Page 45 of The Devil's Playground

When she sees that I’ve turned around, Nicolette reluctantly does so. She also, to my surprise, takes two pointed steps away from me.

“What are you doing here?” she asks.

I know her well enough to catch the slight tremble to her voice.

So does this asshole—and when he hears it? The smug smile on his face widens. “I haven’t seen you in ages and that’s how you greet me? Shit, Nicolette. I couldn’t believe that it was you when I came heading down this street. I just wanted to say ‘hi’ since we happened to bump into each other. You can’t fault me for that, can you?”

She opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. After a moment, she closes it, and nods.

Okay. Something’s going on here. I don’t know what it is—and I don’t like it.

“Nic, you gonna introduce me to your friend?” I ask.

He holds out his hand. I don’t take it.

He shrugs. “Name’s Kieran.” Kieran smiles, then adds, “I’m her brother.”

Nicolette avoids his smile—and my gaze. Her eyes dart over to the man, then drop to the sidewalk. “My stepbrother,” she murmurs. “Ex-stepbrother.”

“Your mom might have given up on my dad before moving on, darlin’, but I haven’t given up on you. We’re family.”

I go still, my own empty grin freezing on my face. “Darlin’?”

What the fuck? He’s got the same Springfield accent as I do—which means no accent—and, yet, he affects this Southern drawl shit as he calls my Nicolette ‘darlin’’.

“Yeah,” he says daringly. “A little pet name for my sister. What about you? You got a name?”

Not one he needs to know.

“This is my boss, Kieran. So cool it, okay?” Nicolette is still refusing to look at me as she says, “Stop this overprotective BS. You know how much I hate it.”

He says something in response to it, but I’m not listening.

Nah. I’m a little preoccupied by what she called me.

‘Boss’. Not ‘boyfriend’, which I get because I’m thirty and not a boy. ‘Guy I’m fucking’ might be too much for her, but what about ‘guy I’m seeing’? Hell, I’d even take ‘partner’.

But ‘boss’?

Is that all I am to her?

And what about this guy? He seems a little placated now that she’s told him who I am—though I do notice she also didn’t give him my name—but I haven’t forgotten the way he called her darlin’ like that.

Know why? Because, as far as I’m aware, she doesn’t have a brother.

Tanner ran Nicolette. Because Devil is a paranoid bastard who’s only gotten worse since he knocked Ava up, he has our tech guy run anyone who might integrate with the syndicate.

The only family Nicolette Williams has is her mother. That’s it. Her mother was recently divorced from some insurance adjuster in Springfield. No kids for him, so how the hell does she even have an ex-stepbrother?

I don’t know, but I’m sure as hell going to find out.

Because this is obviously a conversation for the two of them, I stay quiet as Nicolette wraps it up as quickly as she can. She uses the excuse that we have dinner reservations, then hooks her arm in mine before waving the guy off.

He’s obviously not ready to end it, but what can he do? Giving me one last assessing look, he nods before strolling back the way he came. Meanwhile, Nicolette is trembling—and something tells me it has absolutely nothing to do with the March chill.

I let her lead me to the first restaurant we see so that she can sell her reservation story. However, before we step inside, I unloop my arm from hers and, fisting my hands at my side, I demand, “Who was he?”

“I told you who he was,” Nicolette mumbles, ducking her head in the light from the restaurant’s open doorway. A curtain of pretty blonde hair covers her face. “He was my stepbrother. That’s all.”

---