by Nicole Snow
“No one in, no one out. Not until I come back. Radio Skylar. Get her over here and have her watch Miss Holly. She'll be sure our client behaves.”
James nods, hiding a grin. We both know Milah is more than a little afraid of my lead, and Skylar might be the only woman on the planet who can make our pop star listen and keep her out of trouble. Or maybe my boy's just happy he doesn't have to deal with Milah himself.
Under James’ watchful eye, I lead Kenna around the corner of the hallway, past a jumble of rigging for stage lights and into a dead-end storage cubby. She trails after me in almost furtive silence, as if expecting someone to jump out at us at any moment. I don’t blame her.
It’s like those words roused the ghosts, conjured the dead, and now they're trailing after us with invisible, grasping fingers.
Once we’re alone, I turn to face Kenna, taking in her nervous, slightly too-wide eyes. Everything in me wants to comfort her, but I can’t even let myself touch her, knowing I’ll break her again. “Talk.”
She wraps her arms around herself. “Your father first, or the beach house?”
“My old man.”
“Okay.” She takes a deep breath and tucks her mussed hair back. “I know this sounds nuts, but just stay with me...remember the last time we saw him? You were standing in the doorway while he left with his crew that day?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you recognize those men?”
I frown, searching back through years of memories. “I’m not sure. It was all so fast. Maybe one or two of them. Dad came out pretty fast, brushed past me, told me to stay put.”
“But not the rest.”
“No.”
“Okay. I didn’t think so.” She exhales shakily. “Back then...I think he was being forced into the car, Landon. I think maybe you couldn’t see it past the car door, but I remember a man with a scar on the back of his hand holding his arm tight enough to bunch up his suit, and practically shoving him into that SUV.”
A man with a scar on the back of his hand? I ransack my memory.
“I don’t – fuck, no, I don’t remember anyone like that. But you’re saying you think my old man was kidnapped? That he was a victim?”
She looks up at me with those trusting, liquid eyes that seem to see the best in everyone, even me. “Don’t you think it’s possible? He had a partner, didn’t he? What if he was oblivious to everything until he stumbled on the wrong thing and had to be eliminated?”
“That’s fairy tale bullshit,” I snarl. “Too clean. Convenient. The real world doesn’t work that way, Reb. In reality, it turns out your father’s a piece of shit and there’s nothing you can do to fix it.”
“What hurts your pride more?” Kenna asks softly? “That your father was weak enough to be dirty, or unfortunate enough to be a victim?”
“Enough!” I can’t face this right now.
Can’t face the fact that five years of anger burrowing deep troughs in my heart, my flesh, my bones might've been for nothing. That all this confused hatred and loss and grief and vengeful fury might have gotten all twisted around, snarled on the wrong things.
It’s too much to sort, and I don’t have much time before I have to go back to Milah. Her show starts soon. “Tell me about the beach house.”
“I found tracks,” she blurts out. “The branches were broken in the hedge bordering the trees. I went through and found a man’s tracks in the mud, and a burnt cigarette. There’s a clear path through the trees to the service road...and I found a fresh gas can dumped behind the guard rail. Still had gas in it.”
“Bullshit! That’s too convenient, too.”
Her eyes flare with a spark of anger, red spots of furious color appearing in her cheeks. “You were the one who said it could’ve been more than an accident,” she bites off. “Don’t believe me? Look.”
She fumbles in her pocket and fishes out her phone, then swipes to the photo album and shoves it at me. I take the little phone and thumb through quickly, frowning. Fuck.
Fuck. Muddy footprints, left by what looks like a man's dress shoe. A cigarette.
And I know the area she’s talking about. I could see it, right down to the getaway down the slope and into the waiting car. An arsonist could be in and out in less than ten minutes, fire set and the culprit already miles down the road before it ever took hold.
Somebody burned down my goddamned guest house.
Somebody from Crown Security.
