The Devil Series Books 1-4 (Devil #1-4), page 52
He raises a brow. “You never know how long that stuff will stay up—”
I’m still laughing. “Yes, you do. It stays up forever. I don’t need to read it, but that’s very sweet of you.”
“She makes Davis sound like an asshole,” he says. “Obviously, not the hardest job in the world. But she also says really nice things about the songs she heard you working on.”
I don’t really care what anyone says about Davis, or what anyone says about the album, but I love that he cares. I love that he likes my new songs. And I love that he printed the article out like someone who still thinks the internet is a passing fad.
He crosses the room to put it away but stops in place when I pull off my t-shirt. He stands there, blinking, as if he’s forgotten for a moment what he was doing, and then he slowly turns away, putting the printout in his sock drawer next to a black velvet box I’m trying very hard not to peek at. And I wasn’t snooping. I do his laundry sometimes.
“Come here,” I tell him. His eyes already have that dark, drugged look they get when he’s thinking about sex. I stretch out on the bed, relishing the outline of him now bulging under that towel. My work here is done.
He climbs beside me and I wrap my arms around him. “Tell me something,” I whisper. “Tell me something no one else knows.”
“I’m madly in love with you,” he says, pressing his lips to my neck.
I smile. “Everyone knows that. And of course you are. I’m adorable. Tell me something else.”
He laughs and rolls on his side, his hand on my hip. “I was thinking we ought to take a trip to Maui,” he says. “My mom has a book that says it’s the most beautiful of all the Hawaiian islands.”
“Sure, but how’s the medical care?” I ask.
He pulls me closer and bites down on a grin. “I don’t know, but they apparently have several good places to hold a wedding.”
My heart thuds in my chest. “Yeah? Do you know someone planning to get married?”
His lips brush over my temple, my cheekbone, down along my jaw. “I might. Depends on if she says yes.”
I remove his towel. “I bet she’d say yes. It sounds like she’d be crazy not to.”
“You’re sure?” he asks. I arch up to help him tug off my shorts. “It’s a pretty long trip. I know you have an aversion to that.”
I pull him toward me. “I’m sure. I don’t mind a long trip every once in a while.”
It makes all the difference when you’re not taking it alone.
The End
Want a Drew and Josh bonus novella? Get The Devil Goes to Maui here.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First and foremost, thanks a million times over to my friend Sallye Clark, who’s been letting me tag along on her work trips to Hawaii for years. We’ve stayed in places I could never afford on my own and have seen sights I’d never have found if she hadn’t been there to direct me. (When I tell people about these trips, they always ask if Sallye needs another friend. The answer is No, she does not. I like things exactly the way they are.)
Thanks next to the wonderful Sali Benbow-Powers, whose brilliant suggestions and love for this book gave me the confidence to move forward with it. Sali, I will never publish anything that hasn’t been placed into your hands first.
Thanks to my amazing beta readers for helping me perfect this: Michelle Chen, Christine Estevez, Katie Meyer, Jen Wilson Owens and Tawanna Williams. Your suggestions and confidence in this book made all the difference.
Thanks so much to Staci Frenes at Grammar Boss for squeezing me in for editing and Julie Deaton and Janis Ferguson for squeezing me in for copyediting, to Lori Jackson for another HOT cover, to Nina and everyone at Valentine PR for their endless help, and the amazing Christine Estevez for handling all the stuff I’m terrible at so I can write.
Finally, thanks to my kids and extended family for not rolling their eyes every time I say “I can’t, I’m on a deadline”. I’d like to promise this frantic, last-minute behavior will change, but we probably all know better by now.
THE DEVIL YOU KNOW
ELIZABETH O'ROARK
Copyright © 2022 by Elizabeth O’Roark
Developmental Editor: Sali Benbow-Powers
Editor: Kelly Golland
Copy Edit: Julie Deaton
Cover Design: Lori Jackson
Photography: Rafa Catala
Model: Alvaro Torralbo
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
For Katie Foster Meyer, one of the best people I know and the reason I have this career.
(Sorry I wrote about lawyers and named one Ben. I’ll try to avoid it in the future.)
1
BEN
When Gemma Charles smiles at you, rest assured you’re fucked. And she’s been smiling since she entered the courtroom.
Her client, Victoria Jones, is about to lose her three children. The prosecutor has provided his evidence, and you can make anything sound believable if you know how to tell a story.
Unfortunately for him, Gemma tells a better one.
She begins by proving the grounds for the welfare check were baseless. She plays bodycam footage showing a gross abuse of power by both the police and the social worker.
She proves the letter notifying Victoria of the visit was mailed after the visit. She’s blown up the social worker’s photos of the dirty kitchen floor—the only specific complaint made about cleanliness—and asks the social worker to demonstrate how, exactly, Victoria was supposed to get the floor clean while confined to a wheelchair.
And Gemma, naturally, has brought a wheelchair and a broom with her for the demonstration.
