Hollywood Wedding

by Sandra Marton

  Who else could it be, on this night of miracles?

  The bell pealed again, the sound of it as impatient as the race of her pulse.

  “I’m coming,” Eve called, as she flew down the hall. Laughing, she slipped the bolt, undid the chain and threw the door open. “You came back,” she said, “oh, my love…”

  But it wasn’t Zach at all. It was Dex.

  “What a charming greeting, darling. It’s always nice to find a warm welcome.”

  Eve’s heart hammered in her throat. “Get out of here!”

  “Weren’t you waiting for me, darling?” He laughed, low in his throat, and fumes of whiskey inundated her as he whipped a bouquet of blood-red roses from behind his back and presented them with a flourish. “I’m the kind of man you need, Evie. I’ll make you forget your Mr. Landon before the night’s over.”

  Eve moved swiftly, throwing her shoulder against the door at the same time she tried to force it shut. Dex, half a foot taller and many pounds heavier, simply laughed, pushed past her and strolled into the living room.

  Be calm, Eve told herself. Don’t let him see how frightened you are.

  “Dex,” she said. “Dex, listen to me. Leave now, and I’ll forget this happened.”

  “Evie, darling.” She flinched as he reached past her and shut the door. “How can you say that after all the promises you’ve made?”

  “You have a career to protect. A reputation——”

  “Don’t be a child, Evie. Nobody’s ever going to know about this but you and me.”

  “I’ll file charges. I’ll ruin you!”

  “You’ll ruin yourself, you mean. Think about it, Eve. Who’s more important in this town, you or me? Who’s going to believe that Dex Burton would use force to get a woman?”

  “Why are you doing this?” Eve whispered.

  Dex’s eyes turned cold with rage. “Do you have any idea how many people saw you walk out on me tonight?”

  “I didn’t walk out. We talked business, we finished and

  “You got up, you and your precious Mr. Landon, and you left me standing there like a fool. Everybody who’s anybody in this town saw what happened.” Dex pulled off his jacket and tie and dropped them to the floor. “Your choice, Eve. We can do this the easy way or the hard way.”

  A sob broke from Eve’s throat. She made her move, bolting past him in a desperate break for freedom, but Dex was too fast. He caught her, ripped the towel away and swung her into his arms.

  “That’s all right,” he said. “I like it when my ladies give me a little rough and tumble.”

  He bent his head and kissed her. Eve slammed her fists against his shoulders but he laughed, caught her wrists in one hand and kissed her again as he carried her toward the bedroom.

  She tore her hands free and hit him again, her fingers catching in his shirt and ripping it open. Dex dropped her on the bed, held her down with one hand as he shrugged off the torn shirt and undid his trousers. He fell on top of her, caught her head in his hands and held her prisoner as he kissed her.

  “You son of a bitch!”

  The roar of Zach’s voice filled the room. Dex cried out as he was lifted bodily into the air and flung like a rag doll into the corner.

  Eve scrambled to her knees. “Zach. Oh, Zach, thank God you came back. He was——”

  “Give it up, Evie. Your boyfriend knows what’s happening here.”

  Zach swung around. His adrenaline level was so high that he could barely see through the red cloud in front of his eyes. It was only seconds since he’d found Eve’s door ajar. Fear had sent him racing into the apartment, but that fear had turned to blind, senseless fury when he saw the reason the door hadn’t been fully closed.

  Roses were scattered on a floor littered with a woman’s dress and high-heeled sandals. A man’s jacket and tie had been kicked into a corner. Her bra and panties, his torn shirt, made a clear trail of passion straight to this bed. To Eve, naked and flushed. To Dex Burton, on top of her…

  “Zach.”

  He turned and looked at Eve. She had pulled the blanket around herself. Now she stood beside the bed, her eyes on his.

