Sleeping With My Boss: A Standalone Novel (An Alpha Billionaire Romance Love Story) (A Dirty Office Romance) (134 page)

Jack didn’t appear nervous at all to me as
he said, “Yes, I guess it would seem strange to you, all of those years I spent
bad-mouthing him. I was an angry young man, Alicia. I have since learned to
keep my anger in check and appreciate all that my father has done for me,
instead of holding a grudge over what I thought he hadn’t done.”

“Good for you,” my father said before I
had a chance to ask anything further of him. “Family is our most important
asset.”

“Here, here,” Jack said in a mock toast as
he raised his tea cup before drinking from it. I wanted to roll my eyes, but I
caught myself before I did. If I let Jack know that I could see through his
innocent act he would never share anything with me or in front of me that might
lead the FBI to his arrest.

“Alicia,” Mother said, “Why don’t we have
Jack stay for dinner tonight?”

“Sure,” I said, really wishing there were
some way out of it. “I was planning on making veal cutlets. Is that okay with
you, Jack?”

“Sounds terrific, I’d love to stay,” he
said, enthusiastically.

It was early afternoon, yet but I told
them I had to prepare the veal and excused myself into the kitchen. I wasn’t
good at this whole espionage thing. I knew I’d never get Jack to open up to me
if I continued to avoid his company, but I could hardly stomach being around
him these days.

I poured myself a cup of tea and although
I had an excellent butcher who had already done the work for me, I made a play
of tenderizing the cutlets. After about half an hour, Jack came into the
kitchen.

“Hey, are you sure you don’t mind your
mother inviting me to dinner?”

“Of course not,” I told him. “I have
plenty.”

“That’s not what I meant,” he said with a
serious look. “It just seems that the last few times we’ve talked, you’ve acted
like you’d like to be somewhere else.” I drew on the persona I use when I’m in
court and trying to defend a client that I don’t like.

“I’m sorry, Jack. I don’t mean to treat
you badly. I’ve just had so much going on lately.”

“It’s okay, as long as I haven’t lost my
best friend,” he said, making me sad. I didn’t want to lose my friend, either,
but I was almost certain I already had.

“Can I help you with anything?” he asked.

I gave him some vegetables to chop and I
began preparing the potatoes I was planning to serve with the veal. As we
worked, we talked about old times. I found my chance when Jack brought up a big
fight he’d had with his father just before entering law school.

“You remember,” he told me, “I was in such
a mood. You made me your famous red velvet cake and we stayed up high on sugar,
talking all night long.”

“Yes, I do remember,” I told him. “I think
I gained five pounds that night. That leads me to a question I’ve had, though.
That night, you swore you’d never have anything to do with your father’s
business. What really changed your mind, Jack? I’m not really buying what you
were selling my parents in there.”

Jack went dark for a minute, and I thought
he wasn’t going to answer. Finally, he said,

“I tried making it on my own. I opened my
own practice after you left, and for a while, it felt good defending the
innocent. But I wasn’t making any money and ultimately had to go to Father for
a loan.

“He gave it to me and then promptly began
to use it against me. Anytime he wanted or needed anything from me from then on
he’d throw it in my face. He made me feel like a failure and he turned out to
be right. I ended up losing the practice and not having the money to pay him
back. He offered me a job in exchange for what I owed him and a salary larger
than anything I ever would have made as an attorney. It was another failure on
my part that I accepted it.”

I felt for him as he talked. I didn’t like
seeing him so defeated. I could understand his need to seek out his father’s
help, but I still couldn’t grasp why he would be willing to undertake the
things the FBI were accusing him of.

“Is your commitment to him long-term or do
you plan on returning to the law someday?” I asked, genuinely curious.

“At first, it was only until I could pay
him back. Now, I just don’t know. Every day I stay, I get sucked into the
business a little deeper.”

“Sucked in” sounded to me like he was
almost admitting to getting his hands dirty. He seemed to be sad about it, but
almost resigned to his fate.

I was about to ask him another question
when my mother came in to see how we were doing. The conversation turned to
other things and I was actually relieved. Dinner was actually enjoyable and for
a while, I lost myself once again in the good memories of an old friend. When
it was time for Jack to leave, I walked him down to the lobby. As he was
thanking me for the evening and saying goodnight he said,

“So, I guess you’re really set on marrying
this Hanson guy, huh?”

“Yes, Jack,” I said. “I am set on it. I
love Adam and can’t wait to be his wife.” I couldn’t interpret the look that
passed over Jack’s face, however, the words he spoke next needed no
interpretation,

“Just remember what I said before, if it
doesn’t work out, for any reason, I’ll be here for you.” I thanked him, but
came away with an eerie feeling. If I were a superstitious woman, I would have
said that Jack was predicting that Adam and I wouldn’t work out. I knew he was
wrong. Adam was right for me in every way. We just needed to help bring all of
this intrigue to a close and get on with our lives together.

CHAPTER
FOUR

ADAM

Sunday, I had lunch with Alicia and her
parents. It was nice and I think her mother is really warming up to me. The
rest of the day I spent going over the lists of prospective jurors for the
Brigham case that my investigators had put together for me. I had to be in
court at nine a.m. for jury selection. I was trying to face this trial the way
I did any other, but so much had happened that I was almost fearful I wouldn’t
be able to put my best foot forward on this. I was grateful for Mac because
even though he knew nothing about what was going on with the FBI, he would keep
me grounded.

I got to court half an hour early and so
did Mac. We went over our separate lists and spent some time strategizing
before the judge called court to order. I started out positive and energetic,
but as the day wore on, it was quickly apparent that we had been right to worry
about finding an untainted jury in New York.

