Chapter Three
P int of ice cream and two spoons in hand, I join Sloane on the couch, grabbing the remote to hit play on the movie. It’s not cold by any means but Sloane still puts a blanket over the two of us as the movie starts.
Sloane has been my best friend since I met her in college five years ago. She was working in one of the bars on campus while getting her degree in early childcare education and even after I left to study online after I was picked up by an agent, we remained friends. I didn’t have many growing up, an overprotective brother with his overprotective friends meant people tended to steer clear of me. They meant well, they really did, and I understood with the lifestyles they lead. They think I don’t know what they do but I’m neither blind nor stupid. I see the blood and the guns, the shady looking men and the late-night meetings. They can pretend all they want but what they didn’t realize is that all that time I spent alone, I watched. I had no friends to keep me occupied. I saw what they didn’t want me to see.
I keep their secret though, because they are my family, and perhaps I should fear them but it’s not physically possible for me to be scared of any of them. I know my brother, I know Malakai, Killian and Dean, and while they may be the villains to everyone else, they would never be that for me.
They are dangerous men. Always have been yet they have an allure many cannot resist. Dean, with his quiet intelligence, who always watches, studies everything until no part of it is left unturned. He is the smartest person I know. Malakai who commands and leads, who has a presence you cannot ignore. He doesn’t have to say a word and yet he can bring a whole room to their knees. My brother, Sebastian, playful, charming even, but he holds so much anger and violence beneath that mask. He draws you in with it, makes you feel safe until it’s too late. God knows he’s used it enough times over the years to protect me.
And then there’s Killian, ten years older than me who wears many faces. He is quiet like his brother, but in a different way, it’s intense, he hears everything, sees everything and can have you spilling secrets without lifting a finger. When I first met the guys, he was the one who interested me the most. He’s changed over the years, become harder, his presence bigger, and yet in those dark eyes of his, swirling in the depths of them is tragedy written into the fabric of his being.
I had forgotten how much it hurt to look at him in the years I was away touring the world but when I returned, it had only become more poignant, an aura that shrouded him in a darkness invisible to the rest of the world.
Killian is a man who draws you in, like a moth to a flame. It’s dangerous but beautiful, a temptation that beckons with a gentle curl of the finger. It’s forbidden but perhaps that’s where the desire comes from, wanting something you cannot have.
“You good over there?” Sloane’s voice cuts through my thoughts, drawing me out of my daydream.
“Huh?” I come back to it, the pot of ice cream in my hand now soggy and dripping water onto the blanket. “Shit, sorry!”
Sloane laughs, “You zoned out for a minute there.”
I shake my head, “Sorry, busy day.” The lie rolls off my tongue, “Work started on the house, and it’s been chaos.”
“Everything okay?” Sloane grabs the remote and switches off the TV.
“Fine,” I wave a hand, “Just a lot to do and trying to make sure everything is okay when your house is full of builders is a whole new level of stress.”
She pouts sympathetically, “I bet but if anyone can wrangle a whole hoard of builders it’s you, let’s be honest. ”
I scoff, “What do you expect me to do? Dance for them!?”
Her brow quirks, “Well damn, Sav, didn’t know you had it in you.”
My eyes narrow, “Stop it.”
“Send your brother over there,” She plucks the ice cream from me, grimacing at how wet it has become and pops off the top, scooping out a helping with her spoon, “With what you’ve told me about him, he’ll have them done in a week.”
She isn’t wrong. “No, I’m going to manage this all by myself.”
“Proud of you,” She smiles and goes in for another scoop.
We end up polishing off the ice cream and fall asleep on the couch but at around four I wake up, a little stiff from the cramped position we forced ourselves in. Sloane’s couch is small , big enough to seat two comfortably, but when we’re both sleepers that like to spread, it kind of feels like being crammed into a can. Sleeping while on tour was my actual worst nightmare, we slept on the road an awful lot and those buses aren’t exactly spacious when a whole crew of people are on board.
Careful not to disturb Sloane, I sit up and stretch, making sure to keep her tucked in as she remains sleeping peacefully. It’s good to see her comfortable, when she first arrived in the city, she was exhausted and afraid but the past few weeks she has settled in a little. I know she isn’t even remotely okay but she’s working on it.
Staying quiet, I move through her house, heading to the kitchen to grab some water. There’s minimal light but enough that I can see what I am doing and after I have my water, I lower myself into the chair at the kitchen table.
I should try and go back to sleep but I know it won’t happen; I seem to be waking at this time every morning no matter how late I go to sleep. I’m an early riser anyway, always have been and the time where the sky is still dark, morning barely creeping on the horizon is usually some of my best dancing hours.
