Kitabı oku: «Better Than Chocolate...»

1

“JACK LAROUX with his pants off. Now there’s an interesting thought. I’ve heard he’s yumm-o,” Andrea Scarpini declared from her end of the park bench.

“That’s definitely not what I meant when I said I’d beat the pants off LaRoux.” Eve Carmichael laughed, tilting her head back to soak up the early-spring sun filtering through Manhattan high-rises. Although, it was an interesting thought, and one she’d entertained fairly frequently. Eve was pretty sure it meant she needed a life outside of work. But she had no intention of sharing that tidbit with Andrea. “And I don’t care if he’s yumm-o or Quasimodo, I’ll beat him fair and square with sheer talent.”

“And what if our boy Jack doesn’t play fair? He didn’t earn the nickname Jack the Ripper by being a nice guy,” Andrea said.

Rumors had circulated about Jack LaRoux, Eve’s counterpart at Hendley and Wells Advertising San Francisco office in the six months he’d been onboard. Descriptions had included arrogant, extremely talented and ruthless. Oh yeah, and yumm-o. Nice, however, never entered the picture.

Eve quirked her brow at Andrea and opened her bottled water.

“Uh, nice doesn’t come into it, does it?” Andrea said. Arguably one of the best graphic artists in the city, Andrea abhorred the high-stakes competitive nature of Eve’s job. “I mean they don’t call you Eve the Avenger because you’re nice.”

Eve bit back a smile. No, they didn’t. She’d earned that nickname ostensibly because she never let anything get the best of her. No one crossed her unscathed. Besides, it had a nice cadence to it.

Meanwhile, Andrea was talking herself into another one of her infamous corners. “I mean, I think you’re nice because you’re my friend, but not everyone…” She trailed off, squirming on her end of the bench. “You know what I mean.”

Eve relented and laughed, tugging Andrea out of the corner she’d backed herself into. “I do know what you mean. It’s okay. Do you know what you call a nice account executive?” She took a long swallow of water.

“What?”

“Unemployed.”

Andrea wrinkled her nose. “Very funny.”

“Nah. Just sorta funny. But listen, it gets even better. I got an e-mail from Kirk Hendley this morning. Whoever wins the Bradley account gets the marketing vice presidency over both the New York and San Francisco offices.”

“So, your professional fate rests on farm equipment and lawn mowers?”

“Not terribly glamorous, is it? Lucky for me, I’ve got one of the best teams in the business working with me.” She grinned across the space at her friend and team graphic artist.

Andrea nodded at the compliment. “So, if Jack won he’d have to move to New York?”

“Yes. But Jack doesn’t need to worry about moving. I’m going to show him just what our New York office is made of.”

“It’s only fair to warn you there’s already a pool going in the art department whether you or LaRoux will get the job,” Andrea said.

Neither the pool nor the fact that a confidential memo she’d seen only three hours ago had already leaked surprised Eve. Office gossip was the local pastime at Hendley and Wells. “Who’s the favored winner?”

She took another swallow of water and closed her eyes briefly, reveling in the warmth of the sun on her face and the cool sweetness of the water sliding down her throat. She was only mildly interested in the art department’s predictions about who would win the vice presidency. She knew she would.

“The bets are running close to even,” Andrea said. Eve opened her eyes and leveled a stare. Andrea couldn’t lie worth anything. Flustered, Andrea caved. “Oh, what the heck. Okay, LaRoux’s favored two to one because he’s a man and Bill Bradley has a reputation for being a good old boy. And because, farm equipment is, well, man stuff.”

Eve threw back her head and laughed, earning a dirty look from the couple one bench over. “Man stuff? Jack LaRoux lives in San Francisco. Unless he’s some off-the-farm prodigy, he’s probably never been any closer to a tractor than I have. Consider this an insider tip. Put your money on me, ’cause I’m going to win.” Eve wanted that vice presidency so bad she could taste it. Correction. She didn’t want it, she needed it. Maybe that meant she needed to get a life, but it was the bottom line—this promotion meant everything to her. “I don’t expect Jack the Ripper to play nice. And if he wants to step outside of fair, I’m more than willing to take him on there as well.”

“I think it’s kind of sick and weird that Kirk Hendley’s dangling this vice presidency over your heads like a carrot, making you and Jack compete against each other for it,” Andrea said.

“Seems like good business sense to me,” Eve countered. “We’ve both got outstanding track records….” That was no boasting, just fact. “And we’ll both turn ourselves inside out to come up with something awesome. Kirk and the client wind up with a kick-butt campaign and one of us winds up with a vice presidency. It’s beautifully logical. Guess that makes me sick and weird too.”

