Lace and Lies (Brooklyn Brothers Book 1) Read online

  by

  Melanie Munton

  Lace and Lies

  Brooklyn Brothers Book One

  Copyright © 2020 Melanie Munton

  All rights reserved

  Cover Design by L.J. Anderson at Mayhem Cover Creations

  www.mayhemcovercreations.com

  eBook Edition

  No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photography, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written consent from the publisher and author, except in the instance of quotes for reviews. No part of this book may be uploaded without the permission of the author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is originally published.

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners. This ebook is licensed for your personal use only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people except when loaned out per Amazon’s lending program. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, then it was pirated illegally, and you should return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.

  This is a work of fiction and any similarities to persons, living or dead, or places, actual events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters and names are products of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Epilogue

  More Books by Melanie Munton

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  More books by Melanie Munton:

  Sultry Nights:

  Salsa (Sultry Nights 1)

  Tango (Sultry Nights 2)

  Rumba (Sultry Nights 3)

  Samba (Sultry Nights 4)

  Mambo (Sultry Nights 5)

  Standalone romance:

  King of the Court

  The Unforgettable Kind

  Slow Seductions series:

  Casual Affair (Slow Seductions #1)

  Sweet Attraction (Slow Seductions #2)

  Cruz Brothers series:

  Playing for Kinley (Cruz Brothers #1)

  The Art of Sage (Cruz Brothers #2)

  Always Mickie (Cruz Brothers #3)

  Timid Souls novellas:

  Stubborn Hearts

  Unexpected Love

  Possession and Politics Trilogy:

  Part One

  Part Two

  Part Three

  How the fuck had we gotten here?

  How was this happening?

  The woman I was hopelessly, desperately obsessed with—no, in love with—was pointing a gun right at my head.

  My chest seized with horrific pain, a kind of unbearable burn I’d never felt before in my life. I couldn’t tell if it was from seeing my sweet and beautiful Jasmine threatening to kill me, or if it was from the bullet I’d already taken to the chest. Apparently, one gunshot wound wasn’t enough.

  Jasmine looked ready to finish me off.

  I still couldn’t wrap my mind around what the hell was even going on. How had our lives changed in the blink of an eye? It had only taken seconds for everything to go from sheer bliss to complete shit. Nothing made sense, but I guess that no longer mattered.

  Not when I was staring down the barrel of my deadly fate, held by someone I’d thought I would spend the rest of my life with.

  Even with all that, I still couldn’t stand to see the hurt twisting her face as she stared at me. The anguish she’d suffered, all at my hands. The dark bruises circling her wrists and neck only heightened the guilt consuming me.

  The last thing in the whole goddamn world I wanted to do was cause her pain.

  But I had the evidence of how badly I’d fucked up standing before me, my death shining in her watery eyes.

  “You lied to me,” Jasmine whispered, her gun hand shaking.

  The words stabbed through me like a butcher’s knife. Her voice trembled with emotion as tears leaked out the corners of her eyes. That sight might have been worse than the gun because Jasmine didn’t cry easily or often.

  Those tears had my name written all fucking over them.

  “You hid things from me,” she said, her lower lip quavering. “You fucking betrayed me, Cris. Now, I’ll never know if I can trust you again. Whatever you and I had, you killed it with your money and lies.”

  I sucked in a breath, wincing at the sharp burn that was growing more and more persistent. I clutched my chest where my shirt was already soaked with blood. There might as well have been two gaping wounds because it felt like Jasmine was carving my chest wide open and ripping my heart straight out of its cavity.

  Then again, her heart must have been even worse off if the pain had driven her to the point of wanting to kill me.

  “And now look where we are,” she continued. “Your lies have brought us to this. I was foolish enough to believe you when you said you weren’t mafia. But you’re as fucked up as the rest of them.”

  I felt my face crumple, along with every last shred of hope I had left inside me.

  Jasmine was done.

  Her words said it all. We’d passed the point of no return, never to go back to when things between us were almost perfect. You know how they say you should live your life so that you won’t have any regrets when you die?

  That was a crock of shit.

  I had so many regrets, specifically when it came to Jasmine, I could have filled a goddamn football stadium with them. And the biggest one of all was that I wouldn’t have the chance to fix anything and make it right with her.

  I’d had so many plans for us. But clearly, even the best laid plans could unravel at your feet with one quick pull.

  And in this case, it was the pull of a trigger.

  She at least needed to know how sorry I was for everything. A mere apology would never be enough to repair the damage I’d caused, but it was all I had in that moment. My final moment.

