After a few minutes, I lead her to our bedroom, where I strip her bare and worship her body with my mouth.
“You’re everything to me,” I say, twirling my tongue around her nipple.
“You are my past, my present, and my future,” I whisper into her inner thigh.
“You are all that matters,” I promise her before sucking on her clit.
Once I’ve sated her with my tongue, I push inside her with our eyes locked. I force myself to keep my eyes open despite the pleasure coursing between our bodies. She must need the connection too, because her eyes never wander.
“You are the best thing that ever happened to me,” she whispers.
I want to respond, but she climaxes soon after. The pulsing of her center sends me over the edge, and I spill into her with ecstasy in my body and love in my heart.
Afterward, she lies in my arms and falls asleep. I hope I was able to show her how loved she is.
The sun is falling in the sky and I flip my page, waiting for Lilah to come back out so we can decide about dinner.
The sliding doors open behind me. “I’m going to run out for a while.”
I turn away from the ocean view to see Lilah stepping out of the sliding doors. “Where are you headed?”
“I’m meeting Mina in the city. She wants to discuss what my next steps are, if there are any.”
I sit up from the lounger and place my feet on either side. “You’ve decided to go back to work?”
She shrugs. “I’m not sure. We’re going to discuss it.”
Up until now, she’s told me she has no interest in returning to modeling. What changed?
“Okay. I’ll come with you and then we can grab dinner?”
“No, I’m good to go on my own. I’ll call you on the way back. It’ll be late, but maybe I’ll stop at that Thai place you love and bring some home for us as a late-night snack and we can watch a movie or something?”
I sit back and stare at her. The last thing I want is to pressure her. At the Al Anon meeting I went to, they said I can’t control Lilah and shouldn’t try. “Yeah, okay, sounds good.”
“Great.” She smiles, but it’s not the one I’ve seen since she returned from rehab. In fact, she’s as cagey as she was when she used.
“Are you sure everything is okay?” I ask.
“Promise,” she says.
“Pinkie promise?” I hold out my hand with my pinkie finger extended.
The anxiety churning in my gut has reached a boiling point. I need to know she’s okay, that we’re okay, and she would never lie to me on a pinkie promise. It may have started as a silly game between kids, but it’s developed into a solemn vow—one I know neither of us would ever break.
Leaning in, she places a chaste kiss on my lips before cupping my face and meeting my gaze. “I love you.” She hooks her pinkie finger to mine.
She withheld the words for so long that every time she says she loves me, it’s a precious gift. A morsel of relief eases some of the tension racking my body.
“I love you too. Always.”
Rather than love reflected back at me, her blue eyes shine with sadness.
“I’ll call you,” she says and heads back into the house to leave.
I watch her until she’s out of sight.
Why can’t I shake the feeling that the perfect future I envision is about to be ripped away?
Chapter Forty
LIlah
After the movie premiere, Bernie’s secretary called the next day to set up a meeting for the following week. A helluva lot sooner than I’m prepared for.
Keeping the secret from Jimmy that I’m meeting with Bernie almost put me in a tailspin, but it’s time for me to be the strong one in our relationship.
I enter the lobby of the building all the studio executives work in, make my way through security, and get into the elevator, where I hit the button for the top floor. I step off the elevator, and in my Esperanza heels and sundress, I approach the reception desk. A young blonde who looks as though she could be my sister is packing up her bags and shutting down her computer.
“You must be Lilah,” she says.
“I am.”
“Mr. Butler is expecting you. You can go right in. His door is at the end of the hall.”
“Thanks.” I smile and head down the hall.
Most offices are dark, and everyone I pass in the hallway has their jacket on, their bags on their shoulders. As I draw near his office, my footsteps are the only sound—besides my thundering heartbeat. I feel as though I’m walking toward the gates of hell. God knows evil lurks there.
I knock on his door.
“Yeah.”
I twist the handle and poke my head in. “Hi, I’m a little early, I know.”
He puts down the stack of papers he’s riffling through and turns to face me. “Come on in.” He waves me in. “Close the door behind you.”
The hairs on the back of my neck spring to attention, but I shove away my unease. The door was closed when I arrived.
I close the door, then I turn to make my way over to his desk and find his eyes glued to my ass. That gut feeling inside me says something is off, but with a tentative smile, I sit in the chair across from him. He looks at me with a grin, saying nothing. I wiggle in my seat, allowing my eyes to focus anywhere but on him.
“So… what did you want to discuss with me today?”
His lascivious gaze roams up my body one more time. “I got a call a few weeks back from a woman who claims she’s James’s mother.”
My stomach flips, and my eyes scan for the nearest trash can. I’d forgotten all about her. Last I knew, Jimmy hadn’t heard anything from her since he paid her off. “Well, that’s crazy. As you know, Jimmy, er… James’s mom died.”
He quirks his lips into an expression to say, is she really? “Whoever this lady is, she had some interesting things to say.” He leans back in his chair and steeples his fingers in front of him.
“I’m sure she did since she’s a complete loon. I can assure you, James’s mom died.” My heart pounds with the lie.
