He hated unanswered questions. He didn’t have to guess what it felt like to live with uncertainty because he knew all too well. Not many people could claim an expertise in living with the open-ended loss of someone close. It was a pretty shitty club to join and the membership was purely involuntary and unending. The fact Emery shared that secret knowledge and dealt with that level of unrelenting pain just sucked.
That’s why he was in the coffee shop, standing at the back of the line while his driver waited a few doors down. He tried to blend in, which he knew was not his forte. He was not a head-down, stare-at-his-shoes type, but he worked those unused skills now. The last time he made eye contact in this particular store he wound up admitting at least part of his name to a stranger. The same stranger he hoped to see here again today, but if she stuck to her usual schedule she wouldn’t come in for another twenty minutes.
As soon as he finished the thought he felt a presence looming next to him. His head shot up and he looked right into Emery’s big brown eyes. He beat back the need to blink. She’d snuck up on him, which was not something that happened . . . ever.
She held out her hand. “Here.”
He looked at the white cup with the name Brian scrawled on the side and tried to figure out the chances she planned on poisoning him. “What is it?”
She shook it at him. “Black coffee. You seem like a nothing-fancy, no-sugar kind of guy.”
Right on the first try. Not bad for a woman he’d met all of three times.
He took the coffee and followed her to the small bistro table in the back. Took the seat by the wall. She didn’t seem nervous or upset, and he had no idea what to make of that.
“I feel like you’re trying to tell me something,” he said.
“If I want to tell you something, I will.” She looked two seconds away from rolling her eyes.
“Fair enough.”
She also looked a bit too sexy for his peace of mind in her khaki-colored pantsuit with a pink shirt. Something about the shade lit up her face. The bounce in her walk, the hair around her shoulders, the smirk when she got the drop on him and handed over the coffee. She appealed to him in a raw want-to-abandon-his-responsibilities-and-fuck-her kind of way, which was just about the last thing he needed.
She sat there and toyed with her cup. Spun it around between her palms as she watched him. “Why are you here?”
He thought about coming up with an excuse but abandoned the idea. Emery didn’t strike him as the type to buy nonsense talk. “I realized that the last few times we met I may have acted a little—”
“Arrogant. Annoying. Dickish.”
She seemed to have those descriptions ready to go. He preferred to use one of his own. “Bossy.”
“Wow, that wasn’t even in my top ten, even though it fits.” She shifted her chair to the right when someone pushed past her on the way to the bathroom. “I like my list better.”
He didn’t doubt that. “I’m not normally one who goes back and rethinks his actions.”
“Are you one who apologizes?”
She sounded serious, so he gave her an honest answer. “Hardly.”
“I figured.” She leaned in with her elbows on the table. “So, tell me the truth. Did the senator make you come find me?”
“It’s interesting you think anyone can make me do anything.” No one had ever accused him of that before.
“I thought maybe the two of you were . . .” She waved a hand in the air.
He had no clue what that meant. “Yes?”
“You know.”
“I actually don’t. Finish the sentence.” He pushed his cup to the side and leaned on his edge of the table. The move put them within easier whispering distance, though neither of them had lowered their voices all that much. He just sensed it was coming.
Then there was the part where he could smell her. Not sugary or like vanilla. This was something more sultry. A light touch of a floral scent, but with a bit of musk. It filled his head.
“I thought you might be together,” Emery said.
He wasn’t clear how he felt about the comment. It seemed to suggest he lacked fidelity, or the senator did. “I’m not sure her husband would approve of that.”
“Hey, I don’t care what consenting adults do in their private time. I’m not judging.” This time she held up both hands in what looked like some sort of disingenuous mock surrender. “In fact, if you were together in that way she might have some sway over you and get you to actually answer one of my questions.”
He was intrigued by how her mind worked. She made connections and looked for angles. Good skills, but this time her instincts or whatever was guiding her had misfired. He liked and respected the senator. He met her in the first place through her equally successful law partner husband.
Wren had received work from both of them and continued to cultivate both contacts. He did not fool around with married women and he couldn’t really see the senator cheating. “No.”
Another bathroom goer bumped into the side of her chair. This time she picked it up and moved it until she sat almost next to him, only a few feet away. “You’re going to need to be more specific with that answer. We seem to have several comments flying around. What are you answering?”
“No, I’m not with the senator in any way except having worked with her.” He moved both of their coffee cups out of spilling range. “And no, she did not send me.”