I turned the full force of my glare on him, and he actually took a step back. “Come in search of your dinner, crumb snatcher?” I asked.
“Delaine!” he said, smiling widely in greeting. “Slumming it again? When are you gonna drop Crawford and give Big Daddy Dick a go?”
Noah attempted to lunge from his chair, but I managed to hold him in place, barely. As much as I’d have loved to see Noah beat the crap out of the man, David Stone simply wasn’t worth losing Scarlet Lotus over. “Let it go, baby. He’s not worth it. He’s just suffering from penis envy.”
“Ouch, my feelings,” David whined with his hand over his heart and his bottom lip out in a pout.
I ignored him and stood, turning to face Noah. “I’m going to the house to unpack. I’ll see you when you get home.” Intent on making sure David knew who was buttering my bread, I gave Noah a kiss that was so hot it made my own toes curl. “I love you,” I told Noah, and then walked toward the door.
“Move,” I told David.
He was smart enough to step to one side, but not without giving me a sarcastic grin. “I love you, too, sweetums.”
Dez, Polly, and Mason had just walked back into Mason’s office, all three carrying fresh coffee.
Mason sighed when he saw David’s back before he closed the door. “Oh, shit.”
“Hold the phone. Who is that piece of tall, dark, and ooh-la-la?” Dez asked, checking him out.
“He is what we like to refer to as pathetic scum,” Polly answered.
“No, seriously. Who is he?” Dez asked again. “I think I know him.”
“Let’s hope not,” I said. “He’s David Stone. He owns the other half of Scarlet Lotus.”
“Are you sure? Because he looks awfully familiar.”
Mason sat on the corner of his desk and pulled Polly to stand between his legs. “No offense, Dez, but I hardly think he’d be running in the same circles as you.”
“Well, never mind. It doesn’t matter anyway,” she said, shrugging it off. Then she turned toward me. “You ready to go? I don’t have much time before I have to be at work.”
“Yeah, I’m ready,” I told her, and then bid farewell to Polly and Mason. Of course Polly promised she’d be over first thing the next morning to start wedding preparations. I shuddered at the thought.
Dez and I made it back to the mansion and, with Samuel’s help, got all my things unloaded and stacked in Noah’s bedroom. Shortly afterward, I saw Dez off for her shift at Foreplay, the meat market where Noah and I first met. I had just gone to the kitchen to pour myself a glass of ice water when the doorbell rang. As I walked back toward the foyer, I spotted Dez’s scarf where she had discarded it earlier.
Snatching it up because I knew it was the reason Dez had come back, I opened the door to hand it to her. “Forgot your sc—” My voice caught in my throat when I realized it wasn’t Dez on the other side of the door.
“Honey, I’m home.” David Stone stood there with a slimy smile on his mug.
“Noah’s not in from the office yet.” I attempted to slam the door in his face, but he stuck his arm out and kept it from closing.
“I’m not here to see Noah. I’m here to see you,” he said, forcing me to back up as he pushed his way inside.
“You just don’t take a hint, do you?” I asked, enraged by his relentlessness. “I don’t want anything to do with you, asshole.”
David kept advancing on me until my back was pressed to the wall and he had cornered me. He caged me in with his body, his grotesque hand pushing a lock of hair out of my face while he smiled down at me.
“What do you want, David?”
“I want you.”
“Well, I don’t want you, so you can leave now.”
“I think you might want to hear my proposal before you openly reject me, Lanie.”
I bristled at his familiarity. “What did you just call me?”
He smirked, but he was clearly confused. “What? I called you Lanie.”
I pushed my shoulders back and straightened to my full height as I took one purposeful step toward him followed by another. “I only allow those I consider my friends to call me by that name. And you, sir,” I said, poking him in the chest as he backed up, “are no friend of mine.”
He gave me a broad smile that was more creepy than friendly. “Babe,” he crooned with his hands up in surrender, “why are we always making war when we could be making love?”
I shook my head. “Boy, you are really dumb, aren’t you?”
“Hear me out,” he said. “We don’t have to be enemies. I know what you women really want, and I’m positive we can work out a deal where we both come out on top.”
I crossed my arms and raised an eyebrow at him.
“Okay,” he said with a shrug. “If you prefer to be on top, that’s fine by me.”
“You’re disgusting.”
“Can I finish?”
“I’m really not interested in hearing anything you have to say.” I walked toward the door, but before I could open it to kick him out, David was there with his shoulder pressed against it. I looked at him like he was crazy because obviously he’d lost his mind, but he just flashed that toothy grin again.
“So here’s the deal. You partner up with me, but stay here with Crawford for the time being as if nothing has changed. Let the sappy bastard fall in love with you, and then once you’ve snagged that magic lasso around your finger, you and I take everything. You help me get Scarlet Lotus, and I’ll take care of you for the rest of your life. You’ll never want for a damn thing again. Including the best cock in all fifty states.”
I couldn’t help myself. I laughed. Loudly. I don’t think David appreciated the humor of the situation quite as much as I did because his face contorted into something that didn’t look altogether human.
“What the fuck are you laughing about?” he asked.
“You,” I said, pointing and still laughing at him. “You said that with such a straight face that it’s almost like you actually believe I’d leave Noah for someone like you. But of course you couldn’t really believe that.”
His expression changed again, the angry furrow of his brow replaced with a knowing smirk on his lips. “Aw, I get it. You want your money up front. That’s how my partner paid you, right?”