“Nichelle, wait!”
Nichelle Wright turned at the sound of her name, pivoting on the heels of her teal Louboutin stilettos. “What can I help you with, Steve?”
Steve Brooks stood in the middle of the well-lit hallway of Kingston Consulting with his shirtsleeves rolled up and his tie loosened, although it was just past ten in the morning. He shoved his hands in his pockets and relaxed his stance, as if he had all day to waste Nichelle’s time.
She tapped the manila folder she carried against her thigh and quirked an eyebrow, wordlessly telling him to hurry it along.
Steve finally started talking. “About the Trestle presentation you did this morning, Nichelle. Can you break something else down for me...?”
Nichelle heard a door click open behind her, far enough away that she knew it was her business partner’s office at the end of the hallway. She’d always teased him that for someone who was so friendly and sociable, he was giving mixed signals by taking the office farthest from everyone. Hers was at the opposite end of the hall, in the thick of things.
She glanced over her shoulder. Wolfe Diallo stood in the doorway, getting ready to walk a woman toward the elevators. He was dressed for a day of meetings, his solid six and a half feet clad in a gray three-piece suit. His head looked freshly shaved, and the goatee framing his mouth was crisp and on point, as always. He was a model businessman. Emphasis on model. His gorgeous looks made the men between the covers of Vogue Hommes International look like toothless hobos.
The woman with him wasn’t dressed for business, though. Her voluptuous frame was on display in a tight white dress and red screw-me pumps that gleamed with a suggestive, wet shine. Nichelle’s lips twitched.
She caught Wolfe’s eye as he walked toward her with the woman by his side. Nichelle tipped her head toward his now closed office door. He paused and said something to the woman, brushed her cheek with his and gave her a brilliant smile. A dismissal. The woman’s own smile dimmed, but she still looked up at Wolfe with a mixture of hunger and aloofness. Come get me but don’t think I’m needy. A true talent.
“Excuse me, Steve.” Nichelle returned her full attention to him. “Come to my office a little later if you want to talk more about the project. I’ll be around.” She met his eyes, daring him to push forward with his obvious delaying tactic. “Okay?”
“Sure.” He looked briefly panicked, darting his gaze to the woman with Wolfe.
Nichelle dismissed him and headed down the hallway. As she passed the woman, she nodded, but only got a cold look in return. She felt more than saw the wide doe eyes flickering over her uniform, or what she considered her uniform—white blouse and calf-length black pencil skirt. Her green heels matched her optimistic and peaceful mood.
“Good morning, Wolfe.” She walked into the office past him, her shoulder brushing the lapel of his pewter Zegna suit.
The office was cozy and warm, like his den at home, decorated with imported rugs and rust-colored walls. A large painting of Vermont in autumn dominated one wall. On his bookshelf rested a black Bose speaker dock and matching iPod. Next to them sat a vase of irises, Nichelle’s favorite flowers that Wolfe’s assistant replaced every few days.
“Is it a good morning, or is it great?” He closed the door behind him with a warm chuckle.
The office smelled like the perfume of the woman who’d just left, something musky and warm. Not unpleasant. Nichelle perched her hip on the edge of the wide window in Wolfe’s office and glanced down to the street eight stories below.
“For me, it’s only a good one,” she said. “But it will be even better once we get on the same page about this potential million-dollar contract.” She dropped her manila folder and a thumb drive on his desk then went back to her window perch.
Instantly, Wolfe’s stance was all business—his smile more predatory, the velvet eyes hardened to something like steel. He sat behind his desk. “Tell me more.”
She started in on her mini presentation. Once she finished giving him the details of her latest project, a client she planned to go after for their management consulting firm, he grinned with all his teeth. Like a shark on the scent of fresh blood.
“Yes,” he said. “You know I want it.”
“Good.” She crossed her legs and glanced down briefly at the long line of her calf, the arch of her feet dipping into the five-inch stilettos. “The thumb drive has everything I’ve prepared, including the actual proposal. Once you’ve looked it over—today would be lovely—” She flashed him her own toothy smile. “I’ll put in our bid. There are a few others I have in mind, but this is the biggest and the one we need to focus on for now. We’re ready to grow and grow big.”
“I agree,” Wolfe said. “I trust you. That’s one of the main reasons I asked you to come work with me.”
Nichelle’s lips curled in amusement. He hadn’t really asked but rather seduced her into coming to work with him when he’d decided to leave the family business in favor of striking out on his own. Their families had been friends and neighbors for years, but instead of approaching her like a friend, he made her a business proposition. At first, he asked her to come on as a junior partner, someone to spot trends, grow and shape the management consulting firm in a way that made them money but also positioned them in the most advantageous way possible in the market. But she knew her worth and refused his initial offer.
At Sterling Solutions, the firm he’d hired her away from, her success rate was damned near legendary. Sterling had been on the verge of offering her more—a bigger office, possibly even a full partnership. Somehow Wolfe found out and raised the dollar amount and incentives with his offer. When she refused him again, he laid out the ultimate prize of an equal partnership at Kingston Consulting, plus an indecently large signing bonus.
“I’m just giving you your money’s worth,” Nichelle said with a pointed smile.
They both knew he’d made back the money he invested in bringing her on within the first quarter and tripled it by the second. So far, three years later, they were both very happy with the arrangement.
“And speaking of which.” She dipped a shoulder toward the door. “We might need to fire Steve Brooks.”
Wolfe leaned back in his chair and watched her over steepled fingers. “Of course, if you think it’s necessary. Care to let me know why?”
She shook her head, almost amused but not quite. “He was trying to stop me from coming into your office and seeing you with your latest...female companion.”
“Oh, yeah?”
There was a persistent rumor around the office that Nichelle and Wolfe were more than business partners. Even after three years of seeing nothing more intimate between them than shared laughter and a few platonic touches, nearly everyone at Kingston Consulting was still convinced they were sleeping together.
“I think under the man code, he was trying to protect you from being caught with another woman right under my naïve and unsuspecting nose.”
They exchanged crooked smiles at the thought of her being naïve or gullible enough not to know what Wolfe was up to with his myriad and varied lady friends. “He was being deceptive,” she said.
“Depends on how you look at it.” Wolfe grinned at her from across the desk. “Another CEO would give him a promotion.”
She waved a hand in dismissal. They both knew what kind of CEO Wolfe was. “The corporate version of ‘bros before hos’?” she murmured.
“That fool is no bro