“Nah. You were that way before now,” Andrea teased. Then she sobered. “But what if you lose, Eve?”

“I won’t.”

“Our team is good, but so is his. What if—”

“Losing is not an option.” As a middle kid with an older and younger brother, Eve had discovered at a young age that absolute conviction was the necessary ingredient to winning whatever you wanted, be it an ice-cream cone or a vice presidency. And as a girl, she’d learned to try even harder.

Eve also possessed a perverse streak. The more someone told her she couldn’t or shouldn’t want something, the more determined she was to get it. Her parents, much as she loved them, had sought to quell her ambition from an early age. As their only daughter, it was okay for her to marry an “ad man” but certainly never aspire to be one.

“You know, you’re a little scary when you get that look in your eye.” Andrea held her hands up in surrender. “Okay, so, you’re going to win. When does the battle commence? Monday? Where’s the preliminary meeting? Here in New York or San Francisco?”

“Neither. We’re meeting on Bradley’s home field—Chicago. Technically, we’re both supposed to arrive Monday morning and meet that afternoon. I checked with the travel agency as soon as I got the memo.” She smiled. “That’s why I rebooked my flight for Friday night after work. Who’s to say I can’t enjoy a weekend of rest and relaxation on my own dollar?” Eve opened the plastic lid on her salad and squeezed a lemon half over the green leaves.

“And get a jump on the competition?” Andrea asked, unwrapping her steak-and-cheese hoagie.

“Maybe. I might pick up a few things during my weekend of R and R.” Namely a competitive edge. She was always on her game with a good eight hours of sleep behind her.

Pencil-thin Andrea looked from her hoagie to Eve’s pathetic excuse for a salad. “How can you eat that?” she asked, biting into her sandwich.

The scent of warm onions wafted over to torment Eve. For a second she fantasized about taking a bite of the juicy steak, melted cheese, grilled peppers and onions on a warm, crisp roll. Instead she stabbed her fork into the crunchy green leaves in her salad bowl.

It was a good thing she and Andrea were close friends, otherwise she’d have to hate the waiflike creature scarfing down the sandwich next to her. Eve tugged at her skirt’s too-tight waistband. “I had three choices. Eat the salad and lose weight, buy a new wardrobe or go naked. The first option struck me as the best plan.”

“Perry and Godiva?” Andrea asked.

“Yep. Insult to injury. Some women might’ve lost weight. Not me. I find my boyfriend diddling my secretary on my desk and I binge on Godiva, gain five pounds and wind up with a zit the size of Delaware on my forehead.”

“More the size of Rhode Island and it’s gone. And you’re working on the five pounds. But Perry definitely wasn’t worth it.”

“Perry’s a rat bastard,” Eve said without vehemence. She still didn’t want to talk about the Perry debacle, even with her best friend. Not because she was brokenhearted. No, it was just so damn embarrassing.

And tawdry. Eve’s bare-assed boyfriend and her bare-breasted secretary going at it on Eve’s desk. Her desk. Ugh. Perry, the cheapskate, couldn’t even shell out the bucks for a motel room. Eve had needed an entire canister of antibacterial wipes before she’d felt comfortable sitting at her desk again.

Clearly they hadn’t expected her to miss her flight and return to the office. Delores had still been gasping for air and Perry searching for a lie when Eve had calmly picked up their clothes—Perry’s carefully draped Armani suit and Delores’s size-two skirt—from her guest chair and walked back out the door.

Perry had screamed bloody murder but hadn’t followed her down the hall. Too many people worked late for him to give chase with his johnson catching wind. And Eve would bet they were also pretty surprised when security showed up shortly thereafter based on an anonymous tip. Perry had called the next day, not to apologize but to demand his suit back. She’d referred him to the Goodwill she’d passed on the way home.

Getting mad was a waste of energy. But getting even was definitely satisfying.

“He could’ve told me he wanted to see Delores. It was the deception that bothered me.” She tugged at the waistband of her skirt. It wasn’t a size two. It was a twelve and it was tight. Too tight.

“Sorry, babe. He was doing more than seeing her. Delores is a skinny tramp,” Andrea said. Andrea was a good friend.

“Bimbo.”

“Floozy.”

Eve basked in the satisfaction of name-calling for a few seconds. It was almost as satisfying as a steak-and-cheese hoagie. Well, not really, but it’d have to do.

“Delores might’ve been a bimbo, but she was a great secretary. I definitely miss her more than I miss Perry.” Eve was still getting used to LaTonya, Delores’s replacement.

