Chapter Twelve
ROWAN’S MOUTH PARTS for me readily. Eagerly. I’m still stunned that she isn’t pissed about the sex scene; I’m so used to Eva’s hysterical reactions. But all thoughts of Eva—of the entire fucking planet—vanish as Rowan deepens our kiss with a need that sets my blood on fire. She wants me , and I know it’s the real me and not some version she’s conjured from movies or TV. Her desire is pure, and the want I’ve felt for her since we were alone together in the hot tub the first night finally breaks free.
The force of my want shoves her against the rough cabin wall, but she takes it. She takes all of my kiss, our tongues dancing, delving deep, biting, sucking… She pulls me as tight to her as I’m pressing into her, as if we’re both trying to melt the bulky clothes between us to get to skin… Being naked with this woman is suddenly all I’ve ever needed. To take her hard, to make her feel wanted; to hold her after and then have her again. Have something real…
Rowan makes a sound like a gasp, as if she’s been stung by a thought. She pulls back, pushing at my chest with her small hands that are ungloved in this cold. Her cheeks are flushed, her lips swollen with my kisses, chin red and chafed from the thin beard I’d grown for this part. And her eyes…Rowan’s spectacular clear blue eyes, rimmed with dark blue, hold mine, glassy with want but something like fear too.
“Zach…” she breathes. “I-I need to tell you…”
“Tell me what?” I ask, my own breath still ragged. Rowan hesitates, all of her usual hard-edged confidence melted away. She looks almost panicked. Her jaw works but no sound comes out.
“Hey, it’s okay.” I take her hands in mine to warm them. “Let’s go somewhere and talk—”
“Zach?” My assistant, Andrew, who is supposed to be in Anchorage, has suddenly materialized out of thin air. He looks apologetic and slightly panicked himself. “I’m sorry but I couldn’t reach you by phone. This is urgent.”
“Christ. One minute,” I tell Rowan and move to stand with Andrew. “What is it?”
“It’s Eva,” he says in a low voice. “She’s here.”
“She’s here ?” I blurt, the words ringing out in the cold morning air and then swallowed by the vastness. I spare a glance at Rowan who is hunched against the wall, hugging herself. “What the fuck, Andrew?”
“She’s in Anchorage.”
“You saw her?”
He nods. “She called me to her hotel. Says she has to talk to you. It’s vitally important . She’s very upset.”
“I’ll bet she is,” I mutter. “She’ll come here if I don’t…” Rage and something close to actual hatred rises in me. “Fuck. Fuck! ”
I go back to Rowan, humiliation burning my cheeks along with the wrath. “I can’t fucking believe I have to say this but—”
“Eva’s here,” Rowan says, swallowing hard and looking like she’s trying to hold it together. “I heard.”
“I have to get to Anchorage and send her back. If I don’t, she’ll come here and fuck up the entire production.”
“I get it,” Rowan says. “It’s okay. You should go. That’s probably…” Her jaw stiffens. “That’s probably best anyway.”
Dammit, she’s pissed. Hurt. She’d let her walls down for me and now I’m going to walk away. To my ex . Rowan has every right to hate me. I sort of hate me, too.
“I don’t know what to say,” I tell her. “This situation is so fucked, but—”
“It’s fine .” She glances at Andrew who is at a discrete distance but still waiting for me. “I’m cold. Going in.”
She starts walking past me then stops, her gaze on the ground. “I’m sorry, Zach. I’m so sorry.”
“What, why ? None of this is your fault. Let’s talk later, okay? When I get back…?”
I hear the pathetic desperation in my voice, trying to put all the pieces back together because I broke something good here. Rowan gives me a pained look I can’t fully read, then trudges through the snow, away.
The hotel in Anchorage is a five-star establishment, because of course it is. Eva wouldn’t be caught dead in anything less. My rage has been simmering the entire drive—rage at her for flying to Alaska over a stupid tabloid. Rage at myself for not doing or saying whatever it is I need to do or say for this to be over.
“She came here incognito,” Andrew tells me. “She says she doesn’t want to make a scene.”
“ Yet ,” I snap bitterly, as I’m hustled in a side door by hotel staff that have all been made to sign NDAs provided by a local lawyer whom Andrew has already smartly corralled to contain this mess.
At Eva’s hotel room door—her suite , I amend—I breathe deep and even, so I don’t explode at the first sight of her. I rap on the oak panels.
“Come in,” comes a soft, tearful reply.
Eva is sitting on a couch, looking small against the vistas of the city and the distant mountains revealed by the panoramic windows. She’s dressed in a black Burberry jacket and matching athletic pants with the signature plaid along the seams. Her hair is in a messy bun, no makeup, eyes red from crying.
My heart, still holding every minute of our years together, wants to soften to her, but I’ve seen this show before and I know how it ends: with her throwing something at me or hitting me and then telling me it’s my fault for making her so crazy. I move to stand in front of her, arms crossed.
“Would you like to sit?” Eva gestures at the overstuffed couch opposite hers.
“I would not.”
She recoils at my harsh tone. A nice touch.
“I know,” she says. “I shouldn’t be here.”
“That’s the fucking truth.”
“I just…I saw The Scandal Sheet article and you wouldn’t answer my calls or texts…” Tears fill her eyes, but she takes a steadying breath.
I clench my jaw. “What the fuck do you want, Eva?”
