26. Slider
26
SLIDER
She’d been in there for hours with him. I paced the kitchen, walking just far enough to see down the hall, then turning back. I could still feel her arms around me as she clung to me and cried. She was heartbroken, falling apart, and the only thing I wanted was to hold her.
It was irrational—crazy even. The only thing I could chalk it up to was the fact that I’d been watching her for a full week now and I’d been spending time with her. That had to be it. There was no other explanation for the ache building in my chest as I thought of the tears dripping down her cheeks.
I need Spencer.
Not me. It shouldn’t have bothered me that she said that. Why wouldn’t she want her friend? They’d known each other forever. Hell, they’d been making movies together for over ten years. Everyone in Hollywood thought they were a couple. It was clear as day that whatever they had was undeniably special.
But it still stung when she said the words.
Sighing, I glanced down the hall again. When I saw the door was still shut, I turned back and headed to the other wall. I needed a bigger fucking house to pace. If I walked this path too much longer, there’d be a hole in the floor.
“Are you still pacing?” Rae asked. “Sit down before I throw you down.”
“She’s still in there,” I muttered, wondering what was taking her so fucking long. “Why hasn’t she given us a decision yet?”
“Maybe because she hasn’t decided.”
“It’s her mother. I mean…wouldn’t she want to go home?”
“Not everyone has a great relationship with their mother. From what I can tell, Ginger Taylor was a real piece of work.”
“What do you mean?”
Rae pulled leftovers out of the fridge and set the container between us on the island. I hadn’t realized until right now that I hadn’t eaten all morning and my stomach was growling at the sight of food. The meat was still cold, but I didn’t give a fuck.
“The woman’s been married five times,” Rae scoffed. “Three times while Audrey was still a kid. Can you imagine having that many dads?”
I grunted in response. Hell, I had no idea what it was like to have anything other than a loving, supportive family. I didn’t see them nearly often enough, but I always assumed there was time for that later. Holidays and shit like that.
“I was digging through her financials,” Rae said, popping a piece of meat in her mouth. After chewing, she shook her head. “She left a shit ton of debt.”
“How much?”
“Millions. She was borrowing left and right. Her mansion is worth less than what she paid for it. Not to mention all the credit cards.”
“And who does that fall on?”
“Nobody,” she answered. “But that doesn’t mean they won’t go after Audrey for it. She’s high-profile. If they can get the money out of her, they will.”
“Let’s hope she’s smart enough not to pay them a dime.”
Rae turned quiet, her brows furrowed as she stared at the container between us. I knew that look. She wanted to say something, but didn’t know if she should.
“What is it?”
“Have you noticed anything strange about Audrey?”
“You mean other than the fact that she tries to jump me every time she sees me?” I retorted.
She shot me a look and grabbed another slice of meat. “Like you aren’t trying to get in her pants too.”
“I plead the fifth.”
“But seriously, you haven’t noticed anything?”
“Not really. Why?” Rae always noticed everything. It was one of the reasons Cash hired her and kept her around during interrogations. She was a great read of people and could sense when something was off. And right now, there was something going on that she wasn’t telling me.
“Look, I just?—
The door down the hall opened and Rae immediately stopped talking, cutting me a look that we weren’t going to discuss it. I rose from my stool and walked over to the end of the hallway, waiting to hear what the verdict would be. Audrey didn’t look a whole hell of a lot better than when I left her. She still had puffy eyes and her face was all splotchy, but at least she wasn’t crying anymore.
“Have you decided what you want to do?” I asked.
Audrey nodded. “I’d like to go home.”
I was afraid she was going to say that. My gut churned at all that would need to happen, but what choice did we have? It wasn’t like I could keep her from her mother’s funeral.
“Alright. We’ll start preparations.”
“What about the funeral?” she asked. “Don’t I need to start making calls?”
“I’ll get you a secure line,” I told her. “Under no circumstances can you tell them where you are or give any hints about when you’ll be arriving. The less information, the better. The only thing you can discuss is the actual arrangements of the funeral.”
She nodded, not even putting up the slightest argument. “Yeah, I understand.”
My fingers itched at my side. I wanted to go to her and hold her—to tell her everything would be alright. I hated that she was going through this, but in reality, everyone dealt with death at some point in their lives. It wasn’t like any of us could hide from it. So why was this bothering me so much?
“Give me a few minutes, okay?”
She nodded and walked away with Spencer. As soon as she was out of the room, I turned to Rae, already uncomfortable as hell. “No mistakes on this. We need a solid plan and one hell of a secure location for this funeral.”
“It’s Hollywood. I’m not sure secure is even in their vocabulary, but we’ll do whatever we can.”
I slid my hand over my head, already running through a dozen scenarios. This could go FUBAR so fast if we weren’t careful, and even if we were… ”Any chance we could convince her to hold the funeral out here?”
“I doubt that, but you could always ask.”
“Maybe a funeral here and a celebration of life in Hollywood when this is over,” I muttered to myself. “I’ll get Lock on the phone. We’re gonna need Fox out here ASAP.”
“Just tell Max to go easy on the scotch. The last thing any of us needs is another dance with the devil,” Rae sighed. “We got enough of those with Scottie.”
