Feast of Saints (47 page)

When Jake had given her the expensive phone, he had strictly told her never to go anywhere without it. Never. Understanding dawned on her. He must have an app on his phone that allowed him to track her as long as she was carrying her cell phone with her. Handing him back his phone, she mulled over what that meant. Was his interest in her so acute? Had it been all along?

“How long have you been keeping tabs on me?” she asked, watching him closely.

Jake’s expression turned guilty. “With the phone?” he finally asked.

“What do you mean? Were you tracking me even before you gave me the phone?” she asked, incredulous.

“Yes,” he confessed. He looked uncomfortable.

She looked away from him at the approaching cable car. Her questions multiplied. Forced to let him off the hook for now as a line formed for the gondola, she said, “Well, it came in handy today.”

When they arrived at the town center, Jake led her to his rented car. She considered asking him to take her somewhere other than the B&B, but she needed clean clothes. Surely Sergei was long gone by now. That had been nearly twenty hours ago.

Jake pulled into the small parking lot in front of her B&B, not having asked her for directions or where she was staying. She felt the beginnings of a smile as she thought of her “chance” meeting with him on Fifth Avenue near the Metropolitan Museum. Back then, she had thought what a small world it was. Now she realized that their meeting had not been a coincidence.

But her smile faded when she remembered her pressing need to get out of Jennis’ house before Sierra arrived.

It turned into a frown as she realized that the day Jake broke into her house, she’d left her phone at the studio. He’d intentionally gone to her house with that man, John, thinking that she wasn’t at home.

Jake turned off the car but made no move to get out.

Lilly turned toward him and asked one of her more difficult questions. “Did you think I was conspiring with Campbell to hurt Sierra?” She felt tears threaten but managed to keep a steady voice.

“No. I never thought it was you. John doesn’t anymore, either. It was Mary.”

Lilly’s waterworks evaporated with shock. “Mary? Are you certain?”

“John had a forensic analyst go over Mjicon’s network. There were deleted emails between her and Campbell,” he said.

“But why?” she asked, dismayed. She had thought Mary odd, but even so, she’d worked with her nearly every day. She found it difficult to believe she could be so vindictive.

“It started as revenge, I guess, on Campbell’s part. I should have had him fired immediately after the incident in your Lab. Instead, I had him watched. When he drove by your house….” Jake gripped the steering wheel. “He was let go after that; but before then, he approached Mary and started dating her. He used her to get inside information about me, Mjicon, my family. I can’t explain why Mary helped him. She’s worked for me for nearly ten years.”

Lilly thought about mousy Mary. She didn’t understand, either, unless she was just being manipulated.

“Did Campbell drive a red truck?” she asked.

Jake looked at her sharply. “Did he approach you, threaten you?”

“No, no. It’s just that I think I saw him one night, at the studio, picking up Mary.” She thought harder. “Sierra was there, too, shortly after.”

“When was that? It might be important.”

She bit her lip. “It was the night you came to my house. The night you fired me.”

Jake pinched the bridge of his nose. When he lowered his hand, bland, closed-off Jake was back.

“I didn’t fire you,” he said, and turned away from her to open his door. Walking around the car, he opened her door for her.

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said, as she stepped out of the car.

“Where are you going?” she blurted out. She was too raw to hide the hurt in her voice. She had assumed he would stay with her. “I mean,” she corrected, “where are you staying?”

Jake looked away from her, toward town. “I’m not sure,” he admitted.

He’d come all this way to see her, hadn’t he? Had he left Sierra in Vancouver? Did she know he was here, with her? Lilly had questions that needed answers.

She said, “It’s late, and the town is full of film crew and extras. You’re not going to find another place to stay.”

Running his hand through his hair, his bland expression slipped. Underneath he looked… frustrated, angry even.

“I didn’t come here to barge into your life,” he bit out, pulling out his phone. Lilly watched as he started a web search for a hotel.

Catching his anger, she huffed, “Why did you come, Jake?”

When he still didn’t answer, she said, sarcastically, “Weren’t you tracking me here, with that?” She pointed to the offending phone. “Or were you just passing by today, on a mountain top, in New Zealand?” Frustrated with him and with herself, she felt angry tears slip down her cheeks.

