Chapter Eleven
Winter sat back on her chair between Garrett and Sebastian. After a week, she was more used to Sebastian’s mousy long brown hair. It helped that tonight he had tied it back so she could see his normal eyes.
“Done?” Garrett asked.
“He’s tapping the barrel now. It only cost an extra thirty dollars.” She grimaced and shrugged. “Better than running dry, especially right now.”
“How did you know he had a whole barrel stashed back there, anyway?” Garrett asked.
“He was lying when we were asking about his supplies, the other day,” Winter told him. “My ankle was brushed up against his at the time.”
“You can read people with your ankle?”
“Any touch,” Winter told him. “Flesh to flesh. Even a fingertip will do.”
Garrett shook his head a little. “What are you? I’ve never met anyone like you.”
Winter tried to keep her smile professional and calm for anyone watching them. That included Sebastian, who sat out of human earshot and therefore couldn’t react as if he could hear every word they could say, but was probably listening anyway. “I don’t know what I am,” she told Garrett. “Nathaniel has never met anyone like me, either. I guess that makes me a freak. I won the gene mutation lottery.”
Sebastian got up from the other end of the long table where he was sitting alone, the geeky nerd who had made no friends all week, but was suddenly everyone’s best friend as soon as they had computer problems. He stretched and sauntered casually up the length of the table to where Winter and Garrett sat and stood next to her, looking down into his cup of beer. “You’re not a freak,” he said softly. “If I hear that word come out of your mouth ever again in association with your talents, I’ll slap you silly.” He spared a glance at her. His sea-green eyes glittered with dammed-back emotion. “And it won’t be foreplay.”
Winter struggled to keep her face neutral. “Would you like to join us?” she asked, more loudly for the sake of human ears all around them.
“Please do,” Garrett added stiffly. “I don’t think I’ve had a chance to introduce you, Annette.”
“We met back in L.A.,” Winter reminded him. “Very briefly. Terry had to take care of the generator and server trailers.” She smiled up at Sebastian. “I’m incredibly in awe of the fact that you can produce a working hot spot out here in the middle of nowhere. It’s making my job so much easier.”
Sebastian shrugged and sat down awkwardly, in an uncoordinated and clumsy way that was utterly unlike his usual graceful movements, but was completely in character for the geeky Terry she had watched silently lurking about the set all week, nursing his Internet server inside the climate-controlled trailer and babying the power generator devoted to keeping it running day and night.
He put his beer on the table, sloshing some of it, then grabbed the cup and almost knocked it over. He steadied the cup with both hands, then kept them around the cup for a few seconds as if he expected the cup to run away if he let it go more quickly than that.
He propped his head on one elbow, then realized he was sitting at the table with the Calum Garrett and dropped his hand and straightened up, rubbing his palms on his jeans. He reached for the beer in a convulsive nervous jerk, then clearly decided against risking spilling it for a second time and put his hand back in his lap. He cleared his throat and looked down at the rough wooden surface of the tabletop.
“Computers are easy,” he muttered.
Garrett watched his bumbling with the beginnings of a smile that he tried manfully to suppress. He cocked his head. “Easy for you, perhaps. As long as they behave themselves, I can get what I need out of them but as soon as they misbehave, I’m utterly screwed. And computers seem to delight in misbehaving as soon as it’s most important to you, have you noticed?”
Winter nodded. “I knew a guy – another gee—” She stopped herself, realizing that Terry might find being described a geek offensive. Sebastian, on the other hand, took ownership of the label and wore it with pride. “Another computer whizz,” she amended. “He said that computers always crashed and burned just when you needed them because the average user didn’t know how to take care of their computers, so when they really needed them, they invariably overloaded them – too many programs, too many files, too many conflicting commands at the same time. So the poor, overworked and underfed computer goes belly-up and the user points to the crash and says ‘there, it wiped out just when I needed it.’ But what they really should be saying is ‘There, it wiped out because I really needed it.’”
Garrett raised a brow. “He could be right. I hadn’t thought of it that way.”
Sebastian snorted. “Your friend sounds like an idiot.” He glanced at Garrett. “I mean, I’m sorry. It’s just a dumb theory.”
Garrett shrugged. “Everyone is entitled to their own opinions.” He glanced around the room.
