Scarlet Lady (23 page)
Authors: Sandra Chastain
“Caleb,” Katie interrupted.
“What?”
“Give it a rest.”
“I just—”
“We’ve been over this and over this. Sean gets it.
I
get it. We’ll call you. Now let us do the job.”
Her brother exhaled explosively, which made Katie smile a little. “Aren’t you supposed
to be taking today off?” she asked. “Go home and help Ellen with wedding arrangements or something.”
Caleb and Ellen had met on a job and gotten engaged about six minutes later. He pretty much lived over at her place now, and he’d become more of a father to her son, Henry, than the two-year-old’s real father ever had.
“God, no. She won’t let me near any of the wedding stuff. But I did tell Henry I’d take him to the hardware store.”
“So why aren’t you doing that?”
Katie spotted an exit and swerved toward it, weaving nimbly through three lanes of traffic. The gas tank was getting low.
“I’ve got payroll to figure out first.”
She caught herself right before the words left her mouth.
I can do that when I get back
.
It was the kind of thing a self-sacrificing doormat would say, not a slick professional. A decade of specializing in being a doormat had left her rumpled and ground down, with boot prints on her forehead.
Time to stop jumping to the rescue.
“You should hire somebody else to do payroll, now that I have a new job,” she said instead.
At the end of the off ramp she turned—a little too fast, perhaps, because she got distracted by the fact that Sean was looking directly at her. Somehow he made looking look like not-looking. As though he could see her, but he couldn’t be bothered to
see
her.
How was she supposed to concentrate on Caleb talking about payroll when Sean was not-looking at her that way?
She didn’t know what the guy’s deal was. It seemed as if he didn’t approve of her—though what it was about her he disliked, she had no idea. Her personality, her being on the job, her existence?
Sean had been working for her brother since the summer, and in that time he and Caleb
had grown thick as thieves. He spent hours every week in Caleb’s office, a solid panel of pine muffling the mingled sound of their voices as they bent their heads over some obscure security challenge and Katie tried to get her work done at the reception desk a few feet away.
Then he would come out, fix her with that blue stare, nod like a robot, and leave.
She’d tried being nice to him, reminding him they’d gone to high school together and sat by each other in Algebra II and Trig. She’d tried ignoring him. She’d tried glaring at him and even, one embarrassing day, flirting with him. Nothing made a difference.
He didn’t speak to her. Not at all, not ever, not under any circumstances. It was extremely weird, and it drove her nuts.
Caleb was way too casual about it.
Don’t send me to Louisville with him
, she’d begged.
He hates me
.
No, he doesn’t
, Caleb had said.
I’m positive he doesn’t hate you. You two just need to work it out between you
.
She didn’t know how to work it out, but she refused to let Sean get to her. This job was the big chance she’d been waiting for—her opportunity to get out of Camelot and see new places, rub elbows with interesting people, become somebody independent of Levi and Caleb. Her
own
somebody.
Judah Pratt saw her potential. The singer-songwriter had asked for her specifically. And okay, yes, maybe Judah’s interest in her was largely carnal, but an opportunity was an opportunity. She’d only been in his Chicago apartment for half an hour when it arrived: he’d announced that he would hire Camelot Security, but only if he could have Katie.
He’d said it just like that, too.
Only if I can have Katie
. A week later, the memory retained the power to send shivers skittering up her spine.
Or it usually did. It was a little hard to get swept up in her Judah fantasies with Sean sitting next to her, emanating stony disapproval of … something. Her being assigned to work with him. The way she breathed. Her boots. Who knew?
“Katie?” Caleb interrupted her reverie.
“What?”
“Are you even listening to me?”
“Sure.” She rewound her brain, hoping to locate some phantom memory of what he’d said when she wasn’t paying attention.
Nada
. “What did you say?”
“When did you stop listening?”
“Uh, payroll?”
“Never mind. The upshot is, you’ve still got your old job when you come back.”
“Yeah, but after I completely blow your socks off, you’ll need someone else to do my old job.”
“Please don’t try to blow my socks off. Be safe.”
“Right, right.” She turned into the gas station. “I’ve got to go.”
“One last thing.”
“What?”
“I want you to keep your distance from Pratt.”
“Caleb—”
“No, I’m serious. Sean, I need your help here. Keep the guy away from my sister. I don’t trust him not to take advantage.”
Katie pulled to a stop beside a pump, her blood boiling. There was overprotective, and then there was stifling. She loved Caleb and all, but she wasn’t about to let him smother her to death.
Sean had turned to look at her. He had the most astonishing eyes. Dark, dark blue, with thunderstorms in them.
