Page 95 of Cruel Hearts

I throw myself into his arms, and he catches me.

Just like I knew he would.

The day crawls by. Mel’s brother, Paulo, arrives, and glancing around the Presidential Suite, he whistles. I like him, the man who’s going to try to mug Zane and shoot me.

The restaurant Zane chose is fancy, on a downtown street corner, all glass allowing the paparazzi a good look at us fighting.

Ash needs to believe without a shadow of a doubt I’m dead. That means when Paulo “shoots” me, I need to fall to the ground in a way that’s believable, and not move once I’m lying there. Paulo will carry a prop gun that will sound exactly like a real handgun, but when he pulls the trigger, I won’t feel a thing. It will be up to me to pretend like he really shot me and fall to the ground. Mel demonstrates how I can stagger and crumple to the sidewalk without hurting myself. “In a real shooting, youhave a few seconds before your body realizes what happened and reacts. You can use those few seconds to fall safely.”

I’ll have a fake blood bag taped inside my dress, and when Zane kneels beside my body, he’ll pop the bag to release the fluid. Douglas will be waiting, and he’ll drive us to the hospital. Everything will go so quickly no one will suspect anything.

Zane will have the fake blood on his hands, and he’ll talk to the press outside the hospital. He’ll announce I’m dead, answer a couple of questions, then he’ll go back to the penthouse. Meanwhile, the nurse Mel found to help us will wheel me through the ER to an exam room where I’ll change and put on a wig. Mel’s going to drive a plain sedan, and she’ll drop me off across town where I’ll get into a cab and have it bring me back to the Crowne.

I don’t like the part where I’m alone, but people traveling together draw attention, whereas a woman riding by herself will go unnoticed.

Mel assures us Paulo’s quick enough on his feet to disappear before the police are alerted to the crime and try to arrest him. He, too, will wear a disguise, leaving him free after my death to help us.

That evening, Mel goes over the plan again and again until I want to scream.

“That’s enough,” Zane says, rubbing my shoulder as I tense up during one more walk-through. “I’ll be right there. She’ll be fine.”

Mel blows out a breath. “I know. It’s more for me, though I’ll be at the hospital, too. I don’t completely trust that junkie, but she’s our best shot, excuse the pun, if we want Stella to vanish in the ER. She called me earlier from a payphone. We lucked out, and there’s a blonde runaway Jane Doe in the morgue. She said she can write Stella’s name on the body tag. If this goes well, we may owe her for more than just keeping a secret.”

“If she can work that out, I’ll pay her whatever she wants,” Zane says.

We stop for a break, and Mel and Paulo sit in the corner of Max’s room going over a map of King’s Crossing, puzzling out the route he’ll take to lose the police after he shoots me.

Quinn’s sleeping now and will wait here at the Crowne. I insisted she rest as much as possible. She needs to be strong enough to help us later when we need her.

Denton watched the walk-throughs, Mel teaching me to stagger and fall to the sidewalk. I feel his agitation, but there’s not much for him to do until we start acting out our plan to expose Ash and his father.

Max will stand across the street as part of the paparazzi, and he’ll write an article about the mugging and my death and send it to his editor at theChronicle.

Zarah loves spending time with him, and they’ve been exploring the hotel, Ingrid following a discreet distance behind. She has more freedom roaming the Crowne’s hallways than she ever had at Quiet Meadows, and the exertion puts a blush on her cheeks.

Zane and I sit on the loveseat in Max’s conference room, the main hub of our operation. He cuddles me to him, my back to his chest, and presses a kiss to my hair. Everyone has felt the shift in our relationship. Even Nathalie, who eyes us with a combination of wistfulness, jealousy, and bitterness.

Our dinner isn’t until ten this evening, and in the Honeymoon Suite, I soak in a long, hot bath. Zane doesn’t join me, and I’m a little disappointed and a lot relieved. We’re in each other’s faces all the time, and it will get worse. I needed a few minutes alone, even if I didn’t want them.

I go over the plan.

There’s nothing that can go wrong, and I trust everyone involved. Paulo’s a nice guy. He has a sharp sense of humor andsays he’s a steady shot, not that he needs to be tonight. He’s had extensive training shooting real guns, and he and Mel have worked at their security company together for years. He said acting like a mugger will be fun, and he looks forward to slipping the cops.

The hot water soothes me, the vanilla body wash scenting the air. I get out and rub lotion all over my skin and blow dry my hair. Wearing my robe, I meet Mel in her room. She said she wanted to help me dress, but I don’t know why. I can put on a dress by myself.

She asks me to sit on the counter in the spacious, brightly lit bathroom. A curling iron is heating, and jars and pallets of cosmetics sit near the sink bowl.

“You and Zane, huh?” she asks, curling my hair into waves. It’s almost maternal, and I swallow back tears. I miss Maryanne.

“It’s always been me and Zane,” I say.

“Yeah. I got that. Hey,” she says, fluffing my hair, “I wanted you to dress in here because I want you to wear something extra.”

Frowning, I ask, “What?”

Mel slips out of the bathroom and comes back holding a shiny black tank top. “Bulletproof body armor. It might not be very comfortable in this heat, but they’ve come a long way in design.”

Fingering the material, I ask, “Why do you want me to wear it?”

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