Behind the Scenes

by K. M. Scott

  “Really. She’s never anything other than professional. I’m completely to blame,” he continued in an attempt to smooth things over more.

  Persephone’s gaze never wavered, and she nodded as he finished. “I know. I’m not blaming Tess. That would be like blaming a beautiful woman who wears beautiful clothes for men noticing her. Can we get to what I wanted to see you about or would you like to dig that hole you’re in a little deeper?”

  Like Tess, her boss had a sharp tongue to her too, but he didn’t dare try any verbal sparring with her. “Sure. I’m here to serve. What can I do for you?”

  “I have an assignment for you, Hunter.”

  He nodded, not needing a statement of the obvious. “I’m just wondering why I seem to be the main blip on your radar lately. X hasn’t gone out on an assignment in so long I think it was another sport’s season the last time he left that game room.”

  Instead of discussing his comment, Persephone ignored it and began to read from a file in front of her on her desk. “I got a call earlier tonight about a principal who needs your special kind of help.”

  “My special kind of help?” he asked, wondering exactly what part of him she considered special.

  “Do you know who Alexis Marchand is?” she asked, answering his question with one of her own.

  Hunter thought for a moment. Had he ever heard that name? Nothing rang any bells about it. Shaking his head, he said, “No. Should I?”

  “That’s why I chose you for this assignment. Something told me you aren’t like those two Peter Pans. I’d bet they both know who she is.”

  Sure that meant she had something to do with sports, Hunter focused his mind on female athletes and tried to remember Xavier or Gideon ever mentioning that name. Alexis Marchand. Sounded like she might play tennis.

  As he ran through the many conversations he’d had with them, Persephone began to explain who the woman actually was. “Alexis Marchand is one of the biggest actresses in Hollywood today. She might even be called America’s Sweetheart. She has legions of devoted fans who adore her, which is where the current problem comes in.”

  “Let me guess. Constant adoration is now considered a problem. Oh to be America’s Sweetheart,” he said, not trying to hide his irritation at how too many people bitched and complained about every last thing in their lives.

  Persephone’s face twisted into a scowl, cluing him in to how his comment hadn’t been received well even before she snapped, “Don’t be a smartass, Hunter. Your BFFs downstairs might find the insensitive ass act appealing, but I don’t. Miss Marchand’s problem isn’t that her fans adore her. It’s that one fan in particular is stalking her and making her life a living hell for the past few months. Her manager tells me she’s moved across the country to get away from him and still he found her. This is where you come in.”

  He held his tongue and waited for her to explain what that meant, wondering what special talent he possessed that could help some Hollywood starlet. He’d met more than his fair share as a detective out in LA and had happily left that world behind him, so she may have chosen wrong this time when she picked him for this assignment.

  “You’re going to join her security team and while you’re protecting her, you’re going to figure out who’s stalking this woman.”

  “A bodyguard for some diva actress? You’re kidding, right? She’s famous, for Christ’s sake. I’m sure the police wherever she’s living now will be bending over backwards to help her. Trust me. I worked in the LAPD. I know we worked overtime for celebrities. I’m sure nothing’s changed in that area.”

  His complaining earned him a nasty look. “You’ll join her security team in New York City tomorrow. Tess will give you all the details. See her on your way back to your seat in the game room.”

  Hunter saw that she’d made her mind up and there would be no getting out of this, so he stood to leave and asked, “Any chance I’ll get some time off after this assignment?”

  She looked up at him and nodded as she gave him a rare smile. “I promise after this one you’ll get some much-deserved time off. You will have earned it.”

  Well, at least he could look forward to a vacation after this case. Not that he wanted anything to do with babysitting some celebrity while at the same time trying to figure out which pathetic soul was out there trying to get close to her.

  Tess sat at her desk with a packet ready to hand to him as he exited her boss’s office. Handing it to him, she smiled. “For you.”

  He took it and sat down on the edge of her desk again. “Will you miss me?”

  “Of course. I get more exercise when you’re around, Hunter. All that chasing you do.”

  “It’s the least I can do. See you when I get back.”

  A look of concern suddenly filled her eyes. “Stay safe, Hunter.”

  Brushing off her worry, he stood and began to walk back to the game room. “Don’t fret about me on this one, Tess. This might be the easiest assignment I’ve ever gotten since I started working here.”

  He returned to the empty leather recliner across from the frat brothers who sat watching the football game and flopped down in the chair. At least he didn’t have to leave that afternoon, so he’d get to see a game or two.

  “So what did she want? You going out again?” Xavier asked before muting the TV to hear his answer.

  “Yeah. Some actress who needs to be watched. Like I’m some fucking babysitter. I get to play bodyguard because some sicko is stalking her.”

  Gideon threw his head back and laughed. “Bodyguard? Man, you must have pissed off the boss. Who are you guarding?”

  “Some actress named Alexis Marchand, whoever the hell that is. Persephone seemed to think you two would know who she was, which is why I got stuck taking this assignment. Maybe if I start acting like you overgrown juvenile delinquents I could get out of work too,” Hunter grumbled.

  Xavier whistled. “Damn. Alexis Marchand. She’s hot.”

