“Please, tell me he doesn’t have to come with us.” She raised her arms over her head to slide into a strappy sundress, careful not to let the fabric touch her made-up face to avoid stains.
Melody groaned like this was just one more thing for her to be concerned about. One more thing on a laundry list of things. “If you would just try to get along with him—”
“I don’t feel like getting along with him, and you’re still not answering the question. Does he have to come?” Melody wouldn’t meet her eyes, which gave her all the answer she needed. A scream bubbled up in her chest, threatening to break loose.
But just as suddenly as it came on, that impulse faded. “No, on second thought. It’s good for him to come. I want him there.”
Finally, Melody looked her way, and when she did, she was frowning. “Why? What are you thinking?”
“Don’t worry about it. It’s nothing bad.” She was grinning to herself as she slid in a pair of earrings while watching her reflection in the mirror.
He thought she was a joke? Let him see what her life was really like. He would learn quickly enough that he was in way over his head.
Chapter Seven
“Are you sure this is the right thing for her to do right now?” Braxton’s head swung from side to side as he looked out the window to his right, then the one to his left. “What kind of convention is this?”
“It’s a comic convention,” Melody replied. She sounded downright bored, though her inflection could’ve been the result of her being busy with her phone when she answered. It was practically attached to her hand, that thing. He wondered if she’d ever had a full conversation while staring at the screen and decided the chances were good.
“And they know the actors from the movie are going to be there today,” Serenity added. “So the convention goers are pretty excited.”
She didn’t sound so excited. In fact, the way her foot swung back and forth in a quick rhythm told him she was nervous as hell. She could try all she wanted to pretend to be confident, but she was terrified.
“How many people are attending this convention?” he asked the car at large.
“Thousands and thousands. These events are always popular, especially when stars from movies and TV shows come in to meet the fans.” Melody glanced up, the phone’s light casting an eerie glow on her face. “What about it?”
“You don’t see the problem here?” He looked to Luke, who’d insisted on coming along. It hadn’t taken much to convince Braxton, really. He knew when he was out of his depth, and this was a situation where that applied.
Luke could only shrug. “It is what it is. That’s what we’re here for, right?”
He nodded, falling silent. Brooding. This was ridiculous. Logan would get an earful from him the next time they spoke. How was he supposed to do his job when everybody in this girl’s life seemed completely nonchalant as to her safety? How were they supposed to continue on a business-as-usual basis when any one of those thousands and thousands of so-called fans might be her stalker?
No, it wouldn’t be one of them. He was getting ahead of himself. It was the irritation that made him think this way, frustration over not being listened to. His expertise was being disregarded in favor of keeping this girl on a hamster wheel. She could never stop. She could never slow down even for a second because that one second might mean fading into obscurity.
And now that she was at the mercy of a major studio—he was no fool, he saw the situation for what it was—there would be even less of a chance for her to step back, close ranks, and wait out the storm.
The studio might have hired Wolf Shield Investigations to keep her safe, but they were also there to make sure she kept moving, living up to her obligations as the new star.
She looked like a star. That much he could give her credit for, though a lot of the credit went to the team who’d worked on her hair and makeup and such. True, there was only so much they could do. It helped that they had great raw material to work with.
A message came through from Val. Good news. Hawk was able to find a supplier in the Los Angeles area. They’ll be delivering the cameras and surveillance equipment within the hour.
That was good to hear. He passed this on to Zane, who’d stayed behind to learn more about the layout of the house and the surrounding area. He didn’t like those hills, all that brush where anybody could hide. Sure, his wolf would sniff out an intruder in no time, but would it be too late by then? Would they already be too close?
Besides, he would have to be able to use that heightened sense of smell. His senses were sharper now than they’d ever been before when he was only a full-blooded human man, but even that was nothing compared to what he couldn’t help thinking of as the superhuman focus afforded him when he was the wolf.
Thinking of the wolf brought the wolf forward, and the wolf only cared about one thing just then: the shape of Serenity’s legs, long and lean and tan, crossed at the knee. The top leg swung back and forth, a pendulum, enticing enough to practically hypnotize him.
Only because he felt her watching him, studying his movements, did he manage to pry his attention from them. This wasn’t the time to imagine those legs wrapped around him. God, no, not now.
It was lucky then that they swung into the courtyard of a sprawling hotel in downtown Los Angeles right about that time. “Holy shit,” he muttered, staring out the window at hundreds of screaming people. Many of them were girls, teenagers, but there were a fair number of boys and men out there too.
He sent Val a quick message. Thanks. Have you ever heard of the World Chaser series? The one making the movie based on?
She got back to him right away. Yeah, because I live in the world and not under a rock. Don’t tell me you never heard of them.
“Who’re you talking to?” Serenity asked in a too-casual voice. “Shouldn’t you be—I don’t know—looking out for danger?”
“A coworker,” he muttered, putting his phone away not because she’d pointed it out but because he needed to. “She accused me of living under a rock when I told her I’d never heard of the book series your movie is tied to.”
