Hollywood Girls Club (38 page)

In the three years she’d worked for him, Meg made herself indispensable, and he had been fool enough to let her become a necessity. She knew everything about him—from the way he took his coffee down to his shoe size. She ran his business affairs seamlessly. He leaned on her. Depended on her. Cole even began to
need
her and needing anyone was completely intolerable. To need a person was to appear weak. Need allowed vulnerability to take root. Need was the end of strength. No, to need Meg, was completely unacceptable.

 “Yes, hi. This is Meg Parson. I have Cole Jackson for Stan Morton.”

With the sound of his name on her lips he faced her.

 “Of course I’ll hold.” Meg covered the mouthpiece and her blue eyes sparkled alive with the thrill of the deal. “Why didn’t we use your landline?”

Cole’s heart quickened as Meg’s excitement spilled over to him. He sipped his drink and watched Meg over the top of his glass. This time, her proximity, and not the bourbon, seared through him. This deal was Meg’s baby and once the deal was consummated Cole would have to promote Meg. If he waited any longer another company would swoop in and grab her. One of his competitors might already be trying.

“They’re getting Stan,” Meg whispered still covering the mouthpiece.

Stan Morton owned one of the two things Cole wanted most in the world. Stan owned TBC studios. And the other thing Cole wanted?

Cole’s eyes traced the porcelain curve of Meg’s neck as she twirled a piece of hair between her thumb and pointer finger. Well, the other thing wasn’t for sale, nor was it negotiable. Office dalliances weren’t Cole’s style and neither was a long-term commitment. Meg was the type of woman that required he break both rules and Cole preferred his relationships exactly as they’d been for the past decade of his life: hot, fast, and disposable.

“How will you celebrate?” Cole rarely asked Meg anything so personal. A dusty pink flush crept over Meg’s ivory colored cheeks.

Protectiveness surged through Cole with her blush.

“I’m thinking Bali.” A smile started in Meg’s eyes and quickly encompassed her whole face with the vision of a luxurious and well-deserved beach vacation growing in her mind.

“Nice choice.”

“And you?”

Cole tilted his head toward Meg. Her question surprised him. He’d celebrate the same way he always did; with more hard work. There was no family in his life. His parents were dead. He had an uncle in Florida that he didn’t speak to—could never speak to again.

“I know what you’ll do.” The sparkle in her eyes danced. “You’ll find another company to buy.”

He lifted one corner of his mouth assured and yet uncomfortable in the knowledge that she knew him too well. Meg was right. He’d pore over more market reports to determine what company was undervalued. Spotting good deals had taken him from a college dropout with thirteen dollars and seventy-six cents in his pocket to owning houses in Malibu, Aspen, New York City, and Paris.

“It’s like you’re obsessed,” she said.

Obsessed or obsessive. Either way he continued to win. Cole gathered up all the things he wanted. The things he needed. The things that proved to him and the world that Cole Jackson would stand on his own. Whether knocked down or not, he wouldn’t cave, cower, or run away in fear. Meg’s fingertips caressed the gold necklace she wore.

A tremor rumbled low in Cole’s back. Again he looked away and searched the horizon for a solution to the problem that was Meg. After he promoted her he’d send her to New York or perhaps even Hong Kong. Extreme distance would alleviate the feelings that swept over him when he looked at Meg.

He had fought too long and too hard to regain control of his parent’s company after their death and he refused to put Comnet in jeopardy just because Miss Meg stirred a vulnerable spot within him. Out of sight, out of mind; and the farther out of his sight that Meg Parson was, the better.

“Where’d they have to go to find him?” Meg whispered, “Zimbabwe?” The phone still pressed to her ear, Meg arched backward in a feline stretch and her white blouse curved to her body.

His chest tightened with the sight of Meg’s nipples pert and tight pushing against her bra. He worked hard to press air in and out of his lungs. To stay steady. He ached to reach out and entwine his fingers into the silky strands of her hair. He wanted to, but he wouldn’t. He could, but he didn’t.

