The officer went through Kiegan’s story in more detail, then she thanked him and left.
“Couldn’t resist coming to see if I was ok, could you?” Kiegan teased when we were left alone, the only barrier between us and the chaos of a big city emergency room at 3am being a tiny cloth curtain on rails.
“I figured if you were dead I’d want to see the body for myself. You know, just to make sure.”
“Well, sorry to disappoint. I’m still here. You should want me alive anyway, I sign your paychecks after all.”
“True, I guess you do have some use to me still alive.”
“Besides,” he continued, reaching over and gently placing his hands on my hips, “I can think of another reason why you’d want me around besides my signature.”
I pulled away instantly, but not before I noticed my heart begin to race quicker in my chest.
“Nope, absolutely not. That was a mistake, and I’m going to pretend it never happened.”
Instead of the hurt reaction I imagined, Kiegan just grinned at me again.
“Whatever you say, sis. Now, what do you say we get out of here?”
Twenty minutes and a prescription for painkillers later Kiegan and I were sitting in one of the cars he’d ordered, two of us in a monstrous SUV, heading back to the hotel.
“Why did you do it?” I asked suddenly, breaking the silence that had been lingering between us.
“Do what?”
“Go down there and take on that guy.”
Kiegan just shrugged. “No one else was doing anything.”
“But that doesn’t make it your problem. I mean, the guy had a gun. You had nothing.”
“Except these guns,” Kiegan replied, flexing both arms, then flinching in pain as the bullet wound in his right arm evidently was not completely healed in an hour or so. I rolled my eyes in response. “I had the element of surprise on my side. That was enough.”
“Not quite enough, one of your guns is out of action for a while.”
“That’s true. But the girl’s alive.”
“What was he yelling about, anyway?”
“She left him, he didn’t want her to have a life if it wasn’t with him.”
“That’s so messed up.”
“What’s even more messed up is that there were at least three hundred people in that club. He could have been overpowered so easily, and yet not a single person decided to do anything about it.”
“Well, someone did,” I corrected.
“True. Still.”
“You’re going to get in trouble with the producers.”
“They can deal with it. Did you see the paparazzi when I was taken out in an ambulance?”
I shook my head. They must have all disappeared by the time I had left, I guess they figured no one important was left inside. They were right.
“My picture’s going to be on the front page of TMZ alright. The network people will live. And so will that girl. Way more important than any TV show.”
The car pulled into the hotel and I realized that as much as I thought Kiegan was an asshole, he had probably saved a girl’s life that night.
“See you in the morning. Don’t get hooked on the painkillers.”
“All the cool celebrities have a drug problem.”
“Painkillers aren’t a cool drug.”
“Good night, sis!”
And with that he took long strides to the stairs and made his way up to his room. I shook my head. We were on the 27th floor.
Chapter Fourteen
It took a while before I managed to get to sleep, the adrenaline coursing through my veins keeping me awake despite the fact that it was almost 5am by the time I got into my room.
I remembered just as I began to drift off to sleep that I had a meeting scheduled at ten, and decided that I’d earned a day to sleep in and blow off a meeting.
Unfortunately, two hours later my phone began to buzz. I saw the New York area code and picked up.
It turned out Good Morning America wanted Kiegan on their show. I told them I’d call them back, and hadn’t managed to even put the phone back down before it began ringing again.
I guess the news of what happened last night has gotten out, I thought to myself as I put my phone on silent and collapsed back into the bed. One advantage of my boss being a bit of a bad boy was I knew he wouldn’t care if I blew them off for a few hours. Besides, I’d gotten enough experience now to know that these talk shows wanted Kiegan on their show more than he wanted to go on them. I had the upper hand, and I knew it.
When I finally woke up for real, around 1 in the afternoon, I ordered room service and swore that I wasn’t going to leave the bed for the whole day.
I ate my scrambled eggs and bacon while idly watching a bit of TV and going through all the phone calls I’d missed. When I was finished I texted Leanne.
Hey, do you have the schedule for where Kiegan’s going to be for the next week or so?
The reply came in a minute later.
Nope. Everything’s up in the air now. We were supposed to be filming but can’t. What the hell happened last night?
Kiegan saved a girl’s life.
No shit, seriously?
Yeah, what’s the news saying?
He got shot in a club fight.