Rise of the Notorious (7 page)

“Just peachy.” She started to push past him, her keys out and ready to unlock her door, only to be stopped as his hand shot out to grab her arm. He turned her toward him until her face was dangerously close to his own, and the dark, primal thrill he saw flash briefly in her eyes had his grin widening.

“Aren’t you going to invite me in?” he asked, honing in on her with an intensity she recognized all too well.

“You would like that, wouldn’t you?” she spat, wrenching her arm free of his grip. “Why don’t you go back to Maine and leave me the hell alone?”

“I can’t do that,” he told her easily, his hands finding their way into the pockets of his jeans so he could resist the urge to touch her again. To take her. “I have some loose ends to tie up in the city before I go.”

“That’s always your excuse. How many loose ends could one person possibly have?” She glared at him, hating the fact that she could still feel the burn of his hand on her arm. “Then again, you’re the king of unfinished business, aren’t you?”

Wyatt’s grin faded as bitterness replaced it. Oh, he had a lot of unfinished business where she was concerned. Thinking of it had him changing tactics and backing off, an icy frost replacing the heat in his expression. “You miss me, sweetheart. I know you do.”

“I don’t have time for this,” Madison snapped, crossing her arms. She continued to watch him frigidly, annoyed that her heart, her body, still yearned for him. Her pledge to herself weeks earlier at the fundraiser to manipulate him back into loving her, only so she could break his heart as he had broken hers, flashed in her mind. The fact that he was still here meant that some part of him still wanted her. She pondered over how she could use that against him as he spoke again.

“How’s Raoul doing?”

She immediately disliked the lack of emotion on his face. It meant he was hiding something from her. “Why do you care?”

“Just curious.” Wyatt shrugged, trying to brush it off as he strolled off her porch and down the steps to the street. He turned to face her, tipping his black fedora in farewell. “I’m moving out of the Waldorf and into the Vasser Hotel in the morning. I’ll make sure to drop by and say hi.”

Madison’s lips parted in surprise as she watched him take off down the street, whistling to himself. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion as she tried to figure out his angle.

The last thing she needed at that moment was another complication, and Wyatt Bailey had always been exactly that. While she had discovered that his reason for coming back into her life had been because of her father, she had to wonder now why he was staying. Win was dead, after all.

It occurred to her that she really didn’t know the man as well as she had once thought. If she had, then she would know the reason why he had left her in Las Vegas all those years before.

Why he had left her to ache miserably for eight long years, crushed by the powerful weight of his memory.

H
er knuckles rapped violently against the door, indignation coursing through her as she waited. She stared around impatiently at the empty hallway of the upscale apartment building, her fury building with each and every second that passed.

The police had some nerve interrogating her like some common criminal, especially since she was entirely innocent. And damn the Vassers for ignoring her. She sincerely hoped to see them all burn in Hell for what they had done to poor Win.

The door flew open and the man inside smiled at her, his gold incisor tooth catching the light.

“Miss Jorja Hale,” he beamed, stepping back to invite her inside as he ran a hand over his balding head. His accent spoke of his Russian heritage and only irritated her more. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“You know why I’m here, Eddie,” she spat, sweeping past him on long legs barely covered by a shiny, black leather skirt. The extreme v-neck of her blood red blouse accented her breasts, and she caught Eddie eyeing them hungrily as she turned to face him. “I want to know what the hell you put in the weed you sold me.”

His smile faded as his eyes flew back up to her face. “So this
does
have to do with the Vassers.”

Jorja rolled her eyes dramatically and threw up her hands. “Hello! Who the fuck do you think I was buying that weed for? Myself? Please. I don’t touch that shit.”

“I knew it was for Win…” Eddie grumbled, irritation and panic rising within him as he stormed past her to grab a drink from his wet bar. “I didn’t know it would kill him.”

“The cops are saying it was laced with PCP. Why, Eddie? Why did you do that?”

Eddie turned to her, sipping at the vodka in his glass fervently as his dark eyes narrowed. “I was told to. The Vasser woman, she’s a regular client. She comes in for pills…Vicodin, Oxycontin…she told me Win wanted something different. Something special. So when you came in with a request, I obliged.”

“Wait, wait, this was
her
doing?” Jorja snapped, blue eyes aflame as her mind started processing this little piece of information. If only she could lead the cops to Eddie, but then they’d know that she was the one who’d bought the drugs in the first place. Regardless, this may be the one edge she finally had on the woman. This could bring them all down.

“She told me to give him something that would, how did she put it? ‘Make him jump out of a goddamn window.’” Eddie shrugged, downing the rest of his vodka with relish. “I thought she was just being colorful. It’s not my fault he actually killed himself.”

“Poor Win.” Jorja frowned, her thirst for revenge fueling off the tiny bit of grief she felt for the man she had latched onto and lost. She should have been sunning herself on a beach in Florida by now, not dealing with this mess. Even if it was the last thing she did, she would see to it that the Vassers paid for killing off her last chance of becoming one of them.