  “He’s lying,” she whispered. “Zach, he was trying to-to…”

  “Come on, man,” Dex said. “Do I look like I need to break down doors to get what I want?” He bent down and retrieved his shirt from the floor. “The babe’s been after this movie deal for weeks. Tonight, I could see she was really upset with my screwing around. So after you left, I thought, well, it’s time to fish or cut bait, you know?” Dex smiled his million-dollar smile. “So I phoned the lady, said I’d made up my mind the part wasn’t for me——”

  “Damn you, Dex!” Eve’s voice trembled as she swung toward Zach. Why wasn’t he saying anything? Why wasn’t he comforting her? “Zach, don’t listen to him. None of that happened. He—he forced his way in here.”

  “And she says, ’Don’t tell me that, Dex. Come on over and we’ll talk about it.’ She’s been at me for weeks, holding out a contract I don’t want with one hand and a bunch of promises with the other, if you know what I mean. So I came over, and she opened the door…” Dex flashed Zach a man-to-man smile. “Hey, man, I’m only human.”

  Zach’s chest was constricted and his breathing was shallow. He’d been in fights before—hell, he’d fought his way through his teens and his first year in the Corps. He knew what it was like to feel adrenaline racing through his body.

  But this was different. His muscles felt wound tight, like old-fashioned clock springs. He could hear the racing beat of his heart, feel the thud of his blood as it pounded through the veins in his temples. He needed to think, to sort out the facts from the fiction, but just now he was incapable of that and he knew it.

  He was a man on the verge of explosion, and he relished it because that was all that might save his sanity.

  He stepped toward Dex, a little smile angling across his mouth.

  “You’re wrong,” he said, almost pleasantly. “You’re not human. You’re an insect.” His arm shot back, flew forward, and his fist slammed into Dex’s handsome, smiling face. “And I’m going to beat the crap out of you.”

  “Zach, no!” Sobbing, Eve threw herself at the two men. She pounded on Zach’s shoulders, on his back, panting for him to stop.

  Finally, when he knew the pain inside him would not go away, even if he mashed Dex to a pulp, Zach’s hands fell to his sides.

  Dex staggered back. There was blood on his face, on his shirt; he cringed as Zach stood over him, his hands on his hips, a look on his face that only a fool would have thought to defy.

  Zach jerked his head toward the door.

  “Get out,” he said. “Get out of here, you scabby piece of maggot meat, and don’t let me see your face ever again!”

  Dex scrambled for the hall. Zach waited until he heard the front door slam shut, and then he turned to Eve.

  His heart turned over. Lord, but she was beautiful. More beautiful than ever before, with her tearstained eyes and trembling lips.

  More beautiful—and, perhaps, more treacherous.

  “Zach,” she whispered. Tears welled in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. “Oh, Zach, it was so awful.”

  He could feel his muscles tense. He wanted to go to her, take her in his arms…

  But he didn’t move. “Tell me what happened here, Eve.”

  “I told you. Dex tried to—he tried to rape me.”

  “How did he get into the apartment?”

  “He rang the bell. I thought it was you and——”

  “How could you think it was me? I’d left. There was no reason to think I was coming back.”

  “Yes, but I thought—I thought…” Eve licked her lips. “I hoped you’d changed your mind,” she whispered. “I was thinking how much I wanted you, how I wished I’d asked you to stay, and just at that moment, the bell rang.”

  “And you opened the door.”

  “Yes.”

  “Without looking? Without as
king who it was?”

  “Zach.” She shook her head, trying to smile through her tears. “I know it was stupid. But I wanted it to be you so badly. I—I wanted—I wanted to tell you that I’m in love with you.”

  Her whispered words echoed in his head. She loved him. She loved him.

  “Zach.” Eve came toward him, still clutching the blanket to her Her beautiful face was lifted, almost in supplication “I know you have questions, but right now—right now, what I need is to have you take me in your arms and hold me. Just hold me, Zach, and tell me——”

  “Tell me something first.” Zach’s voice was cold, almost without inflection. Stop it, an inner voice was saying, stop it before it’s too late…

  “Tell me he was lying. That you didn’t invite him here.”

  He saw Eve’s eyes widen. “But—but I have told you. I just described——”

  “You told me what you want me to believe. What I want is the truth. Look me in the eye and say, ‘Dex lied.’”

