Hearsay (4 page)

"Stop calling me white boy." Derrick demanded in a very stern tone. "You know I'm not." He could only tolerate so many references to his biracial heritage in one day. "I think I'm going to pass."

"Suit yourself." She shrugged and started walking again. That wasn't like Tashana, though. As much as she loved her greasy soul and Spanish foods, she always abided by their salads-twice-a-week rule. That could only mean one thing.

"Subject?" he yelled after her.

"Big boss Roman Bradf—"

Tashana's laugh followed him all the way to the restaurant. She didn't seem to mind that Derrick almost knocked her out of his way in his hurry to get to a place he'd been resistant to go about two minutes ago, and he didn't flip her off for making fun of him. She deserved it for not disclosing whatever information she had the second she got to his office, but he let it go. Tashana could be a total bitch. If he "caught an attitude" she wouldn't hesitate to keep him in the dark "for getting fresh with her." He really didn't mind her treating him like a child sometimes and even had fun playing along, but he'd kill her if she dared pull that shit on him today. Best friend or not.

The second she mentioned the subject matter, everything else had disappeared from his mind.

It wasn't about getting a few laughs out of Tashana's delivery of the oftentimes nonsensical gossip his friend could provide anymore. It was about learning details—regardless of how ludicrous, small, or seemingly insignificant—concerning Roman Bradford, law firm owner, superb criminal defense attorney, mostly elusive man, and Derrick's impossible "crush" for as long as he'd been working at ABC.
 

It took some serious effort, but he managed to order food and find a table without ordering Tashana to tell him what she knew right away. The fact that she wasn't in a rush to tell him only attested to her evil ways. She knew the wait was killing him, and she was gladly torturing him.
 

Obviously she had decided it was payback time.
 

Tashana hadn't been too happy with Derrick for setting her up on a date with Deonte from Intellectual Property because, as it turned out, the guy hadn't taken the time to clip his nose hair before meeting her. That was two weeks ago, and somehow she was holding
him
responsible for some other dude's faulty grooming habits.
 

Tashana could
definitely
be such a bitch sometimes.

"So…" she finally said, after approximately ten minutes and going through half the content on her plate. "It looks like the Bradford dreamboat is lifting anchor and sailing away for good."

"Huh?"

"He's leaving the firm." Suddenly she was in such a rush to share the news that she was all but bouncing on her chair. "Come January, Acosta, Bradford, and Chadwick will be no more."
 

Derrick set his fork on the table and slowly wiped his mouth. He'd lost his appetite. He couldn't even look at food right now.

"Wonder who's going to replace him," she pondered. "Who would you say? One of the senior partners, perhaps? Then again, maybe Acosta and Chadwick won't care for it. I don't think the firm's work will be affected if—"

"That can't be right."

"Doreen from Communications and Media told Stacey from Real Estate. There was a big fight," she continued saying between bites. "At the end, Bradford told Acosta and Chadwick he was quitting, and that was it. Isn't that great?"

"No, it is
not
." He drummed his fingers on the table and glared at her. "Why are you so excited about this anyway?"
 

"Because you won't have to worry about sexual misconduct and all that crap you're constantly telling me about. I'll be sad to see Bradford go, don't get me wrong, but the silver lining is you can ask him out if he isn't your boss!"
 

"Those guys went to college and started the firm together," Derrick pointed out, ignoring Tashana's well intentioned but uninformed comments. "They're friends. I can't imagine a reason why any of them would leave."

"Maybe they can't play nice anymore," Tashana said after taking a sip from her drink. "Don't forget Acosta and Bradford had that torrid affair ages ago."

"They did
not
."

Roman thought of Sergio and Alan as his brothers. He would never get romantically or sexually involved with either of them.

"Uh-huh, they sure did. Jeremy from Human Resources heard it from Tiffany. It ended badly when Bradford refused to suck Acosta's cock exclusively. You know how Latino lovers are. You've dated a few. Possessive and jealous and whatnot," she finished, wiggling her eyebrows.

