Bodyguard by CD Reiss

Table of Content

• 1. Unnamed
• 2. Unnamed
• 3. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Text copyright © 2017 Flip City Media Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher. Published by Montlake Romance, Seattle www.apub.com Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Montlake Romance are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates. ISBN-13: 9781542049009 ISBN-10: 1542049008 Cover design by Shasti O’Leary Soudant
• 4. To my son. I prayed to have you, and you’re everything I prayed for. But faster.
• 5. CONTENTS CHAPTER 1 EMILY CHAPTER 2 EMILY CHAPTER 3 EMILY CHAPTER 4 EMILY CHAPTER 5 CARTER CHAPTER 6 EMILY CHAPTER 7 CARTER CHAPTER 8 EMILY CHAPTER 9 CARTER CHAPTER 10 EMILY CHAPTER 11 CARTER CHAPTER 12 EMILY CHAPTER 13 CARTER CHAPTER 14 EMILY CHAPTER 15 CARTER CHAPTER 16 EMILY CHAPTER 17 CARTER CHAPTER 18 EMILY CHAPTER 19 CARTER CHAPTER 20 EMILY CHAPTER 21 EMILY CHAPTER 22 CARTER CHAPTER 23 EMILY CHAPTER 24 CARTER CHAPTER 25 EMILY CHAPTER 26 CARTER CHAPTER 27 EMILY CHAPTER 28 EMILY CHAPTER 29 CARTER CHAPTER 30 EMILY CHAPTER 31 CARTER CHAPTER 32 EMILY CHAPTER 33 CARTER CHAPTER 34 EMILY CHAPTER 35 CARTER CHAPTER 36 EMILY CHAPTER 37 EMILY CHAPTER 38 EMILY CHAPTER 39 EMILY CHAPTER 40 CARTER CHAPTER 41 EMILY CHAPTER 42 EMILY CHAPTER 43 CARTER CHAPTER 44 EMILY CHAPTER 45 CARTER CHAPTER 46 EMILY CHAPTER 47 CARTER CHAPTER 48 EMILY CHAPTER 49 EMILY CHAPTER 50 CARTER CHAPTER 51 CARTER CHAPTER 52 EMILY CHAPTER 53 CARTER CHAPTER 54 EMILY CHAPTER 55 EMILY CHAPTER 56 CARTER CHAPTER 57 EMILY CHAPTER
• 6. CHAPTER 1 EMILY When we became friends, she was just Darlene McKenna. She wasn’t even in third grade when she started singing in her church on Sundays. I sang a little, danced a little, but gymnastics was the love of my little heart. We met during gymnastics camp in Chicago. I was awesome. We were in the same group, and I was already on the team. My parents had put a bar across the garage door so I could practice my casts. Which I did. A lot. My parents worked. They were lawyers, and I was a ten-year-old kid who talked like a buzz saw and couldn’t keep still. So they sent me to lessons and camps to keep me happy. All they ever wanted was to keep me happy. The gym I went to was a second home in a massive warehouse space just south of the city. Banners with team members’ names over the colleges they attended. They’d trained Olympians and champions. There were so many banners they were running out of space. I grew up thinking the odds of winning all the chips were in my favor. Camps were
• 7. CHAPTER 2 EMILY I was late. I figure the whole thing could have been avoided if I’d been on time. But the auto lock on my front gate had jammed, and the back gate wasn’t set up for leaving. It was set up for coming in, so the keypad was on the outside. I had to go back into the house, which took a few steps, then I had to find the key to the back gate, and then the phone rang. Darlene wanted me to bring the video of the Sexy Badass Tour, which I didn’t have loaded on my laptop. So I loaded it. Then forgot the key. This kind of stuff adds up. I couldn’t be late. A dancer could be late and get a slap on the wrist because the practice could continue a dancer short, more or less. But when the choreographer was late, everything stopped. Darlene’s time was wasted, and her time was expensive. Liam, her manager, drilled that home to the entire team at least once a week. I managed to avoid an accident going Downtown and parked on the street. The lot was full, and because I was late, they’d put
• 8. CHAPTER 3 EMILY I made it my business to be on time from then on. One, because it was my job. Two, a few minutes before call was a great time to get coffee at the craft services table and make conversation. The third reason, limited parking, yielded a firm statement from Darlene that no one was to park in the choreographer’s spot. Even if she was late. Even if she was sick. If an ambulance pulled in to take Darlene herself to the hospital for a life-threatening stroke, it could park in the street. Darlene took care of me, but she was still a star. She stopped short in the middle of a move. “I cannot do that, Emily.” The music cut out. The dancers flopped from inertia. “Yes, you can. Look.” I did the move, landed, and turned to her. “That.” “Stop showing off.” “We can make it easier.” The Downtown space she’d rented was called Citizens Warehouse. It had windows everywhere and glossy wood floors. Big show. Ton of people. Dozens. I didn’t know what half of them did, but they were all busy
• 9. CHAPTER 4 EMILY Organic, artisanal, handmade meals were catered on steam tables with a staff to spoon out salads, vegetables, high-protein lean meats, and whole-grain desserts. I was fine with that to a point. “More,” I said to the hipster behind the chafing dish. A warehouse floor full of dancers could eat a farm-to-table establishment out of house and home. “Give her that big piece.” Darlene pointed her fork at a giant piece of chicken. “Everything we do she does ten times.” She leaned into me. “I left a surprise dessert for you.” “I think we need to change the opening on ‘Make Him Yours.’” I took the extra chicken and pushed it to the side to make room. “Make it harder.” Darlene’s assistant handed her a salad with the tomatoes taken out. “Is that a dare?” She winked at me. She complained and begged for more at the same time. Hard work was her MO, and diva was her brand. She honored both sides, and I understood them. I wondered if I would have been the same way if I’d been the one to
• 10. CHAPTER 5 CARTER You need to lighten up. Gotta admit, when I saw that note under the brownie, I thought it was directed at me. But it wasn’t my dessert. It was Emily’s. She was a serious girl. Cute but serious, and for good reason. I wanted to wipe all those reasons away and give her a reason to laugh. But I’d never tell her to lighten up. It’s not a friendly suggestion. It’s an aggressive demand. I put the tinfoil packet on a speaker and flipped over the paper. Nothing. Just brownie crumbs and oil spots. Were brownies oily? I sniffed it. Cloying. Sour. Garlic. Eggs. Skunk. I took a tiny bite of the brownie and had my suspicions confirmed. I folded the brownie away and grabbed a bottle of water to wash out the taste. I wished the story of her ex-boyfriend washed away as easily. Stalkers had a special place in my heart. The place where I kept violence and foul language. Emily cackled from the studio area. I hadn’t heard her laugh like that in the past two weeks. I went to the sound. She
• 11. CHAPTER 6 EMILY I wasn’t protecting Vince. I was protecting myself. I didn’t want to get spun into Vince’s world again. His little dramas. His begging and pleading. His poking and prodding. I just wanted to pretend I’d gotten a brownie meant for one of the assistants or grip guys. The electricians stank of skunkweed and propane lighters. It was probably meant for one of them. Darlene didn’t buy it either. That night, she went out to some fancy event after a day of breaking her ass. Her stylist came with an extra gown for me, but I begged off. I didn’t want to deal with flashing lights or people being so nice because the Darlene McKenna was in their presence. I just wanted to go home and eat a dozen eggs. I let Carlos, her not-as-hot security guy, drop me at the door. He wouldn’t leave until he heard me lock it. Apparently he was picking me up tomorrow because I couldn’t get from the driveway of my house to the parking lot at work without getting jumped by a brownie. I couldn’t argue. M
• 12. CHAPTER 7 CARTER Three other guys could have watched Darlene at the UNICEF event. Carlos, who ran this ship, had to take care of something with actor Michael Greydon, who was apparently dating a paparazza, opening up a whole can of problems. Fabian, the workaholic, had done too many shifts that week, which was not a good way to stay alert. Bart, who did stand-up, couldn’t miss a show. Jamal was driving. So even though I didn’t like working nights, I was on the awards show. Watching Darlene McKenna was my job, and I was fine, just fine. But working the event meant I couldn’t give Vince Ginetti a talking-to. And that guy needed a talking-to. This was some stage six shit. This was about controlling her responses. He’d drugged her so he could have control over her for a few hours. When she didn’t call him to either thank him for the high or yell at him for the assault on her bloodstream, he was going to get pissed and plan something bigger and better. Emily knew this. She knew not to talk
• 13. CHAPTER 8 EMILY I wasn’t much of a drug user. I’d smoked a few times in the High School of the Arts. Dropped acid once. Did my share of drinking. Once we got to LA, I saw how people acted on drugs, and mostly they were fine until the chemicals reached their brain. Then, no matter who they were, they were douchebags. I had to dance the pot through my system. Sweat it out. I got up and did Darlene’s first dance in my dining room. The first thing I ever choreographed for Darlene was one-two-three-and-up-and-turn-and-punch-and-bend-and— I was a singer and dancer. Feeling fake euphoria or really shitty wasn’t good for my performance. Smoking hurt my throat. Drinking depressed my immune system. So I just passed. The only time I felt really and truly free was when my body and the music worked together to make something new. Without that feeling of connection, I felt broken. One-two-three-and-up-and-turn-and-punch-and-bend-and— I wasn’t prepared for how my body would react when the marijuana l