Winter wondered who he was looking for. All of the eighteen or twenty long tables were occupied by cast and crew, and there were plenty of them. These were the semi-permanent members. Each day saw busloads of daily extras dropped off just after dawn to be processed for hair, make-up and costuming, before filming started at seven. The set was very large scale indeed.
Garrett’s gaze settled briefly on the table where Patrick Sauvage was holding audience. The largest group of people crowded around this table. It appeared that even the jaded insiders of movieland were not immune to Sauvage’s box office appeal. He was holding court and Winter couldn’t see him for all the people standing around him.
Somewhere in that group sat Nial, playing his role as Sauvage’s body guard babysitter.
“Patrick seems to have settled in well,” Winter observed.
Garrett gave a very small smile. “He’s in his natural element. A universe that centres on him.”
“Isn’t he your friend?”
Garrett’s smile didn’t change. “That just means I know him a little better than most.”
“You don’t know him well?”
“No one knows Patrick Sauvage well. Not even Patrick.”
Movement from the corner of her eye drew Winter’s focus. She looked up.
Like metal filings to a magnet, people were standing up and snagging Kate Lindenstream’s attention as she moved across the barn-like room. From her direction it looked like she was heading either for the bar or the washrooms, but she was making slow progress toward either, for every few steps she took, she was waylaid by someone else stopping her for a few words.
Winter watched a while, her admiration building, for Kate’s smile stayed firmly in place and not a hint of frustration or impatience showed in her expression or body language. Given the week that Kate had been handed, with the knotty problems Winter had seen her handle, the massive scale project she was coordinating and the lack of sleep she had to be suffering, it was amazing she was still standing upright. And tonight was supposed to be her downtime, too.
Winter turned back to Garrett and saw he was watching Kate, too. His expression was odd. Hard to categorize.
“Do you want to speak to her?” Winter asked, her voice very soft. She knew Garrett would be able to hear her, while the humans sitting at the tables next to them would not.
She glanced back at Kate, who had extricated herself from her current conversation and had finally reached the ladies’ washroom.
“I have Nial’s timetable to maintain. I’m falling behind.” His tone was sour.
“Trust can’t be rushed. He knows that. And with Kate, if you push it…” She didn’t bother finishing the sentence. Garrett was smart.
Sebastian leaned forward. “Although, if you’re deadlocked, as you say you are…” he said, just as softly as Winter.
“It’s been a week and her anger hasn’t cooled. Roman is feeding it.” Garrett shrugged.
“Then you need a dam breaker. Something to open her up and let it out. She’s not seeing you as you. She’s just seeing you as the object of all her problems. Her favourite punching bag. Change that.”
Garrett shook his head. “One thing I’ve learned about humans. They don’t change. Not really. On the surface they give the appearance of change, but down deep, they cling to their old ways. Life is too short for them to adjust.”
“You don’t have to change anything about her but her perspective,” Winter replied. “She just has to look at you differently.”
“Christ, how long is it since you seduced a woman, anyway?” Sebastian asked in an undertone.
“What has this got to do with seduction?” Garrett shot back.
“You’re trying to win her trust. It’s a seduction,” Sebastian said flatly.
“She’s human,” Garrett responded.
“So?” Winter asked, puzzled.
Sebastian leaned even closer toward Garrett. “Get used to that fact real fast, Garrett, and sweep her off her fucking feet or this whole show will be over and we can all go home and let the Pro Libertatis control the rest of our lives. You might find the idea of getting cozy with humans distasteful, but I’m betting Roman doesn’t.”
Garrett’s features tightened. “You’re quite the bastard, aren’t you?”
“When I need to be,” Sebastian agreed. “Nial has more empathy and patience for your archaic attitude, but I’m damned if I’m going to sit here and let you whine about humans a nanosecond longer. You’re being a hypocrite. You want to join the human race again, then join it properly and stop bellyaching.”
Winter let her gaze switch between the pair of them as they glared at each other, while she frantically sorted out the meanings and implications that had just spilled onto the table.
“Who is Roman?” she asked softly, the one fact she couldn’t couple up without more information.
Sebastian sighed and sat back, hunching down and into his role as an introverted geek. Winter watched Garrett, the one who was under the most pressure. He would give her the answer if she let the silence stretch long enough.