“And now Max has picked up his puking habit,” I added.
“He’ll behave if we bring Christa along.”
My gaze snapped to hers. “You want to bring Christa along on a job?”
“To keep Max in line? Hell yeah. Besides, going to a funeral seems right up her alley as a minister’s daughter. Maybe it’ll bring us some luck, too.”
“It couldn’t hurt to try.” I pulled out my phone and made the call. Fuck, I wasn’t happy about it, but here we were. I turned away from Rae and waited as the phone rang. I half hoped he wouldn’t pick up. Then I could say we just couldn’t get the plane. But I wasn’t that lucky.
“Slider, any news?”
“Yeah. She wants to go to the funeral.”
“I was afraid you were going to say that. You want the plane?”
“Yeah. Can you send Christa along?”
He was silent for a moment. “That’s some fucked up kind of torture. I can’t believe you’d even suggest it.”
“It was Rae’s idea.”
“Oh…yeah, it could work.”
I scoffed at how easily he agreed with her. “How soon can they be out here?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Good. We’ll let you know when we’ve got a solid plan in place.”
“Just my two cents, hold off as long as you can. The less time you’re out there, the smaller the window for anyone to find you.”
“Agreed.”
“I’ll send you details as soon as I have them.”
I rubbed my eyes, tired as hell after being up most of the night and all day. I’d been through this plenty of times before, but it was different this time. I couldn’t stop staring at Audrey, wondering if she was doing okay. She was at the kitchen table for most of the afternoon with Spencer, talking with her mother’s husband. I had no idea what arrangements she was making, if any. Things looked pretty tense, and as much as I wanted to find out what was going on, it wasn’t really my place to ask.
Dinner had long since passed and now it was closing in on time to hit the rack. All I could think about was how much I wanted to sleep in the same bed with Audrey, even though I knew what a terrible idea that was. Sharing a bed with Spencer hadn’t exactly been the highlight of this trip. If I walked into her room and slid into bed with her, would I really be able to hold myself back?
Fuck, I needed to get my head on straight before I did something stupid. I headed out back into the cool night air, taking a deep breath. Out here, I could fucking breathe without feeling suffocated by the situation. Maybe I needed to pitch a tent and camp out here for the rest of the time.
A sound to my left drew my attention, immediately putting me on guard. We would all know if someone was on the property. Hell, alarms would be blasting all over the place if someone got within even a mile of this place. I pulled my weapon and slowly moved toward the side of the house, my eyes scanning the property for any signs of an intruder.
The moonlight made it easy to see and there wasn’t a fucking soul in sight. Butting up against the house, I peeked around the corner, exhaling when I saw what made the noise. Holstering my weapon, I slowly walked toward where Audrey was laying on her back, staring up at the stars.
With every step, I told myself just to go inside, to stay the fuck away from her. But as I got closer, I heard her faint crying and knew I couldn’t walk away. I made sure to make some noise so I didn’t startle her as I approached. She quickly wiped the tears from her face, but didn’t bother to sit up.
“What are you doing out here?” I asked, taking a seat beside her, resting my elbow across my bent knee.
“Watching the stars. Wondering what the hell I’m doing with my life. Trying to figure out if I can somehow get out of my contract without destroying my life.” She sighed heavily. “Wondering how the hell I’m going to get Spencer to really leave and follow his dreams.”
Well, shit. “Is that all? Kind of a small list, if you ask me. I’m sure if we put our heads together, we could knock a few off that list.”
She chuckled, still staring up at the stars. “Yeah, no problem at all.”
“Why are you trying to get out of your contract?” I asked. That wasn’t what I was most curious about, but I figured I’d start small and build my way to the biggest question.
“It’s time,” she said after a pregnant pause.
“Time for what?”
“To end all of this.”
“Acting? I thought you liked it? The danger and the excitement…wasn’t that what all that pretend fighting was about?”
She rolled her head toward me, quirking her eyebrow at me. “Pretend fighting?”
“At the house…when you were kidnapped. You know, before IRIS threw the second bomb and nearly killed us. You were pretending to fight that guy off.” At least, I truly hoped that’s what she was doing.
She pushed herself up suddenly, her eyes narrowing on me. “What are you talking about? I was doing all the moves I was taught.”
Okay, maybe I was wrong, which made the whole thing even worse. She really was that bad. I had secretly hoped that I had misread the whole situation. Maybe it was the concussion from the accident or—Hell, there had to be some reason. Flying monkeys or too many kung fu movies.
Unsure of what to say, I nodded, knowing she wouldn’t be able to really see my expression as much in the dark. “Right. They were good ones. Nice kicks.”
She shrugged, plopping down on the ground. “I enjoyed learning all that stuff. I wanted to do more of my own stunts, but they wouldn’t let me.”
Gee, I wonder why. But I wasn’t stupid enough to say that. “You’re too valuable for that.”
“That’s what they told me,” she sighed. “But I missed out on so much.”
I didn’t have a fucking clue what she was talking about. Doing stunts was missing out on things? That was bullshit. “Are you kidding? You got to work with some awesome actors and make incredible movies.”
