by Knight, JJ
I look up from the magazine. He looks different. Younger.
“You shaved your beard! Wow. I’d almost forgotten what you look like without it. Come here and let me kiss your smooth cheeks.”
He’s still frowning at the coffee grounds. “I had this kitchen spotless. Then you came in here and exploded your mess everywhere.”
I start to laugh.
He ignores me and starts sweeping up the coffee grounds, grumbling about me being the slob.
He looks up at me. “What are you laughing about?” He raises one eyebrow, genuinely mystified.
I get up and wrap my arms around him. “I’m laughing because this is so normal. I didn’t know if it could ever be like this with us, and now… I don’t know.” I look up at him, grinning. “Is it weird that I’m happy to have you give me hell for spilling coffee grounds everywhere?”
His dark brown eyes glow brighter with every word.
“You’re messy,” he says, laying on the accusation while smirking.
“We’re both messy.”
“Love is messy.”
I raise my eyebrows and give him a flirty look. “Are you writing song lyrics?”
He embraces me, holding me tenderly next to the messy counter.
Dylan sings softly, “She needed her fix, and she couldn’t wait. She tore it open, tore open his life, tore open his heart, tore open his eyes.”
“Ouch.” I press my face against his smooth, freshly-shaved neck. “Sounds a bit violent.”
He keeps singing, “She left destruction in her wake, a world of chaos, a sound without noise, a whisper in the desert.”
“Hmm. I like that.” I love it when he puts together words without worrying about rhyme or rhythm. The strange, sweet poetry he sings to me at random is so much more special than anything the public ever hears.
I’m tempted to record him some time, but I wouldn’t want to share.
He keeps singing, humming melodies and dropping in words.
The scent of freshly-brewed coffee, combined with his body next to mine, is homey. Pure happiness. This rented Malibu mansion isn’t our home, but it doesn’t matter. Our home is wherever we both are, together.
After he’s sung for a while, he starts kissing me. He stands at my back, kissing my neck while I tidy the mess on the counter.
When everything’s cleaned up, I ask over my shoulder, “Would you like to join me in the bedroom for a nap?”
He grinds against me from behind. “I thought you had a nap in the garden.”
“Did I?” I laugh. “Well, never mind, then. I didn’t want to go to the bedroom with you anyway.”
He presses into me from behind, pinning me against the counter. He reaches up under my shirt and cups my breasts while he breathes on my neck. “You wouldn’t sleep, anyway.”
I tilt my hips to press myself against him suggestively.
He growls in response and grabs the waistband of my shorts.
In seconds, he’s got my shorts and underwear pulled down, his jeans undone, and he’s pushing into me.
I gasp and lean forward on the kitchen counter. I’m wet and he slides easily, all the way. The sudden desperation I feel surprises me. I truly can’t get enough of him. I want him like this, every minute of the day.
He fills me and beats a rhythm that’s as beautiful as his voice.
He leans forward and pulls my shirt off without breaking rhythm. I gasp and cry out for him to take me harder. I can’t get enough.
He pounds into me, crushing me against the counter and holding onto my shoulders to steady me.
With a gasp, he pulls away and turns me around. He lifts me up to sit on the counter, and then he’s inside me again. We’re facing each other, able to kiss. I wrap my legs around him. This angle is even better, and I start to fall apart.
He slows to murmur in my ear, “Does this remind you of that time in the hospital.”
“Yes.”
He growls, “You’re so hot. You get me so worked up. I can’t even look at you without wanting to yank your clothes off.”
I feel the same way, so I pull his shirt off. His bare chest is tense and gorgeous, his muscles flexing as he thrusts into me.
He’s staring at my chest, hypnotized. I look down and see that I’m still wearing my bra, but he’s pulled the cups down so my breasts are popping out over top. They both shake and jiggle with every thrust.
He nods down and tongues first one nipple, then the other. He watches them shake as he pounds into me.
