Maximum Risk, Page 2

  Max held out his hand. “A pleasure.” And it was, so much more than he wanted it to be. The soft touch of her hand in his had him wondering how soft the rest of her body was.

  “Nice to meet you. Maddy has told me a lot about you,” Tara said breathlessly. The spark in her eyes confirmed she also felt the sizzle from their touch.

  “And yet you still came,” he shot her a smooth smile.

  Tara removed her hand from his and stepped back. “As she said, we had plans, and I’ve never been to Rhode Island. This is a beautiful island. So peaceful. Considering a summer home?”

  Since his plans for the area were not a secret, he saw no reason not to tell her. “Resort complex. The depth of the ocean floor on this side of the island would allow even the large cruise ships to dock.”

  “Cruise ships? Wouldn’t that completely change the island?” Tara looked at the grand staircase just outside the door. “Wait, you’re planning to knock this beautiful house down?”

  “Neither has value to me as they are, so yes and yes.”

  “No value? I bet the people who live here don’t feel that way. I can only imagine how the owners of this house feel about your plans for it. This must have been an amazing gathering place for their family.”

  Max hated how her comment made him think of another time, another island—family that would never be the same. “My resort will bring jobs, and you’d be surprised how quickly people become less nostalgic about belongings when offered a good price for them.”

  Maddy turned to look at the large marble foyer. “Have you considered keeping it for yourself, Max? It really is a grand home.”

  “I don’t need a house. I have hotels all over the world. I’m never short of a place to sleep.”

  Maddy pursed her lips and looked him over critically. “That’s no way to live.”

  Losing patience with the direction of this conversation, Max said, “I really should get back to—”

  Madison held up one hand and took out her phone. “I just got a message from Richard. I’m going to step in the other room for a minute to call him.” When neither Max nor Tara answered her, she said, “Okay, so I’ll be right next door if you need me.”

  She conveniently left Max alone with Tara. Madison had never been known for her subtlety. Max leaned in and said, “I know why you’re here.”

  Tara’s head shot back, and she searched his eyes. “You do?”

  Max kept his voice low. “I should warn you, though. I don’t do relationships.”

  She cocked her head to one side. “I’m sorry?”

  “Luke told me about Madison’s matchmaking bet. I’m flattered you flew up here to meet me, but for the sake of clarity: I’m not interested in anything more than a few hours at a hotel. But if you’re okay with that, I’m free tonight.”

  “Wow,” Tara said, her voice thick with sarcasm, “that’s quite an ego.”

  He shrugged. “A lot of drama can be avoided by being blunt from the beginning. If you stay, it’s your decision, and you know the score. If you don’t, that’s also your decision. There are plenty of other options for both of us.”

  “Should I tell you now I didn’t come here as part of a matchmaking bet, or should I let you keep talking?” She put a hand on one hip, which pulled her dress even tighter across her breasts, something Max tried to ignore but couldn’t. His heart thudded in his chest even as he forced his face and voice to remain calm. He fought the urge to dig a hand into the hair at the nape of her neck and pull her face to his. He leaned forward again until his lips hovered over hers. “There’s no need to be embarrassed about it. I’m interested.”

  Her other hand went to her hip, and she pursed her lips in a beautiful act of irritation. “I’m not. Tell me, do women actually sleep with you after you spout this shit to them?”

  Max frowned. Her question took him completely off guard and he answered honestly: “Many, yes.”

  Humor lit Tara’s eyes. She laughed as she spoke. “You have really bad taste in women.”

  Madison returned before Max had a chance to respond to Tara. “Sorry about that. Richard wanted to know if we’d be home in time for dinner. I told him we were just up here for lunch. Will you be able to join us, Max?”

  Max looked at Tara for a long moment. He didn’t like being a source of amusement for her any more than he liked how easily she’d dismissed the idea of sleeping with him. Although he didn’t flaunt his dating practices in the papers as Nick had always done, Max had never found it difficult to find companionship. He was young, good-looking, rich, and from a prominent family. Add his cocky attitude, and normally women all but threw themselves at him. It wasn’t something he bragged about, but until now it was something he’d taken for granted.

