Waking Up to You Overexposed

11



WHEN NICK REALIZED there were holes in the bottom of the candy, he saw red. And it wasn’t the cherry cordial filling.

He needed to know more—especially after what Jackie had told him about some flowers Izzie had passed to Leah last weekend. But he didn’t want to do it here.

“The police are on their way,” he muttered to Harry. Then, without a word, he grabbed Izzie’s elbow and pulled her out of the room, straight to her private dressing room.

She stumbled to keep up and he realized he might be holding her too tight. But he couldn’t let go, couldn’t release his grip. He wasn’t letting her get more than six inches away from him...or letting anyone else get within six feet of her.

“Nick, calm down,” she muttered.

“I’m calm.” Deadly calm.

“No, you’re not. You’re volcanic,” she said as they walked into her dressing room.

Nick shut and locked the door. The last time he’d locked the door to this room had been at the start of one of the most amazing sexual experiences he’d ever enjoyed. He really wished he was doing it for the same reason now.

He wasn’t. He was locking the door to keep Izzie—the woman he now knew he loved—safe from someone who’d tried to hurt her at least twice now. Maybe even more.

Looking down, he saw the new chair sitting in front of Izzie’s vanity and the steam built again. He leaned over and smacked it with his palm, sending it crashing against the wall. It did not fall apart.

But that didn’t ease his suspicion about the last one.

“Why did you do that?” she asked, her voice calm and even.

Good thing one of them was. “Just making sure our friend didn’t sabotage another chair.”

Izzie’s pretty mouth opened into a perfect O as understanding washed over her. That, more than anything, seemed to finally make this situation sink in. She grabbed the edge of the table and sagged against it. “Someone really is trying to hurt me?”

He stepped close and wrapped his arms around her shoulders and tugged her against him. “I think so, babe.”

“Why?”

“I have no idea. Why do stalkers do any of the crap they do?”

Tilting her head back to look up at him, she murmured, “Stalker? Why would someone wanting to get close to me only to do something as dumb as make me sick?”

He had a few ideas. There were a lot of men out there who liked to play hero. Maybe somebody was setting Izzie up to get sick or take a fall just so he could get near her by being the one who came to her aid. Who knew how some dark, twisted minds worked? “Maybe somebody was hoping you’d pass out onstage and he could say he was a doctor and come to your aid.”

She blew out an impatient breath. “That’s silly.”

“But not impossible,” he insisted. “Those flowers that came last week...Jackie said they were for you, but that you gave them to Leah?”

Narrowing her eyes, she nodded. “You think they have something to do with this?”

That seemed incredibly obvious to Nick. “You get a couple of anonymous gifts, and the person who ends up with them gets sick.”

She quickly figured out where he was going. “Harry said Leah was sick Sunday night....”

“So was Jackie. They share a dressing room and both smelled and touched the flowers when they were putting them in a vase.”

Izzie shook her head, obviously not wanting to believe it. He didn’t blame her. It couldn’t be easy for her to think someone out there had been targeting her.

Because it was absolutely killing him to think it.

“And you think there was something on the roses....”

“Could have been insecticide, roach powder, anything. They both got nauseous and dizzy, and went home with horrible headaches.”

Nick didn’t know a lot about common household pesticide exposure, but he sure knew about its military applications. He’d been trained in dealing with all kinds of chemical attacks and imagined the most basic symptoms would be similar.

Izzie finally slipped out of his arms, her lovely face taut and strained. Her mouth drooped and she shook her head, appearing almost...hurt...that someone would be after her.

But the hurt didn’t last for long. As she stared toward the replacement chair, her frown deepened and her eyes narrowed. He saw the clenching of her jaw and knew she was working herself into a temper.

“The cowardly bastard.” She smacked her hand flat against the tabletop, muttering a few more choice curses. “You find out who did this, Nick.”

He liked the return of that fierceness. Izzie wouldn’t let anything keep her down for long—it was one of the things he loved about her. Which he planned to tell her, just as soon as they got around to having that whole “I love you,” and “I love you, too,” conversation. Which would be soon, if he had his way. Very soon.

“I intend to. We’ll start by questioning everyone to see if anybody noticed your anonymous gift-giver hanging around.”

