A Righteous Man

by Crownover, Jay

  If looks could kill, I’d be a dead man.

  I settled back in my seat and lifted a foot to rest on my knee. I was trying to appear calm and collected, but on the inside, I was a mess. This was the closest I’d been to her in ages, and it was hard not to get engulfed in memories and regret. She was looking at me like she wanted to toss me out of the plane. I knew I was watching her with my heart in my eyes.

  “Long time no see, Maren.” My voice was husky and deeper than normal. There was even a small quiver I couldn’t hide, but she didn’t seem to notice. Her eyes narrowed, and she took a deep breath. I could practically see the wheels turning in her head as she tried to figure out a way to get away from me.

  “Not long enough, Salinger.” If her words got any colder, icicles would hang from them. She unfurled a fist and started to tap her fingers on her thigh. “I assume this setup is why my assistant suddenly bailed on flying to New Mexico with me.” It wasn’t a question, more like an angry accusation.

  I dipped my chin in agreement. “She’ll meet you at your dad’s house. Lennon put her on an earlier flight.”

  Maren barked out a bitter laugh as she continued to glare at me. “I can’t say I’m surprised Lennon had a hand in this, but I am disappointed. I thought keeping me as a client would mean more to her.”

  I sighed and let my boot bounce on my knee to bleed out some of my anxiety. “You mean the world to her. She wants what’s best for you, no matter what. She’s scary as hell, and I wouldn’t put it past her to put bodies in the ground for you if need be.” Lennon was head and shoulders above that creep who’d given her a start in the industry but manipulated her beyond belief.

  “No. If she wanted what’s best for me, she would’ve made sure our paths never, ever crossed. I told her that numerous times. You’re bad news, Salinger. Nothing good comes from being around you.”

  I put a hand to my chest as her words hit dead center. I knew she was still resentful and bitter about how things had gone down between us, but hearing her say it to my face stung. I wanted to remember her as the only one who cared about me when I was surrounded by hungry vultures. Facing the reality of the damage I’d done when I’d been at the start of all my carelessness was hard for me to swallow.

  “That was true in the past. I’ve changed.”

  Maren rolled her pretty eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. “Oh, I know. I’ve seen all the effort the celebrity press has put into trying to get people to buy your redemption story. Anyone who doesn’t know you might believe you’ve been reformed. But anyone who’s been burned by you knows better. You don’t just play with fire, you’re the flames that destroy everything they touch.”

  I cleared my throat and pressed on the center of my chest. I felt like I was trying to hold my heart in place. It wanted to fall at her sneakered feet and beg for forgiveness because my words weren’t going to be enough.

  “You don’t think people can change?” I asked the question as I realized she didn’t just cross her arms to show she was angry. She was actually holding herself together.

  “I know people can change. Usually, it isn’t for the better.” Her words were biting and her expression fierce.

  I knew this confrontation wasn’t going to be easy, but I hadn’t planned on her turning to stone in the years we’d been apart. It made me furious at every single person who had forced her to harden over the years.

  I dropped my foot and leaned forward, which caused her to push back even farther in the plush seat.

  “I didn’t just change. I grew up.” And learned some seriously hard lessons along the way.

  She scoffed and gave her head a slight shake. “Oh, really? You call hijacking my flight and conspiring with my agent growing up? You’re still the same spoiled kid who can’t stand to hear ‘no.’ You’re the same brat who has to get your way regardless of who it might hurt and what the consequences might be.” She frowned a little bit in the middle of her rant as if something suddenly occurred to her. “Why are you here, anyway? Does this have something to do with the production company you’re starting? I don’t want anything to do with that nonsense.”

  “I’ve been trying to figure out a way to meet with you for months. I wrote a script when I was in rehab. It’s a story I feel like I can’t tell without you. It is a story I don’t trust in someone else’s hands. It’s why I wanted to start my own production company. The first person I sent the script to was your agent. I hoped she could convince you to read it. I wanted you to see just how much I regret the way things ended between us when I was younger. I hoped the story would show you how sorry I am because I know just saying the words to you won’t get me anywhere. I know she tricked you into reading it and meeting with me, but I really think if you can look past the way you feel about me, you’ll see the value in the project.”

  She sucked in an audible breath, and her arms fell. She blinked her multicolored eyes at me and went pale. The heat of anger leaving her face startled me. I was tempted to reach out a hand because she looked a little like she might wilt into a faint.

  “You wrote that script?” Now her voice was the one with the quiver.

  I nodded. “I did. It started as a therapy exercise when I was at the treatment center, but it sort of took on a life of its own the farther along I got.” I cleared my throat. “I had you in mind the whole time I was writing, Maren. Your agent told me you weren’t interested in any project that had my name attached to it, but I can’t move forward unless I know you at least read through it. When she finally said you would take a meeting, I figured you’d read the script and realized that I just want to make amends. I didn’t know she sent it to you blind until I had to go to extreme lengths to meet with you. If we were anywhere else, you would’ve walked away by now.”

  She let out a little snort. “If I had a parachute, I would be out of here in a heartbeat.”

  A startled laugh burst out of me. “Still as sassy as ever, I see.”

