Here All Along

by Crista McHugh

  “Let her through,” one of the security guards barked.

  Sarah followed him as he cut a path through the crowd for her, her left hand shielding her face from the questions that peppered her along the way.

  “Sage, is it true you’re replacing Mackinzie Donavan?”

  “Sage, are you and Gideon Kelly an item?”

  “Where have you been all these years, Sage?”

  “Tell us what’s really happening in Vegas.”

  Years in the public eye had taught her how to calmly deflect such questions without giving into the rage and frustration brewing inside. She kept her face emotionless, her gaze fixed straight ahead on the back of the security guard, and her mouth shut. The reporters already had more than enough material to spin some wild tale about her. She didn’t need to give them any more to work with.

  The guard must’ve called for backup because two more guards appeared on either side of her once she made her way through the throngs of reporters.

  “Where are you going, ma’am?” one of them asked.

  “Taxi stand, please.” Gideon was on a soundstage just off the Strip today to shoot scenes in what was supposed to a government office.

  The guard nodded and escorted her to the VIP entrance where a taxi stood waiting for her.

  It wasn’t until they were on the way that she finally breathed a sigh of relief. A wave of nausea followed once she replayed their questions.

  Did they know about the marriage?

  A second wave of nausea rolled through when she realized she’d held her wedding ring up for them to capture with their cameras.

  Shit!

  Somehow, she’d managed to screw things up without even opening her mouth.

  ***

  Gideon dialed Sarah’s number by habit, but when it went directly to a full voice-mail box, he remembered her phone was still drying out from being submerged.

  Get Red a new phone, he texted to Jason. After all, he wanted to be able to reach his wife when he wanted.

  His lips twitched when he remembered her teasing threat to buy handcuffs this morning. What if she was in some store right now, buying sexy lingerie for tonight? Maybe even a pair of handcuffs or a riding crop or a velvet mask…?

  His dick hardened, and he shifted in his seat before it became too painful to sit. God, he loved the idea of coming home to her every night.

  Gabe came alongside him and nodded toward the crowd of reporters gathered outside the set. “Wonder if they know something we don’t.”

  “You didn’t leak anything this time, did you?”

  “Nope.” Gabe waved his phone. “The only evidence of your wedding is locked away behind two sets of passwords and some very generous bribes.”

  “I figured you would’ve slipped it to someone by now.”

  “Please.” He flopped down on a nearby chair and wiped his brow. “I have some respect for sacred moments. And speaking of your wedding, how did last night go?”

  “Well,” Gideon replied with a hint of a smile, remembering how beautiful Sarah was when she came.

  “Well? Or well, well, well?” Gabe wagged his eyebrows suggestively.

  “I’m not a kiss-and-tell kind of guy.”

  Gabe raised both arms in the air. “Score one for the Kid!”

  “Shut up.” Gideon gave him a lighthearted shove, his smile widening.

  “Seriously, though, she forgave you, right?”

  “Yes.”

  Gabe gave him a smug nod. “Good. Now that we have your problem taken care of, we can focus on bigger issues.”

  Before he could ask Gabe what he meant, Karl came up behind him. “Where’s Sage?”

  “No idea,” Gideon lied. “Her phone’s dead.”

  “Not what I wanted to hear.” Karl raked his fingers through his hair until it turned into a spiky mess. “Production’s going to be halted unless we find someone to play Rae.”

  “Any luck finding Mackinzie?” Gabe asked a little too casually.

  “No.” The look Karl gave Gabe said he knew the actor was behind the actress’s disappearance. “And personally, I’m glad to be rid of her. I want Sage.”

  The director’s glare focused on Gideon, and he squirmed in his chair. “I told you, Karl, she has no desire to return to acting.”

  “And I’m saying bullshit. We’ll offer her so much money, she’d be stupid to turn this role down.”

  Before, he’d defended her because she was his best friend. Now that she was his wife, he felt even more pressure to defend her. “Sarah’s not interested in money.”

