The Men With the Golden Cuffs

by Lexi Blake

  Ian’s hands came out, steepling in front of his chest as he considered her. He let a long moment of deeply uncomfortable silence pass. Finally, Serena couldn’t take another minute of it.

  “So I should go now?” Damn it. That hadn’t sounded sure of herself. Ian was staring through her, and for the briefest of moments, she wanted to drop to her knees and find a submissive position and hope the big bad Dom was satisfied with it.

  “No, Serena. You should not go now. You should sit back down until such time as this meeting is complete.”

  She swallowed, but decided to make her stand. Independent meant she couldn’t afford to be submissive to anyone. She had to be her own woman, able to stand up to someone like Ian Taggart. “I believe my business is through here. Like I said, send me a bill.”

  “Fine. The bill will be for half a million dollars.” Ian’s smile was a chillingly polite thing. “And some change. I’ll get you an itemized list. You can leave a check with Grace.”

  “Fuck me,” Brian said under his breath. “She’s going to sue us for that, too. Goddamn it, Lara. I should never have let you bring in clients on your own.”

  “Shut up, Brian. I didn’t ask you to be here,” Lara hissed back.

  Serena stared at Ian for a moment and decided he was serious. She’d had top-notch bodyguards around the clock for a week, and another agent had been pouring over her case. Yes. It could be half a million dollars. She didn’t have it. Everything was in her house and her car and her business. If she drained her accounts, she might be able to come up with a little over two hundred thousand, but she also had to fight her ex in court. Her advances were small compared to the big New York authors. She made her money in volume. She would have to up her writing schedule. She would need to put out more books.

  She would need a payment plan.

  “Damn it, Ian. Let her off the hook,” Adam said, frowning at his boss.

  “But she’s wriggling so nicely.” Ian’s expression didn’t change.

  “Sit down, baby.” Jake nodded toward the chair again. “He’s not going to charge you. He’s being a prick.”

  It seemed to be a condition that was going around today.

  Ian eyed his employee. “I am merely trying to set parameters, Jacob. And you know how I deal with bratty, impolite subs.”

  “I’m working on the problem,” Jake said as she sank back to her seat.

  Problem? She wasn’t the problem here. “I am not his sub. I’m not anyone’s sub.”

  Ian’s eyes rolled. “And you didn’t take my advice. Ms. Brooks, when Jacob called me in the middle of the night, waking me from a well-deserved sleep to tell me that you had tricked us all, I mentioned to him that perhaps he should take a step back and look at the problem from a place of intellect and not emotion.”

  “He told me to stop thinking with my dick,” Jake admitted.

  “And what did you do?” Ian asked.

  “Oh, my dick is very stupid, boss. Practically moronic. But that’s between the three of us.”

  Ian’s head shook. “If only that were true. Now, your deeply inappropriate and messy relationship aside, can we get to the reason I called you in? It certainly wasn’t to pass you a bill and send you on your way. Though I will take a check if you feel obligated.”

  “Ian!” Adam practically shouted.

  Ian shrugged, a lazy movement he managed to make predatory. “Well, I didn’t get this office by working pro bono.”

  “I’ll take care of it, Ian. I’ll make sure you have a check.” Lara took a deep breath and stared back out the window.

  Brian gaped her direction. “You’re kidding me. You are not writing a fucking half-million dollar check so your client can fuck her bodyguards.” He flushed and turned to Serena. “I’m sorry, Serena. I’m apparently not up on today’s professional standards. This isn’t the way my authors work. I really am sorry for what Lara did, but I can’t handle this. No one seems to understand my reputation is at stake, too.”

  He stalked out of the room.

  Lara shook her head, her eyes on the door her husband had just slammed. “Please forgive him. He isn’t handling this well. And I’m serious about paying for the case. This is my fault, not Serena’s. And you’ll need to stay on the case, obviously.”

