Skin (11 page)

Shit! His reverse psychology method was about to backfire in his face. He felt his cock twinge and watched Frankie’s pouty lips form a silent
O.

Gritting his teeth, Reese let his thoughts go to the cold, snowy planes of his home in Wyoming, and the way the wind would whip snow into mountainous drifts, how it made travel of any kind impossible. He’d damn near frozen more than a few times during his hours on horseback looking for stranded mustangs. He remembered Missy throwing a hissy fit one Christmas when he refused to allow her to make a round with him during a blizzard. His body tingled, but not with heat: this time the feeling was cold, frosty, chilling. Missy’s laughing face floated into his thoughts and suddenly her eyes closed, and her laughter quieted, never to be heard again.

Reese squeezed his eyes shut. Even after all these years, he couldn’t forgive himself his part in her death. All desire for sex drained like the spring thaw from his body. His muscles tightened and his brows drew tight.

Frankie watched Reese’s face morph from sexy to hard, then bitter, in less time than it took her to snap a round of shots.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, and she realized she really wanted to know. When had this man’s feelings become important to her?

He turned the water off, his actions abrupt. He grabbed the towel from the rack and briskly dried off. Skin still damp, he wrapped the towel around his waist and shot her a dangerous look. “I’d like a little privacy.”

Frankie nodded, and for the second time in the last few moments shame coursed through her. She turned and hurried out of the bathroom.

Pacing the living room floor, Frankie realized she was reverting back to her old emotional involvement habits. She reminded herself what mattered was getting the shot. Period. Feelings, emotions, whatever they were, had no purpose in getting “the shot.” This was business, and her business was to launch
Skin
off the charts. To that end it was all about the shot.

The door to the bathroom opened and she watched Reese walk into his bedroom and shut the door. The click of the lock was not lost on her. That was okay. She didn’t want any more pictures of him in the condo anyway.

She hustled into the bathroom, still steamy from the man who just exited it, and jumped into the shower.

She’d washed her bra and panties the night before. Without his permission, she borrowed a black button-down shirt. She’d change when she got to the office. She had an overnight bag and extra clothes she kept there in her little powder room.

When she strutted out of his bedroom, he looked her up and down. “Nice shirt,” he drawled.

“I’ll send it out to be laundered. You’ll have it back by the end of the day.”

“Polite people ask.”

Bent on putting more distance between them, she picked up her camera bag and purse, careful of her stitches. “I’m not polite.”

Few words were spoken as they drove to the studio. Reese’s closed face and body language offered no opening for conversation.

Frankie didn’t push it. She’d let her guard down last night and blabbed too much. It was retreat time. Professional-distance time. Time to be the bitch she needed to be to not only survive in this world she lived in but to succeed in it.

When Frankie walked into her office with her hair hanging damp down her back and Reese following close behind, Tawny raised a brow and choked back a smile. Frankie ignored her assistant’s smug look and put the key into her office door.

Her gaze immediately zeroed in on the wrapped box on her desk. The gaily wrapped package beckoned her. Setting her camera bag down, perplexed, she picked up the box.

“Birthday?” Reese asked.

She shook her head and pulled the ribbon, then removed the lid. Just as she lifted it, Reese grabbed her hand. “Let me do that.”

“Why?”

“Don’t you think it’s a bit unusual to have a gift on your desk in your locked office?”

Her gut lurched and she felt sick to her stomach. Her hand slid from the box top. Reese moved between her and the box and pushed her back with his right hand. “Do you have a ruler?”

“Top drawer.”

Reese slid open the desk drawer and pulled out a plastic ruler. Stepping as far back from the box as he could while still touching it with the tip of the ruler he slowly lifted the lid. Frankie’s muscles tightened, and the feeling of nausea swelled. What she expected, she didn’t know. When nothing exploded or leapt from the box, Reese stepped closer and peered into it. His brows slammed together and he shot her a disturbing look.

“What?” Frankie asked, afraid of the answer. Her fear angered her. And what angered her more was the distraction. She didn’t have time for this crap. She stepped over to Reese and looked down into the box. Her blood chilled. Son of a bitch! She stepped back, tripping on her feet. Reese caught her, then steadied her.

