FULL NOVELXO Between Never and Forever: Part 2 – Chapter 31
She smiled at the attire I’d had made for her, and she’d accepted my regimented schedule as if it was completely normal. She’d even accepted my obsession with watching her. I think that about solidified for me that Kee was never going to be a woman I would completely be able to figure out.
She was reckless and then reserved, sultry even though she had been innocent, sweet, and then insanely sexy. And even if I couldn’t compartmentalize her, it gave me peace that she would keep me guessing. I wouldn’t be bored like I had been without her for so long.
Of course, the woman continued to test me when I got a text that day in a meeting.
Kee: Olive thinks red top is better. Pink thinks orange. Help us decide.
A picture of her in a crop top with a ton of cleavage came through.
Kee: Oops. Ignore that last text. You can delete it.
Me: No chance in hell. Who are you sending this to?
Kee: None of your business.
Me: You’re engaged to me, Kee. Even your phone knows it. Stop sending selfies to another man and tell me who it is before I confiscate your phone when I get home to find out.
Kee: Your brother.
Me: What? Why on earth would you think he’d be good at answering that question.
Kee: He is good at helping me pick my outfits for the shows.
Me: My brother? Dimitri?
Kee: He really is, Dex. Just forget it.
I glared up at my brother, and he smirked at me like he’d won the fucking lottery in the meeting. I was going to kill him.
Me: He’s not picking shit. He’s acting like it while he stares at your damn body.
Kee: Not true.
So, I started a new text thread between all of us.
Me: You and I both know you’re fucking color-blind and can’t even tell the difference between her orange and red top.
Dimitri: I can.
Me: Which is orange then?
Dimitri: Fuck off.
Kee: Dimitri, you never told me you were color-blind. I’m supposed to be your best friend.
Dimitri: In my defense, all your shit looks good and you don’t like making the decision so if I just pick it’s a win-win.
Me: You better delete all her fucking pictures right now.
I stared at him across the room, and he finally rolled his eyes.
Dimitri: Yeah. Yeah. You’re a big baby, you know that? I hang with her for ten years while you grow some balls, and now I gotta shape up?
Me: Want me to end this meeting so you can repeat that and I can punch you in the nose?
Dimitri: I would, but I’m investing your money because you can’t do math.
“Meeting’s over,” I said, loudly enough that everyone on the Zoom and in the room knew not to argue. “My brother and I need to talk.”
Everyone hurried out, and I stared at him.
“Do I need to kick your ass today?”
“Jesus Christ. Take a damn joke.”
“I’m not in the mood to joke when you’re playing games with my girl and the media is going to play games too. I’m about to have millions of people looking at her again after I take her out on a date today.”
“She’s not even your girl, and she’s got enough people watching her every move already.”
I lifted a brow.
“Fine.” He threw up his hands. “But she’s still my best friend. You’re welcome for the heads-up on Ezekiel by the way. You handling his ass?”
“In more ways than one.” My brother didn’t need to know the details, but I’d threatened his life, had a team break into his home, and was building a case against him.
“He’s got a hell of a legal team, to be honest.”
“I’m not worried. I’ve got cameras and eyes everywhere, Dimitri.” I stood and started to leave the office.
“I’m going out with you two.”
“You’re not,” I said as I walked past him, out the doors of the office and to the elevator, but my little brother kept following.
“You aren’t going to box me out of a friendship with her now that you’re fucking.”
“Watch your mouth. And you’re not coming on our date,” I growled out as Dimitri got in the elevator with me.
“Why not? The paps know me as the best friend anyway. Half of them think we dated.”
“All the more reason for you to fuck off.” I punched the top floor button.
“Let me guess. You told security you had it handled for going out with Kee. Do you honestly think you won’t need me?”
“It won’t be that bad,” I grumbled.
“You have no fucking idea how bad her fans want to see you two together.”
I ignored him because I figured I’d be able to control the environment. Jimmy and I had already discussed the safest roads to take to get to the large ride I wanted to take her on. Then, I could take her to eat for everyone to catch a glimpse but still be private.
When the door of the elevator opened, I turned to him. “Stay in the elevator, Dimitri.”
