“Yep.” I roll onto my hip, so we meet face to face. “You need to learn to count in your head.”
“I’m so sorry,” she responds, half giggling. “I have a terrible habit of mumbling out loud.”
“I’ve realized that.”
Her boisterous smile fleetingly rids the air of the desperation choking it. If only it could do something for her truth-probing eyes. She has questions, many of them, and although I want her to know me, the real Isaac Holt, there are only so many questions I can answer truthfully. I value integrity—it is what I look for any time I’m adding a member to my team—but how can you preach honor when most of your life has been cloaked by dishonorable intentions?
I want Isabelle to know the truth. I want to be honest with her, but if that could double the fight to make her mine, I’m not willing to take that risk just yet.
My heart has only thumped the beat of a content man since she crashed into me at the airport. My shoulders haven’t experienced this litheness in years, yet my empire is about to be embroiled in one of its biggest scandals to date.
As Jean-Paul Sartre hints, ‘Life doesn’t truly begin until you’re on the other side of despair.’ I need to remember that while granting Isabelle access to my personal life as I’ve never given anyone before.
“One question, Isabelle.”
With only the slightest hesitation, she asks the last question I am anticipating for her to want to know. “Did you love Ophelia?”
After trudging through the many objections firing through my head, I reply with a simple, “Yes.”
Despite the confusion I feel every time I peer at Isabelle without seeking similarities between her and Ophelia, I can’t deny the feelings I had for Ophelia. She was my first serious girlfriend. The first woman I wanted to free from misery instead of pushing her headfirst into it. My parents’ volatile relationship made me bitter toward women, but even with Ophelia and I mostly living our lives separately, I wanted us to work, and I wanted her to love me.
I thought my every wish had been granted the day she told me she loved me, then it was cruelly stripped away, and I’m reminded of just how cold-hearted that made me when Isabelle whispers, “Do you still love her?”
I want to say no. I want to tell her I was young and stupid and consumed by the chase, but since that will expose me as the victim I swore I’d never be, I mutter, “I said one question,” before I roll away from her and the hundred more questions she’s dying to ask that will expose me even more than my truth-bearing eyes.
32
“Should I give Keke the go-ahead?”
After angling my body away from Scout, Lead Pilot for Colt Enterprises—a joint venture company I partner with Cormack—I answer Hunter’s question. “Yes, but ensure each of my…” I grit my teeth before snarling through them, “… dates are aware of the rules.”
I can’t believe I agreed to do this, but when I take my feelings out of the equation, it makes sense. Keke’s girls are professionals. There are no hidden expectations or hopes. They’ll be seen on my arm for an hour or two at known Petretti haunts, double their hourly fee from the underhanded endorsement, then go on their merry way.
It should take a week to get Col off Isabelle’s scent. Two at most. I’ve just got to hope like hell I can hold on that long. My mood is already rancid from waking up before the sparrows to beat Isabelle, Cormack, and Harlow to the private airstrip we’re departing from today. With two cars with stolen plates still keeping an eye onMummo Koti, I had to make it appear as if I left before everyone else since that’s how I usually operate after a risqué weekend.
I’ve been twiddling my thumbs for hours, my mind far from business.
As my eyes drink in Isabelle’s stumbling steps toward the private jet, I say, “Have Keke bring the first date forward.” I wait for Hunter to stop humming in shock before finalizing my statement. “I’m not a patient man.”
He laughs like I’m not telling him anything he doesn’t already know. “I’ll have everything ready to go by the time you land tonight.”
“Including surveillance?”
He hums again. “Being installed as we speak.” Before I can bark out further orders, he adds, “And Hugo has already spoken with the security team at her apartment. No one not on your preapproved list… which only has one name on the list… will get past the foyer.”
“Harlow—”
“Onemalename,” Hunter corrects, his tone far too pompous for the early hour he commenced work this morning.
“We have all bases covered, boss,” Hugo jumps in. “So enjoy the in-flight entertainment on your way home before the shit hits the fan. From what Scout told me, this jet has a bed—”
I disconnect our call before his rile sours my mood more. My hands are already itching to touch, caress, and explore every delectable inch of Isabelle, so picture how tenacious the desire becomes when her wide-with-need eyes lock with mine as she stumbles into the jet.
Her knees knock for an entirely different reason when they rake my suit. It’s the same one I wore the night I took her to 57, and despite it being recently dry-cleaned, it still has the Magnum condom I placed in my pocket with the plan to finally claim her as mine.
Col upended my plan just as the chips started to fall into place and the reminder has me jerking up my chin in greeting Isabelle instead of lashing my tongue across her lips as I truly desire.
When she returns my greeting with the faintest of smiles, I shift my focus to the window beside my head. I purposely sat in the only single recliner in the plane, aware positioning myself within touching distance of Isabelle would snap my qualm irrevocably.
