Afterglow

by Cherry Adair

  The room was large enough to hold a hundred wedding guests, but with everyone agitated, vocal, and moving about, it seemed overly crowded with less than half that number this morning. Cole and the redhead wove their way through the masses, making their way along the back wall out of the traffic flow. It took willpower for Rand to pull his gaze from the unidentified woman.

  Hotel security? Another doctor coming to check on the wedding party? He had no idea who she was, other than a distraction he couldn’t afford. It wouldn’t be so distracting if he could get a glimpse of the woman’s face to assure himself she wasn’t who he thought she was.

  “My mother …”

  “Not my fault, baby, I swear. Your sister …”

  “… get tested, what if someone had …”

  Rand lifted his head, his gaze skimming over the complainants and, like a filing to a magnet, back to the redhead just as she turned.

  Ice-green eyes met his straight on.

  Dr. Dakota North.

  Impossible. Improbable. Incontrovertible.

  It was that coppery hair that attracted him three years ago. But it was those pale eyes that had drawn an unsuspecting man like a moth to a flame. Windows to her soul, he’d thought back then. Cool, clear, and as refreshing as looking into a quiet pond. He remembered thinking her skin appeared luminous as if backlit. Glowing and silky smooth—

  Seeing her here made something inside him go still—the quiet before the storm. Then he felt the impact of those familiar peridot-colored eyes like a physical blow to his solar plexus. A bomb of suppressed emotions exploded in his chest and splintered through him like shrapnel.

  Bitch had cojones, showing up here. Now.

  Rand kept his expression impassive, keeping a tight rein on his self-control so he didn’t betray even a flicker of what he was feeling. Too bad that self-control didn’t extend to his thoughts. He maintained eye contact for several more beats, giving her a cold look of inquiry.

  Her chin lifted a fuck-you-right-back fraction of an inch.

  Looking effortlessly hip in a simple white T-shirt tucked into dark jeans, completed with a black blazer fitted to her narrow waist, Dakota was thinner than the last time he’d seen her, her cheeks a little more refined.

  Still so beautiful she made his mouth go dry.

  He cleared his throat, tightening his resolve along with his jaw. He had no idea what the hell she was doing here or where she’d come from, but she could crawl right back.

  She’d tied a mile of glossy red hair up in a just-got-out-of-bed untidy ponytail that hung over one shoulder and curled around her left breast before spilling like magma halfway to her waist. It was much longer than when he … they … than when he’d seen her last, but the color was seared into his memory. Fragrant living fire. Cool and impossibly silky to the touch.

  In spite of, or hell, because of the situation, Rand instantly imagined all that wild red hair spread over her creamy naked body. Spread over his naked body. Even though he hadn’t drunk the mickeyed champagne, watching nothing but sex for hours straight left an imprint on his brain.

  His body remembered hers. The taste. The texture. The heat. It all came rushing back in an unwelcome surge of muscle memory. His skin felt too tight, and he was annoyed to find his heartbeat doing calisthenics.

  What kind of sick joke had put Dr. Dakota North and an aphrodisiac in the same geographical location? Someone up there must be laughing his ass off.

  Rand glanced away. What was she doing here, halfway across the world from Seattle, anyway? Because having Dakota just show up out of the fucking blue was not only annoying as hell, it was a stretch.

  Cole had gone to the airport to pick up Zak Stark’s handpicked Lodestone agent, and this was who he’d brought back? Even though Dakota was a chemist and could probably give him some insight as to what the drug might’ve been, she was a problem Rand didn’t want. They were done. Had been for two years. He wanted nothing to do with her. Not then, not now, not fucking ever again. She’d destroyed his family.

  And nearly destroyed what was left of him.

  He met his assistant’s gaze, telegraphing his feelings without a filter. Cole’s ass was grass for bringing her here.

  He must’ve bumped into her at the airport, or—hell, Rand had no idea why she was standing there as if she had a gold-plated fucking invitation to stay.