• 14. CHAPTER 9 CARTER Emily’s house was on the corner of Olympic and Citrus, not too far from where I lived. The front entrance was on the smaller street, and the driveway faced the wide thoroughfare of Olympic. That must have been for safety. Desolate streets helped the stalker, not the victim. Corner properties on major thoroughfares had advantages. She handed me her phone as I came through the gate. —Was it fun, babe?— “Are you sure he sent this text?” “No. He doesn’t have my new number, and I’ve blocked him.” I gave her back her phone, following her inside. She closed and locked the front door. The little house was clean and uncluttered. I could see where the walls met the floors. “Did you answer?” “No. I blocked the number so he won’t text again. And I got a screenshot and uploaded it to my lawyer’s server. Blah blah. Can I get you something?” “Water?” I followed her into the open space in the middle of the house. “Is this—?” “Dining room,” she answered. Her eyes were still bloodshot a
• 15. CHAPTER 10 EMILY The kiss was such a surprise I lost control of my body, falling into it like a perfectly warm bath. His lips moved gently against mine, his tongue flicked against mine with care as if reading a foreign language he knew he’d understand if he were careful. I’d never been kissed like that. He kissed as if he were listening to me tell a story, and I kissed him back as if I was. He pulled back gently. He wasn’t an asshole about it. He was perfectly fine. A gentleman. But when I realized he wasn’t pulling away so he could breathe or kiss me at a different angle, I got mad. Defensive. Butthurt. Whatever. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I can’t.” And you know, he could go screw himself. I was in no mood. I was weird from a pot brownie and tired, and I had work the next day. One-two-up-turn-what-the-fuck-ever. “Yeah. It’s fine.” He paused as if he wanted to make some other pathetic excuse for . . . what? Not kissing me longer? Not having sex with me? Not marrying me? What did I want fro
• 16. CHAPTER 11 CARTER I could have kissed her longer. At least all night and into the next day, but I’d promised to look in on Vince. Deep in Glendale, just north of Mountain, stood a house shaped like one cracker box stacked on another. You could barely see the 1920s Craftsman it used to be. It had been built to two stories, siding removed and stuccoed over. Windows taken out and filled in to fit Home Depot standard vinyl. Bathroom tile on the steps leading into the closed-in porch. The entire property had been paved in beige concrete so two black BMWs could park in the front yard. The garage was in the back, and on the night I kissed Emily, the rolling door was open. I could see the whole yard down the driveway. A set of metal prefab steps went up the side of the house to a door on the second floor. My guess was that was his way in and out of his room. A few guys were milling around with beers, poking sticks into a barbecue. I couldn’t hear what they were saying between bold laughs and s
• 17. CHAPTER 12 EMILY I woke up with a headache. Not a nagging pain that would go away but a dense throb that felt like a cinder block duct-taped to the left side of my head. Add a side of nausea, and bang: recipe for my morning. After coffee and three ibuprofen, the cinder block turned red brick, and the nausea came out as the star of the show, took a bow, and wouldn’t leave center stage. I showered, dressed, and got to work only slightly grumpy. The morning sun blasted through the windows and went right into my brain. The early birds were at the craft services table or checking equipment. I grabbed a piece of bread to soak up whatever my insides were producing too much of. “Good morning,” Carter said as he poured fresh coffee into his Starbucks cup. I grumbled a polite response. I had more to say, but I didn’t know what he deserved. Thanks for the kiss? An insult for cutting me off at that? Praise for a solid lip-lock? “I went to Vince’s place last night.” Every muscle tightened. I didn’t
• 18. CHAPTER 13 CARTER I had the afternoon off. I got Phin from school. He threw his bag in the back seat and hurled himself in the car. “Hey, Dad. Size of my heart.” We fist-bumped. “Size of mine. Did you shower this morning?” “I forgot.” He forgot a lot of things. If we didn’t remind him to brush his teeth and hair, put on matching socks, close the damn door, none of it got done. I understood this was normal for kids his age, but I also knew that after a certain point he might not improve. For an orderly man, a child with ADHD could challenge every fiber of patience. “When we go home, then. Before I leave for work tonight.” He used to get upset when I worked nights. Not anymore. Either he’d accepted it as his reality or he stopped caring. I got onto Olympic, right into a knot of traffic. “I have homework,” he said, turning the radio to a station he liked. “I need you to help with it.” “If it’s precalc, we can call Sean.” Sean was his tutor. We called him only for math emergencies. “It’s h
• 19. CHAPTER 14 EMILY Simon held up a pure-white sleeveless dress. It matched his short, bleached hair and contrasted against his dark-brown skin. His tongue clucked against the roof of his mouth, and he shook the dress until the skirt waved. “What if I spill on it?” “Spill what? It’s not like you’ve had a drink in your life.” “Not true.” I snatched the dress from him. Something about it jolted me. The color. The shape. I couldn’t place the memory it called up. A salesgirl appeared out of nowhere. “Can I start a dressing room for you?” I handed her the dress, and she passed Bart, my bodyguard until Carter came back from whatever. We’d just gotten to Nordstrom, but I was ready to leave. “Atta girl. You’ll knock them over in that. Trust me. Club NV will be your bitch.” I doubted that. Club NV was way above my pay grade, but I always had a good time pretending I was a star. “I’ll just buy it.” “I need to see it.” He dragged me to the fitting room, trying to come in with me so he could make adj
• 20. CHAPTER 15 CARTER Los Angeles was stuffed to the gills with beautiful women. You couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting the prettiest girl in her hometown or the product of two attractive actors. Emily laughed with Darlene, who could relax at a VIP-only club. Emily wore a pure-white sleeveless dress that ended right over her knees. Her shoes were bright green. In the flashing colored lights of the club, the dress looked like a rainbow and the shoes looked black. Speaking of beautiful women. Even in high heels, she navigated the chaos of the party with grace. I couldn’t take my eyes off her, which admittedly was my job. Fabian, who was on Darlene for the night, made his way to me across the room. He was huge, six five, and built like a bookcase. “Yo.” I could hear him only in the earpiece. “Gotta whiz.” “Don’t forget to shake it.” “Fuck you, man.” He gave me the thumbs-up and disappeared down the hall to the men’s room. I put my eyes back on my principal, half a room away. Easiest jo
• 21. CHAPTER 16 EMILY I’d gone to the bathroom without telling Carter or Darlene. Why? Because I was an adult with a full bladder. And I wanted to get away from Gene. I wasn’t used to telling guy one I was going to the bathroom, then having guy two follow me in so guy zero wouldn’t do what he did. Or whatever. Switch the numbers around. It didn’t matter. Someone had come from behind and pushed me around the corner. I didn’t resist because I thought (hoped?) Carter was coming to the back hall to get me alone. I thought he’d come to kiss me again. I was mentally preparing myself for that kiss when it happened so fast I didn’t have a second to scream. He put his hand over my mouth. Not Carter. Vince. He’d finally come for me. I didn’t switch immediately from sexual anticipation to fear. I got annoyed. Maybe I should have been scared instead, but I’d been conjuring Carter in the back hall only to be interrupted. “Say you miss me.” He moved his hand away from my mouth just enough for me to talk.
• 22. CHAPTER 17 CARTER She was releasing tension. Her nervous laugh was no more than a response to being strung too tightly. So that was what happened when she let go a little. It was all right. I loved watching it get released. I figured by the time we got to her house, she’d be thinking straight. I needed her to have her head on her shoulders, because mine was getting spun around. Seeing her hurt and humiliated had awakened feelings. Admittedly, I’d been attracted to her before. Not a big deal. I’d been attracted to plenty of women. I’d even dated some of them. But she was my principal, and she had an active stalker. Feelings kept a bodyguard from thinking clearly. Feelings got in the way of good judgment. Feelings made a guy look in the wrong direction. Most of all, feelings could rearrange a guy’s priorities. That couldn’t happen. “Can you check the back?” she asked as we went up the three steps to her gate. “I get nervous going outside.” I was going to do more than check her back door.
