Only Pleasure

24

From the moment they entered the Rutherford-Edgewood charity ball Chase knew there was going to be a problem. Not because he intended to start the problem. He was a great believer, in some situations, in letting people hang themselves. It made his life a lot less complicated when he did that.

And he knew the only way he was going to be able to break Drew Stanton’s face was if the bastard started it. Otherwise, Kia was going to be a while in forgiving him.

He was very much afraid she wouldn’t resort to the normal means of making a man pay either. Gutting him off would be the least of the punishments he might well receive.

“Stay away from Stanton,” he whispered to her as they entered the ball and she moved into the receiving line with her parents and aunt and uncle.

Chase stood carefully behind her as the guests who had been waiting in the lobby for the ballroom doors to open began to file in.

“I’m not stupid,” she murmured before the first guest appeared.

Chase was amazed at the line. Hollywood figures, senators, a member of a Middle Eastern royal family, and the cream of Alexandria and the District’s social set moved through it.

Neither Rutherford nor Edgewood was powerful enough politically to pull in some of the names that were attending. But the charity, the band, and the nationally known singer who had donated her time to the ball, no doubt at Kia’s urging, had drawn them in.

It was a social coup, Chase began to realize as the line moved into the ballroom and the adjoining dining room and buffet.

The band was moving into place, though the female performer had yet to make her appearance.

As Chase stood protectively behind Kia, he observed the figures as they went by. He could feel the hairs at the nape of his neck tingling. A sense of foreboding warned him trouble was coming.

He couldn’t get the look of Kia’s apartment out of his mind, or the fact that somehow, someone had managed to screw over the security in both the secured office as well as Kia’s door.

There was something that wasn’t clicking, he could feel it. He should have the answers, the reasons why, and they weren’t adding up in his mind.

Drew had never seemed psychotic, until recently. Of course, Kia could make a man crazy, Chase reminded himself.

As the line finally thinned and dwindled, she turned to him with a strained smile.

“If I don’t get a glass of wine, I may well collapse at your feet,” she told him.

“We can’t have that.” His arm went around her, his gaze taking in the violet and silver-threaded gown she wore.

She loved velvets, he was going to have to remember that. And she looked damned good in it. The gown made her look like a fairy princess.

Moving across the ballroom he guided her to the table Khalid, Ian, and Courtney had taken on the outer edge of the ballroom. Conversation hummed around them, glasses clinked, and laughter filled the room as the band played the soft strains of a Christmas tune.

“Poor Kia. Your feet must be killing you.” Courtney smiled as Chase held Kia’s chair out for her.

There was a hint of strain to Courtney’s eyes, though, as well as in Ian’s expression. And if Chase wasn’t mistaken, Khalid was at the edge of losing his temper.

With Khalid, it wasn’t always easy to tell. That thin scar at the side of his jaw was always a dead giveaway, though. It went perfectly white with his fury. And it was almost snowy at the moment.

“My feet will take weeks to uncramp.” Kia sighed as Chase caught a passing waiter and relieved him of a glass of champagne before ordering Kia’s favorite wine and a whiskey for himself.

He set the champagne at her elbow.

“You’re an angel.” She smiled back at him mischievously as Ian and Courtney both made a sound of denial to that description.

He kissed her upturned lips quickly, then whispered in her ear, “I’ll remind you of that later, sweetheart.”

Her laughter was what he needed to hear. He didn’t sit down. He watched as Khalid rose from his chair instead and moved around the table.

“Could we speak for a moment?” Khalid asked, his lips thin as he glanced around the room.

Chase glanced around, then with a grimace bent to Kia. “I’ll be right back.” He glanced at Ian and received in response a nod that the other man would watch over her.

He and Khalid stepped back, too far from Kia to suit Chase, until they were against the wall in one of the few clear areas in the room.

“What’s up?” he asked.

Khalid shoved his hands into the pockets of his tuxedo trousers and frowned.

“Ian met with Drew this afternoon,” Khalid finally stated, his gaze moving over the ballroom before coming back to Chase. “He had information that may well concern you and Kia as well.”

This wasn’t about the attack on Kia. If it had been, Khalid or Ian would have contacted him. This was personal, and Chase had a pretty good idea what it was.

Khalid grimaced, his lips flattening again, obviously reluctant to give Chase the information.

“Does it have anything to do with the fact that you were Drew Stanton’s third that night?” Chase finally asked.

Khalid’s eyes flared with surprise. “You knew?”

Chase shrugged at the question. “You’re too protective of Kia, Khalid. You were either in love with her or eaten up with guilt. I know you too well, my friend. I knew it wasn’t love; that left guilt. It was easy to figure it out from there.”

