Love is a Battlefield: Games of Love, Book 1 (15 page)

Michael tossed his gloves and hat on the seat of the truck and followed Julian into the house. Julian remembered it well. He’d never actually been in the upper portion—this was an estate modeled after the manors of old, when huge fireplaces in the basement served as a place to cook as well as to provide a makeshift central heating system. Of course, this kitchen was fully updated with Subzero appliances and granite as far as the eye could see. But the sentiment was the same.

The kitchen was busy when they arrived. Two women, both in full chef attire with white coats and crisp caps on their heads, were intent on their work, and the scent of vanilla and potatoes filled the space with a welcoming air.

He immediately recognized his mom’s friend, Yolanda. She greeted him with flour-covered hands and a kiss on his cheek, which he had to bend over to receive. She was a tiny woman—smaller even than his mom—but with an athletic frame despite her incredible touch with pastries.

“Little Julian Wallace!” she exclaimed. “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes? Have you come to bring me a box of produce?”

Julian grinned and took a seat at one of the stools next to a huge kitchen island, nodding politely to the other woman standing over the stove. He didn’t recognize her, but that wasn’t surprising. He hadn’t been here in at least a decade.

He declined Yolanda’s immediate offer of milk and cookies, but Michael was more than happy to settle in with a snack.

“Sorry, bro. The spying will have to wait. I’m so hungry I could eat a nun’s arse through the convent gates.”

Yolanda promptly placed a large slice of cake in front of him, shaking her head, but with a smile lurking at the corner of her mouth. She didn’t have kids of her own, but she’d spent enough time with Julian and his friends as teenagers that he doubted anything fazed her any more.

“Now, what’s this he says about spying? Little Julian, what are you up to?”

“It’s about Duke, Yolanda. He came by the house today. He didn’t go in—just said he was passing by.” Of course, he didn’t mention Kate had been the primary reason for that. There was no succinct way to describe her or their current relationship. He’d tried to with his mom, and all he’d ended up with was a knowing glance and a wink. She obviously didn’t understand the delicate dynamics of their situation.

“You know that’s not like him, paying morning visits, especially since he knows I don’t live there. Do you have any idea what he might want with my mom?”

Yolanda’s and Julian’s eyes met. It wasn’t as unusual of a question as it seemed. When Kilroy had broken the record for the longest hammer throw, it had been Harold who was pushed out of the first-place position—a blow to the ego, certainly, but not entirely unwarranted. That was what the push and pull of battle was all about. One man came out on top and stayed there until another surpassed him. Alpha. Laird. Label it however you wanted—it was ingrained into each of them.

Harold’s turn had come to an end, and although Julian had wanted to be the one to take his place, he’d still been a slightly scrawny youth back then, and everyone knew it was only a matter of time before he’d be ready to challenge Kilroy and get the title back in the Wallace name. It had taken years of training to get where he was today, thanks to mentorships with some of the best men out there, long hours of practice in adverse conditions and a one hundred percent commitment to the Games.

But he was almost there, and Kilroy knew it. The question was, what was Kilroy planning to do about it?

Yolanda pursed her lips, considering his question. “Sorry, Little Julian, but I don’t know much about Duke any more. To be honest, no one’s been around here much lately—not even me. Mr. and Mrs. Kilroy have been in Europe for the past few months, and Duke only got here last week.”

“Is he doing much in the way of practice?”

Kilroy had his own training field out near the back of the house. It was an incredible setup of hammers, double-weighted training cabers and a track. All he needed was a loch and a monster to go in it, and the entire setting would be perfect.

“More than usual, now that you mention it. You know he always gets the competition bug when he’s going up against you. He hasn’t been around much, though. A lot of meetings with some guys in suits.”

That didn’t seem too out of the ordinary. The exact nature of the Kilroy family fortune wasn’t something Julian cared particularly about, but he imagined there were quite a few men in suits involved in it. But it did seem odd the kitchen would be so busy and filled to bursting with baked goods if he was out wining and dining the investing elite most of the time.

