Sizzle in the City (7 page)

Belying his suggestion, his mouth covered hers with assurance, his tongue sliding between her lips in a teasing invitation that she felt to her toes. She leaned against him, feeling his muscle tone and the heat of his body through his pristine white shirt.

Desire, hot and sweet, invaded her as it hadn’t in a long, long time.

Or at least since last night anyway.

Everything about him called to her. She wanted to know if he’d been as scared to leave all he’d known in England, just as she’d been both terrified and excited to move away from her childhood home. She wondered if his father’s indifference had spurred him to the great success he’d clearly achieved. She longed to know everything from his views on politics to his favorite music and foods.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and held him against her. The kiss went on with their hearts racing in sync and long, drugging sensations that seduced her more thoroughly than she’d ever known.

“Well?” he asked, pulling back.

Hazy from the sweet sensation of his kiss, Shelby fought to remember where she was—other than in his arms—what year it was or what planet she inhabited. Her gaze focused on his mouth as she wondered when she could have it on hers again. “Hmm?”

“Technique, my lady.”

“Oh.” She blinked. “Right. Yes, well…” She cleared her throat and prayed her brain would communicate something intelligible to her mouth. “Excellent work, your Lordship.”

“Glad to hear it. Men do have an ego where these things are concerned.”

“Yeah?” She blinked dazedly, as the look in his eyes wasn’t ego, but hunger. “Yours should be secure, then.”

“It’ll hold till Tuesday.” He pressed his lips to hers one last time, then started down the steps. At the bottom, he turned. “Are you sure you don’t have a thing for titles? I wasn’t kidding when I said I don’t have one.”

“Me, either. You started it with the
my lady
business.” Noting he was frowning and realizing this was a hot-button issue for him, she added, “Frankly, I don’t have a clue how the English aristocracy works, and the only title I have a thing for is
chef.
Good enough?”

His smile sent a renewed buzz through her body. “It’s certainly a promising start.”

He walked down the street, and she watched him until his tall silhouette faded into the night.

She was fairly certain she’d fallen into a fairy tale. Hadn’t Victoria said Robin Hood was a myth when they’d started on this crazy project? By agreeing to the plan had she somehow challenged the time-space continuum and blurred the lines between fantasy and reality?

“No,” she muttered to herself, unlocking the door. “But you’ve certainly been watching too many late-night movies on the SciFi channel.”

Despite the fact that Trevor was related to the man she’d targeted for revenge, the attraction was enticing and exciting. Why shouldn’t she pursue it?

Because, other than hot kisses and family trials, he’s as out of your league as the aliens in the movie you watched last Friday night.

Her practical voice also reminded her she was inching toward the unethical side of the line. Hell, if she turned around she’d probably see the line behind her.

But all she could think about was how to get closer to Trevor.

6

Project Robin Hood, Day Nine

Big Apple Catering, The Kitchen

“B
OUNCED
!” S
HELBY
SHOUTED
, slapping the offending, worthless check on the prep counter. “The man is a menace.”

“I can’t imagine why you’re surprised,” Victoria commented, flipping through a fashion magazine. “The guy’s an idiot.”

“He has a certain amount of charm,” Calla said.

Victoria shook her head.
“Please.”

“Surely you recall that he’s lured a lot of people into giving him their life savings,” Calla argued.

“Not any people I know.”

“Oh, right. You’re infallible. Maybe you should sell savvy lessons.” Calla smiled with mock sweetness. “Then again…that last client of yours and his organic toothpaste were both horrible.”

Victoria slapped her magazine closed. “It was not. And what does that have to do with Max Banfield?”

From years of practice, Shelby tuned out her friends’ bickering. It was like being caught at a tennis match between Pollyanna and Darth Vader.

Her thoughts instead turned to Max’s upcoming investors’ meeting. Neither Victoria nor Calla had been able to get a lead on when, where or specifically what the meeting was being organized for. Max was either very selective about his invitees, or he’d simply been bragging at the party, and the meeting was a myth.

Trevor would know.

They were due to have dinner that night. She’d asked her friends to meet her in her kitchen because she was frantically baking cookies for both him and Mario, the Italian chef Trevor had accused of flirting with her on their Friday-night date.

She and Trevor had talked and texted several times since then. While she’d worked three events over the weekend, he’d spent the time at his house in the Hamptons. For some reason, the dichotomy didn’t bother her. But then she was currently involved in a delusion involving a mythical vigilante, so her judgment was shaky at best.

She’d gotten a stunning bouquet of flowers that morning. Trevor had admitted in the note that his secretary—aka Florence, the former governess—had picked them out, as he’d been in Boston since Monday morning.

So honest.