• 23. CHAPTER 18 EMILY The first time he’d kissed me, it had been unexpected, unformed. It had been a first practice before we knew all the steps. This time he took it slow, brushing his lips over mine, only enough to waken the nerve endings. I pushed harder against him until I could feel the shape of his jaw when he opened his mouth, prying mine open to meet him. He was a wave, a tsunami drowning me. My whole body tingled for him. My blood pumped fire from heart to fingertips, igniting on his gunpowder smell. Smoke and electric air. Fifth of July. New Year’s Day. The air after the fireworks at Santa Monica Pier. The explosive potential of combustion and danger. His tongue probed the mouth of a body alive and crackling for him. My resistance went pop pop pop, leaving the white smoke of desire in the air. My arms were around him, and I was lost. My dress was around my waist, held up between our bodies. His hands were at my lower back. I shifted my body so I could feel his erection. I groaned
• 24. CHAPTER 19 CARTER The problem, as I saw it, was that I had two areas of concern with Emily. One was the fact that she was my job. My specific job. She was what I did for a living to support my family. Phin’s mother’s residual checks got smaller every quarter and did little more than cover his education. So I had to work. If I started fucking Emily, I wouldn’t stop. I couldn’t protect a woman I was sleeping with. If I was doing my job, and I always did my job, we’d both be vulnerable at the same time. The second concern was Phin himself. He was everything, and a relationship would divert me from the attention he needed. I’d made the decision long ago that my mother had raised my sister and me already, and it was too much to ask her to raise Phin full-time. I had two hours to really think about it. Two hours of pacing the property inside and outside the gate, getting angrier with every step. Who was I pissed at? Yes. I was just pissed. Me. Vince. The lapsed order of protection. The circu
• 25. CHAPTER 20 EMILY I’d gone to sleep with Carter’s kiss still on my lips and annoyance in my bones. Once I slept off the annoyance, the remnants of the kiss remained. I woke up the next morning with an unbearable heaviness between my legs. I rolled onto my stomach and slid my hand under my panties. I was slick everywhere, and I gasped at my own touch. Forehead to mattress, I spread my legs and thought of him, his taste, the pressure of his lips, the fifth of July smell all over him. His hardness on my hip. He’d felt huge. Monstrous. Maybe my perception was off, because I hadn’t shared myself with a man in ages, but still. When I slid my finger inside, the space seemed completely inadequate for the size of him. And that hard cock was because he kissed me and I wanted it. It was for me. When I let myself come, I made it slow so I could think of him losing control on top of me, a grunting mess of unpracticed pleasure. I dropped to the sheet, relieved. Physically I’d let go of a building ten
• 26. CHAPTER 21 EMILY He was there all day, standing in the corner, by the door, watching me. I tried not to be self-conscious, but it wasn’t easy. He took up more room than his height or mass, and the weight of him created its own gravitational pull. I wasn’t in the zone until midmorning. Darlene was keeping up with the pros on her feet and singing at the same time. The whole team was hitting their marks. It was a beautiful thing whenever we got to the point where we were improving the show rather than learning it. By the time the lunch bell rang, I had an involuntary smile plastered on my face. I was jumping higher and thinking to the beat of every song. My soul was lubricated with endorphins. My brain was so crowded with joy I didn’t have the space to imagine anything but a constant upward trajectory. Darlene pulled me to her table at lunch. “How are you doing?” she asked, shoveling a kale and chicken salad in her face. “Fine. Why?” “I can’t care about how you are?” I took a bite of sush
• 27. CHAPTER 22 CARTER I didn’t want to wash the smell of her off my fingertips, but I had to get rid of my hard-on, and the full bladder wasn’t helping. I washed her off my hands and looked in the mirror, brushing my wet fingers through my hair. In a few hours, Fabian would start working with her as his primary client, and I’d go home, have dinner, put Phin to bed, and watch a little TV before crashing. Almost like normal. Was normal going to cut it anymore? Was maintenance enough? I’d worked hard to maintain a steady schedule for Phin’s sake. I made sure he didn’t have anything else to cope with except growing up. Not bringing a woman around the house for him to get used to was a conscious choice. My choices were becoming less and less conscious. I didn’t have any control around Emily. I knew plenty of beautiful women and plenty of smart ones. She had real talent, but in Hollywood, talent was cheap. My reaction to her came from the gut. My body overrode my common sense. I had to have her.
• 28. CHAPTER 23 EMILY When I let my hips move to the music instead of directing them, my thinking got very clear. I heard only the music and moved. My body served the music and let my mind work. My worry, my fear, my deep neuroses about Carter, stopped nagging at me. He could get hurt by Vince or he could be as bad as Vince. He could hurt himself trying to protect me. He could get sick of the way I lived and leave me. All those things could happen, but while I danced, they didn’t bother me. My first boyfriend, Noah, had dumped me when I was seventeen. He had curly blond locks that reached his shoulders and blue-gray eyes as big as classroom globes. We’d had awkward sex in his parents’ garage a few times, exchanged sweet words, and held hands in the courtyard at Lincoln Park High. A week later, he changed. He denied it, but adolescent girls are pretty intuitive. He didn’t meet me by my locker in the morning, and he didn’t break away from his friends to kiss me on the lips. He sat with Stu Ma
• 29. CHAPTER 24 CARTER Grey followed me as I ran the perimeter of the property. It was small, which made it easy to surveil and protect. The size also meant anyone coming in didn’t have far to go to get to her. The cat must have found small, dark rooms boring. She left me when I checked the closed circuit. Nothing seemed out of order. There wasn’t visual coverage inside the garage, but the camera followed the movements of the cat as she walked through the open door with her tail straight up. Emily’s form crossed the rectangle of the doorway, dancing to music I couldn’t hear. She stopped, said something, did the move again. Even seeing that little of her on a two-dimensional screen, I loved watching her move. Her body cut the air so naturally I could tell where she was going before she went there. Her movements were perfection, and I watched the screen in awe until she stopped dancing where I could see her. I’d crossed a line with her. I had no choice. No. I corrected myself as I walked back
• 30. CHAPTER 25 EMILY I didn’t know what I was trying to prove by working on lifts with him. I wanted to trust him, but his ability to pick me up without dropping me had nothing to do with how much of my heart I could give him. Being able to read each other in a dance didn’t mean we’d be able to follow along emotionally. I needed to know it was possible. I needed to know if he’d respect what I did, if he’d help without calling it girlie. I needed to know if we could talk with our bodies. I wanted his hands on me. And I had work to do. He didn’t have a lick of talent. Not for dancing. But for predicting what I needed and giving 100 percent commitment to listening? He was a prodigy. He even kept his hands where they belonged. This helped less than I’d hoped, because over the course of that first hour, his hands weren’t where I wanted them. He was so close, and his touch was so firm and masculine, that I had to make a concerted effort to keep my mind on the job. “Do I have a future in dance?”
