Strictly Business

What a shame he was gay.

Even the driving music, the high-pitched hysterical laughter, the roving spotlights couldn’t distract Jess Brannen. Her gaze was riveted to the tall man standing near the doors of the banquet room. He was glaring at the young male dancer, aptly named Adonis, who was slowly peeling off his shirt to the screams of enthusiastic women. The lines of the man’s mouth became even grimmer when the stripper, hips gyrating rhythmically, tossed the shirt onto one of the tables. Five women pounced on it, literally ripping it to shreds as each grappled for a souvenir.

From her place near the back of the room, Jess carefully watched for a reaction. His arms were folded across his chest, and she could see his body stiffen, the muscles of his jaw tighten.

His stony expression triggered a memory, and she realized she’d seen this man before. Immediately, she shifted so she no longer had a clear view of him. She prayed the same was true for him.

Although she’d never met Nick Mikaris, fastest-rising builder in the Philadelphia area, she had seen his picture in the business section of the newspaper several weeks ago. She had a meeting with Mikaris Tuesday morning to discuss her firm’s doing the landscaping for his latest project, MeadowHill, and she didn’t want him to recognize her as a spectator at a male strip show. Businesspeople could be very quirky about something like that.

But if it was Mikaris, why was
he
here?

Maybe she was worried for nothing, she thought. Maybe it wasn’t he, just someone who looked like the picture. Photos could be deceiving. She decided to risk a peek.

It was he.

It was the same set of the jaw, but the picture didn’t begin to do him justice. Although his features were too sharp for him to be truly handsome, he gave off an air of potent virility. She judged him to be about six feet in height. He was lean, with dark hair brushed back from his forehead. His simple pullover and gray slacks revealed the well-toned muscles of his body. He was a very attractive man—and definitely possessive of the dancer.

Suddenly Mikaris turned his head, and she found herself staring directly into his eyes. Even from twenty feet away, she could easily feel his gaze rake her. Her blood flowed hot and thick in blinding response, and her breasts ached almost painfully. Molten sensations swirled around her belly and thighs.

With a mighty effort, Jess ducked her head. She immediately took a huge gulp of her drink, but the chilled Bahama Mama didn’t help. Her face was flushed with embarrassment, and she groaned to
herself. Of all the idiotic things to do! She hoped he hadn’t had a good enough look at her to actually identify her. To insure he wouldn’t, she planned to look entirely different for the meeting—exactly like a businesswoman who would be shocked at the very idea of attending a show like this one. If only she hadn’t been so intrigued by him in the first place.…

She must be drunk, she decided, frowning at her glass. It was only her second drink, and the fruity concoction was supposed to be fairly innocent. But the combination of the drinks, little dinner, and total exhaustion was making her silly. Her movements did seem awkward, and her head was too heavy for her neck. That was it, she thought in relief. She was just a little bit tipsy. Maybe more than a little, she conceded. But that explained her unusual reaction to the man.

“Jess! He’s at our table!” Although her best friend, Sandy Fitzgerald, was literally rubbing shoulders with her, Sandy had to shout over the din.

In a panic, Jess looked around, then shivered with relief when she saw Sandy meant the dancer, Adonis. He was performing directly in front of reserved, elegant Gwen. Laughter overtook Jess when Gwen pulled the linen tablecloth over her head. Gwen was taking Sandy’s practical joke well, Jess thought.

The five women, Sandy, Gwen, Adele, Miranda, and herself, had been close friends since they’d attended Bryn Mawr College together, and every year one of the group played a practical joke on another. This time Gwen had been Sandy’s victim. Dinner and gambling in Atlantic City had actually been a “Ladies’ Night” show at the Breakers Casino/Hotel—the very last thing Philadelphia socialite Gwen
Halloran would ever attend. This joke had been perfect and diabolical in its simplicity, Jess thought, and Gwen had been truly caught. Although they had all been shocked initially by the male strippers, they had soon relaxed and begun enjoying themselves, even laughing at the men’s outrageousness. It was innocent fun, Jess decided, wiping the tears from her eyes.

Adonis moved closer to her, and her mirth immediately subsided. But the dancer settled on Sandy for his next private audience, and she started to relax.…

Her entire body froze when the good-looking dancer turned to her. He gave her a lazy smile, while his hips began to circle slowly. She hadn’t realized how tiny his G-string was. The damn thing was almost nonexistent!

“Oh, no!” she moaned, and buried her face in her hands.

“Stop being a prude, Jess!” Sandy shouted in her ear.

“I’m not!” Jess lied, laughing with good-natured humiliation.

She turned to her friend and spread her fingers wide so she could see perfectly. Sandy burst into laughter. Jess didn’t turn back to the dancer, however. One look had been more than enough.

