by Lana Xavier
It was also making me swoon. And slightly turned on, if I was really being honest.
Without another word, she spun on her heel and left, slamming the trailer door hard on her way out. Nathan and I winced at the suddenness of the noise, then watched as Caleb slowly turned around to face us.
I could see a twinge of regret on his face and I knew I needed to speak to him alone.
“Nathan, will you—”
“Already gone,” he said, cutting me off. Before he exited the trailer, he added, “If you need anything—either of you—just give me a shout.”
“Thanks, Nathan,” Caleb said miserably as he bypassed the other man to flop down face-first on my couch.
Nathan disappeared without another word and I got up to lock the trailer door behind him. Unsure of how to proceed or possibly make Caleb feel better, I wound up standing near the door for a few long minutes, nervously fidgeting.
Eventually, he rolled onto his back and gave me a sad look as he said, “Come here, girl.”
I went to him without question and allowed him to pull me down into his arms and cradle me gently against his body. I was beyond confused about everything— the severity of what just happened, Annabelle’s possible involvement in the scandal, Caleb’s reaction to the mess. It made me frozen with a mixture of fear and uncertainty.
“Relax, baby,” he whispered against my stiff neck. “It’ll be alright.”
“Will it?” I wondered, pulling back enough to look in his eyes. “Because you look like your entire world just ended.”
“It’s not that, it’s just.... Shit’s about to get a lot worse for me,” he said as he rolled on his back, letting go of his hold on my body. “Annabelle’s a real bitch when you fuck with her and she’s got a lot of dirt on me. I wont be surprised if she throws me under the bus.”
I propped up on my elbow to watch his eyes as he stared up at the ceiling. “I thought you didn’t care what people thought about you?”
He smiled slightly, obviously a little bit amused by the fact that I didn’t understand. “I don’t, but it’s not about that. It’s about the fact that she’s right—I’m nothing but trouble. More trouble than I’m worth. Once she proves that to the world, there’s a strong possibility that no one’s going to want to work with me again.”
That made me frown. I sat up and crossed my legs beneath me, shaking my head with denial. “No, that would never happen. You’re Caleb Bradshaw. Have you seen any of your movies? You’re an incredible actor, people wouldn’t snub you just because—”
My words died in my throat when he abruptly sat up and pressed his lips to mine. My trail of thought evaporated instantly, my mind only able to focus on the feeling of our lips pressing together so softly and intimately that I nearly swooned.
When he pulled away a mere moment later, I tried to follow his lips with a whimper of protest. But he merely pressed his forehead to mine and whispered, “Thank you.”
“For what?” I asked, opening my eyes to stare into his.
They danced with something unfamiliar—something I’d never seen in them before. “For not asking what dirt she had on me. For looking past all the bullshit and believing that this can be repaired. For forgiving me for treating you so poorly. Just... for everything. Thank you.”
It was probably the most heartfelt words anyone had ever spoken to me and even though they weren’t a declaration of his feelings for me, my heart clenched just as hard as if they were.
I swallowed the lump in my throat and nodded. “You’re welcome. I... Thank you.”
“For what?” he asked with an incredulous laugh. “All I’ve done is fuck up your life again and again. I have no idea—”
“For staying,” I said, cutting him off. “Thank you for staying.”
He looked at me with an unreadable expression and I knew he got it. He completely understood that I was totally lost on him and the revelation wasn’t sending him running. If anything, he looked... pleased.
The happy expression morphed quickly into concern and I squeaked with surprised when he grabbed my shoulders and said, “Make me a promise.”
“What promise?”
“Promise me that you went let me fuck this up. We... I don’t know if we’re on the same page here or not, but what I do know is that my feelings for you are different than anything I’ve ever felt before. It’s way too soon for me to label it, but I want you to promise to help me not screw this up.”
I wasn’t sure if I could even keep such a promise, but I nodded anyways, desperate with hope that together, we could keep whatever was happening between us from imploding.
“I promise. Caleb?”
“Hmm?”
“Are you shooting this morning?”
He frowned a little and shook his head. “No, I’m free until three. Why?”
I grinned and angled my body towards his, gliding with ease into his lap and smiling down at him. “Because I got a little turned on watching you stand up to Annabelle.”
He raised an eyebrow as his hands roamed beneath my shirt and up my back. “Oh yeah?”
“Mm-hmm. And I was really hoping you’d be willing to help me out since you caused the problem and all.”
Caleb grinned and flipped us over, pulling yet another surprised yelp out of me. He chuckled as he brushed a kiss against my lips and whispered, “I think I can handle that.”
* * *
Chapter Thirteen
“I’m going crazy, Candace. Like, absolutely batshit insane crazy,” I said into the phone as I paced back and forth in my trailer.
“Dude, chill. Maybe Caleb was wrong. Maybe she’s not bitter enough to bother you guys.”
I rolled my eyes, grateful that she couldn’t see me do it. It had been two weeks since the explosion with Annabelle and with each day that passed, both Caleb and I grew more and more weary.
