No Denying You(26)

Sounding tired but faintly amused, she said, “Because you’d be here now and not calling. Did you decide to hit a bar or something with the guys after dinner?”

God, how simple it would be to just agree with her and let it go for the evening. Sadly, though, he didn’t often take the easy way out in life and tonight would be no exception. “No, I’m on my way home now from the restaurant.” Letting out a breath he hadn’t been aware of holding, he said, “Em, I need to tell you something.” When there was nothing but silence from her end of the line, he quickly jumped in before he could chicken out. “The woman you met in my office this morning, Alexia, is actually my ex-fiancée and she’s staying with me for a few days. That’s why I didn’t want to meet at my house tonight. She’s . . . having some problems with her current fiancé and asked me for somewhere to stay.” The silence continued so long after his revelation that he looked over at his phone to make sure the call was still connected. “Um . . . Em?”

“I’m here,” she answered, sounding perfectly normal. “Just out of curiosity, why would she ask her ex-fiancé? Did you stay in contact after your split or was it recent?”

“It was a few years ago and, no, today is the first time I’ve spoken with her since our relationship ended.” Brant thought she sounded more puzzled than anything now and he couldn’t blame her. When he thought about it in those terms, it seemed strange to him as well. He wouldn’t have sought Alexia out if the circumstances had been reversed. Of course, Emma didn’t know the whole story and that made a bit of difference.

“She is dealing with a family situation and doesn’t have any friends that she can . . . trust.”

“It still seems strange that she would come to you after so long in those circumstances.”

Brant was starting to wish he had just kept his mouth shut. This was becoming harder and harder to explain without telling her what was going on and he couldn’t do that.

“She has some other problems as well. I guess, due to our history together, she felt she could count on me for support. Our relationship was built on a friendship and she had nowhere else to turn.”

Emma’s only comment was “Hmmm.”

“So, I’ll see you tomorrow?” Brant asked.

“Um-hmm,” she replied absently.

“And we’ll make plans for tomorrow night?” Brant asked almost hesitantly.

“What? Oh sure, yeah, that sounds good. ’Night.” With those words, he heard a click. He felt uncomfortable with how the whole conversation had gone. He would have felt better if she had overreacted and accused him of something. As it was, though, she seemed almost distant from the entire subject.

Fuck, now I remember why it was a helluva lot easier to avoid romantic hassles. Right now I don’t know my ass from a hole in the ground, and that happens only when a woman is involved.

Emma looked down at her watch and hoped Suzy was still awake. She didn’t think she would have had time to make it home from dinner and already be asleep. She quickly found Suzy’s name on her phone and texted her: Old bitch moving in on my man.

Her phone almost immediately signaled an incoming text: What???

As she was typing in her reply, the phone rang. She saw Suzy’s name on the caller ID. When she answered, Suzy immediately asked, “What the hell?”

“Er . . . sorry about that. The last time I had man drama, I was a teenager, so I regressed back for a moment.”

“All right,” Suzy laughed. “So what gives?”

“Well, I found out tonight that Alexia is staying with Brant temporarily since she is fighting or something with her fiancé.”

“Pardon?” Suzy asked. “I don’t think I heard that right.”

“Oh, you did. Trust me, I had the same reaction when he told me. He said that they have been broken up for a few years and in that time have not been in touch with each other. Now, out of the blue, she’s back and needs somewhere to stay? Hellooo! Would you call your ex-fiancé if you and Gray were having problems and ask to stay with him?”

“Um, hells-to-the-no,” Suzy muttered. “I’d rather sleep in my car.”

“Thank you!” Emma exclaimed. “That’s pretty much what I thought. The whole thing seems strange to me. Do you . . . do you think she wants him back? Maybe she made up this whole thing about a fiancé and having nowhere to go.”

“Well, men are usually suckers for the whole damsel-in-distress act,” Suzy admitted, “so I wouldn’t rule it out. I think it might be time for a little R and R.”

“Rest and Relaxation?” Emma asked, thinking maybe Suzy had been asleep after all.

