Duke
I woke up to a pounding headache and a tongue drier than the Sahara Desert. I grabbed my phone from the bedside table, checking the time through squinted eyes. 9:27. There were a couple missed calls from Kelly. She was probably just mad I didn’t take her and Kaylie home with me. Not that I was ever really planning on it. If there’s one thing I learned from the last time the three of us spent the night, it’s that mornings after are even worse with an extra person in the mix.
After splashing some water on my face and throwing my sweat-soaked shirt in the hamper, I made my way to the kitchen. Coffee, then shower. That was the plan. Even if walking down those damn stairs made my head throb harder with every step.
When I reached the kitchen, I stopped dead in my tracks. Now, I’d never had a hangover so bad that I hallucinated, but in that moment, I was about ready to believe it could happen. Because standing in the middle of my kitchen was a smoking hot woman in a tight black skirt and a red silk blouse, with her arms crossed and back to me.
Not that I was complaining about the view.
Maybe I didn’t remember the end of last night as well as I thought I did. I could have sworn I came home alone, but according to the vision in red just a few yards away, there was a lot of late night action I was forgetting. But even if my brain was still a little hazy from the booze, judging by the stirring in my boxer briefs, my dick remembered just fine.
“Good morning, darlin’. Could I interest you in some breakfast sausage?”
The woman turned, her long, dark curls swinging around her shoulders. A look of disgust quickly washed over her face as her eyes locked on my bulge.
“Ay dios mio, you’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” she muttered, immediately taking her briefcase from the counter and marching to the front door, her red-bottomed heels clacking loudly on the hardwood.
“What’s the matter?” I asked, stumbling after her.
“Last time I do a favor for a friend,” she said under her breath, slamming the front door shut behind her.
Favor. Friend. Beautiful woman in a pencil skirt. Charlotte’s hotshot lawyer friend from Los Angeles.
Oh fuck.
“Hey, uh, Valencia, wait up!”
I burst through the door to find her paused on the top step of the porch. She turned sharply to look me dead on, the fire in her eyes enough to burn me straight through.
“It’s Valentina,” she spat, crossing her arms and cocking her hip to the side.
“Valentina, right. My mistake. Listen, I’m really sorry about all this. We were out late last night for—”
“For the opening, I know. I was supposed to be there, but something came up at work. So instead, I got my ass onto a last-minute redeye to make it in time for our meeting this morning, but clearly you had other things in mind,” she said, her eyes flitting to my quickly-softening cock before turning again to leave.
“No, please, don’t go. This is completely unprofessional, I know—”
“That’s the understatement of the century.”
“But I promise, if you give me a chance, we can turn this meeting around.”
“Is it still a meeting when one person shows up with his dick out?”
“Oh, trust me, sweetheart, if my dick was out, you’d know it.”
“Sure, as long as I brought a magnifying glass with me.”
I paused, standing up a little straighter. She squared her shoulders, and our eyes locked, the tension between us thick enough to cut with a knife.
If we were going to make this work, I knew I had to be the one to budge. But dammit if this woman didn’t make me want to blow my lid.
“Look, I’m sorry. Please stay. If not for me, then for Luke and Charlotte.”
Valentina sighed and put a hand on her hip.
“Fine. Put some goddamn pants on first, and then we’ll talk.”
Within fifteen minutes, Valentina and I were walking into the local coffee shop. After throwing on a pair of dark jeans and a gray T-shirt, I convinced her that moving to a second location was probably a good idea. I drove us over to Sue’s Brews, the best—and only—place for coffee in town.
I led us to my usual corner booth, simply smiling and waving at the hostess as we seated ourselves. Sue’s was really more of a café than a coffee shop, with lots of tables and waitresses and such, and I could tell by the look on her face when we walked in that Valentina was expecting something different. I felt a smirk pull the corner of my lip up as I imagined her surprise at how different this place was from the hoity-toity places she probably got her coffee in Los Angeles.
“Not your cup of tea?” I asked after we sat down, nodding my head at the baby blue vinyl bar stools.
Valentina shook her head, propping her elbows up on the table.
“It’s just that when you said coffee shop, I assumed it would be…something a little more...” She left the rest of her sentence unfinished, but I was assuming she meant something from this century.
“Well, Sue’s is the only place in town. And we’ve got a lot of coffee drinkers here in Shady Grove.”
