“London. You have to understand.”
“No. I don’t. I won’t. And your words can’t make me understand it. It’s over Gavin. Just leave me to grieve the loss of what could have been something great.” She turned her attention back to the snake because in taking care of it she felt at least as if she was on familiar ground.
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“No.” He moved forward and the snake hissed. Out the corner of her eye she saw Drake place a hand on Gavin’s shoulder, though she refused to acknowledge either man any further.
“Give her time,” Drake said.
“I don’t need time,” she snapped. “I just need him gone.” Three days later and he was gone. Although she had been informed that he was scouting out the safety parameters of their next shoot—which Warren had decided would be in Yellowstone National Park instead of in the Keys. Warren had made other changes as well; changes she wasn’t apprised of until nearly last minute.
“Warren, what are you doing in Hawaii?”
“Business,” he waved his hand dismissingly. “I’ve decided we’re going to do the lead in for the first segment live. Now you know they have the first shoot edited,” he held up his hand when she started to object and he kept talking. “The network thinks it’s a great idea.
We’re going to set up on Oahu and film you introducing the segments live. Then we’re going to have those scenes pieced in.”
“The first shoot was in North Dakota. That has nothing to do with Hawaii.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he once again dismissed her with his hand.
“We’re doing it anyway. I love the idea…”
“This wasn’t your idea?”
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“Never mind who came up with the idea, just know that they did and I like it. Besides, Yellowstone won’t be ready until next week.
We can kick this first show off with a bang. The viewers will love it.”
“Why won’t Yellowstone be ready for another week? I thought it got the all clear for safety.”
“Let’s just say that the timing needs to be perfect. There’s business to attend to, things that need to happen on schedule. You don’t need to worry about it. Just do the job I’m paying you to do or I’ll find somebody else who can.”
Wow. She hadn’t seen that one coming. Warren had just let her know she was expendable. Could anything else go wrong this week?
First she looses the man she’s sure as day that she’s in love with. She hadn’t known him long enough to let herself fall in love, but she did it anyway. He seemed so caring, so honest and trustworthy and noble. He seemed to be everything she wanted in a man…and then she found out about his mask, about the lies he blanketed her with. Now, she was pretty much being told she could take her walking papers at any time and Warren would gladly replace her. What the hell was going on?
Everything was suspect now. Every behavior, every change in plans, made her wonder if Gavin was right about what he thought was going down with this show. Was there somebody selling government secrets? How were they doing it? Why were they doing it? No, not why. She knew why. Money was a powerful motivator for some people. If Gavin was right, and that wasn’t a big if, she was fairly sure The McGregor Affair
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he was right, then something sinister had been going on under all of their noses for a long time. Even worse, one of them was involved. She knew it wasn’t her, but she couldn’t vouch for anybody else. She hated knowing Gavin’s secret because now it made her just has untrusting of everybody else around her as he had been of her.
Gavin was trying to save the country—the world even, and while she found that amiable, she didn’t like being used, being lied to.
He had suspected her. He didn’t trust her. Perhaps that hurt her more than the lies, because she had trusted him completely before offering herself to him, and he had taken her completely without offering her his trust.
“Live show,” she forced a smile. “It’s different.”
“I knew you’d like it,” his personality did a one-eighty and he was all smiles and cheers again.
“So when are we shooting it?”
“Three days. Then we’ll load up the gear, board a plane and fly away.” He used his hand to simulate a plane taking off.
“I thought we couldn’t shoot Yellowstone for another week.”
“Oh we won’t be shooting before time to start, but you will get in early enough to get some rest and acquaint yourself with the surroundings. You’re doing a climb.”
“A climb?” Well this was at least one spot of good news. She loved to climb. She had climbed in Yellowstone before. Her first boyfriend, Jimmy, had gotten her hooked on climbing in nature. Before Capri Montgomery
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he came into her life she had settled on climbing in the rock gym only, but Jimmy had opened up a new world to her. Even after they broke up they would climb the big ones with each other.
Then he had gotten killed on climb. That had been hard to take because Jimmy was a standup guy. He was the guy you wanted on your team and in your corner. Loosing him as a friend had taken a huge chunk out of her heart. The loss had been too much, had hurt too much.
She wasn’t sure how she got through it, but she had.
She still couldn’t believe it some days. There were times when she would almost swear she would wake up and realize he was still there. But he wasn’t there. His carabineer had been faulty and when he fell it wasn’t strong enough to support his weight. She had always found that odd, because Jimmy was the biggest “triple check” guy she knew. He checked his equipment the day before, the morning of and then again before climbing. She didn’t know what could have distracted him to a point where he wouldn’t have taken that precaution this time.
