This peeked a bit of interest.
“What year?”
I avoided the question and moved swiftly forward.
“Good conversation, nice smile...speaks about nine different languages.” At this point, I was just making things up. Filling in the gaps as I built up momentum. “Drives a Maserati.”
This time, it was Nick’s turn to laugh.
I had a well-known habit of judging people badly for driving exorbitantly over-priced cars. It had made one of our first outings in his own Aston Martin rather memorable.
“Does this Romeo have a name? Or did you already forget?” His eyes twinkled playfully as he took another swig of coffee. “You didn’t write it on your hand, did you?”
I hesitated, then shook my head with a self-righteous sneer. No—I most certainly had not written his name on my hand. I only thought I had. Instead, I’d written the name of this Ryan...
“He has a name. I did not write it on my hand.”
Nick lowered his mug, forcing me to make eye contact.
“What is it then? Fast—don’t think.”
I panicked. Whenever he did this—I panicked. He had a piercing focus and commanding intensity (curtesy of the Oxford debate team) that was specifically designed to off-balance his opponent. In a different life, he would have made an incredible lawyer.
“His NAME, Wilder.”
“Ryan!” I blurted. Then blanched. “Wait—Cameron! No, Ryan!”
Son of a bitch.
His lips curled up in a victorious smirk, a clear winner once again.
“Ryan, was it?” He cocked his head condescendingly. “Was his name really Ryan?”
Please don’t talk about him in the past tense already, it doesn’t bode well for my love life.
I held his gaze only for a moment, before dropping my eyes with a scowl.
“No, it was Cameron.”
He returned to his coffee in triumph, as I stewed in defeat.
“Ryan’s my new brother’s name,” I added petulantly.
His mug came down.
“What was that?”
Fortunately, at that moment, we were interrupted by Louise—Nick’s housekeeper. Aside from myself and Max, she was the only person in the world with the elevator access code to get up to the penthouse. Originally, these things were supposed to be monitored carefully, and in all likelihood—they would probably all go through me. But after the second week of her buzzing my phone every ten minutes, I had surrendered the information without a moment’s pause.
It was a good thing too. If I hadn’t given up the numbers, there was a good chance she would have simply taken them for herself.
Of all the people that flitted in and out of Nick’s world, she was hands-down the most formidable. On her bad days, she might even give dear old Mitchell a run for his money.
Louise Müller had been a supply-runner and French patriot before marrying her fourth husband after the Second World War. The rigid stringencies of the reconstruction had found a permanent and willing host in dear Louise. Upon moving to Bavaria, she campaigned long and hard against the wearing of brightly colored fabric and the performance of lively music. She was a devout believer in hard work, and fiercely detested any of the superfluous frills society had to offer. (In Louise’s opinion, these ‘frills’ included consistent electricity and heated water. After facing jail, the third time for performing a citizen’s arrest at Oktoberfest (her favorite annual tradition), Mitchell Hunter had scooped her up and sent her here—to reform his wayward son.
At a first glance, you might think that two such extreme opposites would have destroyed each other sometime within the first week, but strangely enough—Louise and Nick had found an odd sort of balance. She was the authoritative female presence he’d never had, and I think she saw him as her life’s greatest challenge. Over the years, they’d developed a precarious truce.
If she was surprised to see us up and about at such an early hour, she certainly didn’t say so. She merely stared pointedly at Nick’s feet, until he lowered them slowly off the counter.