Flirting in Traffic (10 page)

Esa clambered up after him, all too eager to not be left lying on the bed with her legs spread wide in front of this divine creature who currently watched her with an impassive stare tinged with dark amusement.

“I apologize. I’d not realized you were entertaining a guest. How are you, Esa?”

“Just dandy, Julia,” Esa answered while she shot a fulminating look at Finn.

He stared first at her, then at Julia, then back at Esa, as though he were convinced he was hallucinating current events.

“You two
know
each other?” he asked incredulously.

Julia gave a small, elegant shrug. “We know each other from our Junior League days.”

“Still partying until dawn I see,” Esa said scathingly as her eyes swept down the woman’s slender,
Town & Country
-cover-ready figure. Her voice sounded cool but in truth her heart beat frantically in her ears.

“I attended a charity ball last night to benefit St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. Unfortunately my date is passed out cold in our hotel room. Gavin likes his drink a bit too much.”

Esa’s jaw dropped in disbelief when she saw the way Julia gave Finn a smoky look as though Esa wasn’t even in the room.

What the
hell
was Julia Weatherell—the only woman who held a viable claim to her sister Rachel’s title as the reigning social queen of Chicago—doing in Finn’s condo looking like she owned the place and treating Esa as if she were some small annoyance, like a suspicious-looking spot on the carpet? Of course Esa knew the answer, impossible though it seemed.

Shit. If this didn’t beat all.
Julia Weatherell
was Finn’s ex-fiancée?

“Finn? May I have a word?” Julia asked in that low, cigarette-rough voice that Esa used to hate…and envy like crazy. It only made her more jealous that Julia possessed that sexy voice without ever touching a cigarette.

Finn met Esa’s eyes briefly before he grimly nodded at the bedroom door and followed Julia out of the room. He pulled the door closed behind them, but not all the way.

And Esa was so wild with curiosity at that moment she wasn’t above listening in through the crack.

“Give me the key,” she heard Finn say clearly in a low, furious tone.

The sound of keys jangling on a keychain and Julia’s husky laughter filtered in through the door. She imagined Julia dropping the key into his waiting palm in the silence that followed, letting her fingertips linger on his skin the process. Esa’s lungs began to burn as she waited in trepidation and forgot to breathe.

“I like that new vase. Did you get it from Serge at Mycroft and Sons? It would look better over on the credenza next to the bowl that we bought together in Paris. Remember that little restaurant next to the shop where we found it? And how after we drank almost two bottles of wine we went back to the hotel room and—”

“What the
hell
are you doing here?” Finn interrupted, the degree of rage in his tone highly gratifying to Esa.

Or maybe it shouldn’t be gratifying? Would he be so royally pissed off if the gorgeous Julia didn’t still have her hooks in him? Who was Esa kidding? She knew too much about Julia Weatherell to think it was possible for a man to become impervious to her charms.

Besides, hadn’t Finn said they’d only broken up a month ago?

Finn and
Julia?
What a bizarre pairing. Julia was known for her snobbishness and Finn was one of the most down-to-earth people she’d ever met.

Once Julia had started a rumor about Rachel and Esa—one of many, at least in regards to Rachel—insinuating that neither of them really had attended college at Northwestern. Esa couldn’t have cared less about Julia’s petty rumor-mongering on the social circuit but Rachel had been in the process of acquiring investors to start up
Metro Sexy
. Her sister had nearly lost two crucial but wavering investors due to Julia’s lies.

“I made a terrible mistake, Finn,” Esa heard Julia say. “You should be glad to know that I’m being punished cruelly for my stupidity. I’m miserable. You have no idea how much I’ve regretted—”

Her voice broke with tears. Esa’s eyes widened in panic at the sound. A beautiful, delicate creature like Julia was always a threat…but Julia vulnerable and overcome by emotion?

Don’t even think about it.

“There are nights I would give anything,
do
anything to be back with you here in our cozy home,” Julia muttered wetly.

Please
, laying it on a bit thick aren’t you, Julia? Esa thought with rising disbelief. Had she no shame? Surely Finn wasn’t buying into this!

More soft crying and helpless hicupping ensued, only to be followed by a dreadful silence.

Some kind of masochistic urge made Esa press closer to the door. Oh God,
what
was going on out there?
Why aren’t they speaking
? she wondered in rising panic. Surely it wasn’t because they were experiencing a passionate, torrid clinch, was it?

Finally she heard Finn exhale audibly.

Don’t let her pull you in, don’t let her, Finn.
Esa knew her mental chants had been for naught when she heard the softened quality of his deep voice when he spoke.