And she hated that she hadn’t been there to save him. He had taught her a thing or two about swiftly executing a save. She was sure he had tried to catch himself while he was falling. If she had been there she would have moved heaven and hell to get to him. But she hadn’t been there.
He was climbing alone—which he had always said was never a good idea. So what was he doing up there by himself?
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noticing that it wasn’t safe. She was angry with herself for having those feelings, but she had them. She missed him so much that even now she still found herself tearing up just thinking about the friend that was no longer in her life.
“You’re up for it aren’t you?” Warren’s baritone voice broke her thoughts. She could only imagine her sullen thoughts were clearly visible on her face. She had always been told she wore her heart on her sleeve. Maybe everybody had been right. She wasn’t good at masking her pain, her sorrow, or even her joy.
“Of course. I love a good climb.”
“I knew you would.” He winked. “I have some business with Jerry. I’ll talk to you later.”
She would look forward to the climb because it was one of the places where she didn’t have to think about all the problems in her world. She could just be in the moment, live in the moment. There wasn’t any other choice because distraction could be disastrous. She loved climbing. Most people saw the dangers; she saw the tranquility.
At least she knew why Gavin had been called away to the mainland. She thought maybe he had been lying to her about that too.
She didn’t care because she wanted him gone, but she did care that she looked at every comment as a lie now, whereas she hadn’t before.
She spent the next couple of days going over the new script, hoping she wouldn’t make a major gaffe on camera, and trying to keep her nerves off the edge. She was worried about Gavin, very worried Capri Montgomery
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about him. Grant had died trying to bring about truth and justice and Gavin could be on the same road with his mission. What if he got hurt, or worse, killed. She was angry with him, but she didn’t want either thing to happen to him. He hadn’t called; and why would he? She hadn’t given him any reason to call her, to assure her of his safety. In fact, she had told him she didn’t want to talk to him again. She had told him she wanted him gone. How would he know that she spent everyday since he left worried about whether or not he was still alive and safe?
“London, get on spot we’re getting ready to go live,” Jerry yelled. She understood that she wasn’t perfectly together these past few days. She was at war with her inner thoughts, trying to make sense of what she and Gavin had. It couldn’t have all been a lie—could it? He felt something for her—hadn’t he? She tried to push Gavin out of her mind long enough to shoot the lead-in shots. The truth was that he was never far from being on her mind. Even when she was angry with him she thought about him, what they shared, what she felt, and she wondered if any of it had been real for him. Not knowing was driving her mad.
Shooting was going relatively well. Jerry had yelled at her during break to get her head in the game. She hadn’t realized it wasn’t in the game. She was delivering the lines without incident, but then she thought, maybe that was the problem. She was delivering the lines as if somebody had written them for her. They had, but she always had a way of making the words her own. She would use her own spin on the The McGregor Affair
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dialogue, change words, and jazz them up to fit her personality. Today she hadn’t been doing that. So in between breaks she reminded herself to do better. And she was doing better, until the close.
“I’m London McGregor,” and at that moment she realized she had just made the biggest mistake on live television that she could ever make. “McGowan,” she quickly stressed. “I’m London McGowan,” she felt like an idiot; “for In Your Backyard: Treasure Hunting in America.
I’ll see you next time for another great adventure.” When they wrapped she decided to stop mentally slapping herself and physically do it. She hit her hand to her forehead. Maybe he didn’t see it. Maybe he wouldn’t know what she had done. Good Lord she hoped the man was in the middle of Yellowstone working instead of in a hotel room somewhere watching today’s show. “Stupid,” she mumbled. “Real stupid, McGowan.”
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Chapter Eleven
“You can’t propose to a man on live television and then profess to be angry with him.” Gavin knew his words were aggravating the woman in front of him, but he didn’t care. He was more than willing to use her on air slip to meet his end goal. He would have to remember to thank Warren Applebee for demanding a live show be worked in this season. They had filmed the adventure treasure hunting segments early and then they pieced them in between live lead-in segments. At the time mostly everybody seemed to hate the idea, including him, but now…now he would gladly use it to his advantage.
“I didn’t propose to you!” Her voice was a high pitch scream.
“Sure you did. By the way, I think my last name suits you just fine.”
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“That was an accident. I should have known you being the jerk that you are you wouldn’t know how to let it pass.” If it were at all possible he would say she was turning three shades of red. Her cheeks had flushed, and her hands had curled into tight balls. Did she intend to use those fists on him? He nearly laughed, but he didn’t. He knew just how far to push, and laughing wasn’t in his best interest right now.
“And,” she stressed. “I’m keeping my last name anyway.”
“Fine by me,” he shrugged. “So when do you want the wedding?”