Though he didn’t say it to her, Nick also intended to carefully watch the staff when he talked to them. It wasn’t impossible that someone who worked right here at Leather and Lace was behind the attacks. An obsessed bartender, a jealous dancer who wanted Izzie’s headliner spot. Maybe even a bouncer wanting to be her hero. Hell, maybe even Harry wanting to stir up a big news story as publicity for the club. He could see the headline now: Hottest Mystery Dancer in Chicago Stalked by Unknown Assailant.

It was possible. Anything was.

“I’ll watch the crowd tonight and see if anybody acts suspiciously, or if I recognize some of the guys who come every night I’m on.” Glancing at her watch, she added, “I have to hurry up.”

That comment drove everything else out of his mind. Nick shook his head hard. “You’re not going on tonight.

She lifted her mask, turning to the mirror. “Of course I am.”

Nick met her reflected stare. “Like hell.”

“It can be like hell in here if you force me to make it that way,” she shot back. “Because if you say that again, we’re going to be having a major fight.”

Nick couldn’t believe her. She’d just found out someone had likely tried to poison her and she still wanted to perform. “Izzie, you can’t be serious.”

“Oh, you bet I am. We’re already down one girl with Leah being sick and I left Harry in the lurch last weekend.” Her eyes flashing fire, she added, “Besides, no one’s going to force me off the stage.”

Her expression betrayed her sheer determination as much as her words did. And he had to wonder if they had a double meaning.

Because despite everything that had happened this evening, he hadn’t forgotten what they had been talking about before Leah got sick. She’d basically asked him if he was going to watch her dance, and he’d hedged on his answer. He hadn’t missed the shine in her eyes or the disappointment twisting at her mouth. But he hadn’t been able to reassure her, because even Nick didn’t know how he was going to react when that moment came.

“It’s too dangerous.”

“There are four big burly bouncers upstairs to make sure nothing happens,” she insisted. Piercing him with her stare, she added, “Besides, you’ll be there to protect me. Or won’t you? Maybe there’ll be something more important to deal with.”

Nick now knew for sure she was referring to their earlier conversation. And maybe she had a right to.

But being a little slow to want to watch the woman he loved get naked in front of a bunch of other guys had absolutely nothing to do with his concern for her now. “It’s not about that.”

“Oh, yes, it is.” Izzie stalked around the privacy screen. Given that it offered no privacy whatsoever, considering the mirror, that was a statement in itself.

A frank one...that the walls were going up between them.

“And frankly, I’m tired of asking you about it. You can watch or not, but the Crimson Rose is performing tonight.”

She yanked her robe off, then, watching him watch her, dropped her bra and panties to the floor.

“Damn it,” he muttered, as always unable to take his ravenous eyes off her. She was just so incredibly beautiful. The woman stopped his heart every time he looked at her.

Izzie continued to ignore him, reaching for her G-string and pulling it on. Then she covered her dark, puckered nipples with those two ridiculous pink petals.

“Don’t do this,” he ordered through a thick, tight throat. “Not until we know you’re safe.” When she stepped out from behind the screen and lifted her chin in challenge, he added, “You don’t have to go out there.”

“It’s my job.”

“It’s something you do part-time for kicks and to rub it in to your family and the world that you’re not sweet little Isabella Natale anymore,” he said, frustrated beyond belief at her stoic refusal to listen to reason.

She appeared stunned by his accusation. “How can you say that? My family doesn’t even know I’m here.”

“I know and that proves my point. You get your secret kicks out of it without ever having to face the consequences. You’re not being honest to anyone—not even yourself—about why you’re doing this and what you really want.”

She jerked as if he’d slapped her. Closing his eyes and shaking his head, Nick wondered how he’d let this whole conversation spin so badly out of control so rapidly.

“You certainly are a fine one to talk,” she finally said, her tone steely.

“What?”

“You accuse me of that, but you’re doing exactly the same thing, Nick Santori. Stringing your family along with this idea that you’re going to be singing “O Sole Mio” and slinging pizza dough with Tony and your father. Meanwhile, you hide your nights doing something exciting and dangerous at a place they would never approve of. I call that hypocritical.”

He couldn’t believe she’d turned things around on him like that. “That’s ridiculous.”

