by Leonie Gant
Chapter Eleven
The next morning the first thing I did was to contact Eleanor’s management and try to put forward my case, in the strongest form possible, that Eleanor attending Ryan Hendricks’s funeral was a disaster waiting to happen. As usual though, Eleanor had made her decision and there was nothing that anyone could do or say that would change her mind. That was why I was standing at the church in black pants and flat shoes, because if things went to hell, I was prepared for it. Eleanor, of course, was dressed in a wildly inappropriate deep red dress which had a thigh split leaving very little to the imagination.
“It was Ryan’s favorite dress on me,” she would impart in a breathy whisper to anyone who looked at her strangely. Today, Eleanor’s manager and publicist had also chosen to accompany her, in the hopes of averting a repeat of the Bliss incident. In my opinion, considering the dress she was wearing, I wasn’t holding my breath. Adam Hendricks was dressed in a black suit, his face appropriately somber. He was at the front of the church and appeared to be consoling Emily Saunders, who was leaning heavily on her sister, Jennifer. Jennifer looked drawn and seemed to be holding up Emily. The tears streaming down Emily’s face seemed to have a devastating effect on her sister and I could see Jennifer was whispering into her ear throughout the service.
Adam Hendricks gave a eulogy which leaned a little too heavily on how much he had sacrificed so that his brother could shine. A little self-serving for my tastes but in a town where even a funeral was considered a networking event, it was pretty much standard. Keeping Eleanor and Emily apart at the funeral was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be and everyone made their way to Ryan Hendricks’s house for the wake. Of course, this was not the house he had died in. No, that would have been tacky. This was Ryan’s main house, the one used by tourist buses to point out the glamorous lives that actors led. Adam was at the door greeting people as they came in. It seemed he was running the show as Emily was nowhere to be seen.
“How are you holding up, Elly?” he asked solicitously, as he hugged Eleanor for just a few moments too long to be entirely appropriate.
“I’m trying to be strong,” she sniffed delicately, “but it’s so hard.”
She was also trying very hard not to slap him. Calling Eleanor Channing, Elly, was considered a mortal sin right up there with providing her with the wrong coffee.
“I know.” Adam shook his head sorrowfully. “I still keep expecting him to walk through the door and tell me it was all simply a hoax.”
For a second I stopped. Could it have been? I’d heard worse, but then I stopped and realized, no, it wasn’t possible for it to be a hoax. I was there. There was no way that Ryan Hendricks was still alive. I hadn’t been that freaked out that day. Once I had managed to ensure that Eleanor was sequestered in a corner with her manager and publicist, I decided to look around and see what information I could glean from the people attending the wake.
The best part of my job is that I can wander around a party and no one realizes that I’m even there. Some would call it slightly unethical. I just call it being aware of my environment. Wallflowers get the best information and sometimes that information could help me do my job. Today though, most of the gossip was centered on the fact that Ryan had been with Eleanor when he died. Cheating on your fiancée was not necessarily considered to be a great sin. Dying while with the other woman was considered to be a bit of a social faux pas.
“You look as bored as I am,” said Jennifer Saunders as she sidled up to me.
“I’m here for work,” I said.
“I know the feeling,” she replied.
I looked at her strangely.
“Ryan was Emily’s fiancée,” she said as if in explanation. “I’m here as support for her.”
“Oh, of course,” I said. “I would have thought your parents would be here too.”
“No, Mom and Dad weren’t too keen on Ryan. They thought he had a bit of a wild reputation and they didn’t really think he was the right man for Emily.”
That was news. The media had been playing up the whole blissful love story angle. I had just naturally assumed the whole family was behind the marriage. I could understand their concern though. Ryan was a bit of a wild man when it came to women. There were movie sets where he had pretty much gone through the entire female cast and some of the crew by the end of the shoot. If I had a daughter, I would slap her in a chastity belt before I let her anywhere near Ryan Hendricks.
“How’s she holding up?” I asked.
“Pretty devastated,” Jennifer sighed. “I think she still can’t believe it. I was hoping that if she threw herself into her work that might help.”
I drew a blank. I honestly didn’t know what work Emily Saunders did. I’d always thought she was some vacuous socialite who lived off her trust fund but then look at Jennifer. I probably assumed the same about her as well. I would never have guessed in a million years that she had opened up a spa or wellness center. Maybe I should look a little closer at my preconceptions. Maybe I’d been working too long with these people and was getting bitter. I mean look at Crystal. Before I became friends with her I would have lumped her into the exact same category as Emily and Jennifer. I looked at Jennifer with new found respect.
“Anyway,” she said, “I should get going. Adam has told me he’ll take care of Emily and I left my husband at home today. Josh has a tendency to get so involved in his work that he forgets basic things, like eating and showering.”
