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  Foley tosses a shrewd side-eye at Mitch before addressing the guy’s comment in a low mumble. “I mix business and pleasure as little as possible, dude.”

  “Which makes my point a problem…how?” Mitch counters. “Because your woman looks like pleasure on a platter tonight, dude.” He jerks his look to me next. “Yours too, boss.”

  “Thank you,” I reply. “But I had very little to do with it, other than suggesting a few good stylists. She picked someone named…Fabergé, I think.”

  “He thinks.” The giant standing close to Mitch grunts and tugs at his tie. Since his neck is the width of a subway tube, it surprises no one that Kane Alighieri looks like a chained tiger in the thing. “A name like that, and he thinks.”

  “They all have names like that,” I volley. “The whole is-she-a-person-or-a-perfume thing.” Then include Mitch in my regard. “Why is that a thing now?”

  Mitch’s lips twist. “We’re gay recon specialists, not fashion designers. I barely found a matching tie for this getup.”

  As Mitch gestures at his suit, Kane mutters, “And you don’t want to know what state I found it in on Monday, on the floor of the closet.”

  Mitch huffs. “That’s what dry cleaners are for.”

  Kane growls. “Honey, that’s what hangers are for.”

  “And now that we’ve settled that first-world problem…” Alex, who could’ve been a circus master in another life with his sunny showmanship, sweeps a hand my way. “We hear you’re making good progress on the Team Bolt hermit cave.”

  At first, everyone rewards his comment with affable chuckles but finishes with gawks that look like a crowd of fanboys awaiting first edition Star Wars figurines. But I can guarantee our cave will have a lot more bells, whistles, twinkling lights, and gadgets than Han Solo ever dreamed for the Millennium Falcon.

  But they know that too—which is why they’ll clearly wait as long as it takes for my answer. Probably why I choose to fuck with them for a second, rubbing my chin and murmuring, “Shit. I guess they didn’t tell you about the cave-in, then?”

  “The fuck?” Kane recovers his voice first.

  “The fucking fuck?” Foley grits out next.

  “So how much longer does that mean we’re pretending to be ‘scientists’ at the downtown building?” Alex finally growls.

  Mitch, looking like the guy who missed the preorder cutoff on the figurines, pulls at his hair until his dark-brown roots are exposed past the purple. “At least I finally found a great udon place over on Grand.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Kane nods. “That place is good…”

  “Well, don’t get too used to it.” I rock back on my heels with a shit-eating smirk. “Though I’ll be sure to tell Anya that udon’s a necessity for the team’s menu once a week.” Then tap one finger at the edge of that smirk. “And considering that you’ll all be setting up in the new digs in just a couple of months…”

  Foley, the closest to me, jabs an elbow as proxy for everyone else. “Ass bucket.” He throws in a good-natured shoulder bump. I grab him by the forearm to return the favor with double the intensity.

  “Oooooh,” Alex teases. “Catfight.”

  “Hmmmph.” Foley shrugs to reseat his dress jacket on his shoulders and then fishes his ponytail out from the collar. “You’re just jealous, sweetheart.”

  “Fuck you,” Alex chuckles back.

  “Awww, come here, sugar.” I approach Alex, arms wide. “There’s enough love here for you too.”

  “And fuck you too.” Alex adapts a boxer’s pose, dancing on his toes in similar fashion.

  I laugh louder, warming up to the reverie. It feels good to have brothers again. The last time Chase or Tyce messed around with me like this, I wasn’t yet ten. As soon as they hit puberty, our boyhood disappeared behind their prep schoolwork and sports—and in Chase’s case, girls. And Tyce? Oh, he enjoyed girls too—the same way he enjoyed fast food. Down in three bites, finished with a lot of sugar, and then crumbs tossed into the waste can on his way out the door.

  And sometimes the timing of my mind is eerily in tune to the convergences of my life.

  This time, pretty damn literally.

