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If only Eric could forget about Sorrel. Not that he wanted to, but it would make his life a whole hell of a lot easier. For one, he wouldn’t be sitting there pining for someone he could never have, playing over and over in his mind their time spent together yesterday. He couldn’t help but smile thinking about how she’d not only made him brunch but a birthday cake, too, when he mentioned he’d never had one. Why celebrate your birthdays when you live for as long and as miserably as his kind did? At least that was how his mother and father looked at it. Sorrel thought it was a crime and remedied the situation, even though his birthday wasn’t until September. She’d found it “cute” that he was only twenty-eight and younger than her. Though she did say he acted much older. She was nothing if not observant. What would she think if she knew he was really forty-one? That he would never age and would live for at least another hundred and fifty years? As much as he wanted the beauty, he would never wish her a life of watching herself age while her husband remained youthful. It had driven his mother to the point of madness.
Eric closed his eyes and thought of much more pleasant thoughts. A vision of Sorrel eating some of the strawberries she was using to make his cake filled him with unspeakable pleasure. The way her luscious, begging-to-be-kissed lips covered the bursting ripe berries had him needing to take a cold shower. It had almost thrown him over the edge when she held one up for him to taste. She had no idea how sexy she was, which only made her more desirable.
Not only had the woman baked him a cake and sung to him, but she’d dragged him all over town delivering her homemade stinging nettle–and-peppermint tea to half the residents of Riverhaven, who were suffering from seasonal allergies. She was a damn saint and beloved by everyone. Eric was sure the town would eventually canonize her, or at the very least rename Riverhaven in her honor. She’d even gotten most of the residents to forgive him for his indiscretion of ever doubting her. She’d blamed it on a lapse of judgment and not eating enough cake.
Eric leaned his head on the steering wheel. He knew very well it wasn’t a complete lapse in judgment, but none of that mattered. All that mattered was that Sorrel was happy. Maybe she was right—there was something beautiful in not knowing why good things happen. And Sorrel was good. He felt her light shining into his dark soul.
He sat up and sighed. His dark powers would come out tonight. The ones he tried to keep in check. The ones he hated because he’d seen his father use them all too often. He’d been trying to take down Clayton Palmer in a more civilized manner, but that was before the book had interfered and sent him careening into Sorrel’s life. His looming deadline for Sorrel’s story meant there was no time left. Clayton’s mistress and his repugnant associates were going to talk, all on the record. They weren’t going to do it willingly, though they would never realize it after Eric was done with them. Eric appeased his guilt by reminding himself that Clayton Palmer was the vilest of humans. The man was getting rich off exploiting the weak. He used immigrants—many who didn’t speak English and none who had any working knowledge of the legal system—to work in deplorable conditions sewing clothes for his department stores. Many of the workers were underaged and trafficked. All were too afraid to go to the authorities for fear of being deported or worse.
Eric saw a flash of headlights and was alerted to Ivy arriving in her Mercedes, which probably cost more than double his annual salary. The middle-aged woman who had more plastic in her than a Tupperware store stepped out of her vehicle in a silver sheen dress and tossed her keys to the valet before slinking into the club. That meant it was showtime for Eric. He straightened his black silk tie and did one more check in his rearview mirror. He tried smoothing the cowlick on the crown of his dark hair that never wanted to behave. How he wished he was getting ready to meet Sorrel for a date instead of seducing Ivy Davies. But he needed names, and she was the first key to unlocking the downfall of Clayton Palmer.
Eric exited his vehicle and slid into his black suit coat. The club had a strict dress code. He looked across the street at the understated brick building with a gold telephone booth outside of it. It looked like nothing special on the outside, but he knew inside it was a rich person’s paradise. Well, for some rich people. He could never imagine Sorrel here. The quirky heiress obviously wanted to remain anonymous in her do-gooder ways. He almost wondered if she or her late father were Robin Hoods, robbing the rich to give to the poor. If she was, he didn’t want to know. For once in his life he just wanted someone to be who they professed to be.
