Caballo Security Box Set

by Camilla Blake

  It was certainly better than the news I received when I walked into my hotel suite a short time later.

  “They weren’t able to get you a two-bedroom suite,” Angela announced as we stepped out of the elevator, walking backward like she was afraid to take her eyes off me—or perhaps it was a simple fear of presenting her back to me. “They’re overbooked and were only able to offer you the original one-bedroom suite that you reserved.”

  “I didn’t reserve it. You did.”

  “I know. And I did call, and they did assure me they could do the upgrade, but there was apparently a paperwork mishap or something. They said it would be several days before another suite will become available. And there are no single rooms left, either.”

  I stopped in the middle of the hall and glared at her. “Then what am I supposed to do with him?” I asked, jabbing my thumb toward Brock.

  Angela seemed puzzled by the question. “There’s a couch in the suite.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I don’t know what else to say. I talked to the manager until I was blue in the face. There’s nothing they can do! The entire hotel is booked until the end of the week!”

  “There’s no other hotel?”

  “Not within less than twenty miles of here.”

  I brushed past her and continued on to my assigned suite. The door opened easily with the key card. It was a huge room, beautifully decorated with gold and white fabrics, the curtains like fine filigree, the artwork perfectly suited to a place like Paris. I immediately crossed to the wall safe behind a gorgeous replica of a Degas and placed my case carefully within its confines. Then I turned and studied my personal assistant and the security operative.

  “You’ll sleep on the couch until other arrangements can be made,” I informed Brock. “If they don’t have a room open up within two days, you’ll give him your room,” I announced to Angela. “This is an inexcusable error on your part. What use is it to bring you along if you can’t handle even the simplest things, like accommodations?”

  “Ms. Walsh, they assured me—”

  I waved a hand at her. “We don’t have time for this just now. I need you to write up contracts for Ms. Clauson, Ms. Day, and Mr. Farris, take them to their rooms, and wait for them to be signed. Can you handle that much?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Have them back to me by dinner.”

  I turned away, crossing to the double doors that opened onto the bedroom. “You’ll keep your things neat,” I called over my shoulder. “I’ll be conducting meetings in this suite from time to time. I don’t want clients aware you’re sleeping on the damn couch!”

  I closed the doors behind me and held my breath for a count of ten. Then I pumped my arms into the air, kicked off my shoes and danced around for a long few minutes.

  Fuck, yeah!

  My stuff was going to be on display all damn week! How many jewelry designers could say that? Not many, I could tell you that. This was a better start than I’d ever had at any previous Paris Fashion Week.

  I threw myself onto the bed, still grinning from ear to ear. I could hear some rumble of conversation in the next room, aware that Angela was still there, probably talking to someone back at the San Antonio office about texting her information on each of our first three clients. Stupid girl! I’d have to replace her when this was all said and done. There’d been too many mistakes these past few weeks, a time when mistakes like that could be damn dangerous. It was too bad, too. She was the first assistant I’d had in a long time that I almost liked.

  But what a hell of a start!

  Chapter 5

  Brock

  I stood on the balcony and studied the text messages on my phone. Josie had been sending me a string of messages all night, most of them jokes with her father and Eva as the punchline. I had to smile as I read through them, especially the ones that included candid photographs showing my brother in a less-than-flattering light.

  The girl didn’t need anyone. She was perfectly well adjusted all on her own.

  I read through the messages again, one conversation especially amusing me:

  Another hour of furniture shopping. Yay.

  That had been followed by a meme of a beloved television character holding his index finger to his head and mimicking a gunshot.

  I’d laughed before replying, Could be worse. You could be stuck in Paris during Fashion Week.

  I’d rather be there. Can I be there?

  Sure. Just convince your dad to let you join Caballo.

  She hadn’t responded to that. I could almost see her, dragging her feet as she followed Akker and Eva through the mall, her phone between her hands. It was a sight that could be seen in any mall all over the United States on any given day, but this one was my family, my niece. My story.

  A part of me wished I was there, but then the sun began to warm the mask on the right side of my face and the sweat made the thing itch. And I remembered why my life could never be as normal as all that.

  I slid the phone into my back pocket and leaned against the rail, looking down over the slowly waking city. It was just after 8:00 a.m. local time, meaning it was the middle of the night back home. I hadn’t slept much, my body confused by the time change. I thought I’d feel a little dull, a little heavy-headed, but I didn’t. My mind was clear, my body relaxed. There was something about being in this city that energized me. I knew I wasn’t going to see much more than one fashion show after another, but it was one fashion show after another in Paris. Another checkmark off my bucket list.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it? Everyone always says spring is the best time to visit Paris, but I think late summer is just as perfect.”

  Luna Walsh came to join me at the rail, dressed in a flowy dressing gown of pinks and grays, subtle colors that complemented the rich browns and golds of her skin and hair. Such rich hair, a deep brown with gold highlights that absolutely shimmered in the sunlight. And those eyes… she had the most amazing gray eyes I’d ever seen. They were pale, but warm all at the same time. Like ice and fire, warring in the same orb. And all that in a petite body with curves that were more perfect than one woman should be allowed. She looked like something out of marble, a statue made by the hands of a genius sculptor. How could something so perfect, so beautiful, not understand just what kind of power she had over a man when she came, so casually, out onto the balcony looking like that? She was simply… gorgeous.

