Stark After Dark

by J. Kenner

  Where do I know her from?

  I try not to think too hard, because that is a surefire way to ensure that I don’t remember. Instead, I put the anklet next to the bracelet. They are not a perfect match, but the settings complement each other beautifully. And, most important, I like them. “I’ll take them,” I say. And because I’m Mrs. Damien Stark and I never, ever do this, despite Damien telling me to buy whatever I want, whenever I want, I don’t even ask the price. Instead, I just tell him to charge it to my room. Then I tell him my name, show him my ID, and fight not to smile when his already polite and deferential attitude ratchets up about a thousandfold.

  “Of course, Mrs. Stark. Would you like to wait? Or shall I deliver the pieces to your suite after we’ve cleaned and packaged them?”

  “I’d love to wear them,” I admit. “How long?”

  “Ten minutes. If you’d like to have a seat?” He points to a silk-upholstered divan at the back of the store. “Some wine?”

  “I’ll just browse,” I say. “Thanks.”

  I stroll around the store, peeking into the glass cases, checking out all of the lovely, sparkly items. But my attention is only half there. Mostly I am racking my brain, trying to remember that woman’s name. I’m trying very hard not to stare, too, which is good, as she keeps turning side to side, her eyes darting all over the place as if she is nervous.

  Soon enough, I realize why.

  She takes one of the handblown glass vases, and slides it surreptitiously into her purse.

  Then she straightens her shoulders, browses the shelves for a few more minutes, and heads for the entrance. She’s almost through, when the security guard steps in front of her.

  “Excuse me, miss,” he says. “I’m going to have to ask you to open your purse.”

  “Pardon?” Her voice rises, and even from across the store I can hear her panic. “Oh, golly,” she adds, and in that moment, I know exactly who she is. Marcy Kendall from Dallas, Texas. One of the few girls in high school that Jamie and I genuinely liked. One of the few who was nice to me and didn’t think I was stuck-up and bitchy just because I entered pageants. Somehow, she saw through all the bullshit and realized that my reserve wasn’t bitchiness, and that the pageants were torture.

  We’d never been close, but I’d liked her. And she’d been like a mirror on the world. A reminder that there were people who would see the real you, even when you tried to hide away.

  I have no idea why Marcy Kendall is shoplifting a glass vase, but I’m determined to find out. First, though, I’m going to help her.

  “Marcy!” I call, and then watch as she jumps almost a foot. She turns in my direction, and her eyes go wide.

  “What—”

  But I interrupt before she can say something stupid. “Where’d you put the glass vase? Did you give it to Mr. Pyle? Because I haven’t paid for it yet.”

  For a second, her face is so awash in confusion that I am absolutely certain the guard is going to swoop down and arrest us both. But then it clears and the confusion shifts to such a profound gratitude that any doubts I may have had about helping her are firmly swept away.

  “Oh,” she says. “I thought you already had. I’m sorry.” She laughs. “I told you that having mimosas at breakfast was a bad idea. I’m such a dope when I’ve been drinking.” She smiles up at the guard, then pulls the vase out of her bag. “Sorry. Guess it looked like I was stealing it.”

  She starts to walk back toward me, and I think that all is well. But then the guard says, “Just one minute, miss,” and he plucks the vase right out of her hand. He points to me. “And I’d like to speak to you, too, miss.”

  “Me? But I—”

  I cut myself off. What the hell should I say?

  Fortunately, Mr. Pyle chooses that moment to return. “Here you go, Mrs. Stark,” and though I know he is using his outdoor voice so that he can share with the world—or at least these customers—that the fabulously rich Damien Stark’s wife actually shopped in his store, right then all I can think is that his well-projected voice has reached the security guard. And that is a good thing.

  The guard’s mouth closes, and he hands the vase back to Marcy. “Sorry for the misunderstanding.”

  “Of course. My fault. Truly.”

  I look at Mr. Pyle. “Could you add that vase to my bill?” I smile sweetly. “She doesn’t need it wrapped.”

  I take my package and hurry after Marcy, hoping that she won’t run off in the time it takes me to get outside.

