by Megyn Ward
“I don’t like it.” He cuts a quick look at the partition that’s raised between the back of the limo and the front.
“Too bad because it’s happening.” When he glares at me, I laugh. “Trust me, Gray—you do not want to be involved in my trying to pack for this trip,” I tell him, trying to make light of the situation. “You’ll take care of your business while I take care of mine—a few hours tops, and then afterward we’ll get out of here and disappear until this whole thing is over.”
FORTY-ONE
Delilah
WE DROPPED GRAY OFF AT THE CLUB AND
after a few terse words with Rivers and a solemn promise from me to stay in my suite and to not let anyone up while he’s gone, Gray reluctantly made his way inside the building.
Twenty minutes later, we’re rolling to a stop in front of the Hawthorne and my stomach is instantly tied into a dozen knots.
The paparazzi is here, crowded onto the sidewalk in front of the building’s set of tinted glass doors, when we pull up, they all leap into action, jostling each other for the best position, the perfect camera angle, crowding around the limo and shouting questions before they even see me in hopes of eliciting a reaction.
Who started the fire at Level?
Who tried to kidnap you?
Are you and Grayson Bright an item?
What does Nik Vanderhoff thing of your new boyfriend?
“Shall I circle the block, Miss Delilah?” River’s asks, his concerned gaze aimed at me through the rearview. “Perhaps if they think you’ve gone—”
“No.” I give him the same too bright smile I gave Gray when I all but shoved him out of the car at the club. “Circling the block will only delay the inevitable,” I tell him. “The sooner we can get this over with, the sooner we can get inside.”
“As you wish.” He hesitates for a moment, like he’s taking a deep breath before throwing open his car door. Letting it slam closed behind him, Rivers wades through the mass of bodies crowded around the limo, each of them shouting questions at him—trying to elicit a reaction out of him too.
What do you think of Grayson Bright?
Where were you when the fire broke out?
Who do you think tried to kidnap Delilah?
Watching Rivers stoically push his way through the crush of paparazzi, I can see how tired he is. How hard it’s been for him to be the only stable constant in my life for so long. I have an instant to feel horrible about it before he finally gets to my door and wrestles it open on a sea of cameras, clicking and flashing at me like a swarm of angry bees.
Reaching for me, River’s pulls me from the car and slips an arm around me, guiding me toward the hotel’s entrance while I look down, watching my feet so I can keep my face averted and as far out of reach from the cameras as possible.
Undeterred, they keep shouting at me.
Does Grayson Bright know you’re engaged to Nick Vanderhoff?
Did you now that Vanderhoff and Liz Cramer have been hooking up behind your back for a year now?
Liz Cramer claims this whole thing is a publicity stunt meant to gain attention—care to comment?
“Almost there, Miss Delilah,” River’s whispers in my ear. “Just a few more steps…”
Sources are claiming there’s a sex tape—when did you make it?
Who’d you make the sex tape with? Grayson Bright or Nik Vanderhoff?
Where have you been, Delilah?
The questions, whispered close, picks up my head, the sight of my face stirring the angry hornets’ nest of photographers and I’m immediately blinded by the flash of cameras just as the doorman wrestles the door open and Rivers manages to guide me through it.
The hotel’s lobby is quiet in comparison and Rivers leads me through it quickly, one hand gripped around my elbow, the other pressed into the small of my back. As soon as we step up to the private elevator, his guiding hands drop away, giving me room to call down the car.
“There’s no sex tape,” I tell him quietly, shooting him a quick, embarrassed glance. “It’s all a big misunderstanding. I never—”
“Miss Delilah, please…” Rivers shakes his head at me, his face creased into a frown. “You don’t owe me an explanation. I’m just your driver. I don’t—”
“Yes you do,” cut him off quickly because he was just about to say he doesn’t matter and he’s wrong. He does matter. He’s one of the few people in my life that actually do. “You matter to me. Your opinion matters to me. What you think of me matters to me,” I tell him, forcing myself to look him in the eye. “I’ve been horrible these past few years…” Shaking my head, I let myself look away so I can fight off the sting of tears. “God, what you must think of me.”
