Chapter Seventeen
One minute, Kendall was saying goodbye to Reese, reminding her to please water her plants—especially the Calathea—and the next, it was a week later, and they were headed back to Los Angeles.
Their time on the road was coming to an end.
The footage was finally coming together. They had enough shots, videos, and interviews to make up a ninety-minute documentary. It was going to be a masterpiece.
Or it would be if Kendall wasn’t about to fuck it all up.
Exactly a week ago, in the parking lot of Sultry Suds, Kendall’s father had called her with an ultimatum. Quit your job as a firefighter and I won’t pull all the funding for the documentary or carry on with that hobby of yours and watch the project fall apart without my support.
But how much funding did they actually need?
It turned out quite a lot. It cost a lot of money to film a fire.
There was still securing rights to any music used within the film, creating a trailer to gain interest, press kits, and film festival submissions, and promoting the film through online ads and social media campaigns.
Not to mention host premieres and screenings and paying fees for online distribution channels.
Without Kendall’s dad’s money, the film wouldn’t make it any further than Sloane’s laptop.
Unless Phantom Rise Media bankrolled the entire thing.
Unfortunately, Kendall had a feeling Lisa had only said yes to the project because Evans Wilde suggested it and was going to pay for it.
So far, Sloane was none the wiser about the ultimatum.
Kendall had considered telling her that the success of this film rested entirely on her shoulders, that all their precious work could end up meaning nothing.
But she decided against it… for now. Since she had no idea what she was going to do.
On one hand, she loved her work more than air, and on the other hand…
well, breaking Sloane’s heart felt like ripping her own in two.
At least her father hadn’t set a deadline for the ultimatum. She assumed he’d find her to do that when she got back to Los Angeles. The man had eyes everywhere.
“You know,” Sloane said, turning the volume down a bit.
Jolene was playing for the second time since they left Santa Barbara, and Sloane hadn’t complained even once.
“I’m actually very proud of the work we’ve done.
This project has honestly blown my mind.
” She reached over and squeezed Kendall’s hand.
“Thank you. I really couldn’t have done it without you. ”
It was a quick, innocent squeeze, like a little exclamation point at the end of her thanks, but it had Kendall all twisted in a knot.
They hadn’t had sex since that time in Crestline, which meant she was hot and bothered with a desperate need to get right back into Sloane’s pants.
Although, they had spent the week having long chats in the middle of the night, over coffee, over lunch, and then again at dinner.
They had spent time with each other every second of every day.
Now, coupled with severe guilt about her dad’s ultimatum, and the fact that she and Sloane had grown closer over the last week, she was an absolute mess.
Inwardly, of course. Outwardly, Kendall looked nothing but poised in her sky-blue blouse and faded denim.
“It’s been quite a ride,” Kendall agreed reluctantly.
But Sloane seemed too happy to notice that the balance was off. That the woman beside her was a big, fat liar.
“I am glad to be going home, though,” Sloane said.
“I miss my bed. I don’t think we had sheets above a two-hundred thread count this entire trip.
And I miss my jacuzzi tub. All those water jets.
” She groaned like she was thinking of a five-star spa treatment.
“I think that I’m going to kick Robbie out.
Call it a revelation, but I need my space. He can go live with Reese.”
“He can’t,” Kendall said matter-of-factly, tugging on her seat belt. The thing made her feel claustrophobic, trapped in, or maybe that was just the secret she was carrying. “Reese lives with me. She moved in with me last year after she lost a ton of money on some scam.”
“Oh, I didn’t know that,” Sloane said, surprised.
“It’s the one thing she doesn’t tell people.”
“What kind of scam?” Sloane asked, glancing at Kendall out of the corner of her eye. Her very blue eyes, on more than one occasion, had looked right through Kendall as if she could see her deepest, darkest secrets.
Kendall wondered if she was overstepping by sharing something so personal about her best friend. But considering Reese nearly tried to kiss Sloane once, the thought felt moot. “A love scam.”
Sloane snorted.
“I know it sounds funny. I laughed too, but she was really upset at the time.”
“What kind of love scam?”
“The kind where you meet someone hot online after just seeing a picture. Fall in love after hours of texting and phone calls and then he pretends to get really sick and convinces poor sweet, na?ve Reese to help pay his medical bills. All ten thousand of it.”
It was a mouthful, and Kendall had gotten an earful when the whole thing had actually happened.
For weeks, Reese had sat curled up in a ball, on the phone with the police, her bank, her parents.
At that point, Kendall had decided the best way to help her friend out was to ask her to move in.
Kendall wanted the company as well, so it was a win-win.