“Duh, no—Research and Reconnaissance. Know thy enemy and all that. I think it’s time to see exactly where Alexia came from and if there is another man in her life. I’ll see if I can get some information out of Gray and maybe Ella can talk to Declan discreetly as well. We’ll figure out if this is on the up-and-up or if someone wants your man back.” They talked for a few more minutes before ending the call.

Emma felt better after talking to Suzy, but she had to fight the urge to kick off Operation R & R right then. She felt the need to do something completely juvenile, like drive by Brant’s house and peek in the windows. Didn’t they say that eavesdroppers never heard anything good about themselves? That probably went double for Peeping Toms then. To distract herself from doing something stupid, she flipped open her laptop and started on the research end of the mission. Thanks to Google, there were very few secrets in the world anymore.

After fifteen minutes of reading everything she could find on Alexia Shaw, Emma sorely wished she had remained in her ignorant bubble. Her family was mentioned tons of times in the different society pages. A younger Alexia stood next to her parents in many of the older pictures. Strangely enough, she had fallen off the radar in recent years. Her parents were still pictured at various events, but Alexia was nowhere to be seen. As Emma pondered what that could mean, she ran across a picture that caught her attention. It was a charity event for the Children’s Hospital and not only were Alexia’s parents in one of the photos, Brant stood with his arm around a beaming Alexia and damn it, he looked happy. Well, what did you expect? They were engaged.

Maybe a part of her had hoped that the whole engagement thing was a mistake somehow. But if the hug in his office this morning hadn’t convinced her, then the picture she was staring at did. It wasn’t just a friendly photo-op picture. Brant’s whole stance toward Alexia was possessive. He cradled her against his side protectively. Emma could only imagine how a photo of she and Brant as a couple might look. The photographs would probably alternate between one of them having their hands around the other’s neck to something a little more sweaty and graphic.

Yeah, researching your new enemy at night: not a good idea. Couldn’t Brant’s ex have been a homely, poor wallflower who didn’t have tons of hits on Google? Just for kicks, she entered her own name and while she got some hits, the only halfway interesting one was a college student named Emma Davis who went by the nickname Emmie-Pie and had quite a talent for tying things in knots with her tongue, as evidenced by all the video clips posted on her site.

Right now, even Emmie-Pie seemed to have a better shot at happiness than Emma did.

Brant rubbed the back of his neck, hoping that the drama with Alexia was going to die down soon. When he arrived home, tired and sexually frustrated as all hell after having to cancel his evening with Emma, he had found Alexia on the phone crying. When he asked her what was wrong, she thrust her phone in his hand and asked him to deal with it for her . . . please? What the hell? He put the phone to his ear, fully expecting to hear either her mother or father on the other end. Instead, he ended up in a lovers’ spat. There was a man whom he soon found out was the fiancé, Carter, begging Alexia to listen to reason. “Um, Alexia stepped away for a moment.” Great, that sounded fucking brilliant. Just the type of thing to reassure a man that he can work things out with his woman.

Dead silence followed before an angry voice boomed, “Who the fuck is this and where’s Alexia?” A smarter man would have ended the connection at that point. How screwed up was it that he wanted to help the woman who had dumped him two years ago to save her relationship with the irate man on the other end of the line?

“This is Brant Stone, a friend of Alexia’s. She’s—”

Before he could finish his sentence, there was what could only be called angry laughter from the other end. Brant could sense no real amusement in the sound. “You’re kidding me, right? I’m over here on my knees groveling and begging for forgiveness and she went straight back to you?” Brant didn’t know why he was surprised. Of course, if you were serious enough about someone enough to marry him, you would tell him about your past. He was naive to think that Carter didn’t know who he was. He actually felt a bit like an asshole for doing this to the guy. There was nothing going on with Alexia, but how was Carter supposed to believe that?

“It’s not like that, Carter. Alexia just needed a place to stay. I’m sure she told you that her parents have been less than . . . supportive.”