Normally, Khalid’s lusts ran much darker and a bit rougher than what he had displayed with Kia. The other man had been too intent, had gone to abnormal lengths to make certain each touch, each kiss, each caress was nothing but pleasure, nothing but those strokes, those whispers that would build a woman’s confidence and her pleasure.

“And I’m still alive?” Khalid asked.

Chase grunted at that. Killing Khalid wouldn’t be that easy.

He had figured it out during that second ménage with Kia. But there was no anger. As Drew’s third that night, Khalid had made certain Kia wasn’t raped, that she had the precious time she needed to lock herself away from Drew. Then he had called her father to come for her.

“You saved her, Khalid,” he said finally, with a sigh. “It’s not your place to feel guilt over what happened that night. She got through it. She might not have if you hadn’t been there.”

Khalid nodded slowly, then said, “It seems my threats have lost their effectiveness. Drew is threatening to go before the review board of the club to have my membership placed under sanction. This, too, I thought you should be aware of, should you require me again. By sanctioning me, they will also be sanctioning any relationships I have formed within the club.” He looked over at Kia. “She is a beautiful woman, my friend. That part I would regret. The rest…” He shrugged again. “My life affords me the freedom and whatever pleasures I choose. However I choose them.”

Chase grinned at that. Arrogance wasn’t something Khalid lacked.

Then he frowned. Kia’s father had moved to the table and was holding his hand out to her. Timothy Rutherford wanted a dance with his daughter. Damn.

He watched as she was drawn to the dance floor. The female per-former was singing a lighthearted ballad, her clear, pretty voice bringing the couples to the dance floor. And it was filling up.

He didn’t like that because he kept losing sight of her and her father. He tracked their progress and felt that edge of danger biting at his neck again.

“You are in love with her, are you not?” Khalid asked, his voice faintly showing his amusement.

Chase took a second to glance at him ruefully. “Is it that easy to see?”

“Eh, only to one who knows you well, perhaps.” Khalid grinned. “But it appears I will win the pool this month. I predicted your fall before the end of the third week of December. The others were predicting much later.”

That damned club pool. That was Courtney’s fault, damn her. Somehow she managed to sneak into the club and write the bet down on the books every damned time it struck her fancy.

“Yes, it looks like you won,” Chase acknowledged. He had lost sight of Kia once more.

“There are many dancing,” Khalid said a second later when Chase couldn’t find her. “I’ve lost her as well.”

Chase was tensing to move when he finally saw Timothy Rutherford move along the opposite edge of the crowd. Kia was no longer with him.

“Find her,” he ordered Khalid, and they slipped between the couples moving on the dance floor.

Chase searched for her as he headed for her father’s position. He was talking with other couples.

“Timothy.” Chase stepped up to the small group. “Excuse me, I’m looking for Kia. I wanted a dance.”

Timothy turned back to him. “She’s on the dance floor.” He grinned. “You can’t keep her off it when she’s in the mood to dance.”

“I don’t see her.” Chase surveyed the crowd again. “Who did she go off with?”

“Harold Brockheim cut in on us,” Timothy told him. “Has always been fond of Kia. Even though she and Moriah weren’t exactly friends.”

Of course, Timothy had no idea exactly what had happened the day Moriah Brockheim died. But Chase had suspected for months that her father did. Annalee had warned Chase that Harold wasn’t accepting the explanation and had asked Chase point-blank if Chase had killed his daughter.

It clicked then. Slammed into his brain with the force of lightning striking into the ground. That was why it didn’t make sense, why none of it made sense. It wasn’t Drew who had targeted Kia. It was Brockheim.

He moved quickly away from the group, ignoring Timothy, and surged back into the crowd of dancers.

He had to find her. Brockheim couldn’t have had time to take her from the ballroom. He wouldn’t be able to force her out of the room, and Kia wouldn’t leave willingly with him.

Brockheim couldn’t be armed. There were too many sensors at the entrances to the ballroom. He would have to force her out by brute strength, and Kia would never allow that.

He had to find her. He had to get her away from Harold Brockheim, and then he could deal with the other man. Moriah’s insanity was obviously a genetic inheritance if that son of a bitch thought Chase was going to allow him to get away with this.

“Chase, I can’t find her.” Khalid grabbed his shoulder, forcing him to a stop. “Ian and Courtney are looking, and Cameron and Jaci, too. We haven’t found her anywhere.”

“Brockheim has her.”

Khalid stared at him in silent shock.

