“Shit!” Zander’s curse shakes me. He rises quickly from his chair and turns his back on me. Holding a hand to his brow, he shakes his head. Did I just do something wrong?
“I—I’m sorry,” I stammer. It’s the only thing I can think of saying.
“No, it’s not you,” he grumbles. He turns to face me and…almost looks like he’s mad at me. “I mean, it is, but not in the way you think.”
“I…don’t understand…”
“I don’t do this, Amory,” he explains. The tone of his voice breaks my heart. This is a man who has everything, but I can see now that he’s missing the most important thing of all. Real love. “I don’t let people get close to me, especially women.”
“I’m sorry,” I reply. No. That was the wrong thing to say.
“No, don’t say that!” His voice is raised. He’s angry, but not at me. At himself. “It’s my fault. This whole thing is my fault and you—”
Suddenly, there’s a loud knock at the door. Heavy. Almost threatening. But Zander doesn’t even flinch. Instead, he takes a deep breath and slowly shakes his head. “Of all the fucking times…”
“Do you want me to go—?”
“No,” he replies firmly. “Stay here, sweetie. I will deal with this.”
Zander strides from the kitchen and I start to tidy up dinner. I hear a male’s voice from the foyer and even though I’m not trying to be a snoop, it’s impossible not to hear bits and pieces of the conversation.
“Had a little something happen over at the Met tonight, Zander.” Whoever this man is, he’s confident, goading. My guess is he’s with law enforcement.
“That right? Catch some punks doing graffiti again, Detective?”
Detective. I was right.
“Somebody tried to steal a Picasso. Lost it on the way out somehow though. Left it sitting in the hallway. A security guard found it and called it in.”
“That’s real interesting, Detective, but if you don’t mind—”
“I looked at the job – the guy came in through a skylight and went out the same way, and the whole time I’m thinking to myself, This feels like Zander Duke.”
“Detective—”
“Now it was sloppier than your jobs,” the detective continues. “Pulley broke. Found the rope beside the painting. Guy’s lucky to have not fallen and broken his neck. But I couldn’t still help but feel like I was loo
king at your work.”
I can’t help it. I inch around the kitchen island and peek through the door to see the detective, tall, with red hair, wearing a long beige trench coat, almost smiling at Zander.
“Listen, Childers,” Zander says. “I know you’ve got this fantasy in your head that I’m some billionaire-by-day, art-thief-by-night, but I’m just a businessman. I’m flattered that you have this opinion of me, but—”
“Don’t screw with me, Duke,” Childers says, continuing to smile. “You’re getting sloppy. One of these days, you’re going to take a wrong step and you’re going to fall. And when you look up, I’m going to be standing right there over you.”
Zander doesn’t respond. He stands there stony as Detective Childers holds his gaze, then turns and walks out the door. I quickly go back to what I was doing at the sink.
“Son of a bitch,” Zander mutters as he comes back into the room. “Sorry about that. Prick’s got a real hard-on for me.”
“It’s okay, I was just cleaning up—”
I’m silenced by a kiss. My first kiss.
My body blossoms like a flower coming into bloom. The electric feeling quadruples and sends shivers from my toes through my spine to my ears, which begin to burn with excitement.
Wow. So this is what it’s like to get physical with someone.
And boy, is Zander physical.