  “Then what does she want?” the director snapped. “A fuckin’ Academy Award?”

  “She doesn’t have one of those,” Gabe quipped. “Just a Golden Globe.”

  “Stay out of this, Harrison.”

  Time to diffuse the situation before Karl started throwing things at his co-star. “Listen, Karl, I’ve told her about the screen test, and if she wants to do it, she will. But I’m not going to force her to do something she isn’t comfortable doing.”

  Karl drew in several quick breaths, his nostrils flaring with each one. “Fine. But if she doesn’t get her ass here by this afternoon, I’ll let people know she’s the reason why this film tanked.”

  Gideon bolted from his seat, his hands curled into fists, but Gabe managed to step in between him and Karl.

  “Cool it, Kelly,” Gabe murmured. “You’re already in deep shit as it is.”

  “Get your assistant on the set before six, or else.” Karl turned and walked away as though he was oblivious to the way Gabe was holding Gideon back from taking a swing at him.

  Gabe shoved him back in a chair and waited until the director was out of earshot before asking, “Have you told her about the screen test?”

  “Of course not.”

  Now it was Gabe’s face that turned a mottled shade of red. “Why the hell not? After all I did—”

  “She won’t do it.” Gideon cut him off, his voice remaining level but firm. “I know her. I saw what fame did to her, and I never want to see her go back to that dark place again.”

  “Unless she’s drunk enough to propose marriage to you, eh?”

  Gideon cracked his knuckles. Karl had already managed to get a rise out of him, but he refused to let Gabe’s taunts get to him. “You saw how wasted she was. Now imagine seeing her like that every night. Imagine—” His throat tightened as memories of that night three years ago flashed through his mind. “Imagine watching her run out into oncoming traffic and get hit by a car. Imagine your heart stopping at the sight of her lying motionless on the ground. Imagine rushing over to her, not sure if she was dead or alive.”

  Gabe pressed his lips together and took a step back.

  “I was there that night, and I never want to live through that nightmare again. And if it means withholding information from her, then so be it.”

  “You can’t protect her forever, Kid.”

  “Watch me.”

  ***

  By the time the taxi pulled up to the set, Sarah’s stomach had more knots than a rope in a Boy Scout camp. The crowd gathered outside the soundstage only added to her misery. What had started out as a blissful morning had suddenly turned into a nightmare of epic proportions.

  She hugged her purse to her chest and wondered if it would be better to turn around and return to Caesar’s. The sun glinted off her wedding ring, and the tension eased in her shoulders. They’d already snapped a picture of the ring on her left hand. There was nothing else she needed to hide at this point.

  After taking a deep breath to bolster her courage, she opened the door of the taxi and dashed toward the set. The guards spotted her before the reporters, and she managed to squeeze through with minimal harassment. The doors slammed shut behind her, leaving her within the relatively safe confines of the set and standing inches from a grinning Gabe Harrison.

  He handed her a Las Vegas baseball cap and a pair of cheap sunglasses. “I highly recommend these if you want to get ar
ound town without a dozen paparazzi on your tail.”

  “Thanks.” She stuffed the items in her purse and craned her neck to see past him. “Where’s the Kid?”

  “Finishing up a scene, I think.” He studied her for a moment before adding, “I know someone who’s dying to meet you.”

  The skin along the back of her neck prickled in warning. “Who?”

  “Karl, the director.” Gabe tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow. “Why don’t we say hi to him?”

  Part of her wanted to dig in her heels and wait for Gideon, but before she could catch herself, she was standing beside the wide-eyed director.

  “Holy shit, you came,” he said, his hand shaking ever so slightly.

  “Excuse me?” She looked to Gabe for assistance, but got nothing from the blank look on his face.

  “Your timing is perfect.” Karl pressed his hand against the small of her back and steered her toward two women standing near a rollaway makeup case. “We’re in between takes, so this is the perfect time for your screen test.”