I don’t want to think Dallas would be fucking insane enough to have authorized it, even if he might not have been the one to light the match.
But I don’t want to believe he’s not, either.
There's a hideous hum in my ears. Like reality coming unglued, heaven and hell both laughing in my face, at my ignorance as everything I thought I knew shatters.
I drag a hand over my face, thinking, letting my brain just run wild.
Dallas is here. Where I can keep an eye on him. That’s good.
Can’t prove that it was him. Not yet. I gotta get home, get that cigarette, maybe see if I can get the police to test it for DNA or something.
The gas can, too. Check for prints, unless he was smart enough to wear gloves. I can’t let him know that I suspect anything’s up, not while we’re here. He might just slip off and head back to clean up the evidence he was too overconfident to leave in the first place.
“Landon?”
Kenna’s voice yanks me from my thoughts. She’s watching me, worry drawing her brows together. I frown, shaking my head and reaching for the radio clipped to my belt. “Sorry. Planning. Listen, I’ve got to get with my guys and find Dallas. If you run into him, do not let yourself be alone with him if you can help it.”
“Dallas Reese? Why not?”
“I think he’s the one who set the fire.”
She gasps. “What?! Why would he do that? Why would he set the fire and then rescue me?”
“That’s a damn good question.”
Things are ticking together in my head, falling into place.
A man with a scar on his hand. An old story my dad and Reg Reese used to tell about a camping accident when they were teenagers hits me. How Reg burned his hands, leaving him wearing gloves or hiding them in his pockets most of the time.
I'd never paid attention to his hands before.
My memory of that day is hazy through the fury of a fight I’d had with my old man, something stupid, and I only vaguely remember familiar shapes. Can’t place Reg. Back then it wouldn’t have pinged as out of the ordinary for my father to be leaving with Reg when they were partners. Emergencies and on call bullshit came up all the time.
But if Reg was forcing my father into the car? And Kenna says that’s what she remembers...
Do I trust her?
I have to trust someone for once, don’t I?
But if what she said was right...
Then Reg Reese killed my father.
And his son, Dallas, probably knows it, and he's busy carrying on his father’s dirty, underhanded ways. He was willing to set the beach house on fire without even knowing if Kenna was in it, for fuck's sake.
Meaning he’d probably kill Kenna without a second thought.
White-hot fury burns through me, scouring me hard enough that there’s no doubt about how I feel about her. No doubt that whatever I fuck up, whatever I ruin, I'll always come back to her.
She’s a riptide, constantly pulling me under, and I’ll sink away and drown before I come up for air.
But we’ll sort that out later. I have to get through tonight. Especially when my senses are tingling, and I suddenly think Dallas had ulterior motives for maneuvering his way onto perimeter security for this job.
How far would he go to eliminate the competition?
Shit. Far enough to eliminate the client altogether?
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
I want to stay with Kenna, but right now, Milah’s probably in bigger danger. I capture Kenna’s arm, steering her gently back toward
the dressing room.
“I want you to stay in here,” I say as I push the door open, ignoring James' curious look and Skylar's deadpan stare and Milah’s offended hiss. “James will keep an eye on you. No one in, no one out.”
Kenna squares her shoulders bravely. “I’ll be fine. Help take care of Milah.”
Milah jerks her head up, almost stabbing herself in the eye with an eyeliner pencil. “What do you mean, take care of me? I've already got two babysitters!” she demands. “Are there more creepers outside, or what?”
“Worse,” I say grimly, barely out of earshot. “Just stay here until it’s your turn to go on. If you’re lucky, the only thing you have to worry about is Kenna ripping your falsies off.”
She stares at Kenna. “Your name is Kenna?”
Kenna eyes Milah. “Did you think C-cup was on my birth certificate?”
Skylar looks up from the corner, her cold eyes shining like pale steel. “I like her, boss.”
Milah sniffs. I snort, then hook my arm around Kenna’s waist and drag her closer.
