by K. M. Scott
Rage coursed through Alexis at that description of her. A damsel in distress. That’s all her very own manager saw her as!
“How the fuck do you think this is going to end, Paul? You planning on killing her and ending the gravy train you worked so hard to keep going? Or is it me you plan to shoot? Because that gun says you think this is going to end that way.”
Paul chuckled, and for the first time, Alexis looked around Hunter to see her manager for the man he truly was. All this time she’d thought he cared about her, but all he’d cared about was money and fame. No matter that the stalker’s letters had made her practically a shut-in afraid to go out into the world around her. All he cared about were headlines to keep her in the news.
“I don’t have to use it. I can just take her out of here and back to New York, and she and I can go back to making her the biggest star in the world.”
Hunter shook his head and held tightly to her hand. “She’s not leaving with you.”
Pointing the gun directly at Hunter, Paul said, “Then I had to come here to rescue her from a jilted lover who kidnapped her and brought her to the one place he knew he wouldn’t be found out. And if my friend Persephone wants to keep this project of hers quiet, she’ll cover the whole thing up. You’ll disappear and no one will know the truth.”
Alexis couldn’t let him do this to Hunter or to her. She wouldn’t live her life under the control of a madman. She could be strong when she had to be.
Knowing Hunter always kept his gun near him when he didn’t have it in his pants, she quickly scanned the room for any sign of it. God, why hadn’t she paid attention when they arrived here? If only she could have some way to find out where it was without letting Paul know.
Hunter moved a step to the left toward the fireplace, and she zeroed in on it sitting on the mantle. It was now or never, and there was no way she planned to just stand by while Paul killed the man she loved. So she tore her hand from Hunter’s hold and raced over to grab the gun.
Her hands shook almost uncontrollably as she wrapped her fingers around it and pointed it at Paul. She’d only held a gun once before, and that was for one of the first parts she’d ever gotten after leaving modeling. All she remembered about how to shoot was the safety had to be off. She had no real experience other than that since that gun had been nothing but a prop, but she didn’t care.
She was an actress, so she needed to act like she knew what the hell to do as she pointed the gun at Paul.
But it wasn’t her manager who spoke first. Hunter looked at her with fear in his eyes and shook his head. “Alexis, what are you doing? Don’t do that. He’s not going to shoot me. Put the gun down, honey.”
“Lexi, watch yourself. You don’t know what you’re doing,” Paul said in that patronizing way he always did when talked to her.
Tears welled in her eyes as she screamed, “My name is Alexis! Don’t call me Lexi! I’m not a child. I’m a grown woman you were supposed to care about. I trusted you, and you tortured me with those letters! You made me afraid to even leave my house. How could you do that to me? How could you do that, Paul?”
“It wasn’t real, Lexi. It was all an act, and you performed beautifully, just like I knew you would.”
He smiled as he said that, like manipulating her was okay. She wanted to kill him for that, but her hands shook so much she couldn’t aim.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Hunter move and turned to see him rush Paul. The two men crashed through an end table and fell to the ground. Alexis kept the gun pointed at her mark, but now she might shoot Hunter if she pulled the trigger. Frozen in fear, she didn’t know what to do.
And then the sound of a gunshot exploded all around her, and she watched in horror as both the man she loved and the man who had betrayed her lay in a motionless heap in front of her.
“Hunter! Hunter!” she screamed so loud her throat burned.
She dropped the gun to the floor and backed away from it in horror. Had she shot it? She didn’t know. It had all happened so fast that she couldn’t tell.
And who had been shot?
Both men lay still, so she couldn’t tell who had been hurt, or worse, who lay there dead. The door burst open, and two of Hunter’s friends rushed in to see what had happened. They didn’t say a word to her, but she wouldn’t have been able to answer if they had. She didn’t know what to say. All she knew was a feeling of sadness she’d never experienced before began to settle into her chest as the reality that at least one person she cared about may very well be dead just a few feet away from her.
And she may have been the one to blame for their death.
“Hunter, man, are you okay? Talk to me,” one of the men said frantically as the other one moved him off Paul.
And then she saw the blood and knew the truth. A large red stain on the front of Paul’s shirt told her he’d been the one shot.
Finally, she heard Hunter’s voice as he spoke for the first time. “I’m okay. Where’s Alexis?”
Unable to hold back the tears of happiness and sadness, she began to sob. Hunter ran over and took her into his arms, holding her tightly to him as she cried.
“It’s okay. You’re going to be okay, Alexis.”
“I thought you were dead. You weren’t moving.”
He tilted her head back and kissed her tenderly on the lips. “I’m okay. The gun went off when we hit the ground and I tried to get it away from him. I’m sorry, honey. He’s gone.”
Alexis looked over toward where the two men stood near the body and sobbed harder. “I thought I killed one of you, Hunter. I thought I was the one who shot the gun.”
He pulled her to him again and held her close. “No, it was an accident. You didn’t hurt anyone. You couldn’t.”
“Why did he do all of this? Why would he torment me like that for months and then come here with a gun to hurt us?”
