8. Alex #3
Their eyes travel over the bare line of her shoulders, the curve of her waist, the skin revealed by her dress, and my jaw tightens hard enough to ache.
My hand settles at the base of Belle’s bare back, where the dress dips low, and my thumb moves over her skin without thought.
She tenses at the first touch, surprised, then eases back into my palm just enough that I know she is not asking me to move it.
Good.
Let every bastard in the room see who she belongs to, and exactly whose bed they will assume she is ending up in.
I usually move through these events without feeling a thing. Shake the right hands. Say the right words. Ignore the women circling and the men measuring themselves against me.
I draw her a fraction closer and feel the rise and fall of every breath beneath my hand.
“Mr. Hartley!”
A photographer calls from the sponsor wall.
I see the lens turn toward us and move before I think, stepping half a pace in front of Belle and cutting off the shot.
Frank is already heading toward him.
Beside me, Belle goes still, but before she can say anything, a banker approaches with his hand extended.
A banker approaches with his hand extended.
“Hartley. And this must be?—”
“Emma Clarke,” I say before he can ask her directly.
Belle’s new name tastes wrong in my mouth.
The banker smiles at her. “A pleasure.”
His gaze drops too slowly.
My hand presses more firmly against her back.
“We were leaving,” I tell him.
“We just arrived,” Belle murmurs as I steer her away.
Another man angles toward us.
I change direction.
Belle looks up at me. “Are you going to let anyone speak to me?”
“No.”
“Then why did you bring me?”
“Empty space beside me attracts questions.”
“And I don’t?”
“You attract different problems.”
Her eyes narrow. “Such as?”
A silver-haired man near the auction table lets his gaze linger on her a second too long.
I meet his stare.
He looks away first.
“That,” I say.
Belle follows my gaze and sees the man studying the auction catalogue with newfound concentration.
“You cannot threaten everyone who looks at me.”
“I haven’t threatened anyone.”
“Your face did.”
A waiter passes with champagne. I take a glass and place it in her hand.
“Drink that.”
“Are you ordering me not to talk again?”
She takes a sip without breaking eye contact.
“Is there anyone here you actually like?”
The honest answer rises before I can stop it.
One person.
I force it back down.
“Danny.”
My palm remains at the small of her back, lower now, close to the curve where her waist becomes her hip.
She shifts beneath my hand.
The movement sends heat through me.
“You can stop hovering,” she says.
“I’m standing.”
“On top of me.”
“You would know.”
Her breath catches.
Color spreads beneath the makeup along her cheeks and throat.
The kiss is between us again, alive and unfinished.
Belle turns until we are almost chest to chest.
“You are impossible.”
“And yet you agreed to come with me.”
“For Liam.”
The reminder should have been enough to kill the thought, but it barely slows me down. She may have agreed to come here because of her brother, but right now she wants to be beside me. I feel it every time she leans into my touch, even while her mouth insists on arguing with me.
Her eyes drop briefly to my mouth before returning to mine. The room presses around us, but for one second I hear nothing except her breath.
Then a camera flashes from across the ballroom.
Belle flinches.
It is small enough that most people would miss it.
I do not.
Her shoulders tighten beneath my hand. Another photographer lifts his camera near the stage, and she looks toward the ballroom entrance as though she is ready to bolt.
The crowd has closed in around us. Cameras move along the sponsor wall. Every mirrored surface throws pieces of her reflection back.
“I need the ladies’ room.”
“I’ll have Frank walk you.”
“You will not send a man in there after me.”
“He can wait outside.”
“I can find it myself.”
I study her face.
She is holding herself together, but only just.
“Don’t be long.”
“I wasn’t asking for permission.” She exhales sharply, irritation cutting through every word.
Belle walks toward the corridor before I can answer.
My hand remains half-raised where her back had been.
I lower it slowly.
Then I move to the bar, where I have a clear view of the corridor entrance, the ballroom doors and the mirrored column beside the mezzanine stairs.
The bartender sets down a scotch.
I do not touch it.
My phone vibrates before the ice settles.
Danny.
“We’ll need to step away during the speeches,” he says without greeting. “I had a private room set aside off the mezzanine.”
“For Dante?”
“Yes.”
“Does he know where?”
“He has the details.”
Danny sounds distracted.
“Where are you?”
“I’m running late.”
I look toward the stage, where his foundation's logo glows behind the podium.
“You’re never late to your own event.”
“I’ll be there.”
“What happened?”
A pause.