  “We need to be at Elizabeth’s fashion show by 10:00, and then I have meetings most of the morning, but I have a break after lunch. Maybe we could go on a tour of the city then. See the Eiffel Tower and all that touristy stuff. I’m sure Angela can scrounge up a guidebook for us somewhere, maybe make a few tour reservations so that we can see the private side of Paris?”

  I glanced at her. It was generous, her offer. Such a difference from the wildcat who’d practically castrated her assistant yesterday for the snafu over the hotel rooms.

  She smiled as our eyes met, a smile that seemed to radiate from all over. She was beautiful, no doubt about it. She could walk the runway with all those models who came here to make a name for themselves. I wondered if she’d ever considered it.

  “I can appreciate that you don’t like to talk. But it sure would be nice if you’d say a word here or there, just enough to keep me from getting lost in my own thoughts, you know?”

  I lowered my head slightly. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “And quit calling me ma’am. You make me feel old when you say that.”

  “Sorry.”

  Her eyes widened slightly. “Wow! You do know words other than yes and no. Amazing.” She turned and walked into the suite, her gown flowing behind her in a cloud of silky fabric. I followed just in time to hear a knock at the door. Breakfast had arrived, a full American continental breakfast complete with pancakes. She had a hardy appetite despite her slender figure, taking her fair share of the fruits and meats, skipping most of the things higher in carbs. I watched her savor a piece of
bacon with coffee thick with heavy cream, finding it almost sexy to meet a woman who could appreciate some of the finer things in life.

  “Ox told me you usually take assignments in the Middle East, things that require more of a military-style approach. But you weren’t in the military.”

  I shrugged, not really interested in a conversation that dealt with the limitations of my physical deformities.

  “He said you wanted to be a lawyer once upon a time.”

  Was there anything he hadn’t told her?

  “I considered going into law myself. My father was a janitor, worked at a prison near San Antonio. There was a riot one night, some years ago, and he was injured. Broke his hip and messed up a couple of discs in his back. Couldn’t work for a long time and had to be on workers’ comp. When the workers’ comp ran out, he had to take part-time jobs that screwed up his recovery. He’s going to forever have pain in his back and this limp that makes it nearly impossible for him to walk for more than a few yards at a time. State of Texas told him it was his own tough luck.” She sighed. “I wanted to be a lawyer so that I could sue the state and everyone else involved. My dad tried to sue, but the lawyer told him the state was untouchable, said that they’d turn it around on him somehow, so he gave up. But I was…” She stopped and stared at the piece of bacon she was holding for a long moment. “I didn’t understand how he could let it go so easily. How he could stop being angry. He was a single parent and that job was all the security we had, you know? I don’t know how we survived all those years after he was hurt.”

  I reached up, brushed the hair out of my face so that I could see her clearly for a moment. There was a ghost dancing in her eyes, pain and grief there. I could almost understand it, that pain. I lived with it, too.

  “I don’t know why I’m telling you all this.” She smiled at me, her eyes growing thoughtful as she studied my face. “You look good like that. You should wear your hair back more.”

  I shook my head, let my hair fall in front of my face again. That wasn’t an option.

  “I bet everyone wants to know how it happened. How many times do people ask to see behind the mask? We’re such an intrusive society, always wanting to see other people’s scars, like it will take away the burden of our own scars somehow.”

  She was right about that. People did ask. A lot.

  “We all have scars. It’s just most of us have them on the inside, where they can’t be readily seen.” She brushed her hands together as she put aside her dishes before jumping to her feet. “I need to dress. Feel free to use the bathroom if you wish. I’ve already showered and there’s a suitable mirror in the bedroom for my purposes.”

  “Thank you.”

  She smiled. “Another new phrase. I’m honored.”

  She walked away, her hips swaying slightly under the silky dressing gown. I watched unashamedly as she crossed to the bedroom and disappeared behind the double doors.

  Beautiful!

  I finished my breakfast and tidied up the dishes a bit, pushing the little cart out of the way before heading into the bathroom. There were two doors into the bathroom, one from the living space, one from the bedroom. The bedroom door was open just slightly, revealing a wedge of the room to my view. I couldn’t see Luna directly, but caught a glimpse of her in the full-length mirror on one wall. She was draped across a low bench in front of a dressing table, carefully examining her face in a magnified mirror as she applied eyeliner. There was something sensual about a woman taking pains with her appearance. I wasn’t one of those men who thought a woman shouldn’t show her face without painting it first. Makeup was artificial, a mask just as plain as the one I wore. But—shoot me for being a chauvinist—there was something very feminine in the rituals women followed in front of their mirrors.