  Approaching us from one side of the lawn, her sparkling gold gown surpassed only by her glowing gorgeousness, is the woman I’ll worship for the rest of my life. From the other side, my father is strolling over, accompanied by Mom and a man I don’t know at all—and then two more I know all too well. By first sight, at least. Beyond that, I don’t hold out much hope—to the point that their presence here has me beyond baffled. Still, I battle past the bewilderment to at least growl, “What the…fucking…”

  “Dude,” Foley prods. “What the hell? You bracing for a First Order star destroyer to jump out of light speed?”

  “No.” I shake my head. “This is probably worse.”

  “Huh?” Foley insists. “Why? And who the hell are those guys with your dad?”

  I inhale deeply. “Don’t know the one in the gigolo suit.” Yeah, colored suits are on-trend for men this season, but there’s orange and then there’s orange. The stranger next to Dad, with his swarthy looks and equally dark glare, is turning the outfit into a bad Halloween costume or the next fashion “thing.” Clearly, he’s banking on the latter.

  “And the other two? The normal ones?”

  Hard snort out before I can help it. Not that I want to. “The one in gray, who looks like he’s on his period? That’s Chase. The dude in the bespoke charcoal, who looks like he just screwed a waitress in the catering truck? That’s Tyce. They’re my brothers.”

  “Seriously?” There’s genuine surprise in Foley’s voice. “Well, that’s cool—unless it’s not.”

  “I’m not sure what it is.”

  “So you need a wingman?”

  I toss him a fast but grateful glance. The guy may have a few strange skeletons hanging out under all that surfer-god hair, but he never fails to shove them aside in the name of standing with me.

  I take my hands out of my pockets. “Thanks, schnookums, but I’d better brave this party alone.”

  “Yeah.” In one grunt, Foley conveys a thousand versions of empathy, helping me at least shore up my posture and step clear of our bromance huddle. For reasons I can’t explain other than bone-deep instinct, the less my family knows about Team Bolt, the better. I even wish I could extend the same protection to Emma, but since she’s going to be a Richards—just the thought of sealing that deal injects me with even more courage—I suppose this part of the game had to happen sooner or later. Besides, I meant every word of what I told her last night. I’m trying to bleed more often for her, no matter how uncomfortable the ordeal.

  Or how much introducing her to my brothers is going to feel like feeding her to the wolves.

  Chapter Four

  Emma

  “Emmalina! What a happy coincidence.”

  I’m still too far away to see whether the forced pleasantry in Trixie’s voice extends all the way to her eyes, but I’m sure I’m about to find out—just as I’m certain the cause of her unease is due to the men who accompany her. Okay, not all the men. Lawson’s holding her hand with comfortable affection, as always, and the older, distinguished guy on her other side seems to be a friend dressed as the love child of Annoying Orange and The Mask. But as I continue down the path, every step bringing me closer to meeting their progress, neither Lawson nor his buddy are the source of my fixation.

  It’s reserved for the pair behind them.

  Whom I already recognize, courtesy of the few photos I’ve managed to yank up on the internet.

  Whom I already feel weird about, courtesy of all Trixie’s revelations from yesterday—and the subsequent follow-up of a meltdown from the man I love.

  Whom I regard now with even more suspicion, courtesy of this not-so-tiny bombshell in the evening. During an event that’s supposed to be about Reece’s victories as a new man, not the downfalls of his youth.

  “Happy is what we’re all here for, right
?” I finish the response with a listen-up-you-two look at Chase and Tyce Richards. Might as well put my figurative foot down, along with the stiletto heel in which it stands, right now. Cause my man any distress, and both of you will learn what a Louboutin in the lungs feels like.

  “Perfectly put, as always,” Lawson praises as we all stop at the crux of my path and theirs. He waits for Trixie to step over and air buss me on both cheeks before doing the same. “And in stunning togs tonight too.”

  “You took the words out of my mouth, darling.” Trixie slides a hand down into mine, using our clasp to “swish” me back and forth. The folds of my gold satin sweep train flair out a little, colliding softly with her fuller skirt, fashioned with forest-green taffeta. “Few but you could pull off a full crew neckline, Emmalina.”