  Where was the Lodestone agent? Zak had assured him he was sending his best man for the job. Rand needed the guy now. Judging by the raised voices around him, he couldn’t wait any longer. They were edging toward hysteria, and it was time to take control.

  Dakota’s shoulders stiffened as she started picking up and comprehending snippets of conversation.

  “… make the Kardashian tapes look tame.”

  “Paparazzi?”

  They each had an embarrassing story, each more horrific and humiliating than the last, and everyone in the room started talking louder, determined to be heard. It was definitely time.

  “Quiet!” Yelling “cut” might be more effective. Still, the decibel level dropped as Rand snagged their attention. “Take a seat and calm down. You all had a bad experience, but trying to top one another is counterproductive.” He paused. “Yes. You’ll be getting your phones and cameras back. I’d like to remind you that you all signed nondisclosure agreements, and it’s in everyone’s best interest to keep this situation out of the press. Let’s see what we know and go from there. One at a time.”

  Everyone talked at once.

  “Enough!” His volume barely changed, but this time the group shut the hell up as everyone swiveled to face him. Their expressions ranged from fury to humiliation to fear. If looks could kill, he’d be stone dead.

  And this was eleven hours after the incident.

  “Arguing and pointing fingers isn’t going to help us find the culprit.” Rand kept his voice low and even. “My team has already spoken with each of you once, and we’re going to go through it again now, one story at a time. You might not realize that you saw something that might help us with the investigation. Please be patient and wait for my assistant, Cole, over there.”

  Cole raised his hand.

  “He’ll come to you. Refreshments have been set up to make the wait easier. Thank you for your patience and assistance.

  “And no, Creed,” he added as the award-winning director and godfather to the bride opened his mouth to speak, “we still don’t know if a wedding guest was responsible.” Rand’s people had grilled all of them like cheese sandwiches. And since no one had been allowed to leave the floor, the culprit was still there. They just had to figure out who that was, and/or wait for a blackmail demand.

  “Then obviously it was one of the hires.” Seth Creed’s voice was tight and level. Rand started out as a stuntman, working his way up to stunt coordinator for the director. Creed was a lifelong friend of Rand’s father. Rand was pretty sure they weren’t gay, but they had an interesting relationship that was hard to define. One thing for sure, Rand liked Seth Creed a hell of a lot more than he did his father.

  The director had guided his career from the start. Rand owed him a lot. Seth’s stamp of approval on his security company had garnered clients before Rand earned them on his own. It pissed him off that this was the way he was repaying his friend for standing by him for years.

  He’d always admired the director’s even temperament. Creed didn’t get flustered, never yelled or threw temper tantrums. His calm tones tended to keep people on his sets on an even keel, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t pissed as hell right now. His fair skin was flushed all the way to his receding hairline. His narrowed eyes warned that when he lost it, it was going to be extremely unpleasant for everyone.

  “One of your security people—” Rand raised a brow, and the director subsided on the brocade settee, his expression grim, his eyes telegraphing his frustration. Unlike the others, he’d obviously taken the time to shower, and was dressed in jeans and a long-sleeved, crisply starched blue cotton shirt,
buttoned to the throat. “Or one of the waitstaff,” Creed finished. “You haven’t found anything new?”

  “I would have told you.”

  “It bears repeating,” Brett Sing, royal pain in the ass and stepfather of the groom, stated flatly as he joined them, his voice rising as he cast an unfocused look around the room. He smelled strongly of sweat and booze. He was still wearing his tux pants and jacket, but somewhere along the way had lost his shirt. “Maguire’s shecurity screwed up. Bottom line—he’sh responsible for this deviant getting in here in the first fucking plashe!” Again—or still—inebriated, he shot out a hand to brace himself as he listed to one side, sending a plate of croissants to the floor.

  Rand bet the man would drink until he drowned out the memory of fucking his stepson’s best man on the dais in full view of his family. “And I’m not saying any different,” Rand said, keeping his fingers in the front pockets of his black dress pants in a deceptively calm posture. “Despite the fact that everyone here was run through a background check—twice—I take full responsibility for what happened.” His gaze flickered to Dakota in the back of the room.

