by Stacia Stone
I pushed open the doors at the back of the massive ballroom and was immediately confronted with a bustling scene. Dozens of people dressed in starched uniforms — made up of tuxedo shirts, black slacks, and bowties — hurried around the room.
Squeezing between two large, silver tray caddies, I approached a guy who looked around my age. He was leaning against a wall divider and seemed to be the only one who wasn’t in a hurry.
“Excuse me,” I said.
The guy turned to me with a devastating smile. “You’re excused, beautiful.”
I cleared my throat, suddenly nervous. This guy was the kind of hot that was dangerous, like he would rob a liquor store right before giving you the best sex of your life. He had dark hair and darker eyes — a gypsy who would come in the dead of night and steal you away. I was both attracted and repelled.
“Do you know where I can find Zach?” I said, ignoring the compliment. “He’s supposed to get me a uniform.”
He gave me a long once-over that made me want to slap his face. “Depends on who’s asking, sweetheart.”
“My name is Dalea. Trina sent me.”
He took a step towards me. I fought the urge to back away as he slowly circled me. “What will you give me if I tell you?”
I suppressed a shiver — of fear or something else, I couldn’t say. “Forget it. I’ll ask someone else.”
He put a restraining hand on my arm and the heat of his touch was practically burning. Was I reacting to him, or just desperate for a man’s touch on my skin?
“Relax, baby girl. I’m Zach.”
“Great.” My voice dripped with sarcasm and I yanked my arm away. “The woman out there said you could get me a uniform.”
“You mean Elsie?” He laughed and the sound was dark and sensual. “I’m surprised she stopped yelling at her assistant long enough to even talk to you.”
I had to laugh at that. “Yeah, I feel sorry for whoever is on the other side of that headset.”
“So, you need a uniform right?”
“Yes, please.”
Zach surveyed me, his gaze lingering on my hips before moving up to my chest. I was about to say something indignant, when he spoke again. “Size four, right?”
“Um, yeah. How did you know that?”
“It’s a gift.” Zach winked at me. “I was probably a gay fashion designer in a past life.”
Everything about him was so overwhelmingly masculine and physically dominant that I couldn’t quite imagine that. I must have made some sort of disbelieving sound because he grinned at me.
“Or I just spend too much time looking at woman’s bodies.”
“That, I believe.”
The look he gave me was so frankly sexual that the breath caught in my throat.
Cheeks flaming, I reached around to open my backpack and searched for something to break the sensual spell he tried to cast. “I have my own pants.”
He stuck his hands in his pockets and gave me a crooked smile. “Changing area is behind those curtains. The shirts are on a rack to the right, just find your size. Hurry back, because we’re still prepping plates.”
“Okay…thanks.”
“One more thing,” he said, before I could walk away. “A bunch of us are going out for drinks when this thing is done. You should come.”
“I’ll think about it.”
I walked away while I still had the chance, my heart beating hard.
It wasn’t until I was back in the dressing area and flipping hurriedly through the racks of starched tuxedo shirts, that I realized something.
While talking to Zach and for the first time since I left the Dollhouse, I hadn’t been thinking about Julian.
Chapter Four
I’d forgotten how much easier it was to work a catering gig than to actually wait tables in a restaurant. All I had to do was say “chicken or fish” in as unobtrusive a way as possible and remember to serve from the left. I might as well have been a brain-dead monkey in a penguin suit.
“Is this free-range chicken?” A socialite dripping in gaudy jewelry and makeup that was too heavy asked me.
“Of course, miss,” I said, though for all I knew it was the same chicken that you could buy at the Fresh Market in Englewood. “Would you like pepper?”
Once dinner was served, most of the waitstaff returned behind the doors with just a few staying in the ballroom to keep drinks refilled.
Zach appeared at my shoulder. “We have a few minutes. Come grab a smoke.”
I didn’t smoke but I’d been working in food service long enough to recognize a free break when I saw one. I followed him out the back door, which was propped open with a brick, where a group of people were sitting on milk crates.
“This is Dalea,” Zach said, his hand touching my back in a way that was too possessive.
I shook his hand off and stepped away a little. “Hi.”
If he noticed me putting additional space between us, Zach ignored it. “Dalea, this is Collette, Jason, Molly and Aeryn.”
Aeryn, a short, redheaded girl with a crooked smile, leaned forward and held out a pack of cigarettes. “Want a smoke?”
I hesitated for a beat too long and one of the girls – Collette, I think – broke in with a cheeky grin. “We have something stronger, if you want that.”
“No, thank you.” I had never done any drugs, not even during the year and a half that I spent in college. I wasn’t about to start now with a bunch of perfect strangers.
