Reservation (Preservation Series) (23 page)

“Well, if I knew what was so damn scandalous about your relationship with this broad, I could try and nip this thing in the bud now rather than later, but you’re not giving me anything here.”

My phone buzzed in my pocket, interrupting my train of thought. Not that I knew how to respond to Danny about this, anyway. I wasn’t going to budge on this, but he was probably right. Something had to be done before Amy started running her mouth. Damn, I never wanted to wring Ian’s neck more than I did right at that moment. Amy had already been sniffing around, showing up again in my classroom back when I was still at the university. Now that she was in touch with Ian again, though, her presence and persistence in getting underneath my skin seemed to be increasing. The two of them together were fucking trouble, literally and figuratively, and I knew it the second they showed up to Sam’s that night for dinner.

“Hold on,” I excused myself, turning to check my texts. It was Sam.

Is Kate okay?

I think so, why wouldn’t she be?

You haven’t heard?

Heard what?

Where are you? Can I meet you somewhere?

Out to dinner. Business. Why?

I’m at home. Just come over when you can.

Okay. Give me twenty.

“Everything okay?” Danny asked, looking concerned.

“I don’t know. I have to go see a friend. Have we gone over everything I need to know for this gala? Are we done here?”

“Um, sure. Yeah, I think we’re good. No date. You’re an engaged man now and the world knows it, remember. Oh, and wear a black tie. Make sure you shave.”

“I wouldn’t
bring
a fucking date unless my fiancée were in town, Danny. And I’m not shaving.”

“Uh-huh. Well, just so we’re clear.” He raised a brow and pointed at me, that patronizing look dressing his face. I’d become accustomed to it.

I leaned in and burned him with fierce daggers. “I do not cheat on my fiancée. I don’t care what I’ve done or what you’ve heard, get it through your skull. Do you understand me?”

“Look, you wouldn’t be my first client to—”

“I’m not like your other clients!” I stood and threw some cash down on the table. “I have to go. See you tomorrow.” I left him sitting there in the booth, shaking his head, and I stalked out of the restaurant, sliding my hat and glasses on before dipping into a cab. Thank God I had friends who knew me and believed in me, because if Danny, Ian, Amy, or one more person implied that I was incapable of being faithful to Kate, I was going to fucking explode.

“What’s going on?” I asked Sam the minute she answered her door. The dogs were barking and Jess was sitting at the dining table, nervously munching on her bottom lip.

“Calm down, baby. Take a seat.”

I pulled out a chair next to Jess and sat on the edge, not allowing myself to get too comfy. Chances are I wouldn’t be sitting still too long. The need to pace was itching my skin. “I’m calm.”

Sam exchanged glances with Jess, leaning over the table to slide a newspaper toward me. It was another entertainment publication. “It looks like the stories circulating about Kate and her mom were only the beginning. Now they’re attacking her from all angles, Ry. Trying to say she was screwing those Mark and Eric lowlifes behind your back. Word’s out about the police report—sounds like they dug up info from public records or something—and they’re saying her attack claim was false.”

I clocked the headline on the newspaper and my fist shot out, banging into the dining room table with a loud thud. Sam and Jess jumped. My legs sent my body rocketing upward, and yup, now I was pacing. “You’ve got to be fucking
kidding
me!”

“When you told me what happened to her...what these guys did...God, Ryan, that was bad enough. She doesn’t deserve this.”

“No. No, she doesn’t. Goddamn it!” My hands were making furious work of my hair, tugging at it as I paced. “I’ll kill whoever printed this, I’ll fucking kill them.”

Jess shifted forward in her seat, searching for my eyes. “Can anything be done? Anything at all? Wouldn’t this hold up as slander in court?”

“I don’t know, Jess.” I grabbed my phone, immediately dialing Kate’s number. She’d be in bed by now, but I had to let her know I was on my way. “I really don’t know. But I have to talk to her. Shit, I need to be there with her. I need to book a flight.”

Sam placed a concerned hand on my shoulder, and my pacing bumped it away as I moved. “Ry, you can’t hop on a plane and fly across the world over this, baby.”

“The hell I can’t! This shit will eat her up, Sam. I need to be there for her. I need to be her fucking rock.”

“You
are
her rock, you know that. Slow down and think about this, Ry. I just thought you should know what’s happening so you can talk to her before this shit gets worse. There’s no need to jump on a plane. You have two photo shoots lined up this week, you can’t just take off and—”

“No, you don’t understand. She’s been...distant lately. Not talking to me like she used to. She’s closing up on me. I need to...I just need to
be
there. I need to be the one to dry her tears, to fucking hold her!” Visions of her night tremors waking her assaulted me, reminding me of the time I was in St. Lucia, when I was there to take her in my arms and soothe her. There was nothing like knowing my girl was in pain somewhere across the globe and being unable to comfort her.

Jess stood and joined Sam’s side, both of them working to placate me, but I was already a raving lunatic. I couldn’t control the paparazzi. Couldn’t control my book sales, the outcome of my career, what the media said about me, or what my future held. But right now, there was one thing I
could
do, and that was be there for Kate while she relived the most nightmarish evening of her life through these tabloids, while they turned the tables and accused
her
of being the bad guy. The criminal. As if she were fucking asking for those scumbags to put their hands on her!

I waited for her to answer, my pacing coming to a halt when I heard the line rustle. “Hey baby, I know it’s late, but I need to talk to you for a minute.”

“Uh, is this Ryan?” a voice asked.

“Who the hell is this?”

“Will, Kate’s friend. We met.”

Goosebumps prickled across the back of my neck. “What are you doing answering her phone? Put her on the line. Now.”

“She’s not available. I can take a message if you’d like.”