The prospective jurors who claimed not to
have a bias against Miles Brigham IV in general had at the very least been
exposed to the constant advertisements that the EPA had been running on
television, radio and in magazines, to raise money for what they termed “The
Victims” of the oil spill. They advertised that the “victims” were both people
and animals, which screwed us further because if the prospective jurors didn’t
care about one, they did the other.

That in and of itself was enough to make
me concerned that the other side was coming to the table already ahead of us,
even though Mac and I had our team working around the clock investigating
backgrounds for weeks now. I told the team that I wanted to know if any of them
so much as used a recycling bin on a routine basis. I didn’t want an EPA
advocate sneaking into the jury pool. That would mean certain death for our
case and millions or possibly close to billions of dollars loss to Miles’s
company. The process of running background checks on jurors was not exactly
legal, but I discovered early on in my career that it could be crucial to winning
a case. In this case, it didn’t seem to be helping at all.

Mac and I took turns asking the
prospective jurors and we each turned down the first six. We were running out
of options and the attorney for the plaintiffs, Hal Rogers, was eating it up.
My head was pounding like a drum by the time the judge called it for the day
and told us to be back at eight-thirty a.m. two days after Christmas. All I
could think about was that I needed a Tylenol and Alicia. I knew Marie would
have something for my headache and tonight Alicia and I would have our much
awaited alone time. I couldn’t wait.

I had my car service take me back to the
office and when I climbed out of the car in front of the office, I saw Alicia’s
friend Jack. He was opening the passenger door of his black Mercedes. I was
surprised when I saw him extend his hand to help Alicia out of the car. She was
smiling and so was he, until he looked over and saw me standing next to him. I
almost smiled at how quickly his fell off of his face.

“Hi, baby,” Alicia said when she saw me
there. “It was so warm earlier I decided to walk to court. I guess I wasn’t
thinking very far ahead. Jack came by and saved me.”

“Imagine that, Jack was there…again.” I
gave him a tight smile and he gave me one in return. He looked at his watch
then and back at Alicia and said,

“I just remembered an appointment I have.
If I don’t see you before, Alicia, have a Merry Christmas.”

“Thank you, Jack, you, too.” Hmm, he
didn’t wish me a Merry Christmas, I thought.

“Thank you for giving my fiancée a ride,”
I told him with a smile. He shot fire out of his eyes in my direction. He
caught himself and quickly hid the look and said,

“It was my pleasure.”

Alicia and I watched as he got into his
car and drove away. When he was gone I said, “I don’t think he cares for me
much.”

Alicia chuckled. “Me neither, baby.”

I put my hand on the small of her back and
steered her in out of the cold. “So he just ‘happened’ to be around again?”

“Yeah, you’re right…that happens way too
often.”

“I really wish you would have called me or
the car service. I don’t like the idea of you alone in the car with him. I
don’t trust that guy.”

“I don’t either, anymore, but not in a
sense that I think he would ever hurt me. I can’t even imagine that. Besides,
it was a productive ride.” We both dropped it as we rode the elevator with
several more people. When we go to our floor, we stepped off and I walked
Alicia to her office, stopping by Mary’s desk and asking her for something for
my headache. She opened one of her desk drawers and handed me a bottle of
Tylenol. I shook three out into my hand and when I handed the pill bottle back
to her she handed me a bottle of water to wash them down. I smiled at her and
took it. She was a life-saver.

“Thank you, Mary. I’ll be back for my
messages in a few.”

Alicia and I continued on to her office
and I sat down when we got there and asked her, “What did you find out? Did
Jack admit something to you?”

“No, not directly,” she said. “When I got
in his car, I started out our conversation by telling him I ran into Alex
earlier.”

“Did you really?”

“Yeah, on my walk to the courthouse I ran
into him at the coffee shop.”

“What did he say?”

“Alex or Jack?”

She was losing me. My head was throbbing.
“Either,” I said.

She grinned. “I’m sorry, babe. I know
you’ve had a tough morning. We can do this later…”

“No, later I’m going to be kissing and
touching you…and inside of you…”

“Okay,” she actually blushed. She’s so
damned cute. “I asked Alex about Jack. He told me about Jack’s dad and the
presidential campaign money. Then lo and behold, there was Jack as I came out
of court with a warm car and a friendly face. I couldn’t resist at least trying
to get a little bit of information.”

“So then did you ask Jack about Alex?”

“Yes and he tried to say he didn’t know
him again until I told him that Alex admitted they knew each other. He finally
gave in and told me that he was acquainted with him and the last time I asked
about him he’d just been confused and hadn’t put the name with the face. Once I
told him what Alex said about his father making campaign donations, he acted
like he just suddenly remembered and said that his father decided it was the
best way to make strong political connections.”

“They’re getting their stories straight,”
I said. It pissed me off even more to think Alex was working with Jack. For
some reason, I saw Jack as sleazier than Alex, although they were accused of
doing the same things. I knew it was jealousy, so I was glad to just have
another reason not to like him.

“I asked him about his father and
Interpol,” Alicia suddenly said.

“Baby! You’re not supposed to do that. You
were alone in the car with him. He could be dangerous if he gets suspicious.”

“I just asked casually. I told him one of
my legal contacts in the U.K. had mentioned it and I wondered if it was
resolved.”

“So what did he say?”

“He got defensive and told me that with
his father’s wealth comes enemies and those enemies would like nothing more
than to see him fail. Jack questioned why I was so interested.”

“See why I worry about you?”

She smiled again and waved at me with her
palm. “I told him that I was just concerned about him. For years, he adamantly
refused to have anything to do with his father’s business and now here he is up
to his elbows in it. I also told him that I was confused about him and Alex
acting like they don’t know each other when they obviously do.”