  “Jasmine, please. I’m sorr—”

  She pulled the trigger before I could even finish.

  The gun went off.

  And it was all over.

  All. Fucking. Over.

  Four months earlier

  Listen up, ladies.

  I am here to tell you that orgasm withdrawal is a legitimate thing.

  And the struggle is very, very real.

>   Not that I’d been able to devote much attention to this affliction I suddenly found myself suffering from. For the last six months, I’d been harnessing all my focus into my newly-formed career that had just recently skyrocketed up into the stratosphere. When a woman barely had the time to eat a measly granola bar or shave her legs, an active social life tended to fall by the wayside. I’d been too busy sketching, sewing, and supervising the creations of my designs until ungodly hours of the night—for six months straight.

  Sadly, the prospect of success had ranked much higher on my priority list than the prospect of sex.

  Until tonight.

  My first solo fashion show—Wrapped in Romance by Jasmine King—had gone off without so much as a snagged thread to be resewn.

  I had officially made my appearance onto the New York fashion scene.

  And the first thing I think about is getting laid.

  You couldn’t blame a girl, though. I was so burnt out from the mounting stress and pressure, I’d been running to go get my own coffee and lunch every day instead of sending my assistant—even though that was literally in his job description—just so I could think of those trips down the street to my favorite café as mini vacations.

  But seeing my name in giant silver script letters emblazoned on the wall in front of me—and watching all those models strutting down the runway wearing my designs—made every single pain in the ass moment totally and completely worth it.

  Back to the whole sex starvation thing, though.

  I hadn’t even realized how bad the situation had gotten until I’d been slipping on the dress I chose to wear for the show’s after party tonight. For a fashion designer, I had a pretty monochromatic wardrobe, the color scheme ranging from heather gray all the way to midnight black. So, the floor-length black ensemble I’d designed specifically for myself for this night fit right into my wheelhouse.

  The top was basically a reverse racerback, the straps cutting in enough to give some near side-boob action, but not enough to actually cause a potential wardrobe malfunction. The back was a swath of sheer black material that dipped low on my back, stopping right above my butt. On the bottom, I’d intentionally sewn the material in the front so it would stretch taught across my thighs, allowing the center slit to show plenty of leg.

  I felt sexy in this dress. Powerful.

  Once I’d gotten it on and looked in the mirror I’d thought, when was the last time I actually dressed up for a man?

  I mean, I was wearing this dress for myself, of course. I didn’t need a man’s approval of my appearance in order to feel good. But I couldn’t even recall the last time a man had complimented me in an interested, sexual way, rather than in an assessing, business-like manner because he was more intrigued by the design I was wearing instead of what was underneath it. Couldn’t remember when I’d last flirted with a man. And the only primping I’d done lately had been for the cameras at events I’d been obligated to attend. Not for someone I wanted to impress.

  Oh, but you wouldn’t know any of that from the tabloids.

  According to the intrepid reporters at those so-called “news” outlets, I was currently dating some former model-slash-French actor who had just made his blockbuster debut on the Hollywood silver screen. Apparently, we’d hit it off at some fashion event a few months ago and were already getting serious.

  I’d never met the man before in my life.

  He was hot, though. I’d give him that.

  The real story was that he was a good-looking guy making headlines in L.A., and I was a good-looking woman making headlines in New York. Wouldn’t we look good in headlines together? Boom. The end. Those “journalists” didn’t need more than that in order for my life to become fodder for their gossip rags.

  But again, it brought to light how lacking my personal life had become.

  I needed to find a new casual hookup and fast.

  That was the direction the waters of my sexual relationships tended to run. No exclusive dating—I didn’t have time for a boyfriend—and no one-night-stands—I also didn’t have time to become diseased or axe-murdered. I just needed someone I could trust, someone I was attracted to, and someone who could be available whenever I needed to hit that pressure release valve. Someone who would be on the same it’s just sex and nothing more page with me.

  Typically, it was never hard to convince a man to agree to such an arrangement. My last hookup was back when I lived in Atlanta, and it had certainly touched on all those points. Marcus, the cute former NFL player with the easy-going attitude and milk carton abs.

  Many a mutually satisfying night with that man.

  Unfortunately, a fashion show after party like this was not the place to start trolling.

  Sadly, I would find no football players here. Pretty much all the men in attendance were either taken or gay.

  I sighed and took a sip of my champagne, just as my assistant Xander bustled up to me.

  And yes, I mean bustled.