She gave another one of those high pitched screams before storming out the room and slamming the door behind her. She had walked away, nearly stomped away, from him. No matter. She would have to come back. In case she had forgotten, this was her room.
She had been ice since they arrived on location. With the shoot tomorrow he hoped she would warm up some. He was making that climb with her. He wouldn’t be on camera. He would be behind her and off to the right of her; that’s how Warren had insisted they film because he wanted some mountains to the left in the shot. Making the climb would be better if they were on friendlier terms. Her on air slip betrayed her current state of animosity. He knew she still cared for him, he knew she still wanted him; he just didn’t know when she would figure it out.
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intended to stay gone because it was nearly ten o’clock at night and she hadn’t come back. She needed to be wide awake, highly alert, not groggy from lack of sleep.
He wouldn’t watch her make a careless mistake that could get her killed on that climb. Determined to drag her back to the room if he had to, he set off to find her. He searched all the places he could think she might hide out. He was tempted to start knocking on doors until he saw the light in the equipment room on.
“It’s already been checked,” he said.
“I check my own gear.” She continued checking her rope, checking her carabineers, checking her harness. He had already checked it. Her refusal to acknowledge that put his nerves on edge.
“You should be sleeping.”
“I check my own gear,” she snapped. “I’ve learned not to trust anybody.”
He swiftly approached her, grabbed her arm and pulled her up from her seated position. This was going to stop, and it was going to stop now. “How long are you planning to keep acting like a child, London?” Maybe those weren’t the best words. In fact he was sure they were probably the worst words because if he thought she was ice before he hadn’t seen anything yet.
She wrenched her arm free from his grasp. He could have subdued her, held her tighter, but she would have fought him more and The McGregor Affair
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risked injuring herself. “Go to hell.” She turned from him, pushing her equipment into her sack.
“London, please listen to me.”
“Listen to you?! My God, Gavin right now I wish I didn’t even know you. I wish I’d never slept with you…”
“We did a hell of a lot more than sleep, honey.”
“I hate you. I really do hate you.” She stormed away from him.
He would have gone after her, but her words were still stinging him. he shouldn’t have cared what she thought. He shouldn’t have gotten involved with her in the first place. She was a suspect then, and even though he now knew she wasn’t a traitor, he didn’t know it then. He could see why she thought he had used her, but he hadn’t. He had never used his body to crack a case and he hadn’t left that moral high ground for this case either. What they had shared had been desire, and lust, and maybe even love—it wasn’t about breaking her down to solve a crime.
Clearly she didn’t think he was a good man at all if she believed it had been.
London tossed and turned all night. She wasn’t rested, she wasn’t ready for this climb, yet she refused to give anybody the satisfaction of knowing that. She had climbed in worse conditions. The day was clear, the weather comfortable, and she would make this climb, tired or not. She might fall on her back the moment they yelled Capri Montgomery
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cut, but she would be at the top and secure on firm ground before that happened.
Gavin McGregor had a way of getting under her skin and wreaking havoc on her nerves. She hated him—but she loved him. How she could feel both emotions so strongly she wasn’t sure. She was just so angry with him. On top of that, she couldn’t seem to get away from him. Sure, he was gone for a few days checking out the safety protocol, or s
o he had said, for their new shoot, but now he was back, smothering her with his presence. She had asked why he was doing this climb. He had told her it was “Applebee’s idea.” He still seemed to insist on calling the man Applebee. Although she was leaning toward using the same name now. She reserved calling people by their first names when they were friends, and no matter how obscured her vision had been, it was clear now that she and Warren were not on friendly terms. Friends didn’t intentionally put friends in harms way.
She didn’t want Gavin doing the climb, but he had said it wasn’t optional. Warren wanted him already in climbing mode just in case something happened. He didn’t want to have to wait for Gavin to gear up and climb up to fix whatever that something was—it would slow down production, he had said. There was something comforting about knowing exactly where she stood. At least now she didn’t have any delusional beliefs that he cared about her. He cared only about the bottom line, and the bottom line was money.
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She had planned to check Gavin’s gear again last night as well.
She had no intention of going back to her room because she was sure he was still there, but when he interrupted her she couldn’t stay in the equipment trailer any longer. Hiding from her trouble was never her motto, so why was she doing it now?
She switched her pack for Gavin’s pack, making sure to give him his harness and keep her own. The least she could do was give him what she could of her gear since it had been double checked. She could recheck his when they reached the shoot location. That had been her plan anyway, but when they reached the location Warren was there and he had insisted they make haste in getting started. What bug he had up his butt she wasn’t sure, but she knew he seemed to be in a hurry.
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