by K. B. Draper
Lenny leaned forward. “This car is totally hot. I’ll drive if she–” He stopped when Kanyon twisted around enough to reach her arm across and force his head back.
“Not a single word,” Kanyon threatened.
“But I–”
Kanyon spun completely in her seat and shot a pointed finger at him. “Not one single word!” She eyed his sweat-ridden forehead. “And if you even think of getting any kind of bodily fluid on my seats, we’ll pull over and I’ll personally drain the remaining liquid from your body.”
He crossed his arms in a huff and they rode in silence for several minutes until Daylen finally spoke. “They’ll probably come after him again.”
“Probably.” Kanyon flipped down her sun visor to examine her face in the mirror. She touched around her swollen eyebrow, causing herself to flinch in pain. “How much are you in to those guys?” Kanyon was still looking in the mirror, but diverted her eyes to see Lenny.
Lenny didn’t move or respond. Kanyon flipped the visor closed and turned to face him. “Lenny, how much are you in to those guys?”
He turned his head to look at her but still didn’t speak.
“Lennnnyy?”
“I can’t say a single word, remember?” he said sarcastically.
“Stick with that attitude and see where it gets you. How much do you owe those guys?”
He thought for a minute then looked at the car’s ceiling. “Twenty-five K.”
“Do you have twenty-five K to give them?” Kanyon asked, already knowing the answer.
Lenny dropped his eyes back to Kanyon. “If I had it, I wouldn’t have had to borrow it, would I?”
Kanyon took a deep breath in lieu of killing him where he sat. If they wouldn’t have been sitting on her leather seats, she wasn’t sure she would’ve been able to resist such a temptation.
“What’s your plan to pay them off? Or should we just go back now, drop you off, and let them beat it out of you?”
His eyes lit with excitement. “I got this tip. If you’d loan me–”
“I got a hot tip for you. Stop fucking gambling on hot tips!” Kanyon barked out.
“I know, I know, but I just need one–” He shut up again as Kanyon narrowed her glare. “Okay, okay, no more tips. I’ll ask my brother for a job. He took over dad’s plumbing business.”
“That sounds like a good idea, but you’re going to have to unplug a lot of toilets to pay off twenty-five thousand,” Daylen said as she pulled into the drive of a modest house.
Kanyon scanned their surroundings. It looked like someone, Marie she was sure, kept a nice, tidy house. The small yard was mowed and decorated with flower beds and quaint yard art.
Lenny leaned forward. “Daylen, please. Do I have to go in there? Marie is really going to kill me. There’s no way I can tell her I lost all our money.”
Kanyon’s eyes stopped their assessment when they reached the house’s attached carport. She squinted to see what was beneath the blue tarp. All she could make out was the exposed grill and headlights.
“Yes, Lenny. You have to go in and you have to deal with her. And before she kills you, try to talk her into going to a hotel for a few days until you get this little loan problem worked out. I wouldn’t be surprised if they came after you again. Soon.”
He wiped a hand down his sweat stricken face.
“Wipe that on my car seat and you won’t have to worry about her killing you.”
He stopped his hand, redirecting it across the front of his shirt. “Sooo … will you go in with me? You know, soften her up a bit?” he pleaded.
“No, Lenny, I–” Daylen started before Kanyon cut her off.
“You know what, Lenny. I’ll go in and talk to Marie.” Kanyon reached for the door handle. “You sit right here and I’ll smooth everything out for you.”
“Seriously?” he asked, disbelief apparent in his voice.
“Sure, no problem.” She pushed open the car door, grabbed her bag, threw the strap over her head, and got out of the car. She waited until the door shut to groan at the shooting pain which streaked across her ribs and stomach. She forced her spine to straighten, fighting against the desire to curl up in a little ball. She walked as purposeful and upright as she could across the yard and up the three steps leading to the front door. She turned back and shot Daylen, a “See, I’m perfectly fine, I don’t need a hospital, back brace, or morphine” smile and an accompanying “All my limbs are still working” finger wave.
