“Not while there’s breath in my body,” Zane swore sincerely.
Pete nodded and then craned around the crowd. He touched his hidden earpiece to activate it. “Target entering the ballroom.”
Zane stifled amusement even as his heart rate kicked up a notch. He wasn’t the only person enjoying playing spy.
Missy was indeed coming in. On her arm was a hot young actor from one of the TV shows currently shooting in New York. Missy sure knew how to pick her dates. As irony would have it, Zane had heard some very underground rumors, from people who ought to know, that the stud was in the closet. That, of course, wasn’t Zane’s business. He waited until the actor peeled off toward the bar to approach Missy.
He had no trouble pasting on a severe expression. Seeing the model brought back more unpleasant memories than she probably imagined.
Always aware of her best angles, she leaned picturesquely against a column at the edge of the glittering room. She’d gone Roman tonight in a deep ruby gown gathered with a ribbon beneath her breasts. The shade suited her brunette coloring as perfectly as the style did her height and shape. One knee-high gladiator sandal peeped through a long leg slit, no doubt intended to declare her readiness for war. Her rich red lips formed a curve as he halted in front of her.
“Miss me already?” she asked archly.
“Probably as much as you miss Constance Sharp, now that her family’s collected her.”
“I enjoyed the old bag’s company while I had it. It was useful.”
“You’ll find that particular usefulness has a price.”
Missy toyed with the ruby pendant in her cleavage. “Men like you know what everything costs, don’t you? What’s it costing your little friend Trey, I wonder? His aunt raised such speculations about his childhood before her children whisked her away. Do you suppose Trey’s mean old daddy explains why he turned out the way he did?”
Zane had heard those speculations. He supported Trey in his decision not to address them publically. If people discovered how he and Trey were raised, so be it, but for every person who understood there’d be ten like Missy who’d twist the facts somehow. The world might enjoy putting them under that microscope, but it wasn’t their business.
No one should be forced to share their history.
“Careful,” he said to the model. “You sound like you’re implying bisexuality is a condition that needs explaining.”
“It would need explaining, if it hadn’t been invented by people who can’t admit what they are. If you’re gay, just be gay. Don’t lead honest women like me on.”
Zane let out a sigh, knowing this conversation was pointless. “I’m here to give you a warning. Leave off bothering me and mine, or I’ll make you sorry we ever met.”
“You’re threatening me?” she asked in mock horror. “That’s hardly cricket, Zane. I’m only here to support this fine charity.”
He looked straight into her eyes, waiting an extra beat for her to understand he was serious. “You don’t matter to me. Not as a supposed girlfriend and not as an enemy. Cause me the slightest inconvenience, and I’ll cut you off at the knees.”
This brought true anger into Missy’s expression. Face hard, she opened her mouth to speak. She was too late. He’d given Caroline the signal. The phone she always carried in her clutch purse rang.
“You’ll want to get that,” he said.
She dug it out with a muffled curse. It was a videophone, of course—the latest, smartest model available. The minute she answered, the file Charlie and Pete had found on the chauffeur’s laptop began to play. It showed her and Owens in bed in a hotel room. The picture was excellent, the sound a testament to Owens’ skill at concealing microphones. Missy gasped—and not because of the video’s graphic nature. Quite obviously, she hadn’t known she was being filmed. As she rode her young panting lover, not as gracefully as she thought, she gave him instructions for planting a camera to spy on Zane in his home. She called Zane a revolting cocksucker and Trey a flaming queer. Owens negotiated an additional payment for his risk, and Missy agreed to pay. If this got out, GLAAD would have her ass on a platter—and never mind Zane’s lawyers.
This, however, wasn’t the worst the footage had to reveal—or not from Missy’s perspective.
Excited by the topics she and her lover had been discussing, Missy tossed back her hair and came.
A sound like a dying walrus issued from the phone’s speakers. Missy might not mind the world seeing her naked, but she’d damn well mind them knowing the noise she made when she climaxed.