At the sight of her tears again, Jake relented. Clicking off the phone, he grabbed his overnight bag from the back seat and locked the car, then stomped behind her as she led the way to her room.

Opening the door to her room, Lilly was relieved to see the bed empty. Sergei must have been angry when he left. The bedspread had been torn off of the bed and lay in a heap by the door. The small desk chair was also overturned.

Stepping in, Jake right behind her, Lilly dropped her pack and picked up the bedspread and slowly folded it, struggling to find something neutral to say to lessen the tension between them.

When she turned to shut the door, she was shocked by the furious glare Jake gave the room, and her. Growling like a caged lion, he paced to the overturned chair, then turned and would have walked right back out the door if she hadn’t blocked his way.

When she didn’t budge, he said through clenched teeth, “I can’t stay here. I’ll go to the airport, find a hotel there.”

“You came all this way, and you’re just going to leave?” she challenged him, hugging the folded bedspread to her chest.

Glaring at her, he ground out, “What’s with you and Taranovo?”

Although she knew perfectly well that she hadn’t done anything inappropriate, she looked guiltily at the bed. Jake’s fists clenched as he visibly struggled to calm down.

“When I got here this morning, I thought I’d just wait for you. He was here, in your room. If he is someone you like….” he trailed off, not needing to complete the sentence for her to know what he meant.

“I can’t stay here in this room.” He made to move around her. Lilly pushed the bedspread into his chest, stopping him, and turned to shut the door.

“I don’t want to know what you think happened in this room, but if it has anything to do with me and Sergei…. Eww. Just… eww.” She covered her mouth in a not-so-pretend retch. “He showed up here last night, drunk, and I couldn’t get rid of him, so I just left. If you’ve been spying on me with your phone thing, you know I left here before midnight and haven’t been back since.”

Jake blinked at her, his anger draining away. “I was on the plane. They made me turn my phone off.”

Stowing the bedspread in the closet and righting the overturned chair, she said, “So, what happened here this morning? Did Sergei say something to make you think that I… that we….” She just couldn’t put it into words.

“I didn’t give him a chance to say anything,” Jake admitted.

Jake looked her up and down, running his hand through his hair. “I’ve spent the last week watching you – tracking you – imagining you working, eating and sleeping. Not once did it occur to me that you might not be sleeping alone. When I got here and saw Taranovo in your bed, I lost it. I threw him out.”

Lilly eyed the bed, picturing what Sergei’s face must have looked like when he woke to Jake dragging him out of the room and wishing she could have been here to see it.

“Literally threw, or just figuratively?” she asked, trying to look stern, but feeling great pleasure when Jake looked sheepish.

“If it helps, I didn’t hit him.” But then he frowned at her, “Although now I’m wishing I had. What the hell’s he doing showing up here and refusing to leave?”

The irony of Jake asking her that question was not lost on her.

“Jake, I don’t want to talk about Sergei any more. He’s a problem I’m going to have to deal with tomorrow. Right now, I’m hungry, and I could really use a shower.”

“Alright,” he said, his face softening with concern, and something else. He moved closer to her and ran his hands over her shoulders, down her arms, taking her hands in his. Her stomach twisted in a knot. They had showered together every morning in Maui.

Pulling her hands from his, she said, “Why don’t you order us something to eat while I shower? You can take one after me if you’d like.”

Jake nodded, letting her go.

She slipped into the bathroom where she mulled over what she was going to say to Jake. Was his jealousy a double standard? Or, was he prepared to pick her over Sierra?

The knock of the food delivery person came while Jake was still in the bathroom, just having finished his own shower. Lilly shuffled to the door, trying not to trip over the hem of the robe supplied by the B&B. She could barely see the top of the delivery girl’s head over a huge brown paper bag of food. The girl shook her off when she tried to pay and tip her. Jake had already taken care of everything.

“Gads, how much did you order?” she exclaimed, peeking in the shopping bag. She pulled out a carton containing egg noodles and plopped down on the bed.

