Chapter Nine
H e was infuriating when he was being smug. He was also tall and gorgeous, and he had more muscles than looked humanly possible.
He also had a point.
I should’ve thought of his shirt, but I was too busy being freaked out over a car bomb.
Nothing to be done about the situation now, I clutched my purse where I had all the letters and let him take me by the arm. I scanned the front yard, which had become my new habit, while he led us up the front steps. Not seeing anyone, my thoughts quickly dissolved back to the wall of muscle next to me.
The moment he’d gotten behind the wheel, the interior of the SUV had filled with the scent I’d only gotten a hint of in his condo. Clean and masculine, but not cologne. And not like burning or gasoline anymore. I was foolishly thinking how much I liked his scent, and worse, how much I liked his hold on me, when my front door burst open and my useless security guard glared at me.
“Where have you been?” Nikolas demanded.
His hand still on my arm, Damian gave my father’s oldest security guard the once-over and immediately sized up who he was. “Engaged with better security. You lose her often?”
Nikolas scowled at Damian. “Who are you?”
“My friend,” I interrupted before Damian could say anything else incriminating.
Nikolas zeroed in on Damian’s shirt. “What is Luna and Associates?”
“Hobby,” Damian clipped. “Don’t worry about it.” He put his arm around my shoulders and smiled down at me. “We got places to be, babe?”
I bit my tongue at the ridiculous term of endearment I’d never liked, not that anyone had ever called me that before a half hour ago. “Yes, we do.”
Nikolas’s glare cut from Damian’s arm on my shoulder to me. “Calandra, you didn’t tell me you were leaving this morning.” He glanced back at Damian’s arm. “Nor did you mention company.” He spit the last word out like a distasteful bite of food.
Deciding right then I was never going to tell him about the bomb, not that I had been considering it, I squared my shoulders. Pretending I had male company all the time, pretending my employee did not act more like a substitute father than a bodyguard, I gave Nikolas a curt nod. “I will catch up with you later, Nikolas, but perhaps you should rise earlier.” I glanced up at Damian, not giving Nikolas an opening to respond. “Let’s go, my tailor is waiting.”
Damian gave me an easy smile. “Lead the way, gorgeous.”
Aware of his presence behind me, I stepped through the front door and into the foyer as Genevieve came rushing out of the morning room in a mess of folders and devices. As her tablet and cell phone started to slip from her hands, I questioned again my sanity when I’d made the decision to hire her a couple months ago to help with the gallery opening.
“Oh, there you are. We need to go over a few last-minute details, and Mr. Sherman has been here almost an hour. He said—oh!” Genevieve fumbled as her tablet started to fall.
Damian stepped around me and caught the device before it hit the ground. Holding it out to her, he smiled. “Looks like you needed a hand.”
She looked up at Damian, and her cheeks flamed. “Oh, um, thank you.” Genevieve quickly looked back at me. “Is he the tuxedo from your text at six this morning?”
Irritation flared at her oversharing, but I bit my tongue. She had come highly recommended for large events, and she’d worked for many galleries over the years, setting up shows for the highly publicized annual art festival. She spoke too quickly, she answered questions with unrelated answers, was always a walking advertisement for disorganization, and periodically she dropped things. But so far everything she’d scheduled, or set in motion, had gone quite smoothly.
“Genevieve, this is Damian Tyler. Damian, this is my assistant, Genevieve.” Trying not to show any unease, I nodded at the papers she had in her hands. “Is that the mail?”
Wide-eyed, she looked from Damian to me. “Oh, yes, even though I know you prefer to get it yourself, I picked it up for you. The mail that is. I thought it would save you some time today. There was also a letter just inside your office. It’s the one on top.” Still blushing, she smiled and handed them to me, then looked back at Damian. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Tyler.”
Seeing the now familiar envelope on top, my muscles stiffened and I fought a wave a nausea.
“Likewise, but no mister.” Damian grinned at Genevieve, oozing charm. “Just call me Tyler.”
