Chapter 57
Walker
Clara is stunning, aesthetic, and composed, and while the artist in me can acknowledge the beauty, my soul aches for the real her.
She’s meant for easy laughs and stolen kisses, for long sweaty nights and lazy home-cooked breakfasts, for clever plans and curling up next to me. Next to any of us. All of us.
Instead, she and Trips spend a cocktail hour’s worth of time taking pictures with people they don’t know and probably wouldn’t like. Summer twirls a glass of wine beside me as we stay close enough to jump in if we’re needed.
“So far, so good,” she says.
“Yup.”
“On a scale of one to ten, how jealous are you?” she asks.
I glance around for a camera, but give up after a second. It’s best to assume I’m always being recorded here. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Right.” Summer leans against a wall, then suddenly straightens.
“What?” I ask, panic searing through me. Please let RJ be safe.
She blinks down at the crowd. “It’s probably nothing.”
“And if it isn’t?” I ask, having learned how important it is to have all the pieces before making a decision. Trips forced that into all of us in Mexico, even as Clara preached flexibility.
Summer steps closer, dropping her voice. “I could have sworn I saw my sister’s friend down there.”
“Could it have been her?”
“She’s as poor as I was, and underage, so no. But…”
My stomach drops. “What does she look like?”
Her blue eyes flash at me, something furious there, like whatever I say is going to be my fault.
Clara’s fake laugh begs me to turn to her, but Summer’s soft voice forces me to pay attention.
“She’s fifteen, black, tall, curvy, and striking with a few crooked teeth on the bottom.
Round cheeks, slanted eyes that always look like they’re stuck between tearing you apart and laughing over nothing. ”
Oh no. “Purple in her braids?”
“Sometimes.”
RJ gave screen grabs of the girls for sale to the cops.
For some dumb reason, I didn’t look at them, but even without that, I know it’s her, the same girl I saw via drone at the storage units.
God, they must have taken the girls there for a ‘photoshoot’ in that storage unit set up like a studio we found last night.
It makes the most sense, especially as the shell company for that unit was the same as Trevor Westerhouse’s condo in his wife’s college town.
“Does she want to be a model?” I ask, already guessing the answers to my next bunch of questions, and not liking a single one.
Summer flicks her eyes back at the crowded ballroom. “Most girls do at some point. Why would Iris be here, though?”
“How’s her family situation?”
“Walker…” Her voice is more of a growl than its usual practiced purr.
“Answer me. Please.”
“Complicated.”
“Damn it.”
I tug her even closer, my lips against her ear, like maybe I’m kissing her, my hand on the small of her back. I hate that I have to do this in front of Clara. “Don’t react.”
“I’m always acting, Walker. You know that better than anyone.”
True. “There are girls here, more than just Iris. They’re being sold at auction later tonight.
Trevor Westerhouse brought in some ‘political friends’ as guests to cover for it.
They might be using modeling as a lure for the girls, but instead of fame, they’ll end up sex slaves to powerful pedophiles. ”
Summer jolts back, her anger only showing in her eyes while her mouth curls into a mischievous smile. “Over my dead fucking body.”
I tug her close again, everywhere her body touches mine reminding me of cold wet clay under my nails: uncomfortable to touch and requiring a good scrub after I’m done. “We have police ready to raid later.”
“What if it’s too late? What if they take the girls and disappear before the cops get here? We both know the police are useless.”
I don’t have an answer to that. Not a good one, at least. The girls aren’t our priority. “We gave the cops all the information about the buyers we could find.”
She spins out of my grip, and if you didn’t know her, it’d look flirty instead of furious. “I’m getting another glass,” she says, holding up her goblet. “Want to join me?” she asks Trevor, her purposeful exclusion of me making her anger at our lack of action clear.
Trevor’s wife answers, and the three of them head to the bar, Trips’ stepmom half a step behind them.
At the direction of the photographer, everyone else gets sent to the open bar as well, but I keep my eyes glued on Mattie until she vanishes into the crowd.
I can’t save every girl here that needs a savior. I’m still no white knight. But I’m going to get Clara back, and if I can, I’m going to keep Mattie out of Bryce’s nasty-ass fingers. It’s the best I can offer tonight.
I’m too damn selfish for the rest of it.
