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“Time to head down. Riley can continue telling me about her business,” the board member says. “She can sit at my ta—”
“She’s sitting by me,” I cut him off to say.
“I am?” she asks with lifted brows.
“You two can head on down.” I nod their way before turning to her. I see them move toward the stairs out of the corner of my eye.
“This is unexpected,” she says when I round on her.
“As the saying goes, keep your enemies close.”
She lifts a perfectly arched eyebrow. “I believe it’s to keep your friends close and enemies closer.”
“I don’t have friends.”
She smirks. “Everybody has friends.” She nods over my shoulder. “What about him?”
I glance behind me to see she's referring to Diego. “He’s family.” I turn to her. “There’s an empty chair at my table. You’ll take that one.”
“What if I wanted to have dinner next to Doug Keen? We were having a riveting conversation on his contemporary art technique.”
A muscle in my jaw ticks. “Your plans changed,” I say bluntly. “And he’s not that riveting.” I had a ten-minute conversation with the man the night before. I only remained for that long because Sam Waterson likes the bastard.
“Kyle,” someone calls behind me.
Reluctantly, I turn from Riley to see someone I vaguely remember approach.
“It’s me, Jake?” he says, patting his chest as if I’m supposed to remember him.
“Jake Albert,” I say, knowing the name from the guest list.
“That’s right. Man, it’s been a long time.” He grins wide like we’re old friends. But that’s not the case because I don’t have friends, like I told Riley. There isn’t anyone, outside of my family, that I would ever get close enough to call a friend.
“How’ve you been? I was just in L.A., where I saw your brother.”
“Great.” My reply is clipped. “Dinner is about to start, and as you can see, I was speaking with—” I break off when I return to where Riley stands to see she’s no longer there.
The fuck?
I glance around to see she’s disappeared.
“That woman who was just standing here?” Jake asks.
I pierce him with a stern look.
“She looked familiar,” he says. “Who is she?”
None of his damn business. “As I said, dinner is about to begin.” I step aside and nod in the direction of the stairs. “I have an announcement to make.”
“Yeah, okay,” he says. “We’ll have to catch up soon.”
I don’t reply as I head to the microphone to announce the dinner.
Ten minutes later, all of the guests sit around nine different tables that have been set out. Only the people I genuinely care about are at my table … and Riley. She’d disappeared for a minute, only to materialize soon after. The original invite had placed her at a table at the opposite end of the room.
Now, she’s seated directly next to me. Every time she moves, I get a whiff of her scent. It’s disturbingly alluring. A light, floral scent mixed with something that smells, for lack of a better term, exotic. I can’t put my finger on it.
Right on time, the caterers serve the watercress and goat cheese salad. I do my best to pry my attention away from Riley’s scent and listen to the conversation between Diego and Sam Waterson. While focusing on certain things can be a problem for me, I rarely ever have to fight this fucking hard to focus when it comes to business.