She’d prided herself on the same. At least she had a couple of weeks ago.

Now she was caught between what she needed and what was right. And that revelation went straight back to her plan to ruin Max. Was she getting justice, or was she unjustifiably vengeful? In her investigation, would she hurt those who were innocent? Should she be patient and hope the authorities would make him pay?

Eventually, anyway.

No easy answers. Like the most challenging of life’s fights, not everybody could win, not everybody would be satisfied with the battle plan. Not all the lieutenants…

She whirled to her friends. “His assistant would know about the meeting.”

Her friends stopped long enough to drag themselves from their debate and gave her identically confused looks. “Who’s assistant?” Calla asked.

“Max’s.” The oven timer beeped, so Shelby retrieved the last batch of cookies. “Somebody’s fielding calls, sending out invites and booking a conference room.”

“He could be doing all that himself,” Victoria said, though she looked speculative. “He could be holding the meeting in his own hotel.”

“You really think Max is doing his own paperwork?” Calla asked, clearly doubtful.

“Exactly.” Shelby ripped off her oven mitt and approached the kitchen’s center island where her friends had gathered. “So there’s a secretary, assistant or clerk who knows what’s going on. We just have to get to her.”

“Or him,” Calla said.

“Her,” Victoria insisted. “You really think Max is evolved enough to have a male assistant?”

“He has an office somewhere,” Shelby said, hoping to head off another skirmish. “Let’s find out where. Did either of you get his card?”

Victoria nodded. “I did, but no address. Just a phone and email.”

“We could ask sexy Detective Antonio,” Calla said.

“I don’t care how sexy he is,” Victoria said, raising her eyebrows. “Which you’ve reminded us of at least four times in the last hour, by the way. The last thing we need is a New York City cop catching wind of what we’re doing.”

They hadn’t really done anything. Not yet.

Except lie,
her conscience reminded her brutally.

“Max’s card is a place to start.” Shelby paced beside the counter. “What’re we going to do when we find the address, though? March in and demand the assistant hand over the investors’ information?”

“Maybe your boyfriend can help us out,” Victoria said drily.

Shelby shook her head. “Trevor is far from my boyfriend, and I’m not getting him involved in this, regardless.”

“Why not?” Victoria asked.

Shelby knew her excuse would sound lame, but she was going for it anyway. “I’m keeping him and Max separate.”

“Separate?” Calla echoed, sounding doubtful.

“Does the phrase
sleeping with the enemy
ring any bells?” Victoria asked, typically blunt.

Shelby shook her head. “I’m not sleeping with him.”

“Not yet,” Victoria said.

“Trevor doesn’t have anything to do with Max’s schemes,” Shelby insisted, transferring the cookies to a cooling rack.

Victoria swiped a warm cookie from the pan. “And you know that due to his good looks and slick, flirty smile?”

“Stop already,” Calla said. “I happen to agree with Shelby.” Before Victoria could follow through with another reality check, she added, “Which I base on hard evidence. He’s loaded because of legitimate means. Why would he need a shady scheme?”

Victoria shrugged. “Some people do it for the thrill.”

Calla narrowed her eyes. “Now you’re being deliberately difficult.”

With obvious joy, Victoria contemplated another bite of her cookie. “When am I ever easy?”

Calla and Shelby exchanged commiserating looks. Despite Victoria’s healthy bank account and in-crowd business connections, she had plenty of issues to deal with. Her drive to succeed was a living, breathing, often invincible force that ruled her life.

Calla slipped her arm around Victoria’s shoulders. “Never. It’s part of your charm.”

Smiling, Shelby moved the cooled cookies to a pastry box. “You know we’re grateful for your honesty.”

“We could all use a bit of bluntness at the moment,” Calla added.

“Fine,” Victoria said. “Ask Trevor about the investors’ meeting.”

Shelby closed the box. “He doesn’t know anything.”

Victoria leaned toward her. “Bet he does.”

On the other side of the counter, Shelby mirrored her pose. “Bet what?”

Victoria brandished the remains of her chocolate-infused cookie. “My own dozen of these.”

“What do I get if I win?” Shelby asked, wondering if she should patent the recipe, since it was such an obvious hit.

“The information about the investors’ meeting.”

Not a bad trade, really. Shelby would show her cynical friend that Trevor was one of the rare good guys. “Deal.”

Victoria’s only response was a triumphant smile as she polished off the last of the cookie.

Shelby had loaded her pastry boxes into the catering company’s logo tote bags—one for Mario, one for Trevor—when complete comprehension over her agreement hit home.

She’d been goaded into asking Trevor about his brother.

“What have I done?” she wondered aloud as she sank against the counter.

