Kiss the Girl (53 page)

Holy Christ, what a mess
.
  He was
in love
with Nixie. 
Maybe unwillingly.  Maybe unwisely.  But completely, madly, and irrevocably in love.  Had he really thought
getting engaged to somebody else
could
change that?
 

Well, no
.
  He’d been hoping, but that was different than believing.
 
He glanced at Mary Jane, her ring hand outstretched and defiant, her eyes full of pain and bravado, and knew she didn’t really believe it either. 
Why else would she have insisted on keeping the whole thing quiet
?
  That wasn’t normal, was it? 
Getting engaged and not telling anybody? 

But
Erik hadn’t been overly concerned with details like that at the time.  He’d been too busy
running f
rom the unpalatable truth in his
heart
, a truth that had just reared back and kicked him in the teeth at the worst possible moment.  He was in love with Nixie
and no engagement could change that.  It only
complicate
d
the shit out of things.

And now judging from the malicious gleam in Karl’s eyes, those complications were about to go public.  Really, really public. 
But now wasn’t the time to untangle the situation.  Maybe getting engaged to Mary Jane had been a mistake
--possibly the biggest of his life--
but t
here was no way Erik c
ould
abandon
her
now
.  Not even for Nixie, though G
od knew Nixie wouldn’t want him to.  She understood what love cost, in all its incarnations from friendship on up.

“Of course it’s true,” Erik said,
giving Mary Jane a reassuring squeeze
.  She was shaking hard enough to loosen her fillings.  She looked up at him with grateful eyes and leaned her head against his chest.
  “That’s my grandmother’s ring
she’s wearing.  It’s been in my family for generations.”
  

“Congratulations,” Karl said, smiling
at Erik with
genuine pleasure
.
 

Tyrese
stood as if rooted, all emotion carefully blanked from his face.  He offered a hand to Er
ik.  “Congratulations,” he said, his voice once again DJ smooth.

Erik smiled grimly and
shook the man’s hand. 
Tyrese
turned, slipped his hands into his pockets and strolled back into the ballroom as if nothing of consequence had happened.  Mary Jane gave a choked sob and turned her face into Erik’s
lapel
.  Karl gave him a little finger wave and slipped through the doors, as if discreetly allowing the lady to indulge her emotions.

Right.  Erik wasn’t fooled.  The guy
was probably mowing down old ladies and small children so he could go bash Nixi
e over the head with this, the ultimat
e proof of Erik’s stupidity
.

He toyed briefly with the idea of tackling
Karl
onto the buffet table and punching his lights out, but that would be self-indulgent and rude
. 
No, responsibilities came first, and right now that meant being the shoulder Mary Jane needed to cry on.   

For now he would just pray Nixie would understand. 
He could beat Karl’s smug ass later
if absolutely necessary.

God, he hoped it would be necessary.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN

“Where are we going?” Nixie
asked
as
James
towed her across the crowded ballroom.  She tried
to
inject
some interest
into her tone
.  She
should
be interested, shouldn’t she?

“To the bar,”
James
said. 
“I need a
real
drink.
” 

At the bar,
he
surveyed the array of bottles with a practiced eye
.  “Give me a bourbon,” he said to the bartender.  “Rocks.”

He tossed back the entire shot in one mouthful, placed the glass precisely on the bar and said, “Another.”  He glanced at Nixie’s
lifted brows
.  “Better make it a double,” he told the bartender.

A trickle of alarm seeped into Nixie’s stomach, the first thing she’d felt since leaving her own apartment nearly an hour ago.

“
This isn’t drinking.  This is
anesthesia
,
”
she said
.
  “What are you planning?”
 

“What am I planning?”  He laughed, but it was a harsh,
unamused
noise.  “Me?  I don’t get to plan, Nixie.  I don’t get to want.  To dream.  To follow my goddamn
bliss
. 
That shit is for the common folk.  Guy like me?  Crown pr
ince to a political dynasty?  I have
responsibilities
, Nixie.
  A sacred fucking duty t
o be a
successful, photogenic credit to
the
family
.
 
Anything less, the wrong guy might get elected.  There goes the economy.  There goes foreign policy. 
I fall down on the job and
the head of every American household is either out of work or getting his ass shot off in one of those countries you’re always cleaning up
.
  And it’s all my selfish fault.”  He
saluted her with his fresh glass.  “
See,
I’m just like you, Nixie.” 

Nixie stared at him as he poured fifty bucks worth of bourbon down his throat. 
Just like you.  I’m just like you, Nixie.
  The words rang inside her head
, echoed in that vast, cavernous space where her heart used to be
. 

“Got to be honest with you, though,” he went on.  “I didn’t
give
two shits about my responsibilities until Daddy dearest made access to my trust fund contingent upon living up to them.”  He paused to study the empty glass in his hand.  “Turns out I dislike being poor more than I dislike being told what to do, when to smile and who to fuck.  Another thing we have in common.”  The smile he gave her was brilliant and charming. 
“
I underestimated you, Nixie.  You’ve got some kind of stainless steel balls.  I mean, it’s one thing to let my dad pick out my dates.  But
letting your mother
fuck
your b
oyfriend for the press coverage? 
That’s hard core.”

“I didn’t...” She faltered, her
chest constricting.  T
he emptiness at her core shifted, morphed into an unsettling sense of pressure, an urgent restlessness she’d never felt before
.
 
She touched one cold hand to her cheek, found it burning.

That
awful
moment
in Kenya
reared up
from her memory in a
rush of disjointed
impressions
.
  The
frantic
creak of ancient bed springs.  T
he
musk
of sex
on
stagnant
air
. 
Sloan’s
face
, pale and perfect against the sheets. 
The petty sting of
Jame
s
’
betraya
l.  T
he vicious slice of her mother’s. 

Funny how different it all looked
now that Nixie’s flash-frozen heart wouldn’t produce the usual
filters of
outrage and pain.  Details previously content to lurk behind the hurt suddenly thrust themselves forward and demanded notice.

Little things.  Like Sloan, whose sexuality had always been more a weapon than a pleasure, moaning her way to a theatrically timed climax.  Like
Karl, who’d never flinched at using Sloan’s body and reputation in service of the cause, allowing Nixie to walk into that scene with the press corps at her back.  Karl, who’d never liked
James
, standing deliberately aside while the flashbulbs
strobed
.

Yes, Sloan had betrayed her. 
But Nixie finally
saw with a stark clarity
that the betrayal hadn’t
been Sloan’s
idea, or probably even her inclination. 

It had been
Karl’s.

Her hand drifted to the base of her throat.  Her pulse bumped there unevenly, startling evidence that, despite everything she didn’t feel, she was still alive.

“I didn’t
realize
--”
she started faintly but
James
cut her off.
   

“Of course you did.”  He raised his glass to her in mock salute.  “I’m not saying you sold her cheap or anything.  I’m sure the payoff was lavish.  But don’t fuck around with me, Nixie.  Not after what we’ve been through.  What we’ll go through yet tonight.  One child of fame to another?  Everything has a price tag. 
And if you’re going to sell your soul, you might as well get your money’s worth
.
  God knows I am.
” 

He
set aside his glass,
an alcoholic film finally dulling
the slicing brightness of his eyes
.  “
Now let’s
get this over with
.”  He
snatch
ed
up her hand with a grim determination that stopped Nixie’s breath in her chest.
 
“
Where’s Sloan?”

Karl had disappeared, leaving Sloan
on
one of the small balconies that studded the ballroom
.  It would do
, she thought, pulling open both doors.  A frame for the drama she was about to stage.  Yes, it would do very nicely.