I took a seat on an egg crate and Zach took the one next to me, close enough that his knee brushed my thigh. I deliberately picked up the crate and scooted it to the side, pretending not to see his knowing smile.
“So what’s your deal, new girl?” Jason, the only other guy, asked me as he lit his cigarette. “We don’t see many new faces. What brings you uptown?”
“I normally work at a diner, but I needed some extra cash. A girl that I used to go to school with told me they needed more waiters for tonight.” I shrugged uncomfortably, not happy with being the center of attention. “So here I am.”
“What girl?” Aeryn leaned forward. “Someone from catering?”
“No. My friend, Trina, works for Berkmore Global – I guess they’re hosting this thing, or something.”
Zach’s eyebrows disappeared into the fringe of hair that hung over his forehead. “I get it. You run with educated bitches.”
“Trina is not a bitch,” I said, affronted.
“But I bet she liked being the one holding the handout.”
“It’s not like that.” Trina and I weren’t close enough for me to feel especially moved to defend her, but I refused to let Zach have the satisfaction of thinking he knew anything about me. “We were roommates in college.
He surveyed me with a look that was too knowing, like he already had me all figured out. “Well, that explains it.”
I’d never been prone to violence but I really wanted to slap the satisfied smirk off of his face. “Explains what?”
“Why you’ve got I’m-too-good-for-this written all over your face.”
“I never actually graduated from college,” I said, rolling my eyes. What a jerk. “If that makes you feel any better.”
“It does actually.” His tone had turned from playful to pointed. “I guess that’s why you’re slumming it down here with us instead of sitting at one of those tables inside where you belong.”
Aeryn broke in with an uncomfortable laugh. “Whoa, guys. Play nice.”
“It’s fine, I’m heading back inside.” I gave Zach my haughtiest look as I stood up from the milk crate. “And just for the record, I’m not slumming it anywhere. I’m too good for you because you’re an asshole.”
Jason’s low whistle carried me through the propped open door. “Nice one.”
I couldn’t believe the nerve of that guy. Maybe insulting a girl within the first ten minutes of meeting her was a trick that worked on some girls, but I definitely was not the one to put up with it.
&nbs
p; Nerves frayed, I joined the group of waiters heading back into the ballroom to pick up the dinner plates. I was at the point of swearing off men completely – wanting them, talking to them, acknowledging that they existed.
As I picked up a plate from a man who hadn’t even bothered to look at me when he demanded that his water be refilled before I cleared anymore dishes, I heard the feedback of a microphone going live.
I looked up to see a beautiful woman on a raised stage at the back of the ballroom. She wore a floor-length red dress that shimmered underneath the twinkling lights of the chandelier. When she spoke her voice was deep and resonant like chamber music.
“Thank you all so much for coming tonight. My name is Adriana Hathaway, and I am the chairwoman of the Chicago Children’s Hospital Foundation. As you know, all of the proceeds from tonight’s dinner and silent auction are going to support the construction of the Berkmore Cancer Wing at the Chicago Children’s Hospital.”
The woman waited through the round of polite applause before continuing. “Now, I’d like to introduce the man who is responsible for putting together this wonderful evening. Since becoming CEO of Berkmore Global only two years ago, he has been a pioneer for corporate outreach in this city and is the recipient of this year’s Mayoral Prize for Excellence in Giving. I am very pleased to introduce the man who has done so much – Julian Berkmore-Hathaway.”
The plate in my hand dropped to the floor as my fingers went limp. The sound of it shattering was covered by the standing ovation as he took the stage. No one at the table I was clearing spared me a second glance as they rose from their seats.
But he must have heard. His gaze found me in the crowd, electric green eyes bright as headlights on a country road. A shock like electricity ran through me. I ducked down behind the standing crowd ostensibly to pick up the pieces of broken china.
My face flamed and I knew I looked like a ripe cherry tomato. I wasn’t ever supposed to see him again, that was the deal. It was supposed to be like he had never existed. I was supposed to be able to pretend that the Dollhouse was a dream – that it had no place in my reality.
But my eyes didn’t lie. Standing up on that stage was the man that had lit my body on fire and consumed my every thought with visions of his face. My patron.
My Julian.
Chapter Five
I pushed blindly through the crowd of people, weaving around tables with no conscious idea of what I was doing or where I was going. I just wanted to get away as fast as I possibly could.
Too overcome to pay attention to what I was doing, I looked up and realized I was in an unfamiliar hallway. The ballroom was right next to the lobby but I must have turned left when I was supposed to turn right.
An exit sign was lit up like a lifeline at the end of the hallway. If I could just make it outside, it would be easy to find my way from there.
