The second published still was a back view of Fox, nothing blocked out. In the background, she could be seen lying nude in the tumbled bed, her hair a wild mass around her head. In this one, they’d blacked out her br**sts.
The text of the “article” was a collection of exclamation points: Think these images are tame?! Well they are!! We have access to incredibly hot and explicit pictures of Fox and his current squeeze getting down and dirty!! Check back in two hours for a fresh fix as we count down to our upload of the original sex tape!! Exclusive!!
“Only those two so far?” she managed to ask her sister through her fury, her mind filled with memories of that night, of the things they’d done. She was ashamed of none of it, would do it again, but only with Fox. The world had no right to violate the privacy of their bedroom.
“Yes.” Thea guzzled what was probably tar-thick coffee. “It looks like the tabloid must’ve bought exclusive rights to the video and they’re getting as much mileage out of it as they can.”
“Shut the f**king company down.” Fox’s voice was so cold Molly felt her skin prickle. “I don’t care how it’s done—tell legal to throw everything we have at the bastards.”
There was a knock on the hotel room door at that instant. Getting up, Fox walked over to open it. “You heard,” he said to Noah as the other man walked in. He’d clearly been pulled out of bed and wore only low-slung jeans, his blond hair a mess and his eyes chips of ice.
“Yeah. Let’s f**k the vultures up.” Coming to sit next to Molly on the sofa, he reached up to rub his knuckles over her cheek. “You holding up okay, Moll?”
“I’m tough,” she said, and it was, she was discovering, true.
Fox wrapped his arm around her waist again when he sat back down on her other side, his rage no less violent. “We’re talking about how to take the tabloid down.”
The guitarist nodded. “I might hate my old man, but the bastard is a shark,” he said, a mix of admiration and anger in his tone. “I called him as soon as I found out about this. He says for you to file a criminal complaint as fast as possible.”
“Right.” Thea nodded. “So anyone who does anything with the video risks falling foul of the criminal justice system, not just civil law. I don’t know if it’ll work with the tabloid based outside the country, but it’s better than nothing.”
They filed the complaint. Meanwhile, Noah tapped his father’s contacts to put a crack private investigator on the trail of the piece of scum who’d decided to use Fox and Molly to land a big payday.
“Someone in the security company either did this or was in on it,” Fox gritted out. “Maybe the same ‘real man’ who let in the groupie, probably for a f**king blow job.” Calling the head of the security firm, a former Green Beret he knew personally, Fox made no effort to hide his fury.
Apparently, that fury was shared—they had a name within the hour, after a check of the corridor surveillance footage from the hotel in question showed one of the guards walking into their suite during a concert. He was spotted going back inside minutes after Fox and Molly checked out, probably to retrieve the camera.
He hadn’t been behind the groupie however; that was traced to a newly promoted guard whom his livid boss had just busted back down to mall patrol. The only people now in the band’s security team had been with the firm for years, and all had also worked more than once for Schoolboy Choir. As for the man behind the video, he’d disappeared, but Molly knew he’d be found—greed this ugly didn’t make for intelligence.
“This is your nightmare, isn’t it?” Fox said hours later, once they were alone again, the suite having been swept for any surveillance equipment in the interim.
“Who does that?” she said, blood hot where she stood by the window. “Who thinks it’s all right to spy on people in their most private space?” She fisted her hands on the sweatpants she’d pulled on—along with a zipped hoodie—for the visit by the cops. “Who thinks that way?”
“Scum.” Fox walked over, eyes shadowed and voice taut as he said, “You gonna run?”
“No, I’m going to fight.” Running out on Fox was simply not, and wouldn’t ever be, an option. “Never again is anyone going to turn me into prey—and I refuse to allow them to hurt you. We’ll kick their butts.”
Fox’s arms locked so tight around her that she couldn’t breathe for a second. Tugging back her head after easing his hold a fraction, he claimed her mouth. His kiss was wild possessiveness, unrelenting demand… but his body, it shuddered. Running her hands down his back, she held him close.
If she ever came face-to-face with the man responsible for putting that look in Fox’s eyes, as if he was readying himself to lose her, Molly would beat the bastard bloody. “No running away,” she said when their lips parted. “Not today, not tomorrow, not any day to come.”
“My tough, beautiful Molly.” His body shuddered again, his eyes dark. “I’m so f**king glad you’re mine.”
Molly held Fox’s words bang against her heart, her fingers locked bloodlessly tight with his as they stood ready to walk out the hotel’s main door midmorning. She’d been running on anger and adrenaline since four a.m., had, until a few minutes ago, believed she had the tools to deal with the media mauling about to happen. Now, with the horde only meters away, she wasn’t so sure. Her stomach churned, her chest painful beneath the peach top that she loved, the one with the softly tied bow at the throat.