  “Why, thank you, ma’am.” I joke with a bad Southern belle accent in the hopes of lightening the mood before Reece gets over here. My periphery is tracking every one of his wide, determined steps, though every pore of my being has been ignited from the second I first set eyes on him. Holy shit. He’s the hottest man in this whole damn park tonight, even though he looks like a matador ready to take down a bull—or five—and he’s completely, thoroughly mine. “I’m…sorry?” I finally manage to stammer to Trixie, not hearing a word of whatever she’s just asked me.

  Fortunately, the woman observes that I’m off track due to ogling her youngest, which intensifies the twinkles in her eyes as she repeats, “I was asking where you got this creation. I may need to make the shop a stop before we depart back home.”

  “I have no idea.” I shrug and then laugh. “A stylist brought it on a rack with six others. The beadwork called to me.”

  “Excellent call.” The woman’s friendly tone washes over me now, providing assurance I hardly knew I was craving. The gown is modest for this jaded crowd, with its fitted, cap-sleeved bodice decorated with subtle silver-beaded lightning bolts surrounded by swirling “clouds” in gold beads, but in the end, how does supporting my man via fashion differ much from tattooing his name on my boob or wearing his flower in my hair?

  Trixie’s subtle approval gives me permission to sneak in a relaxed breath before steeling myself for the night’s strangest plot twist. It’s beyond my fathoming—and clearly Reece’s too—why Lawson and Trixie have suddenly expanded their annual West Coast visit to include their two eldest sons. Like Reece, both men are employed by arms of the Richards family empire—though they head much more significant aspects of the business than Reece, who technically is still in some probationary phase of his reentry into the family’s good graces.

  While he’s been out saving lives on the side.

  Which only now hits me hard as the major suckage that it really is.

  Which brings an equally rough chaser of self-rebuke. Why have I never been more pissed-off about this? The answer is as easy as taking in the noble, beautiful profile of my man—who becomes my hero in so many more ways by showing what he’s doing about the disparity. Thriving in spite of it. Moving on and living past it.

  Because of what he confronted last night about it?

  I’m not sure of that answer—nor does it matter in the scope of how proud I am of him right now, standing here with such undaunted strength and unblinking aim. No longer is he the lost man who bared himself to me yesterday in the cave, but in so many ways, he’s never been more that person. He used that agony to push harder past his walls and then through his emotional valley. And sometimes, fighting through the valley is the only way up the mountain.

  And right now, this Reece—my Reece—is on top of his mountain.

  I see that acknowledgment already from Lawson, who nods in deference before striding over with one hand extended. After their palms meet with a loud smack, he meets Reece’s stare with a smile that consumes his face. “Good to see you, son.”

  “Thanks,” Reece murmurs, albeit with hedged caution. “You too.”

  “You’re looking well, Reece.” The comment is issued by Chase, who favors his father in the looks department. With his toffee-colored hair in a shorter version of Lawson’s Billy Idol spikes, his Lego block jaw is emphasized to its fullest. He smiles with apparent sincerity in response to Reece’s self-deprecating chuckle.

  “Uhhhh, thanks man,” Reece replies around that mirth. “I see Joany talked you into a shower and shave tonight too.”

  “Pfffft.” The interjection comes from Tyce, who finger-scrapes the near-black waves off his forehead. He’s more like Reece in the looks department, with swarthy coloring and gray eyes, though the angles of his face are more elegantly carved, lending him the air of a dark angel. “Of course he looks ‘well.’ He’s able to laser out his own crow’s feet now.”

  Everyone’s gaze drops to the grass—except mine, which remains on Reece, and Trixie’s, which slices over to her eldest. “Tyce,” she hisses.

  “Joke?” the guy snaps back. “It was a joke, people. Remember those?”

  Chase shakes his head as if the guy just pulled out a Bolt Pez dispenser and downed every pellet in the tube at once. “Jokes are about timing as much as content, man.”

  “And people unclenching their assholes,” Tyce retaliates.

  “Don’t be a dick.”

