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Instead, she only sighed. "It's not like that, trust me. Now, let's work on that typing problem of yours before he has another reason to taunt me, okay?"
Natalie glanced at the flowers, first at the thorns and then at the deep red petals. The color of blood.
When Eliza began to trot toward her desk, Natalie picked up the bouquet and dropped the whole thing--vase and all--on Eliza's desk alongside the papers. "Maybe these will cheer you up."
Lord knew it would cheer Natalie up to be rid of them.
* * *
The huge, oak office door hit Brooks Adams so hard on the head that he nearly saw big cartoonish stars pop up in front of his eyes and spin around him before his gaze could finally focus on his attacker.
Garret, Brooks' older brother and co-partner, stood in front of him, his hands splayed out, palms up. "Jesus, are you okay?" He slipped into the room quickly, and then clicked the door shut behind him. "What the hell were you doing standing there?"
"Nothing, I—"
"Please, for the love of god, don't tell me you were spying on Eliza. I told you, my fiancé’s sister is off limits. Rachael read me the riot act about it. She said that Eliza's been through a lot and this job means so much to her and…" Garret stopped short, then let out a long-suffering sigh. "She's been worried about everything since we booked our flight for the wedding. So, for my sake, just for this once, could you please…?"
Brooks made his way over to his desk, doing his best to suppress an eye roll. Why was it that everyone thought he had some kind of compulsion to just whip out his penis in front of every live woman he met? Sure, Eliza was nice, but she was prac
tically a kid. She was still in her early twenties, and if he wanted a girl like that, the last place he'd find her was in this office.
Especially after last time.
He settled back into his chair, and then kicked his feet up onto the wide, lacquered desk. "Was there a reason for your visit or did you just want to make sure your record was still broken?"
He cocked an eyebrow and Garret loosed a smile. "I haven't said it that much."
After settling his feet back into the floor, Brooks reached into his desk and pulled out a little notepad. "I'm actually keeping a count. This brings you into the double digits."
He glanced at the sheet. In actuality, he'd been counting the number of times he'd mentioned Natalie's divorces in comparison to the number of times she'd mentioned his alleged philandering. He added two more dashes to his column, but, as always, they were neck-and-neck.
Garret sat in the leather chair in front of the desk and shrugged. “I’m just concerned."
"About?" Brooks asked.
"Eliza. Weren't you listening?"
"Oh, right, that. Well, you've got nothing to worry about. She's not my type." There. And let that be an end to it. He had more important things to deal with today than his brother's nagging. Like, for example, trying to finally pull into the lead in his personal game with Natalie.
Apparently, Garret didn't get the message, though, because he kept talking. "Regardless, it's not really a secret that your type is...well, it encompasses a large range of specimens."
Brooks looked up from his pad, then at his brother, then at the pad again. "Again, I ask you, why are you here?"
"We have—wait, you never told me why you were standing by the door like that."
"You never asked."
"I'm asking now," Garret said.
Brooks sat the notepad on the desk in front of him, then leaned back in his chair and weighed his options. He could lie and see if he could come up with something believable on the spot. Of course, if his brother didn't believe him, he'd probably just assume that Brooks had been staring out the window at Eliza.
But the truth...
The truth had it's own problematic spots, even if it was the safer of the two options. Maybe if he kept it vague, he'd be able to get away with saying almost nothing at all while still satisfying Garret's curiosity.
It was worth a shot.
"I was just gathering a little intel, that's all," he said.