One of the men turned toward her and Hunter as the other man walked out the front door. “I can help with those answers. Your manager was up to his neck in debt, even worse than your assistant Carla, who was helping him. I’m guessing he needed to be able to say he had the biggest star in the world so he could milk that claim for all sorts of projects.”
Hunter looked over at the man and asked, “I never gave you Paul’s name, though. What made you check into him, Gideon?”
“If you ever paid attention to anything, you’d know that her manager announced at the end of last year that he was creating his own production company. No way you can run that kind of company with just one star, so he’d need more than just Alexis. I remembered hearing about it on some TV show once, so when you gave me the list of names, I added his to it. Turns out, he was behind this whole thing, but I didn’t get the proof I wanted until I ran the prints.”
“I thought I figured it out this morning. That’s why I wanted to get Alexis away from New York for a while to see if I was right.” Hunter looked down at Alexis and frowned. “I wish I wasn’t right about him.”
“What’s going to happen now?” she asked, afraid for Hunter for the first time.
He kissed her on the forehead and hugged her to him. “Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be fine.”
“I’m sorry Xavier and I didn’t get here in time to stop this, Alexis. When Persephone came back to the house, she ordered us to get those prints ASAP, and as soon as we found out what we had, we started coming here. She didn’t know he had a gun. She thought he was a good guy.”
Alexis forced a smile and nodded. “So did I.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Some game on the TV distracted Hunter for only a minute, but it didn’t take long for Xavier and Gideon to start arguing about some statistic or some claim one of them made about one of the teams. Nothing had changed at the estate.
But he’d changed. Not that it mattered much.
Two weeks before, he’d kissed Alexis goodbye and he’d felt like an empty shell ever since. They’d promised to call one another, but he knew how that went. Two people
dedicated to their work equaled a very slim chance that they could make a life together work.
Even if he wanted to believe that even the slimmest of chances could amount to something great.
“Hunter, tell this moron that there is no way the Jets have gone to more than one Super Bowl,” Xavier barked in his direction as he sat lost in thought.
“What?” he asked, irritated either of them had ruined his daydreaming.
Gideon defended himself as he tossed a football at Xavier’s head. “That’s not what I said. Man, you’re a fucking asshole. I said I thought the Jets would have gone to the big game more than once.”
When Hunter didn’t respond to mediate their feud, Gideon leaned over and clapped his hands. “Earth to Hunter. Man, what are you doing over there? You look a million miles away.”
“I’d say about three hundred miles away is more like it,” Xavier said with a chuckle. “I think we have a new addition to the Alexis Marchand fan club here at the estate.”
Hunter simply rolled his eyes. He didn’t have any interest in sparring with these two tonight.
“Seriously, man. Why are you still here? Didn’t Persephone give you like a month off for vacation?” Gideon asked. “If I knew she wouldn’t be calling me up at any moment, I’d be lying on the beach somewhere with a drink in one hand and a beautiful woman in the other. Instead of that, you’re sitting here with us like some zombie over there.”
“I don’t feel like going anywhere. I’m fine right where I am,” Hunter answered, lying through his teeth.
He only wanted to go to one place in the world, and that was where Alexis was. As for being fine, he hadn’t been anything close to fine since she walked out of his life nearly fourteen days before.
Thirteen days and eight hours, to be more exact. He couldn’t bring himself to count the minutes. That just felt too fucking sad, even for him right now.
“You know, you could call her and go see her,” Gideon said.
He knew his friend thought that suggestion would be helpful, but he wasn’t fooling himself. They couldn’t be together as long as they both had the careers they’d chosen.
“No, I can’t, and I don’t want to discuss this anymore,” he said as he got up to leave.
“Yes, you can!” Gideon yelled as he walked out of the game room.
But he was wrong, and there was no way to get around that.
Hunter’s phone vibrated in his pocket as he headed up to his room. Taking it out, he wondered why he’d be getting a call from the boss.
“I’d like to see you in the office right now, please,” Persephone said into the phone before he even got the word hello out.
“On my way.”
Like in a dream, he walked down the hall to the other side of the house without even thinking about where he was going. He’d worked for Project Artemis for long enough that he’d made this trek to Nick and Persephone’s office more times than he wanted to count.
He’d done a lot of good in those years. From the first time Nick told him about the idea, he wanted to be a part of it. He’d watched far too many women get hurt by the law to be able to ignore how much the world needed what Nick and Persephone wanted to do with Project Artemis.
But now as he stepped one foot in front of the other without even thinking, he had a feeling he wanted something else.
Tess didn’t sit at her desk tonight, so he pushed open the office door and peeked his head in. Nick still hadn’t returned from his trip, so Persephone sat alone at her desk working.
“You wanted me for something?” Hunter asked as he stepped into the office.
She looked up from her work and smiled that rare sweet smile Persephone so infrequently offered to anyone but Nick. “Please come in, Hunter. I wanted to talk to you.”
“Any news from the cops?”
Persephone nodded. “That’s all taken care of. Their investigation is complete. Accidental shooting. Case closed.”
Hunter didn’t respond, but he couldn’t help think that she’d had to grease a few palms to get the investigation over so quickly. Money talked, though, even out in the sticks.
