Saving the star, p.10
Saving the Star, page 10
Afraid. She was afraid. And this was her way of telling Beck. For once, it wasn’t a game.
She needed her. Had needed her, perhaps, all night.
“Then protect me closely, Miss Harris.”
With resignation, Beck closed her eyes and nodded. “After you.”
“UNZIP ME?”
Atlanta turned off the faucet before the bubbles could brim over the bathtub. Steam rolled off the water, reminding her of the car, and of Beck, and —
No. She wouldn’t keep replaying it anymore. She wouldn’t feed the fear, wouldn’t let it bury her. She had escaped. She was fine. She was safe. So was Beck.
Beck’s calloused fingers on her back only reminded her of that. They were warm, surprisingly, and much steadier than her own. She unzipped the dress with only a lingering graze of knuckles against spine that Atlanta might not have noticed with anybody else.
“Thanks.” She untangled herself from the shimmering silver until it spilled to her ankles. Beck stationed herself at the door with her back to Atlanta, hands clasped in front of her.
“Undressing in front of me twice in one day,” she noted dryly. “I don’t think this is in the job description, either.”
“It’s wasted on you anyway,” Atlanta remarked, dipping her toe into the bath before she submerged the rest of her body. The water spilled across the porcelain and onto the floor tiles, but she didn’t care as she sank into the foam. It was scalding enough to leave her skin feeling raw, and it unveiled her from the shock of the night just a little. She had dimmed the lights, hiding from anything too overwhelming, too bright, and all that remained was a murky glow that kept her mind subdued.
Without thinking, Atlanta plunged her head beneath the surface and counted to ten. It was an old habit her brother had taught her to keep her relaxed, calm, and it always worked. When water clogged her ears and bubbles slipped from her nostrils, there wasn’t opportunity to think of much else. Her blonde hair floated in snaking tendrils above her, and she pretended for a moment that she was somewhere else. Even when she was holding her breath, though, it felt like she was drowning.
She barely made it to ten before she rose up again, gasping for breath and massaging the tender muscles in her neck. Beck hadn’t moved an inch. Atlanta narrowed her eyes and pinched her nose to rid herself of the droplets before scraping off the last of her makeup with her cloth. “You were very heroic tonight, Miss Harris.”
It was true: even after taking on countless action and thriller roles, and dying in most of them, Atlanta had never seen anybody as invested, determined, protective, as Beck had been tonight. Now that she had time to recall it all without having to face imminent death, it caused something sharp to claw against her belly, her ribs.
She had never been that brave. She had never been cared for that way.
“That’s not what you said earlier, Miss Stone.”
“I called you an idiot,” Atlanta recalled. “Most heroes are idiots, aren’t they?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Beck murmured, low enough that her voice barely carried into the bathroom. “I’m not one of them.”
“Then what are you?” Atlanta’s hands curved through the water, directing it in gentle swishes across her legs and arms before she closed her eyes and rested her head against the lip of the tub.
“God knows.”
“You know, you can look.” She squinted one eye open, just to see if Beck took the bait. “I’m covered in bubbles anyway.”
“I don’t think it would be appropriate.”
“Nothing about us is appropriate.” It was supposed to be another jab, but it came out as a mere whisper. “Turn around, Beck.”
Atlanta didn’t know why it mattered so much, only that it did. She needed to see her face again, needed to know she was here. She felt vulnerable, alone, afraid, and Beck was the only person who had quelled that, tonight and at the party and in Paris, and perhaps even before. It wasn’t about the fact that she was naked in the bath. It wasn’t to make Beck flustered or see what reaction she might gain. She just... needed her.
And she hated herself for it. She had never needed anyone before.
Reluctantly, Beck obeyed, her shoulder pressing into the doorframe as her eyes locked on Atlanta’s. They didn’t stray any further down. Always so steady, so composed. Not like Atlanta The Mess. No matter how good an actress she was, and how much she joked and flirted to distract from the truth, she had never found a strength like that.
A part of her wished that she could be the one to break it in Beck, that she could affect her the way Beck did her. Only Beck hated her for being rich and famous and superficial. Atlanta would never have that power over her. She could have had any other person in the world, and yet the only one she wanted despised her. A cosmic joke. Karma, maybe, for the many mistakes she’d made in her time.
“You never asked me if I was all right.”
“Excuse me?”
“After the accident. When we got home.” Atlanta splashed against the water, wiggling her toes against the faucet. “You never asked if I was okay.”
I was screaming for you, she wanted to say. And you didn’t give a damn about me.
“Because I knew you were.”
“Oh?” The answer surprised Atlanta, and she raised an eyebrow. “How?”
Beck shrugged and closed the lid on the toilet seat before she sat down. Atlanta could see the tiredness pulling down her features now, etching lines at the corner of her mouth and causing her hooded lids to sag. She steepled her fingers and leaned forward. “You don’t strike me as the damsel-in-distress type.”