“So what’s all this, then?”

“His highness has demanded five-star service,” the other woman replied. She stirred at something on the stove before turning her attention to Julian and Yolanda with a wink. “He’s trying to impress a woman, if you ask me. Gareth’s up there setting table service for two on the terrace, and I’m cooking like we’re at the Ritz. Came in on my day off to do it.”

Michael perked up at the mention of food, but Julian forced him to remain seated, one heavy hand on his shoulder.

“He’s bringing her here?”

The woman shrugged. “It’s not something he’s ever done before, but I can see why he might start trying it. A place like this…my food… The poor thing doesn’t stand a chance.”

Julian screwed his mouth into a thin line.
Kilroy was bringing Kate here? Where centuries of family money towered over them all, oppressive and tempting, the real fruit of Eden?

“You said he wasn’t going to be here!” Michael hissed, though not very discreetly. Yolanda and the other cook very nicely went back to work, leaving the two of them sitting over the plate of cake.

“I didn’t think he would be.” Julian obviously hadn’t paid enough attention when Kilroy and Kate had been making their plans. It was hardly his fault. He’d been too busy swallowing his pride and trying not to choke on it to notice anything else.

“So let’s get out of here. The last thing I want is to be caught with my shorts around my ankles, shitting on another man’s lawn.”

Yolanda choked behind him. Julian gave her a healthy wallop on the back before nodding his head toward the door. “If you’re afraid of Kilroy, then go. You can even take my truck. But I’m not leaving.”

“Not even you’d go so far as to interrupt a fellow man on a date, Jules. It breaks all the codes.”

“It’s Kate.”

Michael cast a furtive look around the kitchen. “What? Where?”

“Not here, you idiot. The romantic dinner for two. It’s with Kate.”

Michael shook his head and returned his attention to his cake. “Jules, you tell me where to show up and what to do, and I’ll be there with bells on. But don’t ask me to understand what it is you’re doing anymore. You’ve got depths. Big, hidden ones.”

Gareth came through the swinging doors then, a long, tapered lighter dangling from his fingertips. He was a tall, thin man with bushy eyebrows and a thick mustache that rendered his upper lip almost invisible, but he was every inch the butler in a suit and tie. It was a big departure from how Julian usually saw him, in red flannel and heavy Dickie pants. They went a long way back, the two of them. In addition to serving for the Kilroy family, Gareth owned an incredible expanse of forest in the wilds of North Idaho. He’d been supplying the cabers for the Games for years—cut and stripped right from his own land.

“Wallace! I didn’t expect to see you for a few weeks yet. Did you want me to bring the haul in early?” He shook Julian’s hand with a fierce grip.

“Oh, don’t worry about it. I’ll bring the truck out and pick them up myself.” Julian liked the drive out there. It was one of the most beautiful places in the country, still largely untouched by industry or commerce, the horizon where the tallest evergreen trees touched the blue sky almost a perfect line separating two worlds.

“Well, let me know what I can do to help. The Games are the highlight of my year. Harold would be proud of you.”

“Actually, there is something you can do right now,” Julian ventured, ignoring the remark about his stepfather. The last thing he needed right now was a trip down memory lane. His focus needed to be the here and now. Kilroy and Kate, here. What he was going to do about it, now.

“What I’d like is to be a fly on the wall.”

“A fly?”

Julian pointed one finger straight up. It wasn’t exactly in his master plan to crash their date, and part of him acknowledged it as a bit of weakness that was far, far beneath him. But this wasn’t reconnaissance anymore. It had transformed into full-blown espionage.

Gareth looked him over doubtfully. “I’m not sure you have a very discreet build. And you’ll forgive me for making assumptions, but you probably don’t want to witness Duke in the midst of wooing a lady.”

Julian’s body went rigid, and the sulfurous taste of rage filled his throat. He definitely didn’t want to witness it. But that didn’t mean he had to sit down here and imagine it, either.

Gareth shook his head and continued. “Although maybe you do. You certainly look like you could use a good laugh.”