  A cold hand seemed to wrap itself around Eve’s heart.

  “You don’t believe me,” she said softly.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Yes.” Her breath caught. “Yes, you did. You want me to convince you that I’m innocent.”

  Zach’s jaw tensed. “You have to admit, it doesn’t look good. You, Dex, the clothing and the roses…”

  “Zach. You can’t believe——”

  Zach spun away from her and slammed his hand against the wall. It was the hand he’d punched Dex with, the knuckles already bruised and hurting, but the ache, at least, cut through the nightmare of what was happening.

  “I don’t know what to believe,” he roared. “Don’t you see? I don’t know what to believe!”

  Silence filled the room. Eve stared at the man she had thought she loved, and then she took a deep breath.

  “I told you once,” she whispered, “I was never going to defend myself to you again.”

  “Eve, dammit——”

  “Goodbye, Zach.”

  Darkness flashed in his eyes “Eve…”

  All her self-possession shattered in that instant. She flew toward him, still clinging to the blanket with one hand, and slammed her fist against his chest, over and over, until, at last, she fell back, sobbing.

  “Get out of here. And don’t ever come back!”

  Zach looked at her. God, he thought, dear God, what have I done?

  A terrible numbness swept over him.

  He had done the right thing. The only thing.

  He turned, made his way to the front door and walked out into the night.

  * * *

  It was amazing, how fast you could wrap things up if you really wanted to.

  Zach phoned Ed Brubeck at home early Saturday morning, explained that he’d been called back to Boston on business.

  “But my end of things is pretty much settled here,” he said briskly, “and Eve’s in charge of the creative stuff anyway, so if you’d just help me out, Ed, meet with her once a week or so to check out Triad’s financial situation and then fax me the pertinent information…”

  Brubeck said it would be no problem.

  “It’s just too bad you have to leave so suddenly,” he said, and Zach hoped he sounded sincere when he said yes, yes, it certainly was.

  He checked out of his hotel and stopped at the office on the way to the airport. He wrote Eve an impersonal memo, detailing some last-minute items he thought might need attention and informing her of the arrangement he’d made with Brubeck.

  He reread it and frowned. There had to be more to say to a woman he’d been in love with…

  Almost. Almost in love with.

  He tossed aside his pencil, left the note on her desk, unsigned, and headed for the airport.

  There were three planes heading east in the next hour. Unfortunately, none was destined for Boston. Two were headed for New York, one for Newark.

  This was no time to be picky, Zach thought grimly, and bought a first-class ticket to Kennedy Airport, in New York.

  “You’ll have to hurry to make your flight, sir,” the ticket agent told him.

  Zach nodded, picked up his carryon bag and sprinted for the gate. Any time but this, he’d have figured on taking advantage of the New York touchdown to phone Grant in Manhattan, suggest they meet for a drink or dinner before he hopped a connecting flight to Logan, but the last thing he wanted right now was to sit down and pretend to be in a good mood.

  How could he do that, after what had happened?

  Zach handed his bag to the smiling flight attendant, put his portable computer on the empty seat beside him and stared blindly out the window.

  To think that he, of all people, had been taken in by a woman like Eve.

  It was infuriating.

  But fury wasn’t what he felt right now. What he felt was—was bruised. Hollow. He felt as if someone had reached inside him and torn out his heart.

  Zach exhaled sharply. What he needed was to get back to the life he’d left behind him. A couple of crisp, New England autumn days and some time at his desk would blow the cobwebs out of his head, and then he’d be fine.

  He’d be perfectly fine.

  * * *

  He jerked awake somewhere between Ohio and New York. The flight attendant was bending over him.

  “Sorry to disturb you, Mr. Landon. But we’re coming into some rough weather. The captain’s asked all passengers to please put on their seat belts. Would you mind, sir?”

  Zach shook his head, asked for a Bloody Mary and helped himself to a long look at the attendant’s legs as she made her way up the cabin.

