Chapter Nine
ALICE
Since the day Knox's flowers arrived, Cooper had been the model of good behavior. In the office, he treated me just as always, maybe a shade cooler and more abrupt.
That coolness might have made me worry if he hadn't been at my door every night backing me into my apartment, hauling me against him and fucking me until I could barely walk. In the mornings he set the alarm early and woke me with his mouth and hands, leaving me limp and breathless.
Cooper said morning sex was better than any cup of coffee. I had to agree. I didn't need caffeine. I was on a Cooper high.
I don’t know if it was all the orgasms or the fulfillment of such a long crush, but two weeks into this thing with Cooper and I was reeling.
He wanted to tell people. I couldn’t get my head around that.
If we told everyone, this wouldn’t be a fling.
It wouldn’t be temporary. I’d never known Cooper to do anything but temporary.
If he’d wanted more with me, he’d had years. Except he hadn’t. Not really.
I’d been married until six months ago, and Cooper—unlike his father—was a man of honor. He’d hated my husband, but he’d respected our marriage. Every time I considered the idea that Cooper might have been interested in me all these years, my brain veered away from the thought.
Wishful thinking, Alice.
This is the man who dated an Oscar winner. Who dumped a pop star because she was too high-maintenance. After those two relationships, Cooper had sworn off women he met through his work. He seemed to have sworn off relationships entirely in the past few years. Why would I be any different?
I trusted Cooper when he said this thing between us wouldn’t affect our jobs. The way he’d acted at work this week proved he could compartmentalize. He’d be fine when it ended.
And it would end. I had to keep reminding myself of that.
One day, probably far sooner than I wanted, Cooper would move on. My brain veered away from that thought, too. It had to, defense against the fractures in my heart every time I thought about the day Cooper would leave my bed—and me—behind.
Until then, I was going to enjoy every minute, every second, that I could get.
This was temporary, and no matter how much Cooper pushed, it was going to stay a secret.
I wasn’t going to sit at that desk every day knowing everyone pitied me.
Sad-sack Alice, who hooked up with the boss and ended up dumped, just like every other woman who’d spun dreams of landing Cooper Sinclair. At least I’d be in good company.
I wouldn’t be an object of pity. If we told everyone we were together, I’d have to leave the company when Cooper moved on. I loved my job. I didn’t want to leave.
I never bothered to consider that I’d end things before Cooper. I’d told him the truth. I’d never had sex like that in my life. I’m not a fool. The thing between Cooper and me? That wasn’t about his skills in bed, it was about Cooper.
There would be someone after him. I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life alone, but no one would ever be the same.
There was only one Cooper Sinclair. I was going to keep him as long as I could.
Maybe, just maybe, if we could keep playing it cool at work, I could keep him long enough to get over my crush.
Fat chance, I thought, trying to focus on the order form in front of me. I could have millennia and I wouldn’t get over my crush on Cooper Sinclair. Still, crush or not, there was work to be done. On top of their normally heavy caseload, the guys had the situation with Maxwell to deal with.
Knox was back from New Hampshire, and the brothers had been holed up for two days hammering out a plan to present to Special Agent Holley.
Eventually, someone would run Maxwell to ground.
Despite everything he’d done, no one wanted that person to be Andrei Tsepov.
If Tsepov found Maxwell first, Maxwell Sinclair would end up dead.
Maxwell's boys might be furious with him, but they'd prefer a living father on whom to vent their rage.
Cooper had confided that they'd all agreed their best chance to keep their dad alive was to work with Agent Holley, even if that meant their father would end up in jail. At least in jail, he’d be alive.
In honor of the FBI's visit, I dressed more conservatively than usual in a navy-blue dress with matching navy crinoline beneath. The boat neck of the dress showed my collarbone and little else, dropping into long sleeves tight at the wrist.
When Cooper strode to the front of the office to greet Agent Holley, I wasn't surprised to see we matched, his navy-blue suit the perfect foil for those icy eyes. His glance flicked over me. I was the only one who saw the message in those frozen depths. Later, he promised.
I hoped no one else could read him. Griffen had given me a few long looks since the day with the flowers but hadn't said a word.
Agent Holley was joined by two agents I didn’t recognize. I gave them all a cool smile. “Refreshments are in the main conference room. Let me know if you need anything.”