“Listen to me, Khalid. We have to find her.” He jerked his cell phone from inside his jacket. “Contact Ian. I’ll call Cameron. Brockheim has her, and I want her found. Now.”

The velvety tune the singer was crooning to the room was one of Kia’s favorites. As she danced with her father, she wished she had found Chase, caught his eye, and had him break in. Now she couldn’t see him over the heads of the other dancers. Being short had a tendency to suck.

“You did a wonderful job, Kia,” her father complimented her. He smiled down at her as his pale blue eyes held that warm little twinkle they always got when he was looking at her or her mother.

“Thank you, Daddy.” She grinned back at him. “Not that I had a choice with you breathing over my shoulder for the past three months.”

Her father grunted at that. “Just wanted to make sure you didn’t need any help.” His eyes crinkled. “And you didn’t.”

“I had a good team,” she reminded him.

He nodded at that, then fell silent.

“Your mother says you’re in love with the Falladay boy,” he said at last with a teasing grin. “I thought you were taking us shopping with you when you went husband hunting.”

“Daddy, I haven’t gone husband hunting.”

He frowned. “It will be coming soon, though.”

“Daddy.” She kept her voice warning.

“Well, he loves you, you love him.”

“Daddy.” She narrowed her eyes. “I’m rather enjoying this dance, but I can walk away from it.”

He winced. “You’re being mean to me. Just like your mother. She walked out on my last dance. Somehow she thought I should keep my nose out of my daughter’s business.”

“And she’s right,” she told him. “At least for the moment.”

He was her father. She knew his hurt feelings wouldn’t last for long, no matter how angry he thought he might make her.

He grimaced. “Fine. I’ll back off. But I’m warning you now, I might be pouting at dinner on Christmas. A son-in-law like Falladay would make a fine Christmas present. Maybe next Christmas…”

“Say it and I’m walking,” she warned him, though she was laughing. Her father wanted grandchildren. If he’d had his choice he would have had a house full of children, but he and her mother had never been able to have more children after her.

“Mean to me,” he muttered.

“I love you, Daddy.” She laughed. “Better than ice cream and chocolate cake.”

His lips twitched to answer when a hand tapped his shoulder. He paused.

Kia sobered at the sight of Harold Brockheim. He wasn’t seen out in society much anymore. He and his wife had completely retreated after the death of their daughter earlier in the summer.

Moriah had attempted to murder her step-aunt and uncle. The girl had been insane, as only a few people knew. The Brockheims had done everything to keep that knowledge carefully hidden.

“Timothy, could I steal your daughter?” he asked, his voice raspy.

Her father glanced at her questioningly, and Kia nodded.

Harold Brockheim held her stiffly as they began to move.

“How is Margaret doing, Harold?” she asked softly “I haven’t seen her in a while.”

“She’s doing fine,” he said, his craggy face flinching for a moment. “She’s been staying at home a lot, trying to make sense of things.”

His eyes took on a glazed cast. “Our Moriah is gone, you know?”

Kia wanted to cry for him. She ached for him as well as Margaret, but she had always felt they had been part of Moriah’s problems. Even as a child the other girl had been violent, destructive. She had liked to kill smaller things, animals and pets, and her parents had tried to keep it covered. Moriah had paid the price for it, but it didn’t stop Kia from aching for her parents.

She knew from talking to her own mother that raising children was never easy. She couldn’t imagine the fears and second-guessing that went into it. And when confronted with a child who suffered as Moriah had, it must have been a nightmare.

“I know, Mr. Brockheim,” she whispered. “We all miss Moriah.”

A social lie. Few people did miss her. Most of those who moved in Moriah’s circle had been wary of her.

“Do you?” Harold asked, his face twisting into lines of pain and anger. “You weren’t friends with her. She cried sometimes because you stopped being her friend.”

His words caused Kia to breathe in roughly, but she answered gently. “We grew apart.” Her parents had insisted on keeping her away from Moriah, and Kia had never been comfortable around her.

Harold nodded at that.

“Kia, I’m really not feeling well. Would you mind helping me to the lobby? My chauffeur came with me. He’ll be waiting for me there.”

“I could find my father.” Kia looked around desperately. Chase would pull his hair out if she dared step from the ballroom.

“Just to the door, dear.” He gripped her arm with one hand. “My chauffeur is waiting there.”

“Of course,” she murmured. Good manners dictated that she at least help him to the door. After all, how much danger could there be in that? She wouldn’t be leaving the ballroom, and there were plenty of people around. She had no doubt that Chase would be coming right behind her at any moment.

