“Being on pirate watch as a hired mercenary?” Zach ran his palms down his face again. “Maaan . . .”
“He’ll be away from me and the boys just like before, but only worse, maybe . . . it’s not like he’s with the U.S. government, this is him going solo up against what ever is out there. I’d rather see him reenlist, if he was going to do all of that.”
“Let me talk to him,” Zach said, chewing harder on his toothpick. “I’m home for a coupla weeks, and if he gives me the logistics on the Anita Brown job, then maybe I can fill in for him. This way, he’ll still bring home the bacon, and that’ll give him a little time to regroup without having to do something rash. I don’t need a cut, I’m cool.”
“I couldn’t ask you to do anything like that, and if he thought I—”
“You didn’t ask me to do anything; I’m telling you what I’m okay with.” Zach smiled and headed out of the kitchen. “Besides I’m single . . . what’s not to love— being on tour with a bunch of video vixens, making sure ardent fans stay back,” he shrugged. “Piece of cake.”
CHAPTER 4
ANITA SECURING HER towel breezed past her stylist with a bright smile while she ignored his fussing. “Can I put on a robe at least, before you start?”
“Don’t try to act like I’m the one who is getting on your nerves, boo. I’m not early; you’re late. You know I’m punctual.” He waved the mail he’d collected off the small crescent table in the hallway at her in a mock threat. “Look at you— you’re a complete mess. You need somebody to take care of you.” He tossed her mail on the glass coffee table and made a little ticking sound when he saw her wet footprints against the hardwood floors. “This makes no sense, darling,” he added, singsonging the words behind her.
“I’ll get a mop, and then I’m all yours.”
“Oh, puh-lease.” He walked into the kitchen and carefully set down the Ferragamo men’s shoe box and gently laid the matching suit bag across her kitchen stool to hunt for the mop.
“See, did that take long?” she asked, laughing when Javier twisted his mouth into a combination pout and scowl. She took the mop from him and quickly dabbed the floors and returned. “There.”
“Humph,” he exclaimed and then put away the mop in her small utility closet. “I know you’d better keep NextStarz’s floors clean and everything else. How long they gonna keep you here, boo?”
She shrugged and let out a sigh. “I only got put up here until the police find this stalker . . . I dunno. I doubt they’ll let me stay beyond the tour. They’re spending a lot of money on relaunching my career.”
“After your father and your stupid brothers tried to tank it, but you didn’t hear that from me.”
Anita nodded. “I so do not want to talk about them now.”
“You’re right— tonight it’s all about you, honey. So, let me wash those troubles out of your hair.”
“I love you, Javier,” she said, going to him and giving him a big hug.
He hugged her back and then held her away from him. “The pink silk looks good on you, girl— you been losing weight? But don’t you get too skinny on us.”
“See, why you always have to say something nice and then—”
“Because I’m nosy,” he said, swishing away from her to go hold up the shoes. “Tell me, who for the love of all that is manly, is taking you to the awards tonight wearing a size fifteen shoe, girl!”
She laughed so hard that she fell against the granite counter and it took her minutes to recover. “No, I don’t have a date— this is for my limo driver, but I had the same reaction.”
“Oh, now that’s sad,” Javier said, sucking his teeth. “Your limo driver.” He shook his head and put a hand on one hip. “Girl, you’re supposed to have a limo driver, a security bodyguard team, and a date, and not necessarily in that order. Who is going to strut you down the red carpet? You need a real publicist and to get away from Jonathan Evans’s organization. That man is still playing you.”
“That’s the best I could do on short notice,” she said, trying not to lose her smile. “I got the security coming for the tour . . . as well as I got NextStarz to honor their contract to provide me emergency housing,” she added, sweeping her arms around the kitchen. “Jonathan would have been my date but he liked teenage groupies, soooo, what do you want?”
“Well, is this limo man fine at least? I mean, since you’re dressing him up?
Anita winked. “Make me beautiful and I’ll tell you all about him.”