I’m wide awake, dressed for the day and on my third cup of coffee by the time seven rolls around. Sloane wanders into the kitchen, a yawn stretching open her mouth and one side of her hair sticking up from where she laid in the same position all night. She grimaces in my direction and heads robotically to the coffee machine, yawning again as she places a cup into it and hits the button.
Sloane isn’t a morning person, never has been, which is why I sit here silently while she goes about the motions of waking up and becoming a functioning human being. Although I won’t be here to witness her blossoming into an approachable woman since I have to make a stop at the house first thing this morning and then make my way across town to the studio.
I’m booked into a five-day shoot for a music video and today is day one. I drain the last of my coffee before I stand and wash out my cup and then grab the keys to my car, bidding a silent goodbye to Sloane. I worry about leaving her after everything she went through back in her hometown, but she doesn’t like people hovering and she certainly doesn’t want pity. If she needs it and wants it, she’ll ask for it.
I pull up to my house only a few minutes later, the small front yard piled high with materials and workers coming in and out, carrying it inside. I say hello when they speak with me but ignore them mostly. Already the house is cleaner, the floors slowly being repaired and the walls replastered.
“Miss Levine,” Luke, the man who owns the construction company I hired, finds me in the kitchen. He’s young, with dirty blond hair and a beard that could use a little grooming but he’s friendly and his portfolio was impressive.
“Hi Luke,” I smile at him, “I told you to call me Savannah.”
A ruddy color blooms on his cheeks, and he quickly diverts his eyes as he replies, “What brings you round?”
Who knew telling a man to call you by your first name could make him blush.
“Just checking in,” I shrug, “I was going across the city anyway.”
“Well, we are only on day two,” He reminds me, “But everything is as scheduled, there’s been no issues so far though. You’re in good hands.”
I beam at him, “I don’t doubt it.”
“I’ve got to get on, if you have any questions, please just give me a call.”
I say goodbye, have a final look around and then head back out to my car, hitting the road so I’m not late on set. This isn’t the first video I have made, though it is the longest, we can usually get it filmed in a day, maybe two but five? Seems a little overkill, but I don’t book the jobs, my agent and manager do, and I just follow.
Glancing in the rearview mirror, I spot a familiar Audi behind me. The way the sun beams down and the distance between us means I don’t have a clear view into the driver’s seat, but I know the car. I know the sleek edges and the matte black paint, the dark tinted windows. I’ve been in the car plenty of times and sure, it could be anyone, though I know better.
Killian is behind me.
But I don’t know why.
Pressing a few buttons, I bring up his contact information and hit call.
It rings and it rings, and it rings but he doesn’t answer.
I am not deterred and hit call again.
I keep calling, three, four, five times but still he doesn’t answer. So, I keep going, until finally, on the eleventh call he answers on the third ring.
“Savannah.” He grunts into the phone. Even standoffish and blunt, his voice sends goose bumps over my skin.
“Why are you following me?”
Silence answers me so I repeat my question.
“Where are you going?” He eventually speaks, that gruff tone of his softer than it was before.
“Work.” I reply, “Are you going to answer me?”
“I’m not following you.” He concedes.
“So, it’s not you in the Audi R8 behind me, with the same matte black paint and tinted windows?”
“No.”
“I have a music video I’m shooting today,” I tell him, knowing damn well it’s him behind me, “You going to follow me the whole way across the city?”
Silence.
“Did my brother send you?” I ask him.
Silence.
“Perhaps I should go back on tour,” I continue speaking though I know he won’t respond, “I had more freedom there.”
He surprises me by replying, “You have freedom now.”
“But my brother is telling his friends to follow me, that’s hardly free.”
There’s a pause before he replies with a simple, “ Your brother wants you to be safe.”
“So, you admit you’re following me.” My smile is triumphant.
Killian grunts and I laugh, “Go home, Killian. There’s nothing to see here.”
The line cuts off when I hit the end button on the steering wheel, but he doesn’t stop following me. He takes every turn, sticking close until I pull up to the gates of the studio. My plates are registered but his are not, so he’s forced to stop on the road. It’s the most we’ve spoken since I’ve been home but it’s not like he wanted it.
The barrier lifts to let me through and in the rearview mirror, as I head through the gates, I see his window roll down and his sunglass covered eyes watching me drive toward the studio.
I don’t know why my brother decided to have me followed, I don’t know why he deemed it necessary but if he knew the way I thought about Killian Archer, he wouldn’t send him to be my bodyguard. Not that I need one.
Putting my car into park, I grab my bag and my cell and then head inside, turning back toward the gate in the far distance before I go through the doors. I can hardly see it this far out, but I can just make out the sleek black car still idling on the road.
It wouldn’t be the first time Bast has had one of the guys follow me and it certainly won’t be the last, as much as it gripes on my nerves. If only the man doing the following actually wanted to be around me.