She lifted her chin. “That isn’t necessary,” she told Caleb.
“I think it is.”
“No, it isn’t. If Judah wants to take advantage of me, I’m all for it.”
Sean blinked.
“Katie,” Caleb said, a note of warning in his voice.
“Stop. You don’t want to have this conversation any more than I do, so just drop it, okay?”
Sean got out of the car. Katie watched him go, uneasy but resolved. It was hard enough to defeat her own internal censor. She didn’t need two men dog-piling on to judge her ability to make decisions about her own freaking sex life.
Not that she had a sex life.
“Believe me, I would love to drop it,” Caleb said. “But I don’t think I can.”
“Try. I’m a grown woman. I have condoms. I think I’ve got this under control.”
Sean tapped on the passenger-side window and pointed toward the gas tank. Katie popped the fuel door for him, and he swept one open palm in the direction of the gasoline options. “The cheap stuff,” she said, loud enough for him to hear her through the window. He nodded and turned his back on her.
“I don’t imagine you care,” Caleb said carefully, “but I think your sleeping with Judah is a bad idea.”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“It’s unethical.”
Now
that
was just unfair. Six months ago, Caleb had asked Katie if she thought it would be unethical for
him
to get involved with a client. She’d thought about it and told him no—that it depended on the situation, and in the situation he and Ellen had been in, it was fine.
She’d come to the same conclusion about this Judah job. It would be one thing if Judah were traumatized by fear, quaking in his boots and relying on Katie to keep him safe, but that just wasn’t the case. She was along for the ride. Why not make the ride a little more enjoyable—especially when Judah had made his interest in climbing aboard more than clear?
Maybe it wouldn’t be the smartest move of her life, or the most romantic, but “romantic” wasn’t what Katie was looking for from Judah. If she had to pick one adjective to describe what she was looking for, it would be “torrid.”
Or “inadvisable.” She’d never had inadvisable sex before. She’d had Levi, the high
school sweetheart who’d given her every single one of her firsts: first kiss, first sex, first orgasm, first wedding, first abandonment, first divorce.
Considering that Levi had walked out on her almost two years ago—two long, transformative, sexless years—and the ink had finally dried on her divorce papers a few weeks back, “torrid and inadvisable” sounded like just the ticket. Katie wanted to throw herself headlong into new experiences, skate the edge of recklessness, flirt with disaster.
All while behaving safely and responsibly, of course. No need to get Caleb’s panties in a twist.
Her brother was silent. He seemed to be waiting for a reply to a question she wasn’t sure she’d heard him ask. She tried out another “Mmm-hmm.”
“I didn’t even like the guy,” he said.
“I noticed that.”
“You can do better.”
Judah had unruly black curls and huge, dark eyes. He had a low, sexy voice that she loved to listen to when she was tired, lonely, and in need of a glass of wine.
And maybe it was starry-eyed of her, but she felt as though she already knew him from his music. When he’d said he wanted her on the case, she’d hoped it was because he shared that feeling of familiarity, and their deep, instant connection would lead to awesome conversation and multiple orgasms.
But really, she’d settle for a less-than-mystical experience if it meant she finally got some action.
“I don’t think I want to do better,” she said.
“Fine.” Caleb sounded resigned. “I’ll stay out of it. But I’m going on record as strongly disapproving.”
“Got it.”
The gas pump shut off with a hollow mechanical thump, and Sean turned to the machine to wait for a receipt, shoulders hunched against the January chill. The wind ruffled his short
blond hair and turned the tips of his ears red. He had to be freezing his ass off out there.
Katie was hoping Louisville would be warmer than Camelot had been lately. It was only a four-hour drive, but Kentucky was the South, right? Gray skies and freezing rain had been haunting central Ohio for so long, she could hardly remember what the sun looked like.
All week, she’d been dreaming of Kentucky bluegrass. Totally unrealistic, given the time of year and the fact that she was about to spend the weekend in some dank, beer-piss-smelling nightclub, but she couldn’t turn the daydreaming off. Her mind had a mind of its own.
“Let me talk to Owens,” Caleb said.
“What for?”
“None of your business.”
“Is it about work or my personal life?”
“Also none of your business.” His voice had gone all clipped. She wasn’t getting anything else out of him.
She tried anyway. “C’mon, Caleb. It’s my phone.”
“Put him on.”
“Yeah, fine. Okay.” She jimmied the phone out of its cradle and leaned way over to open the passenger-side door a crack. “Caleb wants to talk to you.”
Sean took the phone, and she closed the door, not wanting any more cold air to get into her toasty car than necessary. He walked ten feet away and lifted the phone to his ear.