I smiled. That was nice and normal.
She gripped my hand. “Thank you, it was nice talking to you.”
“It was good seeing you too,” I said.
After Jennifer left I found myself wandering through the house again. Walking down one of the hallways, I saw a door that looked interesting and opened it. I froze. In that moment I did not know where to look because I saw Emily Saunders backed up against the wall, her legs wrapped around the hips of Adam Hendricks. Her head was arched back and his pants were around his ankles. Sadly enough this was not a new situation for me. My mother always said that I have a curiosity gene that leads me to trouble, and a deficiency in me that makes me follow that curiosity. In this town it meant that I had come across quite a few people in this position before. I heard people coming down the hallway and I panicked. Trying to close the door as quietly as possible, I went to flee before getting caught when a strong arm grabbed me around the waist. Before I knew it I was pinned against the hallway wall and somebody’s mouth was fastened to mine. My first instinct was to struggle but the lips left my mouth and I heard Griffin whisper.
“It’s me. Just go with it.”
He returned to my lips and despite my shock I started to realize that the man may be a jerk, but he could kiss. I was feeling this kiss right down to my toes. Part of me put that down to my very long dry spell since the last time that a man kissed me. Griffin’s hands stroked up and down my side and then settled on my hips. His lips left mine again and I tried to chase them. He chuckled darkly as he started placing butterfly kisses down my neck. I’m not proud of this fact, but in that moment, if he had pulled me into a dark room, I would have done whatever he asked of me. Once again, I am putting that moment of insanity down to my long dry spell. The people in the hallway passed by and when they were out of sight Griffin lifted his head.
“They’re gone,” he said softly.
“What,” I said, still dazed and looking at that beautiful mouth which had just lit some major fires in me.
“Sweetheart,” he said, “you gotta stop looking at me like that or I’m not going to be responsible for what happens next.”
That snapped me out of it. The last thing I needed was to complicate this situation even more than it already was. I wrenched myself away and slapped a hand on his chest.
“What the hell was that for?” I asked indignantly.
“That was to stop you from getting caught for the snooping you were doing. Didn’t your mother ever tell y
ou it was rude to go through people’s houses, especially during a wake,” he said.
“My mom kind of gave up on my manners when she found out how curious I was and that I never listened,” I said.
“I bet you were a stubborn one,” he chuckled again.
Hearing the door opening behind us, Griffin slammed me back up against the wall. This time there was no foreplay and no coaxing. He hooked my leg over his hip and slammed his mouth down on mine. Using his tongue against the seam of my mouth, I relented and he swooped in as if determined to taste every part of me.
“Room’s free if you want it dude,” I heard Adam Hendricks say.
Next thing I knew, my other leg was hooked up and I was carried into the room, the door was shut and I was pressed against it. I felt fingers at the buttons of my top and cold reason came rushing back in. I pushed back against his chest.
“Stop,” I gasped. “What are you doing?”
“Just trying not to get caught this time,” said Griffin, breathing heavily.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, trying really hard not to notice or acknowledge that despite everything else, there was a part of him that was really enjoying this moment.
“I came to see if there was anything I could pick up during the memorial service.”
“I thought it was a funeral.”
“There wasn’t a body,” he said.
“Why wasn’t there a body?” I asked.
“At the last moment I presented information to the lieutenant and he believes that there may be reason to view this as a homicide. The coroner kept hold of the body for more tests.”
“But if there’s no funeral,” I said, “why all this? They could have just canceled and waited for the body to be available.”
“Looks like the show had to go on,” Griffin shrugged.
I’d got momentarily distracted. That movement reminded me that I was currently pinned to the door with my legs wrapped around the lean hips of a man that I was really not very fond of.
“Are you planning on letting me down?” I asked as I tried to wriggle myself away from him.
I looked up and got caught by the way his eyes darkened. I flushed as I realized what I was doing and the response that I was inciting in him. Okay, bad move. I stopped the wiggling and waited for the under pressure detective to calm himself down, although by the feel of him it was going to take a lot of calming. I dropped my legs and he stepped away. I tried desperately to stop my hands from shaking as I discovered that a couple of buttons had managed to come undone in our little effort. Although from the way he was looking at me they might not have come undone by themselves.
“So what was that all about?” I said, while tucking the ends of my shirt back into my very sensible pants.
“I needed to keep my face hidden,” he said. “I’m not supposed to be here.”
Great. He had virtually guaranteed I would not be sleeping tonight from frustration as I replayed those kisses in my mind, and from his perspective I was performing the same function as a balaclava. Wonderful.
“So making it seem like I was the type of person to make out at a wake seemed like a good idea,” I said, cringing as I realized I had been making out at a wake.
