The Dirty Truth, page 1
PRAISE FOR WINTER RENSHAW
“Winter Renshaw crafts the best romances! She always delivers it all—angst, emotion, and humor. Her books are a true delight.”
—Adriana Locke, USA Today bestselling author
“Passion. Drama. Angst. Renshaw nails the romance trifecta with her perfectly paced office love affair.”
—Deanna Roy, USA Today bestselling romance author of the Forever series
“If you’re looking for stories that are thought provoking, wildly sexy, and unputdownable, you’ll never be disappointed with Winter Renshaw!”
—Jenika Snow, USA Today bestselling author
“The queen of contemporary angst knows how to curl toes while breaking hearts! A perfect romance for two imperfect lovers!”
—Sosie Frost, Wall Street Journal bestselling author
“Winter Renshaw is the queen of being unpredictable in the best way possible! Angst, chemistry, and all the feels will have you glued to your Kindle.”
—Ava Harrison, USA Today bestselling author
“Winter Renshaw makes my little dark-romance-loving heart pitter-patter with her fast-paced, sultry, intense thrill rides. Her books are addicting, drawing you in with nail-biting suspense and intimacy so hot I usually devour them in one sitting.”
—Shameless Book Club
“Winter Renshaw is my go-to author when I’m looking for a book with a sexy alpha male and a strong heroine.”
—Claire Contreras, New York Times bestselling author
OTHER TITLES BY WINTER RENSHAW
THE NEVER SERIES
Never Kiss a Stranger
Never Is a Promise
Never Say Never
Bitter Rivals
THE ARROGANT SERIES
Arrogant Bastard
Arrogant Master
Arrogant Playboy
THE RIXTON FALLS SERIES
Royal
Bachelor
Filthy
Priceless (an Amato Brothers crossover)
THE AMATO BROTHERS SERIES
Heartless
Reckless
Priceless
THE PS SERIES
P.S. I Hate You
P.S. I Miss You
P.S. I Dare You
THE MONTGOMERY BROTHERS DUET
Dark Paradise
Dark Promises
STAND-ALONES
Single Dad Next Door
Cold Hearted
The Perfect Illusion
Country Nights
Absinthe
The Rebound
Love and Other Lies
The Executive
Pricked
For Lila, Forever
The Marriage Pact
Hate the Game
The Cruelest Stranger
The Best Man
Trillion
Enemy Dearest
The Match
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2022 by Nom de Plume LLC
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Montlake, Seattle
www.apub.com
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Montlake are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-13: 9781542038270
ISBN-10: 1542038278
Cover design by Elizabeth Turner Stokes
For my one and only and our three little everythings
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE ELLE
CHAPTER TWO ELLE
CHAPTER THREE WEST
CHAPTER FOUR ELLE
CHAPTER FIVE ELLE
CHAPTER SIX WEST
CHAPTER SEVEN ELLE
CHAPTER EIGHT WEST
CHAPTER NINE ELLE
CHAPTER TEN WEST
CHAPTER ELEVEN ELLE
CHAPTER TWELVE WEST
CHAPTER THIRTEEN ELLE
CHAPTER FOURTEEN ELLE
CHAPTER FIFTEEN WEST
CHAPTER SIXTEEN ELLE
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN WEST
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN ELLE
CHAPTER NINETEEN WEST
CHAPTER TWENTY ELLE
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE WEST
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO ELLE
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE WEST
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR ELLE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE WEST
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX ELLE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN WEST
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT ELLE
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE WEST
CHAPTER THIRTY ELLE
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE WEST
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO ELLE
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE WEST
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR ELLE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE WEST
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX ELLE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN WEST
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT ELLE
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE WEST
CHAPTER FORTY ELLE
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE WEST
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO ELLE
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE WEST
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR ELLE
EPILOGUE WEST
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHAPTER ONE
ELLE
I didn’t see God when I died. I didn’t meet the Dalai Lama, the Buddha, Mother Teresa, or my beloved grandmother who passed unexpectedly when I was twelve. There was no parade of loved ones lining up to greet me. No bright light or radiant euphoria. Fortunately, no blazing hellscape. Just a simple, no-frills black void.
While the team of doctors who attended to me post–brain aneurysm assured me I was clinically dead for three minutes, not one of them can tell me where I went.
“Why aren’t you in the meeting?” My assistant, Leah, perches outside my office door, mouth agape as she double-checks her watch. “It started fifteen minutes ago . . .”
Blinking out of my trance, I close out of my hundredth “near-death experience” Google search of the week, close my laptop lid, grab my files, phone, and keys in one impressive swoop—and promptly spill my lukewarm coffee down the front of my ivory wool pencil skirt.
This is not me. But in all fairness, I haven’t been “me” since two months ago, when my life came to a screeching halt—literally—on the floor of my ex’s apartment.