*

“Miss Parson?”

“Yes?” Finally Stan’s secretary was back on the line. How long did they have to wait? How long would Cole wait? Not long. Cole didn’t wait for anything and especially not to give someone a half billion dollars.

“I’m sorry but Mr. Morton is unavailable,” the crisp cool voice on the other end said into the phone.

“Excuse me?” Meg’s stomach spiraled as she turned away from Cole. “Did you say he’s unavailable?” She whispered.

“Unfortunately yes. He’s not accepting any more calls this evening.”

“Did you tell him who it is?” Meg forced an even tone into her voice.

“I did. And he said that perhaps he’d speak with you tomorrow.”

Perhaps?
Perhaps wasn’t good enough. Possibilities and maybes and perhapses wouldn’t cut it when Cole Jackson stood beside you and anticipated closing the biggest deal of his career in the next five days.

“Good night, Miss Parson,” Stan’s assistant said smoothly into the phone.

Meg said nothing. Not a word. She didn’t want to turn around. She didn’t want to face Cole. She didn’t want to see the edges of his sharp-cut cheekbones or the dark shadow of a beard that in the evening clung to his jaw. She didn’t want to glance at his black hair, the edges of which brushed the collar of his still-crisp white shirt. And she definitely didn’t want to look into his hard blue eyes—the eyes that seemed to peer into her soul—and experience the disappointed downslope of his full mouth. Her heart ached at the thought of Cole turning away from her in disgust and irritation at her inability to close the deal.

She needed this job. She needed this success. For goodness sake, after three years of working for Cole she needed a promotion.

Meg closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and turned. “She—” Meg looked up into Cole’s intense blue eyes and her heart jumped. His face set like ice belied no emotion. He stood so very close to her.

His nearness pulled the air from her lungs and she wanted to step back, but couldn’t. A contagious heat radiated through his shirt toward her. With his tie pulled loose he appeared stunningly sexy.

“They couldn’t reach him.” Meg braced herself for the onslaught. She witnessed VP’s get their asses handed to them when they messed up a deal much smaller than the acquisition of TBC. “She said that perhaps we’d speak tomorrow.”

Cole’s face clouded like a thunderhead rolling across the sky. His right eyebrow pulled upward a harbinger of his extreme displeasure. “Did you say
perhaps
?”

Meg nodded.

“I don’t do perhaps,” Cole growled.

Tingles shot through her limbs and her body tightened. She was hyper-alert aware of Cole’s presence, his displeasure. Her nerve endings tuned into his every move.

“How did this happen?” His ice blue eyes bit into her. “How, Meg, could you let this happen?”

Anger lurched upward from her belly and pushed aside her fear.
Her? How could she let this happen?
Meg turned to Cole, her eyebrows knit tight. She handled this deal exactly as he trained her. Each step guided by how she observed him operate over the last three years. Skillful and precise. She had learned from the best. She had learned from Cole.

“I did everything, I—”

“It wasn’t enough,” Cole cut in roughly. He took one step forward.

Her breath shortened as Cole crowded her against the wall of glass.

“Somebody else got to Morton,” Cole said. “Some other company is going to close this deal. Metro Media? Maybe they found out.”

They were nose to nose and Meg’s heart fluttered fast. A tremor shot upward through her knees and clutched the base of her spine where her backside skimmed the glass. His scent filled her and fuzziness blanketed her mind. He was so close, so near, so present. His intensity rushed through her as if she’d caught a sizzling electrical chord in her hand. She closed her eyes and exhaled. She grounded herself.

“No one knows about this deal. Stan…Mr. Morton…he’d only sell to you. Not Metro Media.”

As much as she was irritated by his quick assessment that somehow she failed, she fought a fierce desire to lay her hands on his broad chest, tip her face upward and—

“Where is he?” Cole’s breath tickled her face.

She blinked and forced her mind to focus. Cole Jackson was not the kind of man you lost focus around. He collected women in the same way she collected new shoes: often and always keeping an eye out for the next beautiful pair.