  “My screen test?” She searched the set for Gideon, but he was nowhere to be seen. Meanwhile, Karl had already deposited her in a chair and was giving orders to the makeup artists.

  “I want her ready to film in ten minutes. You got that?”

  One of the women swooped in with a canister of foundation and held it up to her neck to see if it matched.

  The other bunched her brows together and shook her head. “There’s no way she’ll fit into Mackinzie’s costumes,” she told the director.

  Great. Remind me that I’m not a size zero anymore.

  “She can do the screen test in what she has on.” Karl paused to signal one of the grips to move a camera. “This isn’t a take. It’s just something to show the producers to convince them that Sage is perfect for the role.”

  Sarah waved off the woman airbrushing her face and rose from the chair. “Hold on a minute. Who said I’d agree to do a screen test?”

  “Cute, Sage,” Karl said with a snicker. “Let’s just do a quick scene, and then your agent can negotiate your salary.”

  He turned back to the set, but she grabbed his shoulder and whirled him around. “I think there’s some confusion on your part.”

  “No, there isn’t. I told Kelly to get you back here to do that screen test, and he told me you’d come when you were ready. I’m down to the wire now, and I’m not wasting my opportunity, so be a good girl and get in the chair so we can get this formality behind us.”

  Karl walked off, leaving her at a loss for words.

  Gideon knew about this, and he never told her.

  Or worse, maybe he was in on it from the beginning and was doing everything he could to force her back into acting.

  The makeup artist guided her back to the chair to finish applying the foundation. A production assistant dropped a copy of the script into her lap a few seconds later and told her what scene they’d be shooting. Sarah didn’t need to review it. She’d gone over the script enough times with Gideon to know her part.

  By the time her husband appeared, she was made up and ready to go.

  Gideon stared at her, his face unreadable. “What are you doing?”

  “As if you didn’t know.”

  “You don’t have to do this.”

  “Were you even going to give me a chance to decide if I wanted to or not?”

  As soon as she said the words, the proverbial light bulb went off. Deep inside, she wanted to be here. She wanted to do the screen test, and she wanted the role of Rae. And if she hadn’t wandered onto the set at the right moment, it would’ve slipped through her fingers. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  His expression hardened into a mask of stubbornness as he crossed his arms. “Because.”

  “Because what?”

  “Do you really want to go back to being Sage Holtz?”

  “That’s my decision to make.”

  “I like things the way they are now.”

  To anyone else, Gideon would’ve appeared confident, but she knew him too well. She didn’t miss the twitch in his eye, the tightness in his voice, the faint tremor in his hand, the way his breath caught as he waited for her response. He was scared.

  “What else are you hiding from me?” she asked.

  The lines around his mouth deepened into a worried frown, but Karl interrupted before she got an answer.

  “Good. Both of you are here.” He flung his arm over Gideon’s shoulder like they were old friends. “So glad you convinced her to do this. Now, if you two can create half the magic you did the other day, this should be a snap.” He thumped Gideon’s chest. “Go out there and wow me again.”

  The director wandered off to his place behind the camera, but neither one of them flinched from the stare down. Sarah struggled to keep her face impassive even though a never-ending stream of questions flowed through her mind. Was he trying to keep her from the film? Or had he been trying to trick her into taking over Mackinzie’s role from the beginning? And where did their marriage fit into all this?

  The only thing she knew for certain was that Gideon hadn’t been completely honest with her, and that made her second-guess everything, including their marriage.

  She glanced down at the script. “It says here that I need a gun.”

  One of the assistants provided her with the prop. She checked it to make sure it was unloaded and took her place on the set, not looking back to see if Gideon would join her.

  She closed her eyes and got into character. In this scene, Rae was confronting Colt after learning he was an undercover agent. It was challenging and gut-wrenching and such a meaty moment, she couldn’t wait to sink her teeth into it. The raw emotions were easy enough to draw upon, and when she opened her eyes, she saw the world from Rae’s point of view.

