Infatuation (Club Destiny 4)

“I haven’t.” No, Tag had been too consumed by one red haired vixen to know what the hell was going on. If he wasn’t careful, that might become a problem.

Taking a minute, he skimmed the article printed beside the huge picture of Susan Toulmin. It was one of her better shots, obviously taken before she lost her mind.

Admittedly, the woman was attractive, and if they weren’t careful, she might just grab someone’s attention. Like the reporter who obviously felt the need to print this article.

“She doesn’t seem swayed by the judge’s insistence that she keep her mouth shut,” Logan bit out.

There was no doubt that Logan was frustrated, but Tag could only imagine how friendly Luke was going to be after reading this.

“Son of a mother fucking bitch!”

Ok, he didn’t need to imagine. Luke came stomping down the stairs from his office, a litany of additional curse words trailing him.

Fuck. It was too damn early to have to deal with the McCoy twins without having his damn coffee.

And just like that, in walked the red haired vixen carrying not one, but two large paper cups of coffee and she was heading straight toward him. A small smile tipped her lips as she handed over one cup, their fingers brushing one another.

From the looks of it, the few minutes McKenna spent out that morning had done wonders for her mood. He wasn’t sure what she was thinking, or what she was feeling, but he could definitely sense she’d calmed down some.

“Thank you.” Tag held onto the last word – baby – before it could come out.

“You’re welcome.” McKenna started to walk away, but Tag put his hand on hers, stopping her.

“Wait. Join us, please.” He needed her at the moment. Not only because he didn’t want her to walk away, but she just might have some suggestions on how they handle this new issue.

~*~*~

McKenna glanced back and forth between the other two men sitting at the table before her attention was redirected to the newspaper lying on the table in front of Tag. Susan Toulmin’s big head filled up the majority of it, along with the caption “How many is too many?”

Instead of reading the filth she knew she would find, McKenna looked up at the three men now focused on her.

“What do you think?” Logan asked.

“About what?” She didn’t read the article, so she didn’t know what it said exactly, but she had a pretty good idea. No matter what, it wasn’t going to douse Club Destiny in rainbows and sunshine.

“I don’t care what anyone thinks. I want to know what the hell we can do about it,” Luke growled.

“Unfortunately, she’s not violating any request by the judge because she’s not talking about the trial. And she hasn’t released any names.” Tag didn’t sound all that confident.

“I suggest we fight fire with fire.” Backing down had never been McKenna’s style, and despite the fact that she didn’t have a horse in this particular race, something about Susan just rubbed McKenna the wrong way. And, yes, maybe there was a bit of defensiveness she felt for the men at the table.

“We’ll start with a series of articles.” McKenna knew her next recommendation was not going to go over well. “We need to make the readers want to like the people behind the club. Once we can do that, defending the club won’t be necessary because you’ll have more people in your corner than you know what to do with.”

“The people behind the club?” Logan looked skeptical. “As in me and Luke?”

“To start, yes.” McKenna could practically hear Luke’s teeth grinding together. “It’s not like we’ll provide your social security numbers or your address, but we need to let people know just how real the two of you are. Since you,” McKenna focused on Luke, “are the face of Club Destiny, it only makes sense that we share a little bit about you.”

“You want to share the details of my private life?”

McKenna knew he didn’t like the idea, but it made sense. “Are you ashamed of your life, Luke?”

“Fuck no, but I don’t think it’s anyone’s fucking business.”

The vehemence in Luke’s tone was crystal clear, but so was the smile that tipped Logan’s lips. Maybe, just maybe, she had someone in her corner. She was surprised that Tag hadn’t weighed in at all, but she knew just what to say to rectify that. “And you,” she glanced at Tag, “the amount of interest I garnered from one single article was ridiculous. People want to know more about you. At least this way, we’ll take the focus off of the other members and redirect everyone’s attention toward the three of you.”