Page 14 of Hidden With You

“Are you kidding me?” I snap. “You’re my agent, not my mom.”

Her brows rise, and she crosses her arms. “The difference between me and your mother is that I care. Shit,” she adds. “That was completely uncalled for. Too many bourbons tonight.”

“No,” I say. “It’s fine. Hell, it’s more than fine. It’s true.” I shrug. I know she thinks her words hurt, but they didn’t. They’re just the truth. And I’ve been dealing with the truth about my life for twenty-three years.

“I just worry about you,” she says, and I sigh. She knows me better than anyone, and so she knows that I haven’t had a boyfriend since fifth grade when Tommy Dean and I went steady for all of a week. Instead, I serial date. Or, more accurately, I serial fuck. Why not? The breakup will inevitably happen, so why not enjoy the good part and avoid the bad?

“You don’t have to worry,” I assure her. “It’s all good. Haven’t you heard? I’m an international sensation. Thank you for that, by the way.”

Her mouth quirks into a half-smile. Evelyn is a shark at the negotiating table, and everything that’s gone right in the trajectory of my career is because she had my back.

But that’s my career. And while I’m grateful we’re close, at the end of the day, my personal life isn’t her business at all.

“Listen,” I say, “I’m going to head out.”

“So early?”

I shrug. “It’s after ten, and you know me. I can take a crowd for only so long.” I glance toward where Nikki and Jamie are huddled together, looking as if they’re deep in conversation. “Tell them bye for me?”

“Of course.” She pulls me into a hug. It’s awkward—I’ve never been big on the hugging thing—but it’s nice to know she cares. I mean, I get that I’m a client, but that doesn’t change the fact that it feels good.

With her final admonition to “drive safe” echoing behind me, I head back up the steps, then keep my head down as I make a beeline toward the gate that leads from the back patio to the front parking area. I’m not in the mood to talk to anyone unless it’s my Mystery Guy. I’m tempted to look for him, but I talk myself out of it. He’s the one who walked away, after all. I’m hardly going to press the issue. Because how pathetic would that be?

Apparently very pathetic, because even though I have been very firmly telling myself that I don’t want to see him again, I’m still weirdly disappointed when I don’t find him leaning against my car, like the first act turning point of a sexy rom com.

Guess that means I’m living a drama and not a comedy.

With a sigh, I slide into my Prius, telling myself that this is good. I didn’t want to see him. I don’t need to see him. There is no point in seeing him.

All of which—of course—means that I’m bummed about not seeing him.

Honestly, hormones are a bitch.

I crank up the radio to drown out my thoughts, then jam to a My Chemical Romance playlist as I race down the Coast Highway toward the 10, and then, ultimately, my house in the Platinum Triangle. Or, rather, my father’s house. He’d left it in trust for me when he died, with a proviso that my mother could live there, too. Mostly, though, she travels, which is fine by me.

Even though she’s rarely around, I don’t live in the house. As far as I’m concerned, it’s twelve thousand square feet of lonely rooms and way too many memories. Instead, I live in a guesthouse by the pool. I should probably suck it up and move into the main house—but I’m not quite ready to do that yet, so I use the living room as an office and the media room for watching movies. Tricia, the housekeeper who’s been here since before my dad died, still lives on site with her husband, who’s in charge of landscaping.

Someday, I might move back into that monstrosity, but thinking about it makes me sad and overwhelmed. So I don’t. I live in my eleven hundred square feet, write my books, pay the bills necessary to keep a mostly empty house humming along, and try to forget about it.

Neither my home nor the main house are visible from the road, surrounded as they are by a huge row of hedges. I turn down our private drive, slow as I approach the gate, and smile at the wonders of technology as it opens just in time, triggered by the magical barcode sticker on my front windshield.

I follow the driveway around the main house, then park in the garage next to the classic Mustang convertible my dad had been rebuilding before he got so sick. It’s under a dust cover, and every time I park my car, I tell myself I’m going learn about cars and finish what he started.

It won’t happen, though. It makes me sad to let that reality settle in my brain, but I know it’s the truth. I want the car to be complete—I want to get it there to honor my father. But I know myself well enough to know that even though I can play out the scenario in my head, I’m never going to watch YouTube videos on carburetors or slide under the car to work on the chassis.

I mean, I’m not even entirely sure what the chassis is.

So my dream of completing my father’s last project is only that—a dream. Just one of the many fantasies that live in my head. That I might play out on paper but never, ever in reality.

I tell myself that’s a good thing. Those stories are my work. My purpose.

Sometimes I even believe that.

Other times, like now, I think that I’m as naïve as some of the characters I write. And why not? They’re me, too, after all.

I circle my car, then head to the garage side door. I hit the button to close the main garage door, then follow the stone path that leads to the pool, but I branch off to the right before I get to the tiled pool deck, and follow that path to my doorway.

I punch in my key code, then push open the cottage door and step into the combination entry/living/dining area. I toss my purse on the sofa. As I do, I veer to the right toward the kitchen and notice the small stack of mail on the kitchen table along with a plate of chocolate chip cookies and a note that has no writing other than a smiley face.

I grin, take a cookie, and make a mental note to thank Tricia in the morning. Then I sort through my mail, most of which is either junk or bills. A letter-size envelope catches my attention, primarily because it has no postage.

I use a knife to open it, then pull out the single sheet of paper. There’s a single word on it, printed in a massive font size: YOU.

Confused, I turn it over, then drop the paper and jump backwards as if it had suddenly morphed into a snake. The paper flutters down to the tabletop as my heart bounds behind my rib cage.

I draw in a breath and force myself to look down. To really see the all-too familiar image that my brain has already processed: the cartoon-style silhouette of a girl sighted in the target of a rifle.

And underneath that, smaller but still huge and bold, are two more words: DEAD. SOON.