House of Payne: Ice Page 7

  For only a second she thought about lying. “Pretty much.”

  “The thing is, you’re not a problem. I’ve got a fucking ton of problems, but you, Sunny Fairfax, have never been one of them. And you did go away, remember? You got as far away from me as you could by burying yourself here, living at home and working a job that sucks your soul dry. So ask yourself—if you’re not a problem for me, why the hell am I here now, taking all this shit you’re throwing my way?”

  “I don’t know,” she said honestly, shaking her head in growing confusion. “You being here… It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It doesn’t make sense to you because it doesn’t square with the idea you’ve got stuck in your head about the man you think I am.”

  “I know who you are,” she corrected hotly, then lowered her voice when their server arrived with their meal—a steaming fondue pot of melted cheeses mixed with wine, and a charcuterie board fit for a king. “It took me a while to figure it out, but I did finally get there. You live in a pool that’s so shallow only you can fit in it. But that’s okay. As long as I know what you are, I can avoid all the problems a shallow man like you brings to the table.”

  “Shallow,” he muttered, handing her a long fondue fork from the charcuterie board. “Jesus.”

  “It’s true.” Much to her dismay.

  “News flash, babe—a shallow man would never set himself up to take this kind of flak from you.”

  “Maybe you’re trying to tie up a loose end where I’m concerned.” She skewered a chunk of French bread but didn’t dunk it. She was too busy trying to figure out why he was even bothering with her. “We’re living in the same city now. Who knows? Maybe you don’t want a potential enemy here now that you’re working at House Of Payne, so you’re trying to make nice. This,” she waved at the wildly romantic scene around them, “could all just be for show.”

  “Who do you think I am, Damien Eisen?” With a short sigh he took her fork from her, dipped it, then held it up to her mouth. “I’m not some weak-ass pussy who’s afraid of hitting a little trouble down the road, especially from you. Eat.”

  She did, mainly because she didn’t want to wear dripped cheese all over her lap. “We’re not supposed to eat directly off the forks,” she muttered once she swallowed. “Bad manners.”

  “Call the fondue police. This is how we’re doing it.”

  Typical. “And what do you mean by saying you’re not your father? I’d never call Damien Eisen weak.”

  “Sonofabitch is weak, all right.” He speared a bite-sized flower-like curl of prosciutto, dunked it, and waited until she closed her mouth over it. “My old man’s scared of his own friggin’ shadow, trust me on this. That’s why he does what he does—gathers all the secrets on people that he can get his hands on, and then he uses them like fucking weapons. He’s a goddamn plague I want nothing to do with.”

  “Wow.” She took in a broccoli floret and swallowed it before she realized she was placidly allowing Ice to hand-feed her like she was a moony-eyed doofus. She jerked upright in her seat and grabbed up a long handled, trident-style fondue fork, embarrassed and more than a little overheated. “You didn’t used to feel that way.”

  “Have you forgotten the extra security I hired at Skull and Bones Ink to keep him and my mother out?”

  “No.” Something like that was hard to forget. “Obviously you had a pretty severe split with them when you dropped out of law school. But when we were in undergrad, you never talked that way about your dad. For the most part, the Eisens were a fairly happy family.”

  “But then I realized I lived in a fucking sewer, my old man was King Shit and my mom’s heroin-laced slime greased his skids. Not that any of that matters,” he added when she frowned. “As far as I’m concerned, I have no family and I’m better off for it. Everyone around me is better off for it.”

  “I don’t know what that means.” As she spoke, she leaned over to the charcuterie board, speared a delicious-looking slice of aged salami and dipped it. But before she could bring it to her mouth, he caught her hand and directed it to his.

  “It means I’m done talking about shitty people, and now all I want to do is focus on the only thing that matters. You.” With that, he took the bite from her fork, and all the while his gaze pinned her to the spot so hard it stopped her breath. How was it possible he could be so sexy, so insanely manly, just by locking eyes with her and making her feel like she was the only person on earth?

