Chapter 9
SHAW
“You did what?” Presley’s shriek permeated the walls.
I’d been on my couch, pondering—dreading—the scene we were shooting tonight, when her voice echoed around the cul-de-sac. I shot up and rushed to the door, nervous about what I’d find outside.
It had been five days since I’d told her about the movie and we hadn’t spoken since. I’d seen her in passing, but I’d had a punishing week of shooting and hadn’t been home much. Had something bad happened in the past few days?
Presley wasn’t one to get loud. She’d get stony and speak with a sharp bite, but no matter how much I frustrated her, she stayed ice cold. What I saw from my porch was a woman on fire.
“How could you do this? Why would you do this?” she seethed, her arms flailing wide before she poked a man with shaggy-blond hair in the chest. “He was gone. I was moving on.”
“Had to be done, Pres. He doesn’t get away with this.”
Away with what? What the hell was going on, and why was it happening at seven o’clock in the morning?
“That’s . . .” She growled and reached into the air like she was choking an invisible neck. Then her hands balled into fists. “You’re stirring up trouble we don’t need.”
I slowed my pace as I approached them in Presley’s driveway.
The second she spotted me, her hands dropped and she shot me her notorious go away look.
“Hey. You okay?”
Her shoulders were rigid. “Fine.”
I looked at the guy standing across from her. I’d seen him at the garage the day I’d shadowed Isaiah. His name was Leo, if I’d overheard correctly.
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Did you need something?”
“Did you get in a fight?” I pointed to his split lip.
His tongue darted out and licked the cut, but otherwise he didn’t move. His knuckles were red and angry, at least the ones I could see. If he’d gotten into a fight, the other guy had to look worse.
The tension stretched long and awkward. Neither of them was going to tell me what was happening, but no way in hell was I leaving Presley alone with a guy who made her this angry.
The seconds ticked by, the silence painful, until finally Presley broke, turning in a huff to storm inside her house. She stomped up the steps, slamming the door with a boom that rang around the block.
“Shit.” Leo dropped his arms, shaking his head.
“Is there something I should know?”
“Fuck off.”
I held up my hands. “I’m just looking out for her.”
Leo scoffed. “No, I’m looking out for her.”
“Is that what this is about?” I nodded to his split lip. “Who was he?”
“Her ex. And he deserved what he got for hurting her.”
My mind jumped straight to the extreme conclusion. “He hurt her?”
Because whatever pain Leo had inflicted, I’d double it on the son of a bitch. Rage ignited in my veins, off to on, like the flick of a light switch.
“He left her at the fucking altar,” Leo said. “What do you think?”
What? I replayed his answer once. Then twice. Presley had been left at the altar? When? I’d assumed “hurt” meant cheating or abuse. But leaving her at the altar would never have occurred to me.
What kind of dumbass left a woman like Presley Marks?
“You took care of it?” I asked.
“Yeah, I took care of it. She’s ours.” As in, not mine.
Leo spat on the ground and the white blob landed dangerously close to my bare feet. Without another word, he walked to the motorcycle parked behind Presley’s Jeep, started it up and thundered away.
I stayed in place until he was gone, then turned and walked to Presley’s door. I knocked.
“Go away.”
“It’s Shaw.”
The door whipped open. “I know. I heard Leo leave. I’m not deaf.”
“Are you all right?”
“Dandy.” The stone princess had returned.
Maybe this attitude was supposed to scare me away, but it was having the opposite effect. I fought the urge to pull her into my arms and hold her for a solid five minutes.
“He told you,” she whispered. “Goddamn it, Leo.”
“I don’t think he meant—”
“Do not defend him. I don’t need him sharing my problems and I don’t need your pity.”
“Pity?”
“Please.” She rolled her eyes. “That look you just gave me? That was pity. I know because I’ve been staring at looks like that for two months, and I don’t fucking want it from you.”
Presley stepped back to slam the door in my face, but my hand shot out, slapping against it to stop it from closing. “I don’t pity you. But I can be sorry that you got hurt.”
“Aren’t they the same thing?”
“No.” I stepped closer.
Presley tipped up her chin, her feet planted on the floor. Her jaw was clenched hard.
If I cupped her cheek, would some of that strain go away? My hand lifted only to drop beside my thigh. “I feel a lot of things for you, Presley, but pity is not one of them.”
She blinked, her eyes going wide behind her black-framed glasses. As I’d suspected, it made them bigger. The blue was brighter. Bolder.
And they seemed truly shocked.