Melody burst out laughing, then blushed. “Sorry. I thought you were kidding.”
“All right, I clearly have some reading to do.” The car came to a stop then, and he was surprised to see an actual red carpet rolled out from the building’s entrance to the curb at which they sat. An actual red carpet. Things like that actually happened.
“We get out first,” Luke explained. “Step back, leave a space for her, and allow her to exit the vehicle. We flank her at all times.”
“Got it,” he replied. He didn’t need to be told any of this, but the tension in Luke’s voice spoke of a grim sort of anxiety. He didn’t like this idea any more than Braxton did, any more than anyone with a shred of common sense would like it. No sense having a pissing contest over which of them was more skilled when it came to personal protection.
He opened the door, and a wave of earsplitting shrieks crashed over him. If he’d been the wolf, it would have been enough to make his head ring and his ears ache. As it was, he was painfully disoriented as he stepped from the car that the studio had sent to the house and stood in front of hundreds of people barely kept in place by a metal barricade that ran along both sides of the carpet.
Luke stood beside him, then stepped back to leave room for Serenity to climb from the car. The excitement reached a fever pitch, something close to complete madness. If there had been danger around them, he could never have called out to Luke and expect him to understand. There was no hearing anything in that sort of cacophony.
It was because of this that he stood close to Serenity as hundreds of camera phones were thrust their way, taking picture after picture, taking video footage, with people screaming her name and begging for an autograph. It was impossible to know where to look. So many things happened at once. So much madness.
To his surprise—and his horror—images of so many smiling, pleading f
aces overlapped with the images of horror that he carried at all times in a certain part of him that he rarely unlocked, along with the smell of blood and the gritty sand and explosions which had jarred his bones and made his teeth rattle. His chest tightened, stomach lurching, and somewhere in the back of his head, his wolf howled.
“Come on!” Luke bellowed, glaring at him. Right, he was losing focus. He wasn’t over there anymore. He wasn’t in uniform. This was no war zone even though it felt like one as grown men did exactly what Luke had described by practically lunging over the top of the barricade to get Serenity’s attention and beg for an autograph.
The girl handled it well, smiling and pausing now and then to give people the chance to get a shot of her when she wasn’t in motion. Anybody would think she’d been doing this sort of thing her entire life. This version contrasted with the girl he’d met back at the house. They might’ve been two different people.
She had a graceful way of handling herself and the people begging things from her. Many of them—too many—reached out to touch her, grabbing a hand, an arm, touching her hair. He would’ve crawled out of his skin if that was him. Being touched by strangers was never one of his favorite ways to pass the time, but it rolled off her back or seemed to. He had the feeling she wasn’t nearly as okay with it as she pretended.
“Hey! Watch what you’re doing!” he barked at one such man couldn’t have been younger than forty and probably weighed more than two hundred pounds yet was crushing a tiny little girl against the barricade. Her face was dark red, and there were tears in her eyes. He took the guy by his shirt collar and shoved.
It was like throwing a bowling ball down an alley. All of the men behind him scattered, falling back, as he hit the ground. Not that it mattered. The second he let go of the guy, his attention turned to the girl who held a poster-sized image of Serenity that might have been printed from a photo she’d posted to social media.
“Are you okay?” He hadn’t realized that Serenity noticed what was going on, but she had. She bent down, speaking softly to the girl, rubbing her shoulder. “Does anyone have a bottle of water for her?” she called out, looking around. An older girl pulled one from her backpack and opened it, handing it to Serenity with a look of wonder.
In turn, she gave it to the girl, who was breathing in hitching gasps. “Do you need help? Do you think you need to be checked out?” she asked, and Braxton was struck by the concern and sincerity in her face and voice while he did what he could to keep safe space around her, even if it meant nudging back additional graphers and fans who thought they could take advantage of the situation by getting closer to her. Vultures.
The girl shook her head and tried to smile, though Braxton noticed her hands shook. “No, thanks. I’m okay. Thank you for helping me.” She looked up at him with a grateful light in her eyes.
“No problem. Careful around these guys.” He took Serenity’s arm in a firm yet gentle grasp. “Come on. We have to keep moving.”
Even so, she scrawled her name on the poster lying at the girl’s feet and made sure she got it before somebody else could snatch it up. He had to give her credit for that and for stopping in the first place. Some people would’ve hurried inside without paying any attention to what was happening around them so long as they stayed safe—especially when a stalker had them in their crosshairs.
“Come on, come on!” Melody nudged Serenity down the carpet with a scowl. “We’re already running late!”
“Just another day at work,” Serenity called out with an upward glance, meeting his gaze. For a split second, the briefest span of time, he saw her anxiety like she was wearing a mask that had slipped slightly to show him what was behind it.
She hated this, though he didn’t have to be told she would never admit it.
Chapter Eight
Sometimes, after a long day, there was nothing so satisfying as the pop of a cork.
Serenity left the bottle uncorked while she walked around the kitchen, soaking in the silence. Blessed, sweet silence. It was just what she needed after the last day and a half, especially that debacle in front of the hotel.
