Because a Husband Is Forever

by Marie Ferrarella

  Get real, you’re vulnerable because that two-faced liar cheated on you, nothing else.

  The thought was sobering. She took a step back, hunching her shoulders against the chill in the air. “Maybe I’ll see you around.”

  “Maybe,” he acknowledged, folding his frame into the car.

  And maybe not, she concluded silently as she watched the cab pull away from the curb and then merge into the midafternoon traffic.

  The wind felt even chillier as she hurried back to the studio.

  Chapter Five

  As Dakota strode into the building, her mind was still on the man with whom she’d just shared lunch. Alan Curtis waylaid her the moment she entered the long corridor on the way to her dressing room. At six-three and 230 pounds, he wasn’t someone she could easily circumvent. In the producer’s rather wide shadow was MacKenzie, grinning from ear to ear. Since the other woman had left with Randy Taylor but he was nowhere to be seen, Dakota wasn’t quite sure what to make of her friend’s expression. She raised her brow silently in MacKenzie’s direction, who just grinned wider, if that was possible.

  “You’re here!”

  For a big man, Alan had a very high voice when he was excited, and he was clearly excited. Were they up for an award? Dakota wondered. She did a quick calculation and remembered that all the major awards were over for the year and it was too soon for the big nominations.

  “Looks like it.” Taking a few steps, she managed to get closer to her dressing room, but not by much. “Were you waiting for me?”

  She usually went over the production notes for the next day’s show after that day’s taping was over, but it wasn’t something she adhered to religiously. If Alan wanted to see her, he was being rather haphazard about it, she thought.

  “Yes!” he declared with no less enthusiasm. His voice went up another octave.

  “Then why didn’t you page me?” It was obvious that he had to have been the one to page MacKenzie at the restaurant, and although she didn’t wear her pager like a vital part of her body the way MacKenzie did, it was in her purse along with her cell phone. Neither had made a sound during her meal.

  “Because I wanted you to finish having that late dinner with the bodyguard guy.” The last time she’d seen Alan’s eyes gleaming like this, he’d misread the directions on his eye drops and doubled the dosage.

  “Oh-kay.” Dakota drew out the word as she tried to fathom what the producer was talking about. The man wasn’t in the matchmaking business, so what did it matter to him who she had lunch with and for how long? Unable to come up with a reason, she finally had to ask, “Why?”

  “Because I want you two to have a rapport with each other.”

  Well, that certainly didn’t clear anything up. She looked toward MacKenzie for some enlightenment. “Again, why?”

  Impatient, MacKenzie jumped into the exchange, which was going nowhere. “The phones have been ringing off the hook.”

  Dakota tried to make some kind of sense out of the fragments she was being thrown. “Are they calling about the segment?”

  “About the segment, about Russell and Taylor—” Alan began.

  MacKenzie’s eagerness got the better of her. It was obvious that whatever was going on, she took it to be a good thing. “And about what you said.”

  Dakota looked at her, confused. As far as she knew, she hadn’t said anything extraordinary during the show. The unusual thing was that they had gone with just one segment and let it take over the entire program.

  “I said a lot of things during the show, Zee, you’re going to have to be a little more specific than that.” Several people walked by, and she shifted out of the way. The miniparade temporarily separated her from Alan and MacKenzie.

  Alan raised his voice to be heard above the other voices. “Let’s go into your dressing room.”

  “I don’t think I like the sound of that.” Utterly curious now, she led the way into the room, closing the door as soon as the other two were in. She nodded at the chair before the vanity table. “Should I be sitting for this?” The question was addressed to Alan, but her eyes shifted toward MacKenzie for an answer.

  Her friend ended the mystery. “Remember how you’ve said that you’d have a difficult time functioning with a bodyguard underfoot all the time, watching your back and parts thereof?”

