Chris laughed. "Oh, you mean, this song?" He played the chords to "Pickup Kind of Girl" and began to sing.
"Oh, no," I groaned, standing up. "Please, stop."
"You better get used to it," he said. "You're gonna be hearing a lot of my music."
I really did hate that song, but it was a kind of love-hate thing. Stockholm syndrome, maybe, from all the hours being forced to listen to it. I never thought I could find myself actually enjoying it, but that was what was happening now.
I wasn't the type to get star struck. Celebrity, fame, wealth, all that shit had never been on my radar. It was a world so far removed from my own. Music and movies were just noise to fill up the space when I wasn't out on some rooftop with a scope to my eye and my guys’ backs to protect.
But right now, hearing Chris play that damn song... Well, it sounded pretty damn good coming directly out of his mouth. He looked different. While playing his music, Chris glowed. I was entranced. It didn't matter if it was "Pickup Kind of Girl;" at that moment I probably could've listened to him play on for hours.
He closed his eyes as he sang, swaying gently, his fingers dancing up and down the strings. It reminded me of how I was with my rifle. I knew every piece of that gun front to back. If someone tossed a ping pong ball up in the air and said "shoot," I could nail that thing in the blink of an eye. It was obvious that Chris's guitar was an extension of himself, too.
Damn. I already thought the man was good looking, but was I actually gaining some respect for him, too?
"Ahh." Chris laughed, stopping mid-song. "It is pretty terrible."
It sure was, but I probably could've listened to him sing it a dozen times. I wasn't about to tell him that.
"How's your hand?" I asked, nodding towards his bandages.
"It's fine," he said.
"And your face? Looks like you took a pretty hard beating."
"This?" He touched his swollen, bruised cheek. "Nah. The dude had a weak punch. This was nothing."
"You're a glutton for punishment," I said.
He shifted his eyes to look at me. "No. I just know how to take it."
I felt the slightest jump in my heart. God, I must've been fucking horny. I was assigning meaning to things that had none.
The doorbell sounded. Chris stood up and I turned, alarmed.
"Does someone have access to your gate?"
"Sure," he said.
It hadn't been in my briefing materials. "Who?"
"I don't remember. I don't need you to answer my door."
"I'm your bodyguard," I replied, pushing him back onto the couch by his shoulder. "It's my job."
"Fine, alright." He held his hands up. Then he picked up the guitar and strummed it as I walked to go see who it was.
I was probably more on edge than I needed to be, but I didn't like this unexpected hole in security that I had no way of accounting for. As I walked, my hand brushed against the area on my waist where my sidearm would usually be, and my mind drifted upstairs to the closet where I had it stored away. You're just a celebrity bodyguard, I reminded myself, still worked up from Bau's call.
I tapped the screen next to the door and a fisheye view of the front porch appeared. There was a girl standing outside, a young woman with blonde hair held up in a long ponytail, her arms crossed impatiently over her chest. She rang the doorbell again.
"Chris! It's Audrey. Open up!"
I pulled the door open and her eyes widened as they flicked up and down my body. Looking at her face to face, I suddenly realized who she was. Audrey Apple. Like Chris, the only reason how I knew about her was because of the guys in my unit. Last year, a hell of a lot of her photos started turning up in our tent after someone had become a fan. I'd always found it weird, she was only like nineteen, but then again, at thirty I was the old man of the group surrounded by a bunch of guys who were in their early twenties.
Something else clicked—the photo I'd seen in Chris's room. Audrey Apple was the girl from the photo. Isn't she like, ten years younger than him?
"Uh, hi," she said. "Who are you?" She tilted her head, trying to peek past me.
Chris appeared behind me. "Audrey! It's cool, Sylus. This is my friend, Audrey Apple. She's no threat. This is my new bodyguard."
Audrey's eyes flashed. I stepped aside to let her in. "Oh, a new bodyguard. Hi, nice to meet you," she said sweetly, holding hand out. "I'm Audrey."
"Sylus," I said, and she flashed a twinkling smile at me that quickly vanished into a death stare when she turned to look at Chris.