  They were good legs. Great, actually. She had a nice bottom, too, and probably a face to go with the rest. He hadn’t really noticed.

  But what face would compare to Eve’s? He never had decided what color her eyes really were, if they were the blue of sapphires or of the tropical sea. And her hair. That soft, silken, golden hair…

  A scowl twisted across his face. He snatched up the newspaper lying beside him and buried his nose in it.

  They landed in a driving rain, one that reminded him of the storm that had kept him and Eve trapped in that cabin in the mountains. Dammit, how long was this going to go on? he asked himself angrily as he headed for the Boston shuttle counter. There was no reason for everything to remind him of Eve, no reason to think of her at all.

  The sooner he got home, the better.

  But that, it seemed, would not be happening for a while. The rain was getting worse, and so were the winds accompanying it. The next shuttle for Boston had been canceled; passengers were asked to be patient and wait.

  Be patient? Hell, that was the last thing he felt like being right now. And there was nothing worse than waiting around in an airport. He was hungry, too; an airline’s idea of food and his had never been the same.

  Zach looked at his watch. It was early evening. Grant was probably at home, having an early drink. How long would it take to get into the city? Thirty minutes, maybe? There wouldn’t be much traffic, not on a rainy Sunday. He could pop by his brother’s penthouse, have dinner with Grant and bring him up to date on Triad.

  The business part of Triad, Zach thought with a little frown.

  He started toward a bank of telephones, but all the booths were full. Well, he thought as he hurried toward the terminal exit, there was no reason to phone Grant. Neither he nor Grant nor Cade had ever been sticklers for formality.

  Zach stepped outside, turned his collar up against the rain and signaled a waiting taxi. He got in, gave the driver Grant’s Fifth Avenue address and settled back in his seat.

  He probably wasn’t fit company for anybody. His mood was lousy and his disposition rotten, but who better to let it out on than the brother who’d conned him into going out to California in the first place?

  Besides, that was what family was for, Zach thought.

  For the first time in hours, he smiled.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

&n
bsp; IT HAD almost stopped raining by the time the cab dropped Zach off in front of Grant’s apartment building. The air smelled clean and fresh.

  Everything had improved, except for Zach’s mood.

  Damn, but he felt like such a fool. For a man to fall victim to the same kind of female barracuda not once but twice in his life was humiliating.

  The lobby was empty. There’d always been a doorman on duty, but tonight the only sign of life was a half-empty coffee container and an open copy of the Sunday Daily News.

  Not that it mattered. Months before, Grant had insisted on giving Zach a key to the private elevator that led to the penthouse.

  The elevator doors sighed shut behind him and Zach leaned wearily against the wall as the car began to rise.

  The shuttle flight being canceled hadn’t been so bad. Truth was, he was looking forward to seeing Grant. They’d have a few drinks, talk about life in general and nothing in particular, maybe even have a few laughs—and laughs were certainly what he needed now.

  Anything to keep him from thinking about Eve and how she’d suckered him in.

  The elevator doors slid open on the penthouse foyer. Zach shook his head, smiling to himself as he always did at this first sight of his brother’s home. It was big, and impressive, and almost painfully sterile.

  Well, not as sterile as he’d remembered. There were bright flowers in the white vase that had once held an arrangement of something he’d always privately thought looked like a funeral offering. And there was a new painting on the wall, too, something so vivid it made his eyes water.

  Zach put down his carryon. Man, it was certainly quiet.

  “Grant?” He stepped farther into the apartment. “Mrs. Edison?”

  A black shape came hurtling out of nowhere and threw itself at Zach’s legs.

  “Hey,” he yelled.

  He staggered back, regained his footing, stepped down on something soft and yielding and crashed to the floor. The thing he’d stepped on gave a bloodcurdling yowl, raced over his chest and disappeared into the living room.

  Zach’s heart was pounding. He sat up carefully and stared at the creature that had knocked him down. It was a dog, a mangy-looking mutt with funny ears, and it wasn’t interested in ripping out his throat, it just wanted to lick the chin off his face.