His gaze cut away from hers. Away and across the room. She followed the direction of his look.
Adrian Xerus, the man who was rumoured to be Kate’s boyfriend and living in her trailer, while he seemed to have no discernable role on the set, was standing by one of the big squared pillars, a Solo cup in his hand, the other pushed deep in the pocket of his jeans, watching everyone with his suspicious brooding gaze.
Roman.
Winter caught her breath as the last pieces of this small puzzle fell into place. Roman kept poisoning Kate against Garrett. He was in Kate’s bed. Sebastian had just implied that Garrett and Roman had a past.
If ‘Adrian’ was his alias, the chances were good Roman was vampire.
“Does she know what he is?” she asked Garrett.
He had been on the verge of standing up, she realized.
He hesitated. “No, probably not. Roman didn’t tell any of his wives.”
Winter felt her mouth opening all by itself and a cold lump forming in her chest. “He married humans and never told them?”
“It was the way of it, Winter,” Sebastian said softly. “Secrecy was how we survived.”
She shook her head. “I’m sorry I thought badly of you, Garrett. Perhaps you had it right in the first place. No relationships with humans at all is far better than duping them.” She could feel her mouth turning down in disgust.
Sebastian gripped her thigh. Hard. “This is not the time or the place for such a discussion. Garrett, Kate just emerged and she’s heading outside.” He shifted his chin sideways, indicating over Garrett’s shoulder.
Garrett turned, making it casual. Winter looked to her left. Kate was just disappearing through the swing doors that let onto the euphemistically-named beer garden – a fenced-off piece of dried out dirt decorated with a few plastic barbecue tables and faded umbrellas.
“And Roman isn’t by her side,” Garrett added. “A nice change.” He stood up and looked at Sebastian. “Give me fifteen minutes with her, hmm?”
Sebastian glanced at Roman. “Sure.” He seemed confident that he could keep Roman at bay for at least fifteen minutes, if not longer, which sounded odd, coming from the man hunched up on his bench like he might get picked on by the local tough boys at any second.
Winter held her smile back. “You big strong geek, you,” she murmured.
“I slaughter them in Assassin’s Creed,” he replied with a superior tone, as Garrett strolled casually away.
Winter wrinkled her brow. “Is that some sort of game?”
He looked highly offended. “It’s only the best game around, like, ever.”
She bit her lip. “It’s a real game, isn’t it?”
He managed to look even more offended. “Of course it’s a real game! Look—” He launched into a long explanation of the game’s storyline, which included a history of assassins, the middle ages, then tottered off into the realms of fantasy. Winter got lost in minutes and began to nod in all the right places, mentally asleep. Sebastian actually played this stuff? When did he fit it in? He had to sleep these days, just as she did, although not for as long as she did.
He was sipping beer as he spoke and half-way through a sentence, he flung his arms wide. Presumably to explain some dimension or the, like, total awesomeness of some feature of the game.
His cup was still in his hand and the beer – most of a cup’s worth – doused Roman/Adrian as he passed by the table, which sat on the edge of the major corridor through the room.
Sebastian bounced to his feet, stumbling, to stand in front of him as he paused, looking down at the beer dripping down his jeans and onto his shoes, holding his hands out from his sides, disbelief painting itself on his face.
“Jeez, man, I’m so s-sorry. I forgot I was holding my beer. Jeez, this is embarrassing.”
Roman lifted his head and glared at him. “You forgot?” he repeated, his tone dry. Winter didn’t blame him. She wouldn’t have believed Sebastian either.
Roman glanced at her and his eyes narrowed as he looked back at Sebastian. “You’re the computer jerk,” he said, plucking his sodden tee-shirt away from his chest.
“Ah, yeah. I guess that’s me.” Sebastian scratched at his hair and gave a bashful grin.
Roman nodded. “You’re working for Garrett, then.”
“Guilty. Say, man, can I get you some clean clothes or something?” Sebastian waved his hand at Roman’s jeans. Most of one hip had taken the bulk of the beer, and his tee-shirt had soaked up the rest.
“Well, we’ve established you’re guilty about one thing,” Roman replied. “If I hadn’t been watching you as I walked past the table and known your head never moved to sight me, I’d swear you were guilty of dumping this on me, too.” He scowled. “So if you’ll just let me by, we’ll call it even.”