“I’m sorry you regret it, Julia. But—”

“Are you really?”

“Of course I am. I don’t get off on the idea of you being unhappy. We were engaged for Christ’s sake. I was in—”

He stopped abruptly.

Esa’s heart plummeted into her stomach. Oh
no,
this was much, much worse than she’d suspected.

“You were the only one who really understood me, Finn. The only one who knew the
real
me.”

“You made your choice. You can’t come waltzing into this condo like you still live here. What’s between us is over,” he replied gently.

Damn straight it is,
Esa thought.

“Is it, Finn? Is it really?” Julia asked tremulously.

Esa cringed in the silence that followed.

“Yes,” Finn finally said.

Esa stepped back from the door. Never mind the single word that came out of Finn’s mouth. That pregnant pause before he’d spoken had said it all.

She caught a glimpse of herself in the bathroom mirror when she rose from picking up her backpack. Her clothing was rumpled and smelled vaguely of mildew after sitting on Finn’s damp bathroom floor all night. Her hair looked like a rat’s nest.

And why the hell were there tears in her eyes? What kind of a pitiful fool was she to get emotional over a weekend fling, especially when the guy was clearly still pining for his gorgeous, deceitful ex-fiancée?

He must be a moron for getting involved with Julia Weatherell.

Except that she knew very well that Finn was far from being a moron. Esa had been firsthand witness to several of the brightest, sweetest guys in the city falling like lead for Julia. She was the kind of beautiful that made guys lose all remnants of rationality. Plus she was a savvy, sophisticated lawyer. Esa recalled that she was a successful Assistant United States Attorney General.

She was also poison, but apparently a sweet, addictive one when it came to men.

“I’ll just let myself out,” Esa proclaimed too brightly when she walked out of the bedroom a few seconds later.

She caught a glimpse of Julia’s tear-stained, incredulous face. She didn’t give herself time to interpret Finn’s rigid expression before she raced for the door.

She stared blankly at the blurry reflection of herself in the gold elevator doors as they silently shut. Undoubtedly Finn had gotten his fill of her because this time he hadn’t uttered a peep of protest about her abrupt departure.

Esa barely stopped herself from screaming like a blonde in a slasher movie when Mrs. Fuentes dug her cane between two bones in Esa’s foot.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Dr. Ormond!”

“It’s okay,” Esa grunted through a twisted grimace. “The elevator is always crowded on Fridays. I probably should have taken the stairs.”

“Especially tonight. It’s Halloween, you know. There’s a party in the dining room,” Mrs. Fuentes explained as Esa continued to grit her teeth as the pain in her foot ebbed from a roar to a dull throb.

“You’re coming, aren’t you, Dr. Ormond? I’ve got a bottle of gin for the punch and they’re gonna show
Halloween 3
,” Mortimer Shively provoked her with a sly grin.

Esa knew precisely which activity he expected her to lecture him about so she chose the other. “You better watch out, Mort.
Halloween 3
won’t do your kidneys any favors either.”

Mort snorted with laughter.

“
Look
at her, Shively. She’s gorgeous. Why the heck would the doc want to party with a bunch of half-dead zombies like us?” Mr. Abercrombie growled.

“You know as well as I do I like going to Shady Lawn parties once in awhile, Mr. Abercrombie.” Her brow crinkled in suspicion when she noticed Abercrombie’s wry, assessing glance as he peered up at her from beneath bushy gray eyebrows. For some reason it reminded Esa of what Carla said last week about her reserving her room at Shady Lawn nursing home before she turned thirty.

One of the many things Carla had said in order to goad her into going to One Life
.

Had it really been a whole week since she’d first seen Finn walk out of that construction trailer, six days since she’d stormed out of his condo and left him alone with that man-eater Julia Graves? She hadn’t heard a whisper from him since. Now that the weekend was here, it seemed more and more unlikely that she’d ever hear from him again.

She was a fool for expecting anything different, of course. Hadn’t they set clear parameters for their fling? He’d said he wanted his fill of her and surely she’d given it to him during that night of wild, uninhibited, write-to-
Cosmo
-it-was-so-phenomenal sex.

She’d been meticulous about driving Rachel’s car in the far right lanes when they neared 63rd Street all week long, determinedly ignoring Carla’s muttering under her breath that she was a coward in addition to being lame. Look where listening to her best friend had gotten her last week, after all?

Naked, shameless and lust-drunk beneath Finn Madigan’s beautiful body, that’s where.

She flinched away from Mrs. Fuentes’ cane when the elevator door opened on the fifth floor and two more people squeezed on.