I need her to fortify me. Need to know she’s still mine, even after everything I’ve fucked up. Need her to know the words I can’t say right now, not with Milah pouting at us and Skylar gawking and James right outside the open door. I need a lot of things, and they’re right there in those widening eyes and the way she flushes and clings to my arms and falls against me instead of pulling away.
“Wait for me, Reb,” I murmur, then dip my head and catch her mouth in a kiss.
I want her pliant. I want her submissive. I want her willing, and I want to know I haven’t ruined everything between us, and fuck, yes, I’m greedy for the way she goes soft against me and yields and melts until it’s like holding liquid flame. Her body so hot against mine and her mouth an inferno of giving, hungry sweetness.
She lets me in.
She lets me the hell in, lets me take and taste and claim her, and shows it in the way she gasps my name against my lips. And the way her mouth goes ripe and full and needy against mine tells me I haven’t lost her.
I haven’t lost her, and I still have a chance to save us after I un-fuck everything.
I don’t know how I keep being so stupid with this woman, and so lucky she’ll still be here for me. Drive all this fucking way for me, risking the demons I’m wrestling with.
Risking the demon I am.
I love her.
After tonight, I swear I’m going to show it every way a man possibly can.
I tear back when I can’t breathe, when I can’t hear for the pounding of my bloodstream, hot and wild as whitewater rapids with the need she ignites in me.
“Back soon, babe. Stay here,” I whisper, with one last brush of lips, then make myself tear away and walk from the room before I’m tempted to say fuck the concert, fuck Milah, fuck Dallas, fuck everything. I just want to run away with Kenna somewhere safe.
Too bad that's not a real option.
I have to close down. Have to be cold. Have to be the soldier I used to be to get through this.
First point of order: tell James and Skylar not to let anyone in or out of this room but me and Milah.
Second point of order: find Dallas.
I switch to channel eight on my radio. Dallas' men are on channel four, liaising with mine, but I always keep my own crew on a private channel so we can talk if we need to.
Call it paranoia, or good planning. I call it the smartest thing I could've done, when with a few murmurs I’ve got all my guys on high alert, slowly filtering out to monitor Dallas' men.
* * *
Half an hour later, we’re on the verge of Milah going on stage, and my crew hasn’t spotted anything out of the ordinary.
Dallas is nowhere in sight.
Milah’s fretting in the wings, pacing with high-energy pre-show nerves, her entire body a blinding mess of glitter and her rhinestone-studded pink boots flashing and clicking as she paces. The woman must've done a thousand shows in her life since she blew up the charts, and it's amazing to see her so freaked out.
“Will you hold still?” I growl.
“I can’t,” she hisses. “This is my biggest show ever. Make or break. Have you ever sung in front of ten thousand people? The President of Transylvania is watching – he's a huge fucking fan!”
I bite my tongue, deciding not to tell her Transylvania isn't a real country. More like part of Hungary or Romania or wherever the fuck. Skylar would know since her grandma's from there.
My train of thought running off the track tells me it's not just Milah's nerves.
“It’s too many people,” I say coldly, peering around the curtain at the overflow arena crowd. Any one of them could be working for Dallas, sights set on Milah. “We should call this off.”
“Now?” she halts in her tracks, staring at me. “Are you crazy?”
“I’m worried. Got a bad feeling about this, and it’s my job to protect you.”
“Then do your job and stop letting your hormones go to your head, idiot,” she bites off, folding her arms over her chest and looking at me with a huff. “It’s not hard to tell what's going on: your dick’s pointing you back toward C-cup. Get your brain on me long enough to finish this show, and then you can go home and play house with your little Plain Jane.”
I grind my teeth, but I can’t say anything else. She’s the client. She’s the boss.
“Fine,” I mutter. “But first sign of trouble, you hit the deck. Get low, stay low, and wait for me to come for you. No arguing, Milah. We're talking about your life.”