“It’s not what you think. If you like that girl—”
“We’re not going to talk about her.”
“No, no, that’s fine,” Eva says quickly. “It’s not about her. It’s…” The tears come again and this time they spill over. “Will you please sit? I can’t talk to you with you standing over me, so angry…”
“I have every right to be so angry ,” I say. “I’m at the end of a project that means a lot to me, and I don’t need this drama. It’s actually insane that you’re here.”
“Please, Zach,” Eva says, her voice a whisper. “Just give me five minutes.”
I resist for another moment, but she’s looking up at me, her blue eyes swimming and without their usual spiteful glare.
I sit down. “Five minutes.”
“Thank you.” Her smile is full of warmth and gratitude. She looks like she did in the early years, before the Godsent fame morphed her into a stranger. “I’m here because…if it’s not too late…and it might be, I realize that. I’m not here to get in the way of whatever is going on with that woman, I swear.”
Eva’s nervous rambling is a stark contrast to her usual biting sarcasm and throws me off. I have to remind myself this is just a performance from a really good actress.
“Get to the point.”
She heaves a breath. “I’m here to ask for a favor.”
“A favor?” I bark a harsh, disbelieving laugh. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Look, I know the last few months were rough between us.”
“Months? Try years.”
Eva swallows hard. “But I need to be honest with you. Things have not been great for me. Professionally.”
My voice is stony. “Sorry to hear that.”
Eva’s tears fall again. “This is really hard, okay, Zach? But if you could find it in your heart to hear me out, for old time’s sake, without being so hateful…?”
I sigh and lean forward, scrubbing my hands over my face. “Fine. Okay, I’m listening.”
“Thank you.” She takes a shaky breath. “I haven’t had a job since that terrible horror movie I did last year, and I only took that because it’s all I’ve been offered. The jobs are drying up and so is the money. After Godsent, I thought things would be different. They are for you—and that’s great,” she adds quickly. “I’m so happy for your success. And now you have the Oscars coming up and I just know you’re going to win.”
“That’s not what you said on the phone in LA,” I remind her. “Back then, I was ‘wanting the chance to be worshipped and adored.’”
“You should be,” she says. “You deserve it.”
Her smile is disarmingly familiar. It belongs to the old Eva, the girl who used to rest her cheek on my shoulder while we watched movies in our shitty little apartment. Who used to gaze up at me with love, her every action promising us a future…
“There’s no role for you in Midnight Skies ,” I say. “This film is nearly in the can—”
“That’s not why I’m here,” she says, and squares her shoulders. “I’m here to ask if you would take me to the Academy Awards.”
I blink and sit back. “Say again?”
“Just as friends,” she adds quickly. “I need the exposure, Zach. I need to be on a red carpet with the paparazzi and photos and all of Hollywood watching. To remind them of who I am and what I’m capable of.” Fresh tears fall but she wipes them away quickly. “I saw the photos of you and that other woman, and I got scared you would ask her. And maybe you have. Maybe I’m too late, but I had to try.”
I let out a sigh. “Eva…”
“She’s very pretty,” she says, offering a wavering smile. “Are you…taking her?”
I think about how Rowan looked at me after our kiss. Shell-shocked in a way I couldn’t put my finger on. As if something had gone wrong even before my bullshit ruined that perfect moment. That perfect kiss…
Or she let down her walls for you and the literal next second you ran to your ex.
“We’re not talking about her,” I remind Eva. “And it doesn’t matter if I’ve asked her or not. I can’t take you. I can’t.”
“Why not?”
I stare and give my head a shake. “ Why not ? How about because we’re not together? How about because you’ve been with Laurent Moreau for a month?”
“He’s just a friend—”
“Or how about the fact that—until today, coincidentally—you’ve acted as though you can’t stand the sight of me. Now you want a free ticket to the Oscars?”
“Please, Zach,” Eva says brokenly, reaching for my hands. “It’s just one night—”
I pull away from her touch and stand up to pace in front of the windows. “I can’t, Eva. It’s not good for me. It’s not good for us because there needs to be no us , once and for all.”
Eva hurries to join me. “You don’t have to worry about the press. We can spin it as an amicable reconciliation. A friendship born of a past romance. You know how much they loved us together…”
Her hand is on my arm, and I recoil. “You do this every time,” I say in a low voice. “You try to pull me back in, and like an asshole, I fall for it. Because you know how badly I wanted…” I bite the words back. “I can’t, Eva. I can’t do this anymore. I’m sorry.”
I stride to the door, away from her pleading eyes and the sound of her crying.
“Please, Zach. Please …”
Her pain is like pressing an old, fading bruise that's never allowed to heal. But the sense memory of Rowan’s kiss is still on my lips. The feel of her hands pulling me to her, as if she wanted to crawl inside and take refuge in me. And how badly I want to be that for her…
“Goodbye, Eva,” I say and shut the door between us.
Fucking coldblooded, I think with a pang, but I don’t know what else to do. This film and whatever I could have with Rowan hang in the balance.
Outside, I climb into the waiting car. Andrew gives me a curious glance. “It’s handled,” I say.
The car begins the three-hour drive back to Glennallen. My phone is blowing up with calls from my agent, my publicist… The Scandal Sheet article is making the rounds all over the internet, no doubt. I shut off my phone and watch the road that is taking me to Rowan, to my chance to salvage whatever is happening between us, though something tells me it’s already too late.