“When are you gonna order me one of those fancy electric wheelies, Doc?” Abercrombie demanded as the doors shut once again.

“When your physical therapist recommends it and I see even a trace of evidence that it’s warranted.”

They’d ritualistically engaged in this conversation since Abercrombie had come to Shady Lawn for continued physical therapy following his acute hospitalization for a stroke. Despite his surliness, Esa liked Abercrombie’s wry sense of humor and sharp wit. He’d quickly become one of Esa’s favorite patients. She realized that he grumped constantly to her about the wheelchair because he knew that her consistent reply gave him hope.

“In other words,
never
,” Abercrombie grumbled. “Both you and my physical therapist always say I’m too strong for an electric chair.”

“You are,” Esa replied cheerfully. “Anyone who has the energy for being as ornery as you are doesn’t need electricity to power him. If we put you in some pimped-out chair you’ll get so lazy and out of shape that blinking will make you out of breath.”

“Doc Ormond tells it like it is,” Mr. Ostrowski said before he glared at the man and woman who tried to get on the packed elevator when the doors opened on the fourth floor. “Are ya blind as well as brain dead? Wait for the next one!”

Esa sighed. “Thanks, Mr. Ostrowski. Coming from you that’s a real compliment.”

When they exited the elevator Esa strayed in the direction of the Shady Lawn dining room as she chatted with Mrs. Fuentes. The large room was decorated with black and orange streamers and plastic jack-o-lanterns.

“Hey, Doc.”

“Yes, Mr. Abercrombie?” she asked when she saw him waiting alone in the corridor. She walked toward him.

“I watched you park that red car of yours in that postage stamp-sized parking space this morning from my window on the seventh floor this morning. Nine out of ten people wouldn’t have attempted the maneuver. Nine out of ten of the ones who tried would have never come close to making it. You drive like you got balls.”

“Thanks,” Esa said, surprised how pleased the compliment made her feel.

“Must be that fancy new sports car that’s put that restless look on your face.”

Esa frowned. The man possessed the observatory talents of a spy. “It’s my sister’s, Mr. Abercrombie. I don’t like sports cars.”

“Could have fooled me.”

His comment reminded her bit too potently of Finn saying something similar while the dawn sunlight turned his sexy, tousled hair into pure gold.

“What’s your point, Mr. Abercrombie?”

“I’m going into that dining room right now and eat my low-fat, high-fiber plate o’crapola and unglue my dentures chewing on sugar-free candy because I got nowhere else to go, see? You’ve got a good head on your shoulders, a healthy young body and a car fast enough to take you to hell and back in ten minutes flat. So my point is, haven’t you got any place better to be?”

Esa’s mouth fell open.

“No?” Abercrombie answered for her. “Well, take my advice, Doc.
Find
a place.”

Esa shifted on her feet indecisively. “Well, I suppose you’re right. I still have to pick up Carla at the office and Friday night traffic is going to be a nightmare.”

“I’d even choose Dan Ryan traffic over this,” he said as he started to wheel his chair into the dining room.

“Mr. Abercrombie?”

He paused and looked over his shoulder. “Yeah?”

“You have someplace else to be. Home. Just give me a little more time. Another two weeks of therapy and you’re going to be doing laps around the physical therapy gym with your walker. If you give me three I might even send you home with a cane.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Esa replied.

He snorted and resumed rolling down the hallway. But Esa had caught the look of hope that blazed into his blue eyes. It was enough to make her smile broadly for the first time during the whole work week as she walked out Shady Lawn’s front door into the crisp autumn evening.

A half hour later Esa’s moment of euphoria had evaporated. She swallowed what felt like gravel in her throat. Not only were they approaching the dreaded 63th Street viaduct in brain-numbing traffic, Carla had just sprung on her where she was going to tonight.

“You mean you’re actually going to be at Finn’s—I mean Jess’—grandmother’s house?”

“I think Jess said that his grandmother lives with his mother.”

“She used to be an actress and loves to dress up, so she has this thing for Halloween. She has a big party every year,” Esa mused, recalling a few of Finn’s warm stories about his Grandma Glory.

“How do you know that?”

Esa shrugged. “Where else? Finn told me.”

Carla opened her mouth to question her about that but several cars passing them in the left lane caught her attention. “Jeez, Esa, why do we always have to be in the slow lane? It’s going to take forever to get home and—”

“So did Jess tell you it was a costume party?” Esa interrupted, undeterred by Carla’s complaints.

“Hmmm? Yeah, but Jess said I didn’t have to dress up. All the kids wear costumes but only some of the adults.”

“Mind telling me why you’re just springing this on me now?” Esa asked. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Carla’s offended look.