But Adonis moved closer until he was actually bumping her chair. She instantly closed her fingers together and wished the floor would open up and swallow her. She had to get rid of him.

Snatching up her purse, she grabbed the first bill her fingers touched and shoved it at the dancer. It was a twenty.

Sandy leaned forward and asked dryly, “Would you like change?”

“A Brannen doesn’t wait for change, darling,” Jess drawled in her best Bryn Mawr voice. She didn’t have a smaller bill, and even if she had, she’d be damned before she’d hunt for it.

Adonis kissed her on the cheek and danced away.

“We’re blowing our conservative image to Hades!” Gwen shouted, finally emerging from the tablecloth. Her carefully styled hair wasn’t even mussed.

“You are,” Jess screamed over the pounding music. “I have to keep up the family image of eccentricity!”

“What?”

Jess waved her hand. Her throat was already raw, and it would never carry past three people. She watched Gwen nod in understanding about the noise level. Anyway, Gwen already knew what Philadelphia’s first families thought of Jessica Brannen. All the Brannens were noted for flaunting convention upon occasion. Still, her career as a landscaper raised more eyebrows than usual. Why it should, she didn’t know. Doing what she liked and had a talent for made a lot more sense than working at some job she hated.

She chuckled to herself. People might frown, but it didn’t stop them from asking her to landscape their properties.

Suddenly, she felt as if someone were staring at her, and glanced toward the doors. Mikaris whirled on his heel and left the room.

Jess sighed. She hoped she wouldn’t pay for this night out.

And in more ways than one.

• • •

Nick Mikaris strode through the hotel lobby and into the bar. He needed fortification for the upcoming battle with Tony.

“Whiskey. Straight up,” he told the bartender.

When his drink arrived, he just stared at it. Booze wouldn’t help what he was feeling. Damn Tony, he thought, curling his hands into tight fists. He could understand his brother’s need for financial independence. But why did Tony have to take his clothes off in front of hundreds of screaming women to achieve it?

He thought of one woman in there, slim and dark and ethereal, who had stared at him so boldly and made him forget everything but her for a long moment. He cursed and brought his wandering attention back to the problem of Tony. It didn’t matter if the job paid the tuition for law school, he thought angrily. Didn’t Tony realize how this would follow him through his career?

Despite the closed padded doors on the other side of the lobby, he could hear the shrieking women. He deliberately relaxed his body and finally admitted the truth. It was all his fault. At twenty-eight, he hadn’t been prepared to raise a sixteen-year-old boy. He had made mistakes over the past seven years. Too many, obviously. Somehow, somewhere, despite all his care, he had done something that had warped his brother.

And somehow, somewhere, he would have to find the exact right thing that would persuade Tony to give up stripping.

Months of yelling hadn’t worked so far, and Nick thought of his hotel room with grim satisfaction. Tony was supposed to be staying at a motel with the
show, but Nick vowed to keep his hardheaded brother captive here all night until he pounded some sense into him.

“I don’t think it’s fair that Jess can get out of it, but I can’t,” Gwen protested after the show was over.

“That’s because you’re the ‘jokee,’ ” Sandy said, rising from her chair. “You, my dear, have to go backstage and meet the guys in the—”

“Buff?” Jess offered with a straight face.

“Thank you.” Sandy tilted her head in acknowledgment, then turned back to Gwen. “Jess was up at five so she could finish the Howards’ place before coming to the shore. I think we can let her off this one time.” Sandy patted Jess’s shoulder. “We’ll go pick up the room keys, then come back and get you, okay?”

“In the meantime, I’ll take a nap,” Jess said, smiling. “Try not to be an animal, Gwen.”

“Thanks a lot,” Gwen grumbled, and was swept away to her fate.

Jess giggled. Getting out of meeting the male strippers had almost been too easy. Good thing it had, she thought, leaning her elbow on the table. She didn’t have the energy to get out of her chair, let alone the desire to meet nearly naked men. Besides, nothing would ever rival the expression on Gwen’s face when she’d seen the first dancer in action.

Closing her eyes, Jess listened with pleasure as the room quickly cleared out and near silence descended. Every muscle in her body ached as if she had run the Boston Marathon. A dense fog had
enshrouded her brain. If breathing wasn’t involuntary, she’d be in big trouble. She was paying now for her twenty-one-hour day. Leave it to Serena Howard to demand an entire acre of back lawn be dug up and resodded in one day, she thought. Thank goodness Sandy had arranged for the group to stay at the hotel tonight. She never would have survived the long drive back to her home in Yardley, Pennsylvania. All she had to do was stay upright until they came back for her.