Genevieve cleared her throat. “Yes, of course… Tyler.” She smiled sweetly at him.
My hands shook slightly, closing around the envelope and pile of mail. “Genevieve, you may have the rest of the day off.” How did someone get in during the day? Get past everyone here this morning? I was in my office before I left to see André Luna, and there hadn’t been any new letters.
Genevieve’s head abruptly turned to me, and her red, unruly curls bounced. Shock clouded her expression. “But we have to go over all the final arrangements.”
Fighting panic, and fighting the horrible thought that the letter writer was actually the one behind the explosion, I tried to shove it all down and keep my voice even. “I’m sure we’ve already gone over everything, but you may leave anything on my desk that still needs final approval.” There wasn’t anything left to take care of. I’d been planning this event for a year, and Genevieve had taken over all the arrangements a month ago. If the letter writer didn’t attempt anything at the opening, then the show as part of the festival would be a great boon for the gallery. The big question was if. I needed to open the letter immediately.
Still standing there in a rare moment of stillness, Genevieve blinked. “But the show is tomorrow, and the rental furniture is arriving today, and the setup, and the pieces in the gallery need to be double-checked, and the stagers need to be directed what to do, and the—”
“I am aware.” Acutely aware the show was tomorrow. The letter yesterday had said he would have a surprise for me after the show. Oh God. I fought to keep my voice even. “I double-checked the gallery last night. Everything is in order, and I will handle the setup of the tables and chairs outside. Is Mr. Sherman in the morning room?” I needed to get her moving. I needed a moment alone to read the letter. I didn’t know how I could excuse myself from Damian, except while he was being fitted.
Still looking shell-shocked, Genevieve nodded. “Yes. He’s been waiting—”
“Thank you, Genevieve.” Dismissing her, I gave the first excuse I could think of that would get her out of here. “Get some rest today. Tomorrow will be a long day.”
“Um… oh-kay.” She glanced at Damian, then back at me. “If you’re sure?”
“I’m sure.” My heart pounding, I managed to sound authoritative, but I was less successful at controlling the tremor in my hands.
“All right.” Genevieve didn’t sound convinced, but she thankfully retreated.
Damian waited until she was past the foyer and disappeared down the main hall. “Friend?” he quietly asked.
“She’s my assistant.” I didn’t really know anything about her, other than once when I’d told her to go home on a Friday night and enjoy her weekend, she’d jokingly said she didn’t have a personal life. “I hired her to help with the opening.” I moved toward the morning room.
A large, warm hand grabbed my upper arm, and I was spun around. Before I could think to protest, my back hit the foyer wall, and his hands landed on either side of my head.
Low, threatening, his voice turned menacing as his minty breath hit my face. “Time’s up, Princess,” he practically growled.
My heart racing, my knees suddenly weak, panic and heat flushed through my veins in equal measure. “What are you doing?”
He leaned closer. “You know damn well I wasn’t asking if the redhead was your friend.”
I grasped at something to say. “You’re angry I said you were my friend?”
“Call me anything you damn well want.” His tone turned to pure menace. “But you’re done lying to me.”
My traitorous voice lost any kind of authority. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His jaw ticked as he leveled me with a look. “Your whole body stiffened when you looked at the mail. Your hands started to shake, then you dismissed your assistant the day before your event.” He grasped my chin. “Spill it. Right now .”
I reached for anger, but fell short. “Let go of me.”
“ Friends don’t touch each other?” he challenged.
I opened my mouth to reply, but he wasn’t finished.
“What the hell is going on?” he demanded.
I tried to no avail to pull out of his grasp. “Remove your hands and step back.” Desperate, I tried to keep the panic out of my voice.
He did neither. “Five seconds,” he warned.
“Or you’ll do what?” I stupidly asked, losing all sense of the feminine authority my mother had diligently taught me before her passing.
“Four seconds. Tell me why I’m here or I take that letter from you.”