“So why haven’t you told Tony you’re not sticking around? Why haven’t you told your father about this ‘protection’ business you’re thinking of going into with your Marine buddies?”

Leave it to a woman to use something he’d told her less than a day ago in a fight against him. “That has nothing to do with whether you go out onstage and flaunt yourself in front of someone who wants to hurt you.” But even as he said it, a small voice in his head whispered that she might be right. At least a little.

Not that he was going to admit that now...not when they still had the issue of her physical safety to work out. So he pushed on. “And I’m not onstage intentionally taking off my clothes to try to turn on a hundred strangers—one of whom might be trying to poison me.”

She’d stiffened at the word flaunt. By the time he’d finished speaking, Izzie’s face was as red as her mask. “Well, that’s it, then, isn’t it? We’ve finally gotten down to it.”

“Izzie....”

She put a hand up to stop him. “I knew it would come to this, and now it has. You need to leave. I’m going onstage tonight. By the time I get back, I hope there will be a new lock on my door, for my own protection.” Her chin quivered, her full lips shook. But she had one last thing to say. “And you most definitely will not have a key to it.”

* * *

NICK WASN’T IN the audience. Izzie scanned the crowd for him throughout her performance, wondering if he’d be lurking in the shadows, watching out for her.

He wasn’t.

It was over.

Somehow, she managed to not cry as she gyrated to the music. Managed to not show the hungry-looking men in the audience that her heart was broken.

It shouldn’t feel this broken, after all, she’d known going into this crazy, wild relationship with Nick that it would have to end badly. From day one, they’d wanted each other on opposite terms. He’d wanted the cute kid sister of his brother’s wife, who worked at the bakery every day. She’d wanted the sultry, sexy bodyguard who guarded her naked body every night.

That he’d tried to put his foot down and forbid her from dancing the very first moment he had a convenient excuse emphasized that and more.

As she dipped and swayed and thrust and jumped on the stage, four words kept time with the music. They played over and over, keeping the 4:4 beat.

It can not work.

By the time she was finished dancing, Izzie was as much angry as she was heartbroken. Aside from being her lover, Nick was supposed to be the club’s bodyguard. And yet when she’d been the most vulnerable—exposed—he’d been nowhere to be seen.

She’d have something to say about that the second she saw him. But that moment came almost immediately—he had been watching her back. Literally. He was standing, dark and predatory, in the wings just offstage. He’d been watching for her to come off...out of a direct line of sight to center stage. So he hadn’t watched her dance. And he most certainly hadn’t experienced watching her dance with the rest of a big male audience.

Nothing had changed.

“I’ll escort you to your dressing room,” he said, his jaw as stiff as his shoulders. “Rose.”

She didn’t even respond as she slipped her robe on over her nearly naked body, then sailed past him toward the stairs. She didn’t need his help, she didn’t need his approval.

Yes, she needed him. But she’d learn to do without him, just like she’d done without him all those long, lonely teenage years when she’d pined for the man.

Of course, never having had him might have aided her then. Now that she had?

Izzie feared she was never going to get over Nick.

“Ahem.” As they reached the bottom of the stairs, Harry stepped out of the greenroom.

“Everything okay?” Nick asked, instantly on alert.

“It’s fine,” the older man said, but he didn’t sound convinced. In fact, his voice was weak, his face a little pale.

Izzie reached out and put a hand on his shoulder. “Harry, what’s wrong? Is Leah all right?”

He covered her hand with his. “Yes. Jackie called earlier. Leah’s fine.” He glanced over his shoulder into the quiet greenroom. He stepped out of the room and eased the door closed. “But I need to talk to both of you. Will you come with me, please?”

Hearing his urgency and seeing his very obvious concern, Izzie immediately went on alert. Something else had happened...maybe someone else was hurt.

“What is it?” Nick asked in a low voice, obviously realizing the same thing.

The man just shook his head, leading them back up the stairs to his small office, which was on the other side of the lobby. They took a private, back hallway—a good thing since Izzie still wore just her long silky robe. Whatever was bothering Harry, it had to be serious because he hadn’t even offered to wait while she put some clothes on.

Harry’s office was unpretentious and simple. Comfortable. Much like the self-deprecating man who occupied it.