I start to climax, just watching his face, seeing his eyes on my breasts. I come hard and fast, and he just smiles.
After I’ve come back down to earth, I sigh and lean back, steadying myself on the counter with my hands behind me.
He keeps staring at my breasts, his concentration more intense with every second. He’s powerfully hard inside me. I flex my muscles, gripping him, trying to pull him over the edge, but he’s resisting.
I lean to the side on just one hand and reach up to touch my breast. His eyebrows shoot up and his movements become rough.
I roll my nipple between my fingers and then squeeze my breast. He grunts for me to keep going, so I do.
He pulls out of me and nods for me to lean back on the counter. I lean all the way back and grab both breasts.
He flicks his eyes up to mine, and I invite him to do that thing—that thing I know he likes to do sometimes.
I close my eyes and keep rubbing my breasts. I feel his hot mouth on my nipple, and then he pulls away. I squeeze my eyes shut, waiting for it. His breathing is heavy, labored.
He lets out a soft moan as he comes, and I feel his fluid splash along my stomach and breasts. I reach one hand down between my legs and press down, sending ripples of pleasure through my body as I start to peak again.
He pushes my hand aside and I hear him move, leaning down. He kisses the area between my legs roughly. I cry out in pleasure as his tongue pushes me up into heaven.
Chapter Twelve
A few hours later, we’re sitting in the bath tub together, looking up movie times on his phone and talking about what we’ll order for dinner, when the phone starts to ring.
I squeal and nearly drop the phone into the sudsy water.
He laughs and takes the phone from me. It’s a blocked number, so he answers gruffly, “Who is this?”
As he listens, his expression softens.
“So good to hear from you.” He whispers to me that it’s the investigator, Clay Verity.
I sit up straight in the tub, straining to overhear Clay’s side of the conversation.
Dylan says, “Yes, I understand. We can’t be too careful.”
He looks over at me, his dark eyes giving away nothing.
“Sure,” he says into the phone. “I don’t know that place, but send the address. I’m in Malibu, so I can be there in an hour.”
He finishes up the conversation and tosses the phone onto some towels next to the tub.
I clutch my arms around myself. “He wouldn’t say who over the phone?”
“He doesn’t trust the security of phone lines.” He reaches down into the water and squeezes my knee. “Don’t look so worried. We’re getting to the bottom of this. We’re almost through it now.”
I force a smile onto my face. I really want to believe him, that knowing who was setting us up is going to make things better, not worse.
Chapter Thirteen
We meet Clay Verity at an out-of-the-way diner. The restaurant looks like a truck stop, and everyone in here is busy with their food.
I’m not wearing the wig and glasses, because this isn’t the kind of place celebrities visit.
Nobody looks up when we walk in the door.
Clay is already sitting at a booth, eating a club sandwich and fries. He looks different, away from his cute house and without his wife at his side. His gray hair looks darker, his cheeks almost gaunt.
Before he spots us, he’s just a lone wolf in a grungy diner, keeping an eye
on his surroundings as he eats. He actually reminds me of Dylan.
We sit across from him and say hello.
A waitress comes by, and we quickly order. The clubhouse looks good enough, so we get two of those.
Once we’re alone, Clay Verity pushes a folder of papers across the table, to a spot between me and Dylan.
My hand is shaking as I nudge the folder toward Dylan. I’m too nervous to look. What if it’s someone from Dylan’s past, someone still carrying a grudge over what happened with his wife? What if it’s someone I know?
Clay must see the fear on my face.
“Your boss was telling the truth,” Clay says. “With Ryanna’s help, I traced the emails and messages she got about the publicity job. They didn’t come from Morris Music.”
“Good.” I let out a sigh of relief. I’m so happy it wasn’t my boss after all. I would hug Clay Verity if there wasn’t a big table between us.
