Stark After Dark

by J. Kenner

  Once again, I meet Jamie’s eyes, but she’s already on it. She’s snatched the box and is examining every last inch of it and the muffin cup. “Nothing,” she says. “Do you think we ate it?”

  I don’t answer. I’m too busy typing a four into the box. I hold my breath, hit enter, then both laugh and curse when I hear Damien’s voice saying, “Try again, sweetheart.”

  “Oh my god,” Jamie says. “You so have to figure this out. Like right now.”

  I agree. I can picture Damien at work today, doing whatever master-of-the-universe thing is on his agenda. But even while he’s buying Argentina, he’s secretly smirking about the fact that he has befuddled his wife.

  The image only makes me more determined to figure this out. And fast.

  “Paris?” Jamie suggests.

  I try. Nothing.

  I try “Stark,” “Wife,” and “Malibu.”

  And then, I realize.

  “I know what it is,” I say, then type in “Sunset,” the safe word that I picked my first night with Damien. That’s sort of like a key, after all.

  I hold my breath—and then smile with satisfaction when the log-in screen disappears and text fills the screen.

  Congratulations, Nikki, you solved clue number two,

  Interpreted the hint just right.

  Now that you know what to do,

  I’ll tell you that this clue,

  Is only available at night.

  Are you enjoying this game, please say that you do,

  And know that I’m exceptionally fond of you.

  “Fond of you?” Jamie wiggles her eyebrows at me. “That’s got to be the key. Because that man is so beyond ‘fond’ it isn’t even funny.”

  I don’t disagree, but neither have I got an inkling about where this clue leads. And a solid minute spent staring at the screen isn’t helping any.

  I’m about to close my laptop and offer to walk Jamie to Starbucks for a good-luck-at-the-audition latte, when my email pings.

  “I bet he knows you got in,” Jamie says, looking over my shoulder at the name of the sender: Damien J. Stark.

  I realize it must be a new account, because Damien has never used his middle initial on his emails, and I assume it’s one he set up for this game.

  I open the email—and immediately go cold.

  The subject line reads Mine.

  And under that, filling the body of the email, is a grainy photograph of my husband with his mouth on Italian supermodel Carmela D’Amato’s breast. They are both naked, and the look of ecstasy on Carmela’s face is one that I have seen and felt on my own.

  I clap my hand over my mouth, certain I’m going to be sick.

  “Hey,” Jamie says. “Hey. He didn’t send this. You know he didn’t send this.”

  I nod, numb, as Jamie closes my laptop.

  “She’s that supermodel, right? The one Damien screwed around with back in the day?”

  I nod. “I saw her again not too long ago.”

  “Really?” Surprise laces Jamie’s voice. “Where?”

  “Damien’s hotel room in Munich.”

  “Wait. What?”

  I shrug, going for nonchalant. In truth, just the memory makes me edgy. “We came back to the room and she was waiting there. All ready to get down and dirty with Damien again. Apparently, she was on a standby list when he traveled to Europe.”

  “Nikki…” Her voice trails off into sympathy.

  “I know. I’m fine.” And I am. I’m not even jealous. Not really. Except I am. I’m jealous of every woman who had time with Damien. Not because I think he still wants them, but because I covet those lost hours that could have been mine.

  I mutter a curse and reach to open the laptop again, but Jamie stops me. “Dammit, Nikki, don’t do this to yourself.”

  “I’m not.” My voice is shaky, and I take a deep breath to steel myself. “You’re right—Damien didn’t send this. I want to know who did.”

  “And looking at that fucking picture is going to tell you?”

  I shake my head, then open the lid and maneuver my finger on the trackpad to click on the sender. “There,” I say, when the full email address pops up. It’s his name, all right. But it’s not from Stark International or any of Damien’s companies.

  No, the domain that this email came from is WiseApps.

  Jamie lets out a low whistle, and I nod my head in agreement. WiseApps Development is the name of a company that threatened me with litigation just a few weeks ago, effectively putting a nasty gray cloud over my honeymoon. As it turned out, the company—and the lawsuit—were bullshit. A stunt pulled by Damien’s batshit crazy childhood friend, Sofia.