Damn it. The last thing she needed was to think about that. She’d spent much of the last few hours doing everything in her power to forget about it or at least shut down her train of thought before it went off the rails.
There was no pushing it out for good. It had happened, and it would keep happening, trying to get through a crowd of people when all of them wanted something from her. Demanded. Thirsted for.
And that poor little girl. She shook her head as she poured a glass of merlot. That girl could’ve been seriously hurt. Worse than hurt. Nobody cared. It was like just the fact of her being there made them nuts, made them willing to crush each other. And for what? A few bucks off her autograph?
Even Melody hadn’t cared. All she wanted was to get her client inside the hotel and up to the designated suite in time to talk to a bunch of bloggers about the same crap those guys always asked about.
How many more interviews could the studio send her on before filming had even started? There was only so much she could actually talk about since there was nothing new going on, not quite yet. Her answers were probably all starting to sound the same.
She’d be criticized for that, of course. Mocked, even, by the so-called fans who loved the series so much they felt the need to tear down anybody who even considered making movies out of it.
It didn’t make any sense. That wasn’t love. Ownership wasn’t love. Besides, they didn’t own anything. They were fans, readers. Not owners. What made people think they owned things they couldn’t possibly?
Was that how the stalker felt?
A shudder ran through her before she could brace herself, and she took a long sip of wine. Did somebody out there think they owned her? That they had any sort of claim on her, to her? Wasn’t that how stalkers operated? Wasn’t that the root of obsession?
Another sip. She welcomed the warmth spreading through her, liked how it dulled the sharp edges of her thoughts into something smoother, something she could live with, something that, if she picked it up, wouldn’t slice into her.
Wasn’t everything supposed to be easier now? Wasn’t this what she’d been working so hard for? So life would finally be easy. So she could relax and not work so hard. So people would take care of things for her—the cooking, the cleaning, the everything.
Nobody ever told her there would be much harder things to work on once she’d made it, once she’d earned enough to buy the house and the car and pay for the personal trainer and the cleaning service and the assistant and the manager and, and, and…
And it never ended.
And now somebody wanted to hurt her on top of everything else. Another sip.
She jumped at the sound of footsteps on the patio, her head snapping around. The lights were on in the pool, but that was it. Right. Because Braxton wanted to lurk around out there without drawing attention in case somebody was watching.
His presence out there was a comfort and a reminder of the danger she was in—or supposedly in since the email wasn’t exactly explicit in its message. One could assume what the person who’d sent it was trying to say. It didn’t take a genius.
There he was. Prowling. It was just him. The other one, Zane, had gone to sleep in one of the spare rooms. There were four extras, so he and Braxton had their pick of them. It didn’t matter. At least the beds would get some use.
He was absolutely massive, him and his partner. It amazed her that he was even able to get through a doorway without turning to the side, his shoulders were so broad. His back was to her, his gaze trained on the hillside below, which gave her the opportunity to study him without being seen.
Until he turned suddenly, without warning, and looked into the house. She jumped a little, startled, then raised the wine glass. An upward jerk of his chin was the only answer she got.
Great. Like she needed him knowing she’d been watching. Rather than standing there,
looking like an idiot, she sank to the sofa and picked up the remote. Something stupid would do the trick. Something she could numb out to for a while.
When she turned on the TV, the first thing that came up wasn’t anything she’d seen before—at least, not outside of real life. It was a view of her driveway.
Which then switched to a view of the pool.
The pool from another angle. The patio.
It was the feed from the security cameras Zane had installed earlier while she was at the hotel. It flipped back and forth from one angle to the other, one camera to the next, until it cycled back to the driveway. Eerie, watching the outside of the house she was inside. Watching Braxton walk around, stalking through the night.
Now, he couldn’t know she was watching. The TV wasn’t visible from outside. She tucked her feet up in front of her, wrapping one arm around her knees.
What was his deal? He was there to learn about her, to figure out her life and why somebody would want her dead or injured or whatever. He wanted to pick her to pieces, to uncover every little bad or regrettable or shameful thing she’d ever done.
It was easy to hate him when she thought of him that way, as the enemy.
She could also think of him as the guy who’d thrown a grapher off a little girl earlier. It was almost enough to make her feel sorry for the guy.
Almost. Not quite. He was a grown man, and he shouldn’t have done what he did. Maybe if he had a real job, he wouldn’t have to sell autographs online for money.
She blinked hard, shaking her head a little. Wasn’t that exactly what Braxton thought of her? He didn’t have to say it out loud. Not when his smirk told her everything she needed to know.
But she had a job. She worked her ass off all the time. She was never allowed to stop. Tomorrow was a content creation day, for example, which meant she’d be in front of the camera for hours before sitting down to work on her script. Rehearsals started in five days, and there was a lot of work to do before then—if she wanted to be taken seriously as an actress, anyway, which was exactly what she wanted, what she needed. Some legitimacy.
Wolf Shield Investigations: Boxset Page 30