Dylan opens the folder and starts looking over the printouts. There’s a lot of data, with times and date stamps, and IP addresses of computers, along with their physical addresses. From where I’m sitting, it’s a jumble of data.
I look up into Clay’s light gray eyes, ready to hear the worst.
“It’s not Morris, but it is someone local,” Clay says. “That’s how we ruled out a whole lot of people from Dylan’s… uh… history.”
“Damn,” Dylan says.
Clay says gruffly, “Dylan, your personal publicist was in on it. You’ll have to fire her, but don’t do it yet. You can use her.”
I gasp and cover my mouth with my hand. “Your publicist? That’s how they knew about all your last-minute gigs, so they could send Ryanna there.” I turn to Clay Verity. “Why would his publicist do this? Just to increase her workload? Her career is over.”
“I know,” Clay says. “But she wasn’t working alone. How did you come by this publicist in the first place?”
Dylan answers, “She was a referral from…” He glares down at the printouts, too angry to speak.
I lean over and look. He’s got his finger underneath one name in particular.
It’s Maggie Clark.
She’s the former vice president of Morris Music, who nearly ruined my life a few times already.
I can’t control my reactions. “Oh my god. Dylan I should have known. Her son came to see me, and I just thought he was trying to get his old job back. I should have known.”
Dylan turns to me. “Nick came to see you? At the house? I’ll kill him.”
“No, not at the house. He came to Morris. It was that Saturday I went dress shopping, and then everything happened, and I forgot all about it. Oh my god, I feel so awful. I should have known the Clarks had something to do with this, and…” I trail off, on the verge of tears. Everything’s my fault.
“Hush,” Dylan says. He puts his arm around me and pulls me toward him on the booth. My jeans squeak on the vinyl seat, which is just funny enough to keep me from freaking out completely.
“Your reaction is normal,” Clay says. “Trust me. I’ve delivered this kind of information countless times, and people always blame themselves. We don’t want to believe someone else would hurt us, so we make excuses for them. We tell ourselves fairy tales, but life isn’t a fairy tale.”
“Tell me about it,” I say coldly, my voice flat and metallic. “That Saturday, someone stole my wedding dress, and I ended up in the hospital.”
“And you’re stronger for it,” Clay says with confidence.
I stare into his wrinkled, weathered face. There’s wisdom there, in his experience, and in his words.
“Clay is right.” Dylan’s still facing me, his voice soothing. “We’ve been through hell, and we survived.”
I nod in agreement. We have survived, though I don’t know how much more hell from Maggie Clark I can take.
“This was bound to happen,” Dylan says. “And it’s partly my fault. All of Maggie’s scheming wouldn’t have amounted to anything, if I hadn’t reacted the way I did.”
Clay interrupts, “You can’t blame yourself.”
“Of course not,” Dylan answers. “But I’ve learned some things about myself recently. I have these patterns, and some of them are destructive. They’re like… cracks in my own security.”
Clay nods, contemplating Dylan’s words. “Cracks that someone can exploit.”
“Exactly,” Dylan says.
I pull my phone out of my purse and toss it onto the table between us.
“Well, guys, I can get a new phone, but I can’t get a new Dylan.”
They both chuckle at this, lightening the dark mood over the table.
The waitress returns, with big plates of food. I don’t know if I can eat, but I’m happy for the opportunity.
After she leaves us alone again, I ask the guys what the next step is. Now that we know Maggie Clark is still causing trouble in our lives, what are we going to do?
How can we settle things with her, for once and for all?
We eat our dinner and talk through our options. Clay Verity isn’t just a great investigator, he’s also cunning at planning new things. He knows how devious people think, and how to use their greed against them.
The sun sets, and we don’t even notice the time flying by.
The waitress keeps bringing us more coffee, and then pie.
Clay Verity makes phone calls and we write notes on a pad of paper he’s brought along.
There’s a shift change, and a new waitress comes to the table to check on us. She looks over our elaborate notes and asks us if we’re planning a bank heist.
