my emails.
My shoulders slump against the seat as I stare at the email from Henderson's CEO on my screen. The words blur together as I read them for the third time. “Shifting priorities.” “Better alignment with Blackwell's approach.” “Perhaps we can revisit partnership in the future.”
Corporate speak for “you dropped the ball, and we found someone who wouldn't.”
Six months of negotiations. Countless meetings where I flew across the country to sit in their boardroom and convince them we were the right fit. A deal worth forty-million dollars that would have cemented Colonna Consulting's position as the top strategy firm on the East Coast.
Gone. Poof. Just like that.
My chest aches with a burn of frustration. This is my company. My baby. The thing I built from nothing when everyone told me I'd never make it without my father's money or his connections. I proved them all wrong and built an empire with my bare hands.
And now I'm watching it slip through my fingers because I can't be in two places at once.
I press my fingertips to the sides of my head and take a few deep breaths. In through my nose, out through my mouth. The technique Lochlan taught me after the attack on Moretti's floats through my mind, and I cling to it like a lifeline.
When my heart finally slows, I get out of my car and head up to my office. I step out of the elevator and walk through reception. Jayne pops up out of her chair when she sees me.