But Harry Black did not look at all comfortable right now. As he gestured them toward the two armchairs across from his desk, his hand shook.

Izzie almost held her breath, watching him sit down behind the desk. Before he said a word, he dropped his head forward and put it in hands. “I can’t even look at you when I say this.”

Izzie had no idea what the man could be talking about, but beside her, Nick sucked in a sharp breath. “You...”

Their employer immediately looked up, shaking his head. “No. Not me.” Moisture appearing in his eyes, he continued. “It was Delilah.”

Izzie suddenly got it. Delilah had been the one after her. She’d poisoned the chocolates—and perhaps the roses.

Nick muttered a foul word, but Harry didn’t leap to the defense of his wife. She deserved their scorn. No, she hadn’t succeeded in hurting Izzie, her target, but she had certainly made Leah miserable.

“Tell us,” Nick said, leaning back in the chair and crossing his arms over his chest.

His eyes were narrowed, his expression forbidding. Izzie recognized that tension in his rock-hard body. It was a good thing Delilah Black was not here for a personal confession. A very good thing. Because if Izzie didn’t rip her apart, Nick just might have.

“I thought she wanted to retire,” Harry said. He had a dazed expression, the same one many men wore when trying to understand their wives. Izzie had certainly seen it on her father’s face. “She seemed happy helping me with management.”

“How long ago did she stop?” Izzie asked, feeling a sharp sense of pity for the man. She sensed Harry needed to build up to telling them the worst of it.

“A few years ago when she turned forty. Right after we got married.” Opening his desk drawer, Harry reached in and grabbed a silver flask and a shot glass. He poured himself a drink, raising a brow toward Nick and Izzie to see if they wanted one.

Neither took him up on it. Izzie because she was already feeling queasy at the story Harry was telling them. Nick...well, probably because he was already on a low simmer in the chair next to her. Throwing alcohol on a slow burn could make it erupt.

“And what, she thought if she could get rid of your headliner, you’d suddenly put her back onstage? That makes no sense,” Nick said, disgust dripping from his words.

“Not to you. Not to me,” Harry said with a sigh. “But to her.” Growing slightly pink in the cheeks, he added, “I, uh, think there might have been a little more to it, though. I guess I talk a lot about you, Rose...Izzie,” he clarified, calling her by her real name for the first time since he’d hired her. “And I think Dee got a bit jealous, thinking my interest was something other than professional.” Almost blushing to the roots of his balding head now, he quickly added, “That wasn’t at all true. I’m as proud of you as if you were my own daughter...but Dee didn’t get that.”

The man had never even looked at her the wrong way. Izzie didn’t doubt he was being truthful.

“Was she responsible for the roses?”

Harry nodded, taking another deep sip of his drink. “She put some kind of bug powder on them. And before you ask, yes, she did the chair, too. I got her to admit to both of those things, as well as putting some kind of syrup—Ipecac—in the chocolates.”

This time Izzie was the one to call the other woman a bitch under her breath. She simply couldn’t help it. Again, Harry didn’t make any effort to defend his wife.

“Why’d she come clean?” Izzie asked.

“I suspected as soon as I saw the box of candy. Dee loves that kind. And she came home with some of that syrup a couple of days ago, saying she wanted it on hand in case one of her nieces or nephews came over and swallowed something poisonous.”

Nick shifted a little, his arms still cross, his body still rigid. “So you confronted her?”

Harry nodded. “And she confessed. When she saw how sick Leah was, she felt awful.”

“Wonder if she’d have felt that way if it had been Izzie lying on the floor,” Nick snapped.

He sounded very protective. Which made Izzie feel all warm and gooshy inside, even though she told herself that was stupid.

“I dunno,” Harry admitted. “Maybe not.”

Gee, it was nice to be liked.

Nick finally sat up and leaned toward the desk. Fixing a firm eye on Harry he said, “Have you called the police?”

The man slowly shook his head. But before Nick could confront him on it, he added, “I went to Leah first and told her everything. She and Jackie decided to press charges, and they made the call to the police themselves.”

Nick relaxed. A little.

“I understand why that needed to happen.” Tears rose in Harry’s gray eyes and oozed a little onto his round cheeks. “But I couldn’t be the one to turn my wife in.”

