Bad for You by Weston Parker
27
TRISTIN
Back in Raleigh after what would’ve been the best weekend of my life—if it hadn’t been for the blight of the party sitting squarely in the middle of those memories—I sat in my office and tried to focus on work.
It wasn’t easy, since all I really wanted to do was to think about Brittany, but I made it happen. Archer was in and out all day for meetings we had scheduled. He asked how the rest of the weekend had gone but didn’t bring up my misstep about not having told Brittany about the party earlier again.
She hadn’t brought it up again either on our drive home or when I’d dropped her off, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that the consequences of having taken her to the party with me weren’t quite over yet.
The phone on my desk ringing pulled me out of my thoughts, and I was surprised when my assistant told me she had a call from Faye waiting for me. It was only once I told her to put Faye through that I remembered our conversation at the party.
“I have a proposition for you,” Faye said after we’d exchanged pleasantries. “I’ve been taking on a bigger role in the family business, and I think I’ve found an opportunity for us to collaborate. Can we meet up to talk about it?”
“I thought you wanted advice about taking on a bigger role,” I said, frowning as I thought back to what she’d said. “I didn’t realize you’d already taken it on.”
She giggled, the sound grating on my nerves for some reason. “Oh, yes. Well, I would like your advice, but I’ve also made some strides on my own.”
That definitely wasn’t the impression I’d gotten, but I shrugged it off. “In that case, I’m open to meeting with you. My schedule is jam-packed for the rest of the day, but I’ll have my assistant send you a couple of options of slots I have available for the week.”
She made a hesitant, humming sound. “Actually, I was hoping we could talk about it over dinner tonight. It’s the only time I’m free.”
“Dinner? Yeah, okay. I suppose that’s fine,” I said, wondering if perhaps I was being a bit naïve by agreeing.
Ultimately, though, she was in her family’s company now, and we had a long-standing business relationship with them. If she had an idea she wanted to pitch, the least I could do was listen. She’d apologized for what had happened with the lunch, after all. Maybe my gut instincts about dinner were wrong and I wasn’t being naïve about it.
It turned out that my instincts weren’t wrong. Faye made the reservations for dinner, and as soon as I arrived at the restaurant she’d chosen, I knew I’d fallen for a ruse.
No one made reservations at a place like this one to discuss a possible collaboration in business. Fairy lights were strung in a dimly lit courtyard. Candles flickered on all the tables. Soft French music played from speakers mounted discreetly on the walls, and every other table was occupied by couples holding hands or leaning into each other.
Fuck, this was a mistake.
I had half a mind to turn around and walk right back out, but Faye had already seen me where she was waiting at a table in the corner.
She stood up, dressed to the nines in a dress with a provocative neckline and with makeup and hair looking professionally done. A smile broke out across her face as she raked her eyes slowly over me when I approached her.
“Tristin,” she said in a voice that was closer to a purr than anything else. “I’m so glad you could make it. I took the liberty of ordering a bottle of wine for us. It’s a Chateau Margaux. I hope you’re a fan of red.”
As she moved in to greet me, I held out a hand to shake hers instead. She glanced at it, a tiny crease appearing between her plucked brows for a fraction of a second before the smile was back in place. Her hand slid into mine, but she didn’t shake. She just kind of held it for a moment before I let go.
“I don’t make a habit of drinking during business meetings,” I said. “I’ll just have a water. The Chateau Margaux is a good wine, though. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.”
Seemingly taken aback, she blinked a few times before she nodded and lowered herself into her seat. “If you like it, have some. This isn’t a formal meeting, and we’ve known each other a long time. Surely, you can’t be completely opposed to mixing a little pleasure with your business.”
I shrugged out of my jacket and sat down, folding my hands on the table in front of me. “I’m not completely opposed to it, but this must be important if it was so urgent that you needed to see me right away. I’m looking forward to hearing this proposal of yours.”
Her gray eyes held mine, and unless I was very much mistaken, there was a hint of disappointment in them. It was gone when she collected herself, sitting back in her chair as she flashed me a demure smile. “I used to have the biggest crush on you when I was a little girl. Did you know that?”
“I suspected,” I admitted, lifting my shoulders as I shook my head. “You didn’t really know me then, though. You also don’t really know me now. What is this really about, Faye? Clearly, it’s not about business.”
If the coolness of my tone surprised her, she didn’t let on. She stared into my eyes from across the table with that smile still in place. “I do have a proposal for you, and it would be good for business, but it’s of more of a personal nature.”
“Let’s hear it, then.”
She motioned toward the bottle of wine. “Are you sure you won’t have some? It’s delicious, and you might find you enjoy my company if you’d just let yourself.”
“I came here because you said you had something you wanted to discuss with me. Now I’m starting to think that you meant for this to be a date.”