  Gideon took his place across from her, and as soon as Karl shouted, “Action,” she raised the gun.

  “ ‘Calm down,’ ” Gideon said in a soothing voice. “ ‘Let’s talk about this like civilized adults.’ ”

  “ ‘You motherfucking bastard.’ ” She bit back the tears as she delivered the line, understanding Rae’s sense of betrayal all too well. “ ‘You used me.’ ”

  “ ‘No, it’s not like that at all.’ ” He took a step toward her, but froze when she leveled the 9mm with his head.

  “ ‘Liar. You were using me to get close to Esteban,’ ” she said, referring to Gabe’s character. “ ‘You thought that by seducing me, I’d turn him over to you. All your sweet words, all your promises—they were nothing more than lies.’ ”

  “ ‘No, they weren’t. I meant everything I said.’ ” Gideon’s plea sounded so heartfelt, she wondered if he was being sincere or a really good actor. “ ‘And if you give me a chance, I promise I’ll protect you. I’ll make things right.’ ”

  And just like Rae in the script, she wavered. She wanted to believe him. She wanted to have that happily ever after. She wanted to believe in true love. But there were too many reminders that everything around her was fake. The crew. The lights. Even the gun in her hand. It was nothing more than a story, and she was nothing more than a player for people’s entertainment.

  “ ‘I wish I could believe you.’ ”

  “ ‘Rae, please.’ ” Gideon lunged for her, and as the script directed, she pulled the trigger.

  The soft click was barely audible, but it could have been a real blast for all she knew. Gideon recoiled like he’d been shot. Panic seized control of her as she watched him fall. Even though her mind told her it was all make-believe, it was as real to her as it would’ve been for Rae. The gun fell from her hands, and she covered her mouth in horror over what she’d done.

  “ ‘Colt, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’ ” She took a step toward him, swallowing back the bile that rose into her throat. “ ‘Speak to me.’ ”

  He moaned to let her know he was still alive, but before she could learn anything more, the sound of the director shouting “Cut!” broke the silence. />
  The second she lifted her head, she fell out of character, yet she couldn’t shake Rae’s feelings of betrayal.

  Gideon got up and ran to her. “You were fabulous, Red,” he said, his expression a mixture of pride and regret.

  Her heart twisted, and she didn’t know what to say.

  Gabe joined them and gave Gideon a congratulatory shake. “She blew that screen test away. I told you our plan would work.”

  Her confusion evaporated, and she was back to being on guard. “What plan?”

  Gabe’s mouth fell open, followed by a few incomprehensible sounds. “I—I—I mean, we—”

  “Save it, Harrison.” She shoved the gun into Gabe’s hands, her eyes locked with Gideon’s. “What was this plan of yours?”

  “It doesn’t matter, Red.”

  “On the contrary, I think it does.”

  As the silence stretched on, she started putting the pieces together. Gideon wanted to be more than friends with her, and now they were married. But clouding the picture were the film and the screen test he didn’t tell her about and how that sprung up from the kiss that forced her to question their relationship…

  “You tricked me,” she whispered once everything fell into place.

  “No, it’s not like that.” He reached for her, but she evaded him.

  “No, you and Gabe tricked me. The day we ran the lines and the videos and the press leaks—you two were both behind it. And like an idiot, I allowed you to manipulate me.”

  Like ripples in the pond, the consequences of each act grew larger and larger. If she hadn’t run lines with Gideon that day, he would’ve never kissed her, and the scene would’ve never ended up all over the Internet, and her phone wouldn’t have been bombarded with the calls that caused her to start drinking the other day.

  And if she hadn’t gotten drunk…

  She yanked off her wedding ring and forced it into Gideon’s hand. “I can’t do this, not with someone who can’t be honest with me.”

  Then she grabbed her purse and ran for the door before her courage faltered.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Shock held Gideon motionless as Sarah shoved the ring into his hand and ran away. An odd sense of déjà vu enveloped him.