by Ren Benton
Breaking it felt like a violation, but a necessary one. Lex forced his mouth to move. “I’m sorry.”
“Save it for Gin. And make it better than that.”
“I’m apologizing to you. I have notebooks full margin to margin with lists of every way I can think of that I’ve done people wrong, but I’m always finding more to add. I didn’t know I gave part of her back to you and Maisie or that I took it away.” They got to keep more of her than he did, but they had all lost something because of his carelessness. “So I’m sorry. Saying it prettier won’t make it worth more.”
Ethan let his head fall back and expelled a weary sigh. “Probably worth less. We all manipulate words for a living. We could workshop an apology worthy of Shakespeare, and it wouldn’t mean shit.”
“You’ve gotten old and cynical, my friend.”
“Chicks aren’t the only ones who think it’s hot. It’s tiring, though.”
“Beating off the lusty horde?”
Ethan snorted. “Beating them off is the fun part. Being old and cynical is a drag. I don’t know how you’ve maintained it for so long.”
Ethan had been in love with Ryan Greene, mourned him while fearing Gin wouldn’t survive, and then supported her personally and professionally through the media circus and a bullshit trial for what was clearly self-defense.
Lex might be giving the addition of one alcoholic lover too much credit for causing that cynicism, but the possibility didn’t lessen his guilt for contributing to the burden at all. “The one thing I can tell you with certainty is that alcohol will only make it worse.”
“Haven’t touched the stuff since I noticed the sister of my heart monitoring every sip of beer like it’s going to cause catastrophic liver failure and encepha-whatever-you-had. Now I get my empty carbs from chocolate.”
“At least chocolate has antioxidants.”
“I don’t need help justifying my addiction, Mr. Bad Influence.”
Excuses still slid from Lex’s lips without friction. He lifted his water to wash away the bad taste the reminder left in his mouth. “Am I even a rock star if I don’t lead someone down the path of depravity at least once a week? Help me meet quota, man.”
“Fine, I’ll start day binging if will it spare you from being demoted to the easy listening station, but it’ll be hard at the office. I can’t exactly pour a shot of Snickers into my coffee.”
“Oh, sweet child.” Some people just didn’t have what it took to be addicts — good thing a veteran was on hand for a consultation. “What you do, for starters, is wrap it in lettuce...”
After leaving Lex to his second screening of the movie, Gin closed herself in the office for her nightly attempt at a writing session. Half an hour later, the blinking cursor remained all alone on the screen. Her brain had an endless supply of words to offer about disappointment, failure, and doom but none that sparked a story.
Rather than waste more time on her descent into creative despair, she switched to sound editing. The version of River Bound she’d given Lex already had the dialogue mixed to a consistent level. Every other sound — room noise, effects, music — had to be adjusted relative to the accompanying dialogue track to ensure the actors’ speech reigned supreme. A good audio engineer had secrets to streamline the process. Because the budget seldom stretched to cover a good audio engineer, Gin had too few opportunities to learn from their wizardry and was stuck manually dragging sliders, one marker at a time.
When the screen started to smear before her eyes, she backed up her progress and shut down the computers for the night.
She was used to everyone having fun without her by the time she clocked out, but quiet greeted her when she emerged from the office. Piper sat on Matt’s lap, swiping the iPad he held so he had one hand free to play with her hair. Ethan was probably having a private moment with his candy stash. There was no sign of Lex.
“Lex isn’t still in the studio, is he?” She wouldn’t let him overwork himself before she even got his paperwork, even if she had to drag him up the stairs by his oversized feet to put an end to it.
Matt shook his head. “He’s on the deck with Ethan.”
The tension tightening Gin’s shoulders eased by a fraction. She didn’t relish the role of dictator, even if it was for his own good.
Lex certainly wouldn’t view her as helpful if she interfered with what he wanted.
Piper tapped the top edge of the tablet. “These meal plans don’t look as strict as what Lex is on.”
