Chapter 6
A lexandra
Dori stilled at my side. With my eyes closed, I heard rather than saw the reason.
“I’m Raphael Gordonson, Alex’s bodyguard. You’re her boyfriend, aye? I need your help.”
Dori choked. “Did you just call her Alex?”
“He does that,” I slurred and cracked open an eye.
Raphael really was here. Tall, and dark, and stupidly handsome. My head swam. I missed what he said next.
Dori’s voice pierced my consciousness. “Darling girl, stop sleeping on me. The bodyguard says there’s a photographer.”
I flushed cold. I hadn’t been paranoid with the exchange I’d witnessed. “Where?”
Raphael answered. “He’s been watching from a booth. Same guy as from the art gallery.”
I peered through the crowd to the booths. Nope, no creep. Like earlier, he’d been seen then vanished like a ghost.
“I saw someone slip the bouncer money. The one who did this.” I made a grabby hand, taking Dori’s arm in a death grip.
My bodyguard’s eyes darkened. “Ye don’t deserve to have your night splashed over the tabloids tomorrow. Leave while he’s out of the way. I have a car waiting outside.”
Photographers followed me all the time. I’d made an art form out of evading them when needed but had come to accept it as part of my reality a long time ago—interestingly, right at the point the first scandalous headline appeared, with the man in front of me bare-chested in the picture.
That was the turning point in my life. The tabloids and scandal pages changed their tone. They’d always commented on my looks and fashion but shifted it up a notch to my love life. I’d been barely eighteen, yet my adulthood made me fair game for them to hunt. The types of sordid acts I’d read about myself apparently doing were so far from my timid reality it was laughable.
Raphael had been right in the middle of that crossroads of history.
Dori rolled an unsure glance down to where I leaned against him. “Your overfamiliar employee says we should go.”
“He says a lot of things. Doesn’t mean I’ll obey. Who knows what his motivations are.”
We were at the back of the dance floor and close to the rail. I straightened from Dori and wobbled backwards on my high heels. Raphael caught my waist, steadying and releasing me in one smooth move.
A lick of heat curled in my belly. If I ran, he’d chase me, I was certain. That was a far hotter image than he had the right to claim.
I lifted my chin. “Why are you here?”
“I was nearby and saw ye come in. I worried.”
“How did you even recognise me?”
He pursed his lips but didn’t answer, as if it was obvious. Except it wasn’t, because no one else had stared.
“Where were you?” If he’d followed me all evening, I’d riot.
“With Will and Johnnie in a bar across the road.”
I squinted around. “Did they come with you?”
He shook his head, but I already knew the answer. They wouldn’t bother if they weren’t getting paid for it, and wraparound security cost more than the budget allocated to little old me.
“You’ve been on my team for five minutes. Why do you care?”
“I just want to get ye out of here safely.”
Standing next to Dori, Raphael tightened his jaw. Between the two men, my blondie Euro aristocrat bestie and my dark and delicious bodyguard, I was a lucky lady for the view.
I also knew the second my friend made one of his infamous bad choices, as his mother had termed it when we were younger.
Dori’s lips curved with interest. “We don’t need your help. The worst that photographer could’ve got so far is us dancing with no clear sight of my girl’s face. Fuck that guy. If he wants pictures, we’ll give them to him. Point him out.”
All three of us turned. From the bathroom hall, a bedraggled older man strode out, so out of place among the glittering elite that he was unmistakable. He passed the bouncer at the top of the steps, and the two men shared a look. That little interaction confirmed my suspicion that he’d paid good money to be told where I was.
My soul was heavy that there was yet another place I couldn’t be left alone.
Dori laughed. “Never mind. Got him. Let’s have some fun.”
“What are we going to do?”
Ignoring me, he pushed through the people on the dance floor, temporarily clearing a path and providing direct line of sight to the man hunting me. I stood taller, and the photographer raised a small camera in his hand.
Instantly, Raphael stepped in front of me and blocked the shot. For some reason, that gesture amid everything else he was doing hit me in the feels. I peered around him.
Instead of going to the photographer, Dori veered to a clear part of the rail over the dance floor. In a pause in the music, while the crowd waited for the beat drop, Dori yelled at the top of his voice. “Oh my God. It’s Elsie Sale!”
Screams followed, and faces swivelled as people tried to spot the celebrity musician who was the darling of the music scene.
I cackled and hugged onto my bodyguard’s arm. The alcohol coursing through my veins made me bold. I wasn’t going to miss Dori’s show for the world, yet my attention caught and snagged on the feel of Raphael’s hard muscles.
As the first person I’d ever touched in the romantic sense, he’d provided the blueprint for how a man ought to be built. I’d compared everyone who came after with him, and all had fallen short. Yet he’d been a teenager then, and this body was all man. The solid chest and the arms that had held me were thick with hard muscle. He’d been strong, but now he was something else.
It tantalised me.
It woke a deep female instinct that yearned to be protected. A matter of hours ago, when the photographer had grabbed my arm, I’d considered how no one ever touched me. That was a fact. Everyone was careful around me. The few boyfriends I’d had were the exceptions, but even they were hands-off most of the time. No lover had ever held me in public.
It was as if handling me was a treasonable offence, but it only boosted my sense of isolation. I clung to Raphael a little more.
Dori prowled the railing, his lips pouted as he no doubt enjoyed the chaos he’d created below.
