CHAPTER TWENTY
Gray
The last evening Los Angeles sunbeam shone down on me as I straightened my tie, feeling constricted and uncomfortable in my new suit.
I nodded to the driver. “I’m not sure how long I’ll be.”
It could be a few minutes or a few hours.
“That’s fine, sir. Simply text when you’re ready and I’ll meet you here.”
It was strange.
I’d been rich for a few years now but until yesterday and today, I’d never utilized the privileges it gave me. A private plane. Thousands of dollars’ worth of clothes. A personal car and driver to attend my every whim.
As much as I loved my cabin, I would live this way if this was what Zoe preferred. We could buy a house here, maybe with sweeping views of the ocean. We could fly between the homes as well as other homes. It wouldn’t matter as long as she was there.
It became obvious that I was at the right funeral home by the way the women were dressed. Outrageously over-the-top sexy seemed to be the theme for the night, and I received a fair share of cleavage, ass, and thigh glimpses as I strode into the rambling building, moving past the group of paparazzi standing by to catch a piece of the action.
“Are you here to pay respects to Cyn Meadows?” one of the them shouted. I ignored him and hurried into the building, where I stood in the long line of people waiting to pay their respects to the porn queen.
Then I saw her, standing alone by a golden casket, looking as beautiful as sin itself. She looked tired, like the joyous spirit I had become so familiar with had drained away. But she smiled and nodded, shook hands with everyone who passed. Behind the calm façade, I saw the pain she was trying so hard to hide, and I wanted to go to her, sweep her away from all of this.
I couldn’t.
This was where she needed to be. She needed to know, in the years to come, that she had done the best she could for her mother. I knew how important it was to reduce the possibility of regrets.
Just before the line moved from the hallway and into the large room, I hesitated. I didn’t need to draw her attention away from what she currently needed to do. Whether she would be happy to see me, angry, or simple unsure, she didn’t need the distraction of my presence.
Stepping out of the line, I looked around, unsure of where to go. I didn’t want to leave. Zoe might need me. I would watch over her. Again.
Finding a quiet vestibule, I leaned against the wall and waited, keeping an eye on Zoe through the large window. When some sleazy guy leaned down to kiss her on the cheek, my hands clenched but I didn’t move, even when she cringed away from the touch.
If I needed to intervene, I would. I could be at her side in seconds.
“Gray?”
The sound of my name surprised me, and I turned to find a familiar blonde standing in the entrance to the small room. “Leslie.”
She exhaled and nodded. “I thought it was you.” She fingered a necklace she wore, the same clover as Zoe’s, I realized. “Things happened so fast in Montana, I wasn’t sure. What are you doing here?”
I turned back to the window, to Zoe. “Does she hate me?”
Feeling the blonde approach and stand beside me, I waited for what I assumed would be the truth. Zoe’s best friend would know her inner feelings. She would have insight into her thoughts.
“No. She doesn’t hate you. She’s confused and hasn’t had time to process all that she learned just before I arrived with the rescue team because of all this.” She waved her hand to indicate the funeral and the people still coming into the room in droves.
“It was bad timing.”
Leslie turned to face me, crossing her arms over her chest. “I’m not sure there’s a good time to learn that someone you cared about had been spying on you for weeks. Watching private moments. The sense of invasion would be immense no matter the timing.”
I didn’t try to justify my actions. My inactions. My deeds, both noble and otherwise. I simply nodded. “You’re right.”
Leslie sighed. “I’m right and I’m wrong.” She made a growling, annoyed sound. “It’s not black or white.” She smirked. “It’s gray.”
I didn’t have the energy to smirk back. “Things often fall into that shadowed area.”
“Did squirrels really turn the camera?”
I looked her directly in the eye. “Yes. I noticed the new angle of that camera the day before Zoe arrived. It was supposed to scan that part of my property, but it was tilted in the other direction. Then Zoe arrived and I…” I shrugged. There was no justification.
“She’s beautiful,” Leslie murmured. “Men watch her all the time.”
I watched her now. Watched her sidestep another smarmy-looking bastard.
“She was so upset,” I confessed, remembering how she had held her stomach and cried those first few days especially. “I was worried about her. I thought… I thought…”
Leslie sighed. “Zoe would never hurt herself. She’s stronger than you and me combined.”
That was true.
“I didn’t know that at the time. All I knew was that she was experiencing a kind of pain I’d never witnessed before. And I was afraid for her.”
Leslie cleared her throat. “I knew something was wrong when she said she needed to get away, but I’d been so busy with work that I hadn’t pressed her about it. I’d simply given her the keys to my uncle’s cabin, thinking a couple weeks of solitude would do her good.” She touched my arm. “Do you know what caused her to be so upset?”
I watched Zoe’s face, the tight smile she was giving a duo of women dressed in matching leather dresses.
Memories of that first night were so clear, so vivid. Her mouth. The desire in her eyes. The heat of her body. Those words… I dare you to kiss me. Followed by, make love to me.
As vivid as the memory of touching her pliant body was, so was the memory of my realization that she had stiffened, grown cold and quiet. The revelation that had followed.
“Yes, I know,” I told her best friend. “And I also know that she wants to tell you herself.”