“I think you’re a lonely young woman who put her faith and trust in the wrong people,” he answers me honestly, just as the elevator doors slide open. Ushering me through them and into the car, Rivers takes a step back. “I’ve taken the liberty of having your luggage send up and had Rosa freshen your suite—is there anything else I can do for you?”
“No.” I can barely get it out my throat is so tight. “Thank you, Rivers.”
“Very well.” He me gives a small, succinct nod, hands clasped behind his back. “Then I’ll head back to the club and wait for Mr. Grayson there.”
Before I can say anything else, the elevator doors slide closed between us.
When the elevator doors open, I realize that this is the first time I’ve been alone since walking in on the nightmare of what was left for me in my bedroom when I came back from my Friday morning meeting with Jase. It’s hard to believe it’s barely been more than 36-hours since then. If feels like it’s been years since I’ve been here.
Reminding myself of all the things I told Gray before I dropped him off at Level—that I’m perfectly safe and Nik couldn’t get up here, even if he wanted to, I made my way through the foyer and into the living area. Everything pretty much looks like it did when I left for my shopping trip with Liz on Friday afternoon, save for the obvious signs that Rosa had been in to tidy up. The roses she brought up yesterday morning are gone. So is the gift box.
Dropping my bag on the couch, I make my way down the hall to my bedroom. The doors are open, and I can see my luggage stacked neatly at the foot of the bed, just like Rivers promised. Choosing a mid-sized weekender from the stack, I stand in my closet, staring at rows and rows of impractical designer heels. Couture dresses and club wear, none of it exactly what I’d call appropriate for a Wyoming horse ranch.
Telling myself it’s only for a few days—a week at the most, I grab a few pair of jeans from a neatly folded stack and more T-shirts than I actually need. Adding a few summer dresses and shorts, I call it quits. Zipping it up, I carry it into the living room and drop it next to the elevator. Grabbing my bag off the chair on my way back to my room, I take it into the bathroom and collect my toiletries and toss them in on top of the stack of tabloids I shoved in there when I was gathering stuff while Gray was finalizing our travel plans. Reaching in, I pull them out of my bag—their glossy, colorful covers already smudged and dogeared from being read and reread over and over.
Sinking down on to the edge of the tub, I flip through the one that chronicles the fire with hastily grabbed cell phone pictures and video stills—burry photos of people running and screaming. The couch in flames. Wet club goers crying in the street. Being treated by EMS. Flipping forward, I stop on a full-page spread of more cell-phone pictures. I’m in all of them, arms slung around total strangers, grinning into the camera shoved in my face.
Ohmygod—you’re her aren’t you? You’re Delilah Hawthorne. Can I get a picture with you?
It happens all the time. When it does Liz usually rolls her eyes and drags me away from them when she’s with me. If I’m alone, I stop and pose. Smile and make small talk for a few minutes while they take the picture because I feel like I should. Like I owe a part of myself to a total stranger. Friday night was apparently no different because I’m in roughly a
dozen pictures, all taken on the main floor of Level, the tabloid headline splashed across the page above them:
HURRICANE DELILAH CUTS PATH OF DESTRUCTION THROUGH NYC HOTSPOT
Looking at the pictures brings an odd sort of recollection. A sense of remembering without actually remembering… people I don’t recognize with their arms around me. To be honest, I barely recognize myself. Barely feel connected to the person I was in these photographs. Poised to flip the tabloid closed, I pause, gaze fixed on one of the pictures I don’t remember taking—or rather the person standing behind me in it…
From the other side of the suite I hear the faint ding of the elevator, signaling it’s landing and I let out a low, long slow breath of relief because Gray is back.