“No, just an added bonus,” he said, smirking.
Yeah, that was why I hated this guy.
“Anyway,” he said. “Considering the people who saw you were the brother and fiancée of the deceased and they had just been having sex in this room, I don’t think they are able to hold the high ground on this one.”
I stopped. “I’ve got to say, I didn’t see that one coming. I thought she was a lot more innocent than that.” I shrugged. “Of course innocent in this town is relative, it just means you haven’t released a sex tape yet.”
Griffin made some kind of noise as if he was choking.
“Are you okay?” I asked, wondering why I was concerned.
“Fine, fine,” he said, clearing his throat. “Just not expecting you to start talking about sex tapes.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “Just a general comment. Not planning on starting a whole discussion on it. So if you don’t need me to act as a human Richard Nixon mask I assume I’m fine to leave,” I said.
I needed to go home. I also needed to wipe the last ten minutes from my memory and I had a feeling that was going to take a bit of time. I wondered if cold showers really worked. No guy had ever managed to get me this worked up over just a kiss before, so I was in uncharted territory.
Opening the door, Griffin peeked out. “The coast is clear, you should be okay now.”
Slipping past him I’d almost made it out when a hand grabbed my elbow.
“I’ll be seeing you later, sweetheart,” he said huskily, and then let me go and headed in the opposite direction.
I shivered involuntarily. I was so in over my head with this one, I couldn’t even see where the problem began. Heading downstairs, I heard loud voices with Eleanor’s voice rising over the top of them. I raced down the stairs to find Eleanor and Emily at it again. Luckily, this time security had got between them in the form of the biggest man I had ever seen. He even made Jorge look normal. Actually he looked kind of bored standing between two tiny women, like he knew he had a job to do but he couldn’t believe it had come to this. Adam Hendricks had his arms around Emily Saunders as she screamed obscenities at Eleanor. Once again, I’ve got to say that the woman was surprising me. The creativity behind some of those insults was more than I thought she was capable of. Of course all the insults flying followed the same home wrecking slut, no talent whore, kind of topic, but they were creative. Slipping behind Eleanor, I stood next to the publicist and leaned over.
“What’s happening this time?” I asked.
“What the hell am I supposed to do about this?” the woman snarled.
When the publicist is stumped, you know the situation is bad. One thing I have learned about these people is that they are eternally optimistic. No matter how bad a situation, they are able to spin the press in a positive way. When your publicist gives up, you know you are in trouble. Eleanor’s manager was trying to pull her away and seemed to be earning his hefty fees for once. After the last time I was not getting involved in this situation. I knew that Griffin was prowling around the building somewhere and I already owed the guy three months. There was no way, especially after that scene earlier, that I was going to risk extending my period of servitude.
Eventually we managed to get Eleanor into the limo and the manager, her publicist and I just looked at each other with the same expressions our parents must have used when we messed up badly.
“Rehab,” the publicist blurted out.
The manager and I looked at her. Eleanor ignored her completely and continued to drink champagne out of a bottle. Inwardly I chuckled. This was going to be good.
“Exactly where do you think you are going with that thought?” I asked. “Or are we just brainstorming and throwing words out to see what works.”
“Hear me out,” she said. “Eleanor has gone through a traumatic situation. Ryan died on her just as he realized he had made a terrible mistake. That she was his one true love. He called her to beg her to give him another chance. She went to see him and they talked all night about their dreams for a future together and how they could deal with the situation without hurting Emily.”
This woman was wasted in public relations, she should be writing screenplays, very fictional screenplays.
“She witnessed the tragic death of her one true love.”
She was warming up to the story, I could see. Real life had no part in this and I could see the manager was getting hooked in as well.
“The last two days have been terrible for her, so she is exhausted and needs time to heal. We put her in one of those rehab places for a few days so she can deal with her grief.”
“Not trying to rain on your parade,” I said, indicating the woman who was still drinking out of the c
hampagne bottle as we discussed her impending, and I’m guessing, involuntary, entry into rehab. “Is she actually going to have to take part in a detox program? If she is, I’m not liking your chances.”
“Oh, of course not. I know just the place for her. It’ll be more of a holiday for her. She can have everything she wants, she’ll just be away from temptation.”
“The temptation to smash her fist in Emily Saunders’ face,” I said.
“Yes that would be it.” The publicist was nodding enthusiastically, obviously hoping that the rest of us could also see her vision.
“That is a perfect idea,” the manager said, beaming.
The self-congratulatory smiles were interrupted by a soft snore coming from the other side of the limo. Eleanor Channing had fallen asleep while we had been discussing her future, her hand still firmly wrapped around the neck of that champagne bottle.