“She said James isn’t the The Regulator he’s playing in the movie. He was a drug dealer throughout high school—”
“Well, that’s funny since his real mom wasn’t even around then.” My defense of Jimmy comes as second nature to me.
Bernie shrugs. “People talk. She said she’s back in whatever hick town it is you two are from.”
I cross my legs, and his eyes fall to the movement. His Adam’s apple bobs and his eyes flicker back up to me.
“Don’t you find it convenient that a woman claiming to be his mom calls at the same time the movie that’s going to propel his career is due to release? You’re a smart man, Bernie.” Part of me feels slimy from going back to my old mind games, but they worked well when I was trying to score, back in the day.
He huffs. “I did find it very suspicious at first. I didn’t even accept her calls until she used the word blackmail.”
“So you paid her?” At this point, I stop arguing that the woman isn’t Jimmy’s mom.
“Fuck no.” He stands and looks out through his window. “She can try to blackmail me all she wants. She’s right though… having this kinda shit come out right before the movie’s release could tank it. James’s mom is smart, even with only the fourth-grade education you guys get in the mountains.” He turns to face me with a leer that makes my skin crawl.
“I told her she can go fuck herself. That I’d drag her through court for extortion and take whatever measly scraps she has left from the money James paid her—yes, she told me about that. When I was done with her, she seemed to get the point.” His pupils glitter with menace, almost as if he gets off on this sort of thing.
“She’s a lying psychopath.”
His eyes land on me again. “Let’s stop the charade. I’m not an idiot and I’ve been in this business a long time. The lady who called me is James’s mom.” There’s certainty in his voice.
I
swallow, trying to coat my dry mouth. “You don’t know the whole story. She doesn’t deserve—”
He holds up his hand. “Stop fighting and just say thank you.”
“Th-thank you.” My voice is shaky with surprise. “If you took care of it, why am I here?”
I tense as he slinks around the desk and comes to stand in front of me. “Just wait, I’m not done.”
I shift in my seat to face him, craning my head back to meet his gaze.
“I can’t afford to have any surprises upend this movie, so I had my PI do a little digging of his own. The upbringing you and James had… well, pathetic is the best word. Not surprising why you ended up a hot mess.”
Fear thickens my blood until it’s like sludge pushing through my veins.
No, no, no.
If someone is poking around in our past, they might find out about that night.
My breathing becomes shorter and faster. I don’t think he knows—how could he? But if he continues to dig around, he will.
I attempt to keep a lightness in my voice. “There’s nothing to find there except poor people who have no idea there’s a world outside of theirs and some cheap moonshine.”
He pounds his fist on the table. “Stop acting like I’m an idiot!”
I slide as far back as I can in the seat, gritting my teeth. “What do you want?”
I’m not here to help him protect Jimmy. I know a shakedown when I see one.
“How about a drink?” His anger dissipates, and he walks over to his small bar.
“I don’t drink.”
“Oh, that’s right. You’re really convincing the press. It’s funny, what with the whole fake relationship I had James and Adelaide put on, but maybe it’s your happily ever after that will sell my movie. I forgot how much the world loves a happily ever after.” He pours a hefty amount of scotch into his glass, looking back at me while he drops in an ice cube. “Then again, the press does love heartbreak just as much.”
I swallow the lump in my throat, my body falling to its old habit of fear. I stand from my chair, tightening my purse over my shoulder, preparing to leave. “Just tell me what you want.”
“Who says I want anything?” He wanders over to his leather couch and sits down, patting the spot next to him.
“You’re delusional.”
“Am I?”
I’m on the other side of the room, our eyes locked in a showdown until a hollow laugh falls from him.
“James—or Jimmy, right?”
I say nothing.
“He’s done a lot over the years to help you. I’d say he could have already hit it big if not for you. He’s sacrificed everything. You know what’s funny about small towns?”
My stomach gurgles and I grip the edge of the desk to hold myself up. I say nothing.
“Money is king. It wouldn’t cost a lot for my PI to find out everything there is to know about Lilah Robbie and James—or excuse me, Jimmy—Crawford. I can see the headline now.” His hands are in the air. “‘The Regulator sold drugs…’”
He pats the seat next to him.
I shake my head.
“You’re really on that whole staying clean and not letting every shithead-fuck-you-in-the-bathroom thing, huh? Good for you. How long do you think it’ll last? If I were a betting man—which I am,” he laughs again, “I’d say you wish you could score right now. Well, top drawer on the left.” His eyes shift to the drawer.
My eyes follow his.
“Come on, Lilah, grab the blow and let’s party.” He pats the leather seat again. “Oh, on second thought.” He opens a drawer in the table next to him, pulls out a baggie and tosses it on the circular table in front of him.
“No. Just tell me what you want. Money? I’ll get you some.”
His head falls back onto the edge of the couch. “Money? I’m the richest guy in this town.”
I could argue he’s not, but this isn’t the time.
He opens up the baggie, plucks a business card out of a holder on the table and divides it into six lines. My eyes don’t stray from the powder that would allow me to disappear from what’s happening in this room.
“Then what?”
He opens the drawer he got the coke from and pulls out an already rolled up hundred. Staring up at me, he snorts a line and holds the rolled bill out to me.
