"It is my favorite." I look at the box. "I'm glad you're here."
"You wish you were having dinner with the man who owns those cufflinks." She looks over at where I placed Julian's cufflinks on the counter when I got home. "He has excellent taste in accessories."
He also tastes great, or at least his lips do. That's all I got to sample so far.
"Did you sleep with him? Is that why his cufflinks are here?" She pours the dried macaroni into the pot of boiling water.
"No." I shake my head. Tilly and I tell each other almost everything, but I'm not sharing details about Julian, yet. This is new. It's exciting and that nagging voice in the back of my head telling me to be wary because of his ex is still there. "We kissed. He left those at the penthouse after a showing."
She nods. "Here's hoping that he'll be so grateful to have them back that he'll sweep you into his arms and carry you off into forever."
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Julian
"You savedme a boatload of cash, so the least I can do is buy you a bottle of the finest whiskey." I place the brown paper bag in the middle of his desk.
Griffin Kent inches the top of the bag down with the tip of the pen in his hand. "That's not real whiskey, Julian. It's that cheap ass shit we used to drink in high school."
I laugh as I take a seat on the sofa in his office. "Where's Sebastian? I thought he was meeting us here."
"Where he always is; knee deep in someone else's blood while he tries to solve their murder." He yanks the bottle out of the bag and cracks open the lid. "Do you want a drink?"
"No." I wave my hand in the air. "I don't drink cheap whiskey anymore."
"You're an asshole." He laughs as he takes a sip from the bottle. "Christ. That burns all the way down. We must have been desperate when we were sixteen and thought this was it."
"We were typical sixteen-year-olds." I laugh as I drape my arm over the back of the sofa. "Whiskey, weed and women."
"Whiskey, weed and high school girls," he corrects me. "Women now, speaking of which…"
"Isadora's attorney balked at the agreement I had her sign when we started dating. Thank you for that."
Griffin dips his chin. "You're worth too much to fuck around with a woman without something in place to protect your assets."
I was against the idea at first when Griffin proposed it years ago, but he specializes in family law. He's handled a few high profile divorce cases in this city, so he's always looking ahead. It was his idea to arrange for Isadora to sign an agreement that limited her interest in me financially to any shares of the company I'd eventually gift her with. Surprisingly, she agreed to it.
Although we've never lived together, she feels she deserves more now. She doesn't.
"How are you making out with getting her out of the company?"
Griffin knows that the last few weeks haven't been easy. Isadora is still on leave, but that hasn't stopped her from reaching out to our employees to make it known that she feels forced to stay away.
"I'm working on lining up a new job offer for her." I rest my hand on my knee. "I'll know more in a week or two, but she'll trip over her heels if she's offered this. I doubt like hell she'd even step foot back in the Bishop offices if this works out."
"Tell me more." He taps the tip of the pen against the top of his desk.
"I want the deal in place before I share."
I trust him with my life, but I don't have anything firmly in place, so there's no need to explain the details yet.
He rakes his hand through his brown hair. "I'm in the mood for some pool. You game?"
He stands and slides his suit jacket on.
I rise to my feet. "You're on. Loser buys the winner a bottle of scotch."
"The good stuff." He rounds his desk. "No more nostalgic shit for old times' sake."