“I finally get to eat now that we’re done filming
Feast
,” Jake called through the closed door. “Plus, I’ve seen how much you can pack away, Pixie.” She stuck out her tongue at him, although he couldn’t see her.

She had the noodles halfway to her mouth when Jake walked out of the bathroom, rubbing his wet hair, wearing nothing but a towel and smirking at her already digging into the food.

Staring at him, she asked incredulously, “How do you do that?” Susanna Clarke, the author of
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
, surely had Jake in mind when she imagined her protagonist. He was described as tall and handsome with a good figure. His face, she had written, “had two faults: a long nose and an ironic expression.”
¹

“What?” he asked, looking down at his naked torso, the object of her inspection.

Lilly gestured, flustered, toward Jake’s nearly naked body. He was like a chameleon the way he had begun to sculpt his body for the role. “What have you been doing to build all that muscle? What have you been eating?”

Jake walked to stand in front of her and tightened his pecks and abs. “You like?” he asked, mischievously. In Maui, she’d confessed how much she loved touching his chest and stomach.

She dropped the noodle-laden chopsticks back in the carton and set the food aside. Reaching out, she ran her hands over his waist, his abdomen, his chest.

He was solid warm muscle, steamy from the shower.

“Ah, Lilly, yes. Touch me,” he bid her.

She snatched her hands back.

Jake dropped to his knees in front of her and took her hands, placing them back on his chest, “Talk to me.”

Lilly tucked in her chin, unable to look at him, but left her hands pressed against his skin while she tried to find the courage to say what she felt, voice her fears.

Jake leaned in and bent until he could see her face. “Don’t hide anymore. Don’t shut me out. You asked me why I came. I couldn’t wait anymore. Touch me, talk to me.”

“I don’t want to,” she whispered. Jake pulled back, and her hands slid away from his chest.

“You don’t want to what?” he asked, his voice hoarse.

“I don’t want to be a novelty,” she said. “I can’t be casual about this. I can’t be your sometimes girl.” Her tears began to fall again, dropping from her downturned face into her lap, where her hands twisted the belt of her robe.

Jake reached out to touch her face, lifting her chin.

“Lilly, whatever have I done to make you think that my feelings for you are casual?” His eyes searched her face, hopeful.

“Arabella,” she said, quietly voicing her most painful question. “Sierra, I mean. She’s always with you.”

“Is that why you asked me about her last week?”

She nodded, her chin still in his grasp.

“Sierra’s Jennis’ partner, Lilly, not mine.” He continued to hold her chin, making her look at him, see his sincerity. “She never has been.”

“But the stories, the pictures of you both,” she said, wanting to believe him, finding it impossible not to.

Jake released her chin and took her hands from her lap, unwinding the belt she’d twisted around them, and entwined his fingers in hers.

“Sierra and Jennis have been together for years. The press made assumptions about us because we are seen together so often. She asked me not to set them straight. Sierra thinks being openly gay would knock her out of the running for traditional female lead roles.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t explain when you asked. By the time I had her permission, you’d left.”

Jake raised their entwined hands to her face and brushed the pads of his thumbs down the tracks of her tears.

One thumb stroking her lips, he said, “You’re my everything girl, Lilly. Don’t you know that?”

She tried to shake her head, but their hands framing her face stopped her.

“Why didn’t you call me when you came home from Hawaii?” she asked in a small voice. She’d waited for days for him to call.

Jake pulled her forward, wrapping their tangled hands behind his neck.

Their faces close, he said, “I thought I’d pushed for too much from you in Hawaii. I was trying to give you your space. You seemed to need it.”

She couldn’t stop a strangled laugh. “
Now
he gives me my space,” she said, rolling her eyes to the ceiling.

Jake gave her his wry smile. “I take it that was the wrong thing to do?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, matching his sideways smile with a rueful one of her own. “Here we are, in New Zealand…. I’ve turned down the best job offer I’m ever going to get in my entire life, and I nearly fell off a mountain today crying my heart out over you.”

Jake’s smile widened. “You think I’d let you turn down that offer? Or Ravi? He knows better than to let that happen. They’re expecting you in Vancouver in two weeks. And I’m taking you there if I have to drag you.