  “I don’t care how good that script is, Salinger. I’m not doing another project with you. The last time I worked with you, it ruined my life. You have no idea how hard it was to start all over from zero.”

  I sighed and dragged my hand down my face. “I do know.” She made another mocking noise that grated across every nerve I had. “I lost everything because of addiction. If my younger brother hadn’t stepped in when he had, I would’ve ended up dead, not just alone and broke. Do you think anyone wants to work with a former addict? You have no idea some of the clauses I’ve seen added to contracts because I’m considered such a gamble. I get by day-to-day because my brother took over my finances a couple of years ago. But I was well on my way to spending every dime I made on shit that was bound to kill me. That script is my square one.”

  She cocked her head to the side as if she was considering my words. Unfortunately, the raw honesty wasn’t enough to soften her toward me.

  “The difference is, you crashed and burned because you couldn’t stop yourself. The reason my life went up in flames was also because of your lack of self-control. I had no say in the matter.” She squeezed her eyes closed briefly, and when she opened them back, I could clearly see all the pain I’d inadvertently put her through back then. “I swore to myself I had moved past all the negativity in my life, including what happened back then. But looking at you right now,” she scowled, “I’m still really, really mad at you, Salinger. And more than that, I don’t trust you. And you should know, I won’t work with anyone I can’t trust. Including Lennon.” She muttered the last part under her breath.

  I wanted to reach out and hold her hand.

  I wanted to touch her and assure her I wasn’t the same guy who’d blindly let bad things happen to her. I wanted to explain that over the last ten years, I’d been unable to forget about her, regardless of the harmful substances coursing through my veins.

  But the expression on her face let me know that she wasn’t budging. She wasn’t willing to give me a chance to show her how much I’d changed
from the kid she once knew.

  I sighed heavily and slumped back in the leather seat. “I told your agent I could convince you to sign on if I got you alone and explained how important this project is to me. I was sure that, deep down, you would remember the way you tried to save me. I wanted to prove to you that it wasn’t a mistake to care about me back then. I know how much I’ve changed. I just never considered how much you had as well. The Maren I used to know had the biggest heart in the whole world.”

  She would’ve forgiven me.

  The woman sitting in front of me now was a stranger, and I hated it.

  “The bigger the heart, the bigger the target. Guess who was the first person to teach me that lesson?” She shifted her weight and bent down to pick up her fallen phone. “This is a short flight, so sit there and be quiet until we land. You can tell Lennon you gave it your best shot, but I shut you down. You can also pass along that this little stunt lost her a client and a friend.” She turned her gaze to the screen of the phone and made it clear she planned on ignoring me for the rest of the flight.

  My mind started whirling, frantically searching for any way to get her to give just a little. It seemed like I’d underestimated the impact my selfish choices had had on her. As well as how serious Lennon had been about losing her job if I couldn’t sway Maren to the side of forgiveness and collaboration. I thought there was hope to bury the hatchet. It never occurred to me she would still be angry enough that the only place said hatchet would be buried was five inches deep in my skull.

  Maren

  IT TOOK EVERY ounce of willpower I possessed not to openly stare at Salinger for the remainder of the flight. I spent forty-five minutes arguing with him, which left an hour for the shock of seeing him again to dissipate. It also left plenty of time for curiosity to creep under my defenses.

  He was still as cute and as charismatic as ever. He definitely didn’t look like a teenager anymore. Even back in the day, he always seemed taller and broader than the boys I remembered from high school. Now, he was filled out even more, if still on the lean side. His features were sharp, which gave him a slightly predatory look that he’d grown into. His dark eyes were always dark, mysterious, and unreadable, even when he was too young to have the kind of secrets that needed to be hidden. Now, they appeared even shadowy, and the secrets appeared to have doubled. His messy blond hair was the same, but it was darker than I recalled, especially at his roots. It made him look like he’d just crawled out of bed after a rough night. When he was younger, the tousled, sunny locks made him look carefree and wild. As an adult, the style made him look undeniably sexy. Combined with all the new ink that was liberally scrawled across his visible skin, Salinger now gave off a dangerous vibe that was much more fitting to his personality than his youthful good looks had been.

  Before, it was easy to underestimate him. Looking at him now, no one would ever assume he was an innocent, easily influenced kind of guy. He looked like he had been living hard the last few years, like a lot of his bad choices had finally caught up to him. Unfortunately, the rougher, more edgy vibe he was working with these days really worked for him.

  It probably really worked on the large portion of the population who couldn’t resist a bad boy. Lucky for me, boys who were bad had never attracted me. I liked to think I was too levelheaded and reasonable to be swayed by a sexy smirk and bad attitude wrapped up in torn jeans and scuffed combat boots. But, if I was completely honest with myself, I had to admit I was curious about just how many tattoos he’d put on his body in the time we’d been apart and where they were all located. The look suited him.

  My ex had a few, but they were cliché, and I knew he only got them to fit his image of what he thought a rockstar should look like. There was nothing special about them, whereas Salinger’s looked like they had taken hours and hours under the needle and some serious thought and inspiration. He’d gotten good at storytelling as he’d gotten older, so I wondered if the artwork was another way he’d found to express himself throughout the years.