She shouldered past him and stomped to the kitchen, her heels clicking loudly on the stone floor. "I'm no threat, huh?" she said. Chris hurried after her, and I followed behind.
"Hey, Audrey," he said. "I'm sorry about what I said. I—"
"You know, for a moment I thought he might be something else," she said, gesturing towards me.
"No idea what you're talking about," Chris said, looking annoyed. I didn't either, and I realized that this was probably a conversation I didn't need to be a part of. Obviously, they had some shit to work out.
"Hey, where you going?" Audrey called as I tried to back out of the room. "I'm Chris's best friend. We better get to know each other if you're gonna be guarding this asshole's body."
"Alright," I said.
Chris looked uncomfortable. If they were together, she obviously loved to bust his balls. From my first impression of her, I liked her. She reminded me of my aunt, the kind of person who was everywhere and in everyone's business all at once.
She got a glass out from the cupboard and opened the liquor cabinet. "Whoa. No more, huh?"
"Uh... No. Sylus dumped it all." He shot a glare at me.
She filled the glass with water from the fridge. "Maybe you won't be such a dumbass anymore." She walked up to Chris and poked his bruised cheek. "Wow, your face looks even shittier up close. Actually, it's an improvement." She smiled and sipped her water.
"Alright," Chris muttered. "Get your shots in. I deserve it."
She nudged his arm with her elbow. "You know I love you. So, no more Big Mike? I bet he was sad. Did he cry? He seems like he would cry."
"Ah..."
"I knew it! Poor guy. He was such a sweetheart."
"He still works for me," Chris said. "Just doing other stuff."
"You seem a lot more capable," Audrey said to me. "Big Mike was big, but that was about it."
"Apparently," I said. "He let you get beat up."
"That wasn't his fault," said Chris. "I made sure he was gone."
Audrey raised her hand. "Hold up. You were trying to get your ass kicked?"
"No. I was pissed off and drunk and I wanted to teach that guy a lesson."
"Because he called you gay?"
Chris sighed and scratched his chin.
What? That was the reason for the fight? Because some guy called him gay?
I felt a pit open in my stomach. Was that the kind of guy Chris was?
"You don't like gay people?" I asked flatly.
"No, that's not it," he grumbled. "It was stupid. It shouldn't have happened. I just get sensitive about when people say certain things."
"Well, you should probably know that I'm not straight," I said. If he would have a problem with me, I wanted to be upfront about it. I had no issue with losing the job because of it, but I wasn't about hiding.
Both Chris's and Audrey's jaws dropped.
"Oh, really?" she asked, looking at Chris, who didn't look back at her.
"That's... That's not a problem," he said to me.
Audrey looked pleased. It made me think that he was just acting cool with it because she was angry with him about the incident, and was trying to get back on her good side. It didn't make me happy to be used like that, but I was willing to put up with it. Or maybe I was just used to it.
"Alright," I said.
After a moment, he turned to me and asked, "You're really gay?" It looked like his world had been turned upside down. "You don't... seem
gay."
All I could do was laugh.
Audrey rolled her eyes at him. "Oh my god..."
"Let's talk about something else," he said, his face a shade of red.
"That's fine with me," I said.
I couldn't tell if the look on his face was true remorse or if he was just feeling uncomfortable with me.
"Okay." Audrey sounded eager to change the subject, too. "One of my girlfriends has a movie coming out this weekend and she's throwing a big party at Club Insomnia tonight. It's gonna be VIP as fuck."
"Would she really want me there?" He pointed to his face. "With yesterday, I'm probably public enemy number one, as far as the press is concerned."
"Don't even trip. There isn't going to be any press. It's a totally private event. Insomnia is legit when it comes to these things, they'll have it on lock. Anyway, you're you. Of course, she's going to want Chris Stevens at her party. I want you there. And you can bring your sexy new bodyguard."
Chris's face went even more red.
"Yeah, okay," he said, still avoiding looking at me. Seeing him squirm was amusing as hell and I loved that Audrey was fucking around with him.