  It had begun as an off-the-cuff remark that had elicited laughter from the audience, just as she’d meant it to, even though her underlying feelings had been there. It had dovetailed into this segment rather well. Born a child of privilege, she didn’t believe in entourages or in keeping an extended staff around her. She preferred her own company and to take care of any details that needed seeing to herself.

  “Yes?” Her voice was wary as she waited for MacKenzie to continue.

  This time Alan cut in. “Well, your audience wants to see you deal with it.”

  “The audience?” she repeated, a slight thoughtful frown crossing her face. “You mean the people who were here today?” Had they taken some kind of an exit poll?

  “No, your audience,” he emphasized the last word. “The faithful followers who give up an hour of their life every day at two just to sit and watch you on the television. Eighty percent said they wanted you to have a bodyguard for a week or two and then get back to them with all the details.” Alan looked immensely pleased. She could almost see him rubbing his hands together. “I guess they want to live vicariously.”

  She liked pleasing her audience, but there were limits. And she’d meant what she said about not liking the idea of having some stranger share her space, day in and day out. Dakota shook her head, her long hair moving back and forth like a blond storm.

  “Not through me, not this way.” She saw Alan open his mouth to protest, but she beat him to the punch. “I’m a talk-show host, not a life host.”

  He said the one thing that was guaranteed to make her capitulate. “This could boost ratings. Sweeps are coming up, and we need a gimmick.”

  She groaned and rolled her eyes. Glancing toward MacKenzie, she saw no help in that quarter.

  “Please don’t make me do this, Alan.” But even as she made the entreaty, the sinking sensation that her fate had already been sealed overtook her.

  Alan looked utterly confused at her reluctance. “What’s the matter? I thought you’d be thrilled to live with a good-looking man.”

  She’d just assumed that he’d been around during her working hours. This was even worse than she thought. “I have to live with him?”

  Alan nodded. The details had already been worked out with the man who had returned with MacKenzie. “For a couple of weeks.”

  “A couple of weeks?” she echoed incredulously. My God, that was an eternity. She tried to suppress a wave of annoyance. One would think that after all this time, she wouldn’t have to resort to gimmicks to hang on to her audience.

  “Couldn’t I just live with a Bengal tiger for a couple of weeks instead? Damn it, Alan, it’s an invasion of privacy, it’s living with an albatross around my neck, it’s—”

  Alan looked at her innocently as he said the magic words. “It’s sweeps month.”

  She sighed, knowing that he was right, that at the last staff meeting, she’d found that they didn’t have a gimmick in place for the occasion that governed the lives of everyone in television. During sweeps month everyone tried to outdo the other for the tiniest percentage point. Resignation did not feel good.

  She looked at MacKenzie. “Do I at least get to choose which one?”

  She couldn’t read MacKenzie’s expression as the latter said, “The audience already chose for you.”

  “Of course they did.” Dakota was afraid to ask. Maybe because she already knew the answer. It was Ian. Why else would Alan care if she was building “a rapport” or not? Still, she heard herself asking, “And which one did they pick?”

  “They picked Ian.” MacKenzie told her.

  A spark of hope rose to the surface of the quicksand in which s
he found herself standing. “He’s never going to go for this.”

  MacKenzie wasn’t fazed. “Randy was very excited about the idea. A little put off that he wasn’t the one the audience wanted, but he still thinks this is a great idea.”

  It didn’t matter what the other man thought of the idea. He wasn’t the one who would endure being a bodyguard to a woman whose body didn’t need guarding.

  “Ian is not going to go for this,” Dakota repeated. She might not know him all that well, but she recognized stubbornness when she saw it.

  Alan began again, more insistently this time. “But if he does—”

  Never happen, she thought happily.

  She loved her show, didn’t mind doing strange stunts, but they only lasted for a few hours at the most. This threatened to take out a large chunk of her life, and she didn’t want to volunteer it. The last thing she wanted was to have a good-looking man hovering over her as if she was some dolt incapable of tying her own shoes or crossing the street without getting hit by a car.