“We could be good together, Tristin.” She flicked a hand between us. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. A relationship would strengthen the ties between our companies, and I really do think we would be a good match.”
“Maybe we would be, but I’m already in a relationship,” I said, trying to let her down firmly but gently. “I’m not interested in seeing anyone else, and I would’ve told you that on the phone if you’d have been honest with me about your intentions tonight.”
“I don’t mean to waste your time.” She reached for my hand on the table, but I pulled it away. A soft sigh escaped her, but she wasn’t ready to give up. “We haven’t had an opportunity to spend time together with just the two of us. I thought we could use tonight to change that. Why don’t you just relax, have some wine, and get something to eat? We’re already here. We might as well make the most of it.”
“Again, Faye, I’m not having some wine. I drove here, which means I can’t. Even if I wanted to, which I don’t. I don’t mean to sound like an asshole, but like I said, I’m in a relationship with someone else. So no, I’m not relaxing or getting something to eat.”
The calm, confident expression she’d tried so hard to keep in place slipped, leaving behind that cold gleam of calculation in her eyes that I saw so often in my mother’s.
“I saw Brittany at the party, heard her trying to make small talk, and she seems like a nice enough girl. But I’m on Selena’s side on this one. She’s not like us. You need someone by your side that knows how to navigate our world.”
Dear Lord, what is it with everyone and this “world” thing?“Respectfully, you don’t know what I need. A person’s financial status doesn’t mean anything to me.”
“Look.” She schooled her features again. “I know you’ve been living among people who aren’t like us—”
“Excuse me?” I hadn’t been dumbstruck in a long time, but fuck. “Are you implying that the men and women I’ve been living among, the ones who enlisted to fight for and protect our country, somehow aren’t good enough because they’re not like us?”
I emphasized the last word and then scoffed. “There is no ‘us,’ Faye. If you’ll excuse me, I should really get going.”
There was so much more I wanted to say, but I held my tongue. Causing a scene in a restaurant just because I didn’t agree with someone wasn’t like me.
“Don’t go. Please.” She shot up out of her chair when I stood up, circling her fingers around my wrist. “Could you at least give me a ride home? Daddy has our driver for the evening, and I don’t feel safe taking a cab.”
She doesn’t take cabs?My eyes wanted to roll so damn badly, but I held them in check, sighing as I resigned myself to seeing her home. “Fine. Let’s go.”
Once we were on our way to her parents’ house, she pulled her phone out of her purse and fired off a text before turning to face me again. “I didn’t mean to imply anything or to offend you earlier, Tristin. I’m sorry if it happened that way. All I meant was that you and I are stitched from the same cloth. If you would just give me a chance and get to know me, I think you’ll see that.”
“I’m not offended.” I kept my eyes on the road ahead, my headlights lighting up the road when we hit the darker streets leading out of the center. “Let me be very clear with you about this, though. It’s what I’ve been trying to do from the get-go. If you want a friend or someone to talk to about what it’s like to take over from a legend, then I can help you. I can’t offer you anything more than that.”
She exhaled in a huff, turning toward the window and staying like that for the rest of the way to their house. When we got there, I could’ve sworn I saw a flash of light as I stopped at their gates, but when I looked around, I didn’t see anything.
Faye smiled at me, seemingly having gotten over her brief temper tantrum. “Thank you for the ride.”
“You’re welcome,” I returned her smile with a polite one of my own, then shifted my car into reverse. “Good night, Faye. I’ll see you around.”
I expected to hear the door opening, my mind already on Brittany as I wondered whether she’d still be awake. It was early enough for a call, but maybe it was too late to drop by. When the door didn’t open, I faced Faye again.
“Did you forge—”
Without any warning, and before I could even complete my question, her lips were on mine and her arms were locked around me in an embrace. There was another burst of light, but I still couldn’t pinpoint where it had come from.
Figuring it was their security system, I focused on getting her off me. My mouth remained firmly closed even as her tongue prodded against it, and I put my hands on hers to pull them away.
She slumped against the seat when she realized I wasn’t about to kiss her back, shaking her head as she finally went for the door and climbed out without another word. I sat there in stunned silence for a few minutes, then backed out of the driveway and headed home.
What a fucking night.I couldn’t believe she’d kissed me, especially after all that, but I had to hand it to her, she had the balls to go after what she wanted.
Chuckling in disbelief as I rested my head against the backrest of my seat, I checked the time and decided it really was too late to pop in at Brittany’s on my way home. I put Faye and her attempted kiss out of my mind before I even reached the end of the block.
She would be fine. One failed date and unreciprocated kiss wouldn’t be much of a setback for her, if it was even a setback at all. No doubt she’d set her sights on someone else with a trust fund and a family company soon. I hoped that guy was ready for her, and that he was good to her, because despite everything, I understood where she was coming from. She deserved to get what she wanted. She just wouldn’t be getting it from me.