He sat down in front of her desk and watched her hold up a letter in front of her. Confused as to why, he shook his head.
“What’s that?”
“This is from Alexis Marchand. She wrote me a lovely letter thanking me and everyone here for helping her. She also wrote to tell me she’s donating a million dollars to what we do here.”
Hearing Alexis had cared enough to contribute to what they did there didn’t surprise him. He’d seen the good person behind the movie star. He knew who she really was.
“That’s good. She’s good people, Persephone. She deserved better than what Paul did to her.”
Nodding, Persephone said, “Yes, she did. I’m sorry he turned out to be someone like that. He clearly didn’t respect Alexis or what we’re doing here. I thought he was a good person, but I was wrong.”
Hunter sat back and stared across the desk at the woman in front of him. Persephone had never admitted she was wrong to any of them. It wasn’t her style. He had a feeling she felt if she did show anything but pure strength that she’d be seen as less in the eyes of the men who worked for her.
Not to him, though. To Hunter, it made her an even more incredible woman, and that was saying something.
“I’m sorry your friend turned out to be the villain of this piece.”
His comment made her laugh. “That’s remarkably clever of you, Hunter. I never took you for a man who knew anything about theater.”
He shrugged. “I lived in LA for years. No way to escape actors and actresses. They were everywhere.”
“And yet it took moving to Virginia for you to meet one you could see as more than just a star.”
At that moment, something clicked in his head. He had met someone who made him happy, and for the first time in his adult life, he didn’t find as much happiness in his job.
“It did, so I think it’s time for me to move on, Persephone.”
He didn’t know what he’d expected her reaction to be, but as the words left his mouth, he watched her listen, nod, and then simply smile.
“I figured as much. It’s been two weeks, so I have to give you credit. You probably knew somewhere deep down inside ten minutes after she left that you didn’t want to live without her. I called you in here tonight to tell you I had an assignment for you. I didn’t know if it would merely take your mind off your heartbreak or make you quit and go to her, but I figured it would move you to do something. Now I don’t have to do that.”
Hunter threw his head back and laughed. “So much for that month vacation, huh?”
“Actually, it was Nick’s suggestion. I spoke to him about how worried I was about you, and he thought this might help. I guess he was right.”
“Worried about me? Really?”
Persephone twisted her face into a grimace. “Not everyone in the world has to show every emotion they have, Hunter. It doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings for the people I work with. It just means I don’t show them all the time. You’ve been here with us since the beginning. I may not have always liked your methods, but we relied on you more than anyone else because you were as committed to this cause as we are. But you aren’t anymore, and even though we’ll miss you, there are no hard feelings. We never assumed you men would be willing to give up your lives forever.”
In all the time he’d worked for Project Artemis, he’d never heard anything like what she’d just said to him. It made him proud to know his commitment to their shared cause had been seen and appreciated.
“Thank you, Persephone. We did good together. I won’t forget any of you I’ve worked with here.”
Standing up, she extended her hand for him to shake. “Good luck, Hunter. Keep in touch and I hope if we ever need your help on a case, you’ll give us a little of your time again in the future.”
He shook her hand and nodded. “You know my number. Tell Nick I said I’
ll see him soon, okay?”
“I will. I hope you and Alexis will be very happy.”
Hunter took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. He hoped so too.
* * *
A few hours later, he approached Alexis’s building and saw a few photographers milling around the front entrance. Good. If those vultures were there, that meant Alexis was there too.
He walked toward the glass front doors and smiled at the grey-haired man waiting just inside them. Chambers returned the smile as he welcomed him into the lobby. “Gorgeous morning, isn’t it, Mr. McKary? Good to see you again, sir.”
“Good to be back, Chambers.”
As cool as he’d sounded talking to the doorman, as soon as the elevator doors closed, Hunter’s heart began beating like a jackhammer. It felt like there wasn’t enough air in that small space. Checking his look in the mirrored doors, he took a deep breath to calm himself.
Going to see the woman you loved shouldn’t be so hard, except he hadn’t called her before he decided to drive the five hours to see her and they hadn’t spoken since she left.
Fourteen days and three hours ago.
That was longer than some Hollywood stars’ marriages lasted. That thought made his stomach twist into a tight knot. Even worse, he began to wonder if she’d moved on. The life of a movie star happened fast. Maybe she’d met someone already. Maybe she turned for solace to one of her bodyguards.
Maybe he should just turn around and go back to Virginia. He reached out to push the down button, but he didn’t catch it in time and the doors opened to the penthouse. Hunter looked out and saw no one. Had she left to make a film? Was that why the apartment sounded so silent?
The doors began to close, and along with them his chance to be with Alexis again, so he quickly stepped out and looked around for any sign of her. In all the time he spent there, he’d never heard it so quiet.
As disappointment set in that he may have missed her before she left to go on location, he walked down the hallway that felt so familiar now that he was back. He pushed open the door to the room that had been his bedroom and saw she still hadn’t changed it back to her office. Looking in, he saw it just as he’d left it that morning when they drove away to go to the estate.