Damaged Grump (Bad Chicago Bosses)

One by one my staff peels off into taxis and town cars. By the time my driver, Dominick, raises his hand to get my attention and then dutifully pulls the back door of my sleek black Rolls open, it’s only me and Wanda sliding into the dark-upholstered interior.

As we start moving, I pause, lingering on a photo of Reese Halle—now Reese Brandt—in a rather stunning gown. The color contrast between her outfit and Paige Brandt’s gives me a few ideas for a design composition.

I stop as I realize Wanda is giving me that look.

“What now?” I growl, lifting my head and frowning.

“You,” she says tartly, “have never once let a rival go unscathed. Which is why I don’t trust your intentions toward Miss Landry.”

“You’re forgetting Nick Brandt and I are on excellent terms now. 'Excellent' defined as 'doesn’t want to rip my face off.'” I swipe through to another photo of Nick, his bearded face lit up as he stares adoringly at his lovely and pregnant new wife without the slightest care for the cameras trained on him. “Besides, I hardly consider Callie Landry a rival. So really, what’s there to worry about?”

An answer gnaws at the back of my mind.

It must be the glaring fact that her name rolls off my tongue like music.

Annoyingly, I like the way it tastes.

Fuck.

I don’t have time for this. Not for buttoned-down women with their straight-and-narrow ideas of right, wrong, and fuck you.

I’m not sure I have the moral compass anymore, either.

Sometimes you only get to right by the wrong means.

And the last thing I need—the very last—is one of my new acquisitions playing Jiminy goddamned Cricket in a pleated skirt.

If only I wasn’t so curious about the file waiting in my inbox. What will it reveal?

How will Miss Snoopy react when she finds out that on paper, the man she views with flaming contempt owns her?

* * *

Unfortunately, the next day, I don’t have time to find out.

I’m barely stepping off the elevator into the office before trouble shows up on my doorstep. It’s name is Frank Ranallo.

Frank himself isn’t bad. He’s quite the affable guy, the sort of mid-fifties workhorse you expect to see pestering his children about grandkids and never expect to be a merciless shark in the courtroom.

As my head of legal counsel, he has to be a beast, or he wouldn’t survive.

Only, whenever he’s waiting outside my office, that means there’s blood in the water.

“Talk fast,” I say, settling the knot on my tie as I step past him and unlock the double doors to my office. “I have six meetings before noon, two of them on-site.”

He follows me, easing the double doors shut.

“As usual, Mr. Osprey,” he says in his wizened, careful voice, “we’re up to our neck in lawsuits. The latest might be a problem.”

“Hit me.”

“That story you ran last month about the DUIs, well, it’s caught up to us.”

I move to the tall window along the back wall of my office. The entire thing is a single massive pane that gives me a perfect view of my urban domain, sprawling below.

“Reporting the law isn’t a crime, Frank,” I snap, folding my hands behind my back. “It’s a baseless suit. It’s also the truth.”

“She’s claiming you violated her privacy, caused her emotional distress—”

“She caused her own grief with such reckless behavior. You know she nearly collided with a family of four, including a pregnant woman, right?” I say firmly. “Her arrest was a matter of public record with irrefutable evidence. It’s a frivolous suit. It’ll be thrown out of court like a rowdy drunk at bar close.”

Frank’s sigh vibrates the air, long and deep.

I hear those sort of sighs too much from everyone around me these days.

A constant reminder that I’m not an easy man to work with.

“Roland,” Frank says patiently. “She’s throwing a pile of money and legal muscle behind this. And with all the cases on our docket, we’re stretched pretty thin defending over half a dozen major suits.”

“Only half a dozen? I’m slacking. Thanks for letting me know.” I glance over my shoulder at him, arching a brow. “There’s no need to get your blood pressure up. Pull in a few consultants off our trusted roster to handle the excess until the worst of it calms down. Have we ever lost a defamation suit?”

“No,” he admits grudgingly.

“How many cases?”

Another sigh, long and filled with suffering. “One hundred and thirty-two. Probably one hundred and thirty-three by tomorrow.”

“One hundred and thirty-two defamation cases, personal distress cases, libel and slander lawsuits over anything and everything Hollywood brats can think to throw at us,” I say, “and we haven’t lost a single one. Now why do you think that is?”

“Because you pay me to do my job well, and I have a modicum of professional pride,” he answers.