Finally, the princess I was raised to be came rearing back with a vengeance. “Who do you think you are? You will not take anything. I told you why you are here. I told you to unhand me, and lest you forget, I am the one paying you. ”
He didn’t budge. Not his hold, not his stance, not his tone. “Three seconds,” he warned, every syllable a challenge.
Ready for battle, my nostrils flared.
“And know this,” he continued, “I don’t need your damn money or this job. I have no problem walking away.”
“Do not swear at me,” I snapped.
Undeterred, his eyes locked on mine, he leaned even closer. “Two. Seconds .”
The change in his tone, his closeness, his breath on me, his body heat coating me in guilt and something else I had no name for, I felt a shift. The strength of his gaze traveled all the way to the bottom of my stomach, and the fight left me. “Step back,” I whispered, wanting desperately to tell him everything.
“Do not test me.”
My resolve gone, my nerves roiling like the sea in a winter storm, I made one last attempt to protect him. Inhaling, I forced words out. “Step back now.” But it wasn’t a command, it was sheer begging. The letters said anyone I told would suffer. My stalker said this was our secret. He’d said he would know if I called the police or showed anyone his letters. Then he’d mentioned my previous day’s activities to let me know he was watching me. Always watching.
Damian’s impossibly large body curled around mine, hovering a breath away from full body contact. “One second.”
His scent everywhere, his mouth an inch from mine, his biceps bulging, in that moment, he was bigger than all of the threatening letters, and I lost the thread of control I’d been barely holding on to. The truth bled out. “I’ve been getting letters.”
“Calandra,” Nikolas called. “I need to speak with you right now.”
Damian raised his voice and threw a clipped response over his shoulder. “She’s busy.” His eyes never leaving mine, he lowered his voice. “What kind of letters?”
“ Calandra ,” Nikolas barked .
Before I could open my mouth, Damian spun and got in Nikolas’s face. “What kind of security detail lets their client give them the slip?”
Nikolas glared at Damian. “Pardon me?”
Damian glared back. “You heard me.”
Ignoring Damian’s question, Nikolas looked over his shoulder. “Are you okay, Princess?”
“Now she’s Princess?” Damian asked. “Because when you were berating her for evading you this morning, she was Calandra. But now when she’s having a private conversation with me, she’s Princess?”
Nikolas’s weathered face turned red with anger. “I do not answer to you.”
Damian tipped his chin toward me. “You answer to her, but you don’t get up in time to do your job? And you don’t go looking for her when she disappears, but you’ll eavesdrop on her private conversations?” Damian glanced at me. “Looks like you need a new security detail, Princess.”
I wasn’t sure if I was more in shock at him putting Nikolas in his place, or that I’d finally told someone, told him. Speechless, I simply stood there.
His eyes intently on mine, Damian tipped his chin toward Nikolas. “Why don’t you give your security the day off too? I’m sure I can manage to keep an eye on you.” He winked without humor. “We ready for the tailor now?”
“Princess, a word, alone ,” Nikolas ordered.
Damian wrapped his arm around me, but glanced at Nikolas. “Not happening, and before you ask again, I’ll save you the trouble. Damian Tyler. Google me. You’ll be entertained. In the meantime, I’m her date tomorrow, and we’re late for a fitting.”
“Is this true, Princess?” Nikolas asked, his judgment of me in full accord.
“Yes,” I managed, replaying how he’d said he was her date , while my stomach fluttered.
His jaw ticked under the gray stubble he had not shaved off this morning. “The rental company with the tables and chairs is here. You need to—”
Suddenly exhausted and out of patience for him, I cut him off. “I will handle it. You are dismissed for the day, Nikolas.”
His eyes unwavering, his face an unreadable mask, Damian lowered his voice and looked down at me. “We’re opening that letter.” Pasting on a smile, he raised his voice so Nikolas could hear. “We ready to do this, gorgeous?”
No. “Yes.”