Authors: J. Kenner
I don’t want to tell him, because in some small way it feels like I am betraying Damien if I do. Damien Stark is not a man who shows weakness, and that he has shown me is only more proof that he trusts me. I can’t break that trust now. But that leaves me tongue-tied, with no way to explain why I’ve come here.
Maynard, thank God, comes to my rescue.
“He’s tied up in knots, I take it?”
“What happened back there? Why was the case dismissed?”
Maynard looks at me for a moment, and I can see that he is weighing whether or not to tell me.
“Please,” I say. “Charles, I need to know.”
One more moment passes, and then he nods. Just one quick movement of his head, but it seems to change everything. I feel lighter. My breathing comes easier. I lean forward, no longer caring what it is that he’s going to tell me, but simply needing to hear the truth of it.
“The court received photographs and video footage,” Maynard says. “That was what happened after the opening statement. The reason for the in-chambers conference. The images were shown to the prosecution and to the defense. In light of that evidence, the court decided to drop the charges.”
“The court?” I say. “I thought who gets tried was always up to the prosecutor.”
“Prosecutorial discretion is a broad power in the States,” he says. “Not in Germany. The ultimate decision was up to the court, and both the prosecution and the defense presented quick arguments supporting the decision to dismiss.”
I nod, not particularly interested in the legalities of who had the power to let Damien walk. I’m still hung up on the why.
“All right,” I say stiffly. “So tell me what the photographs and videos show.”
Maynard focuses on the papers on the coffee table, then reaches out to idly rearrange them. “Exactly what Damien didn’t want to testify about. Things he wanted to keep private.” He looks up at me. “Don’t ask me to tell you more, Nikki. Just telling you that much pushes ethical boundaries.”
“I see.” The words are hard to force out past the knot of tears that has formed in my throat. I may not know exactly what’s in those pictures, but I get the general idea. And I understand why seeing them would wreck Damien.
I stand, because right then all I want to do is return to him. To hold him and stroke him and tell him that it will all be okay. That nobody else knows.
Then a horrible thought occurs to me. “Will the court release that stuff?”
Maynard shakes his head. “No,” he says firmly. “Damien was given the duplicate set, and the court has ordered the file copy sealed.”
“Good.” I take a step toward the door. “Thank you for telling me.”
“Give him time, Nikki. It was a shock, but this doesn’t really change anything. There wasn’t anything in those photos that wasn’t already in his past.”
I nod, my heart breaking for the boy who had to live through that nightmare. “Thanks,” I say again, then step out into the hall and pull the door closed behind me. I take a deep breath and lean back against the door frame. A shudder cuts through me, and I sag to the ground, my legs no longer able to hold me up. I press my forehead against my knees, wrap my arms around my legs, and cry.
No wonder Damien is wrecked. The one thing in all the world he didn’t want made public came out of the sky like a meteorite and smashed him in the head. And, yeah, the photos are sealed now, but the judges saw them and the lawyers saw them. And someone out there had them. And that someone must still have copies.
Shit.
I need to go to him. I need to hold him and tell him that it will be okay, and I rise to my feet and move slowly to the elevator. I press the “up” arrow to call the elevator to take me back to the suite, then immediately curse my own selfishness.
I
need to go to him?
I
need to hold him? What Damien needs is rest—he as much as told me so himself. What I want—what I need—can wait.
With almost painful brutality, I jam my forefinger against the “down” button, but I don’t want to wait. I need to move, and if I’m not moving toward Damien, I need to be going somewhere else. I shift my stance in the hallway, feeling suddenly at loose ends. At the end of the hall, a lighted sign marks the stairwell. I hurry that direction, then slip off my shoes. I hold them by the heels and run down the three flights of stairs in my bare feet. It feels good—it feels right—and when I reach the bottom of the stairs, I slip my shoes back on and exit the stairwell into the lobby.
I am not sure what I intend to do. It has been such a long day and I am so exhausted that the sun shining through the windows of the hotel seems like an anomaly. But it is still early afternoon on a stunningly beautiful summer day.
I turn toward the entrance, but I’m stopped by the vibration of my phone. I yank it out of my purse expecting Damien.
It’s a text from Ollie. Turn around.