“You know the whole thing’s turned you into something of a legend. The women revere you and the men fear you. Eve the Avenger, superhero to women around the world.”

Eve indulged in a little eye-rolling. “I hope they write better copy for the Bradley ad.” She tried to bring the conversation back to her latest assignment. Perry was old news. Embarrassing old news.

“Hey, they can only work with the material they’re given.” Andrea tore open the wrapping on a Twinkies. “You ought to have a little weekend fling while you’re there. You know, clear out Perry’s bad karma.”

“I’m not a fling kind of gal. And Perry didn’t leave any karma there.” Things hadn’t progressed beyond a few dinner dates and a couple of lukewarm kisses. Despite the surprise element, she’d kept her wits about her and was able to size things up when she’d caught Perry naked. Unless he was extremely good at making the most of what he had, she hadn’t missed much.

“There’s a first time for everything.”

“But—”

Andrea held up her hand, interrupting Eve’s rebuttal. Eve shut up. No one in their right mind talked to Andrea’s hand. “Eve, you are a genius at work. But you’re lousy at picking men. Do yourself a favor. Have a fling.”

Eve had Godiva’d her way to the same conclusion—not the fling part, but the bad choice in men. Chocolate hadn’t helped and she didn’t see that Andrea’s advice would, either. “Is a fling going to improve my lousy judgment?”

“No. I personally think you pick those guys to avoid commitment. They’re losers, so it’s a good reason to dump them. You know, like in Moonstruck when Cher tells Nic Cage he’s a wolf who’d rather gnaw off his own leg than get caught in a trap.”

Eve knew the scene well since she and Andrea had seen the movie about a dozen times since they’d been friends. Andrea had serious Nic Cage fever.

“I do not deliberately pick losers in order to avoid serious relationships.” She didn’t, did she? That would be seriously warped. “So, tell me again why I should hop into bed with a stranger this weekend?”

Andrea wore a dreamy expression. “Think ‘Strangers in the Night,’” she sang the title to the Frank Sinatra classic. Andrea, who’d grown up in Brooklyn, with her grandmother sharing her parents’ house, had been weaned on Sinatra, Nat King Cole and Ella Fitzgerald. Andrea was a quixotic mixture of uptown sophisticate and romantic neighborhood girl, virgin extraordinaire still waiting on a man with an equally romantic soul. They, however, were in short supply. “Think romance. It would be fun.”

“The only fun I’m interested in is winning that promotion and beating LaRoux.”

“I’m just interested in who winds up on top,” Andrea said, a teasing glint in her eye.

JACK LAROUX LEANED against the hotel’s black marble counter, impatience lurking behind his nonchalance. He needed a swim, a shower and a Scotch. Not necessarily in that order. All three were a mere check-in away.

According to Neville, Jack also needed to get laid. But then again, his assistant considered sex of tantamount importance ninety-nine percent of the time. From day one Jack’s perpetual reserve had never inhibited Neville’s outrageous tongue.

While he waited on his key card, Jack checked out the bar tucked into a corner on the first floor, visible from the lobby mezzanine. Not crowded yet. Not surprising at seven forty-five on a Friday night. He could probably pick up a Scotch and Neville’s prescribed lay in the bar. If that was what he’d wanted. Instead, he’d order the Scotch poolside after his swim.

“Here you are, Mr. LaRoux,” said the desk clerk. Meg, according to her name tag, offered a smooth, professional smile along with his key card. “You’re in Suite four-fourteen. Is there anything else I can help you with? Do you need a hand with your bag?”

“I can handle it.” He picked up the garment bag and the black leather attaché housing his laptop, compliments of Hendley and Wells, and smiled across the desk at her. “Thanks, Meg.”

Meg blushed and tucked her hair behind one ear, flustered. Who was he to question why women responded to his smile that way? But they did, and it made his life much easier. Most of the time. “Enjoy your stay, Mr. LaRoux.”

“Thanks.” Jack shouldered his bag and headed for the bank of elevators, anxious to dump his things in his room and head to the pool. He had energy to burn and swimming laps inspired some of his best thinking.

He rode the glass-fronted elevator to the third floor. The thick carpet absorbed the sound of his footsteps as he walked down the hall.

His cell phone buzzed. Neville’s office extension flashed on the caller ID. Jack flipped it open with one hand. “Hi, Nev.”

“You will not believe who just called the office looking for you,” Neville announced with typical dramatic flair.

“Don’t leave me hanging.” Jack keyed open his suite door and padded across the thick carpet. He deposited his laptop on the desk.

“LaTonya Greer.” Neville paused for effect.