  “Then I’m on board,” she told him with the casual assurance of someone who felt that could never happen.

  Alan grinned. “Then you’d better prepare your boarding pass.”

  The sinking feeling was back, larger than before. “Why?”

  Alan beamed, well pleased with himself. “Because I offered to hook them up with someone who could do a commercial for their firm. I’m having the station underwrite the costs.”

  It didn’t get any better than that. She could see how the men, especially Randy, would have a difficult time turning that down.

  So she was going to have a roommate for the next two weeks. “You play dirty.”

  Alan made his way to the door, then stopped to look at her before leaving. “Never said I didn’t.”

  “No.”

  The single word was a cross between some unintelligible guttural sound and a bear growling. All the more intimidating because it had come out of Ian’s barely moving lips.

  Randy had pounced on his friend with the news the moment he’d walked into the office. He’d been behind Ian by five minutes and was still hearing the promises ringing in his ears.

  The two men now stood facing each other on opposite sides of the small reception desk. Wanda, Randy’s younger sister who manned the desk when she wasn’t taking classes at NYU, had wisely chosen to retreat from the field until the battle was over.

  “Russell, just think about the possibilities—” Randy begged.

  “No,” Ian repeated more firmly. “Look, I did the show because you asked me to, even though I didn’t think we needed it. I am not going to play nursemaid to some celebrity as a publicity stunt.”

  For the life of him, Randy couldn’t see what the big deal was. Or the difference—other than a slew of benefits and a stack of money. “It’s not a stunt, Russell, and why should this be any different from anything you do as a regular bodyguard?”

  As far as he was concerned, there was a world of difference. “Because in all the other cases, there was a real threat, a possible danger. We were keeping someone safe and out of harm’s way. This is just a game, a lark dreamed up by some publicity guy with nothing to do—”

  “That’s what he does do,” Randy pointed out. “Come up with gimmicks to help the show. In this case, it’s helping us as well.”

  “I don’t need that kind of help,” Ian insisted. He shoved his hands into his pockets. He never should have said yes to Taylor in the first place. They were doing well enough without this. “It’s a game,” he repeated. “And I’m no good with nothing to do.”

  Randy threw up his hands, clearly annoyed with his partner’s stubbornness.

  “Then pretend she has a stalker. Pretend you’re keeping her safe. Damn it, Russell, have a little imagination. The bodyguard business is about keeping our clients safe from overzealous fans and the invading photographers. From what I saw of that audience today, Dakota Delany’s got a hell of a lot of fans.” He paused, then added more quietly, “John Lennon was killed by a fan.”

  Okay, so maybe Taylor had a point. That still didn’t mean he had to be the one to do this. There was something about being in that woman’s company that told him he shouldn’t be. But it wasn’t something he was about to share with Taylor, who felt that everything with supple hips bore exploring.

  “Why can’t you do it?”

  Randy raised his wide shoulders and let them drop in an almost helpless movement. “Because they want you. The producer said you and Dakota had chemistry.”

  Ian swung around and looked at him incredulously. “We had what?”

  “Chemistry,” Randy enunciated. “That’s when two people—”

  Ian glared at him. “I know what chemistry is. And we—she and I—don’t have it.”

  Ian found the smirk on Randy’s face particularly irritating.

  “I don’t know about that,” Randy murmured under his breath.

  Eyes narrowing, Ian got into his face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Randy raised his hands to ward off his partner’s words. “Hey, stay focused. We’re arguing about you doing this. I don’t want this to escalate into some kind of a full-out war between us.” He tried again, his voice softening. “I was right about this, Ian. On the way over here I got three calls on my cell phone alone. Wanda’s been fielding calls. Business is already picking up.”

  The calls would have come one way or another. “We’re heading into the award season in a couple of months,” Ian pointed out.

  “I don’t want just seasonal work, do you?”