Daylen and Lenny, both perplexed, watched as Kanyon knocked on the door. They continued to watch as Marie answered, spoke to Kanyon for a minute, shot a glaring look at the car, and invited Kanyon in shutting the door behind them.
“That can’t be good.” He waited for a long silent moment. “Do you think they’re plotting my death?”
Daylen didn’t bother to respond because she was wondering the exact same thing.
Kanyon exited the house on her phone and an arm across her ribs, which she dropped quickly as she passed through the doorway. Marie leaned against the door jam, arms crossed, and a satisfied smirk on her lips.
Kanyon ended her call before she got to the car. She leaned down and smiled. “Get out, Lenny. Time to face the music.”
“Did you smooth things out?” he asked skeptically, pulling himself out from the backseat.
“Yep, she’s not going to kill you. For now, at least.” She stepped in close, put a finger to his nose, and lowered her voice to a menacing whisper. “But I’ll warn you right now, if you pull this crap again, just know we’ve come up with a very detailed plan which involves slowly dismembering you with a dull melon baller.” Kanyon stepped back as she mimed a scooping motion at his chest. Lenny gulped. “Good luck.” She stepped around him and the car door. “Oh, and Lenny.” She continued when he looked over his shoulder at her. “Just FYI, I’m going to be calling Marie to make sure the plumbing job is working out for you, because if it doesn’t, we have a whole other plan which involves hot sauce and a thousand little paper cuts strategically placed all over your body.” Kanyon nodded toward Marie and he followed her gaze. Marie made slicing gestures at different points of her body. She smiled when she heard him gulp again. She gave Marie a thumbs up and slid into the passenger seat.
“Want to tell me what really happened in there?” Daylen asked.
“I told her about Lenny’s little predicament and I offered her a solution,” Kanyon replied simply.
“Solution?” Daylen held up a hand. “Wait, do I even want to know? Probably not. Just tell me if it involves death or dismemberment.”
Kanyon pretended to think. “We did talk over the death option, but I’m too tired to dig a hole and she just got her hair and nails done so…” Kanyon shrugged.
“Dismemberment?”
Kanyon pretended to think again. “I guess you could say Lenny will be losing something, yes.”
“Kanyon?”
“Don’t worry, it’ll only be painful for a little bit, but he won’t die.”
They heard Lenny scream from inside the house. Daylen thought Kanyon had been joking and she shot her a quick concerned look. Kanyon flashed a sardonic grin as she heard the faint sounds of Lenny crying. “Should I call an ambulance?”
“No.” Kanyon spun then caught a set of keys in her hand.
“What are those?”
“Keys to Lenny’s, well my ‘79 Trans Am.” Kanyon nodded toward the tarped car in the carport.
Daylen relaxed. “Let me guess, you paid twenty-five K for it?”
Kanyon shrugged. “Funny how things just seem to work out.” She gave Daylen a cool, satisfied look which was met with wariness. “What? Marie’s got the money to pay off the goon squad and I have a Smokey and the Bandit car!” Kanyon attempted to give an exaggerated shrug of innocence but it fell short as she grabbed the side of her ribs which had rejected the gesture.
“I’m taking you to the hospital. I’ll decide if it’s a medical or mental one on the way.”
“No way. I don’t do hospitals,” Kanyon protested.
“You probably have a broken rib and the cut on your eye might need stitches.”
“Hospitals kill people. I’d go in there with bruised ribs and a cut that needs a Band-Aid and I’ll come out with a scalpel left in my stomach and some twenty-letter disease ending in osis.” She adjusted in her seat. “Just take me home. Really, I’m fine. It’s just a couple of bruises.”
Daylen sighed her disapproval. “What about your Smokey and the Bandit car?”
“I called someone to pick it up.”
Kanyon gave Daylen directions to her house. Headed in the right direction, Kanyon laid her head back and closed her eyes, still clutching her aching side. Suddenly exhausted and starting to feel every bruise and ache on her body, she smiled to herself. She felt more alive than she had in a long time.
“That car isn’t worth twenty-five thousand dollars, is it?” Daylen asked breaking the silence.
