Damien turned back to me. “I like you.”
I smiled then looked straight ahead.
Hades moved his hand to my thigh, his large fingers resting there possessively. His gaze remained directed out the window.
“You got any hot girlfriends to set me up with?” Damien asked. “I’m rich, fit, and I know a couple of jokes.”
“You don’t seem very funny to me.” Damien was one of Hades’s associates that didn’t immediately make me uncomfortable. The other men who came into the hotel reeked of threat. Damien seemed harmless, but that was probably inaccurate.
“I can be when I’m trying to get laid. So…got a lady for me?”
I had the perfect lady in mind, but he’d ignored her at the wedding, so he wouldn’t get his chance now. “No.”
Hades smiled slightly, probably knowing I was lying about Esme.
“Come on,” he said. “Maybe a woman from college that you experimented with?”
“I’ve only experimented with men,” I said honestly.
Hades’s fingers dug into my thigh a little harder.
“Damn,” Damien said. “You’re practically my sister-in-law. You’re supposed to hook me up.”
“You can’t get your own dates?” I countered.
Hades smiled. “She’s got you there, man.”
“Obviously, I can,” he said. “But I was hoping for a woman of your station.”
“My station?” I asked.
He gestured with his hands, making an hourglass silhouette of a woman. “You know, with your level of beauty.”
It was a compliment, but a stupid one. “It’s not a club.”
“Man…that’d be sexy if it were.”
“Alright.” Hades silenced him. “Stop harassing my wife.”
“I’m not harassing her,” Damien said. “I’m just getting to know her.”
“Then ask me what my favorite color is,” I said. “Or what my favorite drink is.”
Damien rubbed his jawline as he considered my request. “Hades says you’re usually drinking a vodka cranberry or wine…so I’m gonna go with the first one. As for your favorite color, I’ll just have to guess. Red?”
I was surprised Hades had noticed so much about me. “You got both right.”
“Of course I did. So now we need to move on to the more intimate stuff.”
We arrived at the large estate just outside the city and stepped inside. Introductions were made, and the man Hades was hoping to acquire as a client was older, maybe in his fifties. His wife was half his age…no surprise there.
We gathered in the dining room and had dinner, where the men did most of the talking. Hades sat beside me, while Damien was on his other side. They talked about money, about ways Hades could handle the man’s money so people couldn’t find it. He didn’t just launder money… he physically hid it so no one had any idea where it was. It was impossible to be robbed when you had nothing to be robbed of.
The wife was quiet, barely saying a few words to me. Whenever the conversation became boring, she wore the biggest frown…like the poor girl was miserable. She didn’t like her husband whatsoever.
At least I respected mine…and he was good to me.
It was the second time I’d seen Hades in his element, and he was vastly different from how he was when it was just the two of us. Now he was cold, calculating, and he commanded the room while saying as few words as possible. If he was trying to secure this man’s business as an addition to his company, it didn’t seem like it.
It seemed like the opposite.
When it came down to business, Damien was serious too. All that bullshit in the car was long gone. He wore an expression as determined as Hades did. The two of them were loyal teammates, communicating without even speaking to each other. They didn’t even need to make eye contact. They just felt each other’s energy.
It was a boring evening, but it was interesting to see this other side of Hades.
The monster.
The men excused themselves to talk in the other room so they could light their cigars and drink gin and scotch. The wife offered me dessert, but I turned her down. We were left to make small talk at the dining table.
“Your husband is young,” she noted. “Whenever my husband’s associates come over, they’re usually around his age.”
“Yeah…he’s in his early thirties.” He felt ancient to me since we were seven years apart, but I was certain all the other men my mother had in mind were decades older. Maddox was the exception to that. The thought of him made me realize I’d never asked my mother about the interaction, if he really had been a candidate.
She sipped her wine then propped her chin on her palm. “He seems to care about you.”
“Why do you say that? He hasn’t said much to me.”
“I can tell by the way he looks at you.” She drank from her glass again. “My husband only looks at me when he wants something. The rest of the time…he just ignores me.”