“What does it mean?” he asked.

Frankie’s hand shook and she put it to her throat to still it. The alarm clock lay faceup, the glass shattered and the time set to nine o’ clock. “It means my time is up.”

“Who has access to your office?”

After the first wave of shock and fear swept through her, another wave followed, this one hot and filled with fury. Her office was her sanctuary, her private space, and someone had violated it.

“Anthony!” She grabbed the clock from the box and shoved past Reese, ignoring his calls for her to stop. She marched down the hall to the office her brother had claimed as his and without an invitation she burst in.

He started when the door slammed against the wall, then his eyes narrowed. “You never learned manners, Frankie.”

She threw the clock at him, narrowly missing his face. He caught it. “If you’re man enough to take me out, little brother, be man enough to tell me to my face.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

She pointed to the clock in his hand. “That was on my desk this morning.”

Anthony looked at the clock in his hand. Realization dawned. He was pretty good, Frankie thought. He almost looked as surprised as she’d been.

Anthony set the shattered clock down on his desk. “I didn’t put that in your office.”

“Then who did you pay to do it?”

He sat back in his chair, relaxed, and didn’t seem to give a shit she’d been told her time was up.

“I don’t work that way, sister, and you know it.”

“Why do you want
Skin?”

“Because Father didn’t want you to turn it into the smut rag you want to make it.”

Frankie laughed. “I can’t believe I’m hearing this from you! What do you call your peep shows in the Tenderloin. Sunday school?”

“That’s different.”

“Different because it’s entertainment for men?”

He nodded.

“You’re a chauvinist.”

Anthony shrugged. “Sticks and stones, Frankie.” He smiled, the gesture smarmy. “Have you spoken with our uncle this morning?”

“No. What does Unk have to do with this?”

“Then you haven’t heard the news.”

Blood drained to her feet. His lack of concern for her well-being and his cocky demeanor didn’t bode well for her. “What news?”

“My mother found a codicil to Father’s old will.”

“You’re lying.”

Anthony smoothed his two-hundred-dollar silk tie. “Carmine knows Father wanted you out. No way was he going to be embarrassed by his daughter and the ‘new look’ you wanted for
Skin.
You should have remained the obedient daughter and taken the crumbs he threw at you.”

Anthony’s words stung.

“Father may have given me my first break here, but I worked my way up from interning to creative director on my own.”

Anthony’s eyes sparkled with mockery. “If you say so.”

She said so because it
was
so. She’d worked her ass off. Spending sixteen-hour days for years working on one assignment after another. No one put more blood, sweat, or tears into the magazine than she did.

“Give our ‘Unk’ a call. He’ll fill you in.” Anthony picked up the phone on his desk, and when she refused to take it, he punched in Unk’s number.

Fear ran icy fingers along her spine. What the hell happened since last night? And why did she have to find this out from her brother?

When Carmine answered, Anthony put him on speaker and hung up the handset. Her fingers twitched to slap off his smug smile.

“Unk? Is it true? Is there a codicil to Father’s old will?”

“Francesca, I was going to call you —”

“Is it true?!”

“I have the codicil here in my hands. Connie brought it to me last night.”

Why didn’t that surprise her? What was Connie up to now? Constance Angelina Donatello was as transparent as a window. Everyone knew she’d maneuvered Sonny into her bed and gotten pregnant deliberately. She made no secret of her conquest. Now she suddenly comes up with a codicil? How convenient. “Where is the original?”

“Somewhere I’m sure Santini felt was secure. But never fear. I will find it.”

Hope swelled. “Unk, is the copy notarized?”

“No.”

“Then it’s worthless. I’ll contest it. I don’t believe Father would cut me out.” Uncertainty tugged at her thoughts. Her father had disowned her the day before he died. But the only one who knew that was dead. “What’s the date on the document?”

“A year ago.”

Relief flooded her. If he had changed his will, cutting her out of
Skin,
it would have been after he disowned her, which would have been the day before or the morning of his death two weeks ago. This one was a fake.

“Cara —”

“Unk, please, for now would you tell Anthony to stop drooling all over this place like a goombah over a stripper? Give me some time to locate Father’s last will.”