The whole, clean food sites Gin had passed along were dietary training wheels to provide support while they acclimated to the concept of balance. “Quitting grain, dairy, and sugar cold turkey is traumatic, and I doubt mama being sick and angry for a month is healthier for the baby than Big Macs and Pepsi. If you don’t have a medical condition that would benefit from hard-core food restrictions, there’s no point putting yourself through that right now.”
“Do you have a medical condition?” Piper bit her lip as if she regretted the question as soon as it left her mouth. “Sorry. I just wondered because you obviously don’t need to lose weight.”
There was no right weight for a woman in Hollywood. Either she was too thin and obviously suffering from an eating disorder or she was letting herself go now that she was behind the camera, and the same photo would be used to make both arguments.
Gin’s eating choices had nothing to do with her appearance, though. She pointed at her throat. “This isn’t the only scar I have.”
Her sleeve fell back with the gesture. Matt scanned her upraised forearm, crisscrossed with defensive wounds made by her assailant’s knife.
She returned her hand to her side. Those weren’t the scars relevant to her dietary limitations. “I lost a couple feet of intestine, an ovary, and my uterus. The less I stress my body with inflammatory agents, hormones, and mystery chemicals, the less it rebels.”
Piper covered her belly with a protective hand. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”
“No offense taken. It’s not a secret.” Now that Gin could talk about the physical aftereffects of the worst night of her life without triggering a flashback, she wasn’t shy about discussing her health. The occasional email letting her know her openness helped another woman cope with a life-altering surgical insult made the residual awkwardness worthwhile. “I’m headed to the kitchen. Do you need anything?”
Matt glanced toward the deck. “Can you ask Lex to let me work on your music with him?”
The floor seemed to shift beneath her feet. She placed one hand on the back of the sofa for support. “Isn’t that why you’re here?”
His expression clouded. Piper rubbed his arm and answered for him. “We’re leaving in the morning to go visit family. We’ll come back to pick up Lex on the way back east.”
“Unless you convince him to let me stay.”
Gin had assumed Matt and Piper would be here as long as Lex was, two extra layers of buffer between her and doing something stupid to jeopardize the amiability of her movie’s composer. Losing their protection planted a pit of dread in her belly.
The acute panic that exploded at Matt’s request was different, a resurgence of something old and familiar.
Don’t rock the boat or he’ll leave.
There were obvious differences between present and past. The subject of contention was Lex’s working relationship with Matt, not his alcohol abuse, and her need for him to stay was about her movie, not her personal desperation.
But the echo of codependency vibrated in her bones.
This was the first real test of it since leaving Lex, and she was doomed to fail because, regardless of the circumstances, she still didn’t want him to go.
She kept her distance from involvement. “It’s not personal, Matt. He’s a perfectionist and doesn’t like anyone hearing his work in progress.”
“I know. I just...” His face fell. “I’ve never seen him do it, you know? The Amazing Perry comes out of seclusion and poof! Hit single,
platinum album, like a magic trick. I don’t know how to do anything myself, and he keeps threatening to retire.”
The floor lurched.
Matt continued as if he hadn’t just dropped a bomb. “I know he’s sick talented, but there has to be some technique I can learn. I’ll sit in the corner and keep my mouth shut. I’ll take an oath of secrecy. He can cut my tongue out. Anything.”
By the time he was through, Gin wished she had a wing to take him under. How the hell did Lex withstand all that earnestness? “Have you told Lex any of this?”
“All of it, and he pats me on the head and tells me I’ll be fine and ditches me every time.”
Dammit. Why couldn’t he sound sullen and resentful instead of wounded? Sympathy nosed ahead of her reluctance just enough to win a concession she’d probably regret later. “He’s hard to turn around once he makes up his mind, but not impossible.”
Matt lit up like a searchlight.
She tried to dial down his wattage before he wasted too much energy. “It can’t be done overnight, though. Go visit your folks. I’ll work on him, and maybe he’ll bring you in later. I’m not promising anything.”
