When It Hooks You (It #1) (12 page)

“So you’re the two who stole the love of Lyssa’s life away from the Midwest, eh?” Trish said.

Len held his hands up in defense. “That was all big Carlo’s doing…though I can’t say I tried to talk him out of it.”

“Yeah, it’s great having junior here to kick around,” Craig said, nudging Hayden with his elbow.

“You wish, mincemeat,” Hayden retorted.

Len busted out laughing, and Craig’s rosy skin went a shade darker. Hayden answered the girls’ curious looks with, “Inside joke.”

“Not that far inside,” Len sniggered. He and Hayden shared another laugh—at Craig’s expense judging by the glares the shorter man shot them.

“All right, enough of that,” Hayden said. “First round’s on me. What’ll you have, Trish? How was your first full day in Boston? Was the couch comfortable to sleep on?”

“In reverse order: very comfy, fun, and I think a white wine—something crisp. A pinot grigio or chenin blanc.”

“I’ll help you get them,” Lyssa said, hopping off her chair. “You two want the usual?” she asked Len and Craig.

“As long as it’s wet, I’ll drink it,” Len said.

While Lyssa and Hayden got the drinks, Trish made small talk with the guys. From their accents, she guessed they’d both lived in the Boston area for a long while, and she was right. Lyssa resumed her seat while Trish explained to Len and Craig that she didn’t have an accent.

“I grew up in the suburbs, so I never picked up the
Chicaaago ayxcent
. The northern suburbs of Illinois represent the pure absence of accent. We’re the baseline against which all the rest of you have perverted the language.” With a straight face, she picked up her sweating glass and leisurely tilted the cool liquid past her lips.

“If believing that helps
yah
sleep
bettah
at night…” Len said.

“You
ah
wicked deluded.” Craig shook his head.

Trish laughed at their overly emphasized dialects, and the five of them moved on to other topics. The summer warmth and the snappy, fermented fruit on her tongue combined flawlessly with the easy companionship. It was one of those blissful moments in which she truly felt as if there was no other space or time in which she’d rather be. She was perfectly content.

Craig swigged the last two inches of his pint. “I’ve got to hit it. Taking Benny out tonight to buy his first suit. Big family wedding coming up.”

“I remember my first suit,” Hayden said in a wistful tone. He and Len reverently clinked their glasses to Craig’s empty one.

“Godspeed,” Len said.

“Good grief,” Lyssa groaned. “Are suits what you guys resort to since you don’t have your periods to bond over?” Her eyes slid toward Trish, clearly looking for female support.

“I don’t know…” Trish shrugged. “A quality suit is nothing to thumb your nose at.”

“There’s that look again,” Lyssa said.

“What look?” Trish asked.

“That I’m-mooning-over-Adam-Helms look.”

Trish couldn’t deny it. “Technically, I’m mooning over his suits. He has a tailor in Hong Kong and one in London.”

“You don’t happen to be talking about Adam Helms of Helms Enterprises, do you?” Len asked.

An irrational tightness pinched Trish’s belly. She didn’t want to know that people in the outside world knew Adam—that would bring him out of the dream bubble she’d formed around him. “That’s the one,” she admitted.

“That guy has great suits,” Craig said, setting his glass on the table. “Trish, nice to meet you. Always a pleasure to see you, Lyss. I’ll catch up with you two knuckleheads at the office tomorrow.”

Craig made his exit, and Hayden asked, “What’s so great about this guy’s suits?”

“King —” Len clapped a hand onto his shoulder “—you’ve never even seen a suit until you see Helms wearing one.”

Hayden grunted. “Sounds like the
Emperor’s New Clothes
to me. Nothing can be better than the Alan Rouleau in my closet. It’s woven with threads from heaven and makes me look like an angel. A very successful, very studly angel.”

Len gave Trish a conspiratorial wink. “You think guys compare engine size and sexual conquests? Hell no—it’s all about thread count and cut. So, you got something going with Helms?”

“No, not really. I’ve just gone on a couple of dates with him.” She flicked her hand in the air in an attempt to dismiss the subject entirely.

“Dates?” Len arched a bushy, dark eyebrow.

The way he’d said it threw Trish off, causing her to hesitate. Hayden covered Trish’s muteness: “You’ll have to forgive Len. He’s been an old married man for years now and can’t remember the customs of us single folk.” Turning to Len, he spoke as if talking to a kindergartener. “A date is when a man spends a lot of money on dinner and maybe a show in hopes that the woman will have sex with him.”