“Yeah, I can see that,” she said, shifting uncomfortably in her seat. The place was pretty busy—it was a Sunday morning, after all—and as usual, the locals weren’t doing a great job of not staring at the out-of-towner.
“Don’t worry about them, just sniffing out the new meat. Speaking of, have you eaten yet?”
“I haven’t, actually. Took that redeye from LA, remember?”
“Lucky for you, Sue’s has the best breakfast in town. But don’t tell anyone I said that.”
Valentina nodded, stretching her full lips into a straight line and miming like she was locking them up.
“Well, I’ll be damned. Duke Wilder, based on how you were drinking last night, I would have put money on it that you would have been dead to the world until at least next Tuesday.”
Our waitress appeared next to the table and gave me a playful punch on the arm.
“Oh, come on, Jenny, you know me better than that. No amount of drinking could keep me from seeing that face of yours the next morning.”
Jenny giggled, and Valentina rolled her eyes, muttering something in Spanish under her breath.
“What can I get you two today?” Jenny asked, smiling broadly at us both.
“Just the usual for me, Jen,” I replied, handing her my menu.
Valentina clicked her tongue as she scanned the small list of breakfast foods and drinks.
“If you don’t see what you’re looking for, just let me know. We’ll make just about anything for a friend of the Wilders.” Jenny leaned an elbow on the back of Valentina’s side of the booth.
“Oh, that won’t be necessary,” Valentina said without looking up, clearly struggling to find something she wanted on the menu. I’d watched Charlotte try to order food in Shady Grove enough times to know that she’d have a hard time finding the low-calorie, low-carb, fat-free, practically cardboard option she was looking for.
“Are you sure? You look like a woman who knows what she wants,” I said, cocking my head to the side.
Valentina arched a perfectly sculpted eyebrow at me before turning to Jenny.
“I’ll have an egg white omelet with spinach and tomato, and a non-fat latte with a dash of cinnamon, please.”
“I think we can do that. I’ll go put your orders in, and then I’ll be right back with your coffees.”
As soon as Jenny walked away, Valentina pulled a folder out of her bag, opening it to show me some forms she’d filled out.
“So, Luke and Charlotte explained your situation to me over the phone last night, and I think I figured out your best option moving forward. I’ve put together a countersuit.”
She slid a form in front of me, but I didn’t look it at. Didn’t even touch it.
“I don’t want to countersue. I just want them to drop the lawsuit.”
Valentina shook her head. “They’re not going to do that. I did some digging on these guys, and they are nasty. The only way we’ll get them to drop it in a reasonable amount of time is if we countersue for a lot more money.”
I sighed, leaning back into the blue vinyl and running my hands through my hair. Figures that the one time I think I made something good, something I could be proud of, a couple of fucking assholes with a trademark decide to make my life hell.
What those assholes didn’t realize? I had one badass lawyer on my side.
And she was sexy as hell when she talked business.
“All right, I’m in,” I said, extending my hand across the table. Valentina smirked at the gesture but shook on it anyway, her tanned skin warm against my palm.
Jenny returned with our food, and the sight of my full country breakfast next to Valentina’s egg white omelet was laughable. Her eyes grew wide as she took in my meal: two eggs sunny side up, two thick cut slices of bacon, breakfast potatoes, and a side of biscuits and gravy.
“That’s your usual?” she asked, taking a small bite of her meal.
“Takes a lot to look this good.”
I puffed my chest and flexed a bicep at her, but she just rolled her eyes.
“Charlotte warned me about you and your ways.”
“My ways?”
Valentina set her fork down, folding her hands and resting them on the table.
“This engagement will be strictly by the books. All that strutting and swagger might get you laid every once in a while, but that’s not about to happen here. I’ve got a job to do, and that’s all.”
I raised my hands in surrender, shrugging and shaking my head. “Fine by me. You’re the boss.”
“Good. Glad that’s settled.”
I nodded, and we continued eating, but in the back of my mind I knew it was all a lie. She could tell herself all she wanted that there was nothing between us, that she wasn’t picking up what I was putting down. But if there’s one thing I know, it’s women, and this one was definitely into me.
I gave it three days, tops, before I got in her panties. We were both grown-ups. We could keep it professional.
But there was no way in hell I was letting her fly back to LA that next week without a taste.