  “I thought she lost internet privileges,” Jamie says.

  “I thought so, too.” When I say “batshit crazy,” I mean it in the literal sense. Sofia is currently locked away in an institution outside of London, and after the fiasco with the threatened lawsuit, the security around her was amped up and her privileges were knocked down. But Sofia is as brilliant as she is crazy, and if anyone could figure a way around an internet ban, she’d be the girl.

  “This picture must be years old,” Jamie says, as if to console me.

  “I know. Don’t worry, James. I can handle this.”

  “Damn straight you can, Nicholas. But you don’t have to handle it alone. For that matter, you shouldn’t. Someone is fucking with you. You need to tell Damien. Hell, you need to tell Ryan.”

  I tilt my head up to look at her. “Ryan?”

  “He’s Damien’s top-dog security dude, right?”

  I nod.

  “I may not know Damien as well as you do—”

  “I certainly hope not.”

  She snorts, but otherwise doesn’t falter. “But I do know that Damien’s not the kind of guy who would consent to that sort of picture. And I doubt that he would have been any different half a dozen years ago.”

  I nod. She makes an excellent point. “Someone hid a camera, and then bided their time for years. Sofia?”

  “She’s in London, right? And has been for a while? Look at the coffee table.”

  Needless to say, I hadn’t noticed the furnishings on first glance. Now I see that she’s right. A copy of the London-based Financial Times is on the table, along with a magazine called London Today that looks like an in-house hotel publication.

  “Like I said,” Jamie says, “you need to tell Damien. Go.”

  I do, but not before giving her a hug and telling her to break a leg at her audition.

  Then I’m out the door, shouting to Mrs. Crane that I won’t be back until tomorrow.

  As I race to my car, I think about the cupcake and the message that sent me to it: what is sweeter than Love?

  I sigh. This isn’t the day I expected, not by a long shot. But at least I’m heading toward Damien. And with him at my side, I know I can handle whatever is coming.

  Chapter 4

  I race downtown in Cooper, my still-new Mini Cooper, and ignore the parking garage in favor of the valet parking service in front of Stark Tower. I toss the valet my keys, then race inside.

  Joe waves from his perch behind the information desk. “Good to see you, Mrs. Stark.”

  “Hi, Joe, sorry, Joe. In a hurry!” I jab my finger on the button, then rush up to the nineteenth floor and the reception area for Stark Applied Technology.

  As soon as I walk off the elevator, I see Preston Rhodes step out of the closest conference room.

  “Nikki,” Preston says. “Good to see you. I was just telling Lisa we need to have you two over for drinks so we can hear all about Paris.”

  “We’d love that,” I say. “But right now, I really need to talk to Damien. Do you mind if I borrow him for a few minutes?”

  His mouth quirks with irony. “I’d like to borrow him myself.”

  I frown, confused. “I thought he was in meetings with you all day.”

  “That was the plan. Apparently something came up.” He tilts his head back, as if looking t
o heaven. “He said he was going to the apartment. Something he had to take care of.”

  I feel an unpleasant twisting in my stomach, but tell myself I’m being foolish. Damien handles a dozen crises a day. There’s no reason to think that my crisis has already exploded.

  I use my card key to call Damien’s private elevator to take me to the top floor, which is divided between Damien’s penthouse office space and his downtown residence. As soon as the car arrives, I press the button to indicate my destination, ensuring that the elevator doors open onto the apartment side.

  It whisks me upward, and I hold on to the rail for both balance and support. Because despite my stern admonition to remain calm, the higher we rise, the more my nerves are fluttering.

  I hear voices the moment I step into the foyer. Damien’s, clipped and curt. And another voice, softer but agitated. A woman, perhaps?

  It’s hard for me to tell, but I’m not wasting time playing guessing games. I pass the flower arrangement that never seems to wilt, then step into the living room.