  Ian frowned. No, he didn’t want just seasonal work. He wanted to be kept busy all year round. Maybe then the heartache of not being around his son, of not being able to watch Scottie grow up, wouldn’t keep eating away at him the way that it was.

  A sense of resignation slipped in. So he’d do this. What would it hurt? He pinned Randy with a look. “If I do this, it’s going to be my way.”

  Randy raised both hands up in innocent surrender. As if, Ian thought jadedly. “Absolutely.”

  “I’m going to approach this seriously,” Ian qualified, “as if this Delany woman actually needed a professional bodyguard to protect her.”

  “Wouldn’t have it any other way,” Randy agreed. “Oh, one more thing. The studio wants you to live at her apartment for the duration of the assignment.”

  He’d only done that twice before and hadn’t liked it either time. He definitely didn’t like giving up his freedom, especially not when there was nothing more than a whim involved. “Taylor—”

  “They’re paying us double our usual fee to do it, plus free publicity.” Randy held up his hand and continued more quickly, “Plus the producer’s going to have the studio underwriting a commercial for the firm.”

  “Just to have us do this?”

  “It’s called sweetening the pot,” Randy said. “I told them that you’d be reluctant.”

  Ian laughed shortly. “That’s the first time I’ve ever heard you understate something.”

  “Then you’ll do it?”

  Ian parked himself on the edge of the desk. Something in his gut told him he was going to regret this, but for the good of the company, he was going to have to take this bullet.

  “If I don’t, you’ll probably nag me to death.” He might as well be prepared. “When do I start?”

  Randy’s eyes avoided his. “Tomorrow morning.”

  “Tomorrow?” As if on cue, the phone rang. Ian nodded toward the instrument. “What about business?”

  Randy placed his hand on the receiver but didn’t pick up yet. “If it gets too much for me to handle, I can call in some favors. I know a couple of guys on the job who wouldn’t mind moonlighting.”

  A lot of policemen made extra money in either security work or acting as temporary bodyguards. Right now he was willing to change places with any of them. “Maybe one of them wouldn’t mind taking my assignment.”

  Randy shook his head. “Hey, what�
��s the problem? From where I was sitting, that was one mighty fine lady.”

  Maybe that was the problem. “I’m not interested in ‘mighty fine’ ladies.”

  Randy shut his eyes as if searching for strength. The phone continued ringing. “You were divorced, Ian, you weren’t neutered. There are times I really do despair about you.” With a heartfelt sigh, he picked up the telephone receiver. “Bodyguard, Inc. How can I help you?”

  Ian tuned him out as he went to the door. If this was going to happen tomorrow, he needed to go home to pack.

  And to seriously rethink the career choice that had brought him to this junction. Ian headed toward the elevator. Paperwork was beginning not to sound so bad.

  She was not an early riser.

  Early to Dakota meant that the world was already well bathed in sunlight, people were brewing coffee and, like as not, on their way to whatever life had to offer them that day. Dawn was something she customarily visited from the other side of the night.

  Which was what made her impromptu trip upstate so unexpected, most of all to her. It was definitely not a habit she felt the least bit inclined to acquire.

  She was not one of those people who bounced out of bed unless, like that one time back home, there was an earthquake demanding her attention. So when she heard first the doorbell, then a hard, firm knock on the front door of her thirtieth-floor penthouse apartment, she pretty much thought she was dreaming.

  As the knocking persisted, growing louder, the dream turned into a nightmare and then vanished altogether, leaving her brain enshrouded in a fog thick enough to sock in any airport.

  The knocking turned into banging, the sound vibrating in her head.

  More than half-asleep, she tumbled out of bed, the comforter pooling behind her on the floor like an afterthought. She made one futile attempt at shoving her feet into slippers, had a fifty-percent success rate and half stumbled, half dragged herself to the front door. Anything to stop the awful banging.

  She felt around on the wall in the general vicinity of the light switch. After finding it, she threw it on and blinked as the light blinded her.