The Real Thing Read online

  “Might still do it,” he muttered to himself.

  “What now?” Percy asked desperately on the other end.

  “Nothing, I’ve got to go.”

  “But, boss! What about-?”

  "I'll call you later if I need anything. Good work." Liam hung up the phone before Percy could either complete his question or ask what the good work was about. He could imagine what a frenzy this confusion would likely have Percy in, and he smiled to himself as he re-entered the pawn shop. The geezer behind the counter didn't look pleased to have him back again so soon, but he soon would be. Liam was in the habit of making deals, and this one was more in the owner's favor than in his own.

  "Back again, eh? What's the matter, forget part of your deal?" the older man asked grumpily. He was looking at something when Liam walked in and now whisked it away as deftly as a pickpocket in a Dickens story. Before the bell over the door rang the guy had actually been smiling, for Christ's sake. Liam didn't have to be a genius to surmise that that rarely happened. Now he was all scowls, and Liam couldn't help it; he laughed out loud. The man bristled, and Liam checked himself, but the urge to bust a gut was still strong.

  “Sir, I don’t know how you stay in business with a bedside manner like that,” he said, still chuckling a little despite his best efforts.

  “Thanks for the input. Now tell me what you want,” the man growled, more surly than ever.

  “I want to know what business that young lady did with you,” Liam answered bluntly. He’d never seen much of a point in beating around the bush, especially when it came to getting what he wanted.

  “Don’t see how that’s any of your business. I didn’t tell her what you were doing neither.”

  "I doubt my business had any bearing on hers. That might not be the case for me so if you wish to make a sale, I suggest you answer me. Was she selling something or buying?"

  “Selling something, okay? Jesus, you’re pushy. Anyone ever tell you that before?”

  “Plenty of people,” Liam answered without missing a beat, “and it’s never made any kind of impression. What did she sell?”

  “Seeing as I don’t expect you to let this go, I might as well tell you. It’s a ring. A right nice one, too. Seemed sad to be letting it go. I might have felt sorry for her if I still had a heart.”

  “I’d like to see it, please,” Liam requested. This was going better than he could have hoped for and the whole plan, little more than an inkling when he’d started the conversation, came more clearly into focus. This thing was going to work, like most things he decided to inflict his will upon. The guy brought his new prize back out and set it on top of the smudged counter. Even somebody who knew nothing about expensive things would know that this was something special and Liam knew plenty about expensive things. Jewelry was something he knew more than a little about and the piece he was looking at now was truly fine.

  "Right. I'll take it," he said, reaching for the ring without waiting for an answer. The owner blanched and clutched onto it like it was his mythical cornerstone or something. When he got a look at Liam's expression, he cleared his throat and put his hands back behind the counter.

  “You can’t just grab shit,” he grumbled at Liam without making eye contact, “that’s not how this works.”

  "I'll tell you how it works. You give me a price, and I pay it. It's separate from our other arrangement, and I need it to be quick."

  It didn't cross his mind until that damn bell rang again that he might be too late. He didn't know the woman who'd sold the ring and he had no reason to believe, that she would stick around after making her sale. People rarely hung out at the scene of a place where they'd done something unpalatable. It wasn't like it was going to destroy his life or anything if she wasn't around, but he'd still need to find a date. That, and he would have this very pretty but basically useless ring. When he didn't see her at first, he prepared to enact Plan B and quickly headed to his car, but then he heard a low, pitiful sniffling sound coming from the alleyway.

  “Excuse me ma’am, are you okay?” he asked, rounding the corner to find her with her back against the building’s brick, her face buried in her hands.

  "Oh! God, don't sneak up on people that way. What's wrong with you?" she half asked, half shrieked. She looked at him with those wide, innocent eyes and he realized that she was more than just pretty. She was beautiful. She was beautiful enough that for a second, he forgot what he'd come after her for in the first place. The little trails of mascara slowly running down her cheeks was what snapped him out of his temporary idiocy. He liked to think of himself as a tough man, and many people he worked with would probably say he was an asshole. Still, he hated to see a female cry. He'd always hated it; it filled him with a combination of helplessness and anger that made him want to put a fist through a wall. And she was looking at him like he was crazy. All things considered, this wasn't the best start.

  “Sorry, miss, I didn’t mean to scare you,” he answered, taking a step back. People didn’t often talk to him with anything other than respect. He couldn’t remember the last time somebody chastised him for any reason. And “miss?” What the hell was that about? He hadn't ever referred to anyone as "miss" in his life. She wiped at the mess under her eyes and, unbelievably, smiled a little. It was a pathetic smile given her current state, but he was still impressed. The kind of woman who could rally, then. That boded well for him and his plans.

  "It's okay," she said uncertainly, "you just startled me."

  "I can see that," he said with a smile. Now that she had a friendlier tone, he was getting that feeling again – that winning feeling, the same one he got every time he closed a deal at work. He was one of those men who was primed for success, and he could almost always feel it coming on.

