shrugged. “I’ve been busy.” Setting up trusts, drawing up contracts, setting his trap. But he was worried those were just excuses, not the real reasons.
He glanced around the bar and recognized some of the models from the billboards in Times Square and some of the actresses from plays. But nobody had his pulse quickening. He knew he could bring any one of them home with him or, as Ronan suggested, two. And maybe that was it. There was no challenge. No thrill of the hunt...
Just easy prey.
Like the redhead waving at Trevor from across the bar.
“Go,” Simon urged him.
“Yeah,” Stone agreed. “She’s a hell of a lot prettier to celebrate your victory with than we are.”
“Speak for yourself,” Simon said, feigning offense.
With his thick blond hair and bright blue eyes, he’d been told he was better-looking than the hottest male movie stars—which was why he knew he could get anybody in the place to go home with him, even if he were still the broke runaway he’d once been.
Stone laughed, then said, “I may need to have you sit at the table with me for some of my upcoming trial—to sway the jurors like you did for Trev.”
“Hey, guys, you’re going to have to start working out, so you can be your own jury eye candy,” Simon said, his lips tugging up into a teasing grin. “I’ve got work of my own to do. So damn much money to manage.”
Now it wasn’t just his clients’ but theirs, too. That probably mattered more to Simon than it did the others. But they hadn’t grown up like he had—when the only money he’d known had always really belonged to other people.
“Hey, we sway most of the women jurors ourselves,” Trevor stated with pride and a trace of defensiveness. “We just need you to sway the ones who like pretty boys.”
Simon suppressed a laugh of amusement. He didn’t want Trevor to know how funny he was, so he acted offended and replied, “Fuck you.”
Trevor shook his head. “Sorry, man, you’re not my type. Now, that redhead...” He sauntered off toward the woman.
Stone peered around the bar. “I better find someone, too, or I might wind up going home with you.”
“You wouldn’t get so lucky,” Simon said as Stone headed off. Simon glanced around the bar now, too. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to be the only one going home alone. Or it wasn’t just that. He needed a diversion, something to get his mind off the mole in their office.
He couldn’t have been conned into hiring someone who would betray them. No. Like Ronan said, there was no conning a con. His trap wasn’t going to catch anyone because the leak couldn’t be in their office.
So he wouldn’t let it get to him. Not anymore. He’d find someone else to focus all his attention on for a little while. He wasn’t into blondes like Ronan was. And he’d learned the hard way that redheads were nothing but drama. He needed to find a classy brunette, someone who would actually pose a worthwhile challenge to his charm.
Before he could even look, his cell began to vibrate in his suit pocket. It wasn’t a call but the telltale buzz of a 911 text. Did any of the guys need his help? He visually located them all in the crowded bar, but they were totally engaged on the women they’d found. Not one seemed in need of a wingman.
Simon pulled out the cell and cursed when he read the screen. Damn it. His trap had been sprung. Someone was entering the office after hours, and there was probably only one reason for that. Shoving the cell back into his pocket, he hurried toward the exit.
But before he could leave, Trevor blocked his escape. “What is it? Everything okay?”
It sure the hell wasn’t, but he forced a grin. “Just got a sext.” From the security system. “I have to go.”
Trevor chuckled. “Of course you wouldn’t even have to work for it.” With an envious sigh, he stepped aside to let Simon past.
He hurried out, aware that Trev wasn’t the only one watching him. Let the guys think he was anxious to get naked. He would explain later. Right now he hoped to catch their mole in the act of copying active case files. The office was just around the corner.
The person had the security code, so no alarm had gone off, and no warning was sent to building security or the police station. Within moments he stepped off the elevator onto their floor, which was eerily silent and dark. The only light spilled from under the door of an office—his office.
He silently crossed the lobby, which had glass interior walls with hardwood floors. The exterior walls were the exposed brick of the old building. The ceilings were open to the ductwork and the rafters, the wood painted black while the copper pipes and steel ductwork gleamed in the dark.
Why the hell was the mole in his office? Had they graduated from selling secrets to stealing money? The door was ajar, the crack wide enough that he was able to peer through it.
Someone leaned over his desk, lush curves pressed against the black fabric of a tight skirt. His pulse quickened as he recognized that remarkable ass. He’d been discreetly admiring it for the past two years. He couldn’t have afforded to be obvious about it, not with what a sexual harassment case could have cost the firm. And she had certainly never returned his interest. Now he knew why. She hadn’t wanted sex. She wanted money.
Anger coursed through him, making his pulse race even faster. In addition to being incredibly sexy, Bette Monroe was cunning. She’d conned the ultimate con.
* * *
“What the hell are you doing?”
Bette jumped and the pen she’d been holding slipped from her grasp, rolled across the oak desktop and dropped onto the hardwood floor. She pressed her hand over her madly pounding heart before turning toward the door. When she saw her boss standing there, her heart beat even faster and not just because he’d startled her.
Seeing Simon Kramer was always a shock to a woman’s system. With his golden-blond hair and piercing blue eyes, chiseled features and a muscular body, he was so beyond handsome that it wasn’t even fair—to women or to other men. The other lawyers in the Street Legal law practice were good-looking but nowhere near as attractive as Simon. And not one of them wore a suit as well as he did even though they all had them tailor-made. Simon’s was a silvery gray with a faint sheen of blue that brought out that startling blue of his eyes.
His voice a deep rumble, Simon asked, “What are you doing here?”
Realizing it was the second time he’d asked, albeit nicer this time, heat rushed to her face. She must have been staring at him like a fool. That was why she always made a point of never looking directly at him. His good looks were like a solar eclipse, staring too closely could cause blindness.
Maybe that was why her eyesight had gotten poorer in the two years she’d worked for Street Legal as Simon Kramer’s executive assistant. She’d been standing too close to the sun. Her hand trembling, she shoved her thick frames farther up her nose. Since she only needed the glasses for reading, her distance vision blurred, and she couldn’t see him as clearly now.
Until he stepped away from the door and strode across his expansive office to her. He leaned down