  I expect the familiar furniture. The vase with a crystal red rose. Damien’s science and business magazines scattered across the coffee table. And, of course, I expect to see the man himself.

  I do not expect to see Carmela D’Amato, and when I do it is immediately as if she is the only thing I can see.

  Suddenly, I realize what I should have known all along—bitch from hell Carmela has teamed up with uber-bitch Sofia to screw with me and Damien.

  Well, fuck that.

  As I rush toward Carmela, I vaguely hear Damien calling my name, but it’s like white noise behind the sound of blood rushing through my head. It’s not until my hand has lashed out and slapped her soundly across the cheek that the world snaps back into focus and my legs go weak.

  I’m falling to the ground, but I feel Damien’s arms go around me. As always, he is there to catch me when I fall.

  “Do you know what she’s done?” I snarl. “What she’s sent?”

  He is behind me, so I cannot see his face. But Carmela is in front of me, and I see the way she looks at him, as if the world is suddenly caving in around her.

  I’d braced for her to lash back at me. Instead, she looks soft and a little lost.

  And when she drops to the couch and presses her face into her hands, I know that I have stepped into Neverland.

  “Damien?”

  I steady myself, then turn in his arms so that I can see him. He does not look soft. On the contrary, he is angry and tight. He is an explosion waiting to happen, and in that moment I know that the only reason he’s managing to hold it together is because Carmela is in the room with us.

  His fingers are tight around my upper arm, almost to the point of hurting. I don’t object, though. I understand that this is his way of keeping me close. Of protecting me from whatever is happening—because whatever’s going on is bigger than one emailed photograph sent to Damien Stark’s new wife by his crazy childhood friend.

  “Damien,” I repeat. “What’s happened?”

  He doesn’t answer. Instead, he lets go of my arm and then says very slowly and carefully, “Why did you come here?”

  At the question, Carmela looks up at me. Her eyes are red, but the softness is fading, and as she awaits my answer, I can see her hard edges clicking back into place.

  “I got an email,” I say. I pull out my phone and hand it to him. As I was planning to do that all along, the email is already open on my screen. The note—Mine—and that horrible, sensual, brutally raw image.

  “I opened the email thinking it was from you,” I say.

  “Son of a bitch.” He smacks his hand hard against the wall, and I’m grateful it’s not the one holding my phone.

  “You saw the domain name?” I ask. “When I saw Carmela, I thought she’d teamed up with Sofia.” I no longer think that. Because it’s very clear to me that Carmela isn’t calling the shots here any more than I am.

  “She didn’t,” Damien says. “And this email didn’t come from Sofia.”

  “You’re sure?” Since I know WiseApps was a domain that she set up, I thought my assumption was pretty damn reasonable.

  “She doesn’t own it anymore. Transferred it while we were on the island,” he says, referring to the island getaway he took me to for the last leg of our honeymoon.

  “Because of you.”

  “Because of me,” he confirms, and I wonder how many lawyers he’d sent swooping down on her after the fiasco in Paris and my mini-meltdown at the thought of being sued.

  “She could have transferred it to someone who’s pulling this shit for her,” I say.

  “I don’t disagree. But she’s been in tight lockdown since we left Paris. I called to confirm. Just hung up before you got here, actually.”

  I nod, taking it all in. “And the reason you called to confirm that was because you got an email, too, didn’t you?” I feel like my brain is mush, but I’m slowly catching up.

  Carmela has been silent through our conversation, but now she passes me her phone. It’s open to an email showing the same image, but her message is different. $200,000 by 10 p.m. PST on Feb. 13 or it goes public at dawn on Valentine’s Day. And all the others, too. Wiring instructions to follow. Like my email, this was supposedly sent from Damien.

  “I got the same email,” Damien says. “It came from you. Nikki Fairchild Stark.”

  “Fuck,” I say, then drag my fingers through my hair. “What does he mean by ‘the others’?”

  “More pictures, presumably,” Damien says, and his tone is so calm and so even that I know he is very close to losing it.