  She hasn’t.

  I find her waiting for me on a bench across from the entrance to the store with Jamie’s jeans.

  She looks up as I approach, her smile tremulous. “Thanks,” she says. “You really saved me.”

  I take a seat beside her. “What’s going on, Marcy? Why were you stealing a vase?”

  She lifts her chin. “Oh, I wasn’t,” she says, but I barely hear her words. She’s done a decent job covering them, but in this lighting, I can see the bruises beneath her makeup. And now that I know what to look for, I see them not just on her cheek and neck, but also on her upper arm and wrist.

  I keep my face impassive. I don’t want her to know that I understand. Because I don’t want her to bolt.

  “I meant what I said about drinking in the morning,” she is saying lightly. “I just grabbed it and walked out. Stupid. I would totally have paid.”

  I don’t believe her, of course.

  But I am determined to help her.

  Chapter 7

  I’m sitting with Marcy on a bench when Jamie bops out of the clothing store swinging a shopping bag.

  She sees us, and her jaw drops open. “Marcy? Marcy Kendall?”

  Marcy’s smile is thin, but sincere. “Hey, Jamie. It’s good to see you again.”

  Jamie looks between the two of us. “What’s going on?”

  “I bumped into Marcy in the jewelry store,” I say. “She’s my gremlin.”

  Marcy’s brow furrows. “What?”

  “I’ve seen you twice,” I say. “Out of the corner of my eye. Yesterday in the lobby. This morning at the pool. It’s been driving me crazy because I couldn’t place you.”

  “Oh. And here I thought I was doing a good job just blending into the background.”

  I study her. Hunched over, hands clasped. Cuticles picked to ruins. Yeah, she looks like she wants to fade away.

  I glance at Jamie, and I see the concern blooming on her face, too. I don’t know if she’s seen the poorly hidden bruises, but I imagine she has. Jamie’s a makeup guru; that’s the kind of thing she’d notice right away.

  “So why are you in Vegas?” Jamie asks.

  “Oh, I came with my boyfriend. Um, Jay. Jay Monroe. He’s working one of the trade show booths.”

  “Is he a game designer?” I ask, and Marcy shakes her head.

  “No. Just, you know, clerical, sales, that kind of thing. His boss brought him down, and I came along.” She licks her lips. “He doesn’t like when I stay at home. He gets jealous. That’s another thing we’re here for,” she says brightly, though the sunshine in her tone isn’t reflected in her eyes. “He wants us to get married. You know, a Vegas wedding. Maybe even one of those drive-through chapels.”

  Her smile, I think, is about the saddest thing I’ve ever seen.

  “Where’s home, Marcy?”

  “Oh, Riverside, California, you know? But I miss Texas.” Tears glint in her eyes. “I miss my mom a lot.”

  “Listen, we were going to grab some lunch. Want to come?”

  “I’d love it,” she says, and I can tell that the enthusiasm is genuine. “But I’m supposed to meet Jay for lunch. He only gets the one break today.”

  Jamie catches my eye, and I know she’s thinking the same thing that I am—this girl would be way better off having lunch with us and blowing Jay off.

  But right now, that’s not something we can say to Marcy.

  “What about dinner?” I suggest, though the thought of canceling on Damien mak
es me sad. Still, the thought of not helping Marcy makes me even sadder. And I would hate myself if I sent her back to her boyfriend without knowing exactly how she got those bruises—and how I can help this girl who was so nice to me in school.

  “Oh,” she says. “Um, that would be nice. But we’re supposed to have dinner tonight after he finishes at seven.”

  “Maybe he could join us,” I say. “It would be fun to meet your fiancé.”

  “Um. Sure. I guess.”

  I’m about to lock her into that plan, when I hear a man’s voice bellowing, “Marcy!” down the promenade. The sound arrives first, but the man storms up immediately after. He’s a big guy, solid muscle. The kind of man who looks good in his youth, then starts to fall apart. I predict jowls in just a few years.

  “Jesus H. Christ, Marcy, what the fuck are you doing? I’ve only got forty-five minutes for lunch. What the hell part of ‘at the beginning of the shopping area’ didn’t you understand?”