  It wasn’t fair.

  “So,” she said, and hoped he didn’t hear how shaken she was, “is this how fondue works in the 21st century? We take turns feeding each other?”

  “Damn straight. I hear they kick you out if you don’t follow that rule.”

  Ha. “Seems legit.”

  “My thoughts exactly.” He guided her to spear another piece of meat, prosciutto this time, and helped her dunk it. “Keep feeding me, Sunny. I’ve got one hell of a hunger, and only you can satisfy it.”

  Oh, wow.

  Like the idiot she was, she gave in, feeding him while he did the same with her. As she did, the sensual surrealism of feeding a man she’d thought was out of her life for good kept her wondering if she was having some strange, hyper-vivid fever dream that would vanish the moment she woke up.

  She wanted to wake up. If this wasn’t real, she wanted nothing to do with it.

  How could this be real?

  “I’m so confused.” The bite-sized morsels on the wooden board were almost gone, along with her wine and as far as she could tell, her judgment. “The only reason I came here tonight was because you promised to tell me what it was you wanted from me. So far I’ve heard about how you hate your fam and how you hate the money from the sale of Skull and Bones Ink, so you’ve decided to give me a cut of it.”

  “If it helps any, I don’t hate you. Far from it.”

  “It certainly seemed like you did a year ago,” she couldn’t help but point out.”That’s why it’s kind of hard to believe you’re just innocently popping up in my life now.”

  “Hey, I’m as innocent as they come.”

  Ha. “Unless you’re a bigger fan of cat toys than I ever imagined, you showed up at IBKC because of me.”

  The waiter came by to switch out the cheese fondue and savory board with a small pot of smooth, melted chocolate, with a sectioned dish that held perfect white cubes of angel food cake, marshmallows, banana chunks, and quartered strawberries. “Like I said earlier, I don’t give a shit about cat toys. I’m good with a fundraiser for local shelters because I like animals more than I like people. But yeah, I’m not the type to get jazzed about shit like that, unless…”

  “Unless?”

  “Unless you come attached to it.” He speared a chunk of angel food cake, swirled it in the chocolate, then waited until the excess dripped off before bringing it to her lips. “I’ll put up with a river of corny cat bullshit if that’s what it takes to get to you.”

  She almost choked on her swallow. “There’s no getting to me, and that corny cat bullshit happens to be my work now.”

  “You hate it. Admit it.”

  Damn it. “What makes you think I hate it?”

  “I know you. Working where you do…” He shook his head. “It’s all so sugary sweet.”

  “So?”

  “More than anything, you love the salty with the sweet, the danger with the decent. For the most part, you’re like your name—sunny skies, endless warmth and goodness as far as the eye can see. But there’s another part of you that’s not sunny at all. Nothing gets you going like a sudden thunderstorm with the threat of the whole world coming apart. Being a boring nine-to-five wage-slave in a cubicle farm pushing mail-order pet toys is about as far from the real you as it is from me. By now you’ve got to be fucking screaming inside.”

  Since when had Ice been able to read her mind? “Maybe I’m all about building character these days.”

  “Your character’s perfect as is.”

  “Ther
e you go again—giving praise when just last year you couldn’t wait to get rid of me.” She speared a strawberry quarter, dipped it in chocolate and tapped the excess off. “You fired me, Ice. That’s just something I can’t get around.”

  “Try.”

  She shook her head and brought the bite to her own mouth. “Sorry, pal, but that’s not going to happen. You hit the eject button on me and the business we built together like it was nothing. Yet here you are, landing on my doorstep like that was your long-range plan all along.”

  A corner of his mouth curled with genuine humor. “Can’t put anything over on you, can I?”

  “Not even a little.”

  “I’m just a man starting over, baby. New city, new life.”

  “But same old boring me.”

  “You’ve never been boring.” Again he caught her hand so he could guide the bite to his mouth. He chewed slowly, watching her all the while. And when he spoke, she felt it all the way to the center of her stomach. “You’re my Sunny day.”