  “Our blackmailer did not send them.” Carmela finally speaks, her accent almost musical despite the horrific circumstances. “But I imagine they are…”

  “More graphic.” My hand reaches for Damien’s. “Yeah. I get that.” I glance between the two of them. “So what now?”

  “Now, I go.” Carmela eyes Damien. “You will let me know what you decide?”

  “I will.”

  With a nod, Carmela moves to a table by the window and picks up her purse, then swings it over her shoulder as if she’s here in the apartment for nothing more than an afternoon coffee. “Nikki, would you mind walking me down?”

  Beside me, I feel Damien tense, but he makes no objection.

  I hesitate, then step away from Damien and toward Carmela, a woman I’d never thought I would have an ounce of sympathy for.

  Damien’s fingers linger on mine as I leave, and before the elevator doors close, I look back and meet his eyes. I see the storm brewing, and I almost tell Carmela that I cannot leave him. Not now.

  But then he nods, and the doors shut, and I clutch hard to the handrail as the elevator starts its descent.

  For a moment, neither of us speaks. Then she turns to me. “We did not know. That there were cameras, I mean. Even then—even when he was with me—he never would have done that if he had known he was being filmed.”

  “I know.” What I don’t know is why she is being so conciliatory. I draw a breath. “What did you mean? When you said Damien would let you know what he decides? Don’t you have a say?”

  “I leave it to Damien to decide what to do. Whether to pay or whether to let the pictures be released.”

  I simply stare at her. “And you’re okay with that? With just letting him choose what happens to a pretty goddamn intimate photograph of you?”

  “I cannot lie,” she says, her voice as hard as stone. “I was upset when I got the email. I do not like being used. And I would happily strangle the fucker who has put us in this position. But, yes, I will let Damien decide.”

  “Why?”

  She lifts one shoulder in an elegant shrug. “I am not ashamed of my encounters with Damien. We were both single. And we both look quite nice, yes? Under different circumstances, that image could practically be an art print.”

  Her words are matter-of-fact, but I hear the hard edge of reason and anger underpinning them.

&n
bsp; The elevator arrives at the lobby. Before the door opens, though, I press the stop button, then use my card key to deactivate the alarm before it can start to squall. It’s a handy trick I learned from Damien, who has stopped this elevator on several occasions when we just couldn’t wait to get up to the apartment.

  When Carmela realizes that we’re staying in this plush box until our conversation is over, she exhales loudly, then continues. “The truth is that I’ve posed nude before. And while you don’t seem the type who would know it, there’s a sex tape of me that has made the rounds. A bastard of a manager I screwed back in the day.” She waves a hand as if wafting away smoke. “These photos are tame by comparison.”

  “You didn’t seem to think so when I arrived.”

  Her smile is thin. “Just because they are tame does not mean that I’m not angry.”

  I nod. That much, I understand. “And Damien?”

  “He has always been careful. Private. But why ask me? You know Damien Stark better than I do.”

  I tilt my head, surprised that she would admit as much.

  She sighs. “Look, I know that I was a bitch in Munich. What can I say? I like him. And I very much liked to fuck him.”

  My hand tightens around the rail. “If this is supposed to be a friendly conversation—”

  “My point is that things have changed. He’s married now. I don’t screw around with married men.” She shoots me a wry smile. “And we both know Damien wouldn’t be interested anyway. Not now. Not since he’s with you.”

  I nod. And while I’m not sure that I’ve gone from completely detesting her to genuinely liking her, I will at least grudgingly concede that she’s not a total bitch.

  “The thing is,” she continues, “despite his penchant for privacy, under other circumstances, Damien might say fuck it and let the picture out. Why not? He looks damn hot. And it’s no secret that he used to screw around. More important, we both know that Damien’s not the kind of man who bends over and takes it in the ass when someone threatens him.”

  “No. He’s not. So what’s changed?”

  She looks at me as if I’m an idiot. “You, of course. These pictures get out, and you’ll be drawn through the muck, too. And he’s so damned in love with you that the thought of that just about kills him.”