  Her eyes narrowed as she too studied the room’s occupants. He wondered what she was making of it all, then reminded himself he’d stopped giving a shit what she thought two years ago.

  It wasn’t nearly long enough.

  With her expertise, she’d probably be of some assistance, he acknowledged. But given her track record, he didn’t trust her. When the chips were down, self-preservation was the name of her game. He looked away and returned to the matter at hand. He and his people had done an exemplary job checking every aspect of the security for this gig. Including, Rand thought as he stared at Creed and the others, the entire guest list, the waitstaff, and his own security people. None of them had been exempt from intense scrutiny. The only person he trusted one hundred percent was himself. Everyone else was subject to suspicion.

  Some, he thought darkly, not glancing at Dakota, more than others. “We have a strong lead,” he briskly told the group. “We’re going over every dotted i and crossed t. Again. I assure you, we will find the person or persons responsible and they’ll be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.” Before they were all blackmailed into bankruptcy, he hoped. And he lost his ass.

  He walked over to what should have been the happy couple seated together on one of the ornate sofas strategically positioned to take in the view. Amanda Bennett, the petite, ethereal-looking bride, was one of Hollywood’s new romantic-comedy superstars.

  Judging by her wet hair, she’d showered before changing from her wedding dress into jeans and a baby-blue T-shirt; her feet were bare. She looked about thirteen. She blushed crimson as she burrowed under her new husband’s beefy, protective arm. Her big blue eyes filled with tears. Not the tears that had won her three Oscars, a Tony, and several Golden Globes. These were the real deal. “My mother …”

  “The doctor’s seen her three times,” Rand assured Amanda gently. Sara Tucker, a successful character actress, was too humiliated to leave her room. None of these people were at fault. Whatever the drug was, it was so powerful no one had been able to resist. It was doubtful if any of the wedding guests had even noticed when Tucker tried to rip the clothes off the nearest waiter and, when he fled, capped her bare breasts with the remnants of the wedding cake as she impaled herself on the groom’s twenty-year-old brother.

  Some people should never be seen naked.

  One aspect of this job that he and his people handled extremely well, thank God, was that not a whiff of the wedding had leaked to the press. That in itself was a fucking minor miracle with two such high-profile stars. Coupled with the nondisclosure agreements that all of the guests signed before attending the wedding, it meant there was still a chance to keep a tight lid on the situation. Everyone was humiliated by what happened. They weren’t going to say a damn word when they returned home. Even if someone wanted the publicity and was willing to go public about the incident, he or she would be ostracized by half of Hollywood for doing so, and it wasn’t worth the risk. Salacious was one thing, but the events at the reception had guaranteed that nobody came out smelling like a rose.

  Ligg and his team had better find something on the images. Walters would spot the bad guy on the hotel video. Or Stratham and Rebik would find the missing waiter… . They just needed a place to start.

  “Your mother’s fine now, sweetheart.” Jason Dunham, groom and action superstar, rubbed his chin on the crown of Amanda’s head as he met Rand’s eyes. Like many of the people in the room, Rand considered Jason a friend. He’d doubled for him in a handful of successful movies in his time, and they’d remained friends even after Rand branched off into his security business.

  “I have faith Rand. His guys will find the person responsible and bring them to justice. And yeah, it was all as embarrassing as shit, but nobody died. We’ll all go home, go about our business, and never mention it again.”

  Amanda nodded from the safety of his embrace. He tightened his arm around his bride as he addressed the room at large. “Nobody can say we didn’t create the most memorable wedding.” He smiled his number-one box office, top-grossing actor smile, but Rand saw the strain around the new groom’s eyes. “And thanks to Rand and his team, we’ve managed to pull it off without the paparazzi getting wind. Of any of it.”

  A soft chorus of voices rose in sour counterpoint to his little speech.

  “… appalling.”

  “I’ll never be able to face my friends again.”

  “No way to keep this quiet once we all go home.”