I pushed through the heavy door and ended up in a dark stairwell.
My feet took the steps as quickly as they could. My heart beat loudly enough that I swore it echoed off of the cinderblock walls and surrounded me.
I reached the bottom of the stairs out of breath as relief bloomed in me. But the door opened before I reached it and an imposing figure blocked my path. The door — my only escape! — slammed shut with a sound loud enough to wake the dead.
It was too late to slow my trajectory and I slammed bodily into whoever had opened the door. Powerful arms came up to steady me as hands the size of dinner plates tightened on my arms in a grip too strong to fight.
I looked up into the eyes of Julian Berkmore-Sullivan.
Before I could react, he turned with me and shoved me against the door, hard enough that it hurt. The back of my head hit the steel with a hard thunk and I saw stars.
It was an uncontrollable instinct to fight. We grappled for a moment, as I tried in vain to push him away long enough to get the door open. But he easily overpowered me and pinned both of my arms to my side with the strength of his one.
I opened my mouth — to beg or scream, I hadn’t quite figured out which— but his free hand moved to cover my mouth and pressed down hard.
“Don’t you dare,” he hissed.
“Fuck you.” I shouted against his hand, but the sound was muffled and came out sounding more like Fugh ewe!
“What are you doing here?” The look in his eyes was cold enough to chill me to the bone. “Have you been following me?”
I raised my eyebrows at him and he must have realized that I couldn’t exactly answer him with his hand covering my mouth. He pulled it back, but just far enough that I could speak, as if he didn’t trust me not to scream.
“I haven’t been following you — I haven’t even been thinking about you!” The last bit was a lie, of course, but there was no reason to tell him that. “You’re the one who has me trapped in the stairwell, remember.”
“How did you know I’d be here?” He glared into my eyes, as if willing me to tell him the truth.
“I didn’t,” I said indignantly, annoyed that he’d peg me so quickly for some sort of insane stalker. “I’m just working.”
“You don’t work here.” The arm that had me pinned tightened, stealing the breath from me. “You work at some shit diner on the South side.”
That surprised me, the Dollhouse must have given him considerably more information than they ever gave me. I guessed that made sense, he was the one who had paid for the privilege after all. “A friend of mine works for Berkmore and got me the job for tonight to work the benefit.”
His eyes narrowed. “What’s your friend’s name?”
“None of your business.” No way was I throwing Trina under the bus like that, Julian looked like he was out for blood.
“Tell me.”
“No!” Darkness brewed in his expression and I could tell immediately that Julian did not like being told no. “Look this is all just an awful coincidence. Let me go, I’ll leave and we can pretend that this never happened.”
An emotion that I couldn’t place moved behind his eyes, but he didn’t let me go.
“You left the Dollhouse — tore up your contract. Tell me why.”
I hadn’t prepared for this, not for seeing him again and certainly not for having to explain myself. Why did he want to know anyway? The Dollhouse was full of women who would be desperate to have him. Why spare me a second thought?
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Oh, but it does.”
He moved closer until his lips just barely brushed the shell of my ear when he spoke. Something between us had changed. The air was no longer charged with his anger, but had turned seductive.
The fear remained because of course I was still scared. I knew too well what he could do to me.
“If you don’t tell me then I won’t let you go.”
“Why are you doing this?” My voice came hoarse and whisper-soft.
“Because I can.”
His hair was gelled to the side, not a single strand out of place. The expensive tuxedo he wore was expertly tailored. But despite the dignified appearance, something uncontrolled simmered underneath the surface. He was taut like a wire that was about to snap.
I didn’t want to answer him, didn’t want to give him that power over me. “I don’t have to tell you anything.”
“But you will.”
“Please—“ I didn’t know what I started to say, but the words died in my throat.
The arm that was pressed hard at my waist moved upward. His fingers gently stroked down my cheek and I shuddered.
“Tell me to stop.” The pad of his thumb gently brushed across my lower lip. “You walked away from me once, do it again if that’s what you want.”
Julian released me then, hands falling away and leaving me cold. He even stepped away from the door and into the shadowed corner beyond it. Half of his face was cast in darkness, like a man wearing half of a mask.
He beckoned toward the door with a sardonic wave of his hand. “Go.”
But
I didn’t — couldn’t — move so much as an inch. The force of him was like a gravitational pull and I was caught in its path.
I remember how I awful I had felt for the last few weeks. The memory of his hands on my skin burned like the slice of a knife. The memory had refused to fade even with all of our time apart.
It was wrong and I knew it. He was married. And he was Julian Berkmore-Hathaway. The gulf between us couldn’t be any wider if I dropped an ocean into it.