"Okay." Derrick slammed his hands on the table so hard the bottles of mustard and ketchup jumped around. "My love life is totally irrelevant right now." He wiped his mouth again. "And who the hell's Tiffany?"

"A former legal assistant. She was assigned to Noah's cluster when she got fired for having sex in the supply room with—"
 

"Forget I asked," he cut her off. "There's never been confirmation that Sergio Acosta is gay. As much as ABC's employees love their gossip, the truth is no one knows much about the firm's owners."

Sergio
was
gay. But Roman, Alan, and Sergio were extremely careful about keeping their lives private. Roman had mentioned they knew gossip was a sport among the firm's employees, and they preferred their names were kept out of the game. Sadly for the partners, it wasn't working.

"True." Tashana took another bite of liver and onions and grinned at him. "But you don't seem to question the veracity of the rumors surrounding Bradford."

He didn't have to. Same as Sergio, Roman Bradford was gay. Derrick had known that he was five seconds into their first meeting and personally confirmed his homosexuality months ago. But he had never shared that information with anyone. Not even with his closest friends.

"I thought everybody knows he is," Derrick said evasively.

"But it's never been confirmed, so we can't be sure about him."

"What?" Derrick had to laugh at that one. "Bernice from Cafeteria's word isn't enough this time?"
 

"Don't be a jerk."

"Can we focus here?"

"Of course." She grinned again. "You're right, anyway. Let's not forget he
was
sued for sexual harassment by a male employee."

There were rumors of a relationship gone wrong, sexual harassment, out-of-court settlement for an obscene amount of money to keep that former employee from going public with his story... The list went on and on.

Derrick rolled his shoulders. He refused to believe any of it. "When did the fight happen, allegedly?"

"Not
allegedly
, boo. It went down a few weeks ago."

"I thought Chadwick was in Atlanta fighting for the right to see his kids," Derrick drawled.
 

"So he came to New York for a day. You know he has that private jet he uses all the time to fly his lovers back and forth, but who can blame him? He's probably using all those women to distract himself. Poor thing. Must be missing his seven kids terribly."

"Jesus Christ."
 

"What?"

Derrick rubbed his forehead and rested his chin on his hand. "A few minutes ago you said he has four kids," he said without clarifying how many kids Alan Chadwick actually had.

"Well, excuse me for not knowing exactly how big of a brood he has," she sing-sang.

Two kids is hardly a brood
, he thought, remembering Roman had mentioned Alan and his wife were parents to a boy and a girl.
 

Derrick rubbed his forehead again. "So a few weeks ago, Alan Chadwick put his custody fight on hold and flew to New York in his luxurious private jet for a day so that he could meet with Sergio Acosta, who apparently also came to New York for a day from Spain, where I happen to know for a
fact
he's been for the past month dealing with some Merger and Acquisitions ca—"

"Spain?" Tashana interrupted him. "What do you mean, Spain? He's back to work already?" She wiped her mouth. "Mmmm Mmmm Mmm. He should still be home recovering from those stab wounds he might or might not have received."

"
Tashana
."

"Sorryyy
.
" She took a bite of Derrick's fried chicken. "I don't know when this fight went down. Last week… three months ago… who gives a shit? It's probably all crap anyway. Where's your sense of humor today?"

"Chadwick and Acosta came to New York." Derrick glared at Tashana to keep her from interrupting him again. She was right. The rumors were probably bullshit, but he needed to know what was being said. "They met with Bradford, and during that meeting there was a screaming fight that ended with Bradford saying he was leaving ABC. And somebody actually heard this fight."

"Correct."

"Source?"

"William Fitzgerald from Antitrust and Competition."

"Unreliable."

"According to who?"

"Me," he stated, folding his arms over his chest. "Also, can I point out that no timeframe was mentioned during the alleged fight, yet you have Roman leaving the firm in January?"
 

"Why is this so difficult to believe? Boss Bradford has been mostly away for the past several months. Maybe he decided to make his absence permanent."