  I watched for a moment, feeling like a voyeur, always watching, never engaging. When I finally pushed the door closed with as little noise as possible, I turned and found myself staring into a mirror of my own. I approached it, almost cautiously. I’d been avoiding mirrors for the better part of the last eight years, never a vain man, but made self-conscious by the scars I felt compelled to hide. I pulled my hair back the way she’d suggested, holding it back with one hand while I studied my face in the impossibly clear and bright mirror.

  With the other hand, I carefully peeled my mask away, the soft plastic bending and folding as it was designed to do. It was an expensive mask, meant to smooth the side of my face and give the illusion of normal flesh despite the fact that the color didn’t quite match my skin tone. It molded perfectly to my flesh, staying in place mostly due to the unique design and the natural tackiness of the material, but also with the help of a little cosmetic glue placed strategically along the edges of my scar tissue. As artful as it was, the mask sometimes drew more attention to my face than the scars underneath might have done on their own.

  Then again…

  The fire had blistered and seared the flesh from the center of my forehead, around my nose, and along my jaw on the entire right side of my face. The doctors continuously reminded me that I was lucky my nose was still intact, that my eye hadn’t boiled in its socket and been destroyed, as they’d often seen happen in burn victims such as me. I still had my vision, still had the cosmetic normalcy of my long, narrow, patrician nose. Never mind that the right side of my face looked as though someone had burned a candle too long and it’d begun to melt down onto itself, the flesh lumpy and thickened, twisted into something that was definitely no longer human. They’d tried to fix it on several occasions, but each time they grafted new, smooth skin onto the damaged spots, infection or overgrowth of scar tissue would just make it lumpier, less attractive than it had been before. They finally threw up their hands, no longer willing to try.

  I was lucky. I was alive and I could see, I could smell, I could eat and speak and breathe. That was more than my friends could do. I just looked like something out of a bad horror movie.

  The fire had a sense of humor. It had burned my face but left my nose and eye; it had burned my hands but left my arms and legs in perfect working condition, for the most part. My chest was scarless, too, but my back sported a few spots of twisted flesh that left me with pains that I couldn’t quite ease. And my range of motion was impaired despite all the physical therapy I’d done in the months and years after the fire. Again, they reminded me over and over again how lucky I was. I could have lost the use of my hands altogether, but miraculously I had full use of even my pinkies and thumbs, something the therapists thought was a publishable event. Very few victims of these types of injuries regained full use of their hands.

  But I didn’t have full use. The scar tissue tightened my hands, reducing the motion available to me. Eighty percent, they called it. My wrists were screwed up, too, leaving me with some difficulty in bending and twisting. Ninety percent use of my arms, they said. Not perfect. And nowhere good enough to get me into the military.

  Ian had been a fighter. Ian went into the marines just out of high school, like Akker. He fought for our country in tour after tour of duty in Iraq, Afghanistan, everywhere they sent him. And he’d been going back. If not for that damn study group, if not for my forgetfulness, he would have gone back. That’s why I wanted to go. If he couldn’t, I wanted to take his place. But the United States Government wouldn’t allow it. Too much scar tissue, too little range of motion.

  Fuck them. I found ways of going. I joined mercenary groups who didn’t care about the fitness of the men they sent into danger zones. They just needed bodies. And I learned a lot. I saw a lot.

  Akker thought I had a death wish. He thought I went overseas in order to place myself in harm’s way, with the hopes of allowing some enemy’s bullet or large weapon to put me out of my misery. In a way, he wasn’t wrong. The idea of dying didn’t scare me. The idea of dying for a just cause was inspiring. But he was wrong in thinking I was actively looking for death. I wasn’t. I simply wouldn’t argue with the Grim Reaper if he came for me on some distant b
attlefield.

  I dropped my hair and let it fall over my face. The scars disappeared, but so did everything that had once made me the man I understood myself to be. I was going to be a badass—a high-powered lawyer with a model for a wife, the kind of man who was photographed everywhere he went, the kind of guy that people of all walks of life looked up to. I wanted to be an example, a role model. I wanted to be everything my parents had never been. I wanted to be envied, to be admired, to be loved. But all that went up in a puff of smoke the day of the fire.

  I ended my relationship with Eva because it was better than seeing the shock and disgust in her eyes when she realized what I’d become. There hadn’t been many women since her. Not many women could see past the mask, or the scars.

  I wasn’t sure anyone ever would.

  I turned away from the mirror and undressed without looking at it again. I showered quickly, as had become my habit these past eight years, shaving under the steaming water by feel, and dressed again without once catching my reflection in the mirror. I dragged a comb through my hair, carefully pulling it down over my face so that it would dry in something of a veil. I replaced the mask without aid from the mirror as well, so used to the way it felt, the way it fit, that I could do it in the dark without hesitation. Then gloves, jacket, and I was ready to go.

  Luna was waiting for me in the sitting room. She stood, white linen slacks and a pink silk blouse displaying her curves almost as perfectly as that dressing gown had done. When she saw me, her eyes moved slowly over the tailored suit I wore, her gaze hesitating on the leather gloves that hid those scars from view. Then her eyes landed on my face, a warmth in her eyes that couldn’t have possibly been for me.