“Hey, I can’t let you go without apologizing properly, man!”
Roman’s scowl darkened. “Get out of my way or I’ll move you out of the way myself.” He paused and smiled. “You’ll really wish you’d moved under you own steam, believe me.”
* * * * *
Kate found the darkest corner of the enclosed yard they dared to call a garden, where lights from the bar didn’t spill out through the fly-spotted windows. She pulled a plastic chair over from the nearest table and sat down with a sigh of relief as her feet throbbed and tingled. She had been on them all day, she realized.
The noise from inside was mildly muted out here and in the way of the dessert, it was one of those nights that had suddenly turned cool for no rhyme or reason. The touch of cold air on her face was refreshing. It was cool enough that she would need to head back inside soon, but for now, solitude was more attractive.
“Kate.”
She sighed and looked toward the door, knowing already who she would see. Garrett stood six paces away from the door.
“You’re fucking lousy at reading signals, Garrett. Everyone else can figure out when I want to be alone. Even Adrian got it.”
“Oh, I got it,” he replied. “But I’ve been waiting for a moment when Adrian wasn’t attached to your hip. This is the first time that’s happened all week, so I’m ruining your meditation moment because I won’t go another week waiting for an opportunity.”
She bit her lip. Had Adrian really been shadowing her that closely? “What have you got to say to me that Adrian couldn’t hear?” she demanded.
“He doesn’t like me.”
She laughed. “It’s a big club.”
Garrett moved forward, until he was immersed in the same shadows as she. “I don’t think you dislike me. Not really.” His voice was a lot closer now. Quieter. Pitched only for her to hear. “You’re just pissed at me.”
“No shit, Sherlock.”
“Don’t you think this temper tantrum has gone on long enough? It’s not like you. I think Adrian is responsible for most of it.”
Kate opened her mouth to speak. Twice. Then shut it again. There was truth in what he said but she couldn’t agree with him, because it would give away her game plan. Their game plan. Adrian was a co-conspirator, no argument. But was she pushing the display of temper beyond reason?
“What you did was unforgiveable,” she told him. “You threatened my picture.”
“I used it as leverage. There’s a world of difference and you understand that difference as well as me. You’ve been playing finance with the big boys for years. Why are you insisting on pouting about it? You bluffed. I counter bluffed and you caved. We made a deal. So let’s move on. It’s just business.”
True. But she would go to hell before admitting it aloud to him. Normally, she would be sharpening her financial knives, looking for a vulnerable spot to use for payback, instead of all this posturing and, well, pouting. But the pouting had been serving a purpose. Apparently, that purpose had reached the end of its useful half-life. Garrett was right. Too much more of it would be out of character for her.
Kate gave a half shrug. “Normally, I would agree with you, DoveAngel, but you made this more than business, didn’t you?”
Silence. He stood there in the shadows, not speaking. Kate realized she had caught him by surprise.
He moved over to the nearest table and snagged another chair. He placed it two feet away from hers. “I’m not staying,” he assured her as he sat on it. “I just don’t want to stand over you when I talk.” He leaned forward. Because of his extra few inches of height, he caught the light from the window. It lit his face indirectly, casting shadows across it. His eyes were highlighted, though.
He let out a breath that she could hear quite clearly. “There’s only so many times I can apologize for the Twitter thing and I’ve filled the quota already.”
“I’m not looking for an apology. But you’re expecting me to shrug it off and deal with you like it never happened.”
“I was a faceless person on the internet who couldn’t sleep, just like you.” His voice was low, and just like that day in The Standard, Kate thought she could hear Scottish lilt in his tone. “Are you trying to make me feel guilty by pretending it meant something to you?”
Confusion gripped her. It could only have lasted a second or two, but it seemed to ebb and surge through her in waves as Kate tried to honestly answer – at least in her own mind, first – exactly how she felt about the long distance relationship she had enjoyed with DoveAngel for all those weeks, now she knew who he really was. She hadn’t considered it before now. Garrett’s legal goons and her movie had so thoroughly taken up her attention.
“You really know how to milk Twitter, by the way,” Garrett added. “I’ve never seen anyone get so much PR mileage out of it like you do. If I hadn’t been trying to keep my own Twitter identity private, I would have had my entire Communications department following you as a good example.”