  Turning in his chair, Gideon agreed with him. “Dude, she’s smokin’ hot. I’d take that case in a heartbeat.”

  Maybe this would be better than he thought.

  His interest piqued, Hunter asked, “Oh, yeah? Like how hot?”

  “She was a model before she became an actress. And not one of those stick figure models either. She’s got a body on her that doesn’t quit. Fuck. Wait until you see,” Xavier said, clearly impressed with Hunter’s new assignment.

  “Yeah, he’s right,” Gideon said. “It sucks that you can’t seem to get any time off, but at least you’ll have her to look at while you’re on the job. Trust me, man. Persephone might not hate you as much as I thought giving you this case.”

  Pretending to be fine with it all, Hunter shrugged. “I lived in LA for years. I’ve seen gorgeous women. Trust me. If she was that incredible, I would have heard about her before now.”

  Gideon shook his head. “You’ll see. It might be work, but it will be work with a smokin’ hot woman.”

  The two of them turned back to focus their attention on the football game as Hunter hoped this assignment would be as good as they thought. Having a beautiful woman to look at certainly didn’t make it the worst thing in the world. He just hoped it was over quick. No matter how good looking Alexis Marchand was, she was still an actress and his experience from his time back in LA told him some spoiled diva would more likely than not be a pain in the ass.

  And hot or not, that kind of woman was definitely not what he wanted to spend his time with.

  All he had to do was protect her and find out who was stalking her and he’d be free to finally get some much-needed vacation time under his belt. If he could focus on that, maybe this assignment wouldn’t be too bad after all.

  Chapter Three

  For the third time in less than five minutes, Alexis paced across the floor of her bedroom. Two days into living in her new home, she already felt like a caged animal. Wringing her hands, she cursed Paul and everyone else who told her she had to move to be saf
e from the person stalking her.

  A lot of good that had done. She hadn’t been in this new place not even an hour before that son of a bitch made sure she knew he had seen she moved and he’d followed her.

  She’d traveled three thousand miles to feel the same way she’d felt in the home she loved. At least in California she could go out in her backyard and feel the sun on her face. Now she had none of that.

  Trapped. That’s what he’d done to her. He’d trapped her in her own home.

  God, why did she listen to everyone instead of following her own gut? She never wanted to leave her home, and now she knew why.

  Her fingers ached from her tugging on them, a nervous habit she’d had since she was a child. Looking down at her hands, she cringed at the sight of her fingertips red from what she’d done to them.

  “Alexis, please come sit down. You’re going to make a path in the carpet if you keep pacing,” Lauren said on one of her passes near where she sat in a chair at the end of the room.

  “I can’t. I feel like I want to run away and never look back, but I can’t because that bastard has me trapped here. Again. Nothing’s changed, Lauren. Nothing at all, except now I’m stuck here in this damn city instead of being back in LA. At least if I was there, I’d be happy in my own home.”

  She reached out to grab a hold of Alexis as she spun on her heels to march off toward the other side of the room. “I know, but it does no good to get yourself all tied up in knots about it. Paul is coming over and he’ll know what you should do.”

  Alexis stopped and threw her a nasty glare. “Paul? He’s the reason I’m stuck here in this godforsaken apartment!”

  A sound in the hallway outside her room startled her, and she froze on the spot as she waited to see who had made the noise. Eyes wide, she held her breath as the bedroom door slowly began to open, her heart slamming into her chest as she waited in terror.

  Her manager appeared a few seconds later grinning like a fool. “Lexi, honey! What do you think of this place? Gorgeous, huh? I knew you’d love it.”

  It felt like all the blood ran out of her body as she realized it was only Paul. Dressed in his usual three-piece suit, he looked tanned and relaxed like he’d just spent a week in the Caribbean. Probably on the exorbitant salary she paid him.

  His blond hair looked like it was two weeks late for a trim and hung in his eyes until he pushed it off his forehead in a casual movement that gave him a surfer guy look that only served to remind Alexis how much she missed LA.

  “I hate this place. I want to go home.”

  “Lexi, you fit into New York like you were born here. You’re a natural,” he said with a huge smile as he closed her bedroom door behind him.

  All his chipper talk made her more miserable. “Don’t try to bullshit me, Paul. I’m like a fish out of water here. It’s crowded, noisy, and I haven’t seen the sun since I got here. And this penthouse looks like it hasn’t been updated since before the war. I just can’t decide if it’s the First World War or the Second.”

  He walked over to the doorway and ran his hand down the dark woodwork. “This craftsmanship is classic, Lexi. People pay handsomely for this.”

  Alexis looked over toward the doorframe in disgust. “I know. This place cost me a pretty penny. As far as prisons go, it was very expensive. But starting whenever that designer gets here, all the walls other than a few in the bedrooms are going. Living in a house full of tiny boxes isn’t my idea of six million spent wisely. I need open spaces in my prison.”

  Completely ignoring how unhappy she was about this new place, he said, “Speaking of open spaces, did you hear from Melanie about that part? If you get it, you’ll have open spaces, all right. There’s not much more open than Canada.”