Too long.
“Nothing I can discuss right now.”
His voice has changed. There is something beneath it I cannot identify, something strained and almost breathless.
“Danny—”
“I said I’ll be there.”
The line goes dead.
I stare at the screen.
My brother is never late, and he does not hang up on me unless he has something to hide.
Before I can call him back, Frank appears at my shoulder with two fingers pressed to his earpiece.
“We have a problem at the east entrance.”
My attention moves immediately to the corridor where Belle disappeared.
“What kind of problem?”
“A man attempted to enter using Nikolas Drakos’s name.”
“Where is he?”
“Service hall.”
I check the corridor again.
Belle has not returned.
“Steven stays here,” I say. “Eyes on the ladies’ room and every exit. She does not leave this floor without me knowing.”
Frank relays the order as we move through the service door.
Two members of my security team have a man in a rented tuxedo contained against the wall. They are not touching him, but they have positioned themselves close enough that every route out of the corridor is blocked.
A gala employee stands nearby, clutching an iPad.
The detained man is in his forties, sweating despite the air-conditioning.
“I work for Mr. Drakos,” he says as soon as he sees me. “There was a change in personnel. Your people are refusing to listen.”
The staff member angles the tablet toward me.
“Nikolas Drakos’s assistant already signed in. We have a photographic credential on file. This man isn’t him.”
Frank studies the screen.
“Maybe the man inside is the imposter.”
The detained man points at him. “That is what I have been trying to tell you.”
One of my security men steps closer.
The man’s hand drops.
I stop in front of him.
“What is your name?”
“Timothy Rosenbaum.”
“Who do you work for?”
“Nikolas Drakos.”
“What is his private office number?”
His mouth opens.
Nothing comes out.
I take one step closer.
The corridor narrows around us.
“You entered my brother’s event under another man’s name, without identification, and now you expect me to accept that you belong here because you raised your voice.”
“I told you please check with Mr. Drakos.” His voice trembles in fear a grown man shouldn’t display.
“We will.” Frank tells him.
Relief flashes across his face too quickly.
I lean close enough that only he and Frank can hear me.
“If he confirms your story, you will receive an apology and a drink. If he doesn’t, the police will be the least unpleasant part of your evening.”
The relief disappears.
“Get Nikolas Drakos on the phone,” I tell Frank. “Confirm whether this man works for him. If he does, find out who used his credentials to get inside.”
“And until then?”
“No one leaves this corridor.”
The man swallows.
“I haven’t done anything.”
“You lied your way through a secured entrance.”
“I was told my name would be on the list.”
“By whom?”
His eyes flick toward the ballroom.
Too quick.
I catch it.
“Who sent you?”
“No one.”
Another lie.
Frank sees it too.
“I want his phone, vehicle information and every camera angle from the moment he entered the building,” I say. “Find out who paid for the tuxedo, the car and the room he changed in.”
Timothy’s face loses color.
“You can’t take my phone.”
Frank motions for one of the men to retrieve the phone from the security desk.
He follows me back toward the ballroom.
“This may have nothing to do with her,” he says quietly. “Nobody followed you from Dallas. We have seen no inquiries about Emma Clarke, and the private entrance remained clean.”
“You don’t know that it has nothing to do with her.”
“There is no evidence it does.”
“Twice, men have come close enough to put their hands on her.”
Frank’s mouth tightens.
“She is hiding something,” I continue. “Mark owed dangerous people money. His New York records are sealed, and now a man lies his way into the first public event she attends with me.”
“Nikolas Drakos has his own complications.”
“I don’t care whose complications they are. I want to know whether they can reach Belle.”
“I’ll get answers.”
“You’ll get them before there is another attempt on her.”
We step back into the ballroom.
Music and conversation rush over us as if nothing happened. Champagne continues moving on silver trays. Guests laugh beneath the chandeliers while a stranger sits in a service corridor with two different stories attached to his name.
My gaze goes straight to the ladies’ room corridor.
Belle has not returned.
I check the time.
Too long.
The scotch remains untouched on the bar.
Frank follows my attention. “Steven has the corridor.”
“That isn’t the same as having her.”
I cross the ballroom, reading every exit, every hand and every face turned in my direction.
The locket in my pocket strikes against my chest with each step.
Belle trusted me to keep the last piece of her past safe.
I intend to put it back in her hands myself.
At least she gave me this much. Even if she could not trust me to protect her ten years ago, maybe she is starting to believe I can now.
That has to count for something.