Sloane gasped and whipped her head toward Kendall. If she hadn’t had both hands firmly on the steering wheel, the car might have veered off the road. “And she didn’t see through that?”
“Love blinds you.”
“It does more than that,” Sloane said somberly, turning her gaze back to the road. “It also has the ability to wreck your life, bring it down like a building being demolished.”
“Is that what happened with you?” Kendall asked, wondering how they had gotten back here, on the topic of Louise. “With the breakup; was it that bad?”
She didn’t even know why she asked the question, because there wasn’t a cell in Kendall’s body that wanted to discuss Sloane’s ex-girlfriend again. What she really wanted to talk about was them. The two of them.
Whether it succeeded or not, what the hell was going to happen once the documentary was over and their lives returned to normal?
Would they meet up, continue to see each other, or would the time apart change everything until they were nothing more than a couple of stories they’d tell their friends at parties?
Frankly, Kendall couldn’t think of her life without Sloane. The thought made her shudder. It was like going through life without her cell phone or missing a body part she didn’t know she needed until it was gone.
Over the last two and a bit weeks, Sloane had become woven into her days. Life without her suddenly felt unthinkable.
“No,” Sloane said confidently. “I used to think it was, but this whole documentary, witnessing just how quickly life changes, how a person can change, well, I think it’s opened my eyes.
Life’s too short to hold on to past relationships that were doomed to fail, anyway.
Besides, I might just get a cat. Apparently, they make everything better. ”
“I’m allergic,” Kendall said, remembering the last time she had visited her colleague, Sara, who had two tabby cats called Sullivan and Augustus. Her eyes had swollen up so much she could barely see. “Like really allergic.”
Sloane laughed. “Of course you are. I should’ve known you were a dog person.”
“Umm…” Kendall started, not sure how to break it to her.
Luckily, Sloane was as sharp as a tack. She dropped her jaw and gasped. “Wait, are you seriously telling me you’re not an animal person? Don’t all firefighters love Dalmatians? Isn’t that a requirement?”
“That’s a myth,” Kendall said, grinning.
This was exactly what she was going to miss, this banter that had been developing over the last week, progressively sounding more like teasing, or perhaps even flirting, to an outsider.
They might not have had sex again, but on several occasions, she swore she had seen Sloane undress her with her eyes.
“And no, I’m not what one would call an animal person,” Kendall added.
“I blame my dad. He never let me get a pet, not even a hamster or rabbit. He said they were dirty, and the house would smell too bad. But honestly, the house was so big I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have smelled a horse if it moved in. ”
“Your dad sounds like an asshole.”
“He’s just... umm… particular,” Kendall replied. That familiar gut-clenching feeling hit her as soon as her father, and subsequently the ultimatum, came up in conversation. “But he’s not all bad.”
Ahead of them, the Santa Monica Mountains came into view. Home wasn’t far away, which also meant saying goodbye to Sloane wasn’t some vague idea looming in the distance. It was right around the corner.
By the time they reached Silver Lake and Sloane had turned onto Kendall’s street, sheer panic rose up in her stomach.
Blood was pumping far too fast through her body and on top of that, it felt icy, like she was never going to be warm again.
Dramatic, yes, but what if Sloane was Kendall’s sun?
What if, without the woman in her life, she was doomed to be cold forever?
Spending all this time with Sloane… well, it appeared Kendall had caught some feelings.
But what if Sloane didn’t feel the—
“So, I’m thinking we meet up tomorrow morning,” Sloane said, slowing the Jeep down now that they were in the suburbs.
“We need to go through the footage of the Goleta fire and break it down further. We want the interview with Frances to be in there. It was jam-packed with emotion, but the fire itself—”
“Perfect,” Kendall cut in, feeling so relieved she might float a few inches off the seat. She was going to see Sloane tomorrow. Maybe she’d even tell her about the ultimatum, and they could figure it out together.
The Jeep came to a stop in front of Kendall’s house.
“This is you,” Sloane said, turning to face her. “Do you need help with your bags?”
Kendall shook her head. She considered inviting Sloane in for coffee, but that was too desperate, wasn’t it?
She then considered leaning in and brushing her lips over Sloane’s, but that was way too far.
They weren’t dating. They weren’t anything really, but two people who had spent a considerable amount of time together.
Two people who laughed and flirted and created a documentary worth showing.
“No, I’m all good, thanks. I’ll see you tomorrow. ”
Kendall climbed out, grabbed her bags from the back of the Jeep, and walked up the driveway. Just as she reached the door, Sloane honked, gave a quick wave through the open window, and drove off, leaving poor Kendall standing there, feeling as cold as ice.