• 31. CHAPTER 26 CARTER No matter what anyone tells you, night-vision cameras aren’t perfect. Not even close to halfway perfect. So when I went to the monitors to see what the system was beeping about, I didn’t notice her clogs or the slimness of her frame. I just saw a black-clad person skulking around the house and up the porch. I worked for famous people with crazy fans. Before that, I put people in jail. I made a very nice living and had things to steal. Mostly, and at the top of the list, I needed to protect Phin from my life without making him feel as if he lived in a prison. So the security system was invisible and thorough. It conformed to frustrating Historical Society guidelines. It had been silent for years. When I saw the figure crawling around the house at dinnertime, my instinct was to protect first and ask questions later. I’d been a cop when Genevieve Tremaine and her estranged husband wound up dead. I took stalking very seriously. I told Phin and Mom to get upstairs now. Whe
• 32. CHAPTER 27 EMILY Let me count the ways this was awkward. I had been caught snooping by a security system that automatically called the LAPD. I was wearing sweaty dance clothes that were wet between the legs from a hot frisking that made me wish I had a weapon. Carter was mad at me for good reason, but I had no idea what his relationship with these people was so I had no idea what to say or not. And most important, my stomach growled loudly enough to wake the dead. Carter’s mother kept her hand on my elbow and led me through the living room, with a leather couch and mission-era coffee table, skirting a TV room with a flat-screen and old fabric couches, to the kitchen, where a nook was set up for dinner. She clapped her hands once, the rings on her fingers clicking together. “You’re not one of those vegans, are you?” “No.” “Because I can work around that.” “I eat anything, actually.” “Phin!” Carter’s mother called. The boy who had been looking out the window flopped in with the grace of
• 33. CHAPTER 28 EMILY I called him as I pulled up to my driveway. “Is Fabian there?” he asked. I waved to Fabian, who got out of his car and trotted across the street. “Yeah.” “He’s going to get you in the house and make sure it’s clear.” He did. I set a bowl out for Grey while Fabian checked the shower stalls and closets, made sure the system functioned, and left. Carter stayed on the phone through my security check (tell him to check the studio), Phin’s bedtime (brush your teeth, my God, kid), and a conversation with his mother about who was taking Phin to the bus stop in the morning. I brushed my teeth, peeled off my clothes, and crawled into bed naked. “You’re safe,” he said. “I’m safe.” “Everyone here is still awake or I’d ask you what you’re wearing.” “Nothing. I’m wearing nothing.” “You’re killing me.” “Good night, Carter.” “Good night, naked tiny dancer.” I hung up the phone with a laugh. Grey leaned on the glass door as if she was guarding me in partnership with Carter, Darlene, Fa
• 34. CHAPTER 29 CARTER Phin had fallen asleep on his Kindle. I got it out from under him and wiped the drool off with my sleeve. He slept like a dead thing even on quiet days. His body was at 100 mph standing still. I held up my fist. “Size of my heart, kid,” and touched his cheek with my knuckles. One day his fist would be bigger than mine. I’d get old and small, and he’d be a man. Maybe he’d tell me my love was smaller because my fist was, but he’d be wrong. I’d always love him more. I felt a twinge of guilt for bad-mouthing his mother to Emily. It wasn’t respectful, but anything less than the truth felt like a betrayal. Or, at least if I couldn’t tell the entire truth, I could tell her the truth of how I felt. When I went back downstairs, Mom was in the kitchen wiping the counter. “She seems nice,” she said as I got a glass of water. “She is.” “You seeing her again?” “Saturday. Can you stay with Phin?” She rinsed the sponge and wrung it out. “He’s getting big enough to watch himself.” Sh
• 35. CHAPTER 30 EMILY Fabian drove me to work the next morning, which was good. I got fifteen minutes of rest in the back seat and didn’t have to find a parking spot. He didn’t say anything to me until we were signing into Citizens Warehouse. “You working Vegas?” he asked. “Yeah, you?” “Vegas, baby. Wouldn’t miss it.” Vegas wasn’t going to be fun, no matter how excited Fabian was. Preshows and first shows were a nightmare. No one knew where anything was. Big holes in the production became apparent too late. During the last preshow in San Diego, Darlene had a wardrobe malfunction at the crotch, and ten thousand people watched as the entire dance troupe formed a wall between her and them. The song went south, but thanks to the quick thinking of my dancers, the star’s pride wasn’t too badly damaged. “Does the entire security team travel?” “The top guys. Carlos. Me. Bart complains, but he goes. Not Carter. He’s LA only. Hard limit, and man, Carlos ain’t happy.” I tried not to smile, but it was
• 36. CHAPTER 31 CARTER When Darlene announced my neighborhood, I wanted to hurl myself at her in slow motion and clamp my hand over her mouth. But it was too late, and I wasn’t living in an action movie. So I seethed like it was my job. I finished up my shift, watching Emily leave with Fabian, checking through the window to make sure she got in the car okay, as if that were my job too. Which it wasn’t. Darlene was my job, and she was a lot tougher to watch than her choreographer. At a West Hollywood restaurant, I stood outside the private room Darlene’s manager had gotten for a late dinner. I was a spectacle in my stillness and seriousness. People looked at me in the crowded dining room, wondering who was on the other side of the door. I watched them. They watched me. When Officer Brian Muldoon brought my sorry seventeen-year-old ass to the boxing ring, they were watching me too. Older men of color, mostly. A few white dudes. I thought I was tough, but those guys? They could wring me out an
• 37. CHAPTER 32 EMILY —Are you ok?— The odd urgency of the text from Carter was undeniable, even in three words. —Why?— —Your ex is in the house— What the . . . ? I shut off the movie I was watching. The most meaningless gesture I could have made and the last one I could manage before my body stopped obeying commands. My skin crawled and my muscles froze. Fabian had locked everything. I knew he had. He’d checked the whole house before catching up with Carlos at Entertainment Live! I was starting to wish I’d gone instead of sitting on the couch eating ice cream. —Where?— Was he watching me now? Would he take away the phone? Was I just waiting for a crack to the head? Would he hit me from behind or try and talk to me? —Don’t know. Saw one of his friends outside. Get close to Carlos or Fabian right now— —They’re at EL— I waited for the three dots to appear, meaning he was typing. My ears were on high alert. My muscles were infused with adrenaline but motionless. I didn’t hear a thing. And no d
• 38. CHAPTER 33 CARTER “Dad?” I snapped out of a fantasy where Emily curled up against me and breathed into my chest more and more slowly, until she fell asleep in my arms. I’d gotten home in time for the last of dinner and studying. Phin was memorizing all the countries in Africa and struggled with the landlocked ones. “Are you watching?” “Yeah.” I leaned forward. “Democratic Republic of Congo,” he said, clicking an odd-shaped landmass on the computer. “It’s different from the Republic of Congo.” The map of Africa was completely blue. All right on the first try. “Well,” I replied, “you seem to have it down.” “Yeah.” He shut the machine. Upstairs, he got ready for bed, showering, running across the hall to the linen closet for the towel he forgot, probably leaving puddles all over the floor. Good chance he’d forgotten his underwear as well. He’d cross the hall in a towel, leave it on the floor, put his underwear on without really drying himself, and go to bed with wet hair. I’d hug him befo
• 39. CHAPTER 34 EMILY I had the day to myself. I cleaned the cat box, which wasn’t too bad. I stretched, took calls about costumes. Made a tomato salad with Carter’s gift. I didn’t think about eight o’clock at all. Nope. Didn’t even worry half of a little bit. Except when I took out the bag of cat litter. I wondered if he’d be by the gate. And when the phone rang, I thought it might be him. And when I saw Grey, which was constantly, I thought of him then too. But he didn’t call to confirm or make sure. He didn’t text. He didn’t send flowers, which Vince had done once to get me back. It had worked, and I swore it would never work again. Not that it mattered. No flowers came. I plugged Phin’s thumb drive into my laptop. Knowing what I knew about him, I shouldn’t have. I’d chased Carter away, but I wanted a connection. No discipline in love. I was a danger to myself. Putting a prodigy hacker’s flash drive into my laptop. The screen exploded into a rainbow of flowers that burst and blossomed in
• 40. CHAPTER 35 CARTER She came out in heels and a light-pink dress, fully made up with her hair in a twist and a matching purse. One side of my brain wanted to grill her about when she knew she was coming on the date and how long she’d intended to keep me kissing the intercom. The other side of my brain wanted to take out those hairpins and watch her blonde hair fall over her naked shoulders. “Hi.” She unlocked the gate. “Let me bring these in.” She swung the heavy gate open and pulled out the flowers. I took them and held my other hand out to her. “Bring them in later.” I put them on the ground just inside her property. “If you go in, I’m going to follow you, and if we’re alone in the house, we won’t make our reservation.” “Where are we going?” “Downtown.” She pulled the gate closed. I let her in the car and went around to the driver’s side. I barely had my seat belt on when I smelled her perfume. I usually saw her at work, where she smelled like sweat and lemongrass. I thought that was h
