This Year's Black (Killer Style 2)

“No way. The last time I let you talk me into breaking out of my comfort zone, I ended up in bed with my new client.”

Both women’s jaws hit the floor.

Heat ate its way north from her chest. “You remember… The guy from the club. A few weeks ago. Muscles? Tattoos? Ass worth crying over? Totally my type and, therefore, exactly the kind of guy I should stay the hell away from?” She looked from one shocked face to the other. “Come on, I know I told you about him.” The one who’d tempted her beyond all reason to come back for seconds and thirds and fourths.

Sylvie tossed a crumpled up napkin at her. “The question is how did you wait this long to tell us he’s your new client?”

“Playing a little boss and secretary, eh?” Drea asked. “Who’s the perv now?”

An image of stripping down to her heels while Devin sat behind his desk flashed in her mind, and her whole body began to tingle. “Don’t even put that image in my head. I’m not falling off the wagon again.”

Always ready for any matchmaking opportunity, Sylvie’s green eyes lit up. “Is he the guy you wouldn’t call back?”

She locked her gaze on the last drops of mocha latte in her cup. “That’s the one.”

“Remind me again why you ended up blocking him from your phone?”

“Like I said, he’s just my type—my old type.” She reached for her purse. The girls were circling, and she knew better than to stick around when they decided it was time to offer some older sister advice. She loved them, but sometimes being the youngest in the group sucked big hairy goat balls.

“So the hot, muscled, tattooed guy with a great job who’s fabulous in bed and more than a little bit interested in you isn’t your type?” Drea asked. “And then, after you blocked him, you spent the next week at Paulie’s Gym punching things. That had nothing to do with this guy at all?”

Ryder nodded and stood, ready to bolt. “Exactly.”

Sylvie and Drea exchanged a she’s-full-of-shit glance, but Ryder ignored it. It didn’t matter. She wasn’t about to let personal feelings fuck up this case. From here on out, she was all business.

…

Devin rubbed the back of his neck and pushed his way to the rear of elevator at Dylan’s Department Store. As soon as the doors closed, the baby in the stroller lost his mind. The kid’s screams jabbed through Devin’s eardrums and marched down his spine like an army of ants wearing razor-sharp cleats. The woman, whom he assumed was the mom, had the frazzled, embarrassed, and at-the-end-of-her-rope look of someone who’d been on the receiving end of a baby’s anger and stranger’s disapproval for most of the day.

It reminded him of the last walk he’d taken with his little brother, James, outside of the long-term care facility. A police cruiser came roaring by with the lights flashing and siren blaring. James had clapped his hands over his ears and howled in fear before crumpling to the ground. Strangers had given them wide berth as they hustled past on the sidewalk. No one tried to help. Not like they could. Devin had made sure of that years ago.

The mother picked up the fussy baby and hugged him close, cooing ineffectually in his ear.

“Sorry.” She glanced back over her shoulder at the others in the elevator before quickly turning to face front again. “He’s teething.”

While the elevator inched toward the lobby floor, the other riders ignored her remark and continued to aim dirty looks at the back of her head. She bounced the kid up and down, jiggling him in a failed attempt to calm him, but the red-faced creature didn’t give a shit about the censure. He just kept screaming.

Devin scrunched up his face and made fish lips at the kid. The yelling continued, but the volume dropped a few decibels. He pulled his Stefano Ricci micro-neat silk tie away from his shirt, stuck his fingertips into the pointy end, and curled it toward himself before making faces at it as if the light blue Italian tie was a puppet. The screaming silenced, but the kid’s mouth stayed poised to emit a deafening racket at any moment.

He eyed Devin warily.

Smart kid.

Time to break out the big guns. He let go of his tie and covered his face with his hands, waited a beat, then opened them up. The baby giggled at the peek-a-boo game, showing off two tiny front teeth in an otherwise gummy smile. Devin disappeared again behind his hands just as a ping sounded, announcing the elevator had arrived at the lobby level.

The doors slid open in sync with Devin’s hands, revealing a smiling baby being carried out into the flood of people at the elevator banks. Dead in the center of the crowd stood Ryder Falcon, looking at him like he’d lost his ever-loving mind.

He immediately dropped his hands and shoved them deep into his pockets.

“You coming out?” Ryder asked, a grin tugging the corners of her mouth.

Smooth move, Harris. You’re such a stud. “No. I was heading down to meet you in the lobby.”

She strode into the elevator, looking every inch like she owned the building, and met his gaze with her unwaveri

ng eyes. “Well, here I am.”

“Here you are.” He shut his trap before he blew her away with any more of his oh-so-amazing verbal skills.