Chapter Eighteen #2
didn't speak to Nicole that day. He got through his brooding scenes
as quickly as he could and didn't talk to anyone. A dull fear was
growing inside him, spreading each time Sasha failed to pick up his
phone. When Brett called a halt, he got changed and jumped into his
truck before Bailey could even think about ambushing him, drove
round a corner or two and pulled up.
The
security company answered his call straight away. Yes, Mr Petrica
was fine as far as outside surveillance could tell; there had been
no alerts. A pause while the central office patched through to the
operative in San Marco. Mr Petrica had gone for a walk today. The
operative had followed him, but he'd seemed nervous and had
returned to the house. Was it possible that he knew about the
arrangements? He'd seemed to know where to look.
Laurie swore softly, holding the phone away from his mouth.
“You're meant to be his guards, not his surveillance,” he said bitterly.
Anything akin to being hunted would trigger all Sasha's instincts.
“If he's got your guys scoped out, make them move away, or use
different cars.” He hung up. He hated the sound of his own voice,
harsh with irritation and fear. He hadn't said goodbye, or
thank you for your work so far, or any of the small civilities he'd been taught mattered
even in the least of his transactions. He hadn't taken the time to
shower, and he hated the traces of foundation around his mouth and
eyes, hated the lingering feel of Brett's hands on him, pushing and
tugging to present his best angle to the lens.
Sasha
would cure all these ills. Laurie hadn't been aware of his lover's
gift for cleansing his soul until he'd been out and got dirty. All
he had to do was go home.
A palm
banged on the window of the truck, making him jump. A woman was
outside. She didn't look like a teen fan or a lunatic, so he
lowered the window, ready to redeem himself if he could. “Are you
okay? Can I help?”
“Oh. Oh, my God. Sign this, please.”
Out of nowhere she produced a dog-eared copy of the book that
had been cobbled together out of the first Blood Moon film. “All right,” he said
good-naturedly, avoiding the thrust of the pen she shoved at him.
“I'm not in this one, though. It's Wesley or Nicole you
want.”
“No. It's only you I want.”
Laurie
blinked at her. She looked middle-aged, ordinary, which made her
flat statement all the more alarming. Her breasts were crushed up
against the glass, and her face was blank. Well, there was always
one, wasn't there? Laurie had been warned not to hang about in the
streets around the lot. At least she hadn't pulled a gun on him.
Quickly he signed the book and handed it back. “There. Hot out
here, isn't it? Do you need some water, or—”
“Devlin. Sign it as Devlin.”
Laurie
sighed. He'd noticed that Wes, Nicole and Bailey had developed
autograph scrawls that could mean anything: he'd have to learn to
do the same. “I've got to go, I'm afraid. Could you just shift your
arm so I can...”
“Devlin!”
He
recoiled. She'd turned the word into a bloodcurdling shriek, her
arm still wedged and flapping like a fin inside his car. To his
relief he saw that she wasn't yelling at him—was trying to attract
the attention of another woman further down the street. She too was
clutching a paperback. She turned, mouth dropping open, and then
Laurie saw in the parking bay behind her an enormous Greyhound
coach, in the act of disgorging what looked like three dozen more
just like her.
Laurie
took hold of his lady's fist. It was clammy with unfathomable needs
and desires. “I'm sorry,” he said quietly. “I'm not what you want.
I'm just an actor, and I've got to go home.”
She
wasn't hearing him. She didn't want his words or his reality.
Laurie was now fairly sure that she wanted to hold him in place
like a coveted doll until her entire coach party could descend upon
her prize. He shoved her hand out of the window, none too gently.
He took the barest second to make sure that none of her clothes
were caught on his wing mirror, that none of her friends were
blocking the road, and then he floored the gas.
***
“Sash! Thank God. Why the hell have you not been answering your
phone?”
There it
was again—that frustrated rasp. The edge of a snarl. Instantly
Laurie wished himself back out on the drive again so he could start
over. In his whole life, only one person he'd known had ever spoken
like that, and the bastard was long dead, his presence in Laurie's
genetic makeup only a technicality. Sasha was sitting in the shady
hall, halfway up the beautiful tiled stairs. He had his laptop with
him, and was surrounded by print-offs, as if he'd been working
frantically.
“I had something on. I'll tell you in a minute, but I want to
talk to you first.” Sasha set the laptop aside. He loped down the
stairs and planted himself in front of Laurie, his gaze direct,
ready to hear any explanation provided it was the truth. “I tried
to go out for a walk earlier. I think there are guards outside the
house. I think they followed me. Why?”