  Ian sighed. “Can’t I make a joke? Seriously, you kill a few people and get a reputation and suddenly no one thinks you’re funny anymore. Stop being a martyr, Lara. You fucked up royally. It doesn’t mean I’m going to bankrupt you, and besides, it’s not like Adam and Jake have hated their duties. They’ve likely had enough fringe benefits that they won’t mind not getting their bonus.”

  Serena felt herself flush.

  “Ian, watch it,” Jake said.

  “Now I’m the bad guy because I point out the obvious. Keep the relationship to yourselves. Lara, talk.”

  Lara nodded her head, taking a minute to compose herself. She finally brought her eyes to meet Serena’s before she obviously decided it was way easier to talk to Ian. “She’s absolutely my most talented client. I say that from a place of love and respect, and not just because I stand to make a lot of money off her.”

  “But you do,” Jake said. He hadn’t left his place by her side, but Adam had started to pace.

  Lara nodded. “Yes. Yes, I do. You have to understand that Serena’s books are wonderful, but they’re also only reaching a niche audience.”

  “I’m writing ménage, Lara. You knew that when you took me on. It’s not exactly mainstream and neither is BDSM romance. If you wanted someone who writes sweet, you should have passed on me.” What the hell had Lara been thinking? She’d managed to scare the holy crap out of Serena, and she’d done it for money.

  “You write gorgeous love stories. They just needed some publicity.” She took a long breath. “So I decided to be your stalker.”

  Adam turned on her. “You terrified her. You could have killed her with last night’s stunt. Do you know what she’s been going through?”

  Ian held up a hand. “She’s not done, Adam. This gets so much worse.”

  A little thrill of fear went through Serena. She’d lost the men she was getting close to and her agent all in an hour. She still might lose her friends. What could be worse?

  “I only sent the e-mails. I swear to you, Serena, I just sent the e-mails. I was planning more. I had a whole plan mapped out on my computer. I was going to send you the e-mails for a couple of weeks and then I was going to up the ante so to speak. I was going to have my stalker persona take out ads in local papers begging you not to get Alexa together with Duke and Caden. I even found a skywriter who would put it up over downtown. Imagine it. Writer gets stalked by her characters. The press would have loved it. It’s inventive. It’s guerilla marketing and I thought it would be best if you didn’t realize it was a publicity stunt. You would have reacted naturally.”

  “Yes, she reacted very naturally to nearly being killed.” Jake’s voice was like ice.

  “I didn’t have anything to do with trashing your car or the snake. I talked about the characters, Serena. My stalker idea was about loving your work. I wouldn’t say anything bad about you. The first time you got a message that didn’t come from me, I called in Ian. I started this, but someone has picked up on it. God, Serena, I’m so sorry.”

  She started crying again.

  What the hell was she doing? Lara had always been a maverick with her own crazy ideas. It was one of the reasons they had clicked. It was one of the reasons she’d been willing to take a chance on a writer like Serena. Lara had been the only agent who would even read her work. She’d been a steady hand, guiding Serena through everything. Hadn’t she earned a little leeway?

  It wasn’t like Serena had never made a mistake. She’d made tons.

  “Were Bridget and Chris involved?” She had to know.

  Lara shook her head, talking through her tears. “God, no. I’m a little scared of Bridget, and Chris can’t keep a secret to save his life. He would have told
you three minutes after I told him. Serena, I know you have to hate me now, but you also have to listen to me. I didn’t put a snake in your car. I talked to the cops earlier. Yes, I have your key, but I swear I didn’t use it. I wanted some press coverage. I didn’t want to hurt you. I would never try to hurt you. I thought it was a little game. I thought we would get some good coverage for the release of the new book and the signing. It was stupid. I’m willing to do anything to make it right.”

  So it wasn’t over. It wasn’t over by a long shot. There had been a moment’s peace when Serena had realized that even though she’d lost so much, she’d been free from the threats to her life.

  Now she didn’t even have that. Someone out there still wanted her dead.

  She turned to Ian. “So what should I do? The police don’t want to hear about it. If they find out about this, they’ll think even less of me. I could go somewhere else.”