Kanyon rolled her head to look at Daylen. Her first instinct was to not lay claim to her generosity, but there was a small part of her that wanted Daylen to know she wasn’t always the irresponsible, life destructive, and selfish person Daylen thought she was. “No,” she replied, not divulging she’d actually given Marie thirty thousand, just in case she came to her senses and needed a divorce lawyer.
“So, you did it just to help Lenny?”
“No, I did it for Marie. For some dumb reason she loves the big, hairy, worthless slug.” Uncomfortable with her honesty, Kanyon rolled her head back and closed her eyes again. “And I did it for completely selfish reasons, I always wanted a Smokey and the Bandit car.”
Guilt started to seep into Daylen’s thoughts as she drove. The media was so wrong about Kanyon. They portrayed her as this selfish, self-serving diva with no concern or care for anyone else, but she knew better. Kanyon had put herself and her career in danger tonight. All for her. Again … She couldn’t help but make the comparison between tonight and the night so many years ago when Kanyon rescued her then too. She risked a glance at her savior, who this time was bloody and bruised because of her. Her savior she thought again, but the word no matter how often she used it on the set, wasn’t exactly right. Her mind flooded with images, new and old, and then a single word floated to the surface. Guardian. Guardian? Her Guardian? The thought resonated, but she shook it off as the exhaustion talking.
Daylen found Kanyon’s house and parked in front of the door. Kanyon didn’t move, she had dozed off shortly after they left Lenny’s house. Daylen shut off the engine then turned in her seat. She’d intended to gently wake Kanyon, but instead she hesitated and just took in the sight of her. There was no doubt Kanyon was beautiful; a dark exotic beauty, even with the bruises, cuts, and dried blood on her face. She remembered how she’d initially fought her attraction to Kanyon, but she eventually gave in and came to accept this was just her body’s default reaction to the sight of a beauty such as her. She took in the woman next to her and the all too familiar rush of heat snaked through her veins the same way it had from the very first night she met Kanyon.
Met was probably the wrong word since they hadn’t actually spoken that night. She’d only seen Kanyon from a distance, catching random glimpses throughout the evening. That was until Kanyon had swooped in and saved her from an unknown, but surely traumatizing event.
The night began to automatically replay in her head as it had so many times over the years. She’d been significantly younger and even more naive. She remembered how excited she was to be out at a real Hollywood party, since she had only landed a few minor roles at the time, nothing that would warrant her access to such an elite and exclusive guest list. But she had caught the eye of one of her producer’s sons and he had been relentlessly trying to persuade her to go out with him. She had refused his offers, wanting to focus on her newfound career and freedom. More importantly, she wanted to make her own way and didn’t want any special treatment via his father or, if it ended poorly between them, she hadn’t wanted her career prematurely ended. But when he’d asked her to accompany him her resolve weakened and she figured it would be a once in a lifetime chance to meet some very key people in the industry.
Trevor had picked her up an hour and a half later than planned. When they finally arrived, well beyond fashionably late, the house was already full of guests. She had to swallow a gasp when they stepped into the room and she took in the sea of celebrities. The space was enormous and she remembered trying to absorb the lavish decor, lavish dresses, well, simply the lavish. Trevor offered to get her first drink of the evening while she was still scanning the room. That’s when she first caught sight of Kanyon across the room surrounded by a large, admiring audience. They were all bidding for her attention. It was funny, Daylen remembered thinking at the time, most actresses basked in the admiration of others, but Kanyon looked annoyed and bored, though she was making a valiant effort to hide it behind a friendly and engaged smile. She had been as captivated as everyone else, unable to pull her eyes away until Kanyon unexpectedly looked up and directly at her. She remembered the moment their eyes locked. She knew it was only for a second, but it had been then she’d first felt the electric spark that ignited her body. Kanyon had looked at her so intensely Daylen almost believed she had just read her mind or felt the electricity radiating from her core.
The moment was broken when Trevor came back with drinks and ushered her away to a group of people he wanted her to meet. She couldn’t help but take a quick glance back, but Kanyon had been drawn back to the people around her, nodding and smiling.