She had to know I had a thing for her. She had to know the reason I kept coming to the garage was for her. So why the surprise? I wasn’t hiding my interest, but maybe I needed to make it crystal clear just how much she intrigued me. Just how desperate I was to caress her skin and taste her lips.
My hand lifted, this time without hesitation. The apples of her cheeks bloomed as I skimmed the bottom of her chin with the pad of my thumb. I leaned in, our eyes locked, as a loud rumble filled the air.
Presley blinked, stepping away from my still-raised hand and looked past me to the street.
Leo came racing back, like his wheels were on fire. He parked behind her Jeep and was up her steps in a flash, stepping into Presley’s doorframe like I wasn’t standing there. He forced me aside and wrapped his arms around her. “Sorry.”
She relaxed into his embrace, winding her hands around his waist. “You suck.”
“Yeah.” He dropped his cheek to her hair.
A bubble enclosed them as they stood there, holding on to one another like I wasn’t on this porch.
I didn’t want to be on this porch.
Without a word, I turned and walked home, shutting myself inside as my heart clawed its way into my throat. What the hell? Were they a couple?
Presley hadn’t said anything about being with Leo. She’d turned me down for dinner but I’d kept asking. If she had told me she had a man in her life, I would have stopped. Why hadn’t she told me?
Because we’re not friends, dumbass. I was a fleeting breeze in Clifton Forge, and once this movie was done, I’d be gone. She knew that. Hell, I knew that, but I was still jealous, and I hated that Leo had stolen the hug I’d wanted to give her.
I waited, standing beside the door, listening for the sound of Leo’s bike to leave. It was silent. Did he still have his arms around her? My pride wouldn’t let me go to the window and check.
The knot in my gut tightened, jealousy spreading in a wave until I was green, head to toe.
There wasn’t time for this. I had work to do, a scene to shoot.
Dacia was at the motel and we hadn’t spoken since she’d arrived last night in Montana.
But did I leave? No, I stood there like a goddamn masochistic, waiting for the sound of a Harley.
It never came.
Leo was inside. Presley had welcomed him into her home, probably without him having to hold her carrots hostage.
I scrubbed a hand over my face and unglued my feet. I walked toward the bedroom, my heart dropping with every step. Would I hear her mattress springs squeaking? My eyes snapped right to the window when I crossed the threshold.
Her room was dark. The blinds were drawn.
They were never drawn.
Whenever I came home late at night, her blinds were open and the window was cracked. I did the same to mine so all that separated us was air, and I’d fall asleep with a smile on my face.
Fuck. Time to go.
I plucked a pair of socks from the dresser and sat on the edge of the bed to pull them on. Then I slipped my feet into the tennis shoes I’d worn running before dawn. They were still damp with sweat but they were close by. I tied them up and got out.
Leo’s bike earned a glare as I backed my Escalade out of the driveway.
This jealousy was pissing me off. I wasn’t a jealous guy by nature. When I was with a woman, I expected exclusivity, but if we were casual and she showed up at a party on someone else’s arm, I didn’t have this gut-twisting urge to beat the guy to a pulp for putting his hands on my woman.
Presley wasn’t my woman. Why was that idea not sinking in? She wasn’t mine. She was an acquaintance and my temporary neighbor. If I didn’t get her out of my head, I was going to screw up this movie, and that’s why I was here. The movie.
I couldn’t afford to be twisted up in Presley today of all days.
My part in the scene we were shooting tonight was simple enough.
I had to kill a woman.
Dread chased away part of the jealousy as I crossed town to the motel. The drive to the Evergreen took minutes and it was abuzz when I arrived. Even though we had hours and hours before the cameras would roll, everyone was up and moving, anxious for this shoot.
Now that Dacia had arrived, the crew would be keyed up about her too. She had an uncanny ability to put the people around her on a razor-sharp edge.
Dacia French was a thorn in my side, but she had the name and face to draw a crowd to this movie. We needed both. She was making a killing for playing a small role, but her name would be on the billboard. Her face would be on the poster.
And I only had to survive her for two weeks.
Once she was done shooting her scenes, I had no plans to see her again until the movie’s press junket.
The motel’s lot was full so I parked along the street. The keys in one hand rattled as I walked toward the action. I checked my watch. My hands had been fretting since I’d left home. Was Leo still at Presley’s house? Didn’t she need to get ready for work?
She left about seven thirty each morning, or at least she had on the mornings I’d been paying attention—which was nearly every morning.