Seeing Red

SEEING RED

Hearts and Minds, Book 3

By HOLLEY TRENT

LYRICAL PRESS

 
http://lyricalpress.com/

KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

 
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com/

To folks like Melissa Blue and Rebekah Weatherspoon who read Calculated Exposure and asked if the Russian was going to get his lady—this one’s for you. Warning: Rozhkov’s Disease is contagious.

Chapter 1

Megan had just married a man whose last name she wasn’t quite sure how to spell. The surname was a cacophony of consonants that, when aggregated, sounded much like a disease discovered by some Russian scientist. She should have known how to spell her own husband’s name. Was the affliction spelled
R-o-s-h-k-o-f
or
R-o-z-h-k-o-v
? She shrugged. Quite possibly, it was neither.

A warm, smooth cheek pressed against her left one, and a light arm draped around Meg’s naked shoulders. She inhaled the crisp scent of white-tea perfume and sighed.

Sharon.

“How are you feeling, Mrs. Rozhkov?” her dear friend whispered.

Meg didn’t answer.

They watched four barefoot, tuxedo-clad men tip their boozy libations in a toast toward a cluster of photographers. At least someone was having a good time, if not Meg.

Her gaze landed on her elder brother Stephen. He was plastered, an unusual occurrence for him, and grinned like a fool. He gripped a beer in either hand as if this really were the happiest day in his sister’s life and not a grand charade the whole lot of the men were complicit in. Stephen had known his beer-swigging friends for only two days and had already made a seamless integration into their geek clique. Typical Stephen.

Next, Meg’s stare tracked to a shock of coppery-red hair. She huffed and rolled her eyes at her new husband.

Yeah. Disease sounded right. Rozhkov’s Disease. Symptoms included a lack of common sense, a marriage license, and a couple of gold rings.

“I hate you,” she whispered to Sharon.

Sharon chafed Meg’s right arm in the maternal way she always did. “No you don’t. Besides, this was your idea.”

Meg cringed. She’d been hoping Sharon wouldn’t remember how this farce had come to be. When Meg had broached the topic two weeks before the wedding, she’d been at an exceptionally low point. Sharon had caught Meg crying in her after-dinner Moscato. They were supposed to be celebrating the Fennells’ move back to the United States. It should have been a joyous thing, but everywhere Meg went lately seemed to have a funereal pall. At least, it seemed that way in her little bubble.

At that party, she’d zoned out on all the revelry, because the static in her head was too loud. The static that had been ever-present in her brain since her divorce had cleared only for that nagging voice of self-doubt to pipe up and remind her of how miserable she was. She’d reached her breaking point there at the Fennells’ kitchen island when Sharon had sidled up, wrapped an arm around Meg’s drooping shoulders, and asked, “What’s wrong?”

Meg had ducked out of Sharon’s embrace, straightened her spine, and announced, “Just because I’m not smiling doesn’t mean I’m not happy!”

All of her friends had turned to look at her, and then the tears had come.

She’d never been much of a crier, but she’d been making up for lost time since the divorce. She’d cried enough to fill buckets.

Sighing, she broke free of her downer thoughts and focused on the here and now. She curled her toes into the Bermuda sand and met Sharon’s soft gaze. “This wedding was a bad idea. Normally when I have bad ideas, you and the girls try to talk me out of them. What happened this time?”

Sharon giggled in response. She gave Meg a little squeeze, then eased away, giving back the surly bride’s personal space.

That’s why Meg loved Sharon. She had a knack for reading people, and after twelve years of friendship, she never took Meg’s mercurial temperament personally. Sharon just surfed Meg’s moods like waves and had fun while doing it.

“I see opportunities everywhere, Meg.”

Coming from Sharon, the statement wasn’t an exaggeration. She was one of those rare businesswomen who could make a dollar out of fifteen cents with minimal exertion. Her knack for exploiting possibilities was a running gag in their circle. By trade, she was an event planner, but her hobby was playing yenta, and, well, she’d gone and done it again.

Sharon’s matchmaking meddling was why Meg was now married to a big, redheaded Russian named Sergei Rozhkov. Meg hadn’t even known his real name until two days past when they’d arrived in Bermuda and signed the marriage license. Meg had always known him as “Seth.” Further, she hadn’t bothered learning his last name in all that time. Hadn’t needed to.

And now they were married…at least for the moment.

Lightning flashed over the ocean, brightening the overcast sky and heightening Meg’s impatience. Holding her breath, she counted. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Thunder crashed in the distance, and she exhaled the spent air. Five miles away. Time to get off the beach.

She tightened her grip around the gorgeous hibiscus bouquet she’d cried over while trudging up the beach with her bridesmaids and shifted her weight.

“How long do you think I’ll have to stick with this?” she asked as Carla Fennell joined them with their newest friend, Erica. Erica had experienced firsthand the enormity of Sharon’s meddling. Sharon only meddled when she cared.