  “Monica will talk first.”

  The bridesmaid who’d gotten up close and personal with the priest’s genitals bristled at the accusation. “I will not, you skanky bitch!”

  “Nobody talks.” Seth Creed’s voice carried clearly as he rose from the sofa and faced the crowd. “Not only will I sue anyone’s ass who’s stupid enough to want to get a little publicity for themselves, I’ll see that you never work again. This was no one’s fault—we’re all victims, even Maguire Security, so shut the fuck up and listen to Rand.”

  Rand tuned them out as his Bluetooth headset beeped in his ear. Give me a clue. Just one small fucking thing to go on so I can get this unraveled. “Talk.”

  Oddly, with the one, curt word addressed to his caller, the room dropped once again into a thick silence. The tension was palpable, all eyes fixed on him. Unconsciously, Rand’s attention snagged on Dakota. While he knew it was only skin-deep, her beauty made his teeth ache. Her vibrancy assaulted his senses. She’d always been Technicolor to everyone else’s black-and-white. He scowled and turned away, pacing across the room to stare blindly out at the sparkling Mediterranean through the closed French doors.

  “Found our missing waiter,” his section leader, Mark Stratham, informed him, crisp and to the point. “Dead. Hotel room’s been wiped. Ready for the address?”

  “Go.” Rand listened, committing the unfamiliar street address to memory. “Stay put. I’ll be there ASAP.” He disconnected as he turned to address the room at large. “We have a lead. Everyone chill. Don’t leave this floor. And do not, I repeat, do not leave the hotel under any circumstances. And, yes, Mike, the no-outside-calls rule is still in effect.” The teenage brother of the bride had been bugging to get his phone back for hours. Teenage angst was the least of Rand’s problems.

  He cut off the kid. “I don’t care who anyone wants to talk to stateside. If the paparazzi get even a hint of this, everyone is screwed. We don’t know if this was an act of terror, or if there was a specific target or agenda. This floor is secured tighter than Fort Knox. You’re self-sufficient up here with your own chef and staff, and members of my security team are stationed outside everyone’s doors. Nobody in or out until I get back with answers.”

  He scanned the room, seeing the challenge in Creed’s eyes. “All the answers.”

  The director gave an imperceptible nod; his eyes said, Don’t fuck this up,
your ass is on the line.

  Rand addressed Cole. “Make sure everyone has what they need. You.” He pointed at Dakota, who’d pushed away from the wall when he took his call. “Come with me,” he ordered in a flat, measured voice that brooked no argument.

  TWO

  Dakota considered tall, intense, and surly for a heartbeat before following him out of the room. Rand hadn’t snapped his fingers, but his terse command was close enough.

  Lovely. His loathing for her hadn’t diminished in twenty-five months. If anything, it looked as if he hated her even more; she hadn’t thought that possible.

  The last time he’d talked to her, he’d called her some nasty names. She didn’t care what they said about sticks and stones and about words never harming you. She’d rather he’d struck her than have him believe half of what he’d called her and accused her of doing. She probably would’ve recovered faster.

  She straightened her shoulders and kept up with him. Clearly, he hadn’t changed clothes since the wedding. His powerful legs were clad in custom-tailored tuxedo pants, paired with shiny black shoes, and a crisp white shirt with pin tucks down the front. The top two buttons were undone, the tie long gone. Rand never had liked formality, but God, he wore it well. He looked lean, and elegant and sexy enough to have all those little starlets looking at him with lust in their eyes.

  This man, with his grim mouth, cold, intense eyes, and clipped speech was a stranger, and she’d treat him as such. Once, they’d been all heat and flash. Passion and need. Connection with little communication. When they’d been together she’d never seen him either cold or disinterested. Just the opposite.

  Now …

  Now she didn’t know him anymore. Maybe she never had.

  Despite her jacket, Dakota shivered. A primitive instinct for survival screamed for her to run like hell. As far and fast as her legs—or a private jet—could take her. But she wasn’t going to run. Not from Rand Maguire, and not from what was happening here.