  I glance down the promenade. We’re only four storefronts from the beginning.

  “I’m sorry, Jay. I’m really sorry.”

  I’m not sure how it’s possible, but she seems even smaller.

  “It’s just that I bumped into friends from Texas.”

  “Hey,” he says, barely looking at Jamie and me. He grabs her arm. “Let’s go.”

  “We were hoping you could join us for dinner,” I blurt. “You and Marcy with my husband and me.”

  He blinks at me. “We got plans.”

  “That’s a shame. I just figured with you in tech sales we could maybe mix business with pleasure.”

  His eyes narrow. “You here for the trade show?”

  “No, but my husband owns the hotel. He has a lot of business interests. And I do a lot of app work myself.” I extend my hand, though I’m loath to touch him. “Nikki Stark,” I say. “My husband is Damien Stark.”

  As I had hoped, the name works on Jay like a magic potion. He practically has dollar signs in his eyes.

  “Oh, yeah. We’d love it, wouldn’t we, Marce?”

  “Sure,” she says dutifully.

  “That’s great,” I say. “Marcy’s coming with me and Jamie to the spa at three, so we’ll work out the time and place then.”

  Marcy’s eyes go wide, and Jay doesn’t look too happy. “Spa?”

  “She mentioned you’re working the trade show today,” Jamie says. “We don’t want her to be stuck all alone. It’ll be fun. A girls’ pampering session before y’all do the wedding thing. Congratulations, by the way.”

  “Thanks.” He glances at Marcy. She smiles at him. Fortunately, she looks neither confused nor freaked out. “We should go to lunch,” he says.

  “Three o’clock,” I say again. “At the reception counter for the spa. It’s on the second floor, the other side of the atrium from the restaurant.”

  “Okay,” Marcy says softly. She shifts her purse so that she is holding it against her chest. “I’ll be there,” she adds, and I understand what she hasn’t said out loud—that she’s coming because she feels like she owes me.

  Which means that if I want to keep her listening to me after she arrives, I need to figure out pretty quickly what I want to say.

  As soon as they’ve disappeared down the walkway, Jamie turns to me. “What the fuck?”

  “She stole a vase,” I say, then I tell her the whole sordid story. “You saw the bruises?”

  Jamie frowns, her expression turning dark. “I saw. Guy’s a prick.” She drags her fingers through her hair. “I always really liked Marcy. What should we do?”

  “Talk to her,” I say. I draw a deep breath. “Talk, and hope she tells us the truth. Then maybe we can help her.”

  “You think she’s actually going to show up at three?”

  “I hope so,” I say. “Because if not, we’ll have to cancel our appointment to track her down. And I really want a massage and a manicure.”

  —

  Despite the fact that I totally do want a manicure, I decide to ditch the mani-pedi experience in favor of Mission Marcy.

  Jamie and I both want to get Marcy talking, and I just don’t expect that to happen if we’re in front of three strangers working on our hands and feet.

  Instead, we opt for massages to loosen us up, and then plan to spend the next two hours in the relaxation room before moving on to the salon for pre-dinner blowouts and makeup.

  “I’ve never had a massage before,” Marcy admits after stage one of our spa adventure is complete. “That was really awesome. The thing with the rocks was kind of weird, though.”

  “I thought so the first time I had one, too,” I admit.

  Since Marcy was resorting to stealing vases, I figured spas weren’t a common feature in her daily life and decided to splurge and get all of us ninety-minute Starfire signature massages, which incorporate hot stones. I think they’re awesome—the stones heat up your back and make you that much looser—but being layered in rocks can be a rather odd experience.

  Now we are all three wonderfully relaxed and kicked back in the steam room in the spa’s women’s changing room.

  My plan is to steam for a while, then go relax with a glass of wine and some gossip. And more wine, if necessary.

  “So how did you and Jay meet?” I ask.

  “It was very sweet,” she says, and for the first time she actually sounds as if she liked the guy once. “We met in a coffee bar and I’d lost my wallet. He bought me a latte, then helped me get home. Turned out my wallet was in my purse the whole time.”

