“No, you haven’t! Not at all—”
“Don’t defend what I’ve done.” He shoves a frustrated hand through his hair, then wraps his arms around me and pulls me even closer. “Look, can we try just having a conversation, maybe? I ask some questions, you answer them if you want, don’t answer if you don’t want. No power exchange, no dominance issues. Just two people keeping everything amicable. I know it’s a new concept for us, but maybe we can give it a try?”
Tears bloom in my eyes at the tenderness in his voice, at the hand that strokes my tangled, messed up hair away from my face. At the way he blames himself for what happened and how he’s obviously trying to fix things even after I made a total and complete fool of myself.
I look away quickly, blinking my eyes a couple times as I pray he doesn’t notice. There’s something about this conversation—this moment—that leaves me feeling more exposed than I ever have, more exposed even than I was in his hotel room last night, standing against the window with all the lights on.
Maybe it’s because that was play.
Maybe it’s because so much of our time together has been a battle of wills.
Or maybe, just maybe, it’s because I’m not used to the people in my life trying so hard to meet me halfway. Or, in Ian’s case, more like three-quarters of the way.
I don’t know. I just know that staying right here with him after everything that’s happened is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. Especially when I want nothing more than to shed my skin and crawl away from this mess I’ve created. If I could do that, if I could just start over, maybe I’d have a chance at getting him to look at me again the way he looked at me last night.
Like I was strong and powerful and desirable.
Like he wanted me.
Like I was worthy.
It shocks me a little, how badly I want to be worthy of him. How badly I want to not be the movie star with dirty little secrets in her past…and now, her present.
“Veronica.” His voice is as steady as it is no-nonsense. But there’s an authority there, too—the same kind I heard in his voice last night when he kept me pinned against that window. “Look at me please.”
I do, of course I do, my gaze jumping to his like he’s the puppet master who holds my strings. It’s not an analogy I necessarily like, but in this moment it’s so completely apropos.
“Is that okay with you? Can I maybe ask you some questions now?”
“Ask me a—” My voice breaks, so I clear my throat and take a couple deep breaths before trying again. “Ask me anything.”
He smiles and for a moment, just a moment, I see the man who’s been my adversary—my equal—from the moment I first strolled into that sidewalk café. “We’ve come a long way if you’re giving me carte blanche,” he tells me. “Especially considering four days ago I couldn’t get a straight answer out of you to save my life.”
“Yeah, well, I just finished trying to claw your eyes out. I think that gives you some leeway.” I lift a hand to his cheek, rub my thumb over the scratch I put there when I was trying to get away from him. I didn’t draw blood, but it’s red and angry looking and I hate that I did that to him. Hate even more that there are other scratches, other marks, on his body that I put there in fear and rage and distrust.
“Don’t,” he says, and once again it sounds like an order.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t blame yourself for a few scratches when your body is covered in the bruises I gave you.” He glides his thumb over a particularly livid one on my thigh.
“Yeah, well, I’m pretty sure I enjoyed getting mine a whole lot more than you did yours.”
“To be honest, I don’t remember getting any of these scratches. I was too busy worrying about you.” My smile slowly fades at the reminder of what just happened—and what’s still to come. He nods, like he knows what I’m thinking, then proves he does when he says, “Talk to me, Veronica. Then maybe we can get this out of the way and move on to other things.”
I nearly laugh. Like that’s even a possibility? I have a feeling what happened here tonight is going to linger for a long while to come. Insanity tends to do that, after all.
I should know.
“Tell me about the brooch,” he instructs after giving me a few seconds to prepare myself. “What is it about it that bothers you so much?”
“You mean you don’t know?”
“Should I? Is it some famous jewelry of your mother’s?”
“It’s famous jewelry of the Belladonna’s. The costume designer on the movie found it at an auction in D.C. and we kind of made it into her signature piece. I used it in all her important scenes.”
“Oh. No wonder you were so revolted when you found it in your hair.”
The look on his face tells me he knows that when I say “important,” I mean “violent.” And he’s right. Every time I think of the scene where I had to dismember the body—the gallons of fake blood drenching my hands, dripping down my legs, splattering my clothes, my shoes, my face as I hacked away at prosthetic arms and legs and head—I want to vomit.
It’s been months and I still can’t sleep for more than a few hours without having nightmares about that scene. I can’t cut into a piece of meat without thinking about it, can’t even take a shower without flashing back to the hours I spent trying desperately to get the blood off. Trying desperately to wash away the memories of what I had pretended to do, of what she had actually done.
Ian doesn’t let me dwell, though. Instead, he rubs a soothing hand down my back even as he shifts my attention over to the issue at hand. “So the brooch is part of the props for the movie, not a part of your personal collection?”
“Yeah. It’s not my style at all.”
“I wondered, when I saw it in your hair. But I figured it was just part of the look.”
Oh right. The look. Her look, not mine. The one he found so hot and sexy at the party tonight.
I shove the thought aside, pretend it doesn’t bother me as I assure him, “After what I had to do in the movie while wearing that pin, I would never willingly put it on again.”