We were still moving forward as far as our relationship went, but we were both mentally preparing for the other shoe to drop and for Annabelle to strike Caleb with whatever ammo it was that she had.
“How’s Nathan?” Candace’s voice broke into my rapid-fire, paranoid thoughts.
“He’s fine. Look, why don’t you just call him?” I said with a sigh, not really in the mood to discuss Nathan with my sister for the hundredth time since she left the set.
“Not important. Let’s get back to you.” The deflection was obvious, but I didn’t bother to argue with her about it. “Has Caleb heard anything from Marlena?”
“Nope. Nothing from Annabelle either. No calls, no texts, nothing. And they both just disappeared in the media. It’s just... quiet. Like the calm before the storm.”
“Hmm,” Candace hummed thoughtfully. “It’s worrisome, I’ll give you that. But you really do need to chill. Freaking out isn’t going to help you.”
I snorted and rolled my eyes again. I was well aware that freaking out wasn’t helping anything, but it was completely out of my control. The stares I got every day on set weren’t helping matters either.
It seemed that the longer Annabelle and Marlena waited to mention Caleb again, the more drug out the current scandal surrounding us was. People were still giving me ‘those’ looks, and they only got worse after Caleb and I had held hands one day while walking to lunch.
I was the homewrecking whore of Hollywood and everyone knew it. And they treated me like it, too.
I was so ready to get the fuck out of Vancouver.
The thought of heading home to New York gave me pause. In our constant worry over Annabelle, neither Caleb nor myself had brought up what was going to happen when filming ended. We were getting dangerously close to wrapping up and while part of me was thrilled at the idea of going home, the other part was completely heartbroken.
I don’t want to be without him, but how could this ever work? He lives in a city I loathe and I have an entire life in New York that I don’t want to give up. But how could I possibly ask him to do something when I’m not willing to do the same for him?
>
“Sabrina?”
“I got to go, Candace,” I abruptly said, knowing that I needed to process my feelings about this before even considering asking for her advice. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
I ended the call and checked the time before turning the phone completely off and discarding it on the end table. I grabbed a beer from the mini-fridge and plopped down on my couch, ready to use the next hour trying to think of a way to make this work.
* * *
When Caleb entered the trailer a little over an hour later, I was sitting in the exact same spot and still mentally going over the puzzle of how to make a relationship like ours work from opposite ends of the country.
I’d come up with nothing thus far. At least nothing that seemed like something Caleb would be willing to partake in.
He didn’t strike me as a phone sex kind of guy when he could so easily get real sex from whoever he wanted, which left the option of the two of us travelling back and forth throughout the year. But that thought made no sense considering the fact that Caleb usually wasn’t home anyways. He was wherever he needed to be for his next film.
Whereas I was always home, always in New York. Content with my life as a whole.
Caleb dropped the key to my trailer on the end table and emptied his pockets, watching me with a pensive frown. I could tell he didn’t want to ask. He seemed able to sense the tension radiating from me in waves and I think we both knew that the moment this conversation got started, there would be no going back.
But he didn’t have a choice. I obviously wasn’t fine with ignoring our issues and he let out a sigh of resignation before he finally asked, “What’s the matter?”
“I’m worried.”
He plopped down beside me on the couch, twisting me to look at him. “About Annabelle? Don’t bother, it’s not worth the energy. Either she’ll do something or she won’t.”
Even though Caleb was a damn fine actor, I could see right through his bullshit. He might have meant the sentiment for me, but he clearly wasn’t following it himself. He was worried, too.
“Actually,” I started, not even bothering to call him on his crap right now, “I haven’t thought about Annabelle for over an hour now. I’m worried about us.”
“Us?” he repeated, the frown lines in his forehead growing deeper. “What about us?”
“Shooting ends in a week,” I quietly reminded him and I saw the understanding as it dawned in his eyes. “What happens after that?”
Caleb sighed. “I honestly hadn’t thought about it.”
“I hadn’t either. But I think we should probably start.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face and let out a frustrated groan. I tried not to take it offensively, but it was rather difficult not to get a little irritated over the fact that he obviously didn’t want to think or talk about our future.
Still, I managed to keep my voice level as I asked, “Do you just not want to talk about this now, or at all?”
He chuckled. “Both? I’m sorry, Sabrina, I’m just not really... I’m not the ‘let’s plan our future’ guy. I just go with it.”
My frown deepened as I faced him head on. “You realize if we ‘just go with it’, it’s going to end up with you in California, me in New York, and us never seeing each other.”
I watched as a flash of panic and regret swept over his face, then disappeared just as quickly as it came. When he opened his mouth to speak, I assumed that he was going to say something comforting. That he was going to agree with me. That he was going to relent to actually talking about this.
“Maybe that’s a good thing.”
My heart sank into my stomach. The last thing I expected after the time we had spent together—after all his whispered promises that he could offer me something more—was that he would start back up with his hot and cold mood swings again.
“Are you serious?”
He gave a half-shrug and tried to lean against me, but I wasn’t having it. I jerked away from his touch as if I’d been burnt me. Was he really expecting to say something like that and me just fall to my knees for him afterwards?