“A laugh?” He doubted it. That would be like laughing at a funeral. Or the scene where the villain has the hero’s heart clasped firmly in his hand and is getting ready to wrench it out of his chest. “Not a laugh, Gareth. But information would be nice. What do you say to me listening in on a little bit of that date up there?”

“Wouldn’t work, my boy. Duke’ll smell you out like a rat in a garbage can.”

“He won’t know I’m there. And if he finds out, I’ll handle it.”

“And the lady? No offense, Julian, but it isn’t like you to be so intrusive.”

Julian went in for the kill. “True. But did you know the woman Duke is having dinner with is trying to sabotage the Games?”

Gareth didn’t even blink. “Consider it done.”

The clothes were a little baggy, which was a new sensation for Julian. It had taken quite a bit of convincing to get Michael to give up his spy clothes, but the button-down black shirt and slacks were better suited for hiding in the backdrop than his own worn jeans.

“God, you’re like a woman with these tiny little pants,” Michael complained, stepping out of the pantry off the kitchen, clad in only an undershirt and a pair of four-leaf-clover-covered boxer shorts. “No way I’m forcing my boys in there. They need room to breathe. To be free.”

“Just so long as they stay out of the way, I don’t care what you do with them.” Julian surveyed himself in a large, gilded mirror. He felt ridiculous.

“I still don’t see how this is going to work,” Michael complained. They returned to the kitchen, Michael taking advantage of his newfound freedom by stretching his bare, hairy legs across one of the stools. His legs were nicked with scars, one of his knees swollen with a joint problem Michael insisted would eventually go away on its own.

It wouldn’t be a bad idea to send Michael up there, looking like this. Julian couldn’t think of a better way to ruin a romantic interlude.

But he wasn’t here to ruin it. This wasn’t about Kate at all—at least, not directly. He was gathering information, discovering a few clues. Julian wasn’t so modest he didn’t think he’d figure in the conversation—they were, after all, his two biggest enemies. Catwoman and the Joker didn’t get together without the subject of bats coming up at least once.

“I don’t know how it’s going to work, either. But I’m not about to let this opportunity escape.”

Julian nodded toward Gareth, who’d loaded up a series of silver platters on a tray and was getting ready to head to the terrace with them. Cocktails, he’d assured Julian, had already been served, and he had no reason to think they’d discussed anything other than the Kilroy collection of Staffordshire figurines. It was a topic Duke could talk about for hours.

The configuration of the house wasn’t ideal for meal service, since it took several flights of stairs to get from the kitchen to the formal dining room. The opulence probably more than made up for cold soup, and it would be difficult to concentrate on eating anyway, what with so many portraits of stuffy aristocrats staring down at the table from their wallpapered heights.

Kilroy and Kate were supposedly dining al fresco on a terrace off the dining room, where the sun had set and a calming twilight was settling in. Even Julian had to admit it was romantic. A wrought-iron balustrade was all that separated the cozy table service for two from the formal gardens off the front of the house. A seemingly endless array of geometric bushes and roses went off in the distance, a gravel path broken only by a cherubic fountain or two. There was a fish pond, Julian knew, farther out on the lawn. As teenagers, he and Peterson had once dropped a bag full of tadpoles into it, a prank that wasn’t nearly as productive as they’d hoped, since instead of goldfish, the pond was full of oscars, which promptly ate every single one of the creatures they’d collected.

Gareth coughed discreetly at the open french doors to the terrace, walking through only when Duke made a gesture with his hand. Duke was, fortunately, seated looking out over the grounds, his back to the door. It gave Julian enough time to slip past one of the doors and conceal himself behind the fronds of a potted palm.

Okay, not conceal, exactly. It would take a whole forest of palm trees to hide all of him. But it was enough to give him the illusion of anonymity, especially since the only light on the terrace was a large candle in the middle of the table. If Kate looked up, she might happen to see a tall, dark figure waiting by with a wine bottle in hand. Nothing more. One more servant among so many.