Working Stiff: Casimir (Runaway Billionaires #1) (23 page)

Arthur laughed out loud. “We wouldn’t want to ride in steerage and rub elbows with the commoners.”

Maxence’s eyebrows gathered in the middle. “I had been digging wells in Africa. I built a school with my own hands and taught classes until they could get a permanent teacher. I’m not complaining, but I lived in a hut with a family of eight and slept on a grass mat on the dirt floor like everyone else for six months. I lost forty pounds because there was never enough food and I kept giving mine to the two youngest children, who were even more underfed than the rest because they were girls. Yes, I flew first class to get here. And yes, I’ll be buying crates of supplies to ship ahead when I go back next week.”

Arthur laughed. “Maxence here is far too easy to tease. I should stop tormenting him.”

Maxence looked down at his plate, which had only smears of sauce remaining on it. “I am too easy to tease.”

Rox told Arthur, “Yeah, you should lay off the guy who digs wells and builds schools for children who survived civil wars.”

Arthur laughed again. He pushed off her chair and went back to his supper. “Did your security men help you dig the wells?” he asked, forking more chicken into his mouth.

Maxence flicked his hand in the air, a dismissal. “I leave my security detail in hotels in the capitals of the countries where I go on missions, and soon, I can dismiss them entirely.”

Cash’s expression turned serious. “That’s not a good idea.”

“No one cares about me,” Maxence said, staring at his wine.

“Of course, people care about you,” Cash said.

“That’s not what I meant. I meant that no one would bother killing me. Why don’t you have security if it’s so important?”

He grinned. “Because my family problems are over.”

Maxence raised his eyebrows. “I guess they are.”

Arthur dabbed his lips with his napkin and pushed his half-full plate away about an inch. “God, I’m stuffed. You still do have excellent taste in restaurants, Casimir. Where are we going tomorrow?”

“Hadn’t decided,” Cash said.

Arthur stood and traded his half-full plate across the table for Maxence’s empty one. “Do me a solid, there, would you? My grandmother used to expound about the war whenever I left food on my plate. It still disturbs me to see uneaten food.”

“You used to do this all the time at school,” Maxence said, digging into the leftover chicken, potatoes, and vegetables. “You would take twice the food you needed and then admonish others to clean it up for you.”

“I’ve been a wastrel my whole life,” Arthur agreed, but his sharp eyes watched how Maxence hungrily tucked in the food. Rox glanced back to him, but Arthur only asked, “Are you going to miss your brother’s wedding like you did his engagement party?”

Maxence raised one eyebrow. “No one noticed my absence, I’m sure. Once Pierre and Flicka have children in a few years, no one will notice me at all, ever again, and I will be much relieved.”

“Then you can golf all you want, huh, Max?” Arthur asked him, raising his glass of wine to him.

Maxence turned to Rox. “They’re teasing me because I intend to take Holy Orders and become a priest, a Jesuit, and spend my life working for peace and justice.”

“I think that’s beautiful,” Rox said.

Arthur and Cash cracked up, their male laughter ringing on the dark timbers and iron chandelier above the table.

“I don’t see what’s so funny,” Maxence said.

“All right,” Cash said, turning to Rox. “You know how I might have a bit of reputation around the office.”

Rox rolled her eyes. “Maybe a little.”

“Does he really?” Arthur said, leaning in. “Pray tell, Rox. What has our Casimir become?”

“He’s a heartbreaker who’s been through every woman in the office and most of our clients.”

Arthur rolled his eyes. “So you became a manwhore like the rest of us, did you?”

“Good God. Look who’s talking,” Cash admonished him.

“Me? I’m as pure as new-fallen snow at Gstaad.” Arthur turned back to Rox, his silvery eyes sparkling. “But Maxence’s past is
tawdry.
I can find all sorts of references on the society pages.”

“They still have those?” Rox asked.

Arthur huffed, pretending to be offended. “What else would they have to write about?”

“Politics. Science. Sports. Who are you guys such that you should be written about in the papers? I’m sorry, but I don’t recognize any of you. Cash here is an entertainment lawyer, and our clients get talked about, but they don’t talk about us at all.”

Arthur leaned over the table to look past her to Cash, a huge grin spreading over his face.
“Really?”

Cash growled at him, “I’m a lawyer.
And that’s all.”