Izzie reached over and put her hand on Nick’s leg, sensing he was about to make another comment about Delilah. She squeezed his thigh, warning him not to. Harry was suffering enough. He didn’t need to be told he was a fool for loving someone so hateful. “I understand,” she murmured.

“I hope you do. And I hope you’ll understand that I’m going to see her through this. She’ll be facing assault charges.”

“At the very least,” Nick mumbled.

“I know this might make you want to leave, Ro...Izzie. But I wish you wouldn’t.” The man smiled weakly. “You’re family.”

Huh. If poison was the way Delilah treated members of her family, Izzie would hate to see what she did to her enemies.

“I know that, too,” Izzie said, slowly pulling her hand away from Nick’s warm thigh, already missing the contact. Already missing him. “You love her. That’s what people who love each other do...they support one another, even when they make what other people might see as bad or foolish decisions.” Hearing a quiver in her voice as the subject touched much too close to home, Izzie offered Harry a tremulous smile.

Nick she didn’t even look at.

“Thank you for telling me, Harry. I’m going to go get ready for my next number.” Without another word to either of them, Izzie walked out and went back to work.

And Nick didn’t come anywhere near her for the rest of the night.

* * *

WHEN BRIDGET WENT back to the dealership on Monday morning, she looked for Ted, wondering if he’d have the nerve to show up.

He didn’t. That was good.

Neither did Dean. That wasn’t good.

Hopefully Ted had been scared off, either by Dean, or by the ramifications of his own stupid actions.

Hopefully Dean had not been scared off and was just stuck in traffic.

Bridget had spent all Sunday night wondering what on earth she was going to say to him—how she was going to climb that wall he’d erected between them after he’d kissed her so passionately in the office. But for nothing. He wasn’t there.

She trudged through her day, going through the same song and dance with Marty about the books. She found problems. He waved them off as unimportant. A typical day in the life.

“I am so gonna quit this job,” she muttered that afternoon.

Soon. Maybe she’d even give her notice today. After all, she’d only stayed to see if something was going to happen between her and Dean Willis. Judging by yesterday, it seemed pretty clear nothing was.

She went so far as to open up a document on her computer to type her resignation letter. She’d give two weeks notice, even though she had no other job lined up. She had enough of a cushion to be unemployed for a while. And if she didn’t come up with another bookkeeping job quickly, she’d lay money that Izzie would hire her on at the bakery, just to pay the rent.

But before she’d typed so much as the date, Bridget heard a commotion—shouts, coming from the sales floor. Her first thought was that Ted had come back and was making a scene. But there were several voices, all yelling at once.

She grabbed her purse and threw it under her desk, then wondered if she should crawl under after it...this could be a robbery. But when the door to the office flew open and she saw a uniformed police officer, she didn’t.

“Is anyone in here with you?” the officer barked.

“N-no. Just me.”

“You need to come with me, ma’am.”

Dazed, Bridget followed the officer, seeing all the other employees being herded together by other policemen. All of them were gathered just inside the front door, and Marty was shouting loud enough to break the glass in the windows.

Everyone was talking—demanding answers. Everyone but Bridget. She didn’t have to. Because the second she saw Dean Willis—dressed in a perfectly fitted dark blue suit—talking to other dark-suited men right outside the front door, she knew what was going on.

He was no car salesman.

“Sir, you’ll have an opportunity to call your attorney soon,” one of the officers said, trying to calm Marty down.

It worked for a brief second, until Dean walked through the door. When Marty saw him with the rest of the investigators, he started ranting and struggling against the officer trying to handcuff him. Another one jumped in to help and between them they got the livid man into custody.

Dean looked her way once. His nice blue eyes were frigid. His smile absent. His tousled blond hair was slicked down and parted on the side—conservative, professional. And his clothes were immaculate, right down to his shiny black wing-tip shoes.

He could have been a picture from an FBI agent’s handbook come to life.

The rest of the day went by in a whirl. She was questioned endlessly—never by Dean, who stayed away from her—but by his fellow agents. Apparently there had been a reason Marty hadn’t wanted Bridget to do a good job with the books. They were never supposed to balance out. Because, if the agents were to be believed, Honest Marty’s Used Cars had been bringing in and cleaning up a whole lot of dirty money for some pretty bad guys.