He didn’t dim one bit at the warning. “If he tells you no, I’ll know he really means no and never ask him again.”
If Lex said no, he could break the news to Matt himself because no way was she going to be the one to crush his spirit.
Piper squeezed her man and beamed extra premature gratitude toward Gin. “If I give you a hand in the kitchen, will you tell me about the movie? I’ll die of curiosity if I have to wait to see it in the theater.”
Gin seized the distraction. “I could give you a summary, or you could watch it.”
Piper squealed behind her hands and bounced in Matt’s lap.
“It won’t look or sound like a finished movie,” Gin cautioned.
“That’s what’s great about it!” Excitable hands fluttered. “Our own special screening! And then we get to see it again when you’re finished and Lex adds his magic. Can we have popcorn?”
When Piper’s chatter rose to a level capable of penetrating the thick glass, Lex took it as a sign Gin had emerged from her office. The urge to seek her out and get his fix returned.
He sank lower in the chair instead. Time to find out who to talk to about putting him on a leash. “Security has taken lessons in being unobtrusive since the last time I was around.”
Ethan’s breath hissed between his teeth. “Security and the FBI and a bunch of therapists finally convinced Gin that Fogle was a once-in-a-lifetime event. In the absence of another active threat,” he recited as if reading from an official statement, “it’s unnecessary to maintain a security detail and bad for the asset’s mental health to live her whole life like she’s under siege.”
The darkness that had been peaceful at the beginning of that speech took on menacing qualities by the end. Monsters could be lurking in the shadows, hidden from those who lived in the light, watching and waiting for an opportunity to pounce. “There’s no one keeping an eye on her?”
“Nope.” Ethan didn’t sound nearly alarmed enough to suit Lex. “I wasn’t thrilled about it at first, either.”
“But you’re thrilled now?” Lex knew the accusation was ridiculous, but damned if he could think of another explanation why Ethan and Maisie would allow this to happen. Women who didn’t get recognized every time they stepped out in public were in danger of attracting the attention of a nutjob. Gin — child star, Hollywood powerhouse, outspoken advocate for causes nutjobs tended to oppose — was bait, but because some idiot at the FBI decided protecting her was unnecessary, everybody packed up their traps and left her chained in the open to be feasted upon.
“Hey, I’d feel better with a dozen former Navy SEALs surrounding her, too, but Gin’s relieved they’re gone. She always worried someone would get killed because of her.”
Of course Gin would want to protect the people trained and paid to protect her. Her refusal to leave them unfed or out in the elements was the reason they’d always been underfoot, like rescued cats with guns. Every single one of them looked at Lex like he was the scum of the earth, inspiring his confidence in their ability to identify threats to Gin’s well-being.
Now they were gone, and her vulnerability made his guts knot.
Ethan had the first bedroom, Matt and Piper the one across the hall from Lex. The tour hadn’t included space for Gin. “Where’s she sleeping?”
“Room behind the kitchen. She likes her solitude.”
She was a twin; solitude was unnatural to her. What she liked was not waking up anyone else when she had night terrors.
Ethan reached between the chairs to bump his knuckles against Lex’s arm. “I didn’t mean to freak you out. Bob didn’t skimp on the alarm system. You don’t have to hover over her in the house.”
From one professional word manipulator to another, the lie about not freaking him out was as blatant as the hint about the circumstances under which he should freak out. “Does she still run in the morning?”
“First light.”
Lex’s whole body groaned at the prospect of pounding the pavement after days of confinement in a car and what was sure to be a restless night. “I’d better turn in, then.”
“We can split the dawn detail.” Ethan ruined the magnanimous offer by adding, “I’ve been here five days already, though.”
“It would have been less vicious to smash my face into the railing.”
He left Ethan laughing on the deck.