“You haven’t mentioned anything about the places with high ceilings?”

“There’s no reason to.”

“For
three years?”

Cash enunciated very clearly, “No reason to.”

Arthur sat back in his chair, his eyes wide with amusement, and Rox was totally going to cross-examine Cash about all that later.

“Of course, you’re just a common working stiff, just like the rest of us,” Arthur glanced at Rox. “And with this little biscuit puttering around your office all day, I’ll bet you were—”

Cash rose in his chair.
“Arthur, do you mind!”

Maxence’s dark eyebrows were raised high, but he looked away, toward the deck and the sunlit ocean beyond.

“Anyway,” Arthur said, stretching his long arms above his head. “Where shall we go tonight? Is there a nightclub around here? A theater? A concert?”

“Oh, we live a very quiet life up here,” Cash said. “I thought we could build a fire in the fire pit on the deck outside and have a drink.”

“Good Lord.” He turned to Rox. “Is this your doing? Is he ready to settle down and succumb to the lethal matrimonial virus that seems to be going around?”

“Oh, Lord, no,” Rox said, waving her hands. “Cash and I just work together. We’re really just friends.”

“Oh, well, if you’re
just
friends. I must have misunderstood. What are we doing tomorrow, then?”

Cash said, “Rox and I are working on some very important contracts. There are some irregularities, and we are scouring through hundreds—”

“Tomorrow is Sunday,” Arthur said, gesturing and catching his tipping wine glass before it spilled. That was a pretty impressive save, considering that he had put down most of a bottle of wine by himself. “Surely you won’t work on Sunday. You would have something to say about that, wouldn’t you, Maxence?”

Maxence tilted his head and paused, holding a bite of roasted potato on his fork. “I’ll have to find a church for Mass. Perhaps you would like to go with me?” he asked Cash.

“I’m Protestant,” Cash reminded him. “The Dutch people are Protestant.”

“Not all of them, and we wouldn’t turn anyone away,” Maxence said, his voice low and gentle.

“Oh, of all the sanctimonious bullshit,” Arthur said. “God, Maxence. We’re not here to bore Casimir until he flees from us.”

“Why are you here, then?” Cash asked him.

Arthur continued, “Surely we can find something more interesting to do than going to church.” He turned his silvery eyes on Rox. “What do you usually do on Sundays?”

“I volunteer at an animal shelter,” Rox said.

Maxence lifted his eyes, and he smiled.

Wow, with those dark eyes and perfect cheekbones, when he turned on the smile, he was truly
breath-taking,
even if he was a tad on the skinny side.

A small, lustful part of her brain noted that low body fat revealed abdominals and other musculature. Under those black clothes, you could probably see every striation on the muscles that criss-crossed his body.

Okay, she wasn’t looking. He was going to be a priest, the kind that gave up women and marriage.

And she was sleeping with Cash. Or at least she had once. He hadn’t ghosted on her yet, though he was sure to.

But
damn.
What a waste.

She still told the lustful part of her brain to shut up and quit ogling the priest.

Maxence smiled at her, those dark eyes alight, and said, “Tell me about the animal shelter.”

“Yeah,” Rox said, blinking and looking at her hands. “It’s not glamourous. I clean the cages and fill the food dispensers, and I help with the paperwork and accounting and stuff. If you guys wanted to come, we always need dog walkers and kitten socializers.”

“Kitten socializers?” Arthur asked, his dark eyebrows rising. “That’s a job description?”

“Yep,” she said. “They need to be played with and held and petted so that they’re not afraid of humans. There’s a short window. If they’re not properly socialized for at least several hours every day, they’ll be feral their whole lives. They’ll be essentially unadoptable as pets. We try to find them placement as barn cats because it’s the only way that they’re happy at all.”

“Good God, Casimir!
Kitten socializers!
Why wasn’t I told that this was a thing? All these years, I’ve been throwing charity balls and buying overpriced lots at charity auctions, when I could have been saving my immortal soul and proving my scant worth as a human being as a
kitten socializer.
Come on, Caz. For the love of God, I must give generously of myself.”

Cash raised one eyebrow at him. “It’s just a lark to you.”

“And yet I shall socialize the kittens! Even you, Maxence, must admit that this is a worthy cause.”