“No, you will most certainly not take a fucking message, you’ll put her on the phone.”

“I told you, she’s not able to talk right now.”

“Where is she? Tell me right now where she is, or so help me God, you’ll be sorry.”

“Ryan Campbell, I wonder what the press would have to say about you making threats like that?”

“Who do you think you’re talking to?”

“I know exactly who I’m talking to.” He laughed. “I’ve been paying attention to you, Ryan. You’re hard to miss nowadays. You’ve got quite a few dirty little secrets, don’t you?”

“That’s none of your business. Now put my girl on the mother fucking phone before I hop on a plane and pay a personal visit to your doorstep.”

“You have no idea what this life in the limelight is doing to her, do you?”

“Excuse me?”

“The pictures of you and that supermodel, your baby mama, and now these bullshit stories attacking her character? It’s no good for her, man. You’re no good for her.”

“Excuse me?” The balls on this guy! The goosebumps spread, springing up on my arms and legs, prompting me to step farther away from Sam and Jess.

“She cries a lot, you know. She deserves better. Anyway, I’d put her on the phone, but she’s asleep right now. In my bed. I’ll let her know you called.”

The line went dead, right along with my heartbeat.

“Ryan?” Sam’s voice came from behind me. “My God, you’re shaking. What’s going on?” Her fingertips brushed my arm, but I couldn’t blink, couldn’t speak. My hands trembled, my arms shaking in fine tremors. I could vaguely make out Jess’s voice calling out to me from behind, but nothing could bring me back to the surface. Will’s words latched onto me and continued to sink me, deeper and deeper into a deep abyss of betrayal and dread.

Only one thought propelled me forward, sending me surging through Sam’s front door without another word.

Kate was sleeping in another man’s bed right that second, and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it.

11. DIRT

No matter how many flashes blinded me as I made my way to Danny and Neda’s office, nothing could distract me from my furious need to square things away before I hopped on my redeye to the West Indies. I’d booked the flight during my cab ride, vaguely wondering if it was indeed time to hire a personal security guard. Even with my disguise, it was getting harder and harder to fend off the photographers.

My calls to Danny continued to go straight to voicemail, and there was no getting through to Neda, either. My only option was to speak to them face to face and give them a rundown of my change in plans before I left town. I wouldn’t be going to the Simon and Warden gala tomorrow. Punching this Will guy’s lights out and speaking to Kate face-to-face took priority. And while an e-mail to notify Danny and Neda might have sufficed instead of an in-person visit, I was determined to maintain at least some level of professionalism. An e-mail felt too impersonal. I’d blown my chances once before, and I’d be damned if I was going to do it again. No matter how much red blinded my vision at the moment, I knew I owed it to these people to give them a proper excuse.

Responsibility was a must.

I dashed out of the cab toward the office building, sprinting inside until I reached the elevator. Ringing Danny and Neda one more time from the elevator, I finally gave up and shoved my phone in my pocket. Over dinner at Chez Danyele, Danny mentioned he’d be running to the office to take care of some things before heading home for the evening. He had to be here.

The elevator carried me to the 15th floor and I banked a right and entered the office, finding an empty lobby and no receptionist. A low flicker of light caught my eye from the farthest door and I bolted toward it, finding it cracked open. I moved to push it and step inside, stalling when I heard breathy moans echoing from inside. The moans were echoed by masculine groans, with a squeaking sound highlighting the sensual chorus.

Oh dear God, please don’t tell me I’ve walked in on Danny and Neda.

The tips of my shoes clunked the bottom of the door, the squeaking sound came to a stop, a whisper and gasp replacing it. The whisper I recognized: Danny. But the gasp, which was followed by a feminine giggle, rang clearly in my ears. That was not Neda.

The giggle continued, and I couldn’t help myself then.

I pushed the door open, my gaze traveling up from the carpet and landing on Danny’s desk.

“Ryan!” he shouted, his eyes bulging. A long-legged blonde was laid out on his desk in front of him, and Danny was stationed in between her tan legs, grasping her thighs, right in the middle of nailing her. I noticed a picture of Neda on the corner of his desk near the telephone. My stomach turned. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Suddenly, I saw more than red. I was enraged. “I think the question is what the hell are
you
doing here?”

“This is none of your business!” He jumped back and started zipping up his pants, rushing to fasten his shirt buttons next.

The blonde woman turned to face me, her chin tilting up over her shoulder, and I stumbled back when I registered her face. “Melanie?”

She giggled again, making no move to cover herself or even close her legs. “Ryan. I did say we’d be seeing much more of each other, although I admit I didn’t expect this.”

Danny smoothed his red goatee, running a hand over it nervously while moving to toss Melanie her clothes. She smiled and rolled her eyes, turning back around to slip down from the desk and into her dress. “Get out, Melanie. We need a minute.”

She secured the zip on her dress and her smile turned into a scowl, her fingers extending to jab him harshly in the chest. “Talk to me like that, and we’ll see what that pretty wife of yours has to say about all of the wicked little things you’ve been doing to me.”

Danny glared at her, his nostrils flaring. “I said,
out
.”

Melanie turned and stalked away from him, fluffing her long, loose locks as she passed by me and out the office door. The slam she left behind reverberated throughout the room and I tensed in complete disbelief of what I’d just witnessed, and worse, the conversation I was about to have.

“You of all people,” I sneered, my jaw ticking as I worked to restrain my anger.

“Don’t even think about preaching to me, Ryan.” He turned for the bar and poured himself two fingers of bourbon, then gulped at it between uneven breaths.

“All the shit you’ve been giving me, accusing me of being unfaithful, implying I’m still a cheating bastard, and here you are, screwing Neda over with that bimbo.”