“Nah. Nothing like that. The leads are cold as ever, boss. This is a shitty distraction, but I'll take it. Work works miracles.”
I nod slowly. I decide not to press her, angrily digesting how impossible her case seems. The girl disappeared months ago. Snatched right under Skylar's nose while she was out with her sister, the mother. They think it's the asshole ex, the good-for-nothing sperm donor responsible for her, but nobody knows for sure.
Skylar's dead ends with the police and FBI are reason number one hundred why I took matters into my own hands, digging into Crown. You leave this kind of shit in the hands of the system, you might never get answers.
“Just be sure you're not running yourself ragged. I know what it's like, a fucked up personal situation, something with no clean end in sight.” I stop short of dumping more advice. She's smart enough to know I'm not following my own rules for life, being as mired as I am in the bad blood my old man left behind.
“I know you do,” she says quietly, sucking a few last dregs of coffee through the plastic lid loudly. “I also know you get it, boss. How a person can't let go. Even if it's one crappy thing after another, it keeps coming full circle, until there's an answer. Some closure. Something.”
I slap her shoulder, giving it a squeeze. “You'll have your something, Skylar. Soon as we're done with Miss Holly, let me put you down for some off time. Can't tell you not to spend your free days chasing every rabbit hole, trying to bring the kid home, but I hope you'll do something you actually enjoy for a few hours.”
She shrugs, staring blankly at her empty cup. “There's always coffee. Great for multi-tasking.”
It's so deadpan, so awkward, and so completely Skylar, I just laugh. “Let me get us both a new cup. Lord knows we could both fucking use it today.”
By the time the last show and afterparty end late on Saturday, I’m ready for home.
I might have to face the music with Reb and I’m not looking forward to the estimate on repairing the guest house, but it’s better than the stink of drunken, wet sex and stale champagne in the rooms under our watch.
I’ve just got to get Milah – Miss Holly, and just saying it makes me think of Dallas and makes my skin crawl – on her plane and then this is mercifully over.
Airport parking is a nightmare. Security, even worse with Milah throwing tantrums, alternating between bending over for the TSA agent with a slurring little giggle, and then demanding if these peasants know who she is.
It’s hard to stand stoic and stone-faced while she makes a complete spectacle of herself, but sooner or later we get her through check-in and to the boarding area. She's missing her private jet this time. Can't stand first class. I hear something about her having a lien on the old plane thanks to her year in rehab, which clearly did no good, and she never paid for.
We only have to stay until she’s on her flight, and they should be calling it any moment.
I’m ready to be gone and I’m about to tell my crew to pack up and get ready to head out, when I feel a hand on my arm.
I’m so keyed up and tired I flinch away instinctively, ducking out of reach. It’s an old military habit ingrained in me.
Don’t retaliate; just create defensive distance to assess the situation. And the situation I assess, right now, is a pair of wide blue eyes that perfectly fit the picture-perfect image Milah Holly projects to the media. The fake one where she's this innocent, leggy blonde Barbie with that whole sweetly-dirty schoolgirl thing going on.
And I’m not buying it for a second. Because by now I know everything that coy, mock-innocent smile hides.
I feel like a feral cat backed into a corner, and she hasn’t even said anything. But I know she wants something, and from the way she catches her tongue between her teeth and the way her eyes dip over me, it’s not hard to tell what it is.
“Listen, Landon.” She’s doing her baby-girl lisp, the same thing she peddles in front of the cameras. I’ve seen her practicing it in the mirror. It has no effect on me. “Since you’re working my Bay Area gig next week, too, sweetie, why don’t I stop by your place before we set up? I can’t think of any place in the whole wide world safer than with you. Oh, and I'd so love to relax on the coast for a bit.”
I stare at her flatly. I have to be professional, but for a moment, it takes all my willpower to keep my face as neutral as possible.
“I don’t know how safe my place is,” I deflect. “Reese told you about the fire, didn't he?”
She lets out a fluttery, false little laugh. “Who cares? It’ll be fiiine. Lightning never strikes the same place twice.”
I choose not to correct her.
I also choose to keep my goddamn paycheck, even if it’s starting to feel like it comes at the cost of my integrity. All of it. I grit my teeth, but force myself to nod. I'll let her interpret what that means.
I also remind myself this is part of the gig, and she can’t possibly be serious.
She’s probably still coked out of her mind. Or buzzed from her morning diet of mimosas and toaster waffles – go figure.
So much that she won’t even remember this tomorrow.
I can only hope.
Hope, and signal my crew to get on the move so I can escape this hell and get home as soon as possible.
9
Homecoming (Kenna)
It hasn’t been a half-bad day of writing.
Maybe all I really needed was a little fresh sea air. I’ve spent most of the day plotting story structure, but I think I’ve got a good framework for working out the basic pacing and character development.
More, though, I’ve got the framework and peace of mind to figure out how I’m going to deal with Landon when he comes back.
I’ve just got to stand my ground. I wouldn’t be able to respect myself if I did anything else.
I’m perched at the kitchen island with a cat in my lap and another on the counter, chewing on the cap of my idle pen, when a rustling sound catches my attention from outside. It doesn’t really penetrate at first.
Just the wind in the bushes lining the house in neatly trimmed lines, I think, until there’s a sharp crack!
Like a twig snapping. I look up quickly.
A black silhouette straight out of a nightmare looks back at me, standing at the kitchen window and staring in.
I nearly scream like a baby and fly out of my skin, while my bladder shimmies up inside me in a tight knot.
The cats take off like bats out of hell. I scramble off the barstool, stumbling back a step, desperate to remember where the nearest intercom is and how to work it, but when I look again that dark shape is gone.
Of course, it's gone.
It was a man. No mistaking it.
A man in a hoodie and dark glasses.
Had I imagined it? No, there's no way he could've moved that fast.
I skitter toward the door and yank it open, peering outside, first up one side of the house and then down the other.
Nothing. Nada. No one in sight.
I taste my own fear, bitter in the back of my throat. Maybe it was just a flasher on my eyes, imprinted after staring at the page for so long. I take another step out, turning slowly, looking toward the drive, then toward the back of the house, scanning one step at a time and –
– and nearly collide with the tall, looming shape suddenly there, hovering over me, large and menacing and silent.
This time, I do scream, stumbling backward, my heart a jackhammer that's about to make me pass out from the shock.
“Who are you?!” I demand, scrabbling for the kitchen door.
I’ve got to get inside, get to the security panel, hit the police button. He says nothing, only watching me in grim silence; I can barely see the shadow of his lips beneath his hood. “Answer me!”
He stays silent. Tall, imposing, and creepy as hell.
But then he takes a slow, purposeful step forward, startling me into scrambling back so quickly that suddenly the door is out of my reach. He's blocking my path, closing me off from safety.
Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.