“So, kind of like prostitution but with a much lower probability of success,” Len said.

“How do you know Adam Helms?” Lyssa asked him.

“Bell Funds invested in shares of Helms Enterprises. We did a lot of face-to-face due diligence with him.”

“Is the company part of the portfolios at the new place?” Lyssa asked.

“No.” Len took a sip of his beer.

“Why not?” Lyssa asked.

“As Adam took over more of the firm’s leadership from his father, the company moved into new areas we weren’t entirely comfortable with—from an investment perspective, nothing illegal or anything,” he added.

“What areas?” Lyssa pursued.

“Oh, come on!” Trish blurted before toning it down a notch. “Can’t you financial nerds even finish one drink before analyzing everything?” If she’d wanted to know about Adam’s company, she’d have asked him herself. This was starting to feel like voyeurism. “How ’bout those Sox, eh?”

“Red or White?” Len asked, graciously letting the conversation turn.

“I like my team the way I like my wine.” Trish swirled the remaining pale sips in her glass.

Len departed for home soon after, and Hayden, Lyssa, and Trish went to the seaside restaurant. Buttery lobster melted on their tongues while the expansive surface of the Atlantic gently surged, as if a powerful monster underneath was awakening. Clouds crept into the sky throughout the evening, and by morning a light drizzle coated Boston in steely gray.

Despite the subdued cast of dampened daylight over the pale neutrals of Hayden’s apartment, the girls got themselves pulled together and out the door much earlier than they had the day before. Their first stop was the Museum of Fine Arts. They lingered longest among the collection of couture dresses in the Textiles and Fashion Arts exhibit, which dated back to the days when Boston had been the center of the US textile industry. The rain persisted, so they decided to stay at the museum for lunch, sitting at a table in the middle of the towering atrium that separated the historic part of the museum from the newer wing.

“This is more impressive when the sun is shining.” Lyssa frowned, her eyes raised toward the thousands of drops racing down the enormous glass wall.

“It’s still pretty cool,” Trish said. “A dreary day is sort of nice once in a while. Not every day can be sunny. Though I imagine that—” she tilted her head to indicate a spiky lime green spire; it was made entirely of glass and rose straight up from the floor near the window “—is amazing when the sun hits it.”

Lyssa sighed. “Yeah, it is. Guess this means you’ll have to come back soon so you can see it.”

“Definitely.” Trish smiled. “You know what that thing keeps making me think of?”

“What?”

“A tiger penis.”

Lyssa choked on her ice water and threw her hand to her mouth, her eyes going wide in shocked question.

“Sorry,” Trish said, not making any effort to sound the least bit remorseful. “Tigers have barbed penises. It helps them stay in while mating.”

Dabbing at her lips with her napkin, Lyssa asked, “Why do you know that?”

“After I started relating to the feline, I did a little Googling. Fascinating creature, the tiger.”

“I bring the girl to a museum, try to show her a little culture, and she turns a Chihuly into a giant phallus.”

“I’d say the artist did a fine job of that all by himself.”

Lyssa’s gaze scanned the length of the piece. “I suppose he did. Still, this could be a sign that it’s time for you to get yourself some.”

Trish laughed but declined to respond, instead giving her attention to the menu. Adam Helms was the first man to make her seriously consider losing her revirginity. If his kisses were any indication, a night of wrestling between the sheets with him could be the one way to top their perfect second date.

After lunch, the two friends took in a few more exhibits, taking pictures of their attempts at funny poses with the Greek and Roman statues. Trish sent the best ones to Cliff, who texted back immediately that the ladies of leisure should stop trying to distract men at work…and if they came across an Aphrodite, please, please, please send over a threesome shot.

When they’d absorbed all they cared to at the museum, the girls took a taxi to the Boston University campus. Instead of getting out to walk in the rain, they asked the driver to take them down a few streets so Lyssa could point out buildings of interest. Though the campus was distinctly urban, it still managed classic ivy-covered walls. The girls spotted a cozy-looking coffeehouse and asked the driver to drop them off there. After securing warm mugs of caffeinated joy, they settled into a pair of cushy, worn armchairs.