The court is laughing, the judge is getting irritated, and Gemma is in her element. She has the face of an angel—high cheekbones, wide mouth, almond-shaped eyes—but she’s too goddamn argumentative and short-tempered to do anything but fight for a living. She’s gliding across the floor like a dancer and turning the courtroom into a circus, one in which the arresting officer and social worker are the clowns. She’s clearly proven her case, but she’s still going strong because she’s so fucking mad. She wants every single person in this room to see how ludicrous and unfair the situation is.
“Miss Charles,” grouses the judge as Gemma begins to push the wheelchair out, “put that away. This isn’t drama class.” He turns to the state’s attorney. “Motion is denied. This was a disgusting abuse of power on the part of social services, and I won’t forget the way you just wasted the court’s time.”
Victoria and her family cheer. Gemma hugs them all before rushing toward the exit. I’m hidden at the back of the courtroom, but I catch a glimpse of her eyes just before they disappear behind sunglasses.
She’s crying. And I’m not sure they are happy tears.
2
GEMMA
Two Years Later
The devil on my shoulder is summoned every other Monday.
This morning, as I prepare for the all-staff meeting, he’s dancing like a flame in my chest, and I can’t seem to put him back in his place.
I flat-iron my dark hair until it hangs sleek and shiny, just past my shoulders. I spend extra time on my makeup and put on my good luck heels, which will only bring me to my nemesis’s shoulder, but will at least level the playing field a bit. When we enter today’s meeting it’ll feel less like David versus Goliath, and more like Churchill versus Hitler.
To be clear, I’m Churchill in this scenario.
I rush out the door and into the bright September sun, reaching my building with only moments to spare. Fields, McGovern, and Geiger is on the fifteenth floor of the most sterile, soulless building in LA, and that’s fitting. They’re also LA’s most sterile, soulless law firm. It’s why I chose them.
The conference room is already full when I arrive, and I’m aggrieved to discover he has beaten me in. His head—a foot higher than any other—is positioned directly across from the seat saved for me by my assistant, Terri. Has he done this on purpose? Undoubtedly. Ben Tate lives to irritate me. And he barely needs to try—the sight of his smug face is enough.
Behave yourself, Gemma, I think as I cross the room. For once, don’t stoop to his level.
I’m not normally so restrained, but it’s a big day for me. FMG is excruciatingly stingy with partnerships, and aside from Ben—who came here as a partner two years ago—someone either needs to retire or die before I can step up. Fortunately, two partners plan to retire next spring. Perhaps I can stop hoping tragedy strikes.
Terri slides me a latte as I take the seat beside her. “You’re wearing the good luck shoes,” she says with a nod at my profoundly expensive baby-blue Manolos. I’ve never lost a case wearing them. “You think this is it?”
“It had better be after they amped it up the way they did,” I growl.
Though other associates have been at the firm longer (including Craig, Ben’s bland favorite) none of them bring in anywhere near the amount of work I do, nor have they garnered the kind of publicity I have.
Gemma Charles, Junior Partner. FMG’s only female partner. It has such a nice ring to it, and God I’m going to love watching that smirk on Tate’s mouth fall away when he hears it for the first time.
He’s been my sworn enemy since his first week here, when he somehow managed to steal Brewer Campbell, a prospective client I’d spent six months courting. I’m alone in my hatred, however: the other women on staff don’t care that he’s a smug bastard and stealer of clients. They don’t care that he barely seems to notice they exist. Apparently, all you need to be forgiven around here are broad shoulders and a winning record.
Although his face doesn’t hurt either.
Even I will admit he has a face that’s hard to look away from. His features shouldn’t work together—sharp cheekbones, a nose that appears to have been broken at some point, intense brown eyes. His would be a stern face were it not for that upper lip, which is slightly fuller than you’d expect and turns him into the kind of man you think about a little too long. The kind you see when you close your eyes after swearing repeatedly to yourself that you have no desire to see him at all.
Nicole, the generically pretty blond associate sitting to his left, watches him run a hand through his thick hair, which is somehow always perfect and a little fucked-up at once, as if it was professionally done but then mussed when he banged the hairdresser afterward. Beneath the table, my foot taps with impatience.
“Ben,” Nicole says, after clearing her throat, “I was at Adney’s Tavern this weekend. I thought you might pop in.” The words sound practiced, as if she rehearsed them in the mirror all morning. She’s so fucking infatuated that she probably did.
Behave, Gemma. I pick up my phone and start looking at shoes online.
Ben’s distractedly flipping through a file. “I went home for the weekend.”
“Home?” I murmur, glancing at him. “I didn’t know humans were allowed to jaunt back and forth over the River Styx like that.”
His eyes raise to mine. His mouth twitches. “There’s a small toll. It’s really quite civilized.”
Don’t laugh, Gemma. Do not laugh. I look down at my phone, ignoring the box of donuts someone’s shoved in front of me.
“Live a little, Gemma,” says Caroline Radner, who isn’t well-placed to provide advice, given she passed fifty a while ago and is never going to make partner. I’d planned to get some of the strawberries they always have at these meetings, and now I want to refuse even that on principle.
“Gemma can’t have sugar,” Ben says, his eyes alight. “She likes to keep her teeth sharp.”
