PROLOGUE
There were times in a man’s life that remained indelibly imprinted on his brain for one reason or another. Events that threw open the window to a dark, shadowed corner of his soul and revealed truths he’d search for within himself all his life.
That day had come for John Calvin Walker Jr.
He’d awakened that morning with the knowledge that life no longer held challenge. He had a job that he was too successful at in his father’s law firm. His fiancée was the perfect socialite, an exquisite hostess, and also considered one of Boston’s most beautiful and successful female lawyers. She was about as emotional, compassionate, and passionate as a lump of clay, though.
According to his fiancée, he needed to find a hobby to replace his overly sexed inclinations. This coming from the woman who had spent the better part of the first month they were together exhausting him in his bed.
The passion had waned, slowly at first, until now, six months later, she thought he needed a hobby instead.
His life had gone to hell. Or perhaps, he was only now realizing that his life could be so much more. What, he hadn’t decided yet. How to deal with the complications, he hadn’t decided yet. One thing was certain, the restlessness inside him was growing to the point that it was becoming an ache.
As he sat across from her at her favorite Italian restaurant and pretended to listen to her quiet rant where one of his charity projects was concerned, he realized something was changing within him.
Accepting it was another matter. Dealing with it would be harder. As she talked, he flicked his waiter a look. He was a good man, John thought, he’d waited on John enough to know what that look meant. Within minutes there was a glass of whisky sitting unobtrusively at his elbow despite Marlena’s disapproving look.
She didn’t like the whisky he drank. She didn’t like the friends he associated with, and he was beginning to wonder if she liked anything about him other than the Walker name and the fortune his father had built over three decades. That fortune, added to the centuries old Evanworth inheritance from his mother, Brianna’s, side of the family, made John an impressive catch, and he knew it.
It had nothing to do with him, personally, and John was beginning to suspect that where Marlena was concerned, it was the fortune rather than the man that appealed to her.
“I believe we should be going now,” Marlena announced as he finished a second whisky.
She glanced around the restaurant, directing her attention to a table of giggling young women celebrating a recent engagement of one of their friends.
Marlena looked at them as though something didn’t quite smell right. “We’re going to have to find another restaurant, darling. This one is beginning to accept a less than desirable crowd.”
John looked around. “It looks like the normal one to me.” He shrugged.
The young women at the nearby table were regulars, just not together in a group often.
He swore he saw the same faces every night they ate there.
“As though you pay any attention.” Her delicate nose lifted disdainfully. The narrow lines of it were sharp, too sharp, almost giving her the appearance of a rodent.
John narrowed his eyes. He’d been out of town for a few weeks; had she had a nose job in that time? He couldn’t remember it being that narrow before.
Nodding to the waiter, he indicated that they were finished, knowing his card on file would be charged an exorbitant amount within minutes.
As they moved through the luxurious lobby, his hand settled at his fiancée’s back. A second later his jaw clenched and his hand fell away as he felt her stiffen.
As passionate as ice. Hell. And maybe that second whisky hadn’t been a good idea, because his temper was beginning to brew.
“Oh dear, don’t look, darling, but that hussy Sierra is here.” There was an edge of anger in her tone. “And isn’t that your friend Gerard?”
John felt his jaw tighten at the sight of Sierra Lucas, slender, almost fey in appearance, with her long, thick curls cascading down her back.
The white silk dress she wore showed her curvy figure to advantage. Her full, pert br**sts were obviously unbound and as tempting as hell. As he watched, tiny ni**les hardened noticeably at the same rate his c**k thickened. Damn, he’d known her all her life. This reaction to her was becoming irritating.
He really should have foregone that second whisky.
“John.” Gerard’s smile was as cool as always as his gaze flicked to Marlena. “I haven’t seen you in a while. Is this your lovely fiancée I hear so much about?”
John stepped forward. In the three months he and Marlena had been engaged, he had yet to introduce her to the friend that would serve as his best man.
And then Sierra opened her mouth. “You should know, Gerard, since she’s the same woman I saw leaving your brownstone every morning for the past two weeks.”
It was then John saw the raging hurt and anger in Sierra’s slate gray eyes as she glared at Marlena and Gerard while stepping back slowly.
John’s eyes narrowed, his gut tightening in suspicion. “What did you just say, Sierra?”
The one thing that hit him faster than even the words was the fact that neither Marlena nor Gerard was denying it. Guilt flickered in both their eyes instead.
“My God, that little tramp has nerve,” Marlena finally muttered. “Where is her keeper?”
Gerard was watching John, though. It was a damned good thing, John thought, because he wasn’t certain himself of his reaction. Was that an edge of relief mixed with the sudden anger that his best friend and his fiancée had been lying to him? Lying. Cheating him as though he were too damned stupid to eventually catch on to it?
“Why were you at Gerard’s house?” he asked. “You told me you didn’t know him.”
“Really, John, these things aren’t discussed in public.” Her cold blue eyes narrowed on him. “Your roots are showing, dearest. A marriage such as ours doesn’t necessitate such answers.”
A marriage such as theirs? Where the hell had that come from and what made her think their marriage would be any different than any other couple’s?
“The hell it doesn’t.” He was aware of the looks nearby diners were giving them. The subtle hunger as they smelled the juicy gossip getting ready to roll. “If you’re f**king my best friend, then it’s as good a time as any to discuss it.”