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She huffs, flustered. “No, I—”
“I won’t ask you again.”
Through her thick eyelashes, she says, “It’d be nice.”
“Then I’ll take you on a date,” I reply with a smirk. “Once this is all over. Okay?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know what ‘this’ is, and when it’ll be over, but okay.”
I pull her in for one last, lingering kiss, getting my fill, before stalking back down the stairs and out of the Museum.
As I cross the gardens to the manor, my liquor cabinet calling my name through the open window of my study, I can’t deny the pang of guilt that stabs somewhere between my lungs and rib cage.
Poppy Murphy is the perfect arm candy for this meeting. Not just because I want to show off my prized keepsake, but because it’s a sign of power.
The Mexicans and the Italians, they’ll know exactly who Marcus Murphy is and what he did.
And when they see his daughter on my arm, there won’t be a doubt in their mind that the Quinn family always rises to the top.
Poppy
“Knock, knock,” a voice chortles through the bedroom door. Whoever it belongs to doesn’t actually knock.
I slide off the bed, sticking my thumb between the pages to mark my place. “Uh, come in?”
The door bursts open to reveal a beautiful blonde woman. She brings in the scent of late summer and Chanel perfume, along with a rack of expensive-looking clothes. “Hey girl!” she chimes, whipping her impossibly long extensions around her shoulders. “You must be Poppy.” Her slender hand appears under my nose. As she dangles it in front of me, she scans the room. “Jesus. A bit creepy in here, isn’t it?”
Yeah. I think I’ll need to make use of my makeshift bookmark for this.
I awkwardly take hold of it before she snatches it back. “I’m J.K.” She pops her gum and her false lashes flutter as she sweeps her gaze from my messy bun down to my paint-covered sneakers. “I’m getting Cinderella going to the ball vibes. Right?” Only when she snaps around, do I notice Orna hovering in the door frame. My heart surges as we lock eyes. She flashes me a meek, apologetic grin. I don’t know whether it’s because she let this Barbie hurricane into the museum to assault my ears so unexpectedly, or because she’s been MIA for nearly a month.
J.K. doesn’t wait for an answer. Instead, she grabs the rack of clothes and tugs it across the floorboards, wobbling in her red-bottom heels. “Okay, so, fashion show…” she chirps, snapping her fingers to a beat only she can hear. “Here’s what we’ll do. You’ll go try everything on, give us a twirl, then we’ll decide on the dress that makes you look the cutest. Goddit?”
My mouth opens long enough for a weird, strangled noise to escape before it closes again. “Okay, so,” she purrs, “shall we start with the Lanvin? Or De La Renta? Who’s your favorite designer? I’m pretty sure I—”
“Hey, J.K.?” Orna’s loud voice cuts through this random woman’s ramblings. There’s a firmness to her tone that I really appreciate right now. “Let’s do it a different way. You leave the rack here, we’ll send back whatever we don’t choose. Okay?”
J.K.’s gum almost drops out of her mouth. “Uh, but where’s the fun in that?”
“Oh, believe me, it’s there somewhere.”
We lock eyes and I stifle a laugh, suddenly interested in the beadwork closest to me. Anything to avoid J.K.’s hard stare. “Okay,” she huffs through the silence, “I get the picture. Call me if you need any help, I guess. Or don’t. It’s whatever.”
Orna steps to the side so J.K. can make her dramatic exit, her draped cardigan and endless hair flowing behind her. She follows her down to the lobby, lets her out, then appears in the doorway once more.
The room fills with an awkward silence that makes me wish J.K.’s loud mouth was dominating the space again.
“Sorry about her,” Orna eventually mutters, playing with a chip on the wooden frame. “She used to dress all the Quinn girls for any ball or gala we’d attend. I haven’t seen her in years. Just the mention of her name gives me PTSD.”
Instead of easing into conversation, I pin her with my stare. She meets it and sighs. “Okay, I’m sorry about me too.”
“I thought we were friends,” I say bitterly. “But I guess not.”
Her eyebrows shoot up under her curls. “We were—are. It’s just…” she trails off and bites her lips, offering me a pathetic shrug instead of the explanation I deserve.
“It’s just what? My last name?” I snap. “Please, Orna, tell me. What is it about my last name that is so horrifying, that you fled out of this building like a bat out of hell and didn’t return for a month?”
“I’m sorry, Poppy. It was a shock. I had no idea that you were Marcus Murphy’s daughter.”
