“What did he mean when he said you’re an investment guru?” Josie asks.
“Ladies, if you’ll sit down with me for a few minutes, I’ll explain exactly what my offer is.” Keeping my leather briefcase strategically in front of me, I take a seat. I pull out an envelope and place it on the table.
Luna makes no move to sit.
What I have in mind is riding on Josie, so I slide the envelope towards her. “Your business, including real estate, as well as existing structures, fixtures and chattels, is valued at one point one million dollars. According to records—which are all public, by the way—you owe a total of one million and thirty-five thousand dollars, which gives you an equity of sixty-five thousand dollars, divided in half, more or less. I wasn’t eavesdropping,” –a glare from Luna—“but I did happen to overhear, Josie, that you own fifty-one percent of the business, which would mean that you personally own thirty-three thousand, one hundred and fifty dollars of equity.”
“Um … yes.”
“I’d like to buy out your share for four hundred thousand dollars.”
Josie blinks at me. “What?”
“That’s my offer, but it rides on me retaining the majority share. I’m not willing to negotiate for less.”
“But … that’s far more than it’s worth,” Josie points out.
“Yes.” Which is the only way Luna will ever agree to it, because Josie is desperate and this will solve all—or at least most—of her problems. “I see good potential in this business. I think there’s a lot more you could do with it. You could expand the deck into a destination with a much larger seating area. We could retain the character of the place, spruce it up and build on it. I have a yacht we could offer as a special event charter. There’s a potential to expand the event calendar, too, with big name musicians and so on. I can discuss it with my cousins. I’m sure I can talk them into being our first headline act. If the deal goes ahead, that is.”
“No,” Luna says.
Josie gives her a shocked are-you-crazy glare.
“Josie could consider that offer for forty-nine percent,” Luna continues. “And we’d need to discuss how involved you’d be in the business.”
I meet Luna’s green gaze levelly. She’s fucking heart-breaking. Even sweaty and pink-faced from her work-out she’s stunningly pretty. It’s weirdly painful and hypnotic to look at her. “As I said, the fifty-one percent is non-negotiable.” I anticipated Luna’s hesitation. And I want this deal air tight. It’s not about the money, which I have so much of at this point I can easily afford to pay whatever it takes. So I play my next card. “But you’re right, maybe I’ve bid too low. Let’s make it six hundred thousand for Josie’s fifty-one percent. As far as my involvement goes, I’m planning on spending the next month in Key West.” Am I? Yes. I am. I need to get my fill, and this time it’s going to take longer than one night. That body. That face. Call me a deviant, I don’t care. I want her. She’s lit some kind of fucking bonfire in me that wants to be fed. “After that, I’ll be going back to Chicago.”
I have a fleeting thought that maybe … Luna will want to come with me.
What the fuck are you thinking, you asshole? You don’t sleep with women more than once, remember? You’ll have moved on by the end of the weekend. What are you even doing right now?
“Did you say … six hundred thousand dollars?” Josie murmurs. She has tears in her eyes, with relief, maybe.
Luna, however, has daggers shooting out of hers. “Why do you even want to buy into this business? That’s a crazy offer. I don’t trust you, Mr. –”
“Gage.” I try and barely succeed in holding back a wolfish grin—because I’m experienced enough to know when an offer is going to be accepted, even if it takes a little coercion—which I realize isn’t helping. She doesn’t trust me. And so she shouldn’t. “This could be a very profitable business. And I can help you take it there. Once it’s been refurbished and we’ve realized its full potential, I’ll go home to Chicago and you can be rid of me but still get the use of all my money.”
“You decided all this when you 'overheard’ our conversation yesterday?” Using air quotes with her fingers. The sprinkling of freckles across Luna’s nose gives me an odd craving. The color of her mouth infuses me with an unfamiliarly fanatical kind of lust that makes my heart lurch hotly.
Like it was when she was holding it in her hands.
But I somehow keep my cool, aside from one rock-hard detail. “Yes. As I said, I can see the potential. I’m an investor. I’m always on the lookout for businesses that are being underutilized.”
“Underutilized?” Luna says the word like I’ve insulted her. She pulls up one of the chairs and sits. I can smell her lightly perfumed scent, of flowers and fantasies I want to live inside. Just like I imagined, but far, far better because she’s real and sitting here right next to me. “What kind of investor are you?” As she bites gently on her plump bottom lip, my hard-on throbs painfully.
Fucking hell.
This is bad.
Very, very bad. “A successful one. My father taught me and my brothers when we were young, so I’ve had a lot of practice. I’ve bought and sold dozens of businesses. I know a diamond in the rough when I see one.”
Luna tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. Even her ears are perfect. I’ll gently take the soft flesh of her earlobe between my teeth. I’ll lick and kiss her neck before thrusting my tongue into her luscious mouth.
Christ.
Her eyes narrow. “What’s your motive, Mr. McCabe?”
“My motive? There’s no motive, aside from making money, which I think we could, if we make the much-needed upgrades.”
“The answer is still no.” If looks could kill I’d be a bloody pulp on the floor right now.
Why is it that one woman I’ve really wanted—not just because I feel like getting laid but because she’s … Luna—doesn’t want anything to do with me? Is this some kind of twisted karmic retribution coming back to bite me in the ass after years of not giving a fuck about anything or anyone?
Strange things always happen to me around this time of year. My parents’ memories rev into high gear and mess with the usual rhythm of my life. That Luna just so happened to walk into my life this weekend is … fucked-up but not surprising. Like they’re lecturing me from the afterlife to settle down and aim higher in the one area of my life I can admit I’m less than scrupulous.
The thought riles me, for one reason, and probably not the reason it should: will going to bed with Luna once or twice or several times over the course of the weekend cure me of this sudden … thing that’s happening to me? This bizarre obsession and the erotic-sweet nightmares and the ferocious, feral lust I’m suddenly mired in?
Yes.
No.
I don’t know.
Fuck.
“The answer is maybe,” Josie says.