The Master Undone: An Inside Out Novella Read online

  Crystal’s face lights up with excitement. “I’d love that.”

  My mother smiles and turns her attention to me, rumpling my hair with her fingers. “You look a mess. Your tie is half off and you have bags under your eyes.”

  My smile is genuine, if strained by worry. “Leave it to you, Mother, to tell me exactly how it is. It’s been a long day, but worth it to get here to see you.” That ache in my gut throbs, and I again think how crazy it is that she looks this good when she has stage 3 breast cancer. I soften my voice. “How are you?”

  I watch emotions shift on her face. Uncertainty. Worry. Fear. And finally, “I’m pissed.” Her voice cracks. “I don’t have time for cancer, and . . .” She abruptly looks around me at Crystal. “Did you bring those reports I wanted?”

  “No,” I say firmly. “You’re not working the night before you have a double—”

  “Don’t say it,” she hisses. “Don’t say it. I can’t . . . just don’t.” She turns to my father. “Steven, I need some water, please.”

  My father quickly hands her the cup and I sit there, frozen in place from seeing my strong, unbreakable mother struggling for composure.

  “I forgot the reports in my trunk,” Crystal says, popping to her feet. “My trunk sticks. Mark, can you please come help me?”

  My mother spits her water out and almost chokes on a sudden burst of laughter. “Mark?” she inquires, glancing at me. “You let her call you Mark?” Her gaze flicks to Crystal. “I knew I liked this girl. She knows how to put a man in his place. No ‘Mr. Compton’ for her.”

  My eyes meet Crystal’s, and when I expect her to gloat, she gives me an apologetic look. “Would you help me? Please?”

  I give her a nod. I need a minute to get a grip on what I’m feeling, anyway. Something I never feel or need—but I do now.

  Following her into the hall, I pull the door to the room shut.

  The instant I turn to face her, she confronts me in a soft whisper. “I thought you couldn’t say no to your mother. Why would you start tonight, when she asked for the reports?”

  I’m taken aback and irritated. “You barely know any of us. Don’t try to tell me how to handle my mother.”

  Her lips tighten and her eyes meet mine, and suddenly her expression changes, as if something in mine has softened her. Which is impossible. I’m unreadable. She surprises me by taking my hand in hers. I surprise myself by letting her.

  “You’re trying to protect her,” she says. “I get that, but she’s having a double mastectomy, Mark. She wouldn’t even let you say the words. She needs work to keep from thinking about it.”

  I stare down into her pale blue eyes, and I don’t know what’s happening to me. I don’t have control. She has control. Worse, she’s right about my mother.

  I trust this woman more than I trust myself right now. And that scares me in a way I haven’t been scared in a very long time.

  Three

  _

  At nine o’clock, a hint from my father to leave them alone sends me on my way, and I head to the lobby. To my surprise I find Crystal, who I thought had left a good hour earlier, sitting in a waiting room chair with her laptop open. She doesn’t notice me and I find myself watching her work. I’m drawn to this woman, who’s the complete opposite of my type, for reasons I don’t understand. Maybe it’s simply that she’s different from everything familiar, and everything familiar feels wrong right now.

  Her brow knits adorably as she keys some kind of data into whatever program she has open, long strands of her blonde hair draping her shoulders and cheeks. My groin tightens with an image of that hair draped over my stomach and hips, and guilt twists inside me.

  It’s too soon. I only just discovered that Rebecca’s absence hadn’t meant she was traveling the world with the rich businessman she’d met. It meant she was gone forever.

  And I remind myself that Rebecca was the one person who saw beneath my mask. She knew what I’ve always known: that sex is a tool for me. It’s how I survive, how I block things out. How I blocked her out. I was always honest with her. I never promised her love. But, damn it to hell, I selfishly convinced her to try to live without it. Maybe with her, I came as close to love as I’m capable of ever coming. I did need her, when I’ve never needed anyone before.

  And right now, I need to get out of my own head. I refocus on Crystal. “I thought I sent you home long ago.”