“Costa Rica,” Meg said. “This week Stan’s in Costa Rica.”

Cole sighed as if in that one breath he released a weeks worth of air. He looked past her to the ocean beyond. “Call Thompson,” he said. “Tell him to get the jet ready. We leave in an hour.”

Anxiousness grabbed her insides.

“
We
?”

She hadn’t spent much time with Cole in nearly six months and Meg was uncertain after these moments together that she wanted to spend much more with him.

“It’s
you
that Stan Morton wants. Not me. Not Comnet.” Cole stepped forward and tilted his chin down at her, his voice low and full of gravel. “I’ve thrown every executive I have at him and he’s never even blinked, before you.”

Meg’s heart pitter-pattered against her ribs at an accelerated pace, but to step away would only intimate fear. Or worse yet, weakness. She wouldn’t be banished again, not when she was this close to success.

“So yes,
we
leave for Costa Rica, in one hour. Because you, my little Meggy, will make sure that Stan Morton agrees to this deal.”

An Excerpt from Courting Trouble

Available Summer 2012

Chapter One

Savannah McGrath pushed open the Jeep door and the shriek of old cold metal tore through the frigid mountain air. A grey pall hung heavy in the sky—no sun—no blue—not even the scent of snow. Her legs shivered sending a quake up her spine. The shiver shifted and hardened in her belly—a thick sick feeling. Her hand tightened around the butt of the Winchester 1897 and her thumb caressed the initials carved into the heavy wood stock nearly a century before by a dime-store pocket knife.

Grandma Margaret always said the only difference between an opossum and a man was that the opossum hissed before you shot it. Savannah’d seen an opossum hiss—this morning she intended to find out about the man.

Savannah’s breath, like puffs of smoke, drifted into the early morning sky. She trudged across the Hopkins’ front yard—a foul looking patch of dirt and rock—past a rusted snowmobile missing both skis that waited on cinder blocks for a rescue that would never arrive. She climbed the porch steps. Rickety and rotted the wood creaked beneath her. On the porch crumpled beer cans lay scattered beside a ripped green leather sofa. The Hopkins didn’t take much interest in caring for things, including their family.

Anger surged in Savannah. Anger fueled by seventeen years of neglect. Anger fueled by her daughter. Anger fueled by Bobby Hopkins. An anger that rushed through her head and caused a pounding within her brain nearly as loud as her fist pounded on Bobby’s front door.

“Bobby, you get your no good ass out here!”

A shadow flickered on the other side of the picture window, but no face emerged.

“I know you’re in there!” Savannah yelled. “I’m not leaving until we settle this. You hear me Bobby?”

She pressed her nose against the cool glass of the picture window. Silent images flickered across the unwatched TV in the darkened living room. Her heart hung heavy in her chest with the emptiness of the room, with the squalor of the house, with the absence of Bobby and his continued cowardice toward their daughter.

Savannah turned away from the window her grim feelings like gravity on the corners of her mouth. She stomped down the steps. Her gaze locked on the window just above the garage and she backed into the front yard. Seventeen years before Savannah thought she discovered the cure to all that ailed her within that bedroom—a lover, a friend, a partner for her life—but what Savannah really discovered was a whole lot of sex and very little contraception.

“She is mine, Bobby!” Savannah called out into the early morning air. “Do you understand? I raised her! You ran your ass off to Alaska and I raised her!” Her cheeks were too cold to feel her tears. On her tongue the salt tasted bitter. “Damn you Bobby Hopkins.”

Her heart broke wide and pain thrashed out at her ribs and squeezed at her lungs—so tight and so hard that air burst from her lips and she struggled to draw in a breath. The pain wasn’t for her, the pain wasn’t for Bobby, the pain wasn’t even for Savannah’s long lost once upon a time young love—the pain—this pain—that crippled her and stole the breath form her body was for her nearly grown daughter, Ash.