She imagined what he’d sound like if she could hear him. He had an unusual way of shaping words. Every syllable came out perfectly enunciated, as if he had nothing better to do than tumble the sounds around his tongue.
She liked listening to him talk. Yet another reason it chapped her hide that he wouldn’t speak to her.
After a minute, he disconnected the call and folded himself into the car. He was too tall for a compact. Too broad, too. He brought the cold air in with him, and she could feel the chill coming off his black leather jacket and soaking into her right shoulder.
“You good to go?” she asked, putting the car in gear and releasing the emergency brake.
He nodded, eyes straight ahead.
“You wanna drive?” They’d already begun rolling toward the exit. “Speak now or forever hold your peace.”
If he thought she was funny, he didn’t show it. Instead, he waved her on, settled back in his seat, and closed his eyes.
Sean Owens: World’s Most Boring Copilot.
One of her favorite Judah songs came up on the stereo, so Katie cranked the volume and started to sing along, bouncing gently up and down in a low-key car dance.
Caleb couldn’t spoil this for her, and neither could Sean. Nervousness be damned—she was on a mission. She had sixty miles left to drive, a job to do, a future to claim.
Plus, if everything went according to plan, she was going to get laid this weekend.
This trip was the single most exciting thing to happen to her in a long time.
Read on for an excerpt from Toni Aleo’s
Taking Shots
Chapter 1
Eleanor “Elli” Fisher didn’t understand why she was so forgetful. She was convinced that if her ass wasn’t attached to her, she would forget it at home too. But really? How in the world did she forget all the bulbs for her light stands?!
Elli stood in the entrance of the Luther Arena, waiting for Harper Allen, her assistant, to bring the bulbs back from her studio on the western side of Nashville. This was one of the most important days of her career and she forgot the bulbs.
God, I am an idiot
.
How did she manage this? She ran her hand through her unruly brown curly hair, sighing. As if forgetting the bulbs wasn’t enough, she was also having a really crappy hair day. This was her first year with the Nashville Assassins. She couldn’t blow it. Being chosen to be the photographer for a hockey team was huge, but when it was for the team that just won the Stanley Cup and had the prospect of winning again? Hello, it was HUGE.
When she saw Harper running into the arena with the bulbs in hand, she let out the breath she had been holding. Damn, that was fast.
“For Christ’s sake! It’s a mad house out there!” Harper complained in her thick southern accent. Her hair was in spikes this week. The spikes were also purple, which made it even more interesting. Hadn’t she discussed with Harper how they needed to keep a professional image? Yes, purple was a team color.
But still!
“I know, come on. Let’s go put the bulbs in.” She didn’t have time to have it out with Harper right now; she had to get to the ice. They all but ran towards the entrance to the ice. Once there, she was greeted by the Assassins’ PR rep.
“Ms. Fisher, how do you do? Are you ready?”
Melody Yates was intense. That was the only way Elli could describe her. She was from New Jersey, and had been converted into a Southerner. And that made no damn sense to Elli, but whatever, this was her boss. So she flashed a huge grin and turned on her southern charm.
“Yes, ma’am. Let my assistant put these bulbs in, and we can get started.”
“Good, the boys will be out soon. Then we’ll go downstairs for the other shots we need.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Harper ran ahead of them and started setting everything up. Elli took in a deep breath. She had been photographing weddings almost her whole adult life, and now she was moving to sports. She had always wanted to do sports photography, partly because she had such a love for hockey, but she never could get an opportunity. Now, thanks to a job opening, and being related to the owner of the Assassins, here she was.
This was her chance.
A big one.
Harper handed Elli her camera with a big smile. Harper knew how important this day was, and also how nervous Elli was.
“Go on over there and let me test shoot, Harp.” Harper started towards the goal and turned with a stick in her hand, making a stern face. It brought a smile to Elli’s face. Harper was a dork, but God, Elli loved her. After fixing the aperture on her camera, Elli called Harper over as the guys started skating onto the ice.
“Good golly, Miss Molly! Look at them! Good Lord! They are gorgeous!” Harper whispered as all the guys came out and sat on the bench. Elli took her time looking the guys over. They were gorgeous, alright. But she already knew that, since she never missed a home game. Sometimes she thought it was the uniforms: bright purple and black, with a masked man on the front of the jerseys that brought out their good looks. But nope, even with the helmets off, these men were just plain gorgeous.