“Aw, please. Nothing’s going to happen,” she says with a flippant wave, then makes an odd little gulp sound and presses a hand over her stomach. “Except maybe me puking from nerves. Silly, right? I've done this forever.”
But then the announcer is live, voice echoing over the arena, lights going up and sparks showering over the stage. Milah jumps at her name being called, then flashes me the first real smile she’s ever shown, breathless and anxious and showing how young she really is.
“Wish me luck,” she says, then flits her way out to the stage.
“Break a leg,” I mutter reluctantly.
Just hope to hell that doesn’t end up being literal.
17
Curtain Call (Kenna)
God, I’m glad Milah’s gone.
Even if she did that little about-face and showed there’s an actual heart beating underneath her silicone chesticles, the half-hour we spent tensely circling each other in her dressing room wasn’t exactly the most pleasant.
Thank God for Skylar. That strange, small, statue of a woman kept us in line better than a sheepdog with a few strategic looks. The kind that promised fire, brimstone, and somehow, ninjas, if we got into it again.
We needed it, too. Especially after Landon kissed me in front of Milah – and especially after she claimed he loves me, leaving me locked up inside my own spinning head and not really in the mood for her barbed attempts at small talk.
I really need Landon to make up his freaking mind.
If he keeps jerking me around like this, I’m bound to get whiplash.
Right now, though, all I’m in danger of getting is sleepy.
I never thought a high-stakes chase to find Landon would end in me sitting useless and idle in an empty dressing room, drumming my nails glumly, watching the excited crowd on the wall-mounted TV.
I hate feeling useless. I’m not a damsel, I’m not in distress, and I despise sitting around idle when I could be doing something useful, even if it’s just keeping an eye on any persons of interest.
It’s hot in here, too. Sweltering. The only reason the heat isn’t putting me to sleep is because I’m too keyed up with tension, the real reason I'm sweating and dehydrated.
My mouth is a desert. At least if I had to be stashed away for safekeeping, it was in a starlet’s well-stocked dressing room. I drag myself off the plush sofa and over to the snack bar.
I should've known what the selection would loo
k like: fifty different kinds of booze, and only two chilled bottles of mineral water bobbing in a half-melted ice bucket.
As I turn away, I glance over the crumb-littered plate and empty wine glass next to the bucket. It doesn’t really register, at first. Just remnants and lipstick prints on the glass, as well as streaks of something down below the rim, but something is just off enough to make me stop and take a second look.
There's some kind of residue.
Making a trail from the lipstick print on the edge of the glass to the bottom. Some kind of grains, like sugar that didn’t dissolve quite right, though it’s white and looks like it might have been powdery before it got wet.
Weird. Frowning, I pick up the glass, looking at it from multiple angles.
What is this stuff? Sure, I know Landon said Milah was drugged up all the time, but last I checked you didn’t mix powdered cocaine or heroin with your drink and toss them down like that. I've watched enough bad murder-mystery TV to know.
The sound of gasps – shrieks – tears me away from scrutinizing the glass, interrupting the sound of Milah’s voice coming from the television and bringing the music to a discordant halt.
I look up sharply, watching on the screen just in time to see Milah go strangely still mid-performance, her face blanking.
She wavers back and forth, slowly but also unnaturally fast, tottering like she’s about to lose her balance.
Only, it's worse.
A second later, she's crashing down on the stage, while the entire arena erupts into screams.
I stare down at the glass. Up at the stage. Down at the glass again.
Poison.
Holy shit. Why did Landon’s instincts have to be right?
I have to get to him.
It could mean Milah’s life, if the paramedics come and don’t realize there's crap in her system.
I’m trying my phone, dashing for the door, but of course Landon isn’t answering.
Of course he’s not, because I can see him on the TV screen rushing out to help carry Milah off stage, Skylar at his side, and he’s too busy barking into his radio to ever pick up the phone.