Chapter 5
“Come on in!” Raven called out, pouring more red wine into the humongous pitcher of sangria. A moment later, Clarissa, Kennedi, Bailey, and Mandy stepped into her kitchen.
“You’re here?” she gasped, hugging Mandy closely. “I can’t believe that you’re here in the states! Don’t you have some important gala you need to attend in Sidrina?” she teased.
Mandy laughed, hugging Raven back. “Zahir is here as well. He’s speaking at some conference. He told me what it was about, but the subject was too tedious for me to absorb. Something about building materials and solar something or other.” As the wife of a powerful sheik, Mandy ran her forensic accounting business from the palace now instead of from her office in downtown Philadelphia. But she traveled to Philly regularly to check in with her staff members. Their reputation for accounting excellence was growing and more clients than ever were vying for her firm’s services.
Raven laughed, then moved to hug Clarissa. “How’s Levi?”
Clarissa smiled. Levi, her husband, was a billionaire who’d had the responsibility of helping Clarissa maneuver her way through the social complexities after inheriting her father’s fortunes. Levi, as well as Mandy, helped to stop her father’s accountants from stealing her inheritance.
“Levi is at the club, bothering Matteo and his brother.”
“Good!” Raven laughed. Turning to Kennedi, she grinned. “Did you bring Declan?”
“Nope! He’s with Sean at the club as well,” Kennedi replied, referring to her son and her husband. They’d met in Georgia when Sean, the bastard son of an Irish earl, had bought up a brewery, unaware of how the purchase would foil the earl’s efforts to expand his sex-trafficking business.
“You’re going to bring him to one of these gatherings soon, right?”
Kennedi shook her head. “Sean doesn’t want Declan to discover all of our secrets before he figures them out.”
Mandy had already moved into the apartment’s family room and started pouring sangria. “He’s a smart man!”
All the ladies laughed, accepting a glass of the potent brew. Bailey accepted her glass while also reaching out to hug Raven. “Matteo is with his brother. They might also be at the club, but I didn’t ask. I rushed out of the house so that he couldn’t…” she waved a hand, blushing and not finishing that sentence.
But all the ladies knew exactly what she hadn’t said and laughed, nodding their heads in agreement.
Raven was silent, her mind flitting back to the kiss yesterday.
As if her mind hadn’t been there already, she mentally grumbled.
“What’s wrong?” Kennedi asked, eyeing Raven speculatively.
Startled, she pulled herself back to the present. “Nothing,” she replied, taking a glass of sangria as well as the plate filled with decadent treats that Clarissa offered her.
“It’s something,” Clarissa replied, her eyes narrowed as she surveyed Raven. “How’s the new project going?”
Raven’s lips compressed and she knew she should just say something along the lines of, “It’s going great!” Or maybe, “There are challenges, but I can figure them out.”
But did she say something benign like that?
Nope!
Instead, the frustration she’d been struggling with over the past twenty-four hours burst out of her. Her hand flew in the air and, thankfully, she wasn’t sitting and could pace around the small family room. “Could one of you ladies please explain men to me?” she exploded. “I mean, yeah, I’m supposed to be the expert on human behavior, but there are some actions that just don’t make sense!”
“Such as?” Clarissa prompted carefully.
Raven missed the elbow nudge from Clarissa to Mandy or the knowing glances from the other ladies.
“Such as why a man might…do something…and then attribute it to an overindulgence on sugar or carbs! Or maybe why some men think that love,” she turned and glared at each of them in turn, “doesn’t exist!” She threw her arm in the air. “And get this! I didn’t know about this interesting concept, but there are men in the world who think that they only need to be married, or in a committed relationship, while children are growing up! Some men,” she emphasized those two words, “think that the only reason to be married is to produce said children and after the offspring are safely ensconced in college, it’s fine to simply end the relationship and go on his merry way!”
“Is there one man in particular spouting this nonsense?” Mandy prompted.
Raven turned to glare at Bailey. “Did you have any idea, when you hired me to find a spouse for your partner, that he had such ridiculous ideas about relationships?”
