Then I head into my home office, leaving Skye to wait for Christopher.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
I’m restless the remainder of the night. I didn’t lie to Skye when I said I had work to do. I always have work to do. But it wasn’t because of cutting my trip short. I delegated that work, and the team in Manhattan will get the job done. If Foster McCain is a problem, I’ll go back, but I have full faith in Dimitri to handle it.
I fire up the computer and sit down to go over tomorrow’s agenda when my phone buzzes.
It’s my brother.
“Yeah?” I say into the phone.
“Good evening to you, too,” Ben says.
“Sorry. It’s late. What’s up?”
“It’s nine thirty, Braden. You’re always up until midnight, and you rise at six a.m.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry.” I shouldn’t be short with Ben. None of this is his fault. It’s not like he waved some wizard’s wand and hurled Skye Manning into my life to throw it into chaos.
“So hey,” he says, “I just got a call from Stamos in Manhattan.”
“And…?”
“Well, once I went outside and convinced myself that pigs weren’t flying and glaciers weren’t rising from hell freezing over—”
“Ha-ha. I assume he told you I came home.”
“Yeah, and he wanted to check with me and make sure it was really what you wanted. To which I replied, ‘How the fuck should I know? This is the first I’m hearing of it.’”
“Sorry, bro. I didn’t mean to leave you out of the loop.”
“So you’re finally delegating, huh? What’s the deal, Bray?”
“And you’re opposed to this why?”
“I didn’t say I was opposed. Hell, I’m the one who’s been after you for years to quit micromanaging everything. But there’s got to be a reason.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Give me a break. For you to do a full one-eighty like this, there’s a reason, and I’m guessing she’s got one hell of a magic pussy.”
Anger slides along the back of my neck. My brother’s not saying anything off-brand, but it irks me that he’s right.
But it’s not Skye’s pussy—though she has a pretty spectacular one. It’s not her sexy lips or her great rack. It’s not her gorgeous brown eyes. It’s not her talent or her intelligence. It’s not anything specific about her.
It’s more about me and my reaction to her. My feelings for her—how she’s crawled under my skin, challenging my body and my mind.
“It’s Addison Ames’s assistant, isn’t it?” Ben says.
“She has a name,” I say. “It’s Skye.”
“Interesting that you’re not denying it.”
Why bother? My brother knows me as well as anyone. No one knows the real Braden Black. I’m not even sure I do sometimes. But Ben knows me pretty well. We’ve been brothers for thirty-three years, and he was with me the night the whole Addison Ames thing started.
“No,” I say succinctly. “I’m not denying it.”
“Then you should know I had dinner with Apple tonight.”
“For fuck’s sake. Didn’t you just fuck her a few days ago?”
“Dinner, Bray. We had dinner tonight. We didn’t fuck. The only reason I bring it up is because she ran off at the mouth about you and Addie’s assistant—”
“Skye,” I say. “Her name is Skye.”
“Christ, okay. Skye. Anyway, apparently Addie’s really freaked out now. Thinks Skye’s after her job or something.”
“That’s not true.”
“Are you sure? How well do you know this woman, Braden?”
Not as well as I’d like to.
Damn.
“Well enough,” I say. “She wants to be a photographer. What do you see in Apple anyway? That black hair of hers is freaky.”
“What can I say?” Ben laughs. “She’s hot. And she’s a good person. She’s not her sister.”
No, she’s not. I need to remember that. Back when all the shit was going down between Addie and me, Ben and Apple were on my side.
“Look,” Ben says. “I think it’s great if you’ve found someone you care about. Really. And if she’s the reason you’re taking a step back and doing some delegating that’s long overdue, I’m all for it. There’s just one thing that concerns me.”
“Yeah? What’s that?”
“You barely know her.”
He’s not wrong. “You’re right.”
“Wow. Should I check the sky again? Will I see flying swine?”
I chuckle at that one. “I know what I’m doing, Ben.”
“Will you take her to the club soon?”
“When she’s ready.”
“I’m happy for you,” Ben says.
“What for?”
“Sounds like you’re falling in love.”
God, those words… “I’m not falling in love. Like you said, I barely know her.”
“That doesn’t always matter. There’s no timetable for love.”
I scoff. “Like you’d know.”
He laughs. “I suppose you got me on that one. All right. I just wanted to check in. Since you’re not in Manhattan, I’ll see you at the office in the morning.”
“I’ll be there.” I end the call and throw my phone on the desk.
My own words haunt me.
I’m not falling in love. Like you said, I barely know her.
It’s not the words so much as the fact that, as I replay them in my mind, their cadence like a snare drum, they seem…off to me.
Off as in I’m not sure I truly mean them.
Then I whisk the thought from my mind and do what I do best when I don’t want to think about something.
I work.
Chapter Forty
I work far into the night and finally hit the sheets at four a.m. I allow myself an extra hour of sleep in the morning, rising at seven instead of six.
I don’t have any appointments anyway. As far as the office knows, I’m still in New York.