Getting back in the zone, she called for the coaches first. Trying to bottle her nerves, she got started. After shooting the coaches, it was on to the team. Each player came out in front of the goal, striking his pose. Elli zoomed in, taking a head shot before taking one with him holding a stick. After that picture, each lined up for an action shot, which consisted of skating towards her while shooting a puck. During all of this, Harper offered up commentary.
“For the love of God, El, that dude is hot!” Elli rolled her eyes, taking the shots she needed.
“Hush, Harp.”
“No, really. Like, please, can I hit on one of them? Just one?”
“No.”
“You’re no fun.”
Elli laughed it off. She was starting to get into her groove, just as the captain and the alternate captains came off the bench.
“Oh, to hell with what you say. Number two is mine, after this!” Elli gave her a pointed look as Jakob Titov, the Assassins’ leading scoring forward, skated in front of the goal. Jakob was extremely good looking, with hard lines to his face, bright green eyes, and dark brown hair. He was a looker, but not Elli’s type.
He reminded her too much of her ex-boyfriend.
“Hush, Harper!” Elli said as she took the shots she needed. What she didn’t need was Jakob making eyes at her assistant, which he did. And, of course, Harper returned them. She didn’t know why it bothered her so much that Harper always flirted with the clients. It didn’t matter how old they were or what they looked like, or even if they were the groom. She always found something in them that she liked. It was probably the fact that they all had a penis.
Elli loved Harper, but Harper was a little promiscuous and didn’t care who knew. Guys had no worth to her unless they were naked and inside her, as she always said. Elli always wondered what made Harper that way. It made no sense. There had never been a guy who had done Harper wrong in the twenty two years they had been friends. Her parents were good people. So Elli really didn’t understand where it came from. And, of course, guys liked Harper. She was wild, beautiful, skinny, and amazing.
Everything Elli wasn’t.
Jakob lined up, giving her his action shot. After she got it, he skated towards her and Harper instead of his teammates.
What the hell was he doing?
“Nice hair, beautiful,” he flirted in his thick Russian accent. Harper just smiled widely, as Elli flushed deep red. Elli didn’t know why she was embarrassed, but she was. She didn’t want attention on Harper right now, not with the importance of this job.
“Nice stick,” Harper said, looking down at where he was holding his stick. Jakob gave her a devilish smile and skated towards the bench.
“You are impossible, Harper Allen,” Elli said, flustered.
After getting it together, Alex Welch came next. Alex was easy to shoot. He had good lines, and bright blue eyes, so the pictures were bound to be fabulous. Next was the captain, Shea Adler.
Elli blushed as she got to the close-up of Shea. She had always thought the defenseman was gorgeous. With his almost black hair that fell in the brightest blue eyes she had ever seen, and a crooked nose that had been broken two years ago during a game with the Red Wings, she had to admit that she had a little bit of a crush on him. When he smiled, her heart melted. Yeah, his teeth were probably false, but damn, he had a pretty mouth.
“Why’s he blinking so much?” Harper asked. Elli was too busy looking at his mouth to notice.
“Harp, shut up,” she whispered, but then she noticed that the captain was blinking a little too much.
“Is he hitting on you?”
“Oh, my God!”
Elli’s whole face flushed deep red as she looked down at the picture viewer of her camera. In all the pictures, the captain’s eyes were shut. Elli looked up, and Shea was rubbing his eyes.
“Mr. Adler,” she said as she started walking towards him. He looked over at her.
“I’m sorry, but I need you to stop blinking. Your eyes are closed in every picture I have taken.”
“I’m sorry.”
Oh God, his voice was butter, thick with a Boston accent. Elli swore she came at the sound of it.
“I got new contacts and they are bugging the hell out of me.”
“Someone get Adler another pair!” somebody yelled as he pinched the little lenses out of his eyes, throwing them down on the ice.
“We can do this without them, right?”
Elli just nodded. Gosh, he was gorgeous! He tried to make eye contact with her, and it was obvious that it was hard for him to see.
“I won’t be able to see your beautiful face for a little bit, but I’ll have a new pair soon. Then I can stare some more.”
Elli stood there blinking.
Was he flirting with her?
Did he just call her beautiful?
She turned without a word and went back to work. When it came time for Shea Adler to skate off, he ran into the goal, then the wall, before making it to the bench. Everyone was in a fit of laughter except for Elli. She was still in shock.
Shea Adler had called her beautiful.
After the shoot downstairs, which consisted of the guys in sexy suits holding their hockey sticks, Harper and Elli started cleaning up and tearing down the equipment. Elli didn’t hire big crews; she didn’t like them. All she needed was Harper and two other assistants, and she was good. The day had been great. All the shots were fantastic. Once she edited them, they would be golden. The guys were amazing and sweet, not really as cocky as the sports reporters make them sound. They were good guys.
