Page 107 of Effortless

What she brought out made her heart stop.

A simple black band T-shirt. The faded logo on the front teased her.

Tommaso had been wearing that on the second day he was in New York a month ago. She had been sort of struck by how relaxed he looked in jeans and a tee instead of his usual dress shirts and slacks, or even a suit.

He’d still looked good, though.

Damn good.

Camilla held the shirt up, and stared at it.

Fuck it.

She grabbed her phone, but didn’t make a call.

She checked flights instead.

Apparently, she could be in Chicago before supper time. A cancellation for a first class seat was now hers.

Booked.

Now, Camilla just had to figure out what she was going to do when she got to Chicago.

She did make a phone call that time.

“What, Cam?” her brother asked the second he picked up the call.

“I need some help.”

“For?”

“Chicago.”

Cross made an appreciative noise on the other end. “All right. Like what?”

“Anything. Everything. I mean, Tom I can handle. It’s where to go, and who to know … get what I mean?”

“Yeah, I do. Give me thirty minutes.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

LOU WAS a good middle man, Tom had come to find out. At least where the crew was concerned. It made things far easier on Tom to simply delegate certain tasks to his friend, as the men were more agreeable to Lou, and less difficult.

Things like collecting money for the week.

Or keeping an eye on certain schemes.

Tom wished he had thought of this trick sooner. It would have taken away a shit load of stress, and make things far easier on himself.

Lesson learned.

He got to relax behind his desk, and he barely said a word as man after man from the crew came into the office to hand over their money for the week. Lou took care of the conversation, and paying the guys their dues for whatever work they had done.

It worked for Tom.

Lou liked it.

The crew was agreeable.