Their driver positioned his mirror toward Jules. “What would you like to do?”
“I’m going inside.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t care what kind of meeting of the minds they had planned; they can all leave.”
They should have stayed at the hotel. Too late for that.
“Who is ‘they’?” Rhys asked but already knew.
She growled instead of answering, mimicking his sentiment.
They eased into the driveway and stopped at the front door. Rhys clocked a line of luxury cars parked on the far side, including Mason Marlow’s gleaming black Range Rover next to a fleet of shiny vehicles: a Maserati, two Mercedes, and an Escalade. No doubt the man who’d burned Jules at the altar waited inside. The other cars? He didn’t know and didn’t like the lack of information.
Rhys rubbed his jaw. “Mason and Olivia? Who else?”
“She would have a lot of nerve. But I don’t think so.” A hurricane of emotion stormed in Jules’s green eyes. Not quite anger, not exactly heartsick. But she’d had her trust broken and didn’t trust easily to begin with. “Mason’s definitely in there along with half the legal team of Harrow, Sterling, and Knox.”
Now, Rhys growled also. “Then let’s get your people here as well before you walk inside.”
Her forced short laugh weighed heavily in the dark car. Its exhaustion reverberated from the back seat. She slumped and pressed her forehead against the window. “Theyaremy people.”
Rhys ground his molars. He twisted in his seat to get a better eye on her. “Not if you didn’t expect them. Not if they ambush you. And sure as shit not after what happened today.”
“They didn’t ambush me. They can come and go. This place is as much of an office as their boardrooms—”
“After what happened today, it’s a damn ambush, Jules.”
“Even if it is, I’m not scared of them.”
“Didn’t say you were scared. Just that you need to show up with your own set of people too. You know how this works better than anyone.” She’d been raised in it, by powerful parents some considered show-business gods.
“I can handle bullshit and politics.” She set her purse on her lap, rifling through it for lipstick. Her hand trembled as she applied it.
This woman would put on a show to save face if it killed her, and, man, did he hate politics. Hollywood politics stank just as badly as DC politics. At least in DC politics, they acknowledged the gamesmanship. Here, where everything had aesthetics and promotional values, where some assholes deigned to call her over the hill when she hadn’t celebrated her thirty-sixth birthday yet—the games ruled the roost. Rhys hated Hollywood.
But he didn’t have to like it. His job was simple, as it always was. See her from point A to point B. It didn’t matter; he was certain that, inside that mega mansion, she needed a third party to watch her back. Not a lawyer, not exactly what Sloane Ellis did, but… something.
The driver glanced at Jules in the rearview mirror, his eyebrows raised, as he silently asked, “Stay or go?”
Rhys’s vote was to go. Go now, and don’t think about this place until after Jules and Abigail return from their vacation. Mason and his flock of attorneys could take their ambush and shove it up their conniving asses.
“If Olivia’s here—no, she won’t be here,” Jules said. “If it’s just Mason and the lawyers, I’ll listen.”
“Listen to what?” Rhys grumbled.
“I don’t know. An apology? A contract amendment? Some almost-nuptial payout? Whatever it is, I want to get it done before we leave tomorrow. I don’t want to think about him anymore.”
Wes met Rhys’s eye, and they seemed to agree. This was not a heartbroken woman. He didn’t understand it, but it wasn’t his place to comprehend. Still, he kept waiting for her to lose her mind, sob, and scream. Nothing even close had happened other than her kicking her high heels across the room and diving into ice cream.
“I just want to go on vacation,” she said.
In less than twelve hours, they’d be airborne, flying on a jet across the country. It wasn’t as if Rhys had been excited to make that trip when the plan had been Jules and Mason. Rhys would keep her safe anywhere, no matter who she was with. But now the assignment would be fun.
Anytime Jules and Abigail traveled together, he enjoyed the gig. They acted like normal sisters, not celebrities. They laughed and didn’t take life too seriously. Jules was more like herself with Abigail than with anyone else. Including that asshat she’d almost married.
She acted real with Rhys also. That was probably the biggest reason Rhys continued working with her. Yeah, the Lowry contract with Titan would be hard to replace. It meant solid money and a predictable schedule, unlike the high-value targetsand politicos who mostly took up their time. Vivian would throw an absolute fit if Rhys screwed up this job. But he wouldn’t.
He and Jules fit well, despite their complicated history that he’d never be able to amend. Tough shit for that. He wouldn’t have changed a thing he’d done in the past to keep her safe.
“I’m ready,” she said.
