He held her gaze long enough to make her skin itch and her stomach queasy. She knew what he saw: cheap, ugly suit; severe, dark brown hair; a woman no man like him would spare a second glance. Perhaps it bothered him that someone so displeasing to the eye required regular interaction.
“Do you own a cat?”
She swallowed, thinking about her cranky cat and his current location. “Yes, I do. A tabby.”
He reached out and plucked at the lapel of her ill-fitting, thrift-store suit, just above a tightening nipple. With those long, elegant fingers that had probably never seen a day’s hard work in their lives, he rubbed, sending to the ground one of the offensive cat hairs that tended to Velcro to her person. A barely discernible eyebrow lift pronounced his conclusion.
Crazy cat lady.
It rankled, but as she had taken great pains to present a certain image, regretting her success was pointless. These clothes were her secret identity, masking the super-zero underneath, keeping that bad girl in check. Better he saw her this way. An attraction to her boss was a distraction she could not afford, not when her life was a complete disaster-piece.
Turning to leave, he pulled on his sticky tank, which had molded to his impressive pectorals in a way old Emma would have been all over, but Ms. Strickland pretended not to notice. And then, just in case she’d missed how shredded those abs were, he used the hem to wipe his damp forehead.
Come. On.
By the time he’d dropped the tank, she had managed to pin an expression of bland disinterest on her face.
“I’d better take a shower, or Smythe what’s-his-face will have a whole other reason to be offended. Can you bring in the Crown Point file and have it on my desk for when I finish?”
She smiled and tried not to look overly smug about it. Failed miserably.
“Already done, Mr. Kane.”
Chapter Two
As Brody headed to the private bathroom in his office, Darth Vader’s theme boomed, meaning the one person he did not want to talk to was doing her daily check-in. Although tempted to send it to voicemail, he merely sighed and hit accept.
“Hey, shithead, try picking up once in a while.”
“Morning to you, too, sweet sister.”
“Sweet sister, my dick.” Liv muttered something incomprehensible, followed by a barked order to some poor unfortunate who wasn’t moving his ass fast enough with—Christ Jesus—a chocolate fountain. His sister ran a high-end catering business in Houston, a natural fit for the dictator tendencies she’d been cultivating since the cradle. She also happened to be getting married to a Daddy-approved Texas congressman in eight weeks, which meant she was even more impossible than usual.
“I’m surrounded by incompetence,” she said with the weary sigh of a baby CEO. “So, rumor has it you’re going to chicken out and not show your face at my nuptials.”
He rather enjoyed this game. “Well, actually I was thinking—”
“Brody Kane, before you go any further, remember this: if you bail on my wedding, I will hunt you down. Native American trackers, wolves, crossbows. Whatever it takes. I have at least three bridesmaids who’ve already offered to f*ck
you, four if you count the matron of honor who will happily give you a pity hand job in the church vestibule, never mind that her husband will be squeezed into the third pew. If I have to take Dad’s money to pay for my wedding, then you can suck it up and spend an evening with the family you despise.”
Brody grunted his annoyance. “I don’t despise all of them. You’re in the fair-to-middling range, and I offered to pay for the wedding myself. You didn’t have to take a dime of Papa Kane’s black cash.”
His sister snorted. “And let him get away with not paying a fortune to wash his hands of me? No way! That bastard needs to know he’s good for one thing and one thing only: swiping the plastic.” Her voice softened. “Look, I know it’s awkward, and seeing her—seeing them—is the last thing you want, but you can’t let them win.”
He had no idea how showing up at a Texas wedding extravaganza where his ex-fiancée and her new husband would be front and center came within even ten miles of a win. But he’d do anything for his baby sister.
“Of course I’m going to come—”
“Heh, I’ll make sure of it. Bridesmaids with loose morals, bro.”
Et tu, Olivia? “I don’t need you to set me up.”
“Right. Because according to Flynn you haven’t so much as looked at another woman in six months. He said he pops a new condom in your wallet every month but each month goes by and the rubber remains untouched. I can’t imagine not having sex for an entire six months…”
And Brody couldn’t imagine why he was having this conversation with his sister.
“…unless She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named gave you some sort of dick-shriveling disease. Oh God, is that what’s wrong? Is that why you haven’t been using your penis?”
“Liv, I’m not talking about this with you.”
“Because as slutty as my bridesmaids are I can’t knowingly inflict my syphilitic brother on them. Well, maybe Jess. She has being pissing me off lately—” She broke off to harass someone about pomegranate centerpieces.