• 41. CHAPTER 36 EMILY The ear protectors muffled the pops and cracks around me. The visor was so clean and light I barely knew it was over my eyes. The gun was pink, which I didn’t think was possible, but it was the club’s most popular rental. I liked it because it wasn’t as scary as the others. All I felt was Carter’s body behind me. His right foot pushing mine into place. His arms around mine, meeting at the focal point of our joined hands. His hips just an inch away, too far for me to feel for his arousal. I had earmuffs on, so he tapped my shoulder when he wanted me to squeeze the trigger. My arms bent with the recoil, and I smelled a more intense Carter smell—gunpowder. The bullet missed the black and white paper target by a mile. Carter moved the muff away from my ear. “You keep flinching when you shoot. Don’t turn your head.” “I can’t help it.” “Pretend it’s Vince, and if you turn your head, he might come at you.” He slid the earpiece back on, pressed his body against me, and squeeze
• 42. CHAPTER 37 EMILY No amount of hot passion could keep Carter from checking the windows and doors. I got down to my fancy underwear, and seeing Grey at the back window, I went out to feed her. I was crouched in front of the cat in my lingerie, petting her as she ate. “Does the food get more nutritious if you pet her while she eats?” He stood in the doorway in his suit, and I was dumbstruck for a clever answer. His beautiful body was covered and yet revealed by the slope of his shoulders and the folds of his tie. I was the one in the sexy lingerie. He was just wearing a suit. Same difference. I stood and stepped into the room. He brushed by me and snapped the door closed. “Sorry, Grey,” he said from behind me. Then he whispered in my ear, “Don’t move.” “Okay.” My voice cracked. Carter kneeled behind me and unhooked my stockings, then pulled my panties down slowly, running the rough lace and his soft fingers over my skin. I felt his breath on my bottom, then his lips. When he got my pantie
• 43. CHAPTER 38 EMILY I woke to the sound of purring. Grey was just above my head, pushing her paws into my pillow. There was something nice about the attention but something uncomfortable about its intensity. I reached for Carter and found his warm body right there. He rolled over to face me. “Good morning.” “How did the cat get in?” “She was at the door. Really persistent. And loud. You didn’t hear her?” “Nope. Slept like a baby.” “Babies don’t sleep like you slept.” He ran his fingertip along the ridge of my nose. “Did Phin sleep well when he was a baby?” His flash of uneasiness lasted a split second, but it couldn’t be denied. “Sorry. Was I not supposed to ask?” “It’s fine. I’m just not used to it. What do you want for breakfast?” I sat up and rubbed my eyes. “I don’t know what I have in the fridge.” “You shower first, and I’ll see what I can scare up.” He kissed my cheek and got his naked body out of the bed. My God. What had he created? What had he given me? Had the flawless man stand
• 44. CHAPTER 39 EMILY He stayed at my house when our work schedules dovetailed with Phin and Brenda’s. He and Fabian quietly worked out scheduling with Carlos so that when Carter was around, Fabian wasn’t. I was still Fabian’s principal. Even though Carter insisted he was useless as my bodyguard as long as we were sleeping together, doubling up seemed ridiculous as well as uncomfortable. “Are you in trouble?” I asked one morning after he hung up with Fabian. “For sleeping with a client?” “Only a little.” I didn’t want to hear that, but I needed to. “What does ‘a little’ mean?” I bent over to get my heel into my shoe. “It means he fired me—” “What?” I almost fell over. He caught me and pulled me up, holding me steady until my foot slipped into my sneaker. Was I supposed to give him up so he could work? Was that the ethical thing to do? I wouldn’t. Couldn’t. “I talked him off a ledge,” he said. “How?” “I told him how incredible you are.” He shrugged as if it was nothing and my incredibleness
• 45. CHAPTER 40 CARTER Phin was in an unusually pensive mood, which suited me fine. I felt really good but didn’t want to tell him it was because I’d spent the night with Emily. I ran over everything I wanted to do with her body as we cruised over the 101. When my dick got hard, I thought about all the places I wanted to take her, all the ways I could make her laugh. I wished I could dance, because I would have shared that with her. But maybe I could pick her up again. Help her out with my ham hands and clunky feet. And once she’d had a ton of safety training, I’d get her her own pink Glock, and we’d hit targets together. We were exiting the freeway when Phin shut the radio. “Dad.” “Yeah?” “I got a D on my Africa project.” “I know. That was two weeks ago.” “So I need an A on the family tree project if I want a B on my report card.” “Okay.” “There’s a ton more stuff on your side and nothing on my mother’s side but a bunch of names.” Crap. My happy buzz was shot down like a slow-flying clay p
• 46. CHAPTER 41 EMILY I did everything there was to do in the house and ate lunch in the shade of my tree. I fed Grey some scraps, read a few chapters of a book, but realized I was bored by noon. Darlene was at church. That was her Sunday thing, and it was absolutely nonnegotiable. Sunday was for worship. We didn’t go out, and I didn’t call her until dinnertime. I respected that, but I felt different this Sunday than any other. My night with Carter had supercharged me. I felt expansive, bursting with potential. As if I’d gotten great height on the jump but couldn’t fold into a somersault. I figured I’d work on something. Some new steps. Whatever. I’d tire myself out, at the very least. Then Simon called. “Hey,” I said into the phone while I picked up my plate. “Girl, I have nothing in my closet for Vegas.” “You’re supposed to keep dance clothes in the drawer.” “Don’t make me laugh; you’ll crack my foundation,” he said with faux seriousness. “Did you see the schedule? There’s no time to do a
• 47. CHAPTER 42 EMILY We went to the Grove. Simon looked fabulous in everything. I had to pick a few reasons to be unenthusiastic in order to maintain my credibility. A washed-out olive color. Baggy pants that didn’t accentuate his dancer’s ass. A necklace that was simply too feminine. He had a bunch of bags, and I had none when I tarried a little too long in front of the La Perla store. This was a mistake. Simon was too intuitive to let that slide. “Excuse me?” he said, leaning on one hip. “I like the color.” The mannequin wore a lavender baby doll with a deep purple lace bra and panties underneath. “Just the color?” “It’s unusual.” I pressed forward. The Nike shop was ten steps away, and I needed socks. “Maybe they have something in that color.” I didn’t hear Simon answer. “Or do you think it’s ugly?” I looked for him, but he was gone. “Simon?” He poked his head out of the La Perla store, waved, and went back in. I stood in the doorway. The store was mood-lit, filled with wordless, sensua
• 48. CHAPTER 43 CARTER “The bus? You’re on the bus?” I repeated Emily’s words, then my own. We were mostly done with dinner. Phin had gloated over a second-place finish for a solid hour and a half, while Mom kept looking at the clock as if that would keep her from being late for her date. I usually didn’t answer the phone when we were sitting at the table, but I checked the screen on the pretense of clearing the dishes, and it was Emily. “It seemed like the safest thing to do under the circumstances.” The first thing she’d told me when I answered was that she was fine, but she thought Vince could be in the house. “If I got in the car, he could jump out, and I’m just faster on my feet. But then he could chase me down the block, so I got on the bus.” “Where are you now?” I stared into the sink, which was stacked with lunch’s dishes because Mom never emptied the damned dishwasher. “I don’t want him to hurt Grey.” “Where are you?” “Fairfax and Olympic.” “You took the bus west?” “That’s the side
• 49. CHAPTER 44 EMILY I sat down with my tea and took out my phone. I considered texting Darlene and telling her what happened, but she’d be either mad or worried. Simon wouldn’t want to talk about anything serious, and I didn’t want to avoid the topic either. “Emily?” I looked up from my phone. It was Peter of the crowbarred nose. He held a big cup of something in either hand. He’d changed his glasses to the rimless kind and kept his facial hair in a nice scruff. I remembered his crooked smile and his long neck. His affable sense of humor and general inoffensiveness. I’d been looking for that in a guy, because it was the exact opposite of what I’d just run away from. Those traits made him a perfect victim too. “Hey, Peter. How are you?” He shrugged. “Good!” A girl about my height with a pink pixie cut and a nose ring sidled up to him, looping her hand in his elbow. She had a One Eyed Jack tattooed on her neck and more tattoos peeking from under her sleeves. “Hey. I’m Roxie.” “I’m Emily.” I
• 50. CHAPTER 45 CARTER I called Bart as soon as we got back to my house. I’d left Phin with his homework and Emily in the kitchen making coffee. “The house is clear now,” Bart said. “But she was right. He was here. Her bedsheets are shredded.” “I don’t want her to see that.” “We can change them when LAPD leaves.” “How did he get in?” “He tried busting the keypad then climbed the fence. His mug’s on the recorder. I think he ate a hard-boiled egg. There’re shells on the counter. Unless she left them.” “Yeah, no.” Emily wasn’t a slob. “Can you hang out there until I get back to you?” “Sure.” Letting a woman into my life was a problem I was figuring out slowly but surely, but now that everyone was in the same house, my house, I had an intractable problem. I never wanted to choose between my son and a woman. That possibility was always the fear. Now, here I was in the exact situation I was trying to avoid. “Thanks, Bart.” I couldn’t bring her back to her house with a broken security system and a
• 51. CHAPTER 46 EMILY I peeked in on Phin. He sat in front of a huge screen filled with alphabet soup, if the alphabet included all the characters in the corners of the keyboard. Going back to the kitchen in silence, I wondered what Carter was doing in my house. There had been no way of talking him out of going back to my place. It was never going to be over. Vince was tenacious and bored. If he had any romantic prospects, he wasn’t following up. I didn’t believe no woman could match me. I believed I was his muscle memory. I was his automatic fixation when he felt bad or good or bored or needy. Or maybe he obsessed over me in the in-between times. I didn’t know. I’d never know. Could I leave? Could I just walk away? Slip into anonymity? I’d thought about it so many times and in so many ways. Everything from going back to Chicago to live near my parents to driving until I stopped in the Middle of Somewhere, USA. My imagination never got far. Dancing for a living was a privilege given to very