“Well, yes. After I find a church for Mass—”

“Oh, come on. You can skip it.”

“Actually, I can’t.” He sopped up the last bit of sauce with the last chunk of chicken from Arthur’s plate and glanced at the windows, where the sunset glowed over the ocean. “Indeed, if you’ll loan me a room, Casimir?”

“Of course. I’ll be right back, Rox. If Arthur tries anything, just yell and I’ll kill him when I get back.”

“You guys throw around that killin’ thing awful casually for someone who’s never held a gun,” she called after Cash, but he just laughed as he walked away with Maxence, probably to one of the other guest rooms he had shown her on their tour.

She was turning back to Arthur, saying, “So, what do you do—”

Arthur was leaning toward her, nearly nose-to-nose, and his pale eyes were perfectly serious. He said, very quietly, “Tell me quickly about the accident. Ana couldn’t tell us much, just that he had his spleen removed and some dry facts about the car, and he’s such a private person that he won’t. What has happened to
Casimir?”

The switch in him astonished her again.

She said, “It was really bad. His car flipped at least twice, and the windshield shattered and came in at him.”

“It sounds like you saw it happen.”

She nodded. “I was right behind him. They had to use The Jaws of Life to cut him out.”

Arthur blinked, flinching. “Scars?”

“The windshield sliced through the air bags and cut him up. Lots of little cuts and scrapes all over him. They’re fading fast. In a month, most of them will be invisible.”

“It must have been bloody.”

“He was really beaten up. Both his eyes were swollen shut, and he had bruises all over him. The air bags hit him hard, but they saved his life.”

Arthur laid both his hands flat on the table on either side of the empty plate. “He must have hired nurses to take care of him afterward.”

“I stayed with him. After he got out of the hospital, he just needed someone to make sure he was okay and eating and stuff. He didn’t need a nurse.”

Arthur nodded. “So, his spleen. There is a scar?”

“On his side.” Rox pointed to her own ribs. “Near one of his tattoos. You know about his tattoos?”

“I helped him design them.”

“Oh. Wow. You did a great job.”

“And that bandage on his face?”

“I still don’t know.”

Arthur looked above her head. “Here he comes.”

Rox was still gaping at Arthur.

Arthur settled back in his chair, and his smile turned sultry. “So how long have you two been together? And just how
happy
are you?”

“Back off, Severn,” Cash said as he walked in.

Severn?
Wasn’t his name Finch-Something?

Must be a nickname or something.

“I was merely asking,” Arthur said and winked at Rox. “You never know what could happen, three adults with natural inclinations. It’s not like we’ve never explored that.” He told Rox, “I’m discounting Max. He’s evidently decided to opt out of any games because he’s such an aesthete.”

Cash stood behind Rox’s chair and laid his hands on both her shoulders. “I said, back off.”

Arthur rolled his eyes and poured himself another glass of wine. “You have lived in America too long, Casimir. You’re going Puritan on us.”

TEACHING MAXENCE TO MAKE COFFEE

The next morning, Rox woke up in her own bed, alone but for the three cats who were snuggled tightly around her. Having two new strangers in the house had traumatized the beasts. They had hidden all evening and crept into her bed as soon as the house was dark.

The previous evening, Rox, Cash, and Arthur had indeed built a small fire in a saucer-shaped fireplace on the deck, and Maxence had rejoined them later.

Rox kept sensing snatches of things that she needed to quiz Cash on, things like “places with high ceilings” again and references to a lawsuit that Arthur was involved in.

She had finally crawled off to bed after midnight, but the three guys had stayed out on the deck, talking.

After she got ready, she went to the kitchen to rustle up some breakfast, and found Maxence already down there, holding the coffee maker and inspecting it. He was wearing head-to-toe black again, black slacks and a black dress shirt. His waistband puckered under his belt, and all his clothes hung on him like they were a size too large despite the fact that they appeared tailored.

This time, she looked closely, but this shirt, too, had a regular collar, not a Roman collar like priests wear. He had mentioned that he hadn’t been ordained yet.

He looked up when she came in, relief lightening his dark eyes. “Oh, thank heavens. Can you show me how to use this thing?”

“Okay, sure. You’ve never made coffee?”

He shrugged. “Not something they taught us at Le Rosey, and it seems to have slipped my experience since.”