  “Gentlemen.” At last, Mystery Man speaks. There’s an accent to his baritone, but I’m unable to peg it from just three syllables.

  “Maybe we should just skip the opening act.” Reece’s intercession comes with a look that, in one fell swoop, ages him well past his siblings. It shatters my heart to register that, but then I take every one of my broken shards and fuse them with his. Together, our union will get us through this—whatever this is—a truth I silently send when he darts a fast glance my way.

  Though he responds with a single, subtle nod, it’s all I need to understand him in return. He gets it. He gets me. He knows that I’m with him, sharing so much of what he’s feeling about his family’s strange ambush—commiseration that increases from my end as soon as Lydia appears, walking to Sawyer with his whiskey neat in one hand and her club soda in the other. I love my sister without measure. I always will. But even she can’t undo the margin into which I got scrawled as soon as her star began rising on the tennis circuit. I was an early teenager when it all started to go out of whack, probably close to the same age as Reece when he started oiling skateboard ramps and learning his breathtaking beauty went a long way in the game of girls.

  So he’d scribbled outside his margin by breaking curfew, flunking tests, and likely trying every page of the Kama Sutra before his eighteenth birthday.

  I’d colored outside mine by eating real beef cheeseburgers, going to arthouse films with the geek kids, and learning how to live in a city without a car.

  This city.

  In which Reece has damn near been a new precinct of the police department by himself. In which he’s served tirelessly as a businessman and a superhero, leading to him being honored by its leaders tonight—at the party he should be enjoying right now instead of dealing with whatever twist Lawson and Trixie have brought to his doorstep.

  Damn it.

  So far, it’s been pretty cool to have begun sunny, smooth sailing with both my future in-laws—with Lawson, in his assistance and advice in getting Richards Reaches Out up and running, and then with the heartfelt words exchanged yesterday with Trixie—but if the two of them are here now to bring family drama into his special night, they’re both beneath Square One with me.

  “Reece is right.” Tyce’s statement is suddenly—and shockingly—sincere, prompting my subtle double-take. According to the media, Tyce is the asshole in the middle of Chase’s white knight and Reece’s prodigal bad boy. “The gang’s all here.” He turns his focus to Reece. “And we’ve come because of you.”

  Whoa. More meaningful candor, prompting Trixie to visibly fight back tears. None of it is lost on Reece either, who jumps his dazed scowl between his brothers. “Me? Why?”

  Chase swaggers forward and wraps a hand around his
mother’s shoulder. “A little birdie told us you’re being honored by the city brass tonight. Something about a key to the city and all?”

  Trixie, basking in the affection of her eldest, flushes with happy warmth down to her gown’s shawl collar, which is accented with strips of layered gold satin. Her eyes shimmer as brightly as her emerald earrings as she chimes, “Chirp chirp.”

  But Reece still isn’t ready for the family group hug. Not yet. I don’t blame him, especially when he states, “I’m sure the same ‘bird’ informs you when I’m in New York, which is a hell of a lot easier commute for you guys. So what makes all this different, other than the chance to fondle my prop key and ogle some movie stars?”

  I’m surprised the universe doesn’t cue cricket sounds to fill his family’s palpable stillness of a reply. The whole scene is saved from going full-tilt awkward by a low chortle from the sophisticated stranger. “Well, well, well.” He strokes his chin with the curve of his knuckle. “The Bolt has, how do you say, bent you over the barrel?”

  Aha. The man’s full sentence makes his accent an easy call now. He’s French and proud of it. And now that I know that, clearer assumptions start to form about this not-so-random Richards family reunion. Another quick look at Reece, and I’m certain he’s collecting the same data—especially because Lawson has sent him at least an email each week about the progress on the Virage, the new Richards Resorts flagship hotel that’s opening in Paris’s most luxurious arrondissement. Six months ago, before everything turned upside down at the RRO’s fundraiser gala, Lawson had openly and avidly asked Reece to be the family emissary for overseeing the property’s grand opening.

  But that was before the world changed again. For all of us.