• 52. CHAPTER 47 CARTER He was under his bed, and really, who could blame him? I’d be under my bed too. I shut the door behind me and sat on the floor. It was cleaner in here than his workroom, but I still had to move a couple of books and a wool cap out of the way. “Hey. How are you under there?” “I don’t want to talk about it.” His disembodied voice came clearly from under the bed. He’d pushed art supplies and a box of clothes he’d outgrown from under it. “Okay.” “The only way I’m getting an A on this project is if I make stuff up. So either I can go all in and say my mother is Diana Prince from Amazonia and she was sculpted from clay by Queen Hippolyta, or I can go with plausible deniability.” “Is that the same as lying?” “We talked about verisimilitude in humanities.” “I have no idea what that means.” “It means truthy. Like truthiness. Just that. A truthy tree. I just need an A, and that means I just need truthiness and for you to sign it.” It sounded a lot like lying, but I’d put him in
• 53. CHAPTER 48 EMILY Talking. Banging. Hissing pipes in the walls and whooshing traffic just outside the window. The click of the stove before the gas came through the burner and the clatter of plates. Aching back and chilly feet. Mouth like a slab of yuck had settled between tongue and palate. I usually woke to silence or the first threads of my radio alarm. Light through the drapes in the warmer months. I never woke to the sounds of other people. I stayed still on the couch, shifting only to ease my back, and listened to Phin mumble, Carter bark orders, Brenda in the bathroom upstairs, running the plumbing. Moving would have disrupted it. Opening my eyes would have shattered my dream-state appreciation of the irregular beat of activity. I didn’t want to observe it. I wanted my ears and body to be filled with it. Half-in, half-out of consciousness, I didn’t have the self-awareness to ask why I enjoyed the presence of other people so much. Why I felt comfortable instead of awkward. I just
• 54. CHAPTER 49 EMILY I left Grey enough food for two meals. I had no idea if that would work, but I didn’t have an extra minute to think about it. We barely made it to work on time. A minor miracle that was the result of Carter’s uncanny ability to make the right turns on the right streets at the right speed. He had to slow down at the turn-in. A line of paparazzi waited behind sawhorses at the parking lot entrance. Carlos waved us through. I slid down my seat so they wouldn’t photograph me. I was no one. A nonentity. But my picture in a public place could set off Vince. “They found us,” I said. “They always do.” He pulled into the lot and into a spot, kissing me quickly when the car was in park. “Do you think Phin’s going to be all right?” I asked. “At school?” “I hope so. But the staff members are like hawks over there. If the kid has a bad day, they notice.” “Do you think you’ll work Vegas after this?” I said hopefully and, I admit, selfishly. “The showers in the Bellagio are really nic
• 55. CHAPTER 50 CARTER I was not like any of the other parents at Phin’s school. I expected more than they did. I had rules and clear boundaries. I didn’t pretend Phin was my friend, and I didn’t call him “buddy.” I didn’t lose too much sleep over the emotional bumps and twists of the early teens. Until I got a call the morning after Phin found out who his mother was. They said he was crying uncontrollably and refusing to talk about the reason for the tears. I felt guilty for sending him to school, and that was only the most recent of a long list of things I could have done better. I didn’t know when it would be too much. When the list would get so long it would strangle him. I’d burdened myself with lies, and now he was burdened with the truth. When I got to the office, it was worse than I’d been told. Cora, the assistant head of the school, looked up from her desk, pressed her lips together, and handed me a box of tissues. Phin was on the couch, curled into a fetal position, facing the ba
• 56. CHAPTER 51 CARTER When Phin had stopped crying, I stopped carrying him. My elbows were locked in position and my shoulders ached, but he’d stopped crying. In the hours I carried him around tree-lined streets of the west side, I’d run through everything I’d done to protect him over the years, and I decided my one big mistake was keeping him in Los Angeles. I’d been trying to reduce disruption in his life. A new house. New neighborhood. New people caring for him. It seemed like quite enough. The second mistake had been less clear. I hadn’t given him a more truthful narrative to believe. I’d kept the lies very broad and simple so I wouldn’t contradict myself. I told him about his mother, minus the acting, which he could look up, and minus the fact that she was my sister. I told him I’d loved her, which was true, but left out the murder. I didn’t want him to have the inclination to try and remember what he’d seen, and I didn’t want the shock of it to blindside him. His toddler’s tears thos
• 57. CHAPTER 52 EMILY —Are you all right?— I’d replied to Carter’s text, but I didn’t hear back. I didn’t get a text that night or the next day. Carlos wouldn’t tell me anything, and none of the other security guys seemed to know. Darlene was physically accessible, but her body was twisted so tightly around the upcoming tour that asking her to track down her ex-bodyguard was unfair. But I was leaving for Vegas, and I didn’t know if he and Phin were all right. I looked up Genevieve Tremaine’s name and, in three seconds, found enough gruesome descriptions of the scene that I had to skim the accounts. Digging into more local and less celebrity-driven outlets, I found out about what Carter had gone through when it happened. He’d worked to have crime-scene photos sealed. Phin’s name had been public knowledge. Along with Apple, Pilot Inspektor, and Moon Unit, Phinnaeus was a running metaphor for everything that was wrong with celebrity naming conventions. Carter had requested anything that had to
• 58. CHAPTER 53 CARTER I took him to his favorite strip-mall Thai place. It had a Buddhist shrine in the front with bowls of fresh fruit and flowers and faded photos of specialty dishes that curled at the edges. We couldn’t pronounce the name of it, and most of the menu was in Thai, but we had things we ordered every time. I wanted something . . . anything to be the way it was before he knew I wasn’t his father. Over the past twenty-four hours, Phin had started waking up. He ate a little. Went to the bathroom. He spoke in a full sentence while looking at the Thai menu, which was a relief, except that I had to answer his question. “Where are we going?” “After dinner?” “When you sell the house.” “I was thinking Northern California. There’s a lot of tech up there.” “Is Grandma coming with us?” “She’s getting her own place here.” “Can I stay with her?” The waiter came to take our order before I could react as strongly as I felt. “I’ll have the chicken basil and a Thai iced tea, and he’ll have a
• 59. CHAPTER 54 EMILY I didn’t know how to worry about someone. I’d known only how to read worry in other people’s faces, and that worry usually had to do with me. After seeing the FOR SALE sign on Carter’s house, I had to cover with Fabian, so I continued the way I’d said we were going. I sent him left, then right to St. James. In the air outside an open door to a gym, I heard Darlene’s voice singing. She sounded like unconditional love. I knew she had the gift of making every person who heard her feel as if she were singing just for him or her. I hadn’t understood the truth of that until “This One Time” played in an elementary school gym. “Stop.” He pulled over by a school attached to the church. The gym had an adult aerobics class happening. I pretended I needed to attend and left Fabian to watch the door. I sneaked into the line, but after a few moves I went to the back of the room and sat on the floor with my back to the wall. I clutched my phone. I didn’t know whom to call. The music
• 60. CHAPTER 55 EMILY I wasn’t supposed to leave the tower after lockup. That was the rule, and I was starting to hate the rules. I was starting to think the rules that kept me safe kept me from living. Until Carter made me feel safe, I hadn’t felt out of danger. If I could see him for half a second, maybe I’d feel less vulnerable. I could have texted him. I could have called. I could have sent a message through a mutual friend. I could have taken a later flight and spent the morning finding a pet babysitting place. I didn’t know what I thought I was doing. His house had been dark the last time I’d passed it, and the FOR SALE sign meant he could have left already. But something inside me had shifted. I had to do something. Take a risk. Move forward. Grey hadn’t been cooperative, but I got her by the back of the neck and put her in the car. She curled up in the back seat as if nothing I could ever do would be a big deal to her. There was nothing she couldn’t get over. I admired that. It woul
• 61. CHAPTER 56 CARTER Phin was allowed on his phone only until seven o’clock at night. Then it was to be on the charging shelf by the breakfast nook, facedown. If I happened to stroll into the kitchen after seven, I’d often find him at the nook, reading a magazine upside down. If I picked up his phone, it wouldn’t be sleeping or locked, because he’d put it down in a hurry when he heard me coming. After I watched Emily’s car turn the corner, and after I decided to let her go without following, I picked up the cat’s eating and shitting provisions and went to the house. Phin was on the couch, petting the cat. The rug was wrinkled, and the blanket was off the chair by the front window as if he’d hurried back to the couch when he saw me walking back. He sneezed. “How’s your mouth?” I asked. The crying tiger had a heat that lingered for hours. He’d eaten all of it like a warrior. “Better.” He sneezed again. I dropped the cat supplies by the door. “Do you want some antihistamine?” “I’ll get it.”