The photographer finishes a series of pictures of Clara and her dad, then moves to Clara and Trips kissing. As much as I wish I were the one with her lips on mine, the hint of legitimate joy Trips exudes settles something for me.
He loves her.
I don’t know if he’s said it yet, but it’s there, in the way his hand seeks her skin, in the warmth in his usually icy eyes when he glances at her, in the way he steps closer to her when anybody draws near enough that she might be in danger.
And Clara—she leans into him, welcomes his touch, her fingers tangling in his as the photographer finishes. She strides toward me, Trips seemingly happy to be dragged by her to my side.
Her smile is genuine, and I want to pull her into my arms, to taste the lips I’ve been dreaming of but unable to touch, to breathe her air and bask in her presence. “Walker,” she murmurs, and somehow, into the narrow frame of my name, she squeezes all the love, longing, and hope she holds.
“Clara,” I whisper, forcing down a sudden swell of tears behind my mask.
We stand there, staring at each other like we’re made of porcelain, strong when pressed in certain directions, but easily crushed in others.
And it hurts to know how vulnerable she’s been, how hard this has been for all of us.
Never again. If a gig keeps any of us apart for more than a long weekend, I’m vetoing the damn thing.
Her dad breaks our silent communion. “A familiar face. Finally,” he says, his smile not quite reaching his eyes as he looks between me and Clara.
Trips reaches over, shaking hands with the older man.
“I’m glad you could make it.” He pauses, and then a look takes over his face that’s more like Jansen than the broody asshole who’s bossed us around for years.
“Actually, I have a surprise. For both of you,” he says, looking from Clara to her dad.
He flags down a familiar guard from where he’s standing nearby, the same one that was in the room with us earlier.
The one I knocked out with kitty litter a year ago.
He hasn’t said anything, and I haven’t reminded him what happened all those months ago.
It seems safer. If nothing else Trips seems to trust him.
Trips asks him to fetch the officiant, but the guard doesn’t do exactly as he’s asked. I sort of thought he would.
“Next on your agenda is signing the marriage license. Should he meet you in your father’s office?” he asks.
Both Clara and Trips tense, Clara blinking quickly while Trips locks his jaw, whatever joy I thought I saw snuffed out.
Then Clara glances at me, and a grin sneaks across her face—the one she gets right before she enacts a plan. “Ready for your starring role?”
“What the hell do you think I’m here for if not that?” I tease, trying to match her lightness.
She turns to the guard. “Why don’t we sign things in the gallery? Walker and my dad can be our witnesses.”
“A gallery?” Her dad shakes his head at the absurdity, and well, yeah. It’s crazy.
That doesn’t mean I won’t have my own gallery when I can afford one.
Trips leads us down a series of halls until we get to the infamous gallery.
I’ve heard so much about the place and its impenetrable security that I’m shocked to find the doors wide open, the slightly chilly air seeping from the space.
But after that single observation, I’m done worrying about security. Art takes over.
“Oh my God, is that a Rembrandt?” I ask, drifting to one side. “And a Vermeer? Are you kidding me?”
Trips’ low chuckle forces me to turn away from the millions of dollars of art locked up in this prison of a mansion. There’s at least as much money in the dynamic colors of the Impressionists behind him as there is in the more classic pieces before me.
“My father gets gifts from the friends he helps out. It benefits him to accept them and keep them in good condition.”
So, priceless art in exchange for dead whistleblowers. Great.
My anger must show on my face, because Clara slips her arm through mine and tows me away from her father and Trips, stopping at a small sketch in the corner—the goddamn Rubens.
“This damn thing,” I whisper, once again wanting to reach out and touch the same paper the master touched, to scent the long-faded dust of charcoal on my fingers.
The weight of Clara’s attention has me tilting my head closer to her, and her barely audible voice flows like silk into my ear, the scent of her hair not its typical bargain-bin floral, but deeper and richer. “I like the new drawings you sent as much as this one. I’ve missed watching you work.”
“I miss watching you while I work more.” Her blush at the implication that she’d be my model adds to the pink of her makeup, and I can hardly keep my hands to myself, the urge to yank her against me and reacquaint myself with every little moan of hers almost unbearable.
Instead, I change the subject. “I take it the drawings got where they needed to be?”
“Of course.”
The officiant calls us from across the gallery, a guard with a small table waiting beside him. Trips invites them both in, then straightens his suit jacket twice before we reach whatever this setup is.