Bailey blinked. “Tim doesn’t believe in love?” she asked, obviously startled.
“Nope!” Raven replied, adding another arm toss to emphasize her point. “He thinks that love is a fake emotion. That women pretend to be in love in order to justify their,” she rolled her eyes, “sexual urges!”
The other ladies looked astonished, then in unison, they all burst out laughing. “You’re kidding!” Mandy gasped in between laughs.
“Nope! That’s what he told me. He wants children, and is willing to be married, but good grief, do you know how hard it is to find a woman who is as logical as he is, wants children, but accept a marriage with a time limit?”
The other women stared at Raven for a long moment, shaking their heads at such idiocy.
“He just needs to meet the right woman,” Bailey explained as her laughter slowed, then tilted her head slightly. “What about the current round of candidates you set him up with? Didn’t any of them strike his fancy?”
Raven slumped down on the chair, staring at the delicious foods that her friends had brought. “He said that all of them demonstrated what he didn’t want from a future wife.”
Clarissa lifted her glass. “Well, that’s progress, right?”
Raven grimaced. “I suppose so.”
“Was there any spark from the candidates?” Bailey continued. “Any spark at all? Any kiss at the end of the evening?”
Raven thought about the kiss she and Tim had shared yesterday, and then all of those confusing emotions afterwards. “I didn’t ask about any sort of intimacy,” she replied with as much blandness as she could muster under the circumstances.
Obviously, it wasn’t enough because Bailey’s eyes narrowed suspiciously and Mandy watched carefully as Raven tried to change the subject.
Knowing that more questions would be asked, Raven decided that a change in subject was needed. “I think we should toast to our latest book club meeting. It’s so rare that we can all attend together,” she announced, lifting her glass up high. “To the ‘Naughty Ladies Book Club’! We had another successful reading this month, didn’t we?”
There was a round of cheers, but Raven shifted uncomfortably as Bailey took a long sip of her non-alcoholic sangria, resting her hand on her pregnant belly while still watching Raven curiously.
Thankfully, those cheers brought forth the conversation about the book they’d all read and Raven was finally able to relax. She wasn’t able to fully participate in the conversation, since she was still trying to understand yesterday’s kiss, and the man who had kissed her, but at least there weren’t five sets of intelligent, too-knowing gazes on her.
Tim bent down, narrowed his eyes, and…slammed the red ball into the corner pocket of the pool table. Moving to the other side, he considered the angles of the pool balls littered across the green felt, then bent over and did the same to the blue ball. Over and over, he was unrelenting as he and the pool stick became one, shooting each of the balls into the pockets. When all of the solid balls were put away, he started on the striped, needing the distraction to keep himself from thinking about that kiss.
“Care to play a game?” someone asked.
Tim looked up and watched Levi and Zahir walk into the room. “Don’t you have anyone else to harass?” he growled, then bent over and slammed another ball into a pocket.
“Club business is all caught up,” Levi replied, then took a long sip of his beer. “What’s run up your ass and wiggled?”
Tim had just taken aim, but at the ludicrous question, his pool tip skimmed over the white ball, and he completely missed his shot. The white ball moved two inches to the left, mocking him.
Tim stood up and glared at his friend, then looked around. It wasn’t just Levi and Zahir now standing around the pool table. Sean, Matteo, and Antonio were leaning against the wood paneled walls of the pool room, all with interested gazes and a beer or a glass of something stronger in their hands.
“What’s going on?” he demanded, leaning against the pool stick.
Matteo stepped over to the wall that held the pool sticks and selected one. “That’s what we’re trying to find out,” he replied, examining one of the sticks and finding it adequate. “Why are you so agitated?”
Tim glared at his long-time friend. “Nothing.” He grumbled for a moment, starting to gather all the pool balls so he could rack them up for a game. But after picking up two balls, he stood up, abandoning his purpose as he demanded, “What the hell is with women?”
All five men stopped and stared at him, equally confused.
“Could you be more specific?” Levi asked.
Sean chuckled. “Matteo and Bailey hired Raven to find a spouse for our good friend.”
