Fall Into Temptation (Blue Moon Book #2)(89)

Every time his phone rang, Gia prayed it was the band telling him the timeline moved up. She didn’t want to cheat the kids out of time with their father, but she also didn’t want to murder him in front of them. She was spending every spare moment of the day with Summer on the magazine just to avoid being around Paul or in Beckett’s backyard.

As Thrive took shape online, Gia felt like everything else was spinning out of control. Her only safe place was the desk in Summer’s office.

Things with Paul were exactly the same as when they split up. Gia cooked, cleaned, and worked. He brokered deals and played video games and told everyone exciting stories about life on the road.

Between her rage at Beckett and Paul’s all-night first person shooter video game marathons on the couch outside her bedroom, she wasn’t sleeping well. And an unrested Gia was an even more distracted one.

Evan went to school with no socks today because she hadn’t switched the laundry over to the dryer. The glue sticks she’d promised Aurora’s art teacher were still at the store because she forgot to buy them. Again.

And at this exact moment she was standing outside her studio staring at the locked front door.

Gia knew what she had to do. But she didn’t want to. She didn’t want to hear that voice or ask him for anything. Unfortunately, she had a class starting in fifteen minutes and it was going to happen on the cold November sidewalk if she didn’t get into the studio.

She took a deep breath and dialed. Gia closed her eyes. “Please be Ellery. Please be Ellery,” she chanted.

“Pierce Law,” Ellery’s chipper voice rang out.

“Oh thank God,” Gia said in a rush. “Ellery, it’s Gia.”

“Hey, Gia! It’s so good to hear from you! How’s it going?” Ellery’s voice was unusually loud in her ear.

“Uh, it’s fine. I’m locked out of my studio and I can’t find my keys. I think Beckett said he hid a spare somewhere. Can you —”

“Gia?”

She inhaled sharply at the sound of his voice. Deep, smooth, with a warm liquid pull, like bourbon.

She closed her eyes. “Hi,” she said, going for brisk.

“Ellery said you had an emergency.”

Gia added Ellery to her growing list of people to kill.

“Is everything okay?” Beckett asked. “The kids?”

“Everyone’s fine. I just need you — I mean …” she was getting flustered now.

“You were saying you need me?”

Was that hope she heard in his voice?

She shook her head. It didn’t matter. “I need you to tell me where the spare key for the studio is. Please,” she added hastily.

He was silent for a beat. “Sure. It’s around back. Just stay on the phone so I know you found it.”

“Uh …” She didn’t care for that idea.

“Are you walking around the building?”

Gia sprang into action and jogged around the side of the building toward the alley. “Yes, I’m almost to the alley.”

“So how are the kids?”

“You should know since you just had dinner with Aurora,” Gia grumbled.

“She said you were at the school with Evan?”

Gia hurried into the alley. “Uh, yeah. It was an art exhibit night for the middle school. They’d done some pottery stuff and I was afraid Aurora would go Tasmanian devil on the displays. I’m in the alley now.”

She thought she heard him bite back a sigh. “There’s a loose brick just above ground level under the first window by the door. Do you see it?”

She spotted it, wiggled it with her foot. “I got it.”

“It’s tucked in behind it —”

“Thank you. I’ve got to run,” Gia said, interrupting him.

“Gianna, wait. I wanted to apolo —”

“I’ve got to go. Thank you,” she said flatly before disconnecting the call and wondering how hard it would be to break a lease.





33





With less than a week to the wedding, Beckett opened his house to Carter’s bachelor party. Poker, hot sausage subs — a lame veggie sub for the groom — beer, cigars, and scotch. It was man heaven.

It was also step one of his plan to win Gia back. Beckett hoped Carter didn’t mind his party working a little double duty.

“This is quite the setup,” Carter said, snagging a chip out of the bowl on Beckett’s dining room table.

“Food’s in here, poker’s in the parlor,” Beckett said, dumping a stack of paper plates on the table. “I hope you don’t mind, but I invited Paul.”

Carter stopped mid-chew. “You invited Paul?” He swallowed hard.

“Yeah, and Evan.”

“Evan’s cool,” Carter said, still eyeing him.

“What, don’t you love Paul like the entire rest of the universe?” Beckett asked.

“I think he’s great,” Carter said blandly. I’m just surprised you don’t mind him. Seeing as how he’s your woman’s ex-husband and all.”

“My ex-woman’s ex-husband,” Beckett clarified.

“So you’re starting to come around to him?” Beckett could see his brother trying to work it out.