They looked like an X-rated version of a vampire and his victim. Thank heaven the newspaper had thoughtfully provided a black bar across her na**d br**sts.
How very classy of them.
Oh, God, would her mother see this? Embarrassment flooded her body and she felt the heat of it swamp through her like a brushfire rushing uphill. Her gaze lifted to his. “I can’t believe this.”
“Welcome to my world,” he muttered, then shoved one hand through his thick, dark hair. Half turning, he poured them each a cup of steaming coffee and handed one to her.
“Damn photographers.” He shook his head grimly, took a sip of coffee and said, “This is my fault, Julie. I shouldn’t have taken the chance of being seen, but I was caught off guard and—”
“We both were,” she murmured, shifting her gaze back to the photo of Travis nibbling at her throat. She could hardly swallow her own coffee and was half afraid that the jolt of caffeine would only clear up her vision, making the photo even worse.
“Yes, but you’re not used to life in the spotlight. I should have been thinking. Should have remembered telephoto lenses, damn it.”
Looking up at him, Julie saw that he was both furious and frustrated. Probably not a good combination. “Wasn’t your fault, Travis. Besides, it doesn’t matter now how it happened. The point is, it did. Can’t you—” she shook the paper, then tossed it to the table and concentrated on her coffee “—sue them or something?”
“Pointless,” he said darkly. “It only revs up interest. If we’re lucky, this will stay in the local paper and not be picked up by the bigger outlets.”
“Yeah,” she said, closing her eyes briefly. “I feel lucky.”
He snapped her a look and seemed to notice what she was wearing—or more precisely, what she wasn’t wearing. Moving to the French doors, he closed them, then yanked the sheers closed across them. “No more gifts to the paparazzi,” he said.
“Right.” She clutched her sheet tighter with one hand and held on to her coffee with the other. “So, what’re we going to do about all of this?”
“I’ll have my lawyers contact the paper here in town—”
“But I thought suing was—”
“Not for a suit. He’ll pull out the legalese and give them a stern lecture though.”
Oh, yeah, she’d always figured that paparazzi could be tamed if someone would just sit down and give them a good talking to. But no point throwing a metaphorical log onto his fire. “And then?”
“Then…” He checked his gold wristwatch. “I’m meeting my cousin Rico in a half hour. He’s got some ideas on a few judges I can talk to about getting your prior marriage dissolved quickly and quietly.”
“Okay,” Julie said, already walking toward her half of the suite. “Give me fifteen minutes. I’ll be showered, dressed and ready.”
“No need,” he said brusquely, topping off his coffee. “You just sit tight. I’ll take care of the arrangements.”
“Sit tight?” she echoed, disbelief coloring her tone.
“Yeah.” He walked to a nearby table, picked up a remote and punched a button. The big-screen television flickered to life. “Rent movies, have a massage, go to the pool. Or, there’s a shopping pavilion on the ground floor. Go buy things.”
Julie stared at him, amazed. He actually thought that she would trot off and play lazy rich wife while he was out dealing with her past and arranging her future? Oh, that was never going to happen.
“Uh-huh,” she said. “Shopping. Massage. Is that how the other women you’ve brought here spent their time?”
He must have caught something in her tone because he swiveled his head to look at her, confusion clearly stamped on his face. “Yes,” he admitted. “They all seemed to enjoy themselves. Why wouldn’t you?”
All of them?
Of course, all, she told herself. Travis had probably brought dozens of women to this hotel. This suite. They’d all romped in that bed with him and—Oh, she so didn’t want to think about that right now.
No wonder the desk clerk had tried her hand at a little seduction. From her point of view, Julie was no more than the latest female in a long, staggering line of Travis’s companions.
Well, Julie was different. She might not be the woman of his dreams, but for now anyway, she was at least his wife. Well, more or less. And she wouldn’t be treated like some brainless bimbo looking to get a tight grip on his credit cards.
“I didn’t come here to shop. Or to get a massage. Or to do any number of the things your usual women are so entertained by,” she reminded him. “I’m here to straighten out a mistake in my past.”
“It’s being handled,” he said, glancing back at the television where a space battle was taking place in showering sparks and flashing lights.
“By you.”
“Yes, by me.”
Julie stared at him. “But this doesn’t just concern you, Travis. This is about me.”
“Julie, you’re making too much of this. You’re tired and frustrated and I’m sure the wake-up call in the paper has you upset, too.”
She could almost feel him giving her a pat on the head. She took a long deep breath and fanned the flames of her own simmering temper. “So what you’re saying is, I should just stay here, out of the way and not worry my pretty little head about it?”
He finally seemed to catch the tone of her voice, then turned to her and frowned. “I didn’t say that.”
“You implied it.”
“For God’s sake, Julie…”
“Forget it, Travis,” she said, heading for her bedroom and the shower. “You may have thought you were getting yourself a temporary mousey wife, but you got one with a mind of her own.”
“You’ll only complicate matters,” he called after her.
She stopped in the doorway to her bedroom and looked back over her shoulder at him. “Let’s remember, I trusted Jean Claude to get that divorce without my input. Just look how well that turned out.”
“I’m not Pierre.”
“No, you’re not,” she said, hitching the sheet a little higher across her br**sts. She felt like an idiot having this conversation while wearing nothing but a silken bed sheet. “You’re Travis King, used to getting his own way and having people shout ‘how high?’ when you say ‘jump.’ Just so you know, I don’t jump. Ever. So if you think I’m going to trust another man to take care of something this important without my being involved, you’re way wrong. I’ll be ready in fifteen minutes.”