Erica’s laugh was deep and throaty as she shook her head. “Come on, Seth’s a nice guy. You could do worse.”

Meg cocked up one eyebrow, then tried and failed to suppress a scoff. She
had
done worse. And then divorced him. That jerkoff was why she’d just married a virtual stranger.

Her ex was a philandering rock star who’d cheated one time too many and liked to brag about it. If that hadn’t been bad enough, he’d claimed their son Toby wasn’t his. That had been the ultimate slight.

People thought Meg was a goddamned joke. A caricature. Some pathetic waif a rising star had dragged into the spotlight with him and then humiliated. There was even a “Poor Meg” internet meme.

Poor Meg couldn’t get over Spike.

Poor Meg was such a victim.

Poor Meg should have known better.

Poor Meg should have moved on.

Poor Meg had bought herself a big fucking diamond engagement ring. She’d announced to the world she’d found The One, and that she was getting married again.

Idiot Meg hadn’t thought she’d actually have to follow through with that announcement, but once Sharon impressed on her that this was an opportunity to disassociate herself from Spike once and for all, they’d thrown together a wedding in a week. The groom was practically an afterthought. Meg had told Sharon she didn’t care and to just find someone, so Sharon had.

Seth. Best friend of Carla’s and Erica’s husbands. The man who used to hang out on the stone wall at their mutual alma mater to watch the pretty girls walk by. The eccentric guy who liked patterned shirts a bit too much. And the very same dude who both Erica and Sharon regularly checked in on because apparently single male astrophysicist-slash-aerospace engineers were incapable of feeding themselves nutritious meals.

She already had one kid. Apparently, she’d just picked up a thirty-five-year-old one, too.

“Ugh.”

“What is it, honey?” Carla nudged.

Meg’s cheeks burned hot even thinking it. She blew out a breath and met her friend’s serious blue gaze. “I was just thinking about all the jokes people will make about the red hair.”

The other three women shared a look.

Meg groaned. They had to have noticed it, too. Between Meg, Seth, and Toby, they could declare themselves a convention. Add Stephen’s auburn to the mix, and maybe they could have a parade, too.

“People might think Toby is Seth’s love child,” Sharon said in a flat voice.

“Would that be good or bad?”

Sharon raised her narrow shoulders in a shrug, but Meg could see the concentration bubbling behind those narrowed eyes. Plotting again, probably. “I haven’t decided. I bet Spike will want a paternity test.”

Now Meg really did scoff. “Already had one. Unfortunately, Spike doesn’t believe in science. He’s paying the child support only because the courts do believe in the wonders of DNA. Lucky me.”

Lightning flashed again and this time she didn’t try to count. She knew the storm was blowing closer. Why were they still standing around?

“Looks like those photographers who’ve been following you around all afternoon have given up the pursuit. I think they’ve got enough pictures, so we can probably break it up,” Carla said.

Meg turned and scanned the resort’s long boardwalk and the cabanas nearby. The photographers had been on her trail since the divorce rumblings had started, more interested in her personally after the dissolution of her marriage than they’d been when she and Spike had been married. Before then, they were only interested in generic Meg. The idea of Spike’s wife, but not the specific woman filling the job.

She didn’t spy any unfamiliar camera holders on the beach, and the ones she’d noted before the wedding had now clustered, chatting amongst themselves. Damn shame she’d started recognizing paparazzi. Her mother had joked she should offer them hot coffee next time she found them in front of her building.

“Yes, I’d like to get out of here,” Meg said through clenched teeth. “I’m sure Toby is giving the nanny fits.”

Sharon and Carla snorted in unison.

Erica offered a wry smile.

Meg rolled her eyes. The kid had been a handful at age two. At three, he’d been downright ferocious. At age four, he was motion bound in skin and freckles. He exhausted her with little effort. Handling him on her own was tough, but that was her normal.

“Why don’t you leave him in the nursery a while?” Sharon asked. “He’s there with Ariel and all the Fennell kids. I bet he’s fine. He’s always a little less rambunctious when his cohorts are around. Just give him some time. Maybe it’ll be good for him.”

Meg thought it over. Maybe Sharon was right. Besides, the Fennells and Gills were flying home in the morning, and who knew when they’d all get together again? Everyone was always so busy. This trip to Bermuda had been serendipitous in that they could get together, regardless of the lie for which they’d done it.

Stephen, up the beach, lifted a beer to her in salute, and she waved him over.

He jogged the hundred feet from the waves and wrapped one arm around her and the other around Sharon, grinning like a fool.

Meg sighed.

“I’ve got to give you credit, Meg. I thought this ruse would be a major drag, but you’ve got pretty decent guy friends. Didn’t know you had it in you.”

She didn’t. They weren’t her friends. Sure, she was pleasant when in their company, but calling them “friends” would have been an exaggeration.

“We’re going to wrap this thing up,” she said. “The photographers must be wandering off in search of dinner or some other more famous bone to gnaw on. Tell the guys, will you?”