“All right, I’ve been good all day, but you’re leaving tomorrow, and I’m going to explode if I don’t ask,” Lyssa said. “Are you not the least bit curious to find out why Len seemed surprised that you and Adam are dating?”

“We’re not dating. We’ve just gone on a couple of dates.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Don’t you want to know?”

“He was probably surprised that someone of Adam’s stature would stoop to dating a lowly secretary.”

“Len’s not like that. Do you think this Adam has some sort of juicy skeleton in his closet? I wonder if it has something to do with the ‘new areas’ Len wasn’t comfortable investing in.” Lyssa pulled out her phone and held its face toward Trish. “We could do a search for Helms Enterprises right now and I bet we’d find out.”

“No!” Trish shot her hand out to grasp onto the phone, covering its screen with her palm.

“Why not? Afraid of what we’ll find? Have you never Googled him before?”

“Of course I haven’t. I don’t want guys searching my name on the Internet; I’m not going to search theirs. It’s creepy.”

“So you’ll research tiger schlongs but not the guy you’re currently going out with?”

“Do you have a problem saying the word penis?”

“No.”

“Prove it.”

“Penis. Can we get back on topic?”

“Look, anything I need to know about Adam, he’ll tell me himself. And I’m not going out with him. We
went
out.”

Lyssa huffed her displeasure at Trish’s continued denial.

“My point is, even if there were something of value to learn about Adam on the Internet—and I highly doubt there is—what would be the point of learning it? At the very most I’ve got one more date left with the guy, so I don’t need to know anything about him. That’s the beauty of my plan.”

Lyssa took a sip of her chai latte and regarded Trish through narrowed eyes.

Trish slumped back in her chair, running her finger over the rim of her cappuccino mug. “Can’t you please just let me preserve my admittedly idealistic view of him?”

Lyssa swallowed and set her cup down, reaching over to lay her hand on Trish’s knee. “Yes, of course, I’m sorry. It’s none of my business. I just don’t want to see my friend get hurt.”

Trish lowered a hand to cover Lyssa’s. “I won’t. But thanks for worrying about me.”

They went on to talk about how excited Lyssa was to finally start classes in a few weeks. She admitted to feeling a little lost without a job or school to anchor her. “Maybe after I’m fully immersed in the program at BU this will start feeling like my city, too, not only Hayden’s. Speaking of the city—what do you want to do tonight? We’ve found a few great clubs, but they’re in different parts of the city so we should probably pick just one.”

“Maybe it’s because of the rainy weather, but I could go for a movie and take-out back at your place.”

“On your last night here? You haven’t so much as flirted with a single Bostonian yet.”

“I didn’t come here to flirt with Bostonians. I came to see you. We’ll save the partying for when JoAnne is with me.”

“This is about the guy you don’t want to admit to going out with, isn’t it?”

Trish shrugged. “Maybe a little bit. I’ll get back to dating real men eventually, but for now I want to savor the memory of dreamy Mr. Helms. He’s like a fine wine amid a sea of Mogen David.”

Chapter 11

T
HE
G
LASS
S
HOOK
as an F-22 Raptor shot past. The roar of its engine held Trish in a prolonged flinch as it soared away. Situated many stories above the thousands of spectators on North Avenue Beach, Trish’s colleagues gawked through the windows of a lakeshore hotel. Every mid-August during the air and water show, River South Partners rented the banquet room to entertain clients and prospects. Adam Helms had, of course, received an invitation, but he’d sent his regrets.

As she had for the last five years, Trish made sure the event ran smoothly, acting as the firm’s liaison with catering and hotel services. Stationed by the entry of the room to greet newcomers and keep an eye on the buffet table, Trish was free to observe the crowd. This year Cliff was particularly fun to watch.

As a newbie at the law firm, he naturally felt pressure to maintain a professional demeanor. He was attentive to clients and quick to laugh at the jokes of senior partners. Overall, he presented a calm and cool façade in his business-casual navy blue pants and yellow and baby blue striped button-down. But Trish saw his dark eyes dart to the windows at the first rumblings of each new engine. She noticed the tensed twitch at the corners of his forced smile when Mrs. Beneficence took him away from the airborne pyramid of skydivers to hold her plate while she refilled at the buffet table. When a helicopter deftly pulled out of a vertical dive, he seemed unable to stop his hand from fisting and pumping by his side. Each new trail of exhaust fumes across the electric blue canvas pushed calm and cool Cliffy a bit more over the edge.