• 62. CHAPTER 57 EMILY I drove home with his taste on my lips, my heart beating in the rhythm of that kiss. The cadence of it changed me. I drew breath re-creating it. I didn’t have words for what had changed, just a feeling of transformation between Carter and me that altered the patterns of how I fit into the world. He didn’t know what he’d done. He didn’t know what he wanted any more than I did. His life had been spun around, and he was just starting to get his feet under him. Expecting him to commit to anything but cat-sitting was unfair. The streets were so familiar, yet the route was so new that I missed my turn, overshooting my block by a quarter mile or more. I came around and pulled into the driveway, opening my window so I could reach the keypad. The number 8 stuck a little before it clicked. Could have been left over from the other night. Could be new trouble. I sighed as the gate clattered open. The sigh was acceptance of a course of action I’d kept locked in a cage. It was the k
• 63. CHAPTER 58 CARTER Once I thought about putting on clean clothes, I had to think about showering. I’d lost my opportunity to chase her down the street anyway, so I was going to have to be more deliberate. She was probably home already, stewing about what an asshole I was. I let the water run over me, thinking . . . could I do this? Could I let Phin be alone for a few hours? Could we stay in Los Angeles and deal with the blowback over his mother? Could I commit myself to Emily and Phin? Didn’t people do it all the time? Didn’t men care for large families every damn day? What made me so special that I couldn’t? “You’re wearing a suit?” Phin said when I came downstairs. He was petting the cat without sniffling or sneezing. “Grandma will be back in an hour. You should go to bed.” “Yeah.” “Look, kid. Here’s the deal—” He put his hands over his ears. “La-la-la-go-get-her-la-la-la.” I could have argued with him about how important bedtime was, but he was a big boy, and he was right. I had to c
• 64. CHAPTER 59 EMILY The differences between Darlene’s life and mine were most visible in the drive up to her house. The trees got older, the streets quieter, the traffic lighter. Darlene and I used to dream, and when we dreamed, we dreamed big. We’d get in my car, drive through the richest neighborhoods in Los Angeles, and choose our houses. I’d take the one on the left with the circular drive, and she’d take the one on the right with the rose garden and the fountain. We’d argue over imagined bowling alleys in basements and the sizes and shapes of pools we couldn’t see. But always, we were equals. We were going to make it together, buy two huge houses, and tear out the fences between them. In the end, I bought a tiny place in Mid-City, and she got a three-story Tudor at the top of Van Ness. It didn’t matter at the time. We didn’t make comparisons. I’d traded my dreams for a chance to be something to someone. Maybe if the someone had been less of an asshole, the choice wouldn’t have been s
• 65. CHAPTER 60 CARTER I don’t panic. When there’s danger or something isn’t right, I get calm, which is why I’m a bodyguard in the first place. What I saw when I pulled up to Emily’s house had the makings of a panic. Busted cameras. Banged-up front and side keypads. Half a Louisville Slugger on the curb. Her car wasn’t in the driveway. Had she left already? Had she been taken away? —Are you all right?— I texted her before I did anything, and I was rewarded. ( . . . ) Maybe, in spite of everything I thought of myself, I had been panicking, because when the three dots appeared, I stopped adding to my mental list of protective measures. —She’s fine— —She’s driving. This is Darlene— —She says why?— Why? Was she kidding me? Her house was open to the world, her security system was busted, and she was nowhere to be found. Why was I asking? —Because her security system is all over the street— A black BMW parked in a dark spot down Citrus Street, too far for me to see the plate. —She says she got s
• 66. CHAPTER 61 CARTER They let me go once they saw I was ex-LAPD, I was licensed, and I was working as the occupant’s bodyguard. The worst part about it was that they’d focused so much on the guy holding the gun that they’d lost Vince. Having heard some of what he said, I put together a plan to get rid of him on the short drive home. She’d avoided singing so he wouldn’t get angry with her. She’d given up ever appearing in front of people. But what if doing exactly that turned him off? What if it disgusted him so much he lost interest? It wasn’t violent or earth-shattering, but if it turned him off to Emily, that was enough. By the time I pulled into my driveway, I knew I had to get to Vegas to talk to her. When I peeked into Phin’s room, he was in bed. He thrust his hand under his pillow as if he were hiding something. I went in. “Good night, Phinnaeus.” “Good night.” I reached under his pillow and found the hard edges of his phone. “Thanks. I’m done anyway,” he said as I shut it off. I ki
• 67. CHAPTER 62 EMILY Darlene and I made it to Vegas by midnight because she had no respect for speed limits. We got to her MGM suite earlier than planned. We had plenty of time to stay up watching movies and laughing like giddy schoolgirls. I didn’t get to the Bellagio until two a.m. Vegas really didn’t sleep. The lobby was crowded, and as we walked through the casino to the elevators, I had a feeling of peace and well-being in the middle of a storm of noise and activity. The suite was on the twenty-fifth floor and had a gorgeous view on two sides, but I was too tired to appreciate it. My bags sat by the door. Each one had a little envelope tied to it. The room number and a welcome note from the concierge were inside. It was good to stay in a nice hotel. Good to be welcomed. I was high on exhaustion and goodwill. But wait. I was missing a bag. One of my monogrammed pink leather bags. The smaller one with the makeup. Crap. I called downstairs. My movements were slow and deliberate, as if my
• 68. CHAPTER 63 CARTER I had the entire four-hour drive to convince myself I was right, that if Emily got up in front of an audience and sang, something would shut off for Vince. She’d become public property and unlovable. Neither was true, of course. She’d never be public property because she was mine, and she’d never be unlovable for the same reason. But maybe she’d be free of closed-circuit cameras, bodyguards, and fear. I pulled into the Bellagio parking lot in the early morning hours. Carlos had briefed the team on the performers’ lodgings and the work-arounds regarding Emily’s arrangements. —Tiny dancer? Are you up?— I texted her from the hotel lobby and waited for an answer. The hotel was famous for its colored glass flowers, garden, and marble. It suggested tranquility without offering it. The flashing lights and buzzing, beeping, bouncing casino were ten feet away. It smelled of cigarettes and old coins as I walked through it, following the path to the other side of the hotel. No a
• 69. CHAPTER 64 EMILY This wasn’t my fault. None of it. If I was dead by morning, it wouldn’t be because I’d opened the door or because I moved in with him in the first place or stopped singing to please him. This wasn’t me; it was him. He’d caught me by surprise. He’d knocked the wind out of me and slapped a precut piece of duct tape over my mouth before dragging me to the bathroom. I punched him. I kicked like a gymnast. I grabbed a big ceramic urn to hit him with, but he kicked it away. He was bigger. He was prepared. He was crazy. His goatee had grown out over his cheeks, and he’d lost weight. For a second I saw the handsome guy I’d loved, but he disappeared as soon as he opened his mouth. “This is done, Em.” He threw me into the bathroom. I banged against the glass shower door, but it didn’t break. “I tried to do this like a nice guy. But you don’t want a nice guy.” Twisting and wrestling, he got me onto the floor. My stomach writhed on the slippery marble, but he kept me still with a
• 70. CHAPTER 65 EMILY Darlene had that faraway look she got when her brain was firing in the rhythms of the show. She was pacing the length of the platform she was supposed to perform on. Having spent half the night at the police station making a statement, I’d been late for the sound check and run-through, but I’d never felt better. “No, no, no.” Darlene waved her hands at everything. “I can’t see it. I need to see it.” She jumped off the platform to the seats. “Can we play it so I can freaking see it?” I pointed to the girl behind the soundboard. “Can we get it on the monitors?” She held up five fingers and mouthed the word minutes. “Oh for the love of . . .” Who had five minutes? Lines of dancers waited, ready to try again. Carter stood with Fabian and Carlos. Thor checked things off a list. He was halfway between the stage and the back exit, but when he looked my way, I felt him right next to me. “Sing it, all right?” Darlene shouted. “Please? Can we just do it?” She never shouted as if