  He never merely walked or trudged along. He was always either sprinting or strutting through life with an energy level that was both contagious and exhausting. But God love him. Wherever his fountain of youth came from, I needed to drink from it on a daily basis.

  “Can I just say that you are looking positively fucktastic tonight, lady?”

  Oh, yeah. He also not only cussed like a sailor, he was crass like one, too. The fact that I was his boss was irrelevant in his eyes. Not that it actually bothered me. Not at all. I was adamant about not surrounding myself with shady, fake people. Even if you’re rude and harsh, I’d rather face blunt honesty than face two of you.

  And Xander was unapologetically genuine.

  I snorted in a rather unladylike fashion, not that he gave a flying fig about my pedigree or etiquette.

  Unfiltered.

  That was how my team did things in the studio, and that was how we accepted each other. And believe me, in this industry, that was refreshing.

  “Funny,” I muttered, my tone flat. “I think that’s the most flirtatious thing anyone has said to me in months.”

  The horror that came over his unblemished face was so comical, it nearly had me spitting my champagne all over the expensive marble floors.

  “Oh, honey, that’s not funny,” he said, almost pitilessly. “That’s a travesty. You’re wasting this sexy-ass dress on a bunch of Ds who have no interest in your V.”

  Okay, maybe sometimes I could use a little less honesty.

  “Thanks for the reminder.” My voice dripped with sarcasm. “Have I mentioned that you actually don’t get paid to offer me personal advice?”

  He swiped his finger over the tablet that was permanently glued to his hand, his gaze focused on the screen. “Nope. Fortunately, you’re getting that shit for free. I’d say consider yourself lucky, but seeing as how getting lucky seems to be a problem for you these days…”

  I flicked his ear, drawing a chuckle from him. “Any last words before I fire you?”

  “Actually, yes,” he said, nonplussed by my threat. After all, he heard it at least twice a week. “A reporter from the Times wants to ask you a few questions. Then we’ll have a quick photo op on the veranda.”

  The Aqua Room was one of Manhattan’s hottest event locales, situated at the top of The Empyrean hotel, the most expensive and luxurious hotel in all of New York. The building’s architectural design was like Ancient Rome-meets-New Age chic. The hotel’s interior design, along with The Aqua Room, ran much the same way. The marble floors and giant pillars were like something out of a Roman emperor’s palace, yet the furniture was modern, almost artistic in style. And, of course, the view from the outdoor veranda was stunning.

  “All right.” My gaze flitted over the mingling crowd. “Have you seen Giselle?”

  My agent was probably doing what she did best: keeping time-wasters and bloodhounds off my back. A full-time job, to be sure, with plenty of overtime.

  “Nah, I haven’t seen her lately,” Xander responded, looki
ng down at his watch. “I’ve got to go make a call. Just be out on the veranda in ten minutes, okay?”

  I quirked an eyebrow. “Or what, young padawan?”

  “Or I won’t let you ogle my ass when I walk away,” he quipped. “And let’s be honest, that’s the only way you’ve been getting your jollies lately.”

  He punctuated that statement with an ass jiggle and sauntered off, cracking up at himself.

  I briefly considered firing him just to teach him some humility. Ha! He’d probably just laugh hysterically, smack my ass, and go on about his day as usual.

  After visiting the ladies’ room, I had a few minutes left that I decided to steal away for myself. A few minutes here and there was about all I’d been getting of that lately, too.

  I snuck out to the veranda, slinking off to the side of the outdoor bar where there was a small alcove hidden by a ginormous fake plant. Unnecessary as it might have been, at least it offered some privacy.

  I shivered.

  It was a cooler October night. The temperatures were no doubt going to start dropping off as we got deeper into fall weather. I’d probably need to go grab my faux fur jacket, so my nipples wouldn’t poke through my dress for the photos and grace Twitter feeds everywhere. Nobody needed that.

  I shivered again, just imagining the captions.

  Even the design work etched into the stone walls of the building was impressive. Something from Old World Europe, almost Gothic in nature. Whatever the style, it felt great on my back as I leaned against it, the uneven carvings digging into my tense muscles. Poor substitute for a back massage but hey, I’d take it.

  I pulled out my phone and scrolled through my emails and messages. Why, I didn’t know. I knew all I’d find would be work, work, and more work. Nothing personal or exciting. Just reminders of what I had waiting for me come Monday morning.

  Knowing my time was about up, I stowed my phone back inside my clutch and pushed away from the wall. That’s when I heard probably the most terrifying sound a woman could ever hear in public.