Another cynical laugh ruptures out of him. “Oh, that’s right, you’re sober now.”
I fight my bodies urge to rip that hundred out of his hand and inhale all five lines left. I close my eyes briefly, remembering Jimmy’s words, our future, why I won’t listen to the temporary craving of oblivion. “Can we move this along?”
“I used to think I wanted you out of James’s, or Jimmy’s, life.” He shoots me a condescending smile. “Prepared to pay you off maybe, but with this clean Lilah now? I’m not sure that’s the wisest choice.” He sips his scotch. “Come sit and we’ll talk.”
I don’t move, my eyes on the door. I’ve been in this position before, with dealers and the first man in my life who should have been protecting me. “You realize that if you bring Jimmy down, you’re only hurting your own studio. You’ve invested hundreds of millions in his film and if its star gets on the shit list, you’ll make zero money at the box office.”
Bernie stares at me blank-faced for a moment. I think that maybe I’ve gotten somewhere, but then he bursts out laughing. “You’re smarter than you look. Everything you say is true, but you forget that my studio can afford to lose money on this film. We’ve had a great year, and yeah, it would hurt our bottom line, but we’d recover. Besides, all the blame would fall on James’s head, not mine.” He opens his legs, leaning back on the couch. “When I want something, there’s nothing I won’t do to get it. Not to mention, I’m sure you’ve heard the saying bad press is better than no press.”
“You’re sick,” I spit at him, rage boiling.
“Maybe. Maybe not. The fact is, you have something I want.” His gaze takes a lecherous trip down my body and he leans over the lines of coke snuffing another line. “And I have something you want—to keep quiet about James’s past and to quit digging into it. You’re not going to let your savior fall when you could have prevented it, are you? After all he’s done for you?”
I step one foot forward.
“That a girl. Jimmy would be so proud. You actually doing something for him. All those meetings when he sat there at the end of the table like a pathetic love-sick boy who couldn’t walk away from someone self-destructing right before his eyes. Someone who didn’t love him. You didn’t love him, did you?”
“Yes, I did. I do.” My feet stop in front of the small table in front of the couch.
“Of course you did. Everyone around him tried to get him to leave you and he never did. Never wavered. Now it’s your choice to repay him. Or not.”
I sit on the couch.
I’m not fully settled on the couch before he leans in. The smell of his cologne brings bile up my throat. He runs his finger up my arm, and I swallow it back down.
“Just tell me,” I choke out.
“Do I really need to be more specific?” He slides closer.
The bile rises back up my throat when my eyes spot his erection tenting his pants. He brushes his hand over himself.
“You think I’m going to fuck you?”
“Yes, I do.” His forwardness knocks back my snarky self.
My dad was the same way. Took what he wanted regardless. He might have been the poorest man in our town, but he always took what he wanted from me.
“That’s what it will take? Me fucking you to not out Jimmy?”
“Yes.”
I turn my head away as memories of the girl hiding under her bed rush forward—the shame and dirtiness coating me like paint on my skin.
“I won’t sleep with you,” I say to the door.
“You will if you want your precious James to continue to work in this town. I can ruin anyone’s career with a few phone calls.”
&nb
sp; He allows his response to linger around us. My fists clench in my lap. He’s right. We both know it.
The phone next to him rings and I’m surprised when he picks up the receiver.
“Yeah.”
Another one of his twisted smiles forms. “Sure. Five minutes.”
I move to stand.
“Where are you going?” His hand takes mine and leads me back down on the couch.
“I thought…”
“Five minutes is long enough.”
I shake my head. “You’re kidding.”
“What sells headlines better than the latest heartthrob crashing down from stardom? I can see the magazine in ten years—‘Where is James Crawford now?’”
I whip my head around to meet his gaze.
All his hard work, all the sacrifices and the things he’s done would be for nothing.
Unshed tears burn my eyes, but I push them back. I will not show him weakness.
“I’m sure if I did some more digging, I could find even more fun facts about Hollywood’s good guy. Like I said, money gets a lot of information.”
Alarm bells blow in my head. No, if anyone found out about… no. That would change his life in catastrophic ways. One of my tears breaks past the dam and slips down my cheek. I open my mouth to speak, but I lose my voice.
He grabs my hand and covers his dick with it. “Don’t you want to repay him for all the times he saved you?” He undoes his belt and his pants.
He situates himself on the couch, his eyes falling to his dick, not shy about asking for what he wants. With tears falling, I drop down and let my purse slide from my shoulder to the floor.
Bernie pulls out his erect dick and strokes himself.
I squeeze my eyes shut. I’m doing this for Jimmy.
“Open your eyes, sweetheart, and suck back those tears. I want you to look like you’re enjoying it as you suck me.”
I flutter my eyes open, trying to calm my shaking body. His breathing becomes more and more labored.
“Let me see those gorgeous tits.”
His gaze is like acid burning my skin. I allow the numbness to seep in. It was always my best defense when I was young, and now it falls like a curtain over me. It offers a small amount of relief, keeping me one arm’s length separated from reality.
All We Were (Ex-Factor Duet Book 1) Page 21