ZACH POKED HIS head into the bedroom, needing to talk to Lowell, but not wanting to disturb his sleep. His gaze scanned the darkened room, and fixed on the prosthetic leg that was resting against the overstuffed chair in the far corner of the room. Memories turned a blade in his gut— nothing would ever erase that day from his mind.
Sleep deprivation had made him oblivious to a camouflaged improvised explosive device. Lowell had seen the IED in time to pull him back, shoving him far enough away from the deadly shrapnel it contained. But the vibration of his falling triggered it just as Lowell dove away, costing him a leg. He owed Lowell more than his life . . . he owed him the quality of life. How did one even begin to repay a debt so deep?
“Hey, man,” Zach said, tapping on the frame of the bedroom door as Lowell stirred. Force of habit wouldn’t allow him to walk up on a sleeping, combat-ready soldier without announcing himself— it was a good way to get snuffed.
Lowell opened his eyes and tried to smile. “Glad you brought your sorry ass to the Big Apple?”
Zach tried to smile and entered the room but didn’t put on the light. The shades were drawn but he could still see. “Came to check on you.”
“There goes Anne Marie running off her mouth again. She tipped you off before I called you, right? Sounds like too much of a coincidence that you just so happened to be in the city when I went down.” Lowell closed his eyes.
Zachary stood very, very still. The tone his friend had used when referring to his wife concerned him. The stench in the room was definitely that of a sick man . . . vomit, sweat, and a lot of self-pity. Lowell’s normal caramel skin tone was off and his eyes almost seemed jaundiced. He’d lost weight since the last time he’d seen him, but Lowell also seemed puffy in the face and hands.
“She meant no harm,” Zach said carefully. He shrugged, trying to seem nonchalant and then leaned against the wall, not wanting to go near the chair with the prosthetic. “She just said you had the flu— hey. No biggie.”
He watched his friend relax a little, but that didn’t mitigate his concern for Lowell.
“All right . . . Thanks, man. I just don’t like Anne Marie trying to treat me like I’m an invalid or something.” Lowell’s tone was suspicious, and his gaze was hard and unrelenting. “Everything go okay with the driving job today?”
“It was easy, no sweat. I’m ready for tonight— just gotta shower and change, then I’m out. But, uh, listen . . . I have to thank you. I’m getting to see a beautiful lady do her thing on stage . . . getting a backstage pass. Wouldn’t be a bad way to spend my leave keeping her safe.”
Zach knew the ruse was lame, but he needed a way to open the discussion with his very defensive friend. For a moment he didn’t think Lowell would buy it, and then all of a sudden his buddy laughed.
“Are you serious?” Lowell shook his head and simply closed his eyes again, wheezing.
“What?” Zach said, joking around. “Have you seen that woman? She’s seriously fine, man.”
“Yeah, I’ve seen her,” Lowell said without opening his eyes. “But you know what the B stands for.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard,” Zach said, forcing himself to laugh. “Still, you can’t believe everything you hear in the tabloids.”
“Fortunately I don’t have to read the tabloids . . . I’ve got a contract to bodyguard her at the awards event and don’t have another guy that I can just pull off a standing job. These stars are so fickle, I can’t afford to jeopardize a steady corporate contract
and then have her decide on a whim to go back to having her dumb-and-dumber brothers being her bouncers. That’s why I’ve gotta get up and outta this bed.” Lowell struggled to sit up but then summarily gave up the fight. “I feel like holy hell, though . . . who gets the flu in May?”
“You know, if you give that poor woman what you’ve got and she can’t perform, she might sue you.” Zach folded his arms over his chest. “I damned sure would.”
“I hadn’t even thought about that— and she’s just the type who would do it, too, man.”
“Why don’t you have a stand-in go . . . one of the guys from the—”
“Never happen,” Lowell said, cutting him off and coughing. “Those guys follow orders well enough, but aren’t good at strategy, making logistical corrections and doing maneuvers on the fly, or anticipating best-case, worst-case scenarios. They’ve got good enough resumes in security, but not up to Delta Force standards, you know what I mean.”
“I hear you,” Zach said, nodding. “That’s why we do what we do.”