That gives him pause, but in the end he decides not to address it. Instead, he asks, “So, how did you end up with it, then? If it belongs to the studio, how did it get to your house?”
“I don’t know. That’s the point. I don’t remember putting it on when I was getting ready earlier and I have no idea how it even got from the studio’s storage to my possession. I was there a couple weeks ago, picking up one of her dresses for an appearance the studio wanted me to make, but the only thing I took was the dress. That’s it. Just the dress. Or at least, that’s all I remember. Which is why, when you had the brooch in your hand earlier, I thought you were the one messing with me.”
“Hold on a minute.” His eyes narrow as he pulls back just far enough to be able to search my face. “What exactly do you mean when you say you don’t remember doing these things? That’s very different than saying you think someone did this to you. Do you think you actually put it in your hair and then had some kind of episode and forgot you did it?”
“That’s just it. I don’t know.”
“How can you not know? I don’t understand why your mind’s even going there—this isn’t something most people even think about. Either you did something or you didn’t. Have you had episodes where you forgot before?”
“I don’t know.” At this point, I sound as agitated as I feel. “This morning, there was this gardener and then, the bathtub last night, and I just don’t know. I don’t remember doing any of it, but then…how else could it have happened? I mean, I’m protected. It’s not easy for people to get to me. Between the bodyguards and the security…people can’t just come waltzing up to my home without my permission. So how the hell is it happening if I’m not making it happen?”
“Okay, hold on a minute.” He lifts me off his lap and sets me next to him on the couch. Immediately, I feel bereft—or like I’m being punished. Neither r
eaction makes sense, but that’s the least of my worries right now. “You’re saying other things have happened.”
When Ian says it like that, there’s no other way to answer except, “Yes.”
“Like what? No, wait, don’t answer that yet.” He reaches into the pocket of his suit pants and pulls out his phone. Then he lays it on the coffee table in front of us and opens a recording app.
I stare at him in disbelief. “What are you doing? You can’t record this!” A million headlines go through my mind in a flash, each one detailing my descent into madness. Each one a little worse, a little more lurid, than the one that came before it.
“It’s okay,” he tells me soothingly. “I’m not planning on using this for anything. It’s just a habit of mine, to record any and all information I get so that I can go back through it later and make sure I have the facts straight as I try to figure out how it fits with the big picture.”
“Which facts are those? The ones detailing my total and complete mental collapse?” I know I sound snippy, but come on. He can’t really think that I’m going to be okay with him recording this? The first thing they teach us in Being Famous 101 is not to let anyone record you saying anything that might possibly depict you in even the slightest derogatory light. “I’m not some book you’re writing. This is my life we’re talking about.”
“I know that.” He puts a hand over mine, squeezes tight. “Of course I know that. I’m just trying to help. You can trust me, Veronica.”
He sounds sincere, but I can’t help it. I laugh anyway. “I have trust issues, Ian. I don’t trust anyone—including the man I’m sleeping with.”
“Then what the fuck are we doing here?”
“I thought we were talking—”
“Bullshit!” he exclaims as he shoves a rough hand through his hair. “We’re doing a lot more than talking and you know it. You’re the one who said this wasn’t a one night stand.”
After everything I’ve done, this is what makes him angry? And he is, oh God, he is absolutely livid, absolutely infuriated. I want to placate him. I really do. But the truth is the truth. “I’m sorry, but there’s no way I’m going to let you record me admitting to the fact that I might be insane—”
“You’re not insane,” he snaps.
“You don’t know that.”
“I do know that. I’ve spent my entire career studying insane people. Sorry to disappoint you, sweetheart, but you’re not it.”
“You say that like you’re so certain—”
“I am certain!”
“How? How can you be so sure when you’ve got scratches all over you that prove there’s something wrong with me?”
“All it proves is that you were scared. And that you’ve got a right to be.” He reaches over and switches off the recording app. “But if this bothers you that much, you can just tell me your story. But don’t blame me if you have to keep going over it until I get it right.”
“Yeah, well, it’s not actually that complicated.”
He snorts. “Every single thing about you is complicated, Veronica. And if you think otherwise, you’re fooling yourself.”
“Says the FBI profiler who gets off on tying women to his bed.”
“Former FBI profiler, thank you very much. And I never said I wasn’t complicated, too.” He settles back into the couch. “Now talk.”
I glance behind me at the phone where it still rests on the coffee table. “The recorder’s off.” I say it just to be sure. “This is off the record.”
“Yes, it’s off.” He rolls his eyes. “And of course it’s off the record. You know, right, that you’re going to have to trust me eventually?”
“I already told you. I don’t trust anyone. It’s nothing personal.”
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” I’m as exasperated as he is now. I hate it when he does the cryptic thing.
“Don’t do that. Don’t act like there’s nothing personal between us. I fucked up last night—I know I did. And if, when we’re done dealing with your stuff you still feel up to getting into mine, then I’ll tell you all about why I freaked out the way I did this morning. But don’t act like what’s happened between us over these last four days isn’t personal.” He picks me up, puts me back on his lap, and this time there’s barely room enough to slide a piece of paper between us. “Because it is, and you damn well know it.”
