Kimberly Dean - Courting Gossip

She started to call the security team at Luxxor, but stopped before the call could connect.

‘Damn it.’ The contract she’d signed with the senator had stipulated she call another number first, and it belonged to someone she really, really didn’t want to see right now.

But if anybody could get them out of this mess, it was Brody Haynes.

She pulled up his number in her address book. It was late, but it was Haynes’s job to extricate his clients from bad situations. He was a fixer, a spin doctor. She’d had to call him before when Samuel had had too much to drink and another time when the senator was involved in a fender-bender with an off-duty cop. She dreaded the political operative’s reaction, though, to finding the two of them in a situation like this. He didn’t like her being around Samuel in the first place.

Still, it was in the contract. If she called anyone, it had to be him.

She punched the speed dial with a shaky finger and held onto the sink as she waited for an answer. Adrenalin pumped through her veins. The fear was still sharp, but queasiness had hit her stomach. She’d been scared for her life. Now she was fearful of so many other things.

‘Hello?’

The voice on the other end of the line was groggy, and it took her aback. She’d rarely heard Haynes be anything other than sharp and terse. Had she dialled the right number? ‘Brody?’

‘Genieve?’ There it was. Not terse, but quick and alert to the fact that something must be wrong if she was calling.

‘I…we need you. Room 740 of the Emissary Hotel. Two men just broke into our hotel room.’

‘What?’ There was the sound of creaking furniture and then a thud. ‘Are you OK?’

More loud voices had joined the ones outside the bedroom door, and the light in the bedroom had been turned on. Hotel security must have arrived. She could hear people moving around, but the scuffling and crashes had stopped. At least Samuel wasn’t out there fighting against them alone any more.

Should she have left him like that? She rubbed her forehead. Haynes would surely let her know what she’d done wrong. There was always something.

‘Jenny, are you OK?’ he barked.

Jenny. She ground her teeth. She hated when he condescended to her like that. ‘I’m fine. I locked myself in the bathroom, but Samuel is still out there fighting with them. You’ve got to get here fast, Brody. They’re reporters.’

‘They broke into your hotel room for a story?’

Her stomach turned. ‘They had a camera.’ Her voice faltered into a whisper. ‘They caught us together in bed.’

She didn’t get an answer. He didn’t even let out a curse, yet the chill that came across the line was so frigid, she nearly dropped the phone.

‘Brody?’

‘Who was it? Which channel?’

‘Channel? What does that matter?’

‘It matters. Who are they?’

‘You think I took time to ask? I don’t know — Wait. They said it, but I didn’t recognise it. MTI? TMI?’

‘Don’t say a word to anyone until I get there. Do not come out of that bathroom. Don’t let them catch you on camera any more than they have.’

‘I’m not stupid but, Brody, you’ve got to get here fast. They…they know what I do for a living.’

The chill in the fixer’s voice nearly left frost. ‘Don’t let anyone touch you. I’m coming.’

The line went dead without so much as a goodbye, but for some reason Genieve’s breaths came a bit easier. Her stomach was still knotted, and she knew this was going to be a really bad night. Brody was stoic and cold as Siberia, but he was solid. She just had to hold on until he could get here.

Yet, before she could even make a call to Luxxor, someone was knocking on the bathroom door.

‘Ma’am, this is hotel security. All you all right? Can you come out of the bathroom?’

After what she’d just promised the ice man? ‘No.’

‘We need to talk to you so we can figure this whole thing out.’

‘So talk.’ She held fast, refusing to budge.

Things only went from bad to worse when Metro PD arrived on the scene. That was when she started considering the smoke detector on the ceiling as a viable distraction. If she set it off, could she slip out of the hotel with the rest of the crowd without anyone noticing?

Her toes curled into the bath rug. Despite what the reporters kept saying, she wasn’t a whore. She was an escort, albeit one with an exclusive client…who paid her for sex…She doubted the police would care to split hairs, but she’d never been picked up before. She’d never even come close. She couldn’t be arrested for prostitution. She couldn’t bring down Luxxor. She was with a US senator!

‘Ma’am, you need to come out of the bathroom.’

There was the sound of a key in the lock. She stepped back and bumped up against the shower as a policeman stepped inside. He was a young cop, handsome and wary. His jaw dropped a notch when he saw her. She rubbed her bare feet together. Sometimes the attention she got for her looks was fun, but other times it was a problem.

‘Ma’am, are you OK? Are you hurt?’

‘I’m scared.’ It was the truth. She was scared to death that the truth would come out.

His demeanour changed on a dime. ‘Everything’s OK. You’re safe now.’

He held out his hand. ‘Could you join us?’

She pulled the belt of her robe tighter around her waist. ‘Are they gone? Did you take their camera?’

‘They’re in the other room. I promise you, you won’t have to deal with them.’

Genieve thought fast. It wouldn’t be good to get on the police’s wrong side. Brody had told her not to leave the bathroom, but she was left to her own devices now. She needed to play this right. Tilting her head, she gave the young officer a helpless, fearful look. ‘Thank you for coming to our rescue.’

Our rescue. Hers and Samuel’s. They were together, a couple. At least on paper…

Reluctantly, she stepped into the bathroom doorway. There were still loud voices and way too many people in the room where, only a few moments ago, she and the senator had been getting down to an entirely different kind of busy. She pushed a shaky hand through her hair. When she saw another cop’s head snap around, she took her time combing her fingers through the strands.

Instinctively, she fell back on the training that Luxxor had given her. Say as little as possible, stay out of the limelight and wait for the company lawyer to show up. She didn’t need to tell the police her name, but she wasn’t to fight their requests.

‘Genieve, darling. Are you OK?’

She fought not to roll her eyes. So much for not identifying herself. She took one look at Samuel and knew she had to go into protective mode for him, too. Brody wouldn’t want shots getting out of the senator wearing nothing but a bed sheet. She grabbed another robe off the shelf and handed it to him. ‘I called your lawyer,’ she said, looking at him steadily. ‘He should be here soon.’

‘My law— Oh, yes. Good. He’s needed.’

Samuel knotted the belt of the robe around his waist. His cheeks were flushed and his famous, perfect silver hair was mussed. It was hard to tell if that had come from her hands or the altercation.

Genieve’s cheeks warmed. There wasn’t much about sex that made her shy any more, but the situation here was downright mortifying. The bed where they’d lain was rumpled, clothes were strewn about the room and, worst of all, she still felt that ache of need deep down in her core.

She’d been close. With the fantasy she’d had going, really close.

Her skin crawled when she caught a glance of the two men who’d broken in through the open door to the front room, and she hurriedly stepped out of their line of sight. She had to keep as little attention on herself as she could, although that was easier said than done. She tiptoed her way through the mess of clothes and bedding and settled onto a hard stuffed chair in the corner of the room. The large robe gaped open when she crossed her legs, but she let it. She needed to have everyone on her side right now, however she could get them.