"I told you why. They're friends. I don't see Roman walking out on them."

"Sometimes people need a change."

"I honestly doubt that's the case."

"We have to decide how to proceed."

Derrick stared at his friend not so patiently until she rolled her eyes and explained herself.

"All these years you've been crushing like a teenage girl on that man and refusing to make a move on him because you think he won't give you the time of the day. You say it's because you're his employee, but I know better. What you really think is he won't pay you no mind if you go after him. And now he's leaving. We need to figure out how to get you some of that ass before he disappears forever."

It was so
much
more than a crush.

And Derrick didn't just think Roman wouldn't give him the time of the day. He
knew
.

He and Roman Bradford had
coincidentally
met for eight glorious days during their lunch break by The Pond in Central Park a year ago. They'd shared food and conversation and sexually charged casual touches of hands and legs, and Derrick had been over the moon, thinking the attraction went both ways.
 

But things had changed on the eighth day. Roman had been distracted. He'd barely munched on his food and remained quiet most of the time. He'd also left earlier than usual, without asking him on a date, and breaking Derrick's heart as a result.

And he'd stayed far away.
 

Derrick had been trying to understand what the hell had happened ever since, but the only explanation that made sense was, in the end, Roman Bradford had changed his mind about getting involved with him.
 

He obviously wasn't as interested in hooking up as Derrick had been. Not even a week after Roman pulled away, Derrick had heard big boss Bradford was dating some Broadway twink. Allegedly they'd even gone on an extended vacation together, which sucked hairy balls and smelly dick.

"There's nothing to figure out," he mumbled, trying to forget how terrible it'd been thinking about Roman trotting around the world with another guy.

"You're
not
letting him get away without hitting on him."
 

"I most certainly am," he confirmed after finishing his drink.

Tashana's forehead creased. "But…
why
?"

Derrick shrugged, forcing himself to smile at his friend. He knew he could trust Tashana. She wouldn't tell anyone what hadn't quite transpired a year ago between him and the boss, but he preferred to keep the events all to himself.

"I'm not into him anymore," he said under his breath.
 

Tashana snorted. "You're such a liar."

"Even if I were interested, it wouldn't change a thing."

"How do you figure?"

"
He
is not interested in me." It hurt to admit it out loud, but Derrick made sure his facial expression didn't give his thoughts and feelings away.
 

"There's no way he isn't interested in you." Tashana let her brown gaze slide all over Derrick's tall and lanky frame, taking her sweet time to appraise his light brown hair, almond-shaped golden eyes, caramel-toned skin, straight nose, and the defined Cupid's bow on top of his full lips. "Nah... There's no way he's not interested. Look at you. That mixed heritage of yours is genetic gold, boo. You're an exotic bird." She shook her head. "Besides, I saw him looking at your ass at the company picnic a few months ago. I told you that."

Several times, but Derrick refused to get his hopes up.

"Do you really think he's leaving?" he asked quietly.

"I hope he isn't, to tell you the truth," she answered in a more serious tone. "Those three guys together make one hell of a team, and ABC wouldn't be the same. But if the rumors are true and he
is
leaving? Don't waste your time, honey. Track that hottie down and get yours. The Lord knows you've waited long enough."

Chapter Three

"
Events will take their course, it is no good of being angry at them; he is happiest who wisely turns them to the best account."

Euripides

Roman read the quote on his computer monitor three times before saying it out loud. A silly thing to do, but he had promised his mother that he would, and even if she wasn't around to know better, he didn't want to let her down.

Motivational and inspirational quotes sent by his mother hit Roman's inbox every day at exactly nine o'clock in the morning. It was her attempt to get him in a positive frame of mind. Her loving and caring and not-so-subtle way of telling him it was time to call the pity party over and get on with his life. It hardly ever worked, but he appreciated her efforts nevertheless. If it weren't for the love and support of his family and close friends, Roman would have lost his mind a long time ago.