  “I’ve never been yours.”

  “You are now, so I guess that part’s new. Get used to it.”

  “No,” she whispered. To her dismay, even she could hear her building excitement. “I’m not. I never will be.”

  “We’ll see about that.” He dipped a bit of strawberry into the chocolate and held it near her mouth. Before she could take the morsel in, he pulled the fork away and replaced it with his lips.

  The chaos he created simply by popping back in her life didn’t clear up with his kiss. It did, however, take a backseat as his tongue stroked hers in a way that made her world rock. He must have ditched the food he held, because his hands were on her, and there was no denying she loved the feel of them. One slid into her hair while the other roamed past her shoulder and down the length of her spine, before sliding up her rib cage to rest just beneath the underside of her breast. Excitement and alarm flash-fired through her, and with no clear winner in sight she managed to lift her mouth a fraction from his.

  “You move that hand another centimeter northward,” she whispered against his lips, unable to stop herself from enjoying that naughty-girl thrill of threatening him with another wowser of a kiss, “and I promise I’ll stab you with a fondue fork.”

  The fire that lit his eyes made heat bloom between her legs. “Was that a challenge?”

  “A promise. I’m the daughter of former Mayor Archibald Fairfax III. In this town that means something, so no public boobie-groping for you.”

  Ice’s smile was pure sex. “That means private boobie-groping is still in play.”

  Dear God. “I honestly thought you were going to say up for grabs.”

  “That, too.” He didn’t move his hand any lower as he leaned in to caress the side of her neck in a kiss that made her so dizzy her eyes fluttered shut. “I’m up for the private boobie-groping, Sunny. Seriously fucking up.”

  If she looked at his lap now and saw just how up he was, she’d forget that whole business about being Archibald Fairfax’s daughter. “Too much, too soon.” With that, she edged away, only to feel vaguely bereft when he let her go. “I still don’t know what you’re really after, and I sure as hell don’t trust you as far as I can throw you. Considering I actually wanted to throw you in a She-Hulk, homicidal way not too long ago, getting sexy with you isn’t something that’s going to happen just because you think you can make me want you.”

  “You and your challenges.” To her surprise Ice chuckled, took the fork with the strawberry still on it that he’d dropped on the nearest plate, and fed her the chocolate-dipped morsel. “Okay, Sunny day. Challenge accepted.”

  Chapter Six

  “We Need a Little Christmas” piped through the house as Sunny juggled the last big plastic tub into the foyer. “An early Christmas miracle has occurred,” she announced to her mother as she dropped her burden with about a dozen other boxes and bins piled by the foyer’s ornate marble table in the enter of the room. “No one killed themselves dragging all this crap out of the attic and down two flights of stairs. Yay us.”

  “Don’t celebrate yet. I’m still dying of a heart attack after walking through that spider web from hell.” Distress was etched into every line of Hannah’s cherubic face as she kept checking herself for creepy crawlies. “Swear to God, I can feel the maker of that web crawling all over me.”

  “Maybe you should go take a quick shower before we get going on the decorating.” Looking torn between sympathy and amusement, Claire gave Hannah a quick hug. “I need you at your holiday decorating best this weekend, Hannah love. I’m giving you and our resident Grinch the foyer and the dining room to do today while I tackle the grand parlor.”

  Hannah gave her a grateful smile. “You’re the best, Claire. Give me twenty minutes and I’ll have the Grinch singing Christmas carols.”

  “First Scrooge and now the Grinch.” Sunny loosed an exasperated sigh while Hannah jetted off. She popped open a box and found the pieces of a white flocked tree she’d once had set up in her room as a kid. “I don’t get why you’re complaining about me. I mean, I’m doing everything I’m supposed to be doing, aren’t I? I’m dragging stuff down from the attic. I’m dedicating the next two days of my life to decking the halls in whatever ridiculous way you want. The Grinch was the exact opposite, so I’m not getting how I’m being Grinchy.”