  Tara looked far from impressed, and that intrigued Max. Was it an act or did she actually not find him attractive? He wanted—no, needed—to know. He decided to spend more time with Tara, but not with Madison around. He looked down at this watch. “I can’t. I have a working lunch planned. Perhaps another day?” He directed his question subtly at Tara, who shook her head and smiled.

  Madison missed the exchange and said, “I’d like that. Are you seriously considering not attending Gio’s wedding?”

  “I said I would go, but only on my terms.”

  “Which are?” Maddy asked.

  “Not as a groomsman. I need to get in and get out as I please.”

  Tara watched the exchange and added dryly, “You have some serious commitment issues.”

  Max parried, “And you’re overly generous with opinions no one asked you for.”

  Tara raised her hands in mock apology, “Sorry, didn’t mean to judge. It just fit in so well with everything else you’re afraid of.”

  “You know nothing about me,” Max growled.

  Tara shrugged with frustrating indifference. “You’re right.”

  Madison stayed surprisingly quiet during the exchange.

  “I live my life the way I want to, not because I’m afraid of anyone or anything.”

  Looking irritatingly amused, Tara threw up her hands again. “You don’t have to prove anything to me. We’ll probably never meet again.”

  The idea of not seeing Tara again was unacceptable to Max, but he wasn’t about to admit it. Not there. Not in front of Madison. “Exactly.”

  Madison picked up her coat from the linen-covered back of one of the chairs. She gave Max a kiss on one cheek then finished buttoning her coat. “We’ve interrupted your work long enough. Come on, Tara. Let’s go to lunch.”

  Tara put on her coat and held out her hand to shake Max’s. “This was interesting, Max Andrade.”

  Max took her hand in his, once again shaken by the jolt the simple touch from her could send through him. He leaned down to speak softly in her ear. “We will meet again, Tara. Will you be as outspoken without my cousin?”

  Tara raised one hand, gave him a pat on the cheek, and whispered, “I will if you’re still being an ass.” Then she turned and followed Madison out of the house.

  Max stood in the middle of the foyer staring at the door Tara had walked through. He had dinner plans that evening with a model he’d met the week before during a transatlantic flight. They’d already slept together once, and she seemed eager enough to repeat the experience. She didn’t have a problem with his need to keep things casual. She knew not to expect to sleep over. No drama. Which made her a much more practical choice than Tara would ever be.

  And inexplicably less exciting.

  He called and canceled his date for that night.

  Fuck practical.

  He had to find a way to see Tara again.

  Chapter Two

  In the backseat of an island taxi, Maddy turned and took both of Tara’s hands in hers. “You’re a genius. I knew I was right to hire you. You played that perfectly. He’s intrigued; I bet he calls you.”

  Tara pried her hands out of Maddy’s and clasped them on her lap. “I wasn’t playing at anything.”

/>   Maddy smiled. “You know what I mean. I couldn’t have prepped you better for how to flirt with him. Now just reel him in. Get him to come to New York.”

  With a frown, Tara said, “I’m not reeling anyone anywhere. Is that why you put me in this ridiculous dress? You were hoping he’d like me? He mentioned some matchmaking bet. I didn’t sign up to be part of anything like that.”

  Maddy wrinkled her nose unhappily, then waved a hand in the air dismissively. “I wish he didn’t know about the bet, but don’t worry, none of that has anything to do with you. My cousin’s wife, Nicole, and I lined up the perfect women for him to meet, but we’ll pursue that after I find out what’s going on. All you need to do is help me get him back to New York.”

  Well, that’s both reassuring and insulting at the same time. “So why does it matter if he’s attracted to me?”

  As if explaining something that should have been evident to Tara, Maddy said, “Max is a man. If he likes you he’s going to lower his guard to you. You’re the PI here. Isn’t that something you could use to your advantage to get information out of him?”