“Yeah. That’s why I’ve gotta get out of this bed so I can feed my family.”
“I thought we were boys . . . best friends, man,” Zach said with a fake frown.
“We are— what are you talking about?”
“You have a gig with Queen B . . . you have the flu . . . and you can’t think of another soul who might be able to step in and give you an assist? Okay, man. I’m hurt, but I’ll let it slide.”
“Oh, hey, Zach . . . I thought you wouldn’t be interested and were just joking around. I know you said you’d go, but I really wasn’t going to impose on you after this morning. Besides I know how you hate chaos, plus I didn’t know your schedule. Hell, I didn’t even know you were stateside and available until we talked.”
“I’m on leave for six weeks.” Zach folded his arms and stared down at Lowell and then smiled. “And what did I tell you on the phone when you called me back this afternoon?”
“Anne Marie told you about the ten-day tour, didn’t she, asshole?” Lowell chuckled.
“That’s on a need-to-know basis, soldier,” Zach said, smiling wider.
“My wife probably poisoned me to keep me from going overseas alone with that fine babe anyway.”
“Wouldn’t blame her,” Zach said, chuckling. “So, let me take the weight.”
“If you do this, your cut—”
“Hey, hey . . . don’t insult me, all right?” Zach paced away from the bed. “I get an all-expenses-paid, first-class, backstage pass with Queen B and you want to pay me? Be serious.”
“Oh, yeah, I forgot, this is a vacation in paradise for the consummate bachelor. But you’re giving up your leave and you’ll definitely be working. This chick is high maintenance—”
“Aren’t they all?”
“True, when you put it that way.” Lowell smiled and nodded toward the chair across the room. “Grab a seat; throw that phony leg on the floor. If you’re gonna do recognizance for me, then at least you need to know the basic terrain.” He cocked his head to the side with a wider grin. “By the way, brother, when are you gonna finally give up the lone-wolf routine and come to work with me?”
HE STOOD IN the large hallway in front of Anita Brown’s door with a suit bag slung over his shoulder, waiting. He’d called up in advance and the doorman had known to let him in. But this whole stalker business deeply concerned him. It could be an old boyfriend, disgruntled ex-employee, pissed off family member, or just a general regulation nutcase. There were so many variables that he didn’t like. Although he wouldn’t upset her tonight, if he was going to be her primary bodyguard during her tour, she’d have to sit down with him and revisit everything she’d given and told the police.
And if she didn’t open the door in the next thirty seconds . . .
“Well, hello,” her stylist said, looking him up and down. “I have your tux and I’m still working on ’Nita. Can’t rush beauty— but please come in.”
“Thank you, sir,” Zach said, remaining formal.
“Uhmmmph, uhmmmph, uhmmmph— and you’re her driver?”
“Yes, sir,” Zachary said, keeping everything in his tone strictly military as he followed the slender male into Anita’s apartment.
“Well, my name is Javier. That’s French, by way of Haiti,” he said over his shoulder with a smile. “Your things are in a guest room in the back.”
Zach followed him without a word and stepped into the empty room. As soon as he closed the door he heard Javier’s voice ring down the hall.
“Hurry up, ’Nita— GI Joe is here!”
A FULL TWENTY additional minutes had passed and he was determined not to pace. The endless windows gave him something to do as he looked out at the park and the little ant-like dots of people on the sidewalk. He ran the entrance and exit sequences through his mind that Lowell had given him, glad that there was a truck delivery entrance in back of the building as well as an underground lot so he could get Anita past all the fanfare that was beginning to gather at the front door.
But the moment her heels hit the hardwood floor, everything he’d been training his mind on evaporated. He turned away from the window and simply gaped.
She came out of the hallway clutching a small gold purse in her hands and was sheathed in a honey-brown fabric that looked like it was wet. He had no concept of how Javier did it, but he would definitely give the man due respect for his profession.
