My strategy is still in the implementation stage, and the reminder has my eyes scanning thegrounds surrounding me as readily as Isabelle’s needy eyes gaze at my suit when I return to my Mercedes.
Her happiness about my return is short-lived. Her lusty gaze narrows into thin slits when I signal to Hugo to release the locks so I can guide Tatiana into the seat next to Isabelle.
“Open the door, Hugo,” Isabelle demands, her voice as irate as the numerous tugs she does on the once-again latched locks.
With his humored eyes fixated on mine in the rearview mirror, Hugo asks, “Where to, boss?”
“Isabelle’s apartment,” I reply without pause for thought, aware she will be safer there than anywhere.
When Tatiana snuggles into my side, it dawns on me that she too is feeling the same unease ridding the air of oxygen. She looks sick. However, it isn’t close to the disgusted look that morphs onto Isabelle’s beautiful face when I run my index finger over her clenched fist to silently advise her not everything is black and white. That there’s a whole heap of gray no one pays any attention to.
After yanking her hand away from me like she is sickened by my touch, Isabelle shouts, “Move!”
She leaps over the privacy partition separating the back half of the cab from the front. When her wildly flung stiletto digs into my thigh, I’m tempted to use it to pull her onto my lap. Then, after scrubbing every morsel of Ryan’s kiss from her lips, I’d wipe the memory from her head permanently with an embrace so hazing, she won’t recall a single man she’s kissed in her life except me.
The only reason I don’t is that within a second of Hugo pulling away from the curb, a set of headlights beamed through the back window. We’re being tailed, and although I’m hopeful it is the FBI Regan warned me about, until I know for sure, I must remain cautious.
My eyes snap to the rearview mirror when Isabelle grunts out, “Close your eyes, Hugo, or you’ll cop an eyeful.”
I trust Hugo with my life, but any level of faith is worthless when it comes to the vehement jealousy I forever face when tussling for supremacy on Isabelle’s long list of suitors. Her grace and beauty attract a wide range of men, but regretfully, more times than not, it is from men with sinister intentions—Ryan included.
He knew what he was doing tonight, and despite knowing it would cause more harm than good, he still did it.
That places him on the opposite team to mine.
“I like her,” Tatiana mutters under her breath when two seconds after plopping her delectable ass into the seat next to Hugo, Isabelle leans over his torso to raise the privacy partition.
“And it seems as if Col has quite the fascination as well.” After angling her torso to face me, her eyes nowhere near as dull as they seemed moments ago, she asks, “What is his interest in her?”
Mindful Isabelle’s secrets aren’t mine to share, and aware there are still many I don’t know, I shruglike an insolent fool.
Tatiana is smarter than she lets on. “It would have to be something substantial if Keke put herself on the market tonight. She doesn’t do that for anybody.”
“I give her a lot of business.”
Her smile makes it seem as if I said more than I did. “I’ve heard, and although impressed by the capital you’re willing to lose to keep things professional, I’m just as curious to learn why you haven’t taken full advantage of the situation.” I begin to wonder if some of her comments tonight were part of an act when she mutters, “It isn’t cheating if you’re not officially together.” I realize I have the matter completely misunderstood when she nudges her head to the privacy partition separating us. “So perhaps you should remember that while discussing what happened tonight.”
I’d usually shut downunwarranted advice on my personal life with the tenacity of a bull shark. I don’t do that this time around. Not only is Tatiana not a member of my staff I can boss around, but she also has a point.
I pushed Isabelle, so it’s only fair she pushes back.
When my phone vibrates in sync with Tatiana’s, we end one conversation before taking up another.
“Col isn’t tailing us. He’s still with Keke in the corridor bordering the restaurant.” Tatiana swivels her phone around to show me a surveillance image that date stamp reveals it was taken only moments ago. “So if that isn’t him…” she nudges her head to the headlights following us during the ‘that’ part of her question, “… who is it, and why hasn’t Hugo lost them yet?”
I smirk at the rile in her tone before replying, “Because Hugo doesn’t do anything unless asked.”
“Then perhaps you should have asked him to be your date tonight,” she quips back, her voice a mix of the nasally one she used at the restaurant and a sophisticated businesswoman. After reading the bemused expression on my face with more accuracy than a stranger should have, she murmurs, “We all strive for greatness in our own ways, Isaac.You fought. I do this.”
With a shrug, she glides her hand down her tiny frame.
38
By the time we arrive at Isabelle’s apartment, Hugo has lost the tail as requested via a text message, and Hunter has Col on a firm lockdown, freeing me to chase down Isabelle as Tatiana suggests when she races out of my car like her ass is on fire.
Isabelle is in such a hurry, she sprints through the glass spinning doors at the front of her building before I’ve even slid out of the back seat of my car. As she makes a beeline for an elevator bank at the side of the lobby, I rack my knuckles on the driver’s side window. When Hugo rolls down the tinted glass, I forget he is more a confidant of mine than an employee.
“After requesting Hunter to shut down the feed in the lobby, elevator, and the floor of Isabelle’s apartment, take Tatiana home.”