“You didn’t tell the cops, did you? I can’t have them coming back to me. I run a tight business here, lots of important clients that require discretion,” Eddie asserted, a glitter of fear in his eyes. “I don’t want any trouble.”

Jorja managed a tiny grin, her thoughts of revenge calming her. Now that she knew the truth about the drugs, she could figure out a way to use it against the very family she now hated more than anything else in the world.

“No, I told the cops that Win bought his own drugs, that I had nothing to do with it. This won’t come back to you, Eddie, I promise.” She wandered toward him, placing a soft kiss on his cheek as she brushed up against his body, pleased at how compliant he was once he had a chance to touch her. “Thank you for the information. I’ll see you around.”

She backed away, amused by the blatant desire in his eyes. Men were easily played.

As she left Eddie’s apartment and rode the elevator down to the first floor, she stared at herself in the reflection of the doors. A confident smile lifted her painted lips, cruel and wicked.

There was one, incontrovertible truth that Jorja knew at that moment. One shining beacon of light that gave life to the spirit of her revenge.

Madison Vasser was going to pay, and pay dearly, for what Jorja now knew she had done to Win.

“Alright, so that
confirms what we pretty much already knew. But who’s responsible?” Linc asked his sister as he paced in front of her desk impatiently. “My bets are on Jorja.”

Madison watched him carefully, noting he had a hard time looking her in the eye. It was clear he still hadn’t forgiven her.

“While I can’t figure out a motive for it, I’m inclined to agree with you about Jorja,” she told him, running her pen along her lower lip in thought. “Maybe these tox results are telling us something about our father that we are just trying to ignore.”

“And what is that, exactly?” Linc demanded, coming to a stop before her desk and glaring at her. She saw the distrust in his eyes, could sense he felt detached from her now in a way he had never been before.

“He had many things in his system, Linc. Not just marijuana and PCP. He had taken heavy doses of prescription pain killers. It’s entirely plausible that he simply wanted to die.”

“So what, you’re saying we shouldn’t go after Jorja for supplying him with the drugs he used to end his own life?”

“The drugs didn’t kill him, though they might have if he lived long enough. It was the belt tied around his neck that did it,” Madison reminded him coolly. She remained composed despite the tension in the room.

Linc cursed violently under his breath, his guilt over his father’s death rising up to overtake him. He kicked the corner of her glossy mahogany desk, feeling some small measure of satisfaction from the act.

“It’s Jorja’s fault. I know it is. And that bitch keeps blaming us because she wants to drive all the attention away from herself.”

“If she wanted out of the limelight, she wouldn’t be on television every day,” Madison pointed out, rubbing her temple. “There’s not much we can do about her right now, Linc. We have more pressing issues we need to focus on.”

“She’s spreading garbage about us and you don’t think we should do anything?” he growled, throwing up his hands. “I’m sorry, but I’m about an inch away from hunting her down and strangling her.”

Madison couldn’t help but laugh at his statement, the darkness of the whole situation taking on a humorous note. “I’ll hold her down while you do the deed, darling.”

He managed a half-hearted smile as well, running his hand through his hair as he turned to face her. When he met her eyes, he tried to see past the haunting truth he’d been struggling to live with since the day before. She was his sister, and would always be his sister, regardless of what she had done. It was time he started remembering that.

“Mads, I don’t want to be mad at you anymore,” he confessed, tucking his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “Holding grudges just isn’t my style. Can we be friends again?”

She nodded, fighting back a smile even as relief coursed through her. His easy acceptance humbled her more than he could ever know. “Of course.”

Before he could say anything else, Kennedy poked her head in, a cheerful grin on her face as she spotted Linc.

“Hey, Walter told me you were up here.” She came into the room on long, coltish legs, her waves of chestnut hair falling untamed around her shoulders. “I thought maybe we could get lunch?”

Linc managed a smile for her, but his stress was evident on his face. “I really don’t have time today, Ken. I’m sorry. We have a lot going on right now that we need to take care of.”

“Oh,” Kennedy faltered, unused to Linc brushing her off. She glanced at her older sister and could tell she was annoyed at the interruption. Rolling her eyes, she turned back to Linc. “Alright, I’ll just go then.”

She stormed out, leaving her siblings behind as she made her way back downstairs. As she stood in the elevator, her arms crossed and her lips pursed into a pout, she couldn’t help but despise her family. They were always brushing her off like some annoying fly, as though her opinion, her voice, didn’t matter. It had only gotten worse when the scandal had hit and when the rest of the family had come in from out of town. She had been pushed to the sidelines, even more than usual, and it really hurt to see even Linc doing it now. He had been the only one to ever give her an ounce of his time and now even he was too busy for her.

Just like her father had been too busy for her…and now he was dead. Something about that had changed her, matured her in a way she wasn’t yet ready to accept. The pain of losing him, despite how much he had upset her, had brought out this desperate need within her to be with the family she had left.