Cooper nodded in thanks and turned down the hall, the agents I didn't know tight on his heels. Agent Holley stopped at the desk and gave me a considering look. “You doing okay, Alice?”
My eyes slid away from his before I dragged them back and forced a smile. “I'm okay.” It was the truth, kind of.
Another long look. “If that changes, make sure you have Cooper set you up with someone to talk to.”
“I will. I promise.”
With another nod, Agent Holley made his way to the conference room. He'd been here before, didn't need me to lead him, so I sat at my desk and watched him go.
I hadn't lied. I was doing okay, only waking in the night here and there with flashes of memory. The gun jerking in my hand. Tsepov's man raising his own. In my nightmares, he loomed closer and closer, my own weapon awkward and heavy.
In reality, I’d raised my gun and fired smoothly, as if I did it every day.
Cooper had a point about muscle memory. He made all of us train as if we’d have to fire that gun at any moment.
I always thought it was overkill for the support staff, but it was a part of my job so I did it without complaint.
Now I understood why. He drilled me so many times a part of my brain I never acknowledged saw the threat and handled it before I could process. Those drills had saved my life. Saved Adam’s life. In my dreams, those drills had done nothing. When I slept, I remembered being a disaster with the gun.
Over and over, I saw Tsepov's man, saw the gun in his hand, and I was slow. Too slow. In my dreams, I couldn't get my weapon up in time. It was too heavy, my fingers sweaty. Clumsy.
In my dreams, I didn't get hit from something falling in the explosion. In my dreams, I took a bullet to the chest, and I died. In my dreams, I didn't save Adam's life. In my dreams, everything went to hell.
I hadn't told Cooper yet. I would if they didn't go away. However bad the dreams were, they must have been quiet because he never woke, never knew how often that scene replayed in my mind with a different ending.
I'm not stupid. I’ve set up enough appointments for our own people after a job went sideways to know none of us should handle this stuff on our own.
Counseling was mandatory when there was loss of life on a job.
I wasn’t an exception, but since I made the appointments, it was easy to slip through the cracks.
Things were just so busy in the office. I'd deal with it. I would. Once everything calmed down. Anyway, the dreams would probably go away by the time that happened.
Agent Holley had been through the scene and all the evidence. He’d assured me I’d acted in self-defense. Cooper had told me I'd done the right thing. I knew I'd done the right thing.
What was there to stress about?
Nothing, that's what.
The office was unnaturally quiet as Cooper and his brothers hashed things out with the FBI. They had no interest in trying to get their father off the hook. Maxwell had caused too much damage to too many lives. The Sinclair brothers had honor. They understood justice.
That said, there are layers to guilt once you hit the legal system. Maxwell had access to information the FBI could use to take down the Tsepov organization.
No one was in that conference room arguing in favor of Maxwell's innocence, but there was room to negotiate once they'd all agreed he was guilty as hell.
My heart hurt for Cooper. For all of them.
Maxwell was an asshole. I'd known Maxwell was an asshole when he hired me, propositioning me pretty much the second I accepted the job despite knowing that I was married.
My husband had been the one who'd sent me Maxwell's way, the two friendly through some connection that had disappeared in the mists of time.
I’d turned him down firmly, expecting the job offer to be withdrawn, but he'd simply sneered and said he'd see me Monday. That was the first asshole move I'd witnessed, and it wouldn't be the last. Not by a long shot.
I didn't like Lacey Sinclair, but I felt for any woman who’d tied her life to Maxwell. I’d paid too many hotel bills with itemized lists of champagne and pornography, seen too many charges at lingerie stores I knew Lacey would never patronize.
Maxwell cheated on her flagrantly and often. If he didn't bother to hide it from me, I doubted he bothered to hide it from his wife. She was a bitch, but no woman deserves that.
My own parents had been married since their early twenties, and while they might bicker occasionally, I still turned the corner and caught them making out like teenagers.
They backed each other up, presenting a united front to the world.
Sometimes I marveled at the men the Sinclair brothers had grown into, knowing their parents as well as I did.
As if my mind had conjured her up, Lacey Sinclair pulled open the door to the office.
Crap. I’d planned for everything this morning—except for Lacey Sinclair.