Raphael twisted to keep Dori in sight while using his body to block me. The arm I was holding lightly curved around me, and his free hand gently cupped my shoulder. His almost-embrace had no reason to be so familiar. Once, we’d done this, and years ago. Maybe he’d been the first man I’d touched, but he was hardly the last. I snapped my brain back to the present and focused on my friend.
The photographer left the steps and slipped into an empty booth. Still at the rail, Dori eyed the man but signalled for a waitress. In an instant, a woman was at his side, a tray under her arm and her uniform the black and orange of the club.
Dori bent to whisper in her ear. Starry-eyed, she smiled at him then darted off.
My friend leant back on the barrier, the music thumping, his blond hair falling in his eyes and his posture the picture of elegant languor.
I wanted to join him. Whatever he was planning was going to be good. Yet at the same point, I was enjoying being right where I was.
The waitress appeared again, her steps brisk, and an ice bucket clutched in her hands. Inside it, a champagne bottle smoked. Oh God. I knew what Dori was going to do.
He accepted the bottle and took a swig, leaving the bucket by his feet.
The clueless photographer was still squinting my way, his camera in his hands and catching the light every now and again.
He had no idea what was coming.
Raphael put his lips to my ear. “We need to?—”
He didn’t finish that sentence as Dori moved into action. Putting his thumb to the end of the champagne bottle, he shook it.
White foam sprayed out in a torrent, soaking the photographer and the booth. The man leapt up. Dori shook the bottle again and doused him a second time, pure malice and delight in his expression.
He yelled something that didn’t reach us. People in booths either side jumped from their seats and scuttled away, the waitress watching with her hands to her mouth. The furious photographer scrubbed down his face, and droplets of fizzy wine dripped off him. He held up his camera and yelled at my friend.
Ha. Screw him. I hoped it was broken.
Dori shouted something back then made a third attempt with the champagne bottle, but it was empty. He set it down and picked up the ice bucket instead.
“Fuck. Now we really need to leave,” Raphael warned.
“Are you joking? The night has just become interesting.” I pushed against Raphael, but my bodyguard held firm.
“It’ll become a headline about ye if we aren’t careful.”
“Still don’t understand why you care so much,” I muttered.
Dori leapt up onto the booth’s table. He crowed something I couldn’t hear and raised the ice bucket then upended it. Ice splattered down. I squealed at the fun, wide-eyed as Dori stooped to collect the camera from the table and use it to snap pictures of the soaked and frosted paparazzo instead.
People shrieked. Ice slid across the floor and tinkled down to the dance floor below. Partygoers neared to watch the drama, and another waiter ran for the bouncer who’d had his back to the antics and hadn’t yet noticed. The photographer wiped his face and snatched for my friend.
Easily, Dori evaded the reaching hand, years of skiing paying off in his quick dodge. He slapped the hand away and took another photo, running his mouth the whole time. I needed to hear what he was saying because his taunts were clearly working. This was gold. Hilarious.
On the table, Dori twisted and presented his backside to the man. I giggled. Half the VIP dance floor was now watching, some subtly filming or taking pictures.
The photographer lunged at Dori and this time caught his wrist. He yanked hard, and Dori crashed down to the table. The two men wrestled for the camera, and a punch was thrown. Someone screamed. The bouncer rushed in and grabbed Dori by the ankle.
In an instant, this had turned ugly.
My heart skipped a beat. “We need to help him.”
“We have to go.”
He was right, except I couldn’t just run. “I won’t leave my friend.”
Raphael muttered a string of swear words then tore his gaze back to mine. “Listen to me. This is becoming a brawl, and we need to get out of here before it gets worse. We’ll move fast and get ye to the car outside. Once in there, you’ll lock the doors and I’ll come back for your friend.”
The photographer pulled an elbow back, his fist raised.
I squeaked in distress. “Dori had bad news tonight. He isn’t thinking straight.”
“I’ll help him. I promise. Please, Alex. Come with me.”
I put my hand in his and my faith in his direction. Raphael kept me close, body blocking me past the fight which now had two bouncers wading in. I couldn’t see Dori to know that he was okay. I stumbled down the steps and nearly fell. Raphael tucked me under his arm to finish the descent. At the bottom of the steps, he half carried me, sprinting around the edge of the club so people had to move out of our way. It was chaos down here as well, with a hunt going on for the celebrity Dori claimed was present and people slipping on ice.
I closed my eyes and tapped my forehead to Raphael’s shoulder. My mask was askew and my nerves on the very edge. What had started as funny had turned horrible. I was scared for Dori, and the warm hug of alcohol was quickly shifting into a headache and nausea.
Cool air ghosted over me, and I opened my eyes to the steps outside the club and the street. I wobbled down the first, clutching hard on my bodyguard’s arm wrapped tight around me and under my breasts. A car waited. Raphael snapped open the door and guided me onto a leather seat, barking something at the driver. The man made a quick promise, his wide-eyed gaze skipping over me. Huddled in the seat, I shuffled my skirt down my thighs, straightened my wig, and watched Raphael run back inside.
Dori and I had been in escapades in the past. He was six feet tall and strong from all the sports he did, but he was a lover, not a fighter. Words he’d used to describe himself when provoked by punchy guys who didn’t like his pretty style or expensive clothes.
If he got hurt because I’d decided that dancing and drinking our emotions away was a great idea, I’d never forgive myself.
Over all that was another concern.
That my bodyguard might get injured, too.
My thoughts were interrupted by a bright flash of light. A lens hit my window, the shutter clicking. Another photographer had been lying in wait. And I was caught in their trap.