I left the two of them alone and went outside to go reconfigure the passcode on the outer security gate. If the two of them were going to bang I didn't want to be around to hear it.
I was sitting on a folding chair outside by my car looking at birds through a pair of binoculars, making mental notes of distance and wind speed and trying to anticipate their movements. A black shape filled up my view, and I lowered the binoculars to see Audrey standing in front of me.
She smiled and looked over her shoulder. "What were you looking at?"
"Birds," I said.
She crouched down next to me, squinting off at the trees lining the mansion's security fence.
"Can I see?"
I held the binoculars out to her, and she peered through them.
"Chris doesn't have any problem with you," she said. "Wanted to make sure you know."
"Doesn't matter either way," I said.
"He doesn't have a problem with gay people. He just... he's got shit he's gotta work out. Personal stuff, you know?" She handed me back the binoculars. "It's why he gets himself into trouble so much. He can't accept himself."
I stared at her, not sure what she was getting at.
"I dunno why I'm sharing this with you," she said, sighing. "He's a good guy." She stood back up.
"I'm just his bodyguard," I said. "I'm just here to make sure he stays out of trouble."
"Knowing the full story might help you," she said.
"The full story?"
She chewed her lip. "Maybe you'll figure it out."
I watched as Audrey hopped into her silver Mercedes and drove away, honking the horn and waving at me. I waved back, feeling slightly perplexed.
7
CHRIS
The car pulled into the rear entrance of Club Insomnia and stopped behind a lineup of blacked-out limos and glittering supercars. People were filing into the club, everyone decked out in their best. Just because it was a private, no-press party didn't mean any lack of showboating. The one-upping never stopped in the entertainment world, and I was just as guilty as the rest. I had on my favorite pair of blood-red cowboy boots and a suit I'd ordered to be custom designed by Karl Lagerfeld himself.
I was distracted. I loved these parties because I could get fucked up and not have to worry about cameras or what would end up on the internet the next day, but right now, all I could think about was one thing:
Sylus was gay.
Was the universe playing some kind of joke on me?
I felt like an idiot with the way I'd reacted to it, but the truth was that in my fucked perspective of things, I never could've imagined a man like Sylus to be gay. It just didn't compute. He was everything that my mom made me believe a gay man couldn't be. He was like Dad. A Marine. A fucking no-nonsense badass. So, if he could be gay, then...
Was it fine for me to be, too?
The thought made my head spin. I didn't know what I believed anymore, or what I even knew about myself. It felt like I was being pulled in a hundred different ways, on the verge of tearing.
The door opened and Sylus was standing there, holding it for me. I stepped out of the car, still unable to look him straight in the face. It was partially because I was embarrassed with myself, but mostly because I didn't know if I could control what I was feeling. It was like a wall had been torn down, exposing me to the aching want I felt for this man. How could I fight it?
Did I even want to fight it?
Sylus trailed behind me as I walked into the club. He wore a dark, subtle suit, the kind that was meant to both accentuate his imposing physique and allow him to disappear into the background. It didn't do anything to make him more discreet to me. Even though he was excellent at staying invisible, I could feel his presence and his gaze.
I joined Audrey and her friends, and found myself feeling distracted by the thought of him. I took a quick look around and saw him standing a few dozen feet away where several other bodyguards were keeping watch over their clients. Audrey pulled me to sit with her at one of the half-circle booths, the table in the middle saddled with a crystal bucket filled with ice and bottles of liquor.
"He's hot," Audrey shouted in my ear over the thumping dance music.
"What?"
"Sylus. He's hot."
"I didn't know he was your type," I said. Audrey crossed her arms and gave me a look, but I continued to play dumb. "Why are you looking at me like that?"
"He's hot. Don't you think?"
"Not relevant," I replied, my racing pulse betraying my actual feelings.
"Shut the fuck up. I know you do. Remember what you told me, at your birthday party last year?"
This time I didn't need to play dumb. "I can hardly remember that party at all."
