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Shit.
I hadn’t expected Silas to attend tonight. He wasn’t based in New York, and though he still served on the board of directors at Sterling Chase, he was also a sought-after business strategist who spent most of his time traveling around the world consulting with Fortune 500 companies and governmental agencies. Ordinarily, seeing one of my best friends would have been cause for celebration. At the moment, however, I was tempted to ask him to turn right the fuck around.
Silas was sensible. Calm. Rational. And I wasn’t being any of those things at the moment.
“Am I interrupting something?” Silas asked. His voice was mild, but the accompanying look he gave me spoke volumes… most of it in italics with exclamation points.
“Of course not,Mr. Concannon.” I widened my eyes meaningfully. “I didn’t know you were coming tonight. Are you enjoying your evening, sir?”
Silas’s head tilted to one side, a very clearWhat game are we playing, Sebastian?
I smiled winningly.Go with it.
“Oh, yes, it’s been delightful,” Silas said at length. “I’m on a mission to make sure every member of the Sterling Chase board of directors in attendance shakes the hand of at least fifty millionaires for networking purposes. I’ve done my part, but you’d be shocked at how many of them hide away or find themselves otherwise distracted at these events.”
I nearly snorted. I’d been the only member of the board in attendance before Silas showed up, which meant Kenji, the personal assistant who ruled our lives, had sent Silas here to make sure I didn’t cut out early or hide away.
It was uncomfortable to be known so well.
Silas glanced at Not-Sterling’s hand in mine once again. “How’syourevening, Bash?”
“Unbelievable.”Literally. “I finally got to meet my boss after being his personal assistant for weeks and weeks.” I drew a very reluctant Not-Sterling forward a few feet, presenting him to Silas. “Sterling Chase, this is Silas Concannon. Mr. Concannon, I’m sure you remember Sterling Chase? Since you’re on the board of directors athiscompany?”
Silas blinked. He looked at me, then down at Not-Sterling’s name tag. At our linked hands, then Not-Sterling’s rabbit bow tie and Christmas socks. I could practically see the neurons firing in his brilliant brain as Silas assessed the situation. Then he extended a hand for Not-Sterling to shake. “No, we’ve never met in person, strangely enough.”
Not-Sterling nodded, like the idea of a company’s owner never meeting the people who served on his own board of directors didn’t faze him in the slightest.
Silas’s smile was a sharp-edged thing. “I somehow pictured you with more hair, Sterling.”
I coughed to cover my laugh, envisioning the same Peruvian guinea pig Silas was.
Not-Sterling pulled away from me so he could shake Silas’s hand, and I stuck my suddenly empty fingers in my pocket before they could reach for him again.
“Yes. Well.” Not-Sterling patted his plentiful brown curls, perhaps wondering how much more hair a human head could sustain. “I’m sure there are many incorrect rumors about Sterling Chase out there. I pay them no mind.”
“Rumors about… Sterling Chase?” Silas repeated, eyes flicking to me again. “That’s an odd way to phrase it.”
“Oh, Sterling enjoys talking about Sterling’s self in the third person,” I explained, deadpan. “It’s one of his many, as he likes to call them, ‘quirky billionaire eccentricities.’”
Silas blinked. “Well. I suppose I’ve heard of billionaires doing stranger things…” he said pointedly, and when his eyes met mine, I very clearly heard the words he’d left unsaid:“…take, for example, the two of us, doing whatever the fuck we’re doing right now.”
“Quite true.” Not-Sterling nodded imperiously. “I once heard about a European billionaire who bought a castle for his cat… which seems rather excessive when one ponders that there are people out there who’d just like an upgrade from their cousin’s lumpy futon.” He cleared his throat, his cheeks turning that addictive shade of pink again. “There’s also a chap in Asia, I do believe, who’s attempting to clone himself a pet dinosaur.”
“Ooof. That won’t end well,” I murmured, shaking my head. “Has he never seenJurassic Park?”
Not-Sterling chuckled light and low, a sound of startled, honest amusement, and answering heat flared through my body. He turned those big brown eyes up at me… but the instant his gaze met mine, he seemed to recall exactly where he was, who he was talking to, and who he was trying to impersonate. He looked away immediately.
Silas frowned at both of us… but mostly at me.
“Yes, we billionaires are a quirky lot!” Not-Sterling forced a laugh. “You should see us when we get together at our secret billionaire club.” He paused. “Um. Not that thereisa secret billionaire club. Or that I could talk about it if there was.” He mimed zipping his lips and locking them tight. “First rule of secret billionaire club, you know?”
Silas nodded slowly, studiouslynotlooking at me now.
Not-Sterling’s lies were skirting closer to the truth than he knew.
When Silas and I, along with our three best friends, had created the ETC software, we’d been excited at the possibilities of what the software could do for the world and had hoped that selling it would earn us a nice little nest egg—maybe a couple hundred thousand dollars apiece!—that we could use as seed money to build our futures.
We’d been incredibly fucking naive.