  She lifts a shoulder. “That’s why he thinks I’m so scattered all the time. First impressions.” She rubs her hands over her face and then up, pushing her steam-slicked hair back. “Anyway, he did the full-court seduction press. Flowers. Sweet texts. Little presents. It was so nice. I felt really special. Like I was in a fairy tale.”

  “What changed?” I ask the question softly, and Marcy just keeps on talking. She doesn’t even blink.

  “I don’t know. It was subtle. Slow. First he just wanted to stay in and not go out with friends. And I thought that was because we were all cozy and new. And then he didn’t want me to go out even if he was busy. He said my friends were catty and gossiped too much. But they don’t, really. We just talk, you know, the way you do. And then he got mad when I burned a roast. And after that—”

  She cuts herself off as if suddenly realizing what she is saying. What she is admitting to me.

  “After that he started to hit you?” I ask. My voice is as gentle as if I were dealing with a scared puppy.

  Marcy nods. “I—I’m getting really hot in here.”

  I hate losing the momentum of the conversation, but I also figure that’s code for I’m overwhelmed.

  So we step out of the steam into the cool area of the changing room, then wrap ourselves in the big fluffy spa robes and head into the relaxation area.

  I get us each a glass of wine, both because I want one and because I know that after a massage and a steam, it will go straight to Marcy’s head, thus inducing more talking.

  We find a corner with three lounge chairs set up in a triangle with a table in the middle, and since the table is topped with a big bowl of fruit, it seems like the perfect place to relax. We lay back, sip our wine, and after a few moments I try coming at it from a different direction. “You wanted the vase so you could pawn it?”

  “Yes.” Marcy’s voice is a squeak.

  “So you could run?”

  This time she only nods.

  “Because he hits you.”

  And this time, she just looks at her hands.

  “It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Jamie says. “He’s the asshole.”

  “I think he knows I want to leave. I think that’s why he wants to get married.”

  “You should go to the police,” Jamie says. “He can’t hurt you like this and get away with it.”

  Marcy tenses up so immediately it looks painful. “No. He just gets mad. And I get better. And I’m
not making excuses, really. But it’s not like there’s any proof. No doctors. I didn’t tell anyone. Nothing.”

  “What about a counselor? You should talk to someone.”

  She shakes her head. “I should, I know. But I’m not ready.”

  I glance at Jamie, who nods almost imperceptibly.

  “Do you still want to run?”

  Marcy nods her head. “Yes. So much. I want to go home.”

  “Then run now. I’ll give you some cash—no, don’t argue. I want to,” I say when she starts to protest. “And I can arrange a car to take you wherever you want to go. So tell me, Marcy, where do you want to go? Where would you be safe?”

  “I want to go home,” she says. “I want to go to Texas.”

  “Done.” I smile at her.

  “Just like that?”

  “Just like that.” I stand up. “But we shouldn’t wait around. Let’s get you out of here before he gets out of the trade show. Is there anything in your room you have to have?”

  She shakes her head. “No. I’ve got my purse.”

  “Good. He’ll see the stuff and figure you’re in the hotel somewhere.”

  She blinks at me, her eyes wide and trusting. “This is really happening?”

  “If you want it to.”

  “Yes.” The relief in her voice cuts through me like a thousand sharp knives. “God, yes.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  We dress quickly, and as we’re walking out of the spa, I call down to the desk, then explain who I am and what I want. And, with typical Stark efficiency, everything is ready when we arrive at the main entrance—an SUV to take Marcy home with two drivers so that they can drive straight through to Dallas, and an envelope with two thousand dollars in cash.

  Marcy stares at the SUV like it’s Moses’s burning bush. And as I look at her, I can’t help but think of Damien. Our romance had been whirlwind, too. He had seduced me so thoroughly, sweeping me off my feet, showing me a whole new world. Just like Marcy’s romance, it had been hypnotic and wonderful and like something out of a fairy tale.

  But dear god, what different endings. Because now Marcy cowers when Jay is near, whereas I open like a flower for Damien.