Levi and Zahir shook their heads with sympathy while Antonio looked on with intense confusion. “Why is this such a hardship?” Antonio asked. “I would think that accepting help from someone to find a spouse is a good thing.” He turned back to Tim. “What’s the issue?”
“Women!” he snarled and grabbed more of the balls, loading them into the triangle. “They don’t make sense! They aren’t logical. They all want that stupid ‘love’ thing to make them happy. They want to fall in love and be in love in order to justify…whatever it is that they need to justify.”
“Ye don’t believe in love?” Sean demanded, his Irish accent coming out with his confusion.
“It’s illogical to believe in an emotion that has no basis in reality,” Tim snapped. “Why does anyone need to believe in love in order to justify sex?”
The others stopped and stared, then burst out laughing.
Levi came over and slapped Tim’s shoulder. “What happened, my friend?” he asked.
Tim huffed a bit, then resumed sorting the pool balls. “Nothing happened. I just… I don’t understand why love has to be involved. Why not just decide on a person that you want to have children with and eliminate all of the rest of the messy stuff?”
“Who are you falling in love with?” Matteo prompted.
Tim’s head swiveled towards his business partner and best friend. “I’m not falling in love,” he snapped. “Isn’t that what we’re discussing? I don’t believe in love and I won’t become one of those pathetic men who feigns an emotion that doesn’t exist.”
“For a man who doesn’t believe in love,” Antonio commented, stealing Tim’s pool stick and moving to the other end of the pool table, “you seem almost terrified that it’s happening to you.”
Tim shook his head and walked over to where he’d left his beer. He took a long swallow, only to discover that it was warm. With a grimace, he waved to one of the wait staff. Margaret immediately nodded and left to get him a cold brew.
Tim moved off to lean against the wall, glaring at the pool table. Antonio took the first shot, breaking up the balls. Everyone paused as they watched the balls scatter across the table. Finally, a red ball fell into the upper right corner pocket.
While Levi and Antonio played the game, the other men offered advice on Tim’s issue.
“What makes you disbelieve in love?” Matteo asked.
“As I said, it’s not logical.”
“And yet, I love Bailey with everything inside of me.”
“And I love Declan,” Sean called out. “My feelings for Kennedi are an intense, burning love, but it’s a different kind of feeling than what I feel for my son.”
Tim didn’t respond. Love wasn’t the real issue anyway. It was that kiss. No, it wasn’t the kiss. It was the fact that he wanted to kiss Raven again. But she was completely wrong for him. He wanted something different than what that vixen could offer him. Besides, she was his complete opposite! In every way, they were opposites! There could be no rational future between them.
That thought caught him off-guard. When had he ever considered a future with Raven?
“What’s really going on?” Matteo asked, bending low to take his shot.
Tim considered that question. Then understood. “A marriage, one in which children are created and raised, should be with two people who respect and understand each other.” Okay, maybe he was getting to the crux of the issue. He didn’t understand Raven.
Tim thrived on understanding the world, making the world better and safer, less toxic. Raven…she was a mystery that he couldn’t figure out. She kept confusing him. She was wrong for him in every way that was logical, and yet, he hadn’t given a damn about logic when she’d been in his arms yesterday. In fact, everything about those moments had been completely illogical!
And that bothered him. He wanted, needed, his life to make sense. Everything about his world made sense. And if it didn’t make sense, he would research the problem until he could make sense of the problem. Then it wasn’t a problem any longer.
Raven didn’t fit the boundaries of logic. There wasn’t any way to research her reactions. And yet, he couldn’t seem to dismiss her from his mind!
“You need to talk to her,” Levi advised. “Just tell her what’s on your mind and talk things out. That’s what Clarissa and I do.” He thanked Margaret for the cold beer, then brought it over to Tim. “At first, I didn’t want to have anything to do with her. She was too soft and vulnerable. I grew up with those feelings and didn’t want to deal with them again. But…,” Levi shook his head, laughing at some memory. “Clarissa snuck under my skin. And when she was about to be abused by some unsavory people, I didn’t have a choice. I wasn’t going to let her get hurt.”