The redhead he’d met at the art gallery opening last week? No. Her name was Leslie or Laura or maybe it’d been Leanne. It wasn’t LaTonya. He crossed the sitting room to the bedroom and hung his garment bag in the closet. “Am I supposed to know LaTonya Greer?”

“Hel-lo. Assistant to Eve the Evil One.”

“Hmm. I hope LaTonya Greer doesn’t torture her boss with hyperbole.”

Neville sniffed on the other end. “You’d better hope she’s not as good at her job as I am. Of course, she couldn’t possibly be.”

Jack grinned at Neville’s pretended effrontery and juggled the cell phone on his shoulder as he shrugged out of his jacket. “No one’s as good at their job as you are—hyperbole or otherwise. What did Ms. Greer want with me and what did you tell her?”

“It was some nonsense about confirming information for Monday’s meeting. I told her you were in a meeting.”

“Good. Anything else?”

“Good. That’s it? Don’t you wonder what she’s up to?”

Neville possessed excellent intuition regarding advertising, but he tended to be a tad dramatic, seeing intrigue where none existed.

Jack shrugged, even though Neville couldn’t see it over the phone. “I’m sure you handled it with your usual aplomb.”

“I did, thank you. Now, what’s on the agenda for tonight?” Neville’s voice carried that let-us-digress-to-sex tone.

“After I hang up with you I’m going to check out the pool.”

“Laps and a Scotch?” Nev asked with a sigh.

Neville sounded as if Jack might break out knitting needles next. It didn’t mean he’d grown boringly predictable, it just meant he’d developed a method that worked. Sipping Scotch after a hard swim sparked his creativity.

“I should be poolside—” he checked his Rolex “—in about ten minutes.”

“Swim your laps and then check out the bar. All work and no play makes Jack a very dull boy. Find yourself a playmate for the weekend.”

“I’m not into—”

“Then you should be,” Neville interrupted. “You’ve been wound up way too tight lately. Think of it as relaxation therapy. You know, all those endorphins released by good sex. Consider it priming the pump for doing your best work on Monday.” Neville was nothing if not tenacious. Arguing with him was a waste of breath.

“Sure, Nev,” Jack said.

“You’re humoring me.” Jack should’ve gone for a more convincing tone. “I’m dead serious about those endorphins.”

“I’ve been busy.” And bored. All the women he met seemed the same.

“Nobody should be that busy. Speaking of bitches, when’s the Evil Eve blowing in on her broom?”

They’d been speaking of bitches? Not in his conversation. Jack shook his head. “You supplied the itinerary forwarded by the travel agent. She’s expected the same time I was supposed to be here, Monday morning.”

“I’ll want a full report on the Avenger.”

Eve the Avenger. Or simply, Evil Eve as Neville preferred. She had a hell of a buzz going, not only in the company but in the industry. He’d studied her most recent projects. She was good, borderline brilliant.

“I’m looking forward to meeting her. I admire her work and respect her reputation.” He’d even pictured her a couple of times in his head. Tall, thin, distant, cool. Okay, maybe he even had a bit of a fantasy thing going for her.

“Courting the enemy. That is so Machiavellian,” Neville said.

“Not particularly. It’s just good business. And I wasn’t planning to court her, simply meet her. When I get the new position, she’ll be an asset to the team.”

When he moved into the vice presidency, he’d welcome her talent. And he would win that promotion. He knew he was damn good at what he did. And a vice presidency was the kind of success a man like his father recognized.

Henri LaRoux, with icy disdain, had predicted Jack would fall flat on his face when he left the family business to make his way in the advertising world. Henri hadn’t understood Jack’s driving need to excel outside of the commercial real estate industry and his family’s considerable influence. Jack could hardly wait to throw his visible success in his father’s face.

Not only did he want the vice presidency for himself, he wanted it for Neville, also. Neville had worked long and hard, giving up the security at his old firm to follow Jack to Hendley and Wells. It was nearly seven on a Friday night and Nev was still at the office.

“She’s good, Jack. I’m not so sure about this one.” Nev always got this way on a project, antsy and uncertain. But that was okay. Jack was sure enough for both of them. Nothing, or in this case, no one, was going to stand in the way of that promotion.

“Don’t worry, Neville. Beating Eve Carmichael is going to be like taking candy from a baby.”

EVE DROPPED her towel onto a lounge chair and walked to the edge of the nearly deserted rooftop pool. A couple sat in the hot tub perched a few steps above the pool. Well, they weren’t exactly sitting—it was more as if they were devouring each other. Low lighting cast the tables scattered around the stone patio into shadowed intimacy.