  All his gushing about that part she hadn’t heard about yet only served to irritate Alexis even more. The thought of Canada usually disgusted her, but even that would have been better than being stuck in the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

  “No, she hasn’t called me yet,” Alexis said as she threw herself down onto the chair. “I’m not even sure I want that part.”

  She waited for him to rush over and talk her down from that claim, but instead he sat down and quietly said, “I think I found someone who can solve your letter writer problem.”

  God, did he ever say anything straightforward? Always double-talk from him.

  “You mean my stalker, Paul. At least call him by the proper term. He’s a stalker, not some pen pal from some far off land who has great handwriting.”

  Scowling at her insistence that he speak plainly, he rolled his eyes. “Fine. Your stalker problem. I called a friend who has experience handling this type of thing and she’s sending someone today.”

  Alexis felt her chest tighten at the thought of someone new coming into her world, someone she’d never spoken to or seen before. “How well do you know this person? I’m supposed to trust some stranger I’ve never even met? They could be the person stalking me.”

  Now Paul hurried over to her side and patted her arm, like she was some frightened child or some confused elderly woman who’d lost her way. “It’s okay. I promise. I’ve never met the person she’s sending, but I trust Persephone completely. She’s good people. Her father is Marshall Gilmore, the media mogul, and she’s using her wealth to help people who need precisely the kind of assistance you need now.”

  His explanation sounded like more double-talk. Narrowing her eyes in suspicion that he’d done something she wouldn’t like, she asked, “What do you mean precisely the kind of assistance I need?”

  “She runs a company that specializes in protecting women. Her guys are former military, police, and even FBI. I trust her, Lexi. I know whoever she’s sending will get to the bottom of who’s doing this to you.”

  Alexis pulled her arm away from his continued patting and began to pace again. “You make it sound like I’m some damsel in distress, Paul.”

  He shook his head. “No. You’re a good person who can use some help. That’s all.”

  Still not convinced this new person could do anything more than the police had for months, she asked, “How much is this help costing me? I already pay all those guys I have to guard me.”

  Paul shook his head again and smiled. “Not a dime. Persephone’s organization takes nothing in return for what they do. If her guy helps out and you want to give her something and pay it forward so she can help someone else, then so be it. But she’s not in it for money.”

  None of this sounded even remotely believable. Who in this world didn’t work for money? “Sounds like something out of a film script, Paul. How come I’ve never heard of this group of hers before? What’s the name of this organization?”

  “Project Artemis, and she’s one of the wealthiest women in the world. She doesn’t need money.”

  “Nobody works for free,” she grumbled as she paced past him.

  “This reminds me of Mr. Thompson from when we were kids. Remember how he used to give free cab rides to anyone who got too drunk at the bar?” Lauren said, reminding Alexis of that sweet man from back home in Biwabik.

  Thinking of their childhood in Minnesota made her smile. “He was a nice man. He used to say he did it because it was worth losing a few bucks to save a family from losing a father or mother.”

  Lauren nodded. “I know many nights he brought my father home from the bar. Who knows what would have happened if he had gotten into his car drunk.”

  As Alexis reminisced about the old days and how kind everyone was back home, Paul tried to steer the conversation back to what he wanted to discuss. “See? So it’s settled. The guy will be here this afternoon and he’ll join your security team.”

  Nothing about this seemed settled to her, but if someone could find this person who’d been terrorizing her, then she’d give him a chance because if he couldn’t, at least she wouldn’t be any worse off.

  And that fact alone showed how bad things had gotten.

  After pacing until her l
egs felt like they’d give out, Alexis closed the door behind her and settled into the most comfortable spot in the house—her new office chair. Plush and comfy, it practically swallowed her up in its softness, just what she needed to feel safe again. She still felt trapped in her own home, but at least in that dark blue chair, she could pretend that her life hadn’t become a series of tiny rooms connected by dark hallways.

  She began reading a script her agent Melanie had told her about weeks ago and had finally been delivered to her the day before she left LA. Titled Haunted By Love, it told the story of a woman who was being haunted by her dead husband, who everyone believed she killed. Alexis had only gotten a third of the way into the story, but she already hated it with a white hot passion.

  All the parts she got offered were the same. All the characters felt delicate and frail, like at any moment in the film someone could come up behind them and say boo and they’d crumble into a thousand terrified pieces.

  She wanted to play strong women. Kickass women. Characters who could stand on their own and brave whatever the big, bad world threw at them. Instead, the woman she sat reading sounded far too much like herself lately.

  Terrorized and afraid to leave her house.

  Pitching the script onto the floor, she brought her knees up to her chest and closed her eyes. This was how she’d spend the rest of the day. Curled up in a ball and pretending the world outside didn’t exist.

  A knock on her office door ruined that plan not five minutes later, though. Why couldn’t they just leave her alone?

  She leaned back on the arm of the chair and yelled in the direction of the door, “I’m busy. Whatever it is, talk to Lauren!”

  As she watched in horror, the door opened against her explicit instructions and Paul walked in with a man Alexis had never seen before. Smiling, her manager showed the man off like he’d just created him in a lab or something.

  “Alexis, this is Hunter McKary. He’s the man we talked about earlier today. He just arrived, so I wanted to introduce the two of you.”