Rushing to my aid, Leah plucks a handful of tissues from a nearby Kleenex box before falling to her knees and dabbing the burnt-umber stain in vain.
“It’s fine, Leah. You don’t have to do that.” I take a step back, arms still crammed with meeting materials.
I’ve been back to work exactly one week, and every time I turn around, I’m met with sympathetic regards and notoriously self-consumed colleagues suddenly jumping at the chance to grab a door for me, refill my coffee, or invite me to lunch like we’re old friends due for a catch-up.
That’s the thing about death. Or in my case—near death. Not only does it change you, but it changes everyone around you. At least that’s what I’m learning so far.
I’m still new at this . . .
Still finding my bearings . . .
Still trying to make sense of everything because the die-hard journalist in me demands all the answers and then some.
Leah rises, examining me with unblinking intensity as she motions toward the door. “I’ll phone the conference room and tell them you’re stuck on a call . . .”
“That won’t be necessary.” I straighten my shoulders, drag in a long breath, and gather my composure, because I’m going to need it once I throw myself to the judge-eyed wolves in the conference room.
“You’re just going to go in there?” Her confused hazel stare flicks to my coffee-stained skirt. “Like that?”
“As opposed to no-showing?” They’re not going to fire me for spilling my coffee. They can, however, fire me on the spot for not doing my job. They’ve fired people for lesser offenses, and for every sad sap they send packing, there are a hundred more lining the Manhattan sidewalk outside waiting to take their place.
“They’ll understand . . .” She worries the inner corner of her pillowy lips. “I mean, after what happened—”
“Leah.” I offer a tepid smile and move for the door. “I’m just a little late, and it’s just a stain . . . it’s not the end of the world.”
“I know, but . . .” She trails after me. “Maxwell’s here.”
I stop hard, my blood cracking like ice in my veins.
For five years I’ve typed my fingers to the bone for Made Man magazine, but the number of times I’ve been in the same room as our infamous editor in chief I can count on six of them. While the general public knows West Maxwell for his jaw-dropping good looks and larger-than-life persona, those who work for him know him for his rare presence and a reputation that sends most of his drones hiding behind cabinets, files, and laptop screens at the mere sound of his Italian loafers stepping off the elevator.
“You didn’t tell me he was going to be in today.” I tamp the disappointment in my tone. Leah’s nothing like my last assistant, a charismatic type A Columbia grad student who married some Rothschild she met in the Hamptons and peaced out before the ink was dry on their marriage cer
She bites her lip. “There was a company email that went out this morning.”
“Oh.”
It probably pinged my inbox when I was thirty-nine pages deep on some near-death message board thread on this nineties-looking website that was crammed with all kinds of fascinating experiences. Experiences that were nothing like mine.
Exhaling, I pinch my nose. “I’m sorry, Leah. I didn’t mean to—”
“I have some yoga leggings in my bag,” she says, voice pitched higher, hopeful. “If you pull your blouse over them, maybe they’ll think they’re just regular leggings?”
It’s a thought.
And it wouldn’t be the worst option.
I tug one corner of my silk blouse from my skirt—only to stop when I realize it’s a crepey mess beyond fixing in this current scenario. I’d need a steamer, at minimum, and even then, those things take time to heat up and—no. There’s no time.
Two months ago, I kept a change of clothes in my desk for these kinds of mishaps—not that they ever happened. I was a bit more pulled together preaneurysm. And I was nothing if not prepared. But at some point during my stint in the hospital, they utilized my office as a makeshift space for temps and interns, and the dry-cleaned blouse and slacks I’d always kept on hand miraculously disappeared.
“It’s okay,” I say to her but also to myself, because it never hurts to hear those words. “It’ll be fine.”
Stopping at the little mirror by my door, I check my reflection, tucking one rain-frizzed chocolate wave behind my left ear before giving my cheeks a pinch for color. The old me would’ve had smooth, glossy curls, pristinely lined lips, and a creaseless, fresh-off-the-rack dress. I gather a hard breath and silently wish the hot mess staring back at me all the luck in the world, because she’s going to need it.
With my heart in my stomach and the burn of nausea rising up to take its place, I march to the end of the hall, push through the double doors emblazoned with Made Man’s masculine-meets-modern logo, and plaster the easiest, breeziest of smiles across my face.
The room turns silent, and one by one mahogany chairs creak as various colleagues twist to take a look at the woman of the hour—she who dared show up late for a meeting with our feared and respected commander in chief. Chin up and shoulders back, I stride toward the only available spot—which happens to be next to none other than Maxwell himself.
“Rough morning?” he asks with an unnerving aquamarine gaze so intense it almost distracts me from the blatant condescension in his tone. In this moment, I silently take back every Photoshop accusation I’ve ever lodged against this infuriating Adonis. The man is flawless. Truly. Not a single dark circle. Not a square millimeter of texture on his bronzed skin. Not a tooth out of place or a wrinkle on his white dress shirt. Sex appeal wafting off him like a fine cologne. But he could be the most perfect specimen of man ever to walk this earth, and it wouldn’t change the fact that he’s a bona fide asshole.
