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“You know the man, Ari. He’s been on my back my entire life, waiting for this moment where he steps down and I step up. Grooming me for the role like his life depended on it.”
Ari nodded. “What if you did the unthinkable?”
“And embarrass the family again?” Magnus asked. Both Ari and I turned to him. “What? I’m just trying to state the obvious.” He held his hands up in surrender.
“I think those moments were my way of getting his attention from a father who just thought of me as an asset to his empire in years to come. Walking out on my destiny is not an option, although I wish it were because I’d jump at it without a parachute.”
“There’s my brother!” Lourde squealed.
“What do they say? Lemons equal lemonade. Squeeze the shit out of those lemons, my friend,” Ari whispered as I watched Lourde and Barrett walk toward us and sit down. Behind them, Olivia, Pepper, and Jake sat down, joining everyone.
“Olivia, how nice to see you again!” Ari said in a weird, sarcastic tone.
“Isn’t it?” she remarked, thrusting out a hip. “Perhaps we can debate how much cocaine is here tonight?”
“It’s an integral part of every model’s diet, but you wouldn’t know that, would you?”
“Holy hell, stop it, you two!” Lourde burst out, but my mind was on the quiet Greek beauty in the corner with a man I despised next to her whispering something in her ear.
The server brought a bottle of bubbles to the table, and Ari stood up, opening it.
“Thank you all for coming to my grandmama’s launch. I have an announcement to make. You all know I really do very little in my day, but I want to change that. I’ve decided to work with grandmama, and we are opening our very first flagship store right on Madison Avenue with me in charge of it.”
“That’s amazing, Ari. Congrats,” Barrett said at the same time the cork flew off the champagne bottle, flying somewhere into the crowd.
“Congrats, man,” I said momentarily, getting out of my own clusterfuck of a head to congratulate my dear friend.
* * *
I watched her on the dance floor. Her hips swayed side to side to the beat, her curves a deadly sin made for me. More than anything in the world, I wanted to disappear into the crowd, find her, and pull her close. I lifted the whiskey to my lips, imagining her body moving against mine and getting swept away in her arms. I closed my eyes shut, holding onto the thought. When I opened my eyes, hands moved from her waist and down, circling her ass.
Jake.
Drunk and irritated, I slammed down the rest of my whiskey and leaped off the wall, ready to rip his hands right off of her. But something stopped me. Instead, I paused and turned back around.
If, after what he’d done to her tonight, she was willing to stick with him, then she deserved him. My focus shifted, and in a flurry, I searched for Francesca. Finding her laughing and resting her hand on quarterback, Nick Stone, from the Giants didn’t surprise me, nor did it bother me. I marched toward her, pushing and shoving people that got in my way. There was only one way to rid Pepper once and for all.
“Nick, stop it. You’re too kind,” I overheard Francesca purr. Out of the crowd, I appeared by her side and grabbed Francesca by the hand, steering her toward the exit.
I was done, done with all the bullshit, all the thinking that maybe, just maybe, Pepper and I had a shot. But by the way his hands slid down her body, I knew they were back together, and I was nothing to her.
“Whoa. Where are we going, Connor?” Francesca yelped out. She had to run behind me to keep up.
“Home, where I’m going to fuck you senselessly.”
20
Pepper
I’d avoided Connor at the show, but it was his steely gaze during the catwalk event that was unavoidable, drawing me in like metal to a magnet.
At Sky Deck, the afterparty was magical. If only I could enjoy it. With Jake being more interested in chatting to everyone here and avoiding me, I honestly wondered why I brought him in the first place.
He claimed he wanted to be with me, wanted to make us work, but everything he did was the exact opposite. Being late on both of our dates, one I could understand but two, I had lingering doubts that something was amiss.
And with Lourde by my side, I watched him from a distance, chatting with yet another beautiful woman.
“Hey, you okay?” Lourde asked, placing a hand on my knee.