Relief lifted Atlanta. That was something, at least. Maybe Beck didn’t think her weak and pathetic after all. “I’m damsel-y enough to need you, aren’t I?”
Beck blinked as though trying to decipher the meaning behind her words. Paused. “Are you okay, Atlanta?”
Atlanta. Her name had always sounded so silly on everyone else’s lips, but not Beck’s, with the soft vowels and Ts and the gravelly tone it was sung out with. To keep from dwelling on it, Atlanta flashed a cheap smile. “Someone tried to kill me. Twice. I’m absolutely wonderful, Beck.”
Frustration tightened Beck’s features, and Atlanta couldn’t blame her. She had wanted her to ask, and yet couldn’t bring herself to be honest when Beck finally had. It occurred to Atlanta that she still hadn’t washed, so she started now by massaging her shampoo into her scalp.
“I’m sorry.” The words were a sharp blade that cut through the tranquility of dripping water and things left unsaid. Atlanta faltered and lifted her gaze in surprise, brows furrowing. Beck’s features were strained — the most emotion Atlanta had ever seen her wear.
“For what?”
“For not being able to keep you safer tonight.”
Atlanta sat straighter, twirling her lathered hair across her shoulder. Beck’s words from earlier echoed like a second heartbeat in her mind: I couldn’t protect her, Atlanta. I was too small, and we had nothing — no help, no friends, no support. That’s why I am this way. She couldn’t decide whether she would rather plunge her head back into the water and never come back up for air, or get out of the tub and comfort Beck. “Beck, I didn’t mean what I said before. You... you kept me as safe as you could.”
“Not safe enough,” she grunted, eyes straying from Atlanta’s gaze. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have left you with Sid. My job is to stay with you. I just... I wanted to catch him.”
“So that you won’t have to babysit me anymore?” Her attempt to lighten the mood. She closed her eyes and sank back into the water, rinsing it free of the shampoo.
Beck let out a soft chuckle. “Well, there is that.”
“You kept me as safe as you could,” Atlanta repeated firmly.
Beck shot her a flat smile. “When we first met, you asked me what my real name was.”
Atlanta frowned. That interaction in the stale British bar felt so long ago now, and she couldn’t imagine Beck going by anything but just that: Beck.
“It’s Charlotte. Charlotte Harris.”
“Charlotte.” Atlanta blinked. The name had nothing attached to it: no feeling, no wanting, no curiosity. Not like Beck’s. Still, the fact that she had volunteered the information.... Maybe Atlanta had been wrong before. Maybe a part of her did care. Finally Atlanta wrinkled her nose. “You’re right. It doesn’t suit you. Not like Beck.”
Beck nodded slowly, as though she had been expecting a different reaction. Then she relaxed slightly, bracing her elbows on her thighs. A moment was shared where Atlanta was locked in place by her gaze, heart racing with want, need, and something much more overwhelming she had never truly felt before until tonight. Whatever control Atlanta had had before, Beck had well and truly broken it. This wasn’t just a flirtation, a game, anymore.
Atlanta cared about her. She wanted to know everything about her. She wanted everything from her.
She bathed in silence after that, running conditioner through her knotted hair and washing her skin of any remaining dirt and blood and makeup before sighing tiredly. “Could you pass me the towel?”
Beck eyed her and then the clean white towel folded by the sink before standing and holding it out from end to end, eyes cast to the floor.
“Always so determined to protect my modesty,” Atlanta muttered as she stood, dripping, and took the towel. She wrapped it around herself slowly, hoping that Beck might brave a look before she was done. She didn’t, instead turning her back to her until Atlanta stepped onto the bathmat.
“Please,” Beck scoffed, and Atlanta knew with just that sneer that things were back to normal between them. She didn’t know if that was a good or bad thing. “I don’t think you have any modesty left to protect.”
“Probably not. I’m decent.”
“Decently covered perhaps. Not so much as a person.” Beck whipped around again, expression wiped clean of the emotion that had sullied it a moment ago. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”
The thought of being left alone caused another wave of nausea to roil in Atlanta’s belly, but she couldn’t beg again — wouldn’t. Beck had made it clear she wasn’t interested. Maybe she wasn’t into girls. Maybe she wasn’t into Atlanta. Either way, she tottered into her bedroom wordlessly, shutting the door against the steam once Beck emerged too, skin dewy and hair plastered to her cheeks. “Okay.”
Beck hesitated, gaze lingering a moment too long while Atlanta pretended to busy herself by pulling out her slinkiest pajamas from her dresser. “Unless there was anything else.”
Atlanta shrugged as nonchalantly as she could and willed her heart to stop thundering in her chest. Anxiety must have been clear on her taut features, because Beck inched toward her.