  It might be the best solution. She could find a place where no one knew who she was. Her cousin had a little cabin in Colorado that might work. She could look for someplace of her own from there. She could disappear into the mountains and just sink into her work. She could forget Jake and Adam.

  “No. He could find you, and then you would be all alone,” Ian said.

  “He wouldn’t know where I went.” The more she thought about it, the better it sounded. The cabin was peaceful, isolated. She could go for days without seeing a soul.

  Ian lifted a single eyebrow at Jake. “Would you know where she would go?”

  Jake nodded. “She would head straight for a place called South Fork, Colorado. Her favorite cousin has a cabin there. If I couldn’t find her there, she has a friend in St. Augustine with a condo on the beach she could hole up in. And if she wanted to get really exotic, she would go to Sydney, Australia. She talks to a writer friend there all the time. They talk about her going there.”

  Damn him. It was exactly what she’d been thinking and just in that order. Was she really that transparent?

  Jake smiled down as though he could feel her frustration and took a special delight in it. “It’s best you stay here and under our protection until he’s caught. We’ll take you back to our place. Now that we know what to ignore, we can concentrate on the real stuff. We can have Eve work up a new profile based on what we know. Adam, what is Serena’s schedule like this week?”

  Adam looked over, his eyes skimming her before focusing on Jake. “It’s a quiet week. She’s meeting Bridget and Chris for lunch this afternoon. She has some blog appearances, but the only thing she has to do publically is the party at The Velvet Room. It’s where the signing is. I already approved the catering menu.”

  He had? When had he done that?

  Adam answered as though he’d read her mind. “I asked you to look over it yesterday, and you told me it was up to me. We’re doing an hors d’oeuvres menu including dumplings. You like Asian, so I fashioned the menu off that. And the red velvet penis cupcakes. We have complimentary champagne, and I talked two of my reporter friends into covering it. I found a dress for you from Neiman’s, and you’ll hate the shoes, but they’re perfect. Christian Louboutin stilletos. They arrive this afternoon, and you should break them in. I hired a photographer because we can use it on future press releases. I left an itemized receipt of everything, but I managed to get it all for ten percent under budget.”

  God, he was a sexy man. How the hell was she supposed to go back to life without him?

  Ian was smiling. “See, I should charge you for his organizational skills alone.” He slapped his hand on the desk. “All right. This is how it’s going to be. Lara, you’re a dumbass, but I loved your brother. He saved my life at the cost of his own, and that means putting up with you when you’re a dumbass. Do you want Serena alive?”

  He looked over at Serena as though her whole life depended on what Lara said next.

  “I do. She won’t believe it, but I love her.”

  Ian shook his head. “I don’t care what she believes. Trust me, I know all about keeping someone I love alive when they hate my guts. If you want her alive, I will make sure she stays that way.”

  It seemed stupid to ask if she got a say in that, but she kind of wanted to. Still. It was a stupid question. She didn’t envy whatever girl ended up falling in love with that deeply obnoxious, totally hot man. Ian Taggart was both rock and hard place.

  But she would take more control this time. “I would like to interview some of the bodyguards and figure out which one would work best.”

  Ian leaned forward. “Do you understand the meaning of half a million and counting? You’ll take what I give you and be goddamn happy you’re alive. And you’ll give serious consideration to forgiving Lara because she gives a damn. Adam and Jake think they told me something I didn’t already know. Lara came clean a couple of days ago.”

  “Then why the fuck didn’t you tell us?” Jake asked, his hands on his lean hips.

  “It was on a need to know basis, and you didn’t need to know. I told Eve after she met with Serena.” He pushed a file folder across the desk. “Here’s her new profile. I had hoped to keep Ms. Brooks in the dark. She would have been happier not knowing. If it helps, I gave Lara a long and drawn-out talking to.”

  “He yelled a lot,” Lara admitted.

  Jake grabbed the file folder. “I’ll look over this on the way home.”

  Adam stepped forward. “I think you should replace us.”

  “What?” Jake asked, staring at his partner.