“What did you do?” Tim asked, but the merry look in Levi’s eyes warned him that he wasn’t going to like the answer.
“I married her.” He grinned. “And we’ve been taking care of each other ever since.”
Matteo, Sean, and Zahir all nodded, agreeing with Levi’s assessment. Tim glanced over at Antonio and almost laughed at the man’s derision. Obviously, Antonio was of the opposite opinion. A comrade, so to speak.
Tim nodded to the other men. “I’ll take your words under advisement,” he lied.
Zahir snorted. “No, you won’t. You’re going to ignore our advice and flounder, just like we all did.” He turned to Antonio. “And you will as well, I’m guessing.”
“What the hell did I do?” Antonio demanded.
Zahir chuckled. “You’re just as arrogant as the rest of us,” he said, selecting a pool stick from the wall and walking over to the table. He bent over and knocked three balls into pockets, then said, “We don’t go down easy.”
“But when we do fall,” Sean stepped in with a grin, “it’s always amazing.”
Antonio snorted, his dark eyebrows hiding the eye roll slightly. But there was no misunderstanding his disbelief.
Tim huffed a bit, but took a long swallow of his beer, thinking about retreating to the gaming tables. But he was too distracted tonight. He wasn’t in the mood to lose large amounts of money gambling. Still, he couldn’t help wishing that his friends had better advice to offer.
Mike watched from the parking lot, irritation marring his normally bland features. There were too many women there tonight. One or two, he could get rid of easily. But there was a whole bunch of women in that small apartment.
A knock on his window startled him because he hadn’t seen anyone approaching his car.
He was even more startled when he noted the enormous man bending down to peer into his window.
For a brief moment, he considered driving away as fast as possible. But that would cause too much suspicion. Instead, Mike lowered the window a couple of inches and asked, “Can I help you?”
The man peered inside his car. Thankfully, the set of needles Mike used on his victims was hidden under the seat. Even if it were sitting beside him on the passenger seat, the plastic container that housed his precious needles looked benign.
“You’ve been sitting here for fifteen minutes with the engine running. Are you okay?” the man asked.
The guy looked bland enough, but there was a hardness in his gaze that warned Mike that he wasn’t as easy-going as he appeared.
“I’m just waiting for my girlfriend,” Mike lied. He pulled out his cell phone, acting like he was checking the time. “She was supposed to be down here a while ago.” He stuffed his cell phone back into the inner pocket of his suit jacket. “Women, right?” he snorted, hoping he didn’t look nervous.
The man didn’t reply. Instead, he stood up, still carefully watching, and moved away without any acknowledgement.
Mike considered his options. He could sit here and pretend to wait, but now that he looked around, he noticed that there were several other large men that seemed to be watching the parking lot and roads leading into the apartment complex.
Another option was to walk up to a door and knock. But what if someone answered? No, that would look even more suspicious if he knocked on a door and a little old lady answered.
A little old lady? Instantly, he perked up. Wouldn’t it be fun to ply his skills on someone right under the noses of these neanderthals? He almost laughed, then suppressed his excitement. No, he had to be smart about this. He was here to get rid of Raven Markley. She was the only person who knew about him.
A new idea popped into his head. Instead of simply driving away, which would look odd after he’d waited here in the parking lot for so long, he could pretend to talk to his “girlfriend”.
Yeah, that wouldn’t look suspicious, right?
Pulling out his cell phone again, he pretended to peer up at the top floor of one of the garden style apartment buildings. Then he faked a one-sided conversation in which he grew angrier with each passing second. Finally, he pretended to yell and flail his hands, knowing the bulky men were watching. After a few more seconds of this fake conversation, he ended the call and drove out of the parking lot.
A mile away, Mike chuckled at his bit of acting. Later. He’d come back in a day or two to fix his little problem, then he’d head off to…?
Mike considered his options. What city did he want to visit next? Maybe Las Vegas? The idea of Vegas had a great deal of appeal. He could maybe do his thing to several women before he had to move on. The city had so many visitors, it would be easy for one or two, maybe three…to get lost in the shuffle.