And she’d fallen right in the middle of it.

By the end of the day, Bridget was utterly exhausted. Ready to collapse, her throat sore from answering so many questions. She hadn’t asked for a lawyer—had cooperated fully, believing that’s what an innocent person should do. And she’d spent the past four hours in the conference room, going over months’ worth of seized bank statements and ledgers with some FBI accountant, watching step by step as they built a case against her boss.

At first, she felt a little sorry for Marty. But not too sorry. Especially when she caught snips of conversation about where the dirty money had come from. In her opinion, anybody who cleaned cash that had been earned off the sale of filthy drugs to kids deserved what he got. She was just sorry the creep had dragged her into the sordidness.

She’d seen Dean only briefly, when she’d been brought to tears by the relentless questions of the accountant. Dean had appeared out of nowhere, appearing behind the other officer’s back, barking, “She’s not a suspect, she’s a witness. Treat her like one.” Then, with one long, even look at Bridget, he’d left again to go back to work with the other investigators.

Finally, when it was nearly dark out, Bridget was told she could go home. She’d be called in to help again—and, likely, to testify—but for now, she was free.

Free. Great. She was free to go home, look back on this horrible day—on these past few horrible weeks—and think about what a damned fool she’d been.

Dean had used her. He’d feigned an interest in her so he could build his money-laundering case against Marty. He’d played her like an instrument, obviously seeing the quiet, sweet-faced bookkeeper as an easy mark.

She hated the son of a bitch with a passion she’d never had toward anyone in her life.

That rage carried her down the block as she strode away from the dealership, heading toward her nearby apartment. Usually when she made the walk home, she kept her purse clutched tightly to her side, and constantly scanned for any possible danger. This wasn’t a bad part of town—but as a young woman walking alone, she didn’t take chances. Tonight, however, she practically dared anyone to mess with her. She felt capable of doing real violence.

“Bridget, wait, please!” a voice called.

Though she kept walking, she peered over her shoulder to see who’d called her. She almost tripped over her own feet when she realized it was Dean. “Stay away from me,” she snapped, picking up her pace.

He picked up his, too, chasing her down until he reached her. “Would you stop? I’ve been calling you for two blocks.”

“Not real quick on the uptake, are you?” she said. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

“You have to let me explain.”

“I don’t have to do anything,” she said, though she did finally stop and face him. “And you don’t have to explain, I got it, okay? You were working undercover. I was the easy mark. Of course you’d come after me by any means at your disposal.”

“It wasn’t like that.”

“Like hell.”

“Just...calm down and let me explain. I did not mean to hurt you, and I definitely never meant to get personally involved with you.”

“You mean that wasn’t in the manual?”

“No, it wasn’t. But I was worried, I felt sure early on that you were caught in something you didn’t know about.” He put a hand on her arm. “I was worried about you.”

She shrugged his hand of. “Sure you were. I’m sure your concern was the reason you asked me out. And your fears that I was being used by my boss to help hide money was the only reason you kissed the lips off my face yesterday.”

He closed his eyes, breathed deeply—as if for control—and tried again. “I lost my detachment where you were concerned.”

Those were the first words he’d said that actually made her pause. Because he’d whispered them hoarsely, as if against his will. Like he didn’t want to admit to the weakness.

And she believed him.

Not that it made a damn bit of difference. “Well, that’s too bad for you then,” she said, lifting her chin, amazed that her voice didn’t even quiver. “Because I never want to see you again.” She began walking again.

“Bridget, I know you’re upset now. But I want to make it up to you. Soon, when you’ve...”

“When I’ve what?” she asked, swinging around again. “When I’ve calmed down? Well, keep dreaming, buddy. Because it’s not going to happen. Ever.”

Dean met her stare, but didn’t try to stop her this time when she turned again to start walking. He did, however, have one more thing to say, low, as if making a vow.

“I’m not giving up.”

“Well, too bad for you,” she snapped back, feeling both proud of herself for being so strong...and sad at having lost something she suspected could have been very special.

“Bridget....”

This time, she didn’t turn around. And she didn’t have to wonder what Izzie would do.

Bridget knew what she wanted to do.

So without a pause, she lifted her hand, flipped him the bird over her shoulder and kept on walking.