“Since when do I have go to you for date approval? It’s not like
we
had plans tonight. If anyone, Kitten’s the one who has a right to be pissed. She gets back from Indianapolis this evening. I was supposed to meet her at Top Choice for a drink.”

“I wasn’t talking about the actual details of your date,” Esa lied as she let up the brake to move forward two inches in traffic. “I was talking about the fact that you and Jess obviously have a thing going on.”

Carla snorted. “That should have been obvious to you last weekend, Esa.”

Esa studied her best friend with concern. She’d been notably less gung-ho over the flirting in traffic scheme in the past week, but non-forthcoming as to why. Once she’d rallied and stated firmly that she was going to be checking out a pipe-layer at 47th Street.

On the designated evening, Carla had been desperately trying to search the dozens of construction workers once they’d reached the vicinity of 47th Street when Esa realized that several cars around them were honking their horns. She’d glanced up, her eyes widening.

“I think I’ve found your guy, Carla. It looks like he brought some friends.”

“What? Where?” Carla had demanded.

Esa pointed. On top of the viaduct, five men were lined up side by side mooning the swarm of drivers below them. The letters C-A-R-L-A had been emblazoned on their bare butts with red paint.

Carla’s pretty face had gone rigid in sheer disbelief. “What in the world are they
doing
?”

“I think it’s your guy’s idea of flirting. Take it as a compliment.” Esa had tilted her head and studied the singular phenomenon. “You know, the letter R isn’t bad. Not bad at all.”

Carla had stared at her incredulously. They’d both burst out laughing at the same moment. Esa had honked louder than anyone as they’d passed under Carla’s tribute.

But Esa didn’t think that little episode was the only reason Carla had lost her former enthusiasm for the flirting in traffic idea. She was worried Jess Madigan had something to do with that.

All in all, Esa thought it would be best for both of them to avoid Madigan men altogether.

“I know you had a
thing
with Jess that one night. I just didn’t think it had become
more
of a thing,” Esa said presently.

Carla waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t make too big of a deal of it. I don’t.”

“Yes, you do,” Esa replied, hearing the forced quality of her friend’s casual attitude. “Or you want to, anyway. Be careful about him, Carla. Jess Madigan probably has a little black book for every letter of the alphabet.”

Carla shot her a fulminating look. “You think I don’t know that? I wasn’t born yesterday. I haven’t heard a peep from him all week. He just called me this afternoon. The date he had lined up probably cancelled at the last moment. Hey, I’m all too willing to stand in for her. Jess is amazing…no,
phenomenal
in bed. I can’t believe you didn’t sleep with Finn. I’ll bet that stuff runs in the family.”

“You’re sick.”

“That’s not sick. You know very well what I mean.”

Esa stared straight ahead, conscious of Carla studying her and knowing full well what was coming next. She’d heard it six times a day for the past week.

“Why won’t you tell me what happened when you and Finn left One Life last week? What could be so terrible? Was his apartment disgusting? Did he have bad breath? Did
you
?”

“Carla, just drop it, okay?” Esa grated out. Without thinking she whipped the little car into the left lane and zoomed forward twenty feet before she slammed on the brakes again. She glanced over at Carla, who studied her with frank suspicion.

“I’ve never seen you act this way. Do you want to hear what I think, Esa?”

“
No
,” she replied pointedly.

“I think that you have a major crush on the hunky Finn. What sane woman could be eaten alive by him like he was doing to you in that hallway at One Life and not be ready to beg him to take up full-time residence in her bed? How could anybody screw up something that looked so fantastic?” Carla demanded. She groaned suddenly when she heard her own question.

“God, Esa. Only you could hose down something that hot.”

She didn’t know what she thought was worse—her friend’s suspiciousness and impertinent questions about Finn or the pitying look Carla was giving her.

“For your information, Finn Madigan was far,
far
from being uninterested,” Esa retorted.

“So?” Carla prompted.

“It’s…just…he…thinks I’m…”

“
What
?”

“He thinks I’m a casual weekend fling…a-a wild sex kitten.”

Carla’s blue eyes went wide. “Where would he get that idea about
you
?”

Esa shot her a dirty look.

“Sorry. Of course you’re beautiful, Esa—although it would be nice if you at least tried to do something with your hair once in a while. But that’s not the point,” Carla added quickly when she saw Esa’s snarl.

“I don’t suppose the fact that you dragged me into that sleazy picking-up-men-on-the-side-of-the-road scheme or that I was driving a car with license plates that read
SXKITN69
could
possibly
relate to Finn thinking I’m a slut, could it?”