  “It’s all in the attitude, darling,” her mother said, pulling a family of almost life-sized gilded deer from an appliance-sized box. “You’re here in body, but not in spirit. For instance, where do you think I should put these deer?”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Exactly.”

  It took Sunny a moment before she figured out the point. Ugh. “I’m trying, Mom. My life left the rails a while ago, but I’m doing my best to get it back on track.”

  “Darling.” Claire set the biggest deer down and stepped over bubble wrap and boxes to cup Sunny’s cheek. “I’m not lecturing you, I swear. I’m just hoping I can help you find a way back to being happy.”

  “I am happy,” Sunny protested, then grimaced. “I mean, I’m not spinning around on a mountaintop and singing my lungs out, but then I don’t know of anyone who’s Julie Andrews-level happy. But I’m hardly depressed or boohooing my way through life, okay? There’s nothing for you to worry about.”

  “Not being depressed or crying… Sweetheart, that’s not a measurement of happiness. That’s just not being unhappy. And the difference between not being unhappy and happy is the same difference between merely existing and being gloriously alive.”

  Again Sunny sighed. “I know you’re my mother, but are you ever going to stop worrying about me?”

  “Never. It’s in the contract I signed when the stork dropped you off.” Claire kissed her on the nose before she moved back to fuss over her family of gilded deer. “Are you happy to be back home in Chicago?”

  Oh my God. “Very, Mom.”

  “And you’re happy with your job?”

  “My job? Um.” At that, there was no way Sunny could lie. “I’m good at it, and everyone’s happy with how I’m doing things, but happy? Not really.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I don’t fit in there. If I were the type who enjoyed wearing cat-ear headbands, it would probably be my idea of heaven. And I would definitely have the feeling that I was surrounded by my people, my tribe. As it is…”

  Her mother clicked her tongue. “You’re miserable.”

  “They’re very nice people, my coworkers,” Sunny insisted, feeling guilty. “They love doing things together, like taco Tuesdays and karaoke night. They have their own LOL language and they play with the cat toys like they’re cats themselves—”

  “And you’re miserable.”

  “God, I’m so freaking miserable,” she agreed fervently. Maybe admitting to misery would pacify her mother enough to make her change the damn subject. “Once we’re past the holidays, I might start looking for something that fits my personality better.”
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br />   “You think you’d like to do something besides marketing?”

  “No, I love that, especially finding new and innovative ways to make the ever-changing world of social media work for whatever it is I’m trying to get people to notice. I just don’t know what field I want to help get out there into the global market.”

  “I’ve always said you’re a natural when it comes to reading people.” Reaching into the box, Claire found a wreath, hung it around the neck of one of the gold-painted deer, then set it near the arched opening to the grand parlor. “There’s a fundraising dinner coming up for a fabulous young candidate who’s running for congress next year. Why don’t you go and meet some of the people who’ve put the fundraiser together? I know they could use someone like you on their team. You’d be a breath of fresh air for their organization, and you know how to reach the younger crowd.”

  “Are you suggesting I get into politics?” With a laugh, Sunny opened a box and found a monstrous tangle of what looked like every string of tree lights their family had ever possessed. “You’ve got to be kidding. Have you met me?”

  “What’s wrong with politics?”

  “Everything. Don’t you remember I’m the kid who swore I’d never get into the dirty pool of politics after living in it long enough to see how Dad had to hide who he was just to be accepted? That arena belongs to you and Dad, thank you very much, but not me.”

  “It’s in your blood, darling. And just think—with my connections and the legendary Fairfax name, this time next year you could have your own company that specializes in digital media marketing. With a powerful company like that, and with your savvy know-how, you could be the next generation of king-makers. You could even go straight to the White House itself.”

  The Big Ben chime of the doorbell was a godsend, and Sunny popped up so fast she got a head rush. “Before I’m off to the White House, let’s first get through today’s decorating plan and tonight’s gastronomic delights. Remember, it’s Saturday, so it’s my turn to cook.”

  “Lovely. What are we having?”