“Remembered that you’re supposed to be helping us help you help your parents,” Victoria said calmly.

Shelby glanced around her kitchen, her pride and joy, the heart and soul of her business. If she had to sell everything and go home to take care of her parents, this would be nothing but a memory. Sure, she could start over in Savannah, but how many years would it take to claw her way back to the moderate success she’d worked and sacrificed to gain in New York? What would she tell her employees, many of whom had been with her since the beginning?

And even if that potential nightmare didn’t worry her, the idea of partitioning Max and Trevor into separate areas of her life seemed lame and most likely futile. Making Max pay was only going to come about through clever plans, total dedication and a whole lot of luck.

If she wasn’t very, very careful, though, she wasn’t only going to break a few eggs, she was going to burn them to ash.

Victoria gave Calla a sage look. “She’s more worried about upsetting Trevor than getting revenge on Max.”

Shelby straightened. “I am not.”

Though, admittedly, she was looking forward to seeing Trevor so much, she’d been preoccupied enough to reach for cinnamon instead of cayenne pepper when making jambalaya that morning.

“So you’ll ask him about the meeting,” Victoria insisted.

Sighing, Shelby reluctantly nodded. “Fine.”

She wondered if she should ruin her date before or after she got her sixty-dollar steak.

* * *

A
FEW
HOURS
LATER
, S
HELBY
set down her fork with a different kind of sigh. “That was the most amazing steak I’ve ever eaten.”

Staring at her over the rim of his wineglass, Trevor’s dreamy blue eyes glowed. “It was a pleasure to watch you eat it.”

Shelby cocked her head. “You’re not some kind of weirdo who gets off watching women chew, are you?”

“No.” He laughed. “Is there an epidemic of that kind of guy?”

“In this city, you never know.”

“Yes, I suppose that’s true. I’m simply glad we’re compatible in our culinary interests. A lot of women these days eat nothing but salad.”

“Not me. I’d rather run on the treadmill regularly and eat well.”

“Me, too.”

He was just so damn likable, agreeable, as well as gorgeous. Plus, for a caterer, if the guy wasn’t into food, then automatically there was going to be a problem.

You mean, other than the fact that you’re about to tell a big fat lie to further your own agenda at the expense of his family?

“Speaking of eating well…” she began, dismissing her conscience like a switch of a light. “I’ve ordered everything for your dinner party on Friday. I got a beautiful tenderloin. I could cut it into filets, but I was thinking about doing something more old-school. How do you feel about Beef Wellington?”

“As in the Duke at Waterloo?”

“That’s the one. At first I thought the paté and puff pastry were too fussy, but you can cut the dish at the table, which makes things more homey. Even a manly man kind of thing.”

“A manly man kind of thing,” he repeated, looking confused.

“Yeah, you know, like a
Release the hounds!
bonding experience. Didn’t you tell me these clients of yours have a hunting lodge in Ohio?”

“They do.” He smiled suddenly, brushing his lips across her cheek and sending her pulse into overdrive. “Brilliant. They’ll love it. You’ve thought of everything.”

“That’s what I get paid for. You’re my client, so my goal is to make the clients happy. Speaking of clients… Do you have any idea what’s involved in this investors’ meeting of Max’s?”

Trevor blinked. Complete bafflement suffused his face for several seconds. “Investors’… Max? My brother Max?”

“Right. Another great client.” She decided against mentioning the bounced check. “He told Victoria about some kind of meeting for an investment project, but they got separated during the party, and she never heard all the details. She asked me if I’d talk to you, see if you knew what was going on.”

Not a lie. Well, not all of it anyway.

Trevor said nothing, merely linking his fingers, then lightly resting his chin on them. It was a precisely choreographed pose—Central Casting’s version of Deep in Thought.

His reaction made Shelby’s mouth go dry.
He knows something.

“Hmm,” he murmured. “That’s odd. He never mentioned this to me.”

“Does he usually?”

“He invests in various projects.” Trevor chuckled but Shelby could hear the tension underlying the humor. “Much more adventurous than I am, certainly.”

“That’s strange. Victoria’s pretty conservative.”

“But she’s wealthy.”

There seemed little point in denying the obvious. Trevor had had ample time to discover who Victoria was, but had he taken the time? Maybe this was some kind of test of Shelby’s honesty?

Which you’d fail, by the way.

Shelby nodded. “Her last name is Holmes, as in the Holmes Cardiac Wing at Midtown Memorial. As in Wyforth, Holmes and Stein, law firm to the stars.”

Trevor’s mouth tightened. “I see.”

“Do you think your brother’s next project is really risky?”

Trevor’s expression instantly cleared. “I’m sure it’s fine. Would you like me to ask Max about it?”