Anita’s hair was twisted up and held as if by long crystalline magic pins . . . her gorgeous face was dusted in shimmering gold and her lashes were thick and lush— eyes absolutely breathtaking. But her mouth . . . it held the same wet quality of her dress, and good Gawd, it seemed like she was poured into her gown as though she were liquid flesh herself. The deep plunging neckline made him need to check his pulse, and the slit that ran up the front of the gown exposed her shapely legs that seemed to go on forever.
“So, how do you like my creation?” Javier said, preening and gesturing toward Anita.
“Stunning.”
Javier bowed. “I see you are a man of few words, but I will take that as a high compliment coming from you.”
“Thank you,” Anita said, smiling as she air kissed Javier. “The tux looks great on you, too.” She favored him with a lingering glance and then looked at Javier. “Thank you for always making everyone look so nice.”
“I make it do what it do, that’s all, love,” Javier said. “You kids have fun.”
Zach nodded and then had to remember how to cross the room and open the door. But he managed to do so without letting on just how much her transformation had fried his brain.
“Javier is going to let himself out,” she said as he closed the door behind them. “And the tux really does look great on you.”
“Thank you—”
“Don’t say, ma’am,” she said quickly, finally making him smile.
“Anita,” he said, wondering if she knew just how much her compliment coated him with a new warmth he couldn’t explain.
“Good, finally,” she said, stepping into the elevator in front of him. “You don’t have to wait in the greenroom, you know, or hang in the wings, unless you want to . . . uhmm . . . you can sit in the reserved seating in the front and just dip back to the greenroom during breaks— if you want.”
“I thought the reserved seating was for your guests,” he said carefully, giving her a sidelong glance.
She shrugged one delicate shoulder. “Why can’t you also be a guest?”
He nodded but then caught her gaze as he stopped looking at the elevator numbers descending. “I’m no PR person . . . and I thank you for such a kind offer, but . . . if the paparazzi see me drive you and get out of the limo as your driver and then I show up in the reserved seating, that might look like—”
“I know, I know,” she said, waving her hand. “I have no right to intrude on your private life. Your girlfriend or wife could take things the wrong way, then there’d be drama and what ever.”
/> “No,” he said flatly. “There wouldn’t be drama on my end. My concern is that the tabloids started up some nonsense about your reputation, signifying that you had a limo driver and a paid escort. You deserve to be shown in a much better light than that. I would be a distraction. I think it would be best if I stayed in the background.”
She looked at him with a completely open gaze. “Thank you for that— for caring how things might look for me. I wasn’t really figuring all of that out . . . I guess I just hated the fact that Jonathan Evans would be there flaunting his latest conquest and I’d be sitting there by myself.” She turned to look at the elevator doors. “It’s amazing how alone you can feel even in a room of thousands of people all screaming your name.”
The elevator doors opened and she’d left him speechless. His mind immediately latched onto the task at hand as a diversion. He exited the elevator first, keeping her behind him as he navigated them toward the limo. But what she’d said and the sad timbre of her voice haunted him. So the head of NextStarz was her ex? That arrogant SOB had just cast this woman aside like refuse? What was wrong in America?
Zachary opened the limo door and helped Anita in. He was about to close the door and keep his opinions to himself, but her forlorn expression made him stop and lean in as he held onto the door frame.
“If Evans shows up there with anybody but you— he’s a fool. I hope you win tonight, and I don’t care how many people are there, just because I’m not in the VIP seats, doesn’t mean I’m not watching . . . you’re not alone, all right?”
She rewarded him with a slow turn of her head, an open gaze, and a slow smile that broke on her face like new dawn. “Thank you,” she murmured. “Knowing that will get me through the night.”
“Let’s get you to your big event,” he said in a softer tone than he normally employed. He had to close the door; this woman was fracturing his skull, breaking his concentration, and about to make him cross a line that in the end could cost Lowell a contract, if things went poorly.
Butterflies swirled in her belly and exploded in a cloud of dancing tremors the moment he shut the door. He’d declined because he cared? Wasn’t seeking a front row and the limelight, and actually cared about appearances for her own good? Then there was the way he looked at her, oh, my God. The man smelled so good, too . . . and the tux just set off every chiseled feature in his handsome face and phenomenal bod.