She waves me over, tapping the button on her screen to put Lila on speakerphone.
“What’s up?” I ask as I move closer to Kelsey, our arms pressing together.
“An image from the hotel lobby just pinged. We think it might be Bennie and another woman.”
My mind starts racing. A sighting of Jaxon’s stalker in our hotel in Amsterdam is surprising, considering she was last thought to be living on the streets. I run through the schedule for the day in my head.
“Weston should be heading up—” I’m cut off by Lila.
“We’ve already contacted Weston. He confirmed Jaxon is safe in his room for the night. He sent a team to investigate, but the woman had already left by the time they arrived.”
“Was it a positive identification?” Kelsey asks.
“Do we know where they went?” I ask at the same time.
“Nothing definitive. They arrived by taxi, ordered one drink, paid with cash, and left, also by taxi. We could expend the resources to try to track them, but between coordinating with the government and local businesses in the Netherlands, it feels like too large of an expenditure of resources without a positive identification. That said, it’s why I’m calling. I want an official decision from Kelsey.”
“Send through the images and security footage. We’ll be back at the hotel in”—Kelsey pulls up a rideshare app on her phone—“ten minutes. We’ll review the footage and make a final decision.”
“Everything will be in your inbox when you get there.”
Chapter eighteen
Carter
“I’mleavingNashherewith the final vehicle to take you home,” I say into my phone to Kelsey as I take in the windowed walls of the arena in Berlin from the backseat of the black SUV. Our hotel is over two miles away, and there is no way I’m leaving her here to get home by herself. The fact that she doesn’t even argue but instead gives a tired “okay” before hanging up suggests she’s even more exhausted than I am.
The last forty-eight hours have been some of the most stressful in my life, which is saying something, considering I’ve been deployed in active combat zones. The news about Bennie’s possible reappearance in Amsterdam was like a bucket of cold water poured over us, and any lingering thoughts I had about where the night could go were instantly pushed aside to focus on the business at hand.
After reviewing each of the tapes, Kelsey and I were called to Jaxon’s suite to loop him in. It was a brief meeting where we updated Jaxonand his team on our findings, Kelsey laying out her reasoning behind why she decided not to pursue the individual any further. I backed her fully and tried not to flinch when she sent a surprised look my way. Jaxon was quiet but considerate as we laid out his options, and ultimately went with our recommendation to limit his movements outside of his hotel suite and the concert venue.
Everyone was on high alert during the concert the next night, and even Jaxon seemed a bit tense during the show. The crowd in Amsterdam hadn’t seemed to notice, though Kelsey and I both noted it during our time in the security booth. Kelsey’s team had added an additional security camera at each of the entrances, and her computer screens had been full of the various feeds, her entire focus on being a second set of eyes. Fortunately, the venue in Amsterdam is one of the most intelligent arenas in the world, so plugging into their pre-existing systems made everything slightly easier.
The next morning, Kelsey climbed into one of the buses taking the crew to Berlin, offering me a small smile and wave that I interpreted to mean she was as unhappy about our time apart as I was. There’s an air of unfinished business that, though shoved to the background for now, has been hovering between us since our date in Amsterdam.
No, not a date. Though maybe a date? Do you have to know it’s a date ahead of time for it to be a date?
I stayed behind with Jaxon’s security team, accompanying him to a TV interview before boarding the private jet for our flight to Berlin. We’d had ten minutes to drop off our bags at the hotel before heading over to the venue for the security meeting and sound check. Thankgoodness for Gail and the logistics team handling check-in—all I had to do was grab my key from her.
Kelsey wasn’t so lucky. The buses encountered icy roads on their drive, so they arrived two hours late, literally pulling up to the venue at the same time we did. Fortunately, the forty-five semitrucks with the sets and equipment had left the last venue immediately after the show was torn down, so they made it before the storm.
Since they arrived, everything has felt like a chaotic rush.
I let out an involuntary sigh, and Mikayla’s eyes meet mine from where she’s driving.
“I feel you. It’s been a long fucking day.”
“A long fucking few days,” I respond, running my hands through my hair as I try to work away the headache forming at my temples.
Eddie grunts his agreement from the front seat as we turn off the road that runs along the Spree River, and I try not to be annoyed that he asked me to come back with him to discuss one of the agents on his team. Eddie leads the secondary CPO team for Jaxon—the counterpart to Weston’s team. I’d wanted to put it off until tomorrow so I could stay with Kelsey, but he’d made it seem urgent, so here I am, heading back to our fancy hotel to discuss personnel while Nash makes sure the woman I can’t stop thinking about makes it back safely.
When we arrive, Eddie and I grab a couple of seats at a small table in a secluded corner in the hotel’s lobby. I try to push aside the thoughts of Kelsey and focus on Eddie’s words. He explains that one of his protection officers, Leo, has been struggling with the crowds recently. He’s either not in the right position or is too slow to move if someoneis coming toward Jaxon. It hasn’t escalated into anything major, but I can tell Eddie’s concerned it will.
Leo has been with the team for almost as long as I have, but he’s never been with as high-profile a client as Jaxon. None of us have, except Kevin. Though Hailey Moore’s concerts didn’t sell out as quickly as Jaxon’s Forever Starts Here Tour did, so it might just be impossible to be as high-profile as Jaxon.
“I think he might do better on one of the other teams. One that spends less time guarding Jaxon in high-traffic situations,” Eddie concludes.
It’s a tough call. I’ve worked with Leo before, and he’s solid, but I also know just how important it is that the entire Mitchell Security team is performing their best. We don’t have room for any mistakes.
