Devin’s throat thickened for a split second, but she swallowed it away. “Of course it’s Lucas. Everything is Lucas. My nemesis is Lucas.”
“Because you hate him?”
“I don’t hate him.” She didn’t. She hated the situation and the circumstances.
“Is it because you want him again, and you can’t have him?”
Devin coughed on a exclamation of denial. “I don’t want him.”
Lexi lapped the robe over her thigh. “Uh-huh,” she agreed sarcastically.
“And if I did,” Devin declared, “I could have him any old time I wanted.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure. In fact, I already-” Devin stopped herself.
Lexi scooted eagerly up on her knees. “In fact, you already
“Oh, hell.” What was the point of pretending. “I did it again.”
“Slept with Lucas?”
“Yes,” Devin admitted.
“And you didn’t tell me? When? Why? How?”
“You know what I mean.” Lexi wriggled closer.
“He caught me. Well, almost caught me. Snooping in his emails. I was looking for messages from Konrad.”
Lexi gave an admiring nod. “Gutsy. I like it.”
“I was in his bedroom.” Devin couldn’t help thinking back. “I heard him coming down the hall. So I hopped on his bed and acted like I was there to proposition him.” She cringed at the memory.
“And he said yes?”
“Oh, yeah.” A touch of pride crept into Devin’s voice as she remembered Lucas’s enthusiasm.
Lexi gave a throaty chuckle.
“But then, later, I guess the next day. I’m not sure. He found the emails, and now he thinks… Well, he thinks I’m the kind of person who’d use sex as a tool for covert operations.”
“I think it’s admirable.”
Devin frowned. “That I’d use sex that way?”
“That you’d break into Lucas’s email account.”
Devin plucked at the quilt on the bed. “I couldn’t do it. I mean, I know I did it. But I realized I’d gone way over the line. I was about to shut it down when he showed up.”
She remembered the sick feeling in the pit of her stomach when she’d realized how badly she’d invaded Lucas’s privacy. She was mortified by her own behavior, and she could certainly understand Lucas’s disgust.
“I bet he would have done exactly the same thing,” Lexi staunchly defended.
“You think?” Not that it gave her an excuse, but Devin would prefer to think she wasn’t the only one whose ethics could be questionable.
“Don’t let him paint himself as an angel. You’re not perfect. Then again, neither am I. I’m thinking about sleeping with a man I only just met.”
“Kind of like I did?”
Lexi reached out and squeezed Devin’s hands. “We’re human. It’s not a flaw to be human.” She paused. “So, what do you say about Houston?”
Lucas realized he was unlikely to ever see any of these people again. But he couldn’t get past his discomfort at sitting in a pink armchair next to the lingerie section of Desmonde in downtown Houston, sipping a glass of white wine and pretending he cared about the fashion magazine the clerk had left open on his lap.
He tipped his body toward Byron and hissed. “We’re shopping for
Byron leaned back in obvious self-satisfaction. “Do I know how to keep a little filly happy or what?”
“Can’t we leave? And come back later?” Maybe they could find a sporting goods store or a cigar bar, somewhere Lucas could regenerate his testosterone.
“You’ve never been married, have you, Lucas?” Byron knew that perfectly well. “Trust me on this, I know what I’m doing.”
“But I don’t
He was willing to attend the party. It was a state board of trade event, so there were likely some good business contacts to be had. And Byron always supported Lucas, and Lucas understood Byron was interested in Lexi. But he didn’t see why they had to traipse around Houston like a couple of college girlfriends, oohing and ahhing while Devin and Lexi chose dresses.
“Take a look at that,” Byron cooed in a voice that carried across the room. “Isn’t she the prettiest thing?”
Exiting the dressing room area, Lexi did an exaggerated model walk across the raised floor. The dress she wore was a brilliant blue, tight on top, with a full, layered crinoline-type skirt that fell to her knees. A jewel-studded belt flashed at her waist.
Lucas had to admit, Lexi had amazing legs for a forty-year-old.
Byron gave a low whistle, and Lexi flashed him a grin.
“Those shoes are a must,” noted a salesclerk as she approached the dais.
Lexi turned her ankle to give them a better show of a pair of silver, high-heel sandals with wide ankle straps.
“You like the shoes, darlin’?” Byron asked.
“Love the shoes,” said Lexi.
“We’re taking the shoes,” Byron informed the salesclerk. “And the dress. I’m particularly partial to the dress.”
“It’s the first one I’ve tried on,” Lexi protested.
“Then try on some more,” said Byron with a wave of his large, work-roughened hand. He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial level as he addressed the salesclerk. “Never known a woman to have too many dresses.”
The salesclerk gave him a friendly pat on the shoulder, obviously sensing a hefty commission. “Neither have I,” she readily agreed.
Devin appeared next, but Lucas barely got a glimpse of her black sheath of a cocktail dress before the salesclerk rushed to shoo her back into the change room.
Then the woman marched purposefully past Lucas to the lingerie, snagged a lacy black push-up bra and a scrap of a thong and whisked them toward the dressing rooms. “Nothing will ruin that Rue de Femme dress like panty lines,” she announced to anyone who happened to be within earshot.
Lucas glanced uneasily at Bryon.
“Too much information,” he finally responded.
“Way in the hell too much,” Byron agreed.
Lucas shifted in his chair.
After a few minutes, Devin reemerged. The black dress was simple enough, a square neckline showing a creamy hint of cleavage, three-inch-wide shoulders straps that emphasized her slender arms, a nipped-in waist, clingy over the hips, narrowing to a hemline just above the knees. The dress wouldn’t have normally stood out for Lucas. But Devin was wearing it, and all he could see was the image of that sexy underwear on what he knew to be a killer body.
The clerk stood back to consider. “That neckline simply cries out for diamonds,” she commented.
The observation obviously took Devin aback. Her hand rose to her bare throat.
But Byron slapped one hand on his knee. “I’m buyin’,” he announced in a hearty voice. “Bring on the diamonds.”
“Like hell you are,” Lucas retorted, while the clerk scurried off to the jewelry department.
“Nice shoes,” said Byron, gesturing to the black suede platform sandals that were going to haunt Lucas’s dreams.
“I’m not getting diamonds,” Devin told them both.
Lucas lowered his voice so only Byron could hear. “And