My brother realized his place and sighed as he leaned against the railing. “Take security with you.”
He knew I wouldn’t listen. I had it under control.
But I didn’t.
Kee was dressed in one of the silly shirts I’d had made for her, and we threaded our hands together as we went out on the Vegas Strip. The first couple of blocks were fun. She squealed at a person in costume and stopped to admire the Bellagio’s water show before we got to the High Roller, one of the world’s largest Ferris wheels.
“Oh, Dex. We can’t ride this thing. The line will get crazy with us in it.” She glanced around nervously, but I kissed her cheek.
“It’s fine. I bought the ride for an hour.”
“What do you mean? There’s got to be thirty cabins.”
“Twenty-eight. And I bought them all.”
“For an hour?” she squeaked.
“Just go with it.”
When we got on the wheel, I saw a crowd forming behind us. Pictures were being taken, people were yelling a few things, but we were about to leave them all behind to ride up to the top of the city. I had her to myself, looking down at everyone and everything we’d built, for thirty minutes.
Her hair whipped around in the wind as she smiled big at me, her eyes full of happiness. “This is so freaking ridiculous, and I love it. I love being here with you. It’s like we’re young again. I feel—”
“Alive?”
“Free,” she said, and then she pulled me close and kissed me hard.
And fuck, I kissed her back just as hard for the whole world to see. I knew there would be pictures of us everywhere tomorrow, but I didn’t care. She was mine anyway, wearing my ring, my shirt, so my fucking lips were on hers.
When her hand went down to my trousers, though, I stopped her. “Kee, Jesus. No. There are too many people down there.”
Her eyes sparkled with mischief. “But there’s no one up here. Plus, I’m guessing you didn’t allow the cameras to be filming…?” She glanced at the cameras above us. She was learning.
“No shit.” But my eyes weren’t on her anymore. They were on the crowd gathering below. It was getting bigger and bigger. “Shit, I have to call Jimmy.”
“What for?”
“There’re too many people, and my watch keeps sending alerts on sightings of us. It means people are going to keep coming.”
She sighed and leaned back to stare up at the sky. “Sometimes I just want to be us. Us before what we are now.”
“And instead, you’re becoming something even bigger.”
“Or maybe I’m paving a way out.” She turned to stare at me. “What if I only wrote songs? Had other singers come in to sing them for my show?”
“Is that what you want?”
She breathed in and out and then she said her next words with finality. “It’s what I’ve always wanted. And I know you won’t believe that later. But believe me now. It’s all I ever wanted.”
I threaded my hand in hers and kissed her over and over. We lost ourselves up in the sky, and when we came back to reality, I pulled her close. “Smile for the cameras.”
Our security pushed through the crowd but coming off the wheel proved to be difficult. They were too close to me and definitely too close to her.
“Keelani, can I get your autograph?”
“Keelani, you traded up from Ethan Phillipe to a Hardy. What’s it like?”
“Keelani—”
Her name was being screamed from every direction, but she kept her head down, like she knew the drill. Like she’d done this a million times before. She looked up at me in resignation. “If we don’t talk, they’ll get worse.”
“You’re not going to talk to them when they’re like this. It’s out of control.” I’d miscalculated. I’d thought I would be able to handle them all.
I’d put her in danger.
They screamed at us as we hurried down the road, not giving them an answer to anything. My fear of her being hurt grew and grew. Security pushed us through, but it wasn’t happening fast enough, especially when the questions were getting meaner and meaner because we wouldn’t look at them. “Why are you with him? Why aren’t you coming out of the Black Diamond?”
“Did Ethan do something wrong?” another screamed.
“Were you together years ago?” one guy shouted.
The questions came so fast from everywhere. “He saved you from a car crash, didn’t he? You were drinking that night together.”
I saw her visibly flinch with that statement and tried to pull her close.
“Why are you with him when he caused an accident that killed your friend?”
That was the one, the question that snapped something inside of her.
She turned with a fury I hadn’t seen in her until now. Gone was the Keelani they knew, and in her place was the woman they’d hurt. Kee always felt everything too much, a lot like me, but I’d built up walls in the media on this topic. And she’d been able to get on a stage and sing away her pain. Here, she couldn’t. Here, she took the assault on her character until it was too much.
