Not spotting anything critical on social media to raise any alarms, I decide to let David know the special plans he and Carys have going on later shouldn’t be ruined. Grabbing my tablet and coffee, I juggle the two while I tug at the heavy door to what we call the inner sanctum— where David’s workspace, our file and conference rooms, and Carys’s and Ward’s offices are. Just as I manage to get the unwieldy door open a few inches, it comes flying at me.
I stumble, my tablet going in one direction, the coffee in the other. “Well, I hope the tablet isn’t destroyed.” I bend down to pick it up when a pair of black wingtips appear in my line of sight.
“I think the tablet can be replaced much easier than my suit, don’t you think, Angela?”
Crap. Double crap. There isn’t a chance I’ll receive merely a disdainful look. After all, coffee isn’t Post-its. My eyes snap up and meet Ward’s infuriated ones. “Sorry. I had no idea you were there.”
His mouth open and closes like a guppy. If it was Carys or David, I might have even told him that. But Ward’s different. He always has been.
He leans forward, causing me to step back instinctively. “Probably with more difficulty than the tablet. We could have picked one of those up on every corner.”
“Can’t jet off to London to get a new one made?” I joke feebly.
I only know where his suits are made because they were mentioned in the rags one time. “Winsome Ward” made the headlines the next day along with the model he escorted to dinner.
It was annoying to have to filter out gossip about…whatever Ward is in terms of the structural hierarchy in this firm on top of the normal seedy nonsense about our clients being impregnated by alien babies. Although—my lips barely lift—it did humor David immensely when I showed him that nugget about his wife’s ex-boyfriend.
Ward, more disjointed than usual, slides by me and the mess without any thought about who should be responsible for cleaning it up. Calling back over his shoulder, he orders, “Tell Carrie I’ll be late.”
After the front doors of LLF close behind him, I let out a huge breath before saying, “Like that won’t be anything new.”
The heavy door swings open cautiously. “Angie, did I hear Ward leave?” Carys asks. Then, “What happened?”
“Ward and I collided. Apparently, my latte caused irreparable damage to his day. He’s going to be late to your meeting.”
She flits her hand as if it’s of no consequence. “That’s fine. It means the cake will have more time to get here.”
I grit my teeth. But all I say is, “Of course. Do you still want me to bring it in straightaway?”
“No, let’s hold it until the status meeting later.” We both turn when the phone rings on my desk.
Leaving the mess on the floor just a moment longer, I lift the receiver to my ear. “LLF, LLC. This is Angela. How may I direct your call?”
After hearing from security the cake is on its way up, I inform a gleeful Carys, who ducks inside so I can mop up my coffee disaster.
I briefly mourn the loss of my morning coffee but put it out of my mind and get back to work.
There’s too much to be done, too many secrets to keep.
Including my own.
Hours later, knee-deep in addressing the emails filled with dramatic complaints filed by the celebrities Carys and Ward represent, I can’t help but grumble aloud over the one I just responded to. “The gum wasn’t watermelon.” As if that was going to be noticeable when the band of men known as “The Rind” left their trademark wads of it in the greenroom at the satellite interview they were giving this morning.
Maybe I’ll never understand what drives the rich, I think before adjusting my ponytail and diving back in. Every day, I act as an intermediary between celebrities with more cash than sense and people who exploit them to amass piles of it themselves.
“Where did people’s humanity disappear to?” Then I realize it likely got stuck somewhere between what happened to me and a band whose signature move is to leave their DNA everywhere they go: bathrooms, bars, and now—apparently— the studio of a nationally broadcast satellite show.
“They’re just fabulous,” I mutter.
“Did you say something, Angela?” His dark voice invades my space for the second time in one day.
Ward Burke has this kind of money. Carys too, I suppose. But the way the two siblings carry their wealth is just different.
Carys has an edge of sharp elegance about her that enhances her personality, adding a level of sophistication to her pixie-like appearance. But Ward, with his contradictory darkness, comes off like he stepped out of the pages of Vogue. He oozes the confidence that comes from wearing three-thousand-dollar suits. It’s the kind that’s impervious to the hard knocks of life the rest of us mere mortals deal with. It’s an awesome arrogance, and all it does is leave me wary.
Maybe because it reminds me of too much.
I open my mouth to say something, to apologize for the accidental mishap earlier, because today of all days, he should be happy, but the thunderclouds chasing across his face change my mind. I’m not even certain he knows I know. “No, I didn’t,” I reply before I turn back to my email.
With a grunt, he eases through the door, and I return to my work, awaiting the moment I’m summoned into the conference room to deliver a cake.
One Ward knows nothing about. Yet.
Two
Ward
Happy Birthday to one of the world’s most eligible bachelors—Ward Burke. To enumerate the many reasons we wish Ward another year of blessings would take up the entire magazine. Put simply, when compared against other men of his ilk, Ward Burke rises head and shoulders above the rest.
He’s drop-dead gorgeous, filthy rich, and smart. His aloofness adds a layer of appeal that makes a person want to claw their way through skin and bone to the man beneath. So far, not a single person has managed it.
— StellaNova
There’s a tension I can’t quite rid between my shoulder blades as the banter swirls around me between the other people in the conference room sitting high above Rockefeller Center. Many floors beneath us, crowds of people are gathering like locusts for their turn around the infamous rink, but insulated high up in the air, two people are making jokes instead of business decisions.
A paper airplane flies past my ear with alarming accuracy. I glare at my older sister before asking pointedly, “Aren’t we supposed to be finalizing our scheduling for the next month?”
“Come on, Ward. Lighten up. It’s only your birthday.” Carys grins.
I only wish I could. The words almost slip past my lips, but I manage to hold them back. It’s not my sister’s fault I feel wound up tighter than a spring inside a clock; it’s mine. After thirteen years, the blame belongs solely to me. Still. Always.
It always will.
“Just because you’re now a year older doesn’t mean you can turn into a grump.” Turning to her husband and our shared senior paralegal, David Lennan, Carys purses her lips. “Did I remember to add a ‘no grumpiness’ clause to his contract when he became a partner?”