• 71. CHAPTER 66 CARTER “It’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard in my life.” Emily sat across from me in a corner of the Bellagio VIP lounge, the stiletto on her crossed leg dangling from her toe. Her dress flowed over her thighs, covering everything I wanted to taste. The color had surprised me when I saw it. She called it “spite white.” Her blonde hair was up in a twist, and I was going to put bite marks on her shoulders by morning. “It never would have worked.” Emily’s legs had tensed into pure tight muscle, and when she crossed them I got the sense she could wrap them around a second time. Those legs around me . . . “Now it doesn’t have to. Now you should just do it because you should.” “Go onstage with a voice I haven’t trained in God knows how long?” When she put her hands on her hips and thrust those bitable shoulders at me, the neck of her dress puckered until I saw a lavender bra. “You sounded amazing this afternoon. And you’ll sound amazing tomorrow night.” “Darlene would have nev
• 72. CHAPTER 67 EMILY When he put his fingers near his lips, the orgasm I’d had seconds before shrank to nothing, and I twitched for another. He was looking at me so intensely I had to look away, and of course I chose to look down, where his erection was stretching the seam inside his pants leg. “Can we go?” I asked. He stood and held out his hand. I took it, expecting to go up to my room. Instead, he guided me out to the casino, away from the elevators. “Where are we going?” He showed me his temporary security access badge. “I don’t get it.” “I do.” Left at the carpet. Past the cashier. Against the wall and down a short hall was a door. Putting his card under the light, it beeped and clicked. He opened the door for me. “Let me show you where to go if there’s a problem.” We walked into another hallway. After the dim lights and excited bells of the casino, the world behind the door was flat, bright, and quiet. He showed his card to a guard behind a grate, was buzzed through another door, had
• 73. CHAPTER 68 EMILY After a long workout or a series of demanding performances, my body was sure to ache when I woke up. That was how I knew my muscles were breaking down and rebuilding. Because the pain made me stronger, it had an edge of joy. Everything functioned. I was all right. Rewards for hard work were being granted. I woke in the Bellagio twisted in sheets, hugging a pillow that smelled like the fifth of July, with an aching tenderness between my legs. It hurt to move. It hurt to breathe. I smiled with every shot of pain. “Good morning,” Carter whispered. I opened my eyes. He was freshly showered, tie draped over his shoulders, pants zipped, not buttoned, with the ends of his belt dangling from the front loops. “Morning.” “I was going to try for a fourth.” He adjusted his cuffs. “But I thought you might need a break.” I got up on my elbow. “Carter?” He sat on the edge of the bed. “Yes?” “About last night?” “What about last night?” He slid the sheet off my naked body. “It was incr
• 74. CHAPTER 69 CARTER The sun was just setting behind the MGM, and the crowd was getting restless. It was a small venue compared with the rest of the tour, but a few thousand people on the Las Vegas Strip were hard to miss. Half the women wore Sexy Bitch shirts. The men had matching shirts that said I’m with a Sexy Bitch. I stuck by Emily while she prepped the dancers, then did ID cross-checks for Carlos and eyeballed the line forming outside the auditorium. —Dad?— I smiled when I saw the text. Part of me had been afraid he was going to stay mad and never call me “Dad” again. I would have accepted his decision, but I’d hoped otherwise. —Yes?— —I like your tie— Instinctively, I patted down my blue tie. It was nondescript. Not worth liking or even mentioning. —Which tie?— A segment of the crowd had started chanting, “Sex-y Bitch! Sex-y Bitch!” —The one you’re wearing. It’s a nice blue— Phin was in Los Angeles, four hours away. Had he hacked into my phone? The security cameras at the MGM? The
• 75. CHAPTER 70 CARTER I admit, I found out where Phin was sitting and asked the security lady at the closed circuits to keep an eye on him. She winked and agreed to. After that, I had to let it go. He was fine. He’d better be. Darlene was getting onstage in a silver bodysuit and wig, and I didn’t have the headspace for him. Backstage handlers were in a flurry of activity and anticipation. “She really is something,” Emily said from behind me. I put my arm around her for a second, then let her go. I was on the clock. “Yep.” “They always said we both had talent, but she was the star.” “It’s a big sky.” She rolled her eyes at me as if I didn’t already have a teenager at home, then ran to get her dancers in place for their first big number. She was the picture of competence, and to me, she was a star. I took a call for a drunk and disorderly, caught a crasher, redirected giggling girls looking for the bathroom, and called for cola cleanup. The auditorium went quiet between songs. Darlene’s voic
• 76. CHAPTER 71 EMILY It was completely possible that I hadn’t breathed since the end of the song. Or the whole time I managed my dancers. Or until the laughter and flowers had stopped and Simon picked me up in the dressing room to present the World’s Next Top Diva to everyone. Drunk on endorphins and freedom, I hugged everyone I’d worked with on the show. I hugged the venue staff. I hugged people who didn’t even want to be hugged. “I knew you could do it!” Darlene jumped on me, wrapping her legs around my waist. We’d sung together forty minutes before, but she acted as if we’d both just stepped off the stage. “You were perfect,” I said. “But I want to work on the—” “Girl! No! You just let yourself feel good for a minute. Do you feel good?” “I feel good.” “Can you breathe that in? That good feeling? Like this. Go . . .” She sucked air through her nose and waved her hand in the air. “Do it.” I did it. “Feel good?” “Feels good.” She hugged me again, a good, long one this time until I caught t
• 77. EPILOGUE EMILY I had sounded like a frog on the Sexy Bitch Vegas preshow stage. I watched it a hundred times, and though hearing myself was less painful every time, I was awful. But I went up there for every single show, and I got better every time. Darlene’s gift to me was never the gift of access or opportunity. Her gift was the space to practice, rehearse, repeat. By the time we set up our last show at the Staples Center, I was ready to make my leap without her. Carter’s first priority was Phin’s well-being, so he didn’t travel constantly with us. He worked with the security crew when he could, especially in the summer. Berlin. Paris. Melbourne. Sydney. Sometimes he came with Phin, who insinuated himself with the stage techs with such disarming charm he became part mascot, part apprentice. The Staples Center show was about to break records. Tickets had sold out in seven seconds. Scalpers were getting obscene amounts of money for the worst seats. The calls and offers I’d been putting
• 78. AUTHOR REVIEWS Montlake Publishing Five “we got this” stars. This company really did its research. I especially like Charlotte Herscher as the developmental editor; Christopher Werner as the acquisitions editor; and their superior taste in designers, in particular Shasti O’Leary Soudant, who owned the best WTF moment when I saw her beautiful cover. Beta Readers Five stars aren’t enough for Kyla Linde (dancing) and Jean Siska (legal accuracy). They are flawless. The author, however, probably let an error slip through. Review to come! Family A billion “inspiration” stars to the author’s husband and two beautiful children. Before you ask, we don’t have pets because I’m allergic, but if we did, it would be a yappy little dog. The Team Two stars for Social Butterfly PR for pure originality and constant support. Docked three because it’s boring how organized and knowledgeable they are all the time, every time. Especially Jenn. I’m totally over her perfection at her job. Partners One star eac
• 79. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Photo © 2014 Erin Clenendin CD Reiss is a USA Today and Amazon bestselling author. Born in New York City, she moved to Hollywood, California, to get her master’s degree in screenwriting from USC. In case you want to know, that went nowhere, but it did embed TV story structure well enough in her head for her to take a big risk on a TV-inspired erotic series called Songs of Submission. It’s about a kinky billionaire hung up on his ex-wife; an ingénue singer with a wisecracking mouth; and art, music, and sin in the city of Los Angeles. Critics have dubbed the books “poetic,” “literary,” and “hauntingly atmospheric,” which is flattering enough for her to put it in a bio, but embarrassing enough for her not to tell her husband, or he might think she’s some sort of braggart who’s too good to give the toilets a once-over every couple of weeks. If you meet her in person, you should call her Christine.