“I imagine everyone familiar with dental hygiene hopes to keep their teeth sharp, Ben,” I retort.
“Ah, but you’ve got more than average, right?” he asks.
I narrow my eyes. The running joke, among pretty much everyone here, is that my vagina has teeth. The Castrator, they call me. In theory because I often represent women in custody disputes, and in truth because I won’t play the game—I don’t bake cupcakes and make cooing noises over pictures of everyone’s kids. If a man doesn’t bake cupcakes and make cooing noises, you know what they call him? Senior Partner. Ben hasn’t made cupcakes once. But men expect you to be more thoughtful than they are—softer, more accommodating. And when you are paid less than your peers, or assaulted on a date, or lose a promotion, they’ll tell you it was your fault—you were too soft, too accommodating.
They think it’s a slur when they refer to me as a castrating bitch, but all it says to me is that they’ve finally realized I’m not someone to fuck with. I was someone who was fucked with a lot, once upon a time. It won’t happen again.
Fields’ assistant, Debbie, steps to the front of the room and beside me, Terri discretely sets a timer. We have a running bet about how long Debbie will speak, because even the simplest statement can take thirty minutes in her capable hands.
I text Terri.
Three minutes, thirty seconds.
Terri:
Three minutes, forty seconds.
“So, I shouldn’t have to say this again,” says Debbie, “but I really need everyone to label food in the break room.”
It’s going to be a long one—I can already tell. I go ahead and slide Terri a five-dollar bill.
“So many containers look the same,” she continues. “I don’t want to accidentally eat your escargot when I brought in a tuna sandwich.”
I consider pointing out that you would have to be a fucking idiot to confuse escargot with a sandwich of any kind, but it would just give Debbie something more to talk about, which is the opposite of what I want.
“Anyway,” Debbie says, “you really need to label and it’s not hard to do. I like to use a piece of masking tape, and then I just write my name on there with a Sharpie.”
Debbie continues to explain, to a group of grown humans, how food is labeled. I sigh quietly, and Ben’s eyes flicker to mine, as if he finds my irritation amusing.
One day I’m going to light him on fire—we’ll see how much laughing he does then.
When she says labeling is really important for the third time—repetition is Debbie’s favorite conversational gambit—I have to tune her out and go to my happy place…Shoes. Shoes I will buy. Shoes I wish someone would make. Right now, I’m thinking about green suede heels I saw at Nordstrom. Some people might argue that a kelly-green suede shoe has limited usefulness, particularly when it costs five hundred dollars, but with enough rationalization, I can make the math work in my favor.
“You’re thinking about shoes again, aren’t you?” whispers Terri.
I give her a sidelong glance. “What else would I think about?”
“You’re young and gorgeous. You should be thinking about a hot guy walking out of your shower.”
“What hot guy? There certainly aren’t any here.”
Her eyes flicker toward Ben, but she knows better than to suggest him to me.
“Chris Hemsworth,” she replies, and I laugh quietly.
The statistical probability of Chris Hemsworth walking out of my shower is almost zero, and if it were to happen, I know exactly how it would end, because every attempt at a relationship since Kyle has ended in the exact same way: with him accusing me of being ‘dead inside’ or obsessed with work, which is what men say if you work harder than they do. Unlike shoes, which just exist to cradle you in their green suede bosom.
“Care to share the conversation?” Debbie snaps at the two of us.
“We were talking about Sharpies, for labeling the food,” I reply smoothly. “I just asked Terri to order some.”
“It’s weird, then,” says Ben, eyes glinting with malice, “that she’d respond by saying Chris Hemsworth.”
For a single moment I picture whipping one of my heels across the table—his cry of pain, the brief triumph I’d feel before I remember I’ve done this in front of the most litigious people in LA.
Fortunately, Arvin Fields, managing partner, enters the room before I can act. Arvin is approximately one million years old, but shows no signs of retiring, and he’s still younger than McGovern, who likely remembers voting for John Adams in our nation’s third election.
“As you know,” he begins, “there are changes coming.” His speech is gratingly slow, which isn’t a product of age but more a tactic to wind us all up. He likes his underlings to be like a swarm of angry bees, fighting for dominance, stinging anything in their path.
Which is why Ben and I have both done well here. We were already angry bees when we arrived.
“At the end of this year, two of our partners will be retiring.” I sit up straighter. The announcement. “We’re hoping one of you can step up to the plate.”
My head jerks. “One?” I ask, my voice sharper than I’d like.
“Just one. Over the past decade, we’ve seen a lot less work from certain sectors, and it’s cut into our profits. We’ll be watching you very closely this winter, so may the best man, or woman, win.”
It feels like someone just put a hole in my lungs and all the air is escaping. I deserve to make partner, and instead of just giving it to me like they should, they’re going to turn it into a fucking competition. One Ben will go out of his way to make sure I lose.
My phone vibrates in my lap and I glance at it.
Ben:
Uh oh :-( Sorry about the bad news.
God, I hate him so much. He has my number thanks to the company directory. He’s only used it abusively, thus far. As I have, in turn.