“Do you know where it is?”

“No, but when Mr. Geppi surfaces, I’m sure he can produce the original.”

“Aldo was found dead in his office this morning,” Unk said.

Frankie gasped loudly and watched Anthony’s brow furrow. Her eyes locked with his. For a flash of a second she thought she read fear in his eyes. Not of her, but the person responsible for Aldo’s death.

Frankie didn’t ask if Aldo died of natural causes. It was too coincidental. Someone didn’t want Santini Donatello’s latest will to surface.

“I’ll call you later, Unk,” Frankie softly said, suddenly thinking of Maria and the kids. She’d go over later in the week. She hit the Speaker Off button and looked back at her brother.

“What’s happening, Anthony?”

“Why don’t you tell me?”

At a loss for words, Frankie felt as if the walls of her life were slowly closing in on her. If she didn’t get out, the life would be squeezed out of her.

“What do you mean by that?”

“Figure it out.” He pointed to the clock. “And hurry, sister. Time is ticking away.”

The urge to argue with her imbecile brother drained from her. Instead, she picked up the clock and tossed it into his trash can. “You’re wasting time with your games, Anthony. I’m not playing.”

When Frankie entered her office she found Reese and Tawny engaged in a rather animated conversation. Reese clearly found Tawny’s Malibu Barbie looks appealing. And Tawny obviously reciprocated the admiration. Her blue eyes sparkled and her long lashes batted coyly every time she touched Reese’s arm. Or at that particular moment, despite the fact Frankie had just walked in, his thigh.

Frankie scowled. “Tawny, don’t you have something better to do than drool all over my model?”

Tawny grinned, taking the question in good humor. “Actually, I can’t think of anything better than this,” Tawny answered, looking up into Reese’s eyes like a lost puppy finding her master.

“Well, I can. Get out of here and make sure the studio is clear.” Frankie held open the door until Tawny walked haughtily by, as if she were the Queen of Sheba. Frankie slammed it behind her.

Throwing Reese a scowl, she dared him to comment. She walked to her desk. Pulling her camera out of her bag, she hooked it up to her computer. She wanted to see the pics before they headed down to the studio.

“You should have the cops dust that clock for prints,” Reese said.

Her head snapped up. She was about to tell him to butt out; instead, she shook her head, her attention on her monitor. “The only set of prints on that thing are mine and my brother’s. It was his lame attempt to scare me. It didn’t work.”

“What if it wasn’t Anthony?”

She clicked the mouse, bringing up a file. “It was. He’s a crybaby.”

“Do you know who killed your father?”

Her head snapped up. “No.”

“Do you think you brother had a hand in it?”

“Do you have any idea what you’re insinuating?” she asked, not believing she was actually having this conversation with an outsider.

He came closer. Her skin flushed hot when he walked around the desk to look down at the computer screen, just as a shot of him holding on to his lathered rod in the shower that morning flashed up.

“You’re a bad, bad girl, Francesca Donatello.”

“You’re worse. You knew you had an audience.” He grinned and his warm gaze slid across her. She felt her color deepen. “You set me up.”

“Like a row of dominoes.”

“Paybacks are a bitch.”

He chuckled. “I can’t wait.”

Frankie broke eye contact and watched the rest of the pictures load. As one flashed across the screen, she gasped. Quickly she hit the Back button. There she was, in almost full naked color, sprawled across Reese’s bed, the covers twisted between her bare legs and a smile of satisfaction plastered across her face. For the second time that morning, heat rose to her cheeks. Taking matters into her own hands last night had been the only way she could fall asleep.

“It looks like I’m not the only sneaky one around here.” She managed to keep her voice level.

Reese’s eyes glowed in mischievous pleasure. “That wasn’t the only one I took.”

Frankie clicked the next button and her heat rose. The shirt of Reese’s she’d slept in hung off her shoulder, and her dark nipples, clearly aroused, dominated the picture. “It’s only fair I got to return the favor,” he said.

She clicked to the next shot, this one innocent enough. It showed her snuggled up to Reese’s pillow, her face still and soft in sleep. She looked peaceful, unlike how she felt at the moment.