  She liked the way Adam was thinking. He was thinking with an obviously clear head. “Yes, what he said. I’ll take anyone else. Give me the interns. Surely you have interns.”

  Ian’s eyebrow arched in that way that let her know that she, too, was a big old dumbass. “No. Oddly enough, I don’t have a bunch of interns willing to take a bullet for a client in order to get me to sign off on three college credit hours. You get Adam and Jake. If Adam prefers to quit his job because he decided to go against my incredibly good advice not to screw the pretty client, then you just get Jake. Or you can face this asshole all on your own. I hope you know how to deal with snakes, since we know he likes to use them.”

  Fuck him. He was right, and he had her in a corner. What was she supposed to do? Should she make the decision her pride demanded? Should she take on whoever the hell this guy was on her own? Or perhaps she could give everything up and skulk off for a quiet life?

  She could handle it. She wasn’t giving up anything else. “Fine. But I would like to be kept up to date. I want this settled as quickly as possible.”

  “And so do I.” Ian stood. “Liam is looking into the situation. He’ll continue to be Adam and Jake’s backup until such time as I need to send him to Europe or wherever Mr. Black decides to rear his soon to be chopped-off head. Did I mention I’m going to kill that motherfucker?”

  Serena had no idea who Mr. Black was, but she was happy she wasn’t him. Ian Taggart wasn’t a man she wanted to cross. But he was also the man who had placed her in an awkward position. She was going to have to rely on the very men who had humiliated her.

  She looked up at Jake, who seemed utterly satisfied with the situation. And then Adam, who wouldn’t meet her eyes. Adam, who had perfectly organized her life right down to the food and wine she would have wanted. She hadn’t had to think. She’d just written because she’d trusted Adam to take care of everything, and it was okay because he liked doing it.

  Hadn’t he? He’d told her he did. He’d seemed happy when he was doing it.

  Had that been a lie, too?

  She was brutally confused and beyond miserable. How would she survive another couple of weeks around them? Especially when Jake was being aggressive, and Adam wouldn’t even look at her.

  But she didn’t have a choice. She could deal with them or she could be on her own. She wasn’t too stupid to live. She might be too stupid to be happy, but at least she would be alive.

  “All right.” There wasn’t another answer. She
was in a corner. She looked up at Jake. He’d put her in a corner. He was going to find out that she wouldn’t stay there forever.

  * * * *

  Adam drove through the streets of Dallas, his eyes on the road and his mind on the woman in the backseat.

  “I’m fine, Bridget. It’s all right.” She spoke into her phone. He glanced at her briefly through the rearview mirror. She’d forgotten her sunglasses again. She struggled to find the prescription sunglasses she had. He’d specifically requested that Alex pick them up the night before. He’d placed them next to her purse when he’d unpacked her things, but she’d obviously forgotten them again.

  When she had her next appointment, he would make sure she got the kind of glasses that changed in the sunlight. The sun in Texas was far too bright to go without UV protection.

  He set his eyes back on the road. What was he thinking? She wasn’t his to take care of anymore, and that hurt like hell. He’d fucked up, and he knew from previous experience that she wouldn’t forgive him. A man really only had one shot with most people. When he screwed up, he was out.

  “Bridget, I’m not hiding anything. God, has anyone ever told you you’re a little like a bulldog? Fine.” There was a little pause and then Serena sighed. “No. That didn’t work out.”

  Serena jumped a little and held the phone away from her ear. Bridget was shouting, her anger clearly expressed. No satellite could possibly filter the rage that was coming through Serena’s little cell.

  Well, he had a fan in Bridget, at least.

  “Serena, sweetie? You can put the phone back to your ear. It’s Chris. I’ve taken Bridget’s phone. She’s going to scream somewhere privately now.”

  Serena put the phone back, and the conversation seemed to take a much more civil tone.

  Jake turned in his seat. “Why are you doing this?”

  Bridget wasn’t the only bulldog in the world. “What? Driving? Well, Jacob, when a person wants to get someplace, he has a few options.”