One

Now was not the time to think about the kiss.

It had happened ten years ago, but Arlington Banks could still taste him. The roasted grain sweetness of beer snuck at a high school keg party. His adrenaline, sharp and metallic on her tongue. She could still feel the ghost of his fingers trailing up her ribs, goose bumps spilling from her scalp to her shoes.

Now, after a decade, they were in the same building.

Arlie stole one last glance at her reflection in the brushed metal elevator doors and tucked an escaped tendril back into the chignon she’d spent hours trying to make look effortless.

Tilting her chin to one side and then the other, she managed to confirm her carefully applied makeup was in place despite the door seam dividing her reflection.

And divided was exactly how she felt. Half of her knew that agreeing to a job interview with Samuel Kane, CEO of Kane Foods International, was perhaps the worst idea she’d ever had. The other half knew it was the best option given her circumstances.

Circumstances.

A rather polite word for the soul-sucking chaos she had recently dragged herself through.

Nails digging half-moons into her palms, she watched the glowing green numbers flash on the panel to the right of the doors: 12...13...14... Ten more to go before she reached the exalted floor that served as the executive offices.

The elevator car eased to a stop with a musical ping. Arlie took a deep breath, hoping the small, cold ball of her stomach would lower back to its normal position.

No such luck.

Stepping out onto the twenty-fourth floor, she turned and came face-to-face with French doors roughly a story tall.

This was the place, all right. The Kanes had never been much for understatement. At least, not in the fifteen years she had known the family.

A mechanical buzz sounded as she approached and the doors swung smoothly inward. Arlie bit back an unintentional gasp.

Acres of travertine marble flooring stretched before her, the sweeping curve of a grand staircase flanked on either side by intricately carved wrought-iron railing. The chandelier dangling above it was a hurricane of crystal shards forever suspended in a violent vortex. At its apex, a soaring opera house ceiling had been intricately painted a tranquil blue interrupted only by puffy clouds and cavorting cherubs. Around the border, expertly painted architectural details gave the impression of hand-carved stonework.

She had learned about this kind of hyper realistic paintings in an art history survey course in college once upon a time.

Trompe l’oiel. To deceive the eye.

In her experience, eyes weren’t the only things the Kane family was capable of deceiving.

Arlie wasn’t sure how long she had been standing there, mouth agape, when a smooth, honeyed voice dropped her back into the present.

“You must be Miss Banks.”

Tearing her gaze away from the ceiling, Arlie noticed the reception desk tucked neatly against the wall. Behind the lacquered expanse of inlaid wood, a petite brunette with designer eyeglasses beamed a warm wide smile at her. A small plaque at the desk’s beveled edge proclaimed her to be Evelyn Norris, Receptionist.

“I am. I have—”

“A nine o’clock interview with Mr. Kane,” Evelyn Norris, Receptionist finished for her with practiced efficiency. “Yes, Miss Westbrook informed me.”

“Samuel Kane,” Arlie said. Lord help her if she ended up at the desk of the wrong Kane. Not that there was a right Kane, if history was any indication.

“Yes, I see that.” Evelyn’s eyes flicked toward the oversized monitor on the desk. “If you wouldn’t mind taking a seat, I’ll let him know you’re here.”

“Of course.” Arlie readjusted the strap of her laptop bag. Within the lobby’s cavernous height, the echo of her stiletto heels sounded like gunshots as she wandered over to the waiting area.

Like her shoes, the rest of her outfit had been selected with almost surgical precision. A tight—but not too tight—fitting pencil skirt. A tailored—but not too tailored—crisp white V-necked blouse that revealed the barest hint of cleavage. The hairstyle had been the one element she’d agonized over. Standing in front of the mirror cursing her thick, wheat-colored strands, she’d summarily vetoed long and loose as too casual and nixed half pulled back as too indecisive before deciding on the simple updo.

Settling onto the buttery leather, Arlie drew her phone out of her bag and scrolled through her email to the message that had tossed her world straight off its axis.

Mr. Parker Kane. Arlie had nearly deleted the message when she’d seen that name. She remembered the Kane family patriarch in exceedingly alarming detail. His cold, steely gaze. His thin, perpetually unsmiling mouth. The intricate ways he’d found to keep her aware that, as the daughter of the Kane family’s personal chef, she had been inferior by association.

