Page 75

ADRIAN

“ I have a new employee.” Marisela crossed a leg over a knee, her lips pursed and her eyebrows arched high. As arrogant as she was elegant. Which made it hard to maintain my composure. “Maybe you know her?”

I leaned back in my chair, being sure to keep my posture open while hers remained closed-off. Implying she was hiding something and I was not. “Maybe I do… What’s her name?”

“Emily Shaw. I heard good things. Recruited the girl right out of college.”

“What is it that you want from me, little lamb?” I kept my jaw tight, feigned shock, covering it with blatantly-forced ignorance as I attempted to change the subject. “You know, from one old friend to another?”

The truth was, the girl was exactly where I wanted her to be.

Under Bugs’s watchful eye, within Frankie’s reach, and out of Donnie’s peripheral.

There wasn’t much I could do about Casper.

But he wasn’t interested in Emily anyway.

Just in seeing how worked up he could get everyone else around him.

It kept them all placated, or oblivious, and avoided anarchy amongst the ranks.

For now. Chaos was a given with so many different personalities mixed together in one place.

That wasn’t the only reason I’d tipped my hand at the club, though. I liked this color on Marisela. The jealousy matched her eyes.

“I don’t want anything from you, Dr. Lambert.” She paused a moment, making sure her words hit hard. And stuck. They didn’t because it was just more lies she told herself by telling me. “I’m not here as a friend. I’m here to hire you.”

I tsked my tongue, scooting my chair closer to the desk and bracing myself on my elbows. “You said a favor . Friends get favors. Clients do not.”

“It’s a turn of phrase, pendejo .”

I shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t think it was. I think you need me. At the very least, I think you need my help, don’t you?”

“I don’t need you, Adrian.” She forced out an exaggerated laugh and I leaned back again to get a good look at her.

Her hair was longer, pulled high on her head and hanging down her back, extensions after she regretted her impulsive decision to cut it all off. Her eye makeup dark and her lipstick bright. War paint for a woman who constantly felt at odds with the world around her .

I wondered how long it would take her to realize we were on the same side…

“To need something means to require it. To not be able to function without it.” I pushed up from my chair and took several slow steps around my desk until I was standing in front of her.

“But to want something means it would be nice to have it. Enjoyable even. Want and need are two very different things, you see. For example, I need you, Marisela. But it’s okay for you to want me.

” I held her glare for a long moment, getting off on how it seemed to penetrate me as deeply as any pocket knife.

Maybe deeper. Because the sting didn’t dissipate nearly as fast.

“I think we are well past the English lessons, don’t you, Dr. Lambert ?

” she hissed, but I could see the way she was squirming in her seat.

Crossing and uncrossing her legs as she tried to ease the discomfort building between those plump thighs of hers.

The years had been good to Marisela, made her thicker in all the right places.

I could already picture myself there, buried up to my nose in her cunt. Tasting her, smelling her, wearing her juices like my favorite cologne.

“But there’s still so much I could teach you…” I grinned, dropping it as I reclaimed my desk chair and flipped open my laptop. “Go on, Miss Cruz. Tell me how I can be of service to you.”

She sucked on her teeth before taking a long breath and replying, “I need you to run a paternity test…”

Need. I kept that thought to myself as my eyes dropped to her flat stomach and quickly flicked up again .

“Not for me, idiot,” she grunted. “For Tate. This somehow found its way to my desk.” She removed a crumbled letter from her purse and dropped it on the open space between us.

“Girl claims the kid is his. I want to know if it’s true, what she wants if it is, and how to make it all go away without it hitting the tabloids. ”

“And if it’s not true?” I lifted a curious brow as I snatched up the letter and perused the contents.

“Put the fear of god in your brother, threaten his life, cut off his balls—I don’t care.

Just make sure something like this doesn’t happen again.

” She reached a hand inside her jacket pocket, fumbling around before withdrawing a checkbook.

Then she stood, smoothed out her skirt, and dropped a blank check in front of me. “Your retainer.”

She crossed the room, her palm landing on the door handle before I called out to her and she spun back in my direction.

“Why does it matter to you? If the kid really is his, it’s still a bastard. I’m sure my old man had plenty of them running around. I highly doubt I was the only one.”

She tugged the door open, stepping out into the hallway as she replied over a shoulder. “We had an agreement. That’s why.”

Before Marisela’s seat had the chance to cool in her absence, Bugs came strolling in and plopped down.

He reached out an arm and swiped the blank check off my desk, flicking it twice with his thumb and index finger.

“She does know this is worthless, right? Might as well write guy I paid to kill my husband in the memo section. ”

I shrugged. “Never said anything about killing him.”

“But that’s what you’re going to do, aren’t ya?”

“Dead men don’t have affairs, now do they?” I countered.

“No, I suppose they don’t.” He laughed.