Laurie
ran a hand into his hair. His head was spinning, and he had a
lunchtime-tequila hangover. He could still hear his fan—no,
Devlin's fan, which he was coming to understand was something quite
different—shrieking in his ear. “Guards? What are you talking
about?”
“The silver Toyota Camry and the black Altima. One or the other
of them is always there. I think they watch our front
door.”
If
Laurie said yes, what would happen? Sasha would want to know his
reasons. He'd listen, too, do his sweet best to believe. Given so
much willingness, Laurie could probably persuade him the guards
were part and parcel with the gated estate, the walls, Laurie's
paranoid sensitivity at having a new role in a strange
land.
There
was an easier choice. Laurie shook himself, renouncing subtlety. He
hadn't checked on his way in, but the message had had time to go
through. “That's nonsense. Are they there now?”
“They have been every day for the last week, one or other of
them, so...”
“Show me.”
Sasha
and Laurie stood out on the kerb. A beautiful Hollywood sunset was
painting the western sky gold and violet, a drift of fine cloud
turning to molten fire over the Pacific. There was no Altima parked
across the street. No silver Camry either. Laurie couldn't pick out
their replacements. Maybe the pale blue sedan over there, the
sunset blaze in its windows concealing its driver... “I don't see
anything. What are you worrying about?”
Sasha
lowered his head. His arms were folded over his chest. Every line
of his posture told Laurie he wasn't convinced—not even partway.
Then he took Laurie’s shoulders, held him and looked straight into
his face. “Sweetheart,” he said. “Something's dreadfully
wrong.”
“What do you mean?”
Sasha shook him gently. “You're not yourself. You... Christ,
you even smell different. Tell me. Right now.”
Tequila,
metabolised hours ago, its tang maybe still lingering. Laurie tried
to recoil. But Sasha's grip on him was a loving cage, and he was
getting tired. He was too astonished to resist when Sasha pulled
him down into a kiss.
Not a
glance to left or right for the neighbours. Not a second's
hesitation or reserve. Laurie did full honours to the moment,
briefly forgetting everything but Sasha's warm mouth against his,
that grape-skin heat, the soft seeking pressure of his tongue. He
returned the gesture thoroughly, letting go with reluctance when
Sasha withdrew. “Wow.”
Sasha
was flushed, a little defiant. “Well? I'm in the land of the free
now, aren't I?”
“In the land of the bloody brave, too, apparently!”
They
looked at one another. One corner of Sasha's mouth quirked up. Any
second now they would burst out laughing at one another. There was
such sweet normality in this that Laurie felt an avalanching urge
to confession begin. How could he hide from Sasha? No matter what
the price, how could he live like this? “Oh, Sash. I...”
The
phone was ringing. It was the house one, its electronic purr barely
reaching him through the dusty air. Laurie could ignore it. After a
few more peals it stopped, and his mobile began to
shrill.
“Laurie. I love you, okay? More than my life. More than
breathing. Leave that damn thing alone.”
Laurie
swallowed dryly. Any other caller's name on the screen, he'd have
obeyed. But he had sold his soul. “It's the studio. I
can't.”
He
turned away and went to crouch on the front steps to the house.
They were magnificent, one marble semicircle enclosed within the
next. Fragrant orange trees blossomed in terracotta pots. For some
reason all he could think of was the fire escape outside the East
Hill flat, the rusty skeleton that had creaked under his weight and
Sasha's when they had used to sit out there shoulder to shoulder,
watching the sun go down. He could hear the crunch and rattle of
the trains. He listened for a while to Douglas Brett, who was very
excited. Too excited—for some time now Laurie had wondered about
the extravagant sets, the plot that veered to accommodate them. He
leaned his brow on his hand. When Brett paused for breath, he tried
a question, knowing the answer in advance. “What about Egypt, sir?
And, er...” Christ, he could barely remember. “The Druids at
Stonehenge?”
He
listened some more. When Brett was finished, Laurie bid him some
kind of mumbled good night. That was all the response required of
him; Brett hadn't called for his opinion or consent. He looked up
at Sasha, who instead of coming to sit in any of his usual places
when there was space around Laurie to share—close by his side, or
sometimes, shyly intimate, between his knees—was standing two cold
yards away. Not even within reach. “He's going on location,” Laurie
said. “He's scrapping everything we've done so far. Now he wants to
set the whole thing in the desert. We have to go out to the Mojave
with him, three weeks at least.”