Heat

I don’t answer right away—I’m looking for my resident social climber, Gloria. She can smell a billionaire brat like a shark can smell chum in the water and… yes, there she is, weaving her way through the crowd toward Jake Ferry exactly like a deep sea predator. It would serve Jake right for me to let her get her jaws on him.

It wasn’t necessarily Jake’s choice to open Ferry Lights. That tactic reeks of Reginald Ferry, but as far as I know Jake is just an asshole, not a professional asshole. And the last thing I need is Gloria stirring up some kind of PR hurricane, or worse, whispering secrets into the competition’s ear.

“I’m sorry, Kirby,” I tell my friend, “I’m so glad you came by. Can I catch up with you later? I need to… intercept.”

Kirby gives me a wicked, salacious grin. “Jake Ferry? Really?”

“Not even a little,” I tell him before we trade cheek kisses and I make my way to where Gloria is already laying it on thick.

Once I’m on the move, Jake’s eyes catch mine and track me part of the way. Gloria’s follow, and a split second later her fingers brush her prey’s cheek. She leans in and whispers something in his ear. Probably an offer to blow him in the back room.

I should let her have him. It might make for a good excuse to fire her later on. I’m too damned nice for my own good is what I am.

“Mr. Ferry,” I say as I close on them not a moment too soon—Gloria’s already escalated to flipping those platinum-blonde curls—and lean against my bar. “To what do we owe this dubious pleasure?”

“I was just entertaining our special guest,” Gloria informs me, a note of cool irritation in her voice.

“That’s the only reason I came over,” I say. “I needed someone to check in on the VIP lounge. But if you’re busy—”

“No,” Gloria says quickly, predictably. After all, why try and spear one fish when you can cast a net in a barrel? “I don’t mind at all.” She vanishes like smoke on the wind. Dangle a room full of rich dicks in Gloria’s general direction and she can display impressive celerity. It’s like magic.

Jake Ferry doesn’t even watch the girl go. He settles those smoldering eyes on me—why do spoiled assholes like him always seem to smolder so well?—and his full lips widen into the kind of smile that other girls would crow about getting soaked panties over. Not me; I’d never admit that to a living soul.

I clear my throat. “What brings you here, Mr. Ferry?” Business, girl. Business.

“Please, Miss Hall,” Jake urges, “call me Jake. Mr. Ferry is my father.”

“Is that who your father is?” I wonder out loud. “Well, Jake—what are you doing here?”

He shrugs, and waves a broad, well-manicured hand at the common lounge around us. “Who wouldn’t want steal a glance at the real work of art behind the infamous Red Hall?” There’s that smile again.

That kind of flattery probably gets him a lot of places, and people, but I’m not Gloria, or some empty-headed beauty just waiting for my knight to arrive. Still, I take the compliment and smile graciously. It’s what one does, after all. “What do you drink?”

“Oh, I couldn’t,” Jake says. “Don’t trouble yourself over me.”

“I insist,” I tell him.

“Well… I hear you’ve got a pretty good strawberry whiskey in-house.” He winks at me.

My smile is maybe a little more pride filled than I mean it to be. Oh yes, I sure do—a signature distillation that I worked my pretty little ass off for two years to secure the first three casks of well before it came to market. I’m betting the Ferrys know that, because I made damn sure they couldn’t get their hands on a single bottle of it.

A gesture and a meaningful smile, and Chester gives me a knowing smirk as he fishes one of the bottles from behind the bar. Oh, Chester. At this point we might as well be telepathic.

When I turn my attention back to Jake, he’s looking me over the way a man might size up a racehorse or an expensive steak.

“Eyes up here, Mr. Ferry,” I mutter.

His eyes linger a moment longer on my ass before he meets my eyes. “I wondered if you were as all-business as everyone says. You’re not seeing anyone, are you?”

My eyes roll on their own. Real slick, handsome. Subtle as an earthquake. “Some of us have to work hard to get ahead, you know.” I shake my head in disgust. “We weren’t all born with silver spoons in our ass.”

For a heartbeat, it looks like I actually hurt him. It doesn’t last, though. I suppose a billion dollars in the bank affords thick skin.

Chester delivers the whiskey, and Jake waits for me to pick up the tumbler as he does. We raise glasses with a congenial sort of professionalism and I watch his face as he sips. His eyes get a little wider, genuine surprise registering as the amber liquid does its work.

“Wow,” he says. “That’s… really good. Smooth. Not what I expected at all.”

“It’s not cheap,” I tell him. It’s the truth—four hundred a bottle was steep, and I got it for a bargain.