I do. He’s standing behind me, a few feet from the entrance to the bar. He lifts his hand and waves.
Despite myself, I grin and wave back.
He lifts his phone, and I see him typing another message. A second later, my phone buzzes.
Hey, lady. Can I buy you a drink?
I can’t help it—I laugh. A little early, isn’t it? I type, but the message doesn’t send because my phone is dead.
Shit
. I think back and remember that I forgot to plug it in when we got back from the lake last night.
I hold it up so Ollie can see it and then, with an exaggerated gesture, I drop it from two fingers into my purse, as if I’m discarding something useless and slightly gross. Then I start walking toward him. He goes in ahead of me, and when I enter, I find him already sitting at the bar. The bartender comes up to us and slides a martini in front of Ollie and a bourbon on the rocks in front of me.
“Thanks,” I say, speaking both to the bartender and to Ollie. “It’s a little early.”
“Doesn’t feel like it,” he says. “Not today.”
I take a sip of the drink. “No,” I agree. “It doesn’t.”
He stirs the martini with the olive-skewered toothpick. “I’m glad Stark’s in the clear. I am. I swear.”
I study his face, because I do not understand where this is coming from. But it is like a bright shiny sparkle of welcomeness in a shitty day that should have been an incredible one. So I do the only thing I can do—I smile and tell him thank you.
“I figured you’d be locked away celebrating,” he says.
“Damien’s asleep.”
“Must be exhausted,” Ollie says. “I am. It’s been a hell of a wild ride.”
This is small talk, and I can’t stand it. “Do you know?” I demand. “Do you know why they dismissed the charges?’
He tilts his head as he studies me. “Is that really a line you want me to cross?”
I think about it. About how shattered Damien seems. I’ve refused to hear what Ollie’s had to say about Damien in the past, but now I’m afraid that if I don’t know exactly what is in those photos, I can’t help.
“Yes,” I say firmly. “I want to know.”
He exhales loudly. “Oh, hell, Nikki. I don’t know. For once, I can’t tell you a damn thing. I’m sorry.”
The wave of irritation I expect doesn’t come. Instead, a swell of relief washes over me. Whatever is in those photos, I don’t want Ollie to know. “It’s okay,” I say, then close my eyes. “It’s okay.”
He takes a long sip of his martini. “So, you want to go grab a late lunch? Hang out? Make up conversations between the folks at the other tables?”
My smile is tremulous. Part of me wants to say yes—wants to try and mend whatever has gone wrong between us. But the other part . . .
“No,” I say with a shake of my head. “I’m not ready yet.”
The muscles of his face seem to tighten in what might be a flinch. “Sure,” he says. “No problem. We’ll do it when we get home.” He runs his fingertip idly around the rim of his martini glass. “So, have you been talking to Jamie?”
“Not a lot,” I admit. “I’ve been preoccupied.”
“I guess you have. She tell you that fuckwad Raine got her fired from the commercial?”
My shoulders sag. “Shit,” I whisper. “When?”
“Right after you left.”
“She didn’t tell me.” I know that she didn’t want to bother me with it, what with Damien’s trial, but I still feel like I’ve made a major best-friend blunder. “So, how’s she doing?” I ask. “Has she been auditioning? Any other bites?”
“Don’t know. I haven’t seen her since. I’m staying away from temptation.” He doesn’t quite meet my eyes.
“There shouldn’t be temptation,” I say. “Not if Courtney really is the one.”
“Is that really true?” He looks hard at me. “Or is that just a romantic myth?”
“It’s true,” I say, holding an image of Damien tight against my heart. “It’s the truest thing in the world.”
“Maybe you’re right,” he says, and my heart breaks a little because those words shouldn’t make him sad. Not when he’s about to get married.
He shakes his head as if clearing out cobwebs, then polishes off the rest of his drink. “I’m going to go lay on my bed, close my eyes, and feel the earth rotate. How about you?”
I think of Damien. If I go back, I’ll want to touch him, if only to reassure myself that he is there and real. But he needs to sleep, and right now that is the only thing I am capable of giving him.
“I’m going out,” I say. “I’m in need of some retail therapy.”
