Page 49 of Hate On
Roman offered a vague shrug.
“Do I know her?” Michael pressed.
“You do.” His mind racing, Roman searched for a way to distract his father, at least for a little while. “I really don’t have time to talk about this though. I’ve got a meeting with a West Coast buyer coming up. We’ve been trying to nail this guy down for months and I can’t afford to be late.”
As expected, greed lit Michael’s eyes. “Is that Gibson from Omega?”
“It is.”
Michael clapped his hands together. “Hot damn. Yes, you go on.” He waved a hand at him. “Get ready. And seal that deal for us, Roman.”
Once his father was gone, Roman collapsed back against the door and breathed out a sigh of relief. The meeting with Gibson actually wasn’t for another two hours so he had time.
But it had served to distract his father for a little while.
Pushing off the door, he moved to stand in the kitchen doorway, staring at that second, incriminating coffee cup.
What was he going to do, though?
Today had pretty much cut his time short. At some point in the near future, he was going to have to come clean to his folks about the relationship he was in. He and Julianna were involved.
They were a thing.
But it wouldn’t have mattered to his father how happy Julianna made him.
All Michael Montrose would see was that Roman was sleeping with the enemy.
19
Julianna
“I almostdied.”Moira’s eyes danced with laughter as she finished recounting her tale.
Julianna pressed her lips together to keep from bursting out into giggles but after a moment, it became too hard to hold them back and she pressed a napkin to her mouth to stifle the sound.
The quiet, elegant French restaurant they’d chosen for lunch might not have been the best choice for a midday meal for them, considering they hadn’t seen each other in a couple of months and even then, it had just been for a few minutes the night of the charity gala.
At first Moira gave Julianna an affronted look, but after a few seconds, she started to laugh as well.
Once it faded, Julianna reached over and brushed her fingers down Moira’s hand. “We have got to stay in touch better than this. I always have so much fun talking with you.”
“Tell me.” Moira turned her hand over and they clasped their palms together for a quick moment. “Listen, I’ve been wanting to ask…how interested is your father in Dad’s sale?”
Uneasy now, Julianna drew her hand back. “We’ve got a meeting set up to talk to Edgar in a few days. We’ll see what happens.”
“Come on…give me an idea.” Moira leaned forward in her chair, her voice lowering. “I’ve got good insider info that there’s a London hedge fund group that’s making noises about offering for the whole package. I hear they’re going to offer about what Dad wants, too. But I know it’s not just the money that he’s looking for.”
Julianna wanted to clap her hands over her ears and started humming, anything to cut off the flow of information coming from Moira, but…well, that would look silly.
“We’ll just see what happens, okay?” She summoned up a determined smile and Moira opened her mouth once more, but Julianna shook her head. “I’ll talk to my father, but I don’t want to discuss it. It doesn’t seem fair.”
Moira’s gaze turned speculative and she looked like she wanted to press.
“Julianna! Moira!”
At the sound of her mother’s voice, Julianna turned. Seeing Janice Castle, she rose and went to hug the woman. She spied Abigail Mendoza as well. The two of them worked together on a breast cancer awareness campaign and usually had lunch together several times a month. After giving her mother a hug, she hugged Abby as well then introduced her to Moira.
Abigail, always eager to find possible new donors, beamed at Moira and started to chat her up. As they spoke, Julianna smiled at her mother. “How are you? You weren’t there when I came by this weekend.”