  He head lifts and she shuts her computer. “I have your bags. I wasn’t about to make your day worse by not having them.” She shoves her notebook into her oversized purse that clearly doubles as a briefcase. I watch her delicate little hands, wondering why I don’t mind when she touches me. And why I want her to touch me now.

  She hikes her bag onto her shoulder, thrusting her chest out in the process, and my gaze drops to the high neckline of her dress, the material hugging her in all the right places as she walks toward me.

  She stops in front of me. “How’s your mother?”

  “Putting on a show of bravery she doesn’t feel.”

  With a grim nod, she agrees. “Yeah. I kind of got that, too.”

  For a few moments I just stare down at her, puzzled by this woman in too many ways to count. “You seem rather fond of my family, for someone who’s only known them for three weeks.”

  “Actually,” she corrects, “I met your mother at a Riptide auction I attended with my father and brother about a year ago. I’d been working at a small gallery a few blocks from Riptide and we sort of became friends.” She smiles with a memory, and it’s genuine in a way so few are. “When the sales manager’s job came open, your mother all but tied me to the desk and insisted I take it.”

  I could think of a lot of places to tie this woman up, and none of them are to a desk, though that holds interesting potential. “I’m surprised it took her a year to hire you.”

  “I’m as stubborn as she is, and I thought we’d have issues working together. But it turns out we’re a great team.”

  “Seems that way,” I agree, having seen how fond my mother is of her. I motion to the exit. “Ready?”

  She nods. “If you’re ready, I’m ready.”

  My lips twitch. “That’s the most agreeable you’ve been since I met you.”

  She grins. “Don’t get used to it.”

  —

  I pull the Mercedes up in front of my hotel, and I have no desire to be alone with my thoughts. “Come in,” I tell Crystal. “I’ll buy you dinner.”

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “I don’t remember saying, or thinking, it was,” I reply. When her eyes meet mine, for some reason I know that she feels like an obligation and it bothers her. Why would she assume such a thing? Who has made her feel that way? Nudging her, I add, “I’m not looking forward to staring at a hotel room wall for the next few hours. Spare me that, please.”

  The valets open her door and mine. “You told your mother you’re tired,” she reminds me, then laughs. “And she seemed to think you look that way, too.”

  My brows lift. “That may be true. But it still doesn’t mean I can sleep.” It’s an admission I normally wouldn’t make. I seem to be doing a lot of things with this woman I wouldn’t normally do, and I’m not sure if that’s because of her or me.

  She considers me a moment, then smiles. “Well, I am hungry.”

  “Good,” I say, more pleased than I should be by the prospect of a simple shared dinner as we exit the car. But I really don’t want to be alone with my thoughts, and my normal outlets to escape are back in San Francisco, in the club I own.

  We head inside the typical high-end hotel of marble and glass, and I pause in the entryway to give the doorman a hefty tip. “Make sure my bag is in my room when I get there later tonight.” He quickly nods, eager to oblige, and I turn to Crystal. “Let me check in so I don’t have to deal with it later.”

  “Of course,” she agrees, and she motions to a couple of chairs. “I’ll be right here.”

  A few minut
es later, I’m done registering and I find Crystal with her head buried in her laptop again, so absorbed in her work that she has no idea I’ve stopped in front of her.

  “Ms. Smith,” I say.

  Her gaze lifts and snaps to mine. “Crystal, or I’m not having dinner with you.”

  My lips quirk, and I’m remarkably amused by her spunk. “What are you working on?”

  “I’m this close,” she says, holding her fingers up barely parted, “to snagging a couple of super-rare Beatles items for the next Riptide auction. I’m exchanging emails with the guy we’d be buying from.”

  “Beatles, huh?”

  “Yes,” she says, shutting her computer and shoving it into her purse. “It might not be art, but these items will bring in big money.”

  “You won’t see me complaining about money,” I assure her. “Shall we go eat?”