  "What is it that you want?" she asked, not unkindly, taking a couple of small steps in his direction. He watched the way her body moved without letting on that he was looking, a talent any man with halfway decent game had by his teens. It wasn't the most gentlemanly thing in the world, but Liam doubted any red-blooded male would be able to help himself from looking. Her breasts moved easily as she walked, and he could immediately imagine their weight cupped in the palm of his hand. If he could get her to agree with his plan, he thought it would do more than fill a role that needed filling; he thought he might enjoy it, too.

  “We’ll get to that,” he answered, smiling brightly.

  "Will we? That sounds awfully cryptic," she answered nervously. She took another step towards him, and he caught a whiff of her perfume, something sweet and floral and light. If she noticed him noticing it, noticing her, she showed zero sign.

  “First, I have something for you. I thought you might want it back.”

  As the woman watched, Liam pulled the ring out of his pocket. He didn't even know her name, but his heart swelled when he got a look at her face. Never before had he seen such naked gratitude on a person. It was immediately followed by confusion and maybe even a bit of suspicion, but that look of gratitude was what stuck.

  “I don’t understand. Why do you have that?” she asked, utterly perplexed.

  “I saw you come out of the shop,” he confessed, wondering for the first time if there was anything about what he’d just done to feel awkward about, “you looked upset.”

  “I guess I didn’t hide it very well,” she answered bashfully. “Everything always shows on my face.”

  “I talked to the shop owner, asked him what your business was.”

  "And he just told you, huh? I don't know why but I figured places like this kept things sort of private. Stupid of me, I guess," she said, shaking her head. She looked on the verge of being disillusioned, so much so that Liam almost laughed. Not because he wanted to be mean, but he couldn't think of another person he'd met who was this naive about the way these sorts of things worked.

  "You would think," he answered, keeping his face expertly composed, "but you can be rest assured that I mean no harm."

  “Thank
you, but I don’t understand why you would but it.”

  “To give it back to you, of course.”

  "But you can't!" she cried, "Why would you do something like that? You don't even know me!"

  “It’s not to pry into your life, so there’s no need to worry about that. I know people break up and it’s hard. I wouldn’t presume-”

  "No," she interrupted, "it's not like that. No breakup. I wasn't married. The ring belonged to my grandmother. She left it to me. When she...you know."

  “Christ, I’m sorry. I just assumed.”

  “Don’t be,” she said, wrapping her arms around herself protectively.

  “Anyway, I wanted to give it back to you,” he said easily, extending his hand to her palm out with the ring glittering even in the dull light. “Here. Take it.”

  “I don’t understand. Why would you do that? You don’t even know me?”

  “I told you, you looked upset coming out of the shop.”

  "I'm sure a lot of people do. I can't imagine you buy everyone's things back. I mean, that would be insane."

  "You're right; I don't. I have to admit to you here, I've got an ulterior motive."

  He held his breath a little after saying the words, waiting for a reaction he couldn't predict. A lot of chicks would flip out at this point, thinking he was a pervert and maybe giving him a good slap in the face. He wouldn't blame them, either. This woman surprised him, though. Her eyes got huge, her mouth opened, and she started laughing. She laughed hard enough that her whole face flushed, and Liam got his first glimpse at what she looked like when she was happy.

  “Sorry, did I say something funny?” he asked, momentarily caught off guard.

  “No,” she said, visibly struggling to get herself under control, “I mean yes, but I don’t mean to be rude. I’ve just never had anyone say anything like that to me before. It sounds like something out of a spy movie or something.”

  "I'm glad I cheered you up some," he said, his own smile back in full force. "Now tell me, do you want to hear what I have to say?"

  Chapter Three

  Felicity Reynolds

  For the first time in her life, Felicity felt like she was living somebody else’s life. Her body, her mind, nothing felt like it belonged to her. Nothing felt real. She had woken up that morning with one idea of the way things happened and now, sitting on her old familiar sofa with half of the springs sprung out, that idea was shattered.

  “You aren’t doing this,” she whispered to herself in her new, surreal voice, “you can’t really be doing this.”

  Back to the scene where the unreality began, with the fancy-suit man approaching her and turning everything upside down. As it turns out, fancy-suit man had a name. It was Liam North, which only made him sexier. It sounded like something out of a Bond movie, for the love of God. Liam North had given her back her grandmother's ring. She kept it clutched in her hand, afraid that if she let it go, it might vanish. And now? Now, she was about to do the craziest thing of her whole life in order to show her gratitude.

  "I'll compensate you on top of the ring, of course," he had said, as if handing over fistful of money was the easiest thing in the world. She had balked at that and told him there was no way she was taking anything else from him, that the ring was already far too much. His response had been noncommittal and left her with the feeling that he would do whatever he felt like.