  Tara looked out the window of the taxi. “As I told you, my business has consisted solely of tracking and photographing. I don’t like lies. I’m not comfortable with manipulating people.”

  “A little flirtation is harmless. You might even enjoy it if you relaxed a little.” Maddy tapped her fingers on the door of the cab and said, “You didn’t find Max attractive at all?”

  Tara met her eyes. “I’ve never met a more arrogant, self-serving, overconfident ass.”

  A grin spread across Maddy’s face. “That must have been some talk the two of you had when I stepped out of the room.”

  “If you must know, the lost cousin you think you need to coddle offered me a few hours at a local hotel. I haven’t received a proposition that easy to turn down since some guy in a bar told me he had a six-pack in the trunk of his car and wanted to know if I’d go for a drive and share it with him.”

  Maddy’s eyes widened. “That’s surprising. Max is usually so smooth with women.”

  “Is that what gave him his enormous ego? I personally found nothing attractive about him—at all.”

  Maddy groaned. “Oh, no. I know that tone. Listen, normally I’m all about people hooking up. And I like you, but we need to stay focused here. Max is only one of the people I want you to get close to. Luke is also single and just as in demand with the ladies. You can’t go getting moony-eyed over either one of them. It’d be better if you looked available to both of them. At least until we figure out what’s going on. Agreed?”

  “I just told you I couldn’t be less interested in Max.”

  Maddy studied Tara’s face and shook her head. “Dammit. Plan B. Stay away from Max. Don’t try to lure him anywhere. Just focus on getting to know the rest of the family.”

  The taxi pulled up to the island airport, cutting off what would have been yet another denial about feelings for Max. She followed Maddy onto her private jet.

  Tara wasn’t about to bring up the subject of Max again, but she was tempted to explain to Maddy exactly why she could never have any feelings for Max’s type. Tara didn’t make the same mistake twice. She’d already dated someone like Max in college: good-looking, cocky, and wealthy. Ted had said he loved her, and she’d believed him. They’d moved in together right after college, and Tara had thought she’d found her happily ever after, even if sometimes she’d felt like it wasn’t exactly as she’d imagined it would be. It had been good, but looking back, she wouldn’t describe it as ever having been great.

  While job-hunting, Tara had remembered her childhood dream of being a private investigator and, for fun, had decided to follow Ted. She hadn’t expected to see him go anywhere besides the gym he practically lived in. Seeing him drive to another woman’s house and watching her greet him at the door with a kiss changed Tara forever. At first she hadn’t believed what her eyes had shown her, so she’d taken a picture of him with her phone. She’d taken another photo of him the next night when he’d taken another woman to dinner. The day she’d left him, she’d printed out the pictures and laid them on the counter. No argument. No need to talk it out. Unlike men, photos didn’t lie. The evidence had freed her.

  Soon after that, a friend had asked Tara to trail her potentially unfaithful husband. Tara had and then presented the evidence of his betrayal in full color. Tara’s unexpected career had taken off, growing solely by word of mouth. She’d named her agency New Holmes because she liked to think that what she brought people was a truth that, although it hurt to hear, brought the person a chance to start over with a guilt-free, clean slate. And if, by doing so, she gave women the ammunition to stick it to a few cheating, rich husbands who thought they could hide their money and their girlfriends—that was just gravy.

  Once a playboy, always a playboy.

  So, no, Max was not her type. Not at all.

  ***

  A week later, Max sat in the living room of the penthouse suite in his London hotel, answering work emails. Dale reported the family on Slater Island had accepted their low counteroffer and their lawyers could close on the property with his okay. He told Dale to move forward with it but to hold off lining up the demolition crew, then slammed the laptop shut.