  She pushes to her feet but I don’t step back to give her space. We’re toe to toe, and I can’t seem to find a reason, aside from her being off-limits, to find this a problem. I’m in no hurry to move, either. Instead, I inhale that warm rum scent of hers. It is addictive. Damn, I like that smell.

  “I’m ready,” she says, prodding me to move. “Starving, actually.”

  Yes—starving. I’m starving. For her. So much so that I have to force myself to finally step back and give her room to walk. “Never let it be said I kept a starving woman waiting.” I usually do keep my women starving and waiting, just not for food. I’m not so sure this one would allow that, though, which should be a complete turn-off. It isn’t. It’s more of a challenge.

  “You like word games,” Crystal observes.

  I tilt my head slightly. “What did I say to merit that observation?”

  “It’s what you didn’t say,” she replies, “and yet it’s in the air. That unspoken hidden meaning to a lot of what you say and do.”

  “You are direct, aren’t you?”

  “We’ve already established that. And that I’m hungry, so feed me. How about it?”

  My lips twitch. “How about it, indeed.” I motion her onward and this time we fall into step together. This dinner is absolutely going to be the much-needed distraction from the hell going on in my head—exactly what I’d hoped for.

  —

  A few minutes later, I’m seated across from Crystal inside the hotel-sponsored Fireside restaurant at a corner table. Seated behind the rectangular bar with snowball-shaped glowing lights dangling above it, we’re secluded from the rest of the patrons, just as I’d hoped. I want this woman to myself, if only for an hour.

  “Have you ever eaten here?” she asks, setting her phone on the table and her purse in the extra chair next to her. “The food is good. It’s not far from the gallery I used to work at.”

  “I have,” I tell her. “And yes, it is. How do you feel about wine?”

  “I love it, but I’m a lightweight so it’s not a good idea.”

  “Maybe it will loosen you up and you’ll tell me all about yourself.”

  She snorts and somehow it’s delicate and feminine, even sexy, when normally I would find it unrefined. “Do I really seem like I need loosening up? Because that’s a first. I’m me, no matter what, and I make no apologies for that. And what specifically do you want to know that I haven’t already told you?”

  Everything, I think, but the waiter stops beside me before I can offer her my edited version of that answer. I glance at the wine menu and then at her. “Red wine okay?”

  “I prefer white, but I have to drive, so I’d better pass.”

  Ignoring her objection, I order a merlot I’m particularly fond of and send the waiter on his way. “I’ll get you a car to take you home and pick you up in the morning.”

  She holds up her well-manicured hands. “You don’t have to—”

  “I don’t do anything because I have to, Crystal.”

  “Crystal,” she repeats. “Why do I feel it’s such an accomplishment for you to use my first name?”

  “I don’t know? Why?”

  Her brow furrows. “You really do like word games, don’t you?”

  “Do I?”

  She holds up a finger. “See. Answering a question with a question. Word games.” Her phone rings and she snatches it up and her eyes brighten. “It’s my Beatles man. Calling rather than emailing has to mean good news.”

  I listen to the smooth, charming way she greets her customer and the impressive way she navigates her side of the exchange. She’s a master of conversation, but I knew that already. I’m not beyond seeing how she’s worked her magic on me.

  The waiter returns with our wine and pours some into my glass for me to test the vintage when Crystal covers the phone and whispers, “He won’t ship the items. He says we have to pick them up.”

  I sample the wine and give the waiter the go-ahead to fill both of our glasses. “Tell him we’ll insure them.”

  “He axed that idea before I even got it out. He says it isn’t good enough.” She crinkles her nose. “He’s a little eccentric.”

  Eccentric artists and collectors are my life. “Where’s he located?”

  “Los Angeles.”

  “If it’s worth my time, I’ll go pick up the items myself.”

  “Perfect.” Her attention goes back to her call. “How about I arrange the pickup and call you tomorrow?” She listens a moment, and repeats what she said to me. “Yes. I’ll talk to you then.” Setting her phone back onto the table, she grins. “Done. We have a deal.”

  “I take it you feel the travel is worth my time?”

