Page 32 of The Billionaire's Masquerade Ball

Xander sat down. He had been expecting more resistance somehow from her. “Her name was Cynder—er, Cyndil. She seemed to have some authority, so she might have been managing one of the catering companies?”

Gail stood, not giving anything away by her face. “That’s very helpful. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to take care of this right away.”

“Good.” Xander shook her hand, feeling oddly deflated. Maybe punching Patrick in the face would have been more satisfying. He was hoping to get information on where Cynder worked, but he couldn’t ask now.

Wyatt followed closely on his heels as they left the office, closing the door behind him. Thankfully the other two women didn’t emerge from their offices. “Well, that was unexpected,” Wyatt muttered quietly.

Xander stopped suddenly and gave him a quick look. “Why?”

Wyatt flushed a little, as though he didn’t expect for Xander to respond. “I, uh …”

“I’d like to hear your thoughts if you can find a way to get them from your brain to your mouth.”

“Patrick is Gail’s son,” Wyatt said in a quiet voice. “And those other two women are her daughters. You didn’t know?”

Xander rocked back on his heels, shocked. This is the kind of detail that he should have known. Though typically he handed off these kinds of details to other people, he liked to know everything. Knowledge was power. Which meant that he had just gone into essentially a negotiation with an enormous blind spot. His mind scanned over what this might mean.

Would Gail still fire Patrick? Her own son? She hadn’t seemed particularly surprised. Did she already know how he was? The thought made him sick.

“Why didn’t you mention this before we came?” Xander hissed. The last thing he wanted now was for anyone in the office to hear the conversation.

Wyatt flushed. “I thought you knew. You’re usually about ten steps ahead of me with every detail, so I just assumed …”

Xander couldn’t fault him. He should have known this. Nodding quickly, he moved forward into the main lobby and then stopped again, just short of running into someone. He glanced up, then sucked in a breath. It was Cynder. She stood in front of him, holding one of those cardboard travel containers with several cups of coffee. She looked as startled as he did.

Before he could even stop it, a grin spread over his face. The memory in his head of her couldn’t hold a candle to the real woman. She was beautiful, but in an unassuming way—the opposite of the two other women in the office who oozed a forced and faked attractiveness.

“Hey,” Xander said.

“You,” she said, her voice a little out of breath. She looked at Xander and then narrowed her eyes at Wyatt. Had she met Wyatt too? Xander felt a sudden flash of jealousy. Wyatt was closer to her age. He looked like he could be in a boy band with his unkempt hair. Women liked that, didn’t they?

He glanced at Wyatt, who looked surprised. He clearly recognized Cynder from Saturday as well. Xander stepped closer to her, moving a little between her and Wyatt.

“You brought me coffee? That was thoughtful.” Her incredible eyes darted away from him and she looked like she was about to drop the drinks. Xander put a hand on hers to steady it. He couldn’t help himself.

“Cyndil!” Gail’s voice rang out from the back office, much more sharply than the tone she had used with Xander, though it matched her cold eyes better. He had a feeling that when she wasn’t talking to a client, this was her normal way of speaking.

“If you’ll excuse me,” she said, pulling away.

“You’re welcome,” Xander whispered after her. She shot him a confused stare before knocking on Gail’s door.

Now he knew where to find her. He could call her any time and ask her on a date. It shocked him that he was even considering it, because he knew that this wouldn’t be like the other women he took on one date. If he pursued her, it would be much more. Maybe he would call after today, when Patrick got fired or maybe she even got a raise or some kind of bonus for putting up with him.

Xander only wished he could be there to see Patrick get canned. Though if Patrick was Gail’s son … Xander frowned, thinking suddenly of what Cynder had said Saturday night. She didn’t think Gail would do anything about it.

As they walked away, Wyatt shot Xander another knowing look and opened his mouth to say something.

“Nope,” Xander said. “Whatever you were just thinking about, forget it.”

Wyatt shook his head and sighed, but didn’t say anything else.

The elevator took forever to arrive and then was incredibly slow on the way down. As the doors slid open, Xander’s phone began to ring. Olivia. He hissed out a breath. She hadn’t put out anything on the gala yet, so he still needed to stay on her good side. He had a feeling that she was going to drag it out just to have an excuse to keep calling him.

As they headed through the doors and outside, a blast of icy air hit Xander as he answered the phone, lip curling as he did. “Hello, Liv.”

---