But Mr. Samuel Kane. That was a whole other matter. Eldest of the three Kane siblings by a mere hour, Samuel was a book nerd turned multimillionaire CEO. That name, along with the should you be interested had ultimately caught her interest. Arlie had read that phrase approximately seventy-eight times.

It wasn’t the opportunity she was interested in, per se, though the position aligned alarmingly well with her qualifications.

She was interested in not having to choose which bill she would pay late each month. She was interested in no longer working high-end service for tables of wealthy businessmen who somehow managed to ogle and insult her at the same time. She was interested in piecing back together the rubble of her life after the complete and total disaster that the last six months had been.

“It appears Mr. Kane is running just a few minutes late,” Evelyn informed her. “He asked me to convey his sincere apologies.”

As if any Kane was capable of sincerity.

Her brief encounters with Mason Kane, Samuel’s twin brother, had certainly taught her that. Pompous, popular, and persistent, Mason had dogged her heels from the second she’d crossed the threshold of the private school they had all attended. Achievement had been tantamount among Lennox Finch Academy’s coveted virtues. Some people broke records in high school track. Some students got their names on the honor roll.

Arlie’s lone distinction within those hallowed halls? She’d been the only female to resist Mason Kane’s self-professed ample charms. Four long years of his asking her out in increasingly dramatic and creative ways only to be rebuffed each and every time. All the while, Arlie’s attention had been fixed on shy, serious Samuel, on whom she’d had an ardent, desperate crush.

“No trouble at all,” Arlie assured her. Reaching into her bag, she drew out her leather portfolio. A small swell of pride loosened anxiety’s grip on her chest as she paged through the glossy photographs from cookbooks, magazines and digital ads. Glasses of iced tea with their thirst-inducing beads of condensation. Perfectly medium-rare steaks, pink juices anointing pristine white plates. Vibrantly green roasted broccolini, coarse sea salt scattered like honeymoon rose petals over the crisped crowns.

She had been good at this, once upon a time. A rare double threat who both styled the food and took the photographs. The thought was a soothing balm to the open, aching wound that losing her dream job had ripped open.

Made all the deeper by the fact that she’d brought it on herself.

“Mr. Kane is ready for you.” Evelyn marched around the front of her desk, a gentle incline of her head indicating Arlie was meant to follow her.

Together, they bustled down the hallway to yet another elevator. Evelyn flashed her badge at a small black panel before pressing the single button.

The only way was up.

“Here we are.” Evelyn held the elevator door when they arrived at their destination, allowing Arlie to exit first.

The fabled twenty-fifth floor didn’t look like an office so much as a penthouse apartment. Wood parquet floors. Intricately woven Persian rugs. Rooms with curio cabinets full of objets d’ art and ankle-deep carpeting.

Directly across from the elevator, a wall-sized mirror in gilded frame hovered behind a table displaying an army of pictures. Arlie floated over to them, overcome by a wave of nostalgia that almost toppled her off her carefully chosen shoes.

Kanes jumping horses. Kanes posing with purebred dogs. Kanes holding aloft the limp carcasses of sleek feathered ducks and geese.

All three Kane siblings lined up before the gigantic stone-lion-flanked fireplace of Fair Weather Hall. Only child that she was, Arlie had always been fascinated by the idea of siblings. Looking at the picture now, she felt a similar pang of longing. She had remembered the late Mrs. Kane explaining to her that she’d chosen their names based on her much-beloved detective novels—Marlowe, her only daughter, and the twins: Mason and Samuel.

And there he was. The Samuel Kane she had met for the first time when they were both thirteen years old. A green-eyed, dark-haired, sullen boy with wire-rimmed glasses, always standing a good foot away from his twin brother and his sister. Arlie would have bet her Nikon D6 that the hand mysteriously missing from Samuel’s left side hid a book behind his back.

“Miss Banks?” Evelyn had made it halfway down the hall before realizing she’d lost Arlie.

“So sorry,” Arlie said, trotting to catch up.

