“I wanted to talk to you,” I tell her.
“You couldn’t have called?”
“Would you have answered?”
She purses her lips, revealing her answer. “Well, I’m busy right now, so…” With a shrug, she turns, tugging her mom’s elbow as the two start to walk.
I jog a couple steps to catch up and fall in beside them. “I heard about the work you’re doing in West Valley.”
She cocks her head to the side. “You did?”
I nod. The problem is that right now, I’m not sure how to reconcile our differences. There’s the obvious physical attraction between us, but we both want something the other isn’t willing to give up. The only thing I can come up with is to meet on common ground and talk about something we can agree on and work on together. Maybe by doing that, we can move past the City Center and Oakwood Club thing. When the PI told me about the women’s small business grant she and her mother fund, and the women’s shelter Evangeline volunteers at in West Village, I saw my opportunity.
“I can’t promise you City Center, but I do think we can come up with some joint opportunities to help women in the community.” Turgenev Holdings has a whole department devoted to philanthropy—for the tax write-off, of course, but she doesn’t need to know that.
We round the bend by the playground, and Declan waves at me. I don’t miss the look of confusion that passes between Evangeline and her mother when I wave back. Good. I want to keep her on her toes.
“Okay…” Evangeline says slowly. “Should I have my assistant contact yours to schedule a meeting?”
“That’s not necessary. Why don’t you meet me at my place for dinner tomorrow night?”
“At your place?” she asks dubiously.
I shrug, not really pulling off the innocent act. “I have a home office.”
“No, I tell you what,” she says. “Meet me at the shelter at noon on Saturday. We could use a big, strong man to do some work around the place.” The smug grin on her face tells me she’s teasing me. “Then, maybe,” she holds up a finger to emphasize her point, “we’ll go to dinner.”
I can tell she thinks I won’t do it, thinks I won’t get my hands dirty. “Fine,” I agree. “I’ll meet you there.”
“Fine.” She turns to continue her walk but glances back at me, a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I’m walking back to the parking lot, feeling victorious, when someone calls my name. I turn, expecting to find Evangeline, but instead, it’s her mother jogging toward me. She stops when she reaches me, only slightly out of breath.
“Mrs. Rutherford?”
“It’s Miss Rutherford, and I just had something to say to you,” she says, one hand on her hip. “I have never been one to flash my money or make waves or break rules, but my daughter is, and I need you to understand something. I grew up in a different neighborhood and have different connections than you that can be just as dangerous. If you hurt her or put her in harm’s way…”
I hold my hands out in what I hope is a gesture of surrender. “Say no more. Your daughter is safe with me.”
She narrows her eyes on me. “You’re a handsome devil. I don’t trust you.”
I laugh as she turns and walks back to Evangeline. “Good to meet you, too, Ms. Rutherford.”
I never imagined receiving two very different threats in the same day. Life certainly hasn’t been boring since Evangeline walked into it, that’s for sure.
Chapter Seven
Evangeline
When I pull up outside the West Valley Women’s Shelter, I’m surprised that Losev is already here waiting for me. He’s standing beside a white Ford F150, and wearing loose jeans and a white t-shirt that displays his muscular arms. The black lines of a tattoo snake down one of his arms, and I can see the outline of his abs through the thin material of the shirt. I’m so distracted that I almost crash the Spider right into the back of the truck.
As I’m gathering my purse, he stalks over and opens my car door, peering inside.
“Are you driving a fucking Fiat?”
I push him out of my way to stand. “Are you wearing a fucking t-shirt?”
He laughs and shuts my car door behind me.
“And what did you do, steal that truck?”
“You wanted a big, strong man. I had to play the part.”
As we walk toward the door, I can’t stop looking at him. He looks…normal. This is the big, bad devil. The man with organized crime ties and more money than God himself. And he’s here, volunteering at a women’s shelter, because I asked him to come.
I introduce him to the staff up front, and then go through the office to the donation center in the back. Normally, I would spend time in the actual shelter—cleaning or spending time with children to give weary mothers a break, or listening to women who needed to talk. But I don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable, so I keep Losev away from the residents.
The donation center is a large classroom lined with metal shelves and stacked with plastic bins full of clothes and toys. Losev surveys it all as regally as he might his own collection of expensive cars.
“What are we doing?”
“Sorting donations,” I tell him, moving past him into the room. I point to one of the highest boxes. In my white sneakers, I’m about six inches shorter than normal and can’t reach it without a step ladder. “Let’s start with that one.”
To be honest, I expect him to complain or to try to take control, but he doesn’t. He reaches up and pulls it down, placing it in front of me. I pull the lid off and tip out the contents, which appear to be women’s clothes of varying sizes. I give him directions—weed out the trash and then sort into sizes. He nods and settles in to work without complaint.
“So,” Losev says, plucking a shirt from the pile and giving it a once-over. “Where did you learn to play poker?”
I shake out a white shirt only to find a yellow stain on the front, and toss it in the trash pile. “College,” I tell him. “While most girls were getting drunk at frat parties, I was perfecting my poker face by swindling boys out of their money in pool houses.”
“Wasn’t Rutherford Global already successful by then?”
“Yes. But when you grow up poor, it just becomes a habit to…I don’t know, expect the next shoe to drop and lose everything. If the company folded, I needed a way to pay for college. I wasn’t going back to the cottage in West Valley.”
“You still own it, though.” It sounds like a question, but I can tell he already knows the answer.
“Yes. It’s a good reminder.”
“Of the other shoe?”
“No. Of how good things can be, even without money. In spite of everything, my mom loved me and gave me a wonderful childhood in that home. I volunteer here to remind me of the other shoe. Of how close we came to needing a women’s shelter, and how hard my mom worked to keep us out of it.”
He pulls the next box off the shelf, and we start sorting the boys’ clothes inside.
“Why are you here?” I ask.