Someone chuckles from the far side of the table.
Papers shuffle.
A pen clicks.
My cheeks flush ten degrees hotter, graciously disguised under a conservative layer of filter-effect foundation.
“Something like that,” I fire back with an unfazed smile as I get settled.
His stare drifts to my stained skirt, which is half-obscured by the table. Made Man has an impeccable dress code, one necessitated by the fact that at any given moment world-famous photographers and A-list celebrities could walk through our halls in preparation for a shoot, interview, or highly anticipated promotional piece. West Maxwell would sooner die than have his prestigious staff appear less than perfect at all times. Not that I fault him for it. This company is his baby, his life, his world, and his soul mate all wrapped into one glossy eight-by-eleven magazine.
He’s the Oprah of influencers—if Oprah were a thirty-seven-year-old dark-haired, teal-eyed titan of industry with the kind of broad shoulders and chiseled features that would give Khal Drogo stans a run for their money.
The suffocating weight of his stare lingers on me as I flip my notebook to a clean page and ready my pen.
In all my years working for this self-made gazillionaire, this marks the closest I’ve ever been to him physically. I’ve been copied on emails (likely sent by his assistant), and I’ve been in the same room as him at all of Made Man’s holiday parties. Once I almost passed him in the hallway—until he took a sharp left and disappeared into my supervising editor’s office. It happened so quickly and unexpectedly I thought it was a mirage. And then I spent the rest of the afternoon convinced my supervisor was getting canned and I was next, because while West Maxwell owns the entire operation, he only makes appearances when something major’s about to go down.
I jot the date at the top of the page and press my pen against the first line, waiting for West to continue the speech I interrupted . . . only his attention veers toward my notebook.
“It’s the seventeenth,” he says, loud enough that the other end of the twenty-five-foot table can hear him. His jaw flexes as he forces an audible exhalation through his perfectly straight nose. “Not the sixteenth.” Scanning the room, he chuffs. “Someone please assure me this young woman isn’t one of our fact-checkers.”
I ignore his dig as a handful of sorry souls humors him with a chuckle.
Crossing out the date, I correct my grave mistake and offer him a subtle nod. “Fixed.”
“We good now?” he asks. “You mind if I continue my presentation?”
Prick.
His attention bores into me like a lead laser beam, anchoring me in place while simultaneously burning me from the inside out. But I force the sensations away and divert my gaze to the slide projected on the screen behind him.
“Now, where was I?” He turns away from me, and his black suit coat strains against his muscles as if they, too, would prefer not to be trapped in the inhospitable inferno of his atmosphere. “Ah, yes. I was just getting to the merger.”
Merger?
Mergers in the print world almost always mean job cuts.
My core tightens until it burns.
The woman beside me exhales, sinking back into her seat. I scan the sea of faces for my editor, Tom, and pray to be met with a reassuring gaze—only he appears twice as bewildered as everyone else in the room.
“Don’t worry.” With his signature devilish smirk and wicked glint, West lifts his palms as if he’s cheaply entertained by our reactions. “We’re not being sold. Would never dream of that. We’re buying out a competitor.”
A handful of relieved grumbles fills the dense air, and West makes his way to the opposite side of the room as he continues.
“I think you’ve all heard of a little magazine by the name of City Gent?” he asks before shooting a look my way. “For those of us who may not know, City Gent is a niche publication with a reader base not unlike our own but with a local demographic. They have a corner on the Manhattan and tristate market and record rack sales at every corner bodega from Harlem to Chinatown. Turns out the diversified corporation that owns them is looking to get out of print media and reallocate those funds to the tech spheres. But their loss is our gain. Happy to share they accepted my offer yesterday afternoon.” He points to the woman across from me. “With my direction, Miranda Bonham will be handling every aspect of the merger, so any questions you have can be directed to her. Please know this announcement is hot off the presses, so we may not have answers for you right away. Still working out all the minute details of this merger, but we’ll share everything as soon as it becomes available. I have no further information for you at this time.”
A man in a cerulean gingham bow tie and matching glasses raises his hand.
“You.” West calls on him like he’s an attendee at a seminar, because of course he doesn’t know any of our names. Then again, I don’t know that particular man’s name either. Pretty sure he works in accounting and started while I was gone.
“How will this acquisition affect workloads?” the man asks. “Specifically, will we be absorbing more responsibilities, or will we be merging workforces with City Gent’s existing staff?”
West steeples his fingers over his nose and stops pacing. “Any other questions from those of you who were actually listening to what I just said?”
I cringe inside and avert my attention to my paper, focusing on the scratched-out date at the top.
In the corner of my eye, another hand goes up. I close my eyes and wait for Maxwell to verbally slaughter another well-intentioned staffer.