“What did you just say?” I let her respond to them because everyone needed an outlet, but I didn’t expect her to grab the camera and shove it in their face. “I was with him then and he saved us. He saved us when it was my fault. You can write that everywhere. And now you can get the hell away from me.”
The cameraman stumbled but he got right back in her space, and his face was bright red with anger. “You little bitch.”
When he lunged for her, there was no question about what was going to happen. The man’s eyes widened as he saw me step forward. I heard Kee yell, “Don’t, Dex.”
I punched him hard in the nose anyway.
I never acted out with the press; they didn’t bother me anymore. Yet, I’d seen how they bothered her, saw her starting to panic, and I was being fucking alerted that her heart rate was up even while she was with me.
She was mine, and I protected what was mine. Always. To every and any extent.
I probably shouldn’t have taken the camera strap around his neck to then constrict his airway and tell him to back the fuck up the next time he came near my fiancée, but I did that too before my security escorted us away and held the crowd back. They kept their distance now anyway.
They would learn. Whether we were inside a HEAT property or not, we would not be fucked with. I would not allow it.
“Sir, we intercepted this being delivered to your suite today. Without an address, we would like permission to open it and assess any threats.” Jimmy held out a red envelope and immediately Kee’s heart rate spiked as she recoiled from it.
Jesus, I needed to turn off my alerts from her engagement ring when I was with her. Still, it signaled that she knew what the envelope was before I did.
“No,” Kee blurted out.
I narrowed my eyes. “You know this envelope.”
“I do. It’s…”
Right then, Dimitri jogged up. “Dex, you meant it when you said you were going to handle your shit out there today, huh?” He glanced down at what we were all looking at. “What the fuck, Kee? Another letter?”
“Dimitri, don’t—”
“What the fuck do you mean another letter?” I snatched it out of my security’s hand even as she tried to grab it from me.
“He’s going to find out anyway, Kee. Dex doesn’t leave any stone unturned. It’s actually compulsive behavior at this point.”
“Shut the fuck up,” I gritted out because I was reading.
“It’s not a big deal,” I heard her whisper.
But the words were a very big deal. So was the picture. Of her in our damn suite. Without clothes on.
You go to sleep with him sometimes, Keelani. This was only supposed to be a fake engagement. You’re only supposed to be in my bed. Your virginity was supposed to be mine to take.
Don’t you know that?
And you didn’t respond to my texts. When can I see you? I’ll bring down that whole hotel if you don’t respond soon. I’ll ruin that man. And you. The punishment for sleeping with him is going to be brutal.
I’ll make you feel better though.
I promise.
Just text me back. Tell me where I can see you. I need to see you.
You know better than to ignore me.
The chaos was starting to spin out. The top that I’d had twirling round and round perfectly all this time was wobbling, ready to fall down and destroy everything. “You got texts, Kee?”
Her eyes flicked to the windows where a crowd was still outside and then to me. “Not from him.”
I looked down at the letter again, and she peered over to see it, but I folded it up, my heart pounding faster by the second. He’d tapped into something well enough that he knew her secrets and mine. He’d been better at snaking through my security measures than I had been at setting them up. There was a chink somewhere in the system that I was missing.
“I want the fingerprints off this letter, Jimmy. Immediately.” I looked him square in the eye so he knew the gravity of the situation.
“Is it bad?” she asked.
“Of course it’s fucking bad. The last one he had your damn panties in the envelope, Kee.” Dimitri looked about as worried as I felt.
“I want the other letter sent to our security team.”
“They’re just empty threats. And there’s only been a few in a whole year.” She shook her head at both of us.
“Even so, they need to be informed.” I looked to my brother for confirmation.
“He’s right, Keelani.”
She sighed, like handling it all herself was the only way she wanted to do things. “Fine. Anyway, we need to worry about the media. Dex, punching someone is a problem. And what I said is a problem too.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Can’t it wait?”
“I don’t think so.” She shook her head. “You need to see the contract I signed. Now.”