Hard Sell (21 Wall Street #2)(30)

“Whoa, hold up,” Lara says with a laugh. “We’ve barely decided on the date!”

I notice she doesn’t look at me, and I appreciate it. Somehow, she knows that I need a minute, because . . .

Damn it. Damn it.

It takes me a second to even register what’s happening, because I’m so not a crier, but . . . yup. There are definitely tears stinging the corners of my eyes.

“Yes,” I blurt out. “Absolutely.”

Lara’s expression erupts into a happy smile, but Kate’s look is downright puzzled. “Sabrina, are you—”

“Shut up,” I say with a laugh, dabbing at my eyes. “And Lara, you’re lucky you’ve become one of my closest friends, too, otherwise I’d never forgive you for ruining my makeup.”

Lara’s response is the pop of the champagne cork. “Now we can enjoy this.”

“So where do we start with the planning?” I say, accepting the flute she hands me.

“Oh, who cares about that right now?” Lara says, lifting her glass in a toast. “I’m the bride-to-be; I get to decide what we talk about. And right now, I want to toast to the possibility that Matt and Sabrina are finally on the verge of coming to grips with their thing.”

My head snaps up in surprise. Whoa, hey. How the heck did this become about me?

“I’ll drink to that. The sexual tension between those two has been suffocating me for years,” Kate says, lifting her glass. “Sabrina? Ready to spill your guts?”

“No,” I grumble. But then I stand and lift my glass to theirs anyway.

I don’t believe in love—but I do believe in friendship.

And these girls right here are as good as it gets.





13

MATT

Tuesday Midday, September 26

“Jacket on, Cannon, let’s go.”

I’m not sure how long it takes my brain to register the interruption. I’ve been told it’s a full minute until I shift from Calculator Matt to Human Matt.

It’s always been that way, though luckily my colleagues at Wolfe Investments are a good deal more understanding than the jerks in fourth grade who’d been less than impressed by my early ability to do complex equations.

I don’t need to do math in my head as much anymore—my job’s more about intuition and research than it is actual number crunching. But it still feels like there are two parts of my brain at work when I review a portfolio: the part that’s processing the trends, the word on the street, that particular client’s financial goals, and the computer part, as I use to think of it, that can’t see a set of numbers without processing them endlessly.

My assistant’s used to my process more than most, so after barking her initial order to get my jacket, she remains still, waiting for Human Me to catch up.

“What?” I finally say.

She points at the suit jacket I’ve hung on the back of my chair. “Put that on.”

Other than glancing at the clock, I don’t move. Unless I’ve got an in-person meeting, I don’t wear my suit jacket in the office. And my sleeves are rolled up to my elbows more often than not. I like to be comfortable when I work. Or as comfortable as I can be in a career where suit-and-tie’s basically an official uniform.

“You have a lunch appointment.”

I frown. Admittedly I’m awful at managing my calendar, but I’m at least adept at reading the damn thing. And there was no lunch meeting when I checked it that morning.

“It’s just a conference call with—”

“Nope, I rescheduled that,” Kate says.

I narrow my eyes, because though I trust my assistant implicitly, rarely does she change my schedule without telling me first. It means something’s up.

She glances over her shoulder, then goes to close the door before returning to my desk and sitting in the chair across from me.

“The Sams have lunch at Nobu today.”

“So?” I can’t imagine why I would possibly care that Wolfe’s CEOs are having sushi for lunch.

“They’re not going alone. Jarod Lanham is joining them.”

That gets my attention. Jarod Lanham is one of the world’s most famous billionaires. American by birth, he’s been a resident of Monaco for the past decade or so. The man’s only thirty-six, but already rumors of his net worth hover in the nine-billion range.

In other words, exactly the client Wolfe and every other company on Wall Street would kill to have. Not just because of the sheer amount of money, but his relative youth means that it could be both a profitable relationship and a long-standing one.

I want him. Everyone wants him, but I really want him on my list. I’ve been following him for years, impressed by his investments, his ability to steadily amass wealth even as he dominates the social scene in every country he visits.

In other words, Jarod Lanham is me but on the other side of the accounts. A fellow “boy wonder,” so to speak.

Kate knows my obsession. So do The Sams.

“They didn’t invite me,” I mutter, standing and unrolling my shirtsleeves. Even after Sabrina saved the brunch situation on Sunday, they’ve been keeping their distance.

“Can you blame them?” she says. “You’re persona non grata around here. They already have an uphill battle to impress Lanham with Ian’s scandal being so fresh.”