Kostas's Convenient Bride. Lucy Monroe

      She was still ignoring him.

      Too bad for her, he wasn’t in the mood to be ignored.

      He’d just go by her condo. It wasn’t exactly a trip, a few floors below his penthouse that was double the size of her small one bedroom. At least she’d moved into his building and out of the hopeless apartment in an unacceptable part of town.

      Forty-five minutes later, he sent a short text. Where the hell are you?

      When she didn’t reply in five minutes, he sent another one. I can keep this up all night until your damn phone’s batteries die from all the alerts.

      He was surprised when she didn’t reply after that one. Andreas didn’t make idle threats, though. He proceeded to blow her phone up with texts every five minutes, even more shocked when the first few did not elicit a response and moving into downright worried by the time his phone rang forty-five minutes and eight texts later.

      “Stop!” Anger and exasperation warred in her shout.

      More than a little annoyed himself, he demanded, “Where are you?”

      “You’re not my keeper.”

      Knowing he did not have to be worried for her safety allowed him to ratchet back on the irritation. He went for calm, rational. “We need to talk.”

      “Maybe you should have thought of that little thing before this minute, you think?”

      “We would have talked this afternoon if you hadn’t thrown a hissy fit and stormed out of my office.” Okay, maybe not so calm.

      “That? Was not a hissy fit. I do not lose my cool, storm anywhere and I never throw fits, hissy or otherwise.” Oh, hell. Her voice had gone cold and devoid of emotion, like it did when she was protecting herself.

      He didn’t like thinking she felt the need to protect herself from him. “Be reasonable, Kayla. You’re blowing this all out of proportion.”

      “What exactly? The fact you’re planning to take my home away because that wife pimp says you need to?”

      “I’m not doing anything with your condo.”

      “Don’t play the idiot!” Kayla’s shout stunned him into silence.

      She was right; she didn’t lose her cool. The only time he’d ever heard her raise her voice was when they used to sleep together. And no matter how good a lover he was, the times she let herself go enough to scream were few. Allowing himself to remember their sexual past was not productive, as he had learned early on after taking her on as a business partner.

      He could not afford that kind of distraction from his goals.

      Right now, his goal was figuring out what was going on with his best friend. “Kayla?”

      “I’m taking the day off tomorrow.” The even tone of her voice after that primal scream of pain was almost worse than the shout itself.

      “Why?”

      “I have things to do.”

      “What things?”

      “How did your wife pimp put it? None of your business, Andreas.”

      “Kayla, stop it. I don’t know what has gotten into you—”

      The low beep that indicated the call had been ended interrupted Andreas. Damn it. She should know he wouldn’t sell the company without an after plan for both of them.

      He hadn’t expected her to want to go into venture capitalism herself, not really, but she was brilliant at computer code and not just that related to security. Kayla would be a stellar value add as an adviser and contributor of modified or original programming for any company he might be interested in investing in.

      Once she calmed down, she’d see that.

      Until then, he should probably make sure she got both “I’m sorry” éclairs and coffee from her favorite bistro in the morning.

      He’d drop them off on his way to work. Maybe he should reorganize his morning so they could spend a couple of hours together.

      They hadn’t had off time together in a while.

      It was just that spending time with her away from work came with temptations he had to fight. The uncontrollable passion they’d once shared had to be kept locked up tight. That kind of attraction didn’t lead to anything good. It was exactly what had been his mother’s downfall and the reason his father, whom even Andreas could acknowledge was generally an honest, if bullheaded man, had an illicit affair.

      Keeping their past firmly in the past should have grown easier as the years progressed, but the opposite was true. Andreas found himself admiring Kayla in a very personal, very sexual way at the least convenient times.

      But he could not allow his own weakness to damage their friendship. He’d worked too hard to find a place in his life for her more permanent that bed partner.

      * * *

      Kayla turned on her phone as she stepped off the commercial flight into the tunnel leading to the JFK airport. One long beep indicated multiple text messages and another different tone told her she had at least one voice mail.

      She looked for someplace to step out of the flow of busy foot traffic and spied an area set aside for business travelers to work. Making her way across the wide hallway, Kayla barely missed bumping into a woman pushing a stroller at a faster clip than Kayla usually jogged.

      A man in sweats and sandals bumped into Kayla, knocking her right against a wall. She waved away his hurried apologies, more bothered by the idea of having to talk to a stranger than the sore spot on her shoulder from hitting the wall.

      Kayla hated traveling alone and missed Andreas’s commanding presence that always seemed to create an opening, no matter how many people crowded the walkways. The traitor.

      Kayla’s phone buzzed as she reached the relative safety of the business area. She grabbed it and was relieved to see Hawk Security. She’d emailed Sebastian Hawk the night before, but hadn’t heard back and wasn’t even sure he’d be able to work her into his schedule.

      Kayla answered quickly. “Hello.”

      “Miss Jones?” a female voice asked.

      “Yes, this is Kayla Jones.”

      “I’m calling for Sebastian Hawk.”

      Her gut clenched with both hope and trepidation. “Yes?”

      After telling the secretary that Kayla was in New York now, she learned Sebastian Hawk wasn’t, but was expected back that night. And while he always spent his first day back from any business trip with his family, he could fit her in for a lunchtime meeting the day after.

      “That would be great.” She made no effort to curb the enthusiasm she felt from showing in her voice. She was grateful and she let it show. Her home was on the line and even if Sebastian Hawk didn’t know it, Kayla did.

      “If you’ll give me your email address, I’ll send you the calendar invite.”

      “Thank you.” Kayla recited her particulars, thinking Sebastian Hawk’s secretary might actually be as organized as Bradley.

      Kayla ended the call and looked around the airport, wondering what she was going to do with two days of no work and for the first time in six years. Deciding to check her other messages, she discovered that Andreas had texted her multiple times. Bradley had texted her twice and there were three voice mails. At least one of those was from someone besides Bradley and Andreas.

      Kayla listened to the voice mail from the project lead on the revamp of their school security software. Ten seconds into the message, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to laugh or cry.

      Not that Kayla cried anymore. Crying never changed anything and it gave her a headache.

      Her