“I can stay until your parents get home, if it’d make you feel safer.”
“Are you sure that’s appropriate?” Why? Atlanta wondered as soon as the question left her lips. Why couldn’t she just tell her she wanted her here? It was as though her mouth and her brain weren’t connected at all. She had spent too many years trying to separate them for the sake of her career.
“Nothing about us is appropriate,” Beck echoed Atlanta’s words. “But you’re right. I’ll go.”
She made it all of three steps before Atlanta called her back. “Beck.”
Beck whipped around expectantly. Atlanta took a deep breath, swallowing down the turmoil crashing around within.
“I’d like you to stay.”
Beck nodded, offering the ghost of a smile. “Then I’ll stay.”
BECK HOVERED IN ATLANTA’S bedroom while she changed behind the paneled room divider, her shadow slipping through the wooded slats. Beck couldn’t fathom why the actress had chosen now to stop dressing and undressing in front of her — perhaps because she had already maxed out her vulnerability for the night, or perhaps because the air between them suddenly felt ripe with something Beck couldn’t identify. Electricity, sparking from her corner of the room to Atlanta’s. It wasn’t unusual to grow closer to a client after an incident like tonight’s, but never like this. Beck’s CEOs and politicians had never deigned to take a bath in front of her, that was for sure.
But Atlanta wasn’t like any other client. She was wily, attention-seeking... and yet for a moment, as she had forced her eyes to remain locked on Atlanta’s face, Beck had glimpsed something beneath that and wondered if it was all just a mask, like she had said on the balcony.
Beck couldn’t make sense of it, so she scoured the bedroom, fingers running across surfaces free of any dust until she came to a shelf of leather-bound books. The ones Atlanta had bought in Paris were there, on the bookshelf. All classics and poetry, with a few modern crime and thriller novels interspersed between them. And then there was the typewriter on her dresser, paper flopping out of it with a few sentences already printed. Beck fought the urge to read them. Last time she had seen it, she had been certain it was unused.
She turned when she heard Atlanta’s quiet feet tiptoe against carpet. “Do you write?”
The corner of Atlanta’s mouth twitched with that coy smile as she pulled at the hem of her top. She wore a scanty satin camisole and lace-lined shorts in a rosy pink that set off her sun-kissed skin. Once again, Beck had to fight to keep her gaze from traveling down to her long legs. It wasn’t that she was attracted to her — so she told herself, at least. It was just that anybody would be a fool not to acknowledge Atlanta Stone’s beauty, and as she began to see slivers of the real woman beneath, curiosity was getting the better of her.
“Does that surprise you?”
Beck shrugged, nose prickling with the waft of smoke that still clung to her clothes from the destroyed car. She needed a shower. Desperately. “You’d like it if it did.”
Atlanta narrowed her eyes and sat cross-legged on her bed, scraping back her damp hair from her shoulders. “What makes you say that?”
“You’ve been trying to get a reaction from me since the moment we met.” There was no question or accusation there: Beck knew it to be true, and she wasn’t in the habit of pretending she was an idiot.
Atlanta’s eyes glittered as she watched — always watching, waiting. Waiting for what? What did she see in Beck? What did she want to see?
“Interesting theory.” Atlanta stood, opening the first drawer on her desk and pulling out a wad of papers. She threw them down in front of Beck. The first was a title page: “The Broken,” written by Atlanta Stone. Brows knitting together, Beck turned the page and found a script. She scanned over the words, the dialogue, the descriptions. Beck knew nothing about writing, but she could imagine this playing out on a television, could imagine herself flicking through the channels after a long day and pausing when she found this show littered among the same old sitcom reruns and David Attenborough documentaries.
“You wrote this?”
Atlanta nodded, and then winced as though remembering her whiplash. Her fingers curled around her neck, massaging the corded tendons there. “Yep.”
“It’s...” For once, Beck could not find the words. “Good. Have you submitted it to anybody?”
Atlanta scoffed. “God, no. They’d never take me seriously.”
“Why?”
“The same reason you don’t.” She said it lightly as she ambled back to the bed and sat again. “Nobody does. I’m just a ditzy actress, right? My only job is to sit and look pretty.”
“Atlanta,” Beck murmured softly, guilt dancing in her gut, “if this is something you want, you should at least try. You’re clearly talented.”
Atlanta only shook her head stubbornly. “I don’t think so.” She sighed, shifting as though she was uncomfortable with the sudden praise. “You know, you don’t have to stand over me all night. Sit.”
“Am I a dog, now?” Beck retorted, but didn’t argue against the invitation. She was sore, exhausted, on the brink of collapse. She shimmied her stiff arms from her now tattered blazer and draped it over the chaise longue before she collapsed onto it.
“Roll over.” Atlanta’s smirk grew.
“Ha,” Beck