  “I had the items valued by a Beatles expert. They’re costing us a hundred thousand dollars.” She lifts her wine and holds it out to me. “They’re worth double.”

  “Impressive,” I say, and touch my glass to hers. “Sounds like we need to feed his eccentric demands.”

  We both sip our wine.

  “Hmm,” she says. “This is excellent, but”—she sets her glass on the table—“I have to drive. I really can’t drink.”

  “I’ve already told you I’d get you a car service.”

  “No, I—”

  “I just bought the wine. I can’t drink it alone.”

  “Yes, but Mark—”

  “You’re staying,” I insist, and I’m amazed by how much I like my name on her lips, when I’m used to Mr. Compton or Master. I like it. I like it a hell of a lot.

  She purses those too-tempting lips and then sighs. “Fine.” She reaches for her glass. “But if you’re hoping to find out some deep, dark secrets about me that somehow make me a bad employee, you won’t. Not even with the grape in me.” She takes a drink and casts me a coy look. “But I might try to find out yours.”

  “You can try. Others certainly have.”

  “But you’ve never had me try.”

  “No,” I agree. “I’ve never had you try.” And since I’m adamant about my privacy, why do I want her to try?

  The waiter returns in the midst of my contemplation and we order dinner. When we’re alone again, Crystal digs into the warm bread he’s left us and I’m drawn to how uninhibited she is. Her lack of walls and barriers must be why I find myself so comfortable with her.

  “A hamburger, Mr. Compton?” she queries. “How very rustic of you.”

  “I can get my hands dirty when I want to.”

  Her eyes twinkle devilishly. “I think I might like to see that.”

  There’s a challenge beneath her words. For me to show her? I’d like to show her, but I won’t. I almost think she knows that, and is enjoying taunting me. “And I’d like you to tell me more about you.”

  “Translation,” she replies, and flattens her hands on the table. “You want me to convince you that I can handle my job when you’re back in San Francisco and your mom is recovering.” She sits up straighter, as if preparing to give a speech, and delicately clears her throat. “Mr. Compton. I’d like to submit to you my qualifications as sales manager for Riptide.” She grins. “Beatles, baby. Doesn’t th
at say it all?”

  I tilt my head to study her. “Beatles, baby?”

  “I guess that just broke all your rules times ten.”

  “Who says I have rules?”

  She waves off my question. “Oh, please. You have so many rules, your rules have rules. Any woman who dared to date you would need an encyclopedia-sized book to keep up.”

  “Any woman who dared date me?”

  “Yes. You’re too good-looking and rich for anyone’s good. But I’m sure there are plenty of women who dare. They probably stand in line for a chance to read your rule book.”

  From anyone else, being called good-looking and rich would be a compliment. I’m not sure with Crystal. I’m not sure of too much with this woman.

  “But not you,” I say, certain that’s what she meant. No. She wouldn’t line up for anyone. She wouldn’t be that easy to conquer.

  “I’m a control freak,” she readily admits. “You’re a control freak. We’d be like two bulls after the same red scarf.”

  She’s right, and yet my blood pumps faster, just thinking about having her naked and willingly at my mercy. I can’t help but think she’s exactly what I need: a challenge. And how sweet her submission would be, because I’d really earned it.

  But I won’t go there. Not with someone I work with, and absolutely not in the deep, dark hell I’m in right now. I’ll just think about it. Probably way too much.

  Four

  _

  Crystal tells me stories about my mother over dinner, making me laugh. I don’t laugh a lot, but I have a soft spot for my mother. Maybe I have a soft spot for Crystal. I’m not really sure what I think about my reactions to her.

  “So . . .” Crystal says, mopping up the last of her vanilla ice cream with a forkful of chocolate cake. “Why don’t you work here in New York?”

  I drum my fingers on the table. “And here I thought you’d used such great restraint, not prying into my secrets.”

  “So you admit you have secrets.”

  She’s quick-witted. I like that about her. “We all have secrets.”

  “Some more than others.”