“Sabrina, don’t be like that. I just mean... don’t you think this is going a little fast? Maybe some separation is a good thing.”
I stood up from the couch and stared at the wall, unable to look at him any longer. What the fuck happened since he left my trailer this morning? There had to be some sort of logical explanation to his sudden shift.
“If you need space, then you’re free to go. I don’t want to crowd you or move too fast, so maybe we should spend a few nights apart,” I said, mentally patting myself on the back for keeping my voice so calm.
He got off the couch and moved to grab my waist, rolling his eyes when I backed away.
“Are you serious?” he parroted back at me, almost mockingly. “Don’t be this way, girl. Come here,” he beckoned with a crook of his fingers.
Apparently, keeping my calm demeanor hadn’t done me any favors. I added an edge to my voice when I spoke again, hoping it’d drive home my point.
“If you honestly think I want to sleep with you right now—you’re out of your fucking mind.”
Caleb gave me an incredulous look, like he couldn’t believe I was passing up a night with him. I returned the look right back at him, unable to believe that he truly thought I would want to sleep with him after he just said we needed distance.
“So that’s it? I give you the truth and you just close up? Maybe it is better this way. You don’t even fucking know me, Sabrina!”
Only I did. I did know him, far better than he gave me credit for.
I knew well him enough to realize he was only saying all of this to purposely push me away.
He did warn me that he was going to fuck up.
I clung to the thought as I opened the door and made a sweeping gesture with my arm, repeating the thought over and over in my head to hold my anger in check. While there were a number of things I probably could have done in that moment, I followed my gut instinct and pushed back.
Pushed him out of my trailer. Out of my bed. The message was clear.
Caleb paused, shocked at the seriousness of my gesture. For a split second, he appeared to be considering his options and there was the briefest moment where I thought my choice might wind up working out.
Until I saw the look of dark rage that crossed over his face, still firmly in place as he marched past me and slammed the trailer door shut behind him.
His message was clear as well. He wasn’t going to come running back.
Hell, he wouldn’t even come walking back. I’d pushed a little too hard for his liking and now, it was all going to fall down to me. He had chased after me again and again.
If I wanted to keep him, this time I’d have to chase him.
I sighed and ran a hand into my hair.
I did promise not to let him fuck this up. Now I just need to think of a way to fix it.
* * *
Sleeping alone after weeks of spending my nights in Caleb’s arms was awful. There was no brief moment of confusion when I woke up—wondering what the source of the warmth at my back was until the rush of elation when I remembered it was Caleb. There was no fully rested feeling that you only got after a great sleep.
There definitely wasn’t any morning sex.
I was just... cold. And very much alone. The sadness that made my heart clench wasn’t entirely surprising, but it was a little worrisome. Had I really grown so accustomed to Caleb so quickly? Was he right after all?
Were we moving too quickly?
I sighed and threw the sheets off of my body, rolling out of bed and quickly using the restroom before returning to the main room of my trailer. I grabbed my phone from the nightstand and checked to see if I had any messages.
I wasn’t holding my breath for an apology from Caleb, but a girl could dream.
Sadly, I only had one text and it was from my sister. I frowned at the message that contained nothing more than a link
and tapped the screen to open it in the browser.
When the page loaded, I felt my blood run cold and I slammed my eyes closed.
There it was. Exactly what we had been waiting for.
Caleb’s name being drug through the mud far worse than mine ever had been. Detailed outlines of his past diva-like behavior on set, the hell it was to have him as a client, a breakdown of his (many) relations with women.
The bombs had been dropped.
Part of me recognized that this was likely the reason for the fight I had with Caleb yesterday. He seemed somber when he entered the trailer, like something was on his mind, but he bypassed whatever it was to see what was wrong with me.
Someone must have contacted him to warn him. He had known this was about to happen and the stress of that combined with my own stress of what was going to happen between us freaked him out.
He must have thought pushing me away would be easier than dealing with working through this mess together.
It was only a theory, but that was all I had. I couldn’t ask Caleb anymore. At least not after the way we left things the night before. Anything I said at this point would come out like I was slinging accusations and that was the last thing he needed right now.
But one thing I was certain of was that I wasn’t going to allow our relationship to become a casualty in this war. If I couldn’t go directly to Caleb about it, I would have to find another way.
* * *
Chapter Fourteen
After I decided that I wasn’t going to lose Caleb over such trivial bullshit, I opened my laptop and began scrolling through all the recent news about him, taking in every detail as I hopped from article to article. Some of the things I read were less than pleasant—especially the accounts of how he treated women—but I refused to dwell on rumored accounts of his past.
I knew better now than to believe everything I read and even if everything was true, I wasn’t about to judge him for it. It was hardly my place to do such a thing.
It was incredibly clear that Annabelle was the driving force behind the entire mess considering she was directly quoted in almost every article I came across. Marlena was mentioned often, but there was no direct quote from her other than rehashes of what she said about our ‘affair’.
