Madeleine slid her arms around her. “I’m really happy for you.”
“I couldn’t have done it without you. Or the Duchamps and their boycott. I might have to send them flowers. A whole houseful.” Her lips curled up.
“That’d go down about as well as last time.” Madeleine laughed.
“Honestly, I never thought I’d ever get back my first dream.”
“And you did. You got the girl, too.”
Elena licked her lips and darted a nervous look at Maddie. “You know, I’ve been thinking. About the proposal you made?” She was pleased how flippant she sounded. She swallowed. Now or never.
“What proposal?”
Elena gave her desk a testing rap.
“Oh!” Madeleine’s eyes widened. “Are you serious? And don’t you dare tease me like last time. That was so cruel promising desk sex and not delivering.”
“About as cruel as you leaving me to attempt a serious conversation with Perry while my thong stared at me from across the room.”
“Okay, that was a little evil of me.”
“So it was on purpose? Distracting me from retrieving it?”
“You deserved it. Torturing me with impossible fantasies.” Madeleine looked unrepentant.
“Hmm.” Elena’s lips twitched. “Perhaps it was a little cruel. I’m prepared to make amends.”
Madeleine’s face lit up. “Are you seriously talking desk sex after all this time?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s something else.” She knocked the desk again, above the drawer. “Open it.”
Madeleine slid open the desk drawer. A velvet box sat inside.
“I promised to ‘table’ something last time,” Elena said. “This counts as a table, does it not?” She held her breath, placed the box between them, and opened it to Madeleine.
Her lover stared at the diamond ring for so long that Elena wondered if she’d made a terrible mistake. Elena had spent an eternity trying to find the right one, even enlisting the services of Perry, who was officially insufferable now. “Don’t you like it?” she asked pensively.
“Are you kidding?” Madeleine’s eyes shone. “I love it. But you know…a beautiful ring like that usually comes with a question.”
“Is that so?”
Madeleine nodded. “Spoiler alert, I’m going to say yes. And then I’m going to kiss you. And then we’re going to have hot fiancée desk sex.”
“Well, now I’m conflicted.” Elena laughed. She held the ring out, and said seriously, “Madeleine Grey, I knew the day we met that you were trouble. How right I was—and how much I needed it. Needed you. I love you. Will you…”
“Yes!” Madeleine slid the ring on and kissed her breathlessly.
“You do realize I didn’t actually ask you anything,” Elena pointed out. Her heart was thundering, her mouth dry, and she couldn’t seem to control her grinning mouth. She’d never felt anything like this before. She was pretty sure it was a sign of true love—or a heart attack.
“Asked and answered.” Madeleine laughed. “Now I’m certain promises were made.” She patted the desk, a gleam in her eye.
“I’m quite sure I didn’t agree to that,” Elena protested, although truthfully, it was the reason she’d proposed in her office: To give Madeleine her fantasy.
Maddie’s T-shirt was already half off her head. “Uh-huh,” came the muffled sound.
With a sigh to hide her mounting excitement, Elena sat back, unbuttoning her silk blouse. She watched appreciatively as Maddie tried to haul her skinny jeans down her legs. “You’re so beautiful,” Elena noted quietly.
Kicking her jeans away, Madeleine grinned. “I love it when you get mushy.”
Elena slid off her blouse and gave an imperious look. “It’s not mush. It’s accuracy. And the truth is you are beautiful.” She lowered her voice. “I love you more than is sane, Madeleine.”
“I love you too.” Madeleine smiled. “And who knew you were so romantic?”
Elena sighed at the frankly preposterous comment and kissed the lie straight off those lips.
# # #
THE AWKWARD TRUTH
CHAPTER 1
Focus: Absolute
On November 23, at 10:07 a.m., Felicity Simmons seized her boss’s tea mug and hurled it against the wall, changing her life forever.
“I am not your assistant, Elena!” Felicity stood ramrod straight and glared. “I’m NOT who you pay to fetch and carry and make drinks and photocopy paperwork. I will never get you another fucking chai latte ever again, so don’t bother asking. I’m your chief of staff. Do you understand that? I’m a trained lawyer, exceptional at what I do, and I deserve to be treated accordingly.”
“I see.” Elena’s pleased little smile took all the wind out of Felicity’s sails. “It took you long enough.”
Then Elena promptly promoted her.
Astonishing how a career could be advanced with nine pieces of ceramic and a sticky wet spot of chai latte (nonfat milk, extra hot) on the gunmetal gray carpet. No one ever said media mogul Elena Bartell was predictable.
It was now March 10, 8:58 p.m., well over three months later, and Felicity was still trying to get her head around what had happened. She stared out her glass balcony doors at the jutting skyline from the thirty-second floor of her Manhattan apartment. Felicity might even be able to pay her mortgage off this year with the pay hike that came with going from Elena’s chief of staff to deputy chief operating officer, soon to be running all of Bartell Corp as acting COO. That did not seem real. None of this did.
A noise made her start, and she peered into the darkness of her balcony, although she had a pretty good idea as to the culprit.
Her building’s balconies comprised one long strip of concrete flooring on each level with a glass parapet in front. Each apartment’s balcony sides were chest-high, frosted-glass dividers with funky stylish holes to let the wind through. Unfortunately, the little holes were ideal climbing aids if you had paws. As a result, Loki, her next-door neighbor’s cat, hopped from balcony to balcony and liked to make herself at home in Felicity’s pair of designer topiary trees.
Oh, Felicity might not have caught the creature in the act, but she’d seen plenty of leafy evidence that the beast liked to claw her way up the tree stems, bursting up into the rounded balls on top like something from Alien.
This was unacceptable in about fifty ways, of course, from the defiled expensive trees to enduring an animal with trespassing issues. Perhaps the worst part was the fact that it was a cat. Felicity didn’t like cats anywhere near her. Dogs, either. It was a boundaries thing. As in they had none.
Felicity knew she was being watched. She rose and slunk over to the wall next to the balcony, then flicked the lock on the sliding glass door. Inching open the door, she pushed it along its track, leaving the thinnest of gaps. Thanks to twenty years of watching her diet with the diligence of an A-list actress, the thinnest of gaps was all she needed.
The rustle sounded again.
Felicity drew in a deep breath and rammed her hand blindly into the foliage.