“Mr. Kane’s office,” Evelyn announced before knocking exactly three times on a large wooden door.

“Come,” the muffled voice ordered from the other side, a strange mix of irritation and command.

Arlie’s stomach performed an impromptu death roll as Evelyn gingerly turned the ornate handle and peeked into the opening. “Miss Banks for you.”

“Fine.”

Evelyn Norris stepped back, giving Arlie’s elbow an encouraging squeeze before shuffling off down the hall.

Heart rattling against her ribs like a trapped bird, Arlie squared her shoulders, tilted her chin up, and opened the door.

Her first thought when she saw Samuel Kane standing beside a desk roughly the size of a boxcar was that she shouldn’t have brought her portfolio, she should have brought a crash helmet. Because the second her eyes locked with his, her knees decided to turn to butter.

A thousand times she had rehearsed this scene in her head. A thousand times she had failed to adequately prepare herself for the man standing before her.

The Samuel Kane she had invented for these mental practice runs was a slightly older version of the quiet, studious teenager she had known. Tall and lean, maybe with a good start on a receding hairline. Definitely wearing some kind of pretentiously recognizable designer suit.

The suit part she’d been right about.

Damned if she hadn’t been dead wrong about how that suit would fit him.

His coat hung from a polished mahogany coat rack to the left of his desk, allowing Arlie an unfettered view of the pale blue shirt clinging to his broad, rounded shoulders and a torso clearly honed by hours, days, probably years, in the gym. A crisp sapphire tie hung down the center of his chest, anchored in place by a gleaming gilded lion tiepin. Below the tawny leather belt circling a lean waist, the fitted pinstripe slacks hugged the powerful, corded muscles of his long legs.

Then there was his face.

Many an afternoon when she had come to Fair Weather to help her mother with the food for a large gathering, she’d invented elaborate excuses to steal glimpses of Samuel while he’d sequestered himself in the family’s library, a pile of books next to him on the Regency end table. From her covert vantage, she’d watched as he’d turned page after page, pausing only to push his glasses up his nose with the tip of his left index finger at regular intervals.

As a young man, he’d had an almost poetic sensibility with full sensitive lips and prominent cheekbones, a lock of dark hair flopping over his brow. The hair and lips remained intact, but years and a goodly dose of testosterone had broadened his jaw, chiseling it into a dangerous outcropping above the crisp angle of his starched collar. Beyond the actual changes in his features, Samuel looked like every ounce of his relentless thirst for knowledge had been distilled into hunger itself. Lean. Predatory. Ruthless.

“Arlie Banks,” Samuel said, coming around his desk. “Thank you for coming.”

She hadn’t realized she’d frozen in the entryway until he closed the distance between them with purposeful strides. When he was close enough for Arlie to catch a current of soap, aftershave and pressed wool, he held out his hand.

After a beat of hesitation, she slid her small, sweaty palm into his, surprised by the electric jolt that shot straight to her heart when his fingers closed over hers.

“Of course,” she said, trying to seem confident and calm as she met the eerie golden-green eyes he’d inherited from his late mother. “Thank you for thinking of me.”

“I didn’t.” He motioned her toward the chair directly opposite from his expansive desk.

“Oh?” Arlie tried to ignore the stab of disappointment as she primly seated herself.

“It was Marlowe.” Samuel walked around behind his desk and slid into the wide wing-backed leather chair with practiced ease.

“Oh,” was the most intelligent answer Arlie could manage.

Marlowe Kane, one grade below and several levels of social sophistication above Arlie, had mostly ignored her during high school. Sometime after college, Arlie had been surprised to receive a connection request from her on a social media employment site. No one had been more shocked than Arlie when she discovered that Marlowe had traded in her pom-poms for an MBA and a job as the corporate comptroller at Kane Foods International.

“She mentioned that you were the artistic director of Gastronomie, but that you’d recently left the company.”

A single bead of cold sweat crawled down Arlie’s ribs like an unwelcome insect as she silently prayed that he didn’t ask for any further details. “That’s correct.”

Samuel leaned forward in his chair, light from the floor-to-ceiling windows behind him gilding the crown of his dark, sleek head. “Why?”