He’s right. I may not want him to be, but he is. Just because neither of us had planned for it, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen just the same.
And so I tell him. About the bathwater. About the shower gel I haven’t used for months. About the gardener and the ruined plants and the rows upon rows of belladonna. I tell him all of it, growing more and more anxious with each detail I reveal.
Ian listens through it all, interrupting only to ask a question or to clarify some detail I glossed over in my determination to get this finished as soon as possible.
And when I’m done—when I’m empty and distraught and so, so scared, he gathers me in his arms and whispers that everything’s going to be okay. That I’m not crazy. That somehow we’ll find a way to fix all of this.
I don’t believe him.
I want to—God, do I want to. But years of living in Hollywood—of seeing smoke and mirrors used time and again to hide the fact that everything falls apart—makes it impossible.
That doesn’t stop me from letting him gather me in his arms, though. It doesn’t stop me from reveling in the small kisses he presses all over my face. And it sure as hell isn’t going to stop me from asking him for the story he promised me in return for mine.
Chapter 23
Jesus Christ. She’s been through the fucking ringer, hasn’t she?
First, she’s spent her life dealing with that mother of hers, who obviously loves her, but just as obviously feels upstaged by her and does whatever she can to remedy that whenever she can.
Then William Vargas invades her childhood and, I’m pretty certain, turns it into the stuff of nightmares no matter how she tries to hide it.
And finally, to top it all off, she lands the most iconic role of her career only to find herself straddling the edges of her own sanity because some jerk has it out for her.
She just can’t catch a fucking break.
The thought infuriates me, almost as much as the idea of some asshole with access gaslighting her just to see her squirm. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe that’s not what’s happening here. But frankly, I know crazy, and Veronica isn’t it. Which means someone else is pulling the strings here. Someone else wants to discredit her, wants her to think she’s crazy. The only questions are who and why.
I start to ask her about it, think about poking around inside her head to see what she knows about who might be doing something like this to her. But it’s nearly dawn and frankly, she looks exhausted. Tomorrow, or more precisely, later today will be soon enough to badger her.
No wonder she has trust issues. Someone who knows her pretty well, someone who has access to her life, is trying to make her think she’s insane. In my book, it doesn’t get much worse than that.
—
“I’m so sorry this is happening to you,” I tell her as I rock her gently against me.
She snorts. “Now there’s a Hallmark card for you. Sorry you’re going insane. Wish I could make it better…”
“You’re not insane. Getting inside diseased minds is what I do. And yours is just fine.” I reach for my cellphone, turn on the flashlight app on the first screen, then lean back a little so I can watch the way her pupils dilate at the sudden influx of light. As expected, they respond exactly as they are supposed to.
That doesn’t stop her from trying to squirm away. “A little notice next time might be nice.”
“You’re the one who’s afraid. I’m just trying to put your mind at ease.” I turn off the flashlight, put the phone back down. “So we know your pupils react normally. What about headaches? Are you having any on a regular basis?”
“No. I mean, every once in a while—”
“Once in a while doesn’t count unless they’re so debilitating you can’t function.” I raise my brows at her in a silent question and she shakes her head. “How about nightmares? How often do you have those?”
She shrugs. “It depends. I’ll be honest, I have a lot more now that I’ve read the collected works of Ian Sharpe. Dude, it must be terrifying running around in your brain. I don’t know how you do it. I don’t understand how you can spend so long immersed in minds that sick. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m grateful that you can, and that there are people like you around, but I don’t think I could do it. The six months I spent as Celeste were more than enough for me—and she only killed one person.”
“A violent sociopath is a violent sociopath, whether they’ve killed one person or a hundred.”
“I’ve heard you say that before,” she tells me with a nod. “It was actually key to how I portrayed her and how she viewed her world. Her husband’s mistress might have been the only person she actually murdered, but her whole life was one big sociopathic incident. Everything in it was designed to further her own agenda, to help her get what she wanted. People who got in her way became collateral damage of one kind or another. It’s why she was such a brilliant politician’s wife.”
“And such a brilliant murderer,” I agreed. “You know her well.”
She inclines her head ruefully. “Maybe too well. Maybe if I didn’t know her this well, we wouldn’t be where we are right now.”
“All things considered, I’m kind of happy about where we are at this particular moment.” I bring a hand down to cup her ass, using physical touch to help ground her as well as myself. And also, just copping a feel, because she has a fabulous ass and it’s been too long since I touched it. Two birds, one stone.
She wiggles around in my lap a little, trying to get comfortable. But every shift of her body has her sex pressing against my cock. I’m doing my best not to get hard—that’s the last thing she needs right now—but Veronica isn’t exactly making it easy.
At least until she continues talking about the Belladonna. Then any hint of arousal I have goes right out the window. There’s nothing about Celeste Warren that I find sexy. “I spent the year leading up to the filming watching every interview with her I could find, reading every single thing about her that exists. I even visited D.C. and her hometown of Greenwich, Connecticut. I talked to everyone I could find who ever knew her. I walked where she walked, saw what she saw every day.”