“You’re such a jerk!”
Cade turned to see Ella standing in the doorway to his office. “What did I do?” he asked, moving his feet off the coffee table, but not standing up from the couch.
“You tricked Alex into showing you my idea.”
He smirked. “You just wish you were as smart as me to figure out how to trick someone.”
She laughed at him. The laugh that said she knew something he didn’t and she wasn’t about to clue him in on it. That seemed to be going on a lot lately with her. “Cade, you have so much to learn.”
He shook his head, not wanting to get into it with her. She really did always get the upper hand, it seemed. “Did you like the glass?”
“I did. It looks much better in the shadow box.”
“Is it here? Let me see it.”
“Nope. If there was one person I’d consider showing first, it’d be Brody since it’s for the bar. Or maybe Aiden if he wanted some in the restaurant. But not you. I’m thinking no one is seeing them until the meeting.”
“Brat,” he said without much heat.
“So you’ve always said.”
“Was there something else you wanted?” he asked when she stood there staring at him like she did so much as a kid. She had more patience than any of them and could make them all squirm within minutes with her cool gaze.
“Do you know a Keith Stevens?”
“No, why?”
He could see she was hesitating, then finally said, “When I was at Alex’s, a reporter called wanting to talk to Alex about that guy. She said she wasn’t available. I was just curious.”
He sat up a little straighter. “What was her reaction to the call?”
“Not much of one really. Just said to say she wasn’t available. If I didn’t know better, I’d think it was just a marketer trying to sell her something.”
“Then why did you bring it up?” Cade asked. Ella always had a reason for everything she did, she just didn’t always share that reason.
“Just to see your reaction. How are things going with you two?”
“What makes you ask that?” He wasn’t saying any more until he knew what was going on.
“I asked Alex that question. Or one similar.”
“What was her answer?”
Ella laughed. “I should tell you it’s none of your business but I won’t. That would be mean and I’m in too good of a mood to be mean today. She said you guys were more than friends.”
He held his sister’s stare, then said, “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“You know what.”
She winked at him and then walked out of his office. Ella may bust on all of them, but at the heart of it, she knew what everyone needed and when. She was trying to figure out what was going on between him and Alex and she did it in her way and then she let him know the answer.
Ella was tough as nails. If she didn’t get the answer she wanted, or thought she would from Alex, she would have pried some more. Or she would have pushed him some more. But she didn’t.
And Alex’s answer to Ella about them being more than friends was simple enough, but if there was one thing he knew by now, nothing about Alex was ever simple.
Which was why he was doing an internet search on Keith Stevens.
It took him a bit to find anything relevant and it wasn’t until he found the name of someone running for Senate in Texas. He was thinking it couldn’t be the same person until he saw the guy graduated from Duke the same year as Alex. Seemed he was a year ahead of her but stayed for his MBA.
There was nothing to be found in the way of any connection between Alex and this guy, so he really had no idea what was going on. Maybe it had to do with work. Made sense. Of course, it didn’t explain why a reporter was calling though.
Damn Ella.
There wasn’t anything he could do about it, and he couldn’t ask Alex. Not without saying Ella told him and he wouldn’t betray his sister for something that seemed unimportant.
They were the Fierce Five. They laughed, they fought, they played pranks on each other. But in the end, they were loyal and thick as thieves.
***
Later that night, Alex called Cade. She hadn’t had any communication at all with him today and she wondered if Ella might have said something to him about the reporter calling.
She wasn’t positive and she’d like to think Ella wouldn’t do that, but the bottom line was, she couldn’t take the chance.
“Hey there, hot stuff,” she said when he answered the phone.
“Wow. What’s got into you?”
“I’m not allowed to pay you a compliment? I thought you liked it when I did that.” She heard his laughter over the phone and it warmed her to know she caused it.
“You can compliment me all you want. You’re calling late tonight,” he said.
It was a little after eight. He normally initiated the texts with her throughout the day. She was the one that called him at night. It’d been two days since she’d called, but they still had some communication every day. Until today.
He hadn’t texted her at all and that was the reason she’d thought Ella told him about the reporter. “How was your day?” she asked.
“Boring. How about yours?”
“The same,” she said. She decided to test the waters. “Ella stopped over. Thanks for ratting me out and letting her know you saw the glass first.”
He laughed. “It’s too much fun to poke at her. She wasn’t mad. She didn’t give that impression to you, did she?”
“No. Just said you were sneaky like that. I’m starting to realize how sneaky you really are.”
“It can be a good trait to have,” he said.
“Especially for a lawyer.”
“I’m not a lawyer in the true sense of the word. It’s not like I practice daily.”
“Sure you do,” she said. “Everything you do is always with the business in the back of your mind. It’s business law, right? You didn’t go for criminal or anything like that.”
“Nope. Business law. It’s boring at times. What is even more tiresome and tedious is patent law and I’m starting to look into that more.”
“I suppose that goes hand in hand with a lot of what your family is doing right now.”
“It does,” he said. “I’ve been working with another patent attorney for about two years on a few things and I’m thinking it might be best if I do a lot of it for us. He’s been great. My siblings have no idea how exhausting this all is.”
“I bet. Just from meeting Brody, Aiden, and Mason, I can’t see any of them sitting behind a desk for more than ten minutes.”
“Very true. Could you tell them that next time they give me grief?”
“Sorry, but the same could be said about me. I think the only one that can relate to you is your sister.”
“So I’ve been told before,” he said. “Enough about work. It’s after hours for most people. What are your plans this weekend?”
“Not much. Tomorrow night I’m hoping to get out when everyone else leaves for the day. No plans this weekend. What about you?”
“Nothing set in stone. How’d you like to get dinner Saturday night at Fierce? In the restaurant?”
“I’d like that a lot,” she said.
They talked for a few more minutes and she hung up satisfied Ella never said a word about the reporter and that things were going just great between her and Cade.