Dropping the tabloid in the trash can where it belongs, I grab my bag off the counter and exit the bathroom. “Hey,” I call down the hall on my way to the living room. “I think we should just stay at your place instead of coming back here after you pack.” Dropping my bag on the couch, I turn toward the foyer and the figure standing in front of the closing elevator doors. “Because I’m so ready to get the hell out of…”
The sentiment dies in my throat when I realize that the person standing between me and the elevator isn’t Gray. It’s the same person who what standing behind me in the photograph I was just looking at, holding the clutch I lost Friday night and I feel it again—that sense of remembering without actually remembering but the feeling lasts for only a moment before the dam breaks and I remember everything.
FORTY-TWO
Grayson
THIS IS TAKING WAY TOO LONG.
Much longer than I have the actual time or patience for, considering that the majority of the damage to the club was caused by its sprinkler system.
I have more important things to do than walk some guy in Dockers around a charred, soggy couch.
“I don’t make the rules, Mr. Bright,” the investigator reminds me without looking up from his clipboard. “Your…” His brows draw together, his skepticism almost palpable. “brother—a Mr. Jase Bright indicated possible arson as cause for the incident. That means that as an arson investigator, I have to investigate, so please, if we could run through the events of Friday night again, that would be helpful.”
Incident.
Someone started a fire as a diversion so they could kidnap Delilah—I’d call that a hell of a lot more than an incident. Instead of pointing that out, I hold my tongue. Take a deep breath and count to ten before I launch into my account of what happened Friday night for what feels like the thousandth time.
“I was here,” I say, pointing at the blacked table in front of the couch. “Looking of someone who’d been dealing—”
My phone buzzes in my back pocket and I practically dive for it.
It’s Conner.
“I have to take this,” I tell the investigator, turning my back on him and walking away before he can say anything. “Tell me you found Vanderhoff,” I say into the phone while tossing a quick, assessing look over my shoulder. The investigator isn’t paying attention to me. Rather, he’s crouched down in front of the couch. He’s snapped on a pair of gloves and removed its charred cushions, camera aimed at something on underneath them.
“I found Vanderhoff,” Conner tells me. “According to TMZ he and Liz Cramer checked into the St. Regis less than an hour ago.”
The St. Regis is directly across the street from the Bright building, which puts it catty-corner to the Hawthorne. Liz followed Delilah to Boston and now she’s followed her back to New York? What the hell is going on?
Shit.
I look at the investigator. He’s frowning at the picture he just took on the preview screen of his camera like he might’ve found something. “Okay,” I say, thinking fast. “I—”
“There’s something else,” Conner says, cutting me off. “I pulled that video apart. I was right, it’s a deep fake—a really good one—and the girl on it definitely isn’t Delilah. It’s Liz Cramer.”
“Mr. Bright, I need you to come over here,” the investigator says, shooting me an impatient look.
“Where are you?” Conner asks, confused.
“At Level—it’s a long story,” I tell him before he can ask me what’s going on. “I’ll call you back.” I hang up, shoving my phone into my pocket, making my way back to the couch.
“So, I found your point of origin,” he tells me, jerking his chin at the couch. Under it, surrounded by the burnt remains of its frame is a warped, stainless steel champagne bucket engraved with the club’s logo. “I’ll have to run some tests but best guess, your assailant filled the bucket with accelerant—probably high-test booze—and stuck it under one of the cushions and dropped a match.” He looks at me, that skeptical look of his making a reappearance. “You say you were standing right here, not long before the fire broke out?” he asks, making it obvious that I should’ve seen something. Should’ve noticed someone shoving a champagne bucket full of vodka under a couch and setting it on fire.
“It was Friday night,” I remind him, unable to help the defensive tone that delivers it. “We were near capacity and I was dealing with another situation.” Staring at the champagne bucket, I feel something tickling at the back of my brain. I shake my head. “We’re done here—you can see yourself out,” I tell him, suddenly sure I need to leave.
He scowls at me. “Mr. Bright, I don’t think you’re understanding the—”
“I understand just fine,” I tell him, cutting him off. “I just don’t give a shit. Any more questions can be funneled through my attorney.”