To the left, a small bar stood empty except for the bartender and a cocktail waitress chatting at the counter. The waitress looked at Eve to make sure she was okay. Eve signaled with a small wave. She’d swim first, drink later. Smooth jazz floated from hidden speakers. Despite the glass walls and roof, Eve could almost feel the caress of the night air.

She curled her toes over the cool edge of the tiled pool. Underwater lights illuminated the water. Odd how pools looked different at night.

And thank God, this one was practically deserted. She tucked her hair into a swim cap, a carryover from her high-school swim-team days. She’d rather look funky now than have the chlorine wreck her foil job. Green highlights weren’t in vogue, and she was going to be at her absolute mental and physical best come Monday morning.

Leaning forward, she sliced into the warm water. Ah, heavenly. She flutter-kicked to the surface and rolled to her back. Mmm, she could easily stay this way, buoyed by the water, watching the night sky beyond the glass ceiling, lulled by the sultry saxophone solo.

But that wasn’t doing squat for the extra five pounds of Godiva residing on her thighs. Unfortunately, the women in her family not only shared lousy judgment in men, but also had a tendency to carry a few extra pounds. Equally unfortunate, they also tended to eat their way through an emotional crisis—and they weren’t stuffing themselves with fresh fruit. No, they preferred rich, dark, fattening chocolate. Aunt Nelda’s backside, jiggling in sweatpants, flashed through her head.

Ugh. Atonement time. Resigned, she rolled to her stomach and struck out with a breast stroke. After the first couple of laps, the rhythm took over and her mind wandered, thinking of nothing, thinking of everything. Some people sat cross-legged on the floor to reach a meditative state. Eve swam.

Stroke, kick, breathe.

Stroke, kick, breathe.

Pool wall, flip.

Thirty laps later, Eve climbed out of the pool. The hot-tub pair were still going at it—she didn’t want to know what was going on beneath the swirling water—while the waitress was now engaged in deep conversation with the bartender. For all intents and purposes, she was alone.

She pulled off the rubber swim cap and shook her head, sending her hair tumbling to her shoulders. She finger-combed it—damp, but mercifully not green.

Eve began to towel herself dry. The thick cotton felt great against her damp skin and wet bathing suit. Warm and soft, almost like a touch. Yowza, it’d obviously been too long since she’d actually been touched if a saxophone, a little starlight and a warm towel affected her this way.

“You missed a spot.” A man spoke from the darkened area behind her. The mixture of amusement and sensuality in his baritone voice sent a shiver down her spine.

Eve started and the man stepped out of the shadows.

Holy guacamole.

At a glance he was drop-freaking-dead gorgeous. Slightly above average height, black hair, lean, towel casually draped around his neck, a drink in one hand. He was amused sophistication with a killer smile and her heart slammed against her ribs.

“What?” Well, that was marginally better than huh with her mouth hanging open.

“You missed a spot,” he repeated, taking another step forward. His brows, dark slashes that angled up at the end, lent him a decidedly wicked, sexy look. He caught the end of her towel between his lean fingers and dabbed it against her bare skin, along her collarbone. Her skin quivered and her breath hitched in her throat. She wasn’t sure if she was relieved or disappointed when his fingers didn’t brush against her. He dropped the towel and it fell back against her breast.

Eve gathered her wits and laughed. He was self-assured arrogance and she was an idiot. “I bet you come with your very own warning label.”

For a second he looked startled, and then he laughed, too, a low, sexy rumble that skittered along her nerve endings and settled into a nice cozy warmth in her stomach. He raised his glass in acknowledgment, his lips quirked into a wry smile. “If I do, I’m unaware of it.”

Hmm. She thought he was very much aware of it. How many women had melted, just like her, when he had turned that smile on them? She’d bet most.

She shrugged into a cover-up, slid her feet into her mules and picked up her straw bag. “Thanks for making sure I didn’t walk around with a wet spot.”

“Would you care to join me for a drink?”

She didn’t miss the challenge in his eyes that underscored his invitation. Eve hesitated. Was she going to heed that warning label she’d slapped on him?

She’d made it her personal philosophy to never date any man who looked better than she did, a realistic outlook in her opinion. She wasn’t exactly a dog, but she wasn’t Angelina Jolie either. Extremely good-looking men and average women weren’t a winning combination. She’d seen it before. Not only did other women snipe behind Ms. Average’s back that her man could do better, but they were bold. They felt free to hit on a hot guy who was with a not-so-hot chick.

Of course, he’d invited her for a drink, not a date. And quite frankly, Eve had never been able to resist a challenge.

“Sure. Why not? I’d love a drink.”