She jumped. A little. “It’s a quick distraction, late at night. I don’t look at it as PR. It’s just talking.”
He grinned. “Like that argument you had with the guy about Constantinople’s main street?”
Kate laughed. “The moron. And he said he was a professor of history!” The so-called professor of history had insisted that the main street in Constantinople had been called Constantine’s Way, when in fact the main street had never been named at all. Kate had been happy to quote references and experts, but the guy had been bombastic in his opinion and blind to the laughter around him.
“There, you’re smiling again,” Garrett said softly.
Her amusement faded. “You really get off on manipulating people, don’t you?”
“It was meant in kindness.”
“Doesn’t mean you’re not doing it.”
“Why does relinquishing control, even for something positive, bother you so much?”
Kate shook her head. “I’m not a control freak.”
Garrett smiled. “Ms. Director. I bet you don’t go on roller-coasters, either.”
She took a deep breath. “Bet you don’t either, Mr. President and CEO of his own financial empire.”
Garrett grinned. “I don’t, but that’s because of an inner ear thing. Not a control thing.”
“Liar. You hated the fact that I told you ‘no’, so you dealt yourself onto this movie just to spite me.”
He leaned a little closer and his voice grew softer. “I dealt myself in because it was your picture. I could have spent my ten million on a Suez oil deal twenty-four hours earlier, but I didn’t. I wanted in on your deal. You. Kate Lind’stream who can’t sleep and has a mind like a razor. You’re never going to believe me on that, so let it drop.”
Kate peered at him, wishing the light were better so she could see if he were lying or not. But then Garrett had faced down hostile takeovers and pissed-off defense attorneys in courts on all the major continents. “Even if you’re lying, I’m never going to be able to tell, am I? You’re better than any actor I know, because your training has been in the theatre of the real.”
He swore, so softly she suspected she wasn’t supposed to hear it. But she had always had great hearing. Better than average.
His kiss caught her utterly by surprise. Completely flat-footed. She even gasped into his mouth.
But even as he kissed her, her brain disconnected from her body thanks to the surge of adrenaline produced by the shock and she was able to process the moment with startling clarity.
She wasn’t surprised, ashamed, or even disgusted. The whole week had been leading to this. She had been wondering what it would be like to kiss him. The entire time she had been spitting her insults and railing at Garrett for his various transgressions, the same outfield portion of her brain that was in overdrive now had been silently sizing him up, wondering what it would be like to be in the arms of the man she had admired for so many years, now he was actually here, a dogged irritant in her life.
She had watched him moving around the set, in worn denim jeans that looked surprisingly good on his long legs and a faded denim shirt, the sleeves rolled up, and the top three or four buttons open. It was an interestingly different look from the jeans and tee-shirts the rest of the crew wore.
Well, now he was kissing her and her intellectual curiosity was being answered.
But why was he kissing her? To prove he wasn’t lying? Anyone could kiss anyone. It didn’t mean anything.
His hand slipped under her hair, cupping her jaw. It was a soft, oddly endearing touch.
With his touch her mind ceased functioning, all curiosity melted away, as the power of the kiss swelled and swamped her with earthy, hot and blooming arousal. She gasped again and this time it had nothing to do with surprise.
His tongue slipped into her mouth. Touched hers.
Garrett. This is Garrett.
She moaned.
He brought her to her feet, his lips never leaving hers. As she straightened, his body pressed up against hers. The kiss changed. It grew deeper, more languid. There was real intention behind it. Offering. Need. Want. She could feel the power of it in Garrett, building and building…
Until he abruptly spun away, into the full spill of light from the window, almost staggering. He brought a hand up to his mouth and it shook as he touched his lips. He wasn’t looking at her.
Kate stayed silent, breathing hard. Watching him. She wasn’t going to encourage him. Her mind was back in control now. For all sorts of reasons – and Adrian topped that list – this must stop right here.
But there was one thing she had to say. “Okay,” she said tiredly. “I believe you.”
Garrett glanced at her. Something that looked like pain etched his forehead. He gave a dry laugh and headed for the door into the club. By the time he reached it he was striding fast. The heel of his hand hit the door with a thud that jarred the frame and made the door shudder open with a wobble.
Then he was gone.