  I huffed out an annoyed breath, bothered by the fact that I was wondering about him at all. It wasn’t easy to sit in the small plane in complete silence, but I refused to engage with him any more than I already had. I was worried that if he kept talking, he was going to wear me down and make me reconsider his offer. I really loved that script, and something happened to my insides when Salinger disclosed he’d been the one to write it. Suddenly, Lennon’s insistence that I should know who was behind the words I couldn’t get out of my mind made a lot of sense. Salinger was on every single page as clear as day. The writing was just as reckless and untamed as he was. The story was just as unpredictable and heartbreaking as he had been.

  I silently repeated that I didn’t want a single thing to do with him over and over again until the plane touched down in Santa Fe. As soon as we landed, I sent a text to Lennon letting her know she was fired. I would have to go through a more in-depth process once I got back to California, but I wanted her to know I wasn’t happy. She had crossed a line there and there was no coming back.

  I glanced at Salinger, who was staring at me with an unreadable expression on his perfectly sculpted face. Really, why did he get to have a perfect jawline and chiseled cheekbones when he was such a selfish jerk? Those good looks should belong to someone who would go out and do good with them. They were wasted on a guy who couldn’t think beyond himself and was bound to break a million hearts with no remorse.

  “I’m sure Lennon or someone on your team arranged for your return to LA. I’d say it was nice to see you again, but it wasn’t. Stay the hell away from me, Salinger.” I nodded to the silent flight attendant who’d made herself scarce when Salinger and I started arguing. I knew the crew wasn’t at fault for the stunt Lennon and Salinger had pulled, but I was still irritated at everyone who’d had a hand in ruining my flight. I shouldered my slouchy weekender and headed toward the door. I was planning on staying with my dad for a few days, so I had another flight chartered for later in the week to go home. I assumed Salinger could just hitch a ride back to LA on the same jet, but he got up and followed me.

  “I’m flying home tomorrow. Lennon told me if I couldn’t convince you to sign on today, she would make my life a living hell. She told me if I came back to LA with bad news, it would be bad for both of us. She said she needed time to cool off. I’m staying the night here in Santa Fe, so she has a buffer.” He chuckled like it wasn’t anything unusual to be hiding out from an agent on the warpath. “It’s hard to say who’s more disappointed that you won’t consider working on this project—her or me.”

  He had it all wrong. The person who was most disappointed was me. However, my sense of self-preservation was too strong to give in to the temptation of working with him again. No matter how stellar that script was.

  I walked across the small tarmac toward the even smaller terminal where my father usually met me when I came to visit. The airport here was tiny and nowhere near the star-studded spectacle like most of the ones in California. When I came home, I barely bothered to hide my identity because no one cared who I was or why I was there. I cast an apprehensive glance over my shoulder at Salinger. He was trailing behind me like a sullen shadow. He’d dropped a pair of mirrored sunglasses over his eyes and was walking with his head down like he was worried about being noticed. I wanted to tell him he didn’t need to be so cautious, but he was undeniably recognizable. My steps faltered when I realized if anyone happened to snap a picture of us together in my hometown, my life would once again blow up when the dust had just settled from the last implosion.

  I spun around and slapped a hand on the center of his chest when he was close enough to touch. I tried not to flinch at the contact, but the way his golden eyebrows lifted above the rim of the sunglasses told me I failed miserably.

  “Stop following me. Do you have any idea what will happen if a picture of us together leaks anywhere? Stay here for five minutes, then walk into the terminal. You probably won’t be recogn
ized, but just in case, we need to keep some distance.” I could feel his body heat radiating through the thin material of his shirt, and it was seeping into my palm. I wanted to fist the fabric and push him away… or maybe pull him closer. I gasped at the last thought and dropped my hand just as my phone rang.

  Scowling at him because, even though I couldn’t see his expression clearly, I knew he was smirking at me like the cocky asshole he was, I answered the call with a sharp, “What?”

  I turned on my heel and continued toward the terminal, not bothering to see if Salinger was following or if he heeded my order to stay back. I was rattled that touching him, even lightly, scrambled my brain. It was a good thing I’d turned down the opportunity to work with him. I didn’t like how easily he got under my skin.

  “Maren! Thank goodness you finally landed.” My assistant’s voice was shaky and shrill on the other end of the line. “I just got to your dad’s house after running to the store so I could stock the fridge for you guys. I noticed his truck was still in the driveway, even though he was supposed to be picking you up at the airport. I used my key to let myself in and found him unconscious in the kitchen. He was breathing, but it was very shallow. I called 911. They put him in an ambulance and are rushing him to the hospital. They said it might be a cardiac event but can’t be sure until they run some tests. I left you a couple messages to see if you wanted me to meet you at the airport and take you right to the hospital, or if you want to catch a cab and have me meet you there.” She took a breath and let it out loudly. “He didn’t look good.”

  I didn’t feel my phone drop from my suddenly numb fingers. It would’ve hit the tarmac and shattered had Salinger not moved like lightning to catch it before it landed. The building in front of me started to swim before my eyes, and the ground felt like it was rushing up to meet my face as my knees turned watery and weak.