Chapter Five
I exit the hotel and turn left, then wander aimlessly down this polished street that I have walked so many times with Damien. Like Rodeo Drive and Fifth Avenue, Maximilianstrasse has its own rhythm, its own pace. And like those equally famous streets, it also has the pristine sheen of money. Last week, I held Damien’s hand as we strolled and shopped. This street was like a magical place, banishing the dark gloom of the trial and giving us a few moments of light all wrapped up with a bright, shiny bow of luxury.
Today, I desperately want to return to that state of mind. To let the polished brass door handles and crystal clear windows with ornate displays fill my head so that there is no room for my worries. It’s not working, though, and this street that held fun and fantasy when Damien’s hand was in mine now seems like nothing more than a crush of grasping, gaping people who are pushing and shoving, moving through the world with too much time and too little to do.
Dammit
. I should be celebrating. Hell,
Damien
should be celebrating.
I walk a few blocks, past Hugo Boss and Ralph Lauren and Gucci until I reach a small gallery that Damien and I had popped into on my third day in Munich. The manager, a reedy man with an easy smile, greets me immediately. Considering he’d flirted shamelessly with Damien but essentially ignored me, I’m surprised he recognizes me. “
Fräulein!
It is so good to see you. But why are you not celebrating? And where is Mr. Stark? I was so pleased to see that he has been cleared.”
“Thank you,” I say, and I can’t help but smile at his effusiveness. This is the kind of reaction I’d hoped to see from Damien. “He’s asleep, actually. It’s been an exhausting couple of weeks.”
The manager nods knowingly. “And what can I do for you?”
I had entered on autopilot, but now that I’m here, I realize that I’ve come with a purpose. “You can ship, right?”
“Of course,” he says, and he’s polite and well-trained enough not to scoff at my idiotic question.
“I want to look at those black-and-white prints,” I say, pointing toward the room where Damien and I had spent over an hour gazing at the brilliantly executed photos from a local Munich photographer.
I followed Damien to Germany so quickly that I forgot to bring my own camera, and even though this is hardly a trip that rates a flurry of souvenir snapshots, there have been moments when I regretted not having it. For years, a camera has been my security blanket. First, the Nikon that my sister Ashley gave me during my freshman year of high school. More recently, the digital Leica that Damien presented me in Santa Barbara, an amazing gift that reflected just how well the man understood me—and how much he wanted to please me.
Now, it is Damien I want to please. Though he isn’t comfortable behind the camera, he has excellent taste in the resultant images, and we had both been impressed by the astounding composition and ethereal lighting of this series of photographs.
I pause in front of one that shows the sun descending behind a mountain range. Bands of light seem to shoot out from the image, and though the shadows are deep, every nuance of the stony mountain face can still be discerned. It is beautiful and dark and romantic and edgy. It reminds me of Damien. Of the times that he has held me close and softly whispered that between us, the sun is never going down.
Now I want to give him this photo. I want to hang it in the bedroom of his Malibu house, a reminder of all that is between us. I want us both to know that even in the dark there will always be the light, and that no matter what, we will continue on forever. I want an image that says
I love you
.
“It is a beautiful print,” the manager says from behind me. “And a limited edition.”
“How much?”
He quotes me the price and I come genuinely close to having heart failure. But except for the Lamborghini rental, I have spent none of my million on frivolous things, and besides, this image isn’t frivolous. As I turn once again to look at the photograph, I realize that it feels strangely important, and I know that if I walk away I will regret it every time I look at the walls of the Malibu house and see that it is not there.
I shift again to smile at the manager, but end up looking out the window instead. A woman stands there, the brim of her hat pressed against the glass as if she is trying to peer into the gallery. There’s nothing intrinsically odd about that—after all, most people do look through gallery windows—but there is something about her that looks familiar. And there is something in her stance that suggests that it’s not the photographs she is looking at, but me.
I shiver, suddenly and unreasonably disturbed.
“Fräulein?”
“What? Oh, sorry.” I turn my attention to the manager, but my eyes dart back to the woman. She pulls away from the window and walks on. I exhale with relief, then mentally shake myself. I am being ridiculous. I aim a smile at my companion. “Yes,” I say firmly. “I’ll take it.”