Leslie pushed her hand through her blonde hair, tucking some of the strands behind her ear. “Then I’ll wait for her to be ready.”
“You’re a good friend.”
She fingered the charm around her neck, lifting it to her lips. “It’s easy to be a good friend to Zoe. When she lets you into her life, she lets you completely in. She’s solid and she doesn’t judge, God knows she’s suffered enough judgement in her own life.”
“That’s probably why she doesn’t judge.”
Leslie nodded. “She has layers of self-protection that she wears all the time, and many people see that as her being icy. Or worse, they think she feels superior to them.” She laughed. “And that couldn’t be further from the truth. But that air of distance combined with…” she waved a hand at Zoe, “her perfection makes women hate her and men long for her. But it’s more about ownership than anything.”
“I love her.”
Leslie didn’t even seem surprised. She nodded and faced me again. “She worries that it isn’t truly her that you care about. She said she looks very similar to your late wife.”
I winced, couldn’t stop the action.
Leslie laid a hand on my arm for a moment. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s true, there is a close resemblance, and maybe that is part of what drew me to her, made me feel familiar with her at the beginning. It’s not what made me want to stay. It’s not why I’m here now.”
Leslie didn’t pull any punches. “Are you sure?”
I thought of the gravestone, the bones of my wife and daughter lying beneath it. “Yes. Before coming here, I flew to New York. To say goodbye.”
Her hand moved to cover her mouth and tears filled her eyes, but they didn’t fall. “I’m so sorry.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
“Where you able to say goodbye?” she asked, her fingers on her charm again.
“Yes. It’s what Jessica would have wanted. She wouldn’t have wanted me to live the way I’d been living, so isolated from the world.”
“It has to be hard, walking the line between the present and the past.”
I looked at Zoe again. “It had been hard. Until her.”
Leslie sniffed. “Dammit, you’re going to make me cry, and I swore that I wouldn’t cry.”
I remembered breaking down after our Tantra night together, how freeing the release had been as Zoe held me. It had been embarrassing. Men didn’t cry. Men were strong, didn’t show that kind of emotion.
The stereotype was bullshit.
I thought of Mr. Pederson, the foster father I was most grateful for. I remembered him holding me while I cried and he cried before I was taken away. I’d been thinking of him often, wondering how he was. If he’d remarried. Moved on with his life. Maybe I’d try to find him, tell him how grateful I was for the time I’d been able to spend with him and his wife.
“Excuse me, I need to go do a couple things,” Leslie said, wiping at her tears with a tissue she’d produced from somewhere. “I’ll be back in a little while. Will you still be here?”
I nodded, watching Zoe. “Yes. I’m not going anywhere.”
I didn’t. I stayed right there, watching over the woman I loved, hoping that she was able to sense my protective presence… and that she would find it welcoming.
Much later, Leslie reappeared at my side, a water bottle in her hand. She passed it to me, and I gratefully took it. “Thank you.”
“It’s almost over,” she said, watching the last of the crowd trickle out of the building. “Where are you staying?”
“I secured a room at the Omni. A driver is waiting for me outside and can take me…” my eyes were on Zoe, “hopefully us anywhere. She and I need to talk.”
“Yes, you do.”
“Will there be a burial tomorrow?” I asked. “I didn’t see anything other than this service tonight.”
Leslie shook her head. “Cynthia is being cremated. I’m sure Zoe will want to do something special with the ashes, but there is nothing planned after tonight.” She groaned, her face growing tight. “Shit.”
I was immediately alarmed by the look in her eyes. “What? What’s wrong?”
“The bastard is here,” she said through gritted teeth. “He just couldn’t stay away.”
I looked back through the window to see an older man practically swaggering in Zoe’s direction. From the look on her face, she was about as pleased to see him as Leslie was.
“I’ll be right back,” Leslie said and was gone before I could stop her. I heard her heels clicking on the marble floor as she ran to the entrance of the chapel.
I kept my eyes on Zoe, watched her cross her arms protectively over her chest. She looked past him and held up a give me a minute finger, to Leslie, I supposed. A few seconds later, the heels came clicking back in my direction.
The man looked greasy, and not just because of the dark hair that was slicked back from his face. He simply carried that air around him as he spoke to Zoe.
I watched her stiffen, cross her arms tighter. Watched her shake her head, her face a mask of fury.
“Who is he?”
“Theo Southerland,” Zoe spat. “Cynthia’s agent. Nastiest man on the planet.”
My eyes narrowed. “The agent who wanted to get her in the business?”
Leslie’s nostrils flared. “The one and only.”
Leslie gasped when the man raised a finger and pointed it in Zoe’s face. I growled and took a step toward the window.
Zoe said something, causing the older man to stomp his foot. He looked ridiculous, like a child. “Score one for Zoe,” Leslie murmured.
I wasn’t so sure. The man’s face turned a mottled-looking purple. I silently hoped he would stroke out.
Theo Southerland said something else, and Zoe spit in his face.
His response was immediate. His hand came around, hitting her hard. Beside me, Leslie screamed.
I didn’t hesitate. I turned and ran, racing down the long hallway to the chapel entrance, rage riding my back.
I was about to kill another man with my bare hands.