Elli was packing up her camera when she saw Jakob Titov coming towards her. He gave her a grin before going over to where Harper was standing. She watched as he flirted with Harper, who was playing hard to get; something she had perfected. Jakob pulled his phone out as she did the same. They were exchanging numbers. He asked her something and Harper just giggled and then leaned forward, giving him a kiss on his cheek.
Jakob put his hand on his heart before stepping backwards, a dazed look on his face, causing Harper to laugh. He shot her a wave as he left with his bag over his shoulder. Harper smiled and looked over at Elli. “He’ll call when he gets in the car,” she said as she walked towards Elli with the rods from the light stands.
“How do you know? He said that?”
“Nope, but I know his type. Needy.”
The sad thing was that Harper was probably right.
Elli looked down at her camera, taking care to put it away. As she zipped the zipper to her purple and black bag, (Yes, team colors) she cursed herself for being shy and stupid with guys. When Shea said she was beautiful, she should have said something clever. That’s what Harper would do. But nope, she just stood there blinking and looking downright stupid.
Elli knew the problem. It was the fact that she had no confidence at all. She didn’t think she was good enough for male attention. She wouldn’t say she was plus-sized, but she was thick. She wasn’t a size two anymore. Nope. Good ole ten now. Even with her thyroid medicine to help with her hypothyroidism, she still couldn’t keep the weight off. It
didn’t matter if she had great fashion sense to cover her dumpy body, guys just didn’t hit on her the way they had when she was 18 and a size two. It was depressing, because Elli was lonely.
Elli would never admit it to anyone, but she wanted that “happily-ever-after”.
She always put on the front that she liked being alone and didn’t need a man, but it was such a lie. Elli wished she could be like her older sister, Victoria, who loved being single, loved sleeping with different men, but Elli just couldn’t do it. Sex was such a private thing and with the way she felt about her body, no one was getting her undressed until she knew she loved him and he loved her.
After packing everything on the carts, they started pushing them down the hall towards the car. After three trips, they had everything packed, and were walking toward their cars when Harper’s phone rang. Elli didn’t even stay back to listen. She kept walking with a wave as Harper cooed into her phone.
Once in her F-150, (hey, trucks aren’t just for boys), she drove off towards the west end of Nashville to get onto the interstate. She’d planned to ask Harper if she could stay the night with her since she was stupid tired and didn’t want to drive for forty five minutes, but it looked like Harper was going to be busy. So Elli decided to go home. She hit the interstate, preparing herself for the drive. It was probably good that she was going home. She had forgotten to call Ally, her neighbor, to let her dog out.
When Elli had purchased the old country home outside of Nashville five years ago, it had seemed like a great idea. The studio had been open for two years. It was thriving and she wanted a home, not some apartment or condo. She bought it without even looking at anything else. It was the house for her. After five years, it wasn’t the old country home she had bought. It was a masterpiece. Everything had been redone: the décor classic and beautiful.
Whenever Elli’s dad came to visit, he would always say that it was like he was standing in sunshine because it was so bright. She smiled just thinking about it. She was so proud of both her studio and home. They showed the world that she was doing something with her life. They proved that she didn’t need her family’s money, that she was successful after losing her stint on Broadway, and that she could live without Justin, her ex.
She pulled into her round driveway, grabbing all of her bags. Even before getting to the door, she heard her pug running down the hall, and then the barking started.
“I know, Adler. I’m home, darling, hold on.” Elli opened the door and her 40 pound pug attacked her. Well, he tried to, at least. She laughed as she threw her keys in the basket by the door. She bent down to her puppy, who was struggling to breathe.
“Oh my goodness, Adler, honey. Breathe, darling.” Elli pet him until he calmed down, kissed the top of his head, and then locked the door as her house phone rang. She didn’t answer it. She knew it was her mother, and Elli was not in the mood to talk to her. The machine picked up and her mother’s voice rang over the machine, telling her to call her. She pushed delete before going to the kitchen for some dinner. She decided on a frozen dinner, since she didn’t feel like cooking. She went to get her laptop while her food cooked in the microwave.
Elli walked through her bright yellow living room. She loved the décor in here. The gleaming walls accented the black wrap-around couches that had matching throw pillows. The couches brought the room together. Her extremely large TV, a gift from her father because she loved watching the away games in HD, hung above her mantel that held pictures of her nieces and nephews. She smiled as she passed them to get her laptop. She loved her nieces and nephews, and couldn’t wait to take them to the park next weekend when they came for their monthly visit.