She laughed. "You said, 'if a hot gay dude dropped my lap I might take it as a sign from God.' Well, Chris... The sign has been given and it's in the form of that scrumptious hunk of man over there." She nodded in his direction.
Damn. Flashes of memory were coming back to me. A weekend in Nashville. Strippers. Me dancing on one of the poles. Telling Audrey the exact words she'd repeated to me just now.
I looked towards Sylus again and felt my heart skip like a misfiring engine. I'd never been around a man who could set me off in such an immediate, visceral way. Just from laying eyes on him I felt this incredibly powerful pull, like a man being wrangled by a lasso around the waist—or around something else.
Maybe it was the explosive way he'd arrived in my life. My mind kept going to what'd happened last night, poring over every detail I could muster of the drunken memories, repeating every heart-pounding moment. No man had been able to hold so much power over me, physical or otherwise.
"Goddammit," I muttered. "But just because he's gay doesn't mean he's into me."
Audrey grinned like she'd just won gold in the Olympics. I'd just admitted that she was right. I may not have spoken the words out loud, but this was enough for her to declare a triumph.
"Of course not," she said. "But you can make that happen."
"I didn’t exactly get off on the right foot with him," I said.
She took my hands and shook them, excitedly. "You don't know that. You've only just met."
"Anyway, he's my fuckin' bodyguard."
She groaned. "My God. How is this like pulling teeth with you? It's simple, Chris. Do you want the guy or not?"
I squirmed and looked around. The music was blasting, the drinks were flowing and everyone was involved in their own business. No one could hear us. "Yeah," I said. "Fuck. Yeah, I guess I do.”
Those words leaving my mouth was like a green light to my heart. No more misfires, only pedal to the metal. My heart wasn't the only thing that took off. I felt my arousal growing rapidly between my legs, threatening to make a tent out of the soft fabric of my slacks.
"Yes!" she exclaimed
, clapping. "Give it up for Chris, everyone!"
"Shut it," I said. Then, I realized something: I had no idea how to get a guy. All my romance was theoretical, just shit I'd written for songs. The art of real-life flirtation wasn't exactly my most practiced skill. "Aw, fuck. What do I do about this?"
"I'll help you as much as I can. I mean, it helps that Sylus is living with you."
"Yeah. Or this could be the biggest fucking disaster waiting to happen."
The DJ cut the music and Audrey's friend, a budding actress named Sylvia Klein, climbed up onto the table, wobbling drunkenly on her heels. "Thank you all so much for being here!" she said, speaking into the microphone. "You have no idea how proud I am of this movie. I don't want to toot my own horn, but I seriously think some awards are in our future!" She pumped the mic into the air and hooted as everyone in the club cheered and whistled. "I think it's time to get this party started. Bring out the shots!" She dragged out the last word and cranked the music back up. People holding trays stacked with double shots of whiskey began to file out onto the club floor, passing them out as Sylvia screamed, "Let's all get all get faded!" into the microphone.
A shot glass appeared in my hand. I swirled its contents, releasing its rich aroma.
"Let's have some fun," Audrey said, holding her glass up.
I tapped mine to hers and was about to drink when Sylus vaulted over the booth and landed onto the seat beside me. I nearly dropped the glass into my lap.
"Relax," I said. "I'm not gonna go crazy." I tossed the shot back and grinned at him. I knew it wouldn't do me any favors to fuck with him like that, but I just couldn't help myself. I immediately grabbed another shot and downed it.
Suddenly, my head was trapped in the vice grip of Sylus's massive bicep. My cheek pressed up against the hard muscles of his abs, surrounding me with the warmth of his body and the deep and spicy aroma that was his scent. It washed over me, filling my senses with an intoxication like nothing I'd ever felt before. It was like breathing fresh air for the first time. Every lungful was better than the last.
He dragged me to my feet and hauled me across the club towards the patio exit, and though I feigned putting up a fight, struggling and protesting, I wasn't in any hurry to get free from the headlock.
In His Sights: A Brothers Synn Novel Page 5