Clay looks up at her innocently and says, “We’re writing a screenplay. These are my writing partners. We’ve got a great idea. Gonna sell it for a million dollars.”
She puts her hand on her hip and says, “You and everyone else who eats here, honey.”
“Wanna hear the plot?” he asks.
She backs away slowly. “Can I get you anything else from the kitchen?”
Dylan asks her to bring one each of the flavors of pie we haven’t sampled yet. She runs off happily.
“See how that works?” Clay says. “If you want someone to leave you alone, act like you’re desperate for their attention.”
His words give me an idea for our plan. I sit up straight and flail my hands, barely able to control my excitement. “That’s it! I know exactly what we need to do.”
Chapter Fourteen
The meeting with Clay happened five days ago.
Things have been hectic at Morris since then. Chet and I conducted a secret investigation at work, with Clay Verity helping us. We found an internal rat—Bridget. She had the phone number for Dylan’s publicist on a note on her computer monitor, and she had a ton of other incriminating evidence in her files.
It turns out she had a nephew in the pool of musicians trying to become the new Dylan Wolf. I feel sorry for the kid, but I didn’t feel bad for Bridget when security hauled her out.
Revenge is sweet when it’s simple justice.
Dylan wanted to write a song about Maggie Clark and humiliate her, which made us all laugh. It was good in theory, but we agreed that when you get down to the level of someone like Maggie, you get covered in mud, and then you become more like her.
I don’t want to have all that negativity in my life.
Nan raised me better than that, plus I’ve seen for myself how doing something good causes better ripples than doing something bad. I wouldn’t have my sister Riley back in my life if I’d held onto my anger over the past.
We will have our revenge on Maggie Clark, for all the heartbreak she caused us, but there will be good ripples.
The phone on my desk rings, breaking me out of my plotting and scheming.
“There’s someone here to see you, Miss Rivera,” says the security guard. “He won’t give his name.”
“Is he tall, with dark hair?”
“Yes, and he’s got chunks of metal all over his face. I mean piercings, Miss River
a.”
“Make a visitor badge for him and send him up. For his name, write it as Casper the Unfriendly Goth.”
“Oh,” the guard says. “That’s a good name for him.”
I hang up the phone, practically crying with giggles over Nick Clark seeing the name on his visitor badge.
He appears at my door five minutes later, his face neutral as usual. I smirk at the badge, then compose myself. We have serious business to do. I buzz Chet’s desk over the intercom. “Nick’s here,” I say.
“Five minutes. The lawyers are printing the agreements.”
Nick takes a seat across from me. “This is all happening so fast.” He pulls the visitor chair closer to my desk and glances around the glass walls nervously. Everyone on the executive floor is aware of what’s happening, so I can’t blame Nick for feeling self-conscious.
“Jess,” he says softly. “Once again, from the bottom of my heart, I am so sorry. I had no idea my mother was hacking phones. She can be spiteful… but trying to break up you and Dylan like that… I just can’t apologize enough.”
“I believe you. And you came to warn me, right? Not in so many words, because you didn’t know the whole story, but I appreciate that. It’s something a friend would do.”
The smallest bit of a smile creeps onto his face. “I’m trying to make amends, but it isn’t easy.”
I give him a warm smile. We’ve been talking by phone for the last few days, ever since the investigator got to the bottom of my hacked phone. Nick has been more than helpful, going through his mother’s files for us.
Hacking people’s phones is quite a serious offense, and with Nick’s help, we’ve been able to gather more than enough evidence to prove his mother was behind it.
One key piece of evidence was the nude selfie Dylan sent me. She had her tech guru pull it from my phone, and she sent me a fake news alert about it. I was relieved to find out I hadn’t been hallucinating that night, and even more relieved that the photo hadn’t been sent anywhere else. The funny thing is, a picture like that would probably make Dylan even more famous, but I wouldn’t want it out, because it was private, just for me.