  He blamed jetlag for his miserable mood, but the truth was he’d been in a funk since he’d left Rhode Island. He’d made the mistake of walking around the island after Madison and Tara left. It was a quaint, mostly underdeveloped, mini-version of Martha’s Vineyard. People greeted him as they passed him on the street. A few stopped and asked him where he was from and if he was staying for long. They were disturbingly open and friendly. He wanted to tell them: “Hey, don’t be so fucking happy to see me. I’m about to change everything you like about this place.”

  His walk had taken him back to the row of exquisite homes he was about to purchase. He stood there, looking out over the water again, thinking about the Andrade wedding he had attended on Isola Santos. That island had been in his family for generations, and seeing so many of his relatives gathered for his cousin’s wedding had brought back painful memories he thought he’d effectively shed long ago.

  He remembered visiting that island as a child with his father and brothers and always feeling like an outsider. According to his mother, the uncles had never accepted her and, because of that, would never accept her sons. What he knew of his uncles, Victor and Alessandro, and what he felt when around them never matched. They spoke of family and loyalty but had betrayed him and his brothers when they’d needed family the most.

  Max had been a teenager when his father had died. Back then, he hadn’t known his father had started a new family in Venice while still married to his mother. Gio had discovered that secret shame when he’d gone to retrieve their father’s body but had kept it to himself.

  After their father’s death, his brothers had fought viciously. Max couldn’t remember why. It never took much. Finally, Uncle Victor had intervened and invited them to spend a summer with family on Isola Santos. For a short time, Max and his brothers had gotten along and had felt accepted by that side of their family. But it hadn’t been real. None of it. His uncles had covered old lies with layers of new ones.

  Like a house built on an old garbage dump, a life built on lies eventually begins to rot from the inside out. Gio had been the first to leave. He’d been furious when he’d left, but he’d refused to say why. He pulled away from everyone, claiming he was overwhelmed with his responsibilities at the family company.

  Nick had followed and joined Gio at Cogent for a short time, then had taken off to party with his friends.

  Max and Luke had stayed with the Andrade uncles the longest. They’d even traveled with them. Wherever they went, whomever they met, Alessandro and Victor introduced Max as family, and the title held importance. Uncle Victor often said, “You’re an Andrade, and to an Andrade, family is everything.”

  Max had believed them and, for the first time in
his life, could remember being proud of his family. For a short time, he’d felt as if he’d belonged somewhere.

  Until Gio called and told Luke and Max they needed to come home. He claimed nothing was as it appeared. The uncles had manipulated them, betrayed them. None of George Andrade’s sons had or would ever truly be accepted in that family. Gio’s proof had been how they’d stolen Gio’s inheritance—the island.

  Recently, Gio had flipped the story and now claimed the uncles hadn’t stolen anything, but it was too late. Max had spent years overcoming what had been another loss to him. He wasn’t angry. He didn’t allow himself to feel one way or another about much when it came to people. Caring was a waste of time and energy.

  Which was why he refused to be moved by the friendly welcome he’d received on Slater Island. For all he knew, it had been staged as an attempt to make him reconsider his plans. Tossing his laptop onto the couch beside him, Max decided the sooner he leveled the homes on Slater Island the better.

  He didn’t like that he couldn’t stop thinking about the island.

  And Tara.

  He wanted to call Madison and ask for Tara’s last name, but he told himself she had made her choice. Even if Tara suddenly became interested in him, the fact that she was Madison’s friend should have been enough of a turnoff. Being with Tara would be complicated, and he avoided complicated. Yet there he was, sitting in London, wondering where Tara was and what she was doing.

  He took out his phone and called Luke.

  “Max, hey, this is a surprise. Hang on, let me close the door.”

  Max felt a little guilty at how happy Luke always sounded to hear from him. “If you’re at work we can talk later.”

  “No, I’m finishing up paperwork. Surgeries are done for today. Where are you?”

  With Luke it was always best to be vague. “You know me, traveling for work. I was wondering if you still talk to Madison.”

  “Absolutely. What’s up?”

  Max hesitated. “Have you met her friend Tara?”