The scent of popcorn greeted him when he opened the sliding door. The TV mounted above the mantel showed Olivia reuniting with Tambara Zakari, the actress playing her sister. Matt and Piper were fused into the same chair, their attention stuck on the screen rather than each other for a change.
Gin curled in the corner of the L-shaped sofa, where she could unobtrusively observe her focus group, aiming only an occasional glance toward the screen to correlate their reactions with the film.
Lex leaned his elbows on the back of the couch. Under his breath, he asked, “Isn’t popcorn off limits?”
Her hushed reply brought to mind more intimate conversations than theater whispers. “They’re not initiated into the grain-free club yet.”
She offered him a little bowl of cashews suitable for card-carrying members.
He wasn’t hungry — he never was — but it had been a long time since Gin last wanted to share anything with him, so he accepted a nut.
On the television, the sister’s abusive husband made his first appearance. Lex studied the actor’s face, his clothes, his mannerisms, trying to pinpoint what made his character so loathsome even before his violent tendencies came out. As far as he could tell, it was the perfect Nice Guy act.
As the scene played out, the primitive part of his brain struggled to articulate his apprehension. The next time Olivia and Tambara shared the screen, the explanation clicked. It wasn’t the husband — it was the way the women reacted to him. Uncharmed by his good looks and warm words. Shying away from his touch. Watching him like wary prey keeping a predator in view. They knew he was the bad guy and told the viewer without a single word of dialogue.
Awe. No other word described how impressed he was with Gin’s ability to transfer an idea from her head to his so smoothly, his understanding seemed like intuition. She crafted every word, every gesture, every camera angle, and in the end, it was the viewer who felt like a genius for comprehending what had been spelled out a thousand different ways.
His fingers brushed the bottom of the bowl. He’d left only a few grains of salt for Gin. In his typical selfish fashion, share once again meant all mine. “Let me get you a refill.”
She shook her head and returned the empty bowl to the cradle of her legs, more interested in Matt and Piper than a snack.
Lex took advantage of her distraction to look his fill. In profile, the curve of her forehead echoed the slope of her nose. Her upper lip protruded slightly past the lower one. The tender ho
llows beneath her eyes collected violet shadows. He knew the hills and valleys of her face by heart, a landscape that used to feel like home.
He’d let addiction lead him away, and now he was just another gawking tourist.
She turned her head and caught him staring. “Are you sick of it already?”
“Never.” A second too late, he realized she was talking about the movie, not her face. He didn’t have to backpedal, since the answer applied either way. If not for the woman competing for his attention, he’d be as rapt an audience for his third viewing as Matt and Piper were for their first. Gin had been living with this movie day and night for the better part of a year, though. “Do you ever get tired of watching it?”
“Do you get tired of playing the same twenty songs night after night?”
“Excruciatingly.” Every show, he struck a fan favorite from the set list at the last minute and replaced it with a cover of another artist’s song to break up the monotony. “But I’ve seen all your movies twenty times, and they never get old.”
“I’ve seen you on stage at least twice that. The last was as exciting as the first. Boredom depends on which seat you’re watching from.” She rested her head on the back of the couch, near enough to his arm to serve as a painful reminder that she no longer used him as a pillow. “My media load will be ramping up soon. I’m looking for inspiration from these youngsters for something new to say.”
It was wrong to think of them as kids when they were knocking down adult milestones he’d never been close to, but he felt too damn old to put them in his peer group. “I don’t remember ever being that young.”
“I’ve seen your baby pictures. You never were.”
She scrunched her face in a fair approximation of the grim dissatisfaction with life evident from the first photo taken of him in the delivery room. An experienced eye would have recognized even then the face of someone destined to turn to chemical substitutes for happiness.
That old, cynical expression remained consistent into adulthood whenever he had a camera shoved in his face. The only exceptions were a couple of selfies with Gin that caught him smiling. He barely recognized the happy man with her in his arms and envied that bastard’s eternal suspension in those moments without the weight of addiction, lies, and fear of discovery dragging on his face.