She breathed a sigh of relief as they neared the doors. She paused, then turned her head to Brockheim in terrified shock as she felt the knife that pressed against her flesh, hidden in his hand by the long sleeve of his tuxedo jacket.

“No,” she whispered as she stared into his maniacal gaze.

“I can do it here,” he whispered. “Or we can go someplace quiet and call your boyfriend. Make your choice.”

He pulled her past the doors, the dampness on her flesh telling her he had drawn blood. The grip he had on her, the tense set of his body, and the position of his arm assured her that if he shoved that knife in her side at that position, she might well be dead before anyone even knew she had been stabbed.

“Why?” Her voice was hoarse as he dragged her to the elevators.

The lobby was practically empty. The few guests milling about had their backs to them. There was no way to draw any help, no way to catch anyone’s attention, as he led her across the floor.

“We’re going up,” he ordered her firmly as they stopped at the elevators. She pressed the button with trembling fingers.

There was a chance. She waited, tears trembling on her lashes as terror raced through her. Where was Chase? He was always right behind her. He never left her for long.

The doors opened, and the elevator was empty. Brockheim pushed her inside.

“Twenty-seventh floor,” he snapped.

She reached out slowly and pushed the button. As the doors closed, she saw Drew step out of the ballroom. His eyes narrowed on the elevator, and she almost cried out in fear.

He would never tell Chase he had seen her. He was so furious with her, and she didn’t blame him.

“Why are you doing this?” she whispered.

“Shut up.” Brockheim pressed the knife tighter against her. “If anyone else gets on the elevator at another floor you won’t speak. You’ll put your head down and stay carefully behind me. Trust me, Kia, I will kill you.”

Yes, he would. And the elevator was so small he might well end up trying to kill anyone who attempted to help her.

How was she going to get out of this? She thought frantically. There had to be a way. She had waited too long for her own happiness, for a chance to lie in Chase’s arms, to let this happen.

“You should have remained faithful to your husband. It would have kept you alive.” Brockheim’s voice was heavy with grief. “I didn’t want to do this, Kia. I really didn’t. If you just hadn’t become involved with that bastard Chase, then you would have been safe. Why did you have to be such a little whore. You were nothing but a nasty slut with that murderer.”

Kia shook her head, the tears finally slipping from her eyes. Harold was as insane as his daughter had ever been. Perhaps more so.

“What are you talking about?” She gasped as the knife bit into her waist.

“That son of a bitch killed my baby,” he snarled. “My little girl. She was my only light, Kia. My sweet little baby—and he killed her. He put a bullet right between her eyes, and everyone covered it up. The police let him get away with it. Everyone did. I won’t.”

His hazel eyes gleamed with madness as the elevator neared its destination.

“You have once chance,” he told her. “If Chase comes for you. That’s your only chance. When he does, keep your mouth shut and do as you’re told. Do you hear me?”

The elevator stopped. Kia felt the dampness of blood running into her dress. The knife was pressing into her, reminding her how delicate her position was.

She followed Brockheim, his hand bruising her arm as he led her down the silent hallway. Everyone had known Moriah was crazy. Once, when Kia was a child, Moriah had become hysterical when a favorite pet of hers had liked Kia during a visit. She had tried to push Kia down the long, winding stairs of the Brockheim mansion because of it. Weeks later, servant gossip had come back to Kia’s parents that the puppy had been found, stabbed to death.

It looked like the daughter had learned her love of knives from the father.

“Here’s the key.” Brockheim stopped in front of a door. “Open the door.”

Kia took the key and slid it carefully along the security panel. Once inside, he would have to relax his guard. He was an old man. If she could get the tip of the knife out of her side, then perhaps she could have at least a fighting chance. That was all she needed.

She couldn’t let Chase come up here. She couldn’t allow Brockheim to force Chase into killing him. And she was terrified that was exactly what would happen.

If Chase had, for whatever reason, been forced to kill Moriah, then it explained so much about his hesitancy in a relationship with Kia.

Everyone knew Chase had been fond of Moriah. He had been close to Moriah, then had been forced to kill her.. There had even been speculation for a while as to whether or not he would become involved with her.

“Get in the room.” He pushed her inside as he flipped on the lights, and before she could do more than stumble he flung her away.

Kia turned, ready to fight, and found herself staring into the barrel of the gun he held in his hand.

“I’m smart.” He smiled. “So much smarter than your bastard lover. I’m going to kill you and let him watch you die. And then I’m going to kill him. Moriah won’t have to be alone anymore. She’ll have the two you to keep her company. The friend she lost, and the man she loved. The man who killed her.”