The night had gone quickly. She’d had fun and as planned, she’d met a lot of good contacts who had taken her number because they had the perfect role for her. When the party started to wind down she was more than ready to leave, it was late, or actually it had been extremely early. She’d asked Trevor if he was ready to go but he suggested one last drink on the balcony, his obvious attempt at setting a night ending romantic scene. He’d even used the words “do me the honor”. She agreed only as a matter of politeness, but rolled her eyes the second he’d turned his back to retrieve their drinks. The Prince Charming act had likely worked on other women, but she’d spent the time he’d been gone figuring out how to decline his inevitable advances in a way that wouldn’t harm his ego or her career.
She shuttered at the memory of Trevor walking toward her with two glasses and a smile meant to charm. She had nearly rolled her eyes again, wishing now she would’ve just punched him in the face and bolted. She’d taken the glass and offered a polite thank you instead. His smug smile of satisfaction still haunted her. Back then however, she figured the smile meant he thought he was going to get lucky and the last drink and romantic gesture had just cemented the deal. They were both wrong. She’d never been one to sleep around and didn’t have one-night stands, especially with smooth talking, pretty-faced, daddy’s boys.
As they stood looking out over the L.A. lights, they sipped their drinks while he complimented her dress, her smile, and her eyes. He inched closer and brushed a hand down her hair and a fingertip over her lips. What he’d said was perfect, too perfect, and she remembered wondering if he’d inherited his father’s skills of setting the stage. She’d finished her drink quicker than normal to fast-forward this particular scene, but before she could make her polite escape, Trevor’s too smooth smile morphed to a malevolent grin just before he pulled her to him and placed a rough kiss to her lips. She had meant to stop him, meant to hit the pause button, having no interest in the end of the movie playing out on their little balcony set, but her knees had gotten weak and her head clouded in a strange, disorienting fog. She remembered thinking something was seriously wrong. She hadn’t drunk enough to feel so disconnected from her body or her thoughts. Trevor had pulled her tighter to him and kissed her more aggressively. She tried to resist but her arms hadn’t received the “FIGHT HIM” instructions. She’d tried to twist out of his grasp, but he’d only held on tighter.
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br /> He’d taunted her. “Come on, Daylen, you know you want this.” No I don’t, she’d thought, but her mouth had been unable to form the words. “I knew that last drink would loosen you up a little,” he growled before he devoured her mouth again and his hand moved up to grope at her chest.
Daylen remembered the panic rising inside her and her heart pounding. She had screamed at herself, ordered herself to move, to resist, to fight. Then, just like that, it was over as quickly as it had started. Trevor’s hands released her and she fell limp to the ground. She remembered how much effort it took to lift her head and how she fought to focus on the new scene playing out in front of her. Kanyon was there, standing over Trevor who was bent over and holding on to his crotch with both hands. She watched Kanyon lift Trevor’s head up and lean down to speak directly into his ear. She released him with a push that knocked him to the ground. He lay curled and whimpering in pain.
Kanyon had knelt beside her and pushed a lock of hair from her eyes. The last thing she remembered before she lost herself to the dark was looking into Kanyon’s deep blue eyes.
She awoke hours later in her bed in the small apartment she was renting at the time. There were no clues as to how she had gotten home, the only things out of place were the three aspirin, the glass of water, and the note on her nightstand that read, “Take these, drink this, and never trust anyone in this biz.”
She smiled at the thought of the note she still carried in her wallet and then looked across the car at its author. A new shot of desire surged through her as she took in Kanyon’s face. She didn’t know what it was. Well, if she was being honest with herself, she knew exactly what it was. What she felt for Kanyon wasn’t residual hero worship, she had long ago stopped her mind and heart from accepting that cop-out. Daylen reached out and moved a strand of hair which had fallen across Kanyon’s face and her fingers froze as Kanyon’s eyelids lifted slowly. Daylen was again caught by the hypnotizing blue eyes. “Hey,” Daylen whispered.
“Hey,” Kanyon replied in the same soft tone.
