THE UNSTOPPABLE JASON SALFORD

CHAPTER 6

Jason looked at Rachel.

Then he smiled.

It was a small smile. Cold. Almost pitying.

"An affair," he said quietly. "That's interesting, Rachel." He glanced at Derek standing beside her. "You walked in here with another man on your arm the morning after our divorce. But I'm the one having an affair."

Rachel's face flushed.

"That is completely different," she snapped.

"Is it?" Jason said.

"Derek is a business partner."

"Of course he is."

Rachel pointed a finger at him. "Don't do that. Don't stand there and twist this around. You know exactly what you're doing."

"I know exactly what I'm doing," Jason agreed calmly. "I came here for a meal. That's all."

"With her." Rachel's eyes cut to Claire. "You just met this woman and you're already bringing her to hotels?"

"Claire and I met this morning," Jason said simply. "That's the truth."

Rachel stared at him.

"You expect me to believe that."

"I don't expect anything from you," Jason said. "Not anymore."

Rachel's jaw tightened.

She turned to the crowd that had gathered around them. Her voice climbed deliberately.

"Everyone hear that? He shows up at the most expensive hotel in the city with a woman he just met and claims the Harmon family invited him to dinner." She laughed. "My ex-husband who has never held a job in five years. Invited by the Harmon family."

A few people laughed with her.

Rachel turned back to Jason.

"So you're telling me," she said coldly, "that this woman beside you is from the Harmon family? Is that your next claim?"

Jason looked at her steadily.

"Claire is from the Harmon family," he said. "But she is not the one who invited me."

Silence for exactly one second.

Then the laughter came.

Louder this time. From more people.

Someone near the desk said he was something else.

Another voice said Rachel really dodged something by divorcing him.

Derek Chase shook his head slowly with the satisfied smile of a man watching exactly what he expected to happen.

"Rachel," he said, putting a hand on her shoulder, "your ex-husband is truly something special." He clicked his tongue. "First he claims the Harmon family invited him. Then he claims the woman beside him is from the Harmon family but she's not the one who invited him." He spread his hands. "Who invited you then? The hotel plants?"

More laughter.

Derek looked around at the gathered crowd, playing to them now.

"I have done business with the Harmon family for three years," he said loudly. "I know every senior member personally. I know their staff. I know their properties." He held up his phone. "One call. That's all it takes to expose this man completely."

Rachel nodded.

"Make the call," she said.

Derek was already dialing.

Claire stood behind Jason's shoulder watching all of it with her arms folded. Her expression was perfectly neutral.

But her eyes were something else.

She had almost laughed again twice in the last sixty seconds and was managing it through considerable effort.

The call connected.

Derek put it on speaker with the confidence of a man who had never once been wrong about something in public.

It rang.

And rang.

And went to voicemail.

Derek's smile stayed in place.

"He's probably in a meeting," he said smoothly. He lowered the phone. "It doesn't matter. The point is clear."

He looked at Jason.

"Dream on," he said.

At that moment a woman cut through the edge of the gathered crowd with the quick efficient walk of someone whose job required them to appear wherever problems were developing.

She was polished. Mid-forties. Dark blazer with the Grand Monarch insignia on the lapel.

The hotel manager.

She scanned the group and her eyes landed on Derek immediately.

Derek's face opened into a wide smile.

"Sandra," he said warmly. "Perfect timing."

Sandra Chen, General Manager of the Grand Monarch Hotel, smiled back with professional ease.

"Mr. Chase," she said. "Is everything alright?"

Derek gestured toward Jason and Claire.

"We have a small situation," he said pleasantly. "These two walked in off the street claiming to be guests of the Harmon family. The gentleman is also claiming the Harmon family personally invited him to dine here today." He lowered his voice to the register of someone sharing something almost too embarrassing to say. "I think they may have wandered in from outside and gotten confused about where they are."

Sandra looked at Jason.

Then at Claire.

Her smile stayed professional.

But something shifted behind her eyes.

She knew the Harmon family was entertaining a guest at the hotel today. Richard Harmon himself had called ahead. The Supreme Banquet Hall had been reserved and prepared since yesterday morning.

She just didn't know who the guest was.

She kept her face neutral.

Derek pressed forward.

"Sandra, you know every Harmon family member personally," he said. "You run their hotel. Just confirm for everyone here that these two have no connection to the Harmon family whatsoever and we can all move on."

Sandra hesitated for just a fraction of a second.

Then she straightened.

She pushed carefully through the small crowd until she was standing directly in front of Jason and Claire.

She studied Jason's face.

Then Claire's.

Her expression shifted again. Something she couldn't quite resolve.

She didn't recognize either of them.

Claire had been abroad for six years. Sandra had never met her.

And Jason.

Sandra had no file for Jason. No photograph. No name on any guest list she had seen.

She made her decision.

Her voice came out sharp and certain.

"Security."

Two guards near the desk looked up immediately.

Sandra pointed at Jason and Claire.

"Remove these two from the hotel."