  "So why agree?" she whispered to herself, her fingers clenched so tightly around the ring that her knuckles turned white. She would tell him she wasn't going. As soon as he showed up at her front door, the location of which he now knew because she was trusting enough to give it to him, she would tell him that she had changed her mind. Then she could change out of the only cocktail dress she owned into her PJs and get back to her couch. The dress was ill-fitting anyway. She didn't own anything nice enough to fit really well, and at the rate she was going, she never would.

  “Oh, good Lord!” she squealed as the sound of a fist rapping on her door. She stood up so quickly that she almost dropped both her ring and the glass of white wine she had been nursing to calm her nerves. She smoothed her skirt, nodded at the image staring back at her from her cracked, floor length mirror, and opened the door.

  "You really like to make an impression, don't you?" she asked, wishing she’d sounded even a little bit less flustered. Unfortunately, there was little chance of that. She was expecting to see Liam standing there waiting for her, but instead she found an impossibly tall, impossibly thin woman holding a handful of dresses.

  “Hi!” she greeted cheerily, “Nice to meet you. I won't lie, I do love to make an entrance. Now, are you going to invite me in? These dresses are heavier than you would believe!”

  Before Felicity could reply, the beanpole woman brushed past her and started laying all of her swag out on the couch. It was surprisingly humiliating, seeing her do that. Something about the finery of the gowns, because that's what they were, made her own place look that much more drab. Ever rip, every stain, was so much more visible in comparison to the expensive fabrics. Her face was hot with shame, and she wrapped her arms more tightly around herself still. Already this was feeling like a major, major mistake.

  “I’m sorry, but who are you?” she asked as politely as possible, given the circumstances. The stick woman looked up, startled, and then laughed surprisingly raucously.

  "My God, you would want to know that, wouldn't you?" she giggled. Felicity was on the verge of answering back with a yes, she would very much like to know, when somebody else came through her still open door. She shouldn't have left it open. She didn't exactly live in the best part of town, and with her back to the door, anyone could walk right in. When she saw who it was, though, she was surprised by the immense amount of relief that flooded her system.

  "It's you," she said happily. She hoped she didn't sound too happy; this wasn't a real date after all. Still, it was hard not to be excited. She had never seen a man looking quite so fine as Liam did now. And she'd thought the dresses made her apartment look dingy? Even they paled in comparison to the figure Liam presented. First of all, it was her first time seeing a guy in a tux outside of a television screen. She'd didn’t attend her prom because she couldn’t afford a nice dress, and the prospect of going in something homemade had been too humiliating to tolerate. Consequently, she had missed out on the guys who had been brave enough to wear their fanciest to that high school affair. Even if she'd gone, she doubted it would have offered a fair comparison. What Liam had on wasn't any rented tux. This was custom made, tailored to fit his athletic body perfectly. Everything about him exuded an easy kind of confidence, something she was sure only came from never having to worry about anything at all. Which, she was almost sure, he didn't have to do. Just like anyone else, the first thing Felicity had done upon returning home from the pawn shop was google the mysterious man. Liam North, a man who headed an empire, a jewelry empire to be precise. He catered to most of the prestigious companies and had a cult following amongst the rich and famous. It made his presence in the pawn shop at all much more curious to her, as well as him wanting her to come with him this evening to his fancy function. In short, she was thoroughly confused and one hundred percent underdressed.

  “It is me,” he answered, sweeping her into a hug that left her breathless. “Is that alright? Were you expecting somebody else?”

  “No, not at all! I was a little surprised that you brought a friend, but-”

  “Friend?” the stick woman laughed, checking her makeup in a compact mirror she seemed to have pulled out from nowhere. “We’re not friends. I’m his personal assistant.”

  "Oh! That never even occurred to me. Are you coming with us?" Felicity asked, feeling very out of place in her own home. She hadn't ever met a person who needed a personal assistant before. Come to think of it, she hadn't ever met a personal assistant either. Liam saw her expression and laughed. He laughed a lot for a man in such a serious position, she wondered. When he did, his Santa Claus
blue eyes had a way of crinkling at the edges. He had dimples too, and teeth so perfectly white they might as well be in an ad for teeth-whitening toothpaste. His thick dark hair fell into his eyes, and he brushed it away from his face casually. Her stomach lurched, full of butterflies even to be near him, and she looked away quickly. This was a business arrangement, and that didn't mix well with a schoolgirl crush.

  "No," Liam laughed, "she's not coming with us. She came along to help me out with the dresses and such. I don't trust my sense of women's fashion to get us through the evening."

  “Just how fancy is this party?” Felicity asked trepidatiously.

  "It's more of a gala than a party, but I don't want you to worry. Brigit will take care of you, and once we're there, you'll have me."

  "Aren't you a lucky girl?" Brigit said dryly. Felicity looked at Liam, sure he would be angry at what looked like impertinence. Instead, he laughed and bowed extravagantly, like they were living in a romance movie. Brigit rolled her eyes and grabbed Felicity by the arm.