Page 10 of Dichotomy

“We did. It was nice. You would love it. We’ll take you soon.”

My eyebrows shot up. Introducing me to their parents? “That is very ‘some day’ talk,” I teased him.

He just smiled at me, squeezing my hip. “Yes, it is.”

He guided me to his car and opened the door for me, helping me settle in before going around to the driver’s seat. All the guys were gentlemen about that kind of stuff. It used to bother me when I was younger when guys would do that. It felt like they were putting up this nice guy approach and then would turn around and say, “gotcha!” But these men had proven to me over and over again they were good men, not simply “nice guys.” I felt treasured and taken care of when they did these things for me now.

I gave him the address to my apartment, smiling when he grumbled. He started driving, and I pulled out my phone, scrolling through the schedule for tomorrow and arranging meetings for the guys as well as delegating some of the smaller clients to the other executives. The other executives had reallystepped up while we were gone, and I made an item on my to-do list to make notes in all of their performance review files. SDS employed good people. That reminded me. I needed to reach out to Lacey, our HR director, and let her know we may be having former Citadel employees applying to SDS, and we’d need to background check them thoroughly. I was sure there were good people who worked for Citadel; I just wasn’t sure how many there were.

I didn’t look up until we pulled into a parking garage. I frowned. This wasn’t my apartment building. The garage was familiar, though, and when I saw Alexander’s Mercedes parked in a reserved spot, I recognized it as the garage for the building the brothers and Adrian lived in.

“Did you need to grab something?” I asked as Marcus parked in his own reserved spot.

“Nope,” he said, looking at the wall instead of at me. I knew he’d caved too easily about taking me back to my shitty apartment.

“Okay…” I said slowly, hiding my grin. “Then what are we doing here?”

The man literally squirmed in his seat as he tried to come up with an answer.

“Okay, we are picking up something.”

“What are we picking up?”

“The key to your new apartment.”

My jaw dropped. Um, what? My car door opened, and Sebastian crouched by my door, a wide grin on his face.

“Hey, new neighbor!”

CHAPTER 6

ALEXANDER

My phone pinged as I slathered garlic butter on the loaf of French bread our housekeeper had picked up for me earlier.

Sebastian:They just pulled in.

I winced. We had pulled a lot of high-handed moves this afternoon to maneuver Evelyn into one of the two apartments below our penthouse suite. Marcus suggested it after our meeting with the FIA agents earlier this afternoon. The other apartment was occupied by Adrian, and the security on this building was top-notch. It had been installed by SDS, after all. But none of that was going to matter to Evelyn when she learned we had packed up her entire life from her house and installed it one floor below our own.

And that was why I was cooking Evelyn’s favorite meal, lasagna and garlic bread, in her new kitchen. I wasn’t above using underhanded tactics to get her to see the benefits of living here. At least temporarily. Truthfully, her “Miracle” manor felt more like home than the penthouse suite, but if we wanted it to remain off the FIA’s radar, we couldn’t be commuting back and forth.

Adrian reached into the refrigerator next to me and poured a glass of Evelyn’s favorite wine. A white Greek wine my mother had sent her from one of their many travels. He poured half a glass, paused, then poured more.

“Good choice.” I smirked at him as I slid the garlic bread into the oven.

He rolled his eyes. “Like you’re not pulling out all the stops too.” He motioned to the gray sweatpants and tight white T-shirt I had thrown on as soon as I had gotten home.

I knew Evelyn liked seeing me in casual clothes. I had caught her staring at me more than once. So after leaving the office early, I’d dug through my closet and changed quickly.

“And here we are.” Sebastian’s cheery voice came through the front door as he threw it open.

The apartment was a mirrored layout of Adrian’s apartment across the hall. It was large, being one of two apartments on this floor. The main door opened into a large living area with the kitchen off to the left. The stainless-steel appliances and white cabinets lent it a modern feel that was the polar opposite of the manor’s kitchen, but I hadn’t had time to renovate it to match before Evelyn arrived. A large kitchen island with four barstools separated the kitchen from the dining table. Wall to ceiling windows covered the left side of the room. The bulletproof privacy glass presented a picturesque view of the city skyline.

On the opposite side of the room, a large TV hung above a gas fireplace. A gray sectional couch with neutral throw pillows faced the TV. The couch was something I did have time to get delivered in the last few hours. The previous couch was a leather monstrosity that I knew Evelyn would hate. She liked soft, comfortable things. I couldn’t do much about the modern feel of the apartment on short notice, but I could get a new couch delivered.

Down the hallway to the right of the door were three bedrooms. The master bedroom that Evelyn would be taking, a guest room in case one of us stayed over, and a third bedroom that Sebastian had converted into an office. The office was complete with a secure link into the Archers’ command center. Liam had helped Sebastian set it up, and now Evelyn had a wall of monitors from which she could run the Archers. I knew it probably killed her to take a step or several steps back from running the Archers, but hopefully it was only temporary.

“Marcus, this is absolutely ridiculous. I—” Evelyn’s voice cut off when she stepped through the doorway.