I don’t stick around to listen to the rest of it. When I step out onto the sidewalk, Rivers is there waiting for me. As soon as he sees me, he opens the rear passenger side door and I climb in.
A few moments later Rivers is back behind the wheel and he’s wedged to limo back into the Midtown traffic.
“There was press in front of the hotel when Miss Delilah and I arrived earlier—would you like me to take you to the service entrance, Mr. Gray?”
“No.” I shake my head, gaze aimed out the window, surrounded by a trucks and taxies, all moving at a snail’s pace. “Not if it’s going to take longer for me to get back to Delilah.”
I turn to look at him for a moment, long enough to catch a fleeting frown in his reflection in the rearview. “Is everything okay, Mr. Gray?”
Is everything okay?
The question almost makes me laugh because everything is not okay. Everything is pretty much fucked and the longer I’m away from Delilah, the more certain I become that leaving her alone, even for an hour, was a mistake.
“Was Liz Cramer with Delilah Friday night?” I ask him instead of answering his question because I can’t shake the feeling that she’s involved in this somehow, even if its inadvertently. “I didn’t see her but—”
When I say her name, Rivers frown collapses into a scowl. “We picked up Miss Liz at her apartment on Lexington,” He tells me, his tone making it obvious that he doesn’t think much of her. “She and Miss Delilah spent the afternoon shopping. Afterward it was dinner and drinks around town until Miss Delilah and Mr. Jordy left her at a bar on the Lower East Side and—”
“Wait.” I sit up a little straighter, something about his account, pricking at the back of my brain. “Jordy Cramer rode with Delilah to Level?”
“Yes…” He frowns again. “He was very angry the last time we spoke—he called from Miss Delilah’s phone and asked that I bring the car around immediately. He claimed she was ill and he needed to get her home right away. When I told him that I’d just spoken to her and that she’d sent me on another errand, he was furious.”
Listening to Rivers account of what happened tightens the back of my neck in an instant because it all makes sense now.
Looking out the window again I can see the Hawthorne’s crisp white flags whipping in the warm evening breeze, their regal gold insignias signaling the hotel’s location. Across the intersection is the St. Regis, its ro
yal blue flags waving back. The sea of bumper-to-bumper traffic between them, all but standing still.
According to TMZ he and Liz Cramer checked into the St. Regis less than an hour ago.
Liz Cramer is with Nik… but her brother is never far behind. That’s means Jordy is here. His co-dependency on his sister and his obsession with Delilah wouldn’t allow him to be anywhere else.
Before I can think about what I’m doing, I throw open my door and start running.
FORTY-THREE
Delilah
“HEY, DELILAH,” HE SAYS, HIS MOUTH STRETCHED
in the same friendly smile that he’s aimed at me a thousand times.
Jordy.
Liz’s brother.
He was there Friday night. Caught a ride to Level with me from the bar his sister dragged us to. I lost track of him almost as soon as we got up to the VIP area. He asked me if I wanted something from the bar but I was too focused on the drama unfolding between Nik and Gray to pay his offer much attention.
“Hey, Jordy.” My gaze slips past him for a moment to land on the set of closed elevator doors. It’s not the only exit but it’s the closest. “How’d you get up here?”
He lifts his thumb and wags it at me, the grin on his face dimming a little at my tone. “You should probably keep better track of who you give unrestricted access to your suites too,” he tells me, tossing the clutch I lost Friday night onto the foyer table between us. “I brought your bag back.”
“Thank you…” I say it carefully, trying to stay calm so I can think. Try to plan my next move. “What are you doing here? I thought you guys were in Boston.”
“You know Liz—she likes to follow the drama. That usually means you and since it’s my job to follow her…” He takes a testing step toward me and it takes everything I have not to counter it in an effort to keep distance between us, to keep up the façade that everything is fine. That I don’t know he’s the one who tried to kidnap me. “She’s across the street at the St. Regis with Nik,” he tells me. “They’re… busy so I figured I’d come over and say hi.”