“I thought you’d never seen anything I’d done,” she said with laughter in her voice.
“I haven’t, but I did look you up. The movies were well-received. And they wouldn’t have kept doing movies with you and Spencer if they didn’t think you were amazing together.”
“Not that it matters anymore,” she sighed. “It’s all over.”
“Is this because of your mother?”
The silence was heavy as I waited for her answer. I almost thought she wouldn’t answer.
“Do you get along with your parents?”
“Yeah, I do,” I answered, feeling bad that I couldn’t lie to her to make her feel better.
“Do you have brothers and sisters?”
“Sisters,” I grinned, thinking about them. “Three of them. One older and two younger. And all a huge pain in my ass.”
“You’re lucky,” she mumbled. “I never had a real family. Not until Spencer. He’s the closest thing I’ve ever had to a relative. He’s my emergency contact and the person I spend all my holidays with.”
“Then why are you trying to push him away?” I asked, unable to hold it in any longer. It didn’t make sense. I’d seen the way they were together. Spencer cared about her a lot.
“Because he deserves better,” she whispered. “I can’t be selfish anymore.”
I studied her as she stared up at the stars. There were tears tracking down her face again, but this time, she didn’t try to hide them. What the hell was going on with her that she didn’t feel she deserved someone like Spencer around her? I didn’t understand it. From the outside, it looked like he wanted to be by her side. He’d give anything to be with her. So, why was she pushing him away?
“You know, you can’t make someone leave you if they don’t want to.”
“Even if they’ve sacrificed everything for you?”
There had to be more to the story, something I was missing. I laid down beside her, looking up at the stars with her. I could see why she was out here. It was peaceful, even if the ground was fucking cold.
“There was a time when I gave up what I loved for someone else,” I confessed.
I felt her eyes on me as I continued to stare up at the sky. I never bared my soul to anyone. It just wasn’t in me to open up in this way, but she needed to hear it, even if only so she would understand that some choices were made for reasons beyond our control.
“Who was she?” Her voice was so quiet, I almost didn’t hear it.
“She was the girl I thought I was going to marry. I was in school and I fell for her the minute I saw her.” I swiveled my head to look at her. “Have you ever had that? You just saw someone and knew?”
She shook her head. “No. I never looked.”
“I met her on my first day of school.”
“Culinary school?”
I nodded. “She was in my class and she was just so beautiful. I don’t think I could breathe properly around her for at least the first week.”
“I can’t imagine it,” she teased. “Baldy was in love.”
I grinned, remembering the feeling when I first saw her. She had those beautiful, tragic eyes that drew me in. I was a goner from the moment I met her. “I was. Hopelessly. There was no one in the world for me but her.”
“Did you ask her out?”
“I wasn’t that smooth. I think my first words to her were Me Mick. Classmate.” I huffed out a laugh at the memory. “It was the first time I ever saw her smile. She took pity on me and helped me in class and we became inseparable.”
“So what happened?”
That was the part that drove a wedge between us. The part that absolutely gutted me. “She was a mess. Mentally, I mean. I tried to help her, but she didn’t really want it. And the more I tried to be there for her, the more she pushed me away. She would have these bouts of depression where I couldn’t get her out of bed to get to class. I would miss class to stay with her, and it would start this cycle of self-loathing in her. And the longer things went on, the worse they got. Eventually, she broke things off with me. She couldn’t stand the thought of me risking school and my career for her. So, she broke things off and pushed me away.”
Her fingers brushed against mine, and at first, I flinched. But as she tightened her grip on mine, I found myself taking her comfort. This was the first time I’d told anyone about why I left culinary school. For so long, I had pushed away my love of cooking because of the reminders. It took a damn long time to allow myself to enjoy it again without feeling like it was all so tragic.
“Anyway, I couldn’t stand to be at school without her. Everything reminded me of her, so I left. I had no idea what to do, so I joined the military.”
“You gave it all up,” she whispered.
“There was no joy in it without her.” I rolled my head to look at her, hoping she would understand my point.
“It’s not the same,” she said, her voice barely audible as a tear slipped down her cheek.
“Isn’t that up to Spencer to decide?”
“He’d be giving up everything for a life of?—”
When she cut herself and turned away from me, I knew I was getting to something big, but that was it. She’d shut me out.
“Audrey, a life of what?”
“Do you really think we can make it home safely for the funeral?” she asked, switching topics and pulling her hand from mine.
Suddenly, I felt lost—completely alone without her hand in mine. I clenched my fist, trying to push away the urge to snatch her hand back and beg her to let me in. It wasn’t my business.
But that wasn’t part of the job. She was a client. “Yeah,” I answered, ignoring the ache in my chest. “We’ve got it all set up. I think it’ll be good.” Shit, that wasn’t the right way to put it. “I mean, it should be fine. No issues.”
“That’s good.”
“We should get to bed. We have a lot to do tomorrow.”
“I think I’ll stay out here a little longer,” she whispered. “I just want to watch the stars a little longer.”
I should have gotten up and left. That would have been the smart thing to do, but no one ever accused me of being very smart.