Page 47 of Wicked Angel
“The layout. Of the house. The master bedroom is on the other side.”
He cleared his throat a little. “Yup.”
“I thought you weren’t home. Your car’s gone.”
When I glanced over, he was taking a glass out of the cupboard and staring at me. I looked away.
“My buddy Shane drove it home last night.”
“Oh.” I took a deep breath, preparing to force out a quick apology for barging in on him, then vanish into another room until he cleared out, but then a second pair of feet came down the stairs.
Fucking wonderful.He wasn’t alone up there.
A woman’s naked legs appeared. Long, slender legs. Then an enviable butt draped in silky cream fabric. When Johnny’s guest reached the bottom of the stairs, she met my eyes, too.
Brianna MacMillan.
She had long, light-brown hair smoothed into a flawless ponytail, the kind of perfect little nose I’d always wished I had, and the figure of a lingerie model in that tiny wisp of a cream sundress layered over a gold bikini.
Just like the first time I’d met her at a party, the woman had “mean girl” written all over her. It was the way her blue-gray eyes scraped over me. Honestly, she might’ve been my doppelgänger other than the fact that she was taller, wispier, sexier, and achingly prettier than me. I wasn’t exactly hideous here, but I’d never beenthatgirl.
You know, the girl Johnny O took to bed.
He would’ve, if you’d let him,my memory of that night reminded me. The night he kissed me in the dark with such torment in his eyes.
Brianna’s perfect face twisted with a slight sneer in my direction, before she floated over to Johnny. He’d poured a glass of water at his filter tap and took a swig.
I noticed he didn’t offer her anything.
She made sure I was watching before her fingers drifted along the waistband of his joggers, where the soft fabric hugged his hip. “What’s on the agenda for today?” she asked coyly, like she was inviting him to suck her clit.
Ugh, don’t picture it.
“A lot,” he said flatly.
“Care to take me along?”
He seemed to almost laugh but grimaced instead. “No. I’ve got work.” He stepped away from her as he set his water glass on the counter.
She reconfigured her game plan when flirting didn’t work. Her eyes slashed over to me. “Who’s the maid? And why’s she staring at us?”
That’s when I realized she had no idea who I was.
She didn’t remember meeting me. She had no idea I was Danielle Duke’s intern, or Elle Delacroix’s sister. Because she didn’t care. Because I didn’t even rate with her enough to be memorable, no matter who’d introduced us.
Which meant that she also didn’t recognize me as the girl who bought Johnny a drink and sat at his table at the fundraiser, making her jealous and making me lose my job in the first place. What kind of narcissistic A-hole made a stink like that because someone got more attention than she did, and then didn’t even care enough to remember that person’s face?
When I looked at Johnny, he made a slow, thorough study of his T-shirt on my body. Then my bare legs. Then the rubber gloves I was wearing as I sorted recyclables. Then he said, “She’s not ‘the maid.’”
“Well, who is she? And why’s she in your kitchen?”
“Get out of my house, Brianna.”
She bristled but tried to hide it, to save face. “What, right now? Aren’t you going to get me a car?”
“Already paid for your Uber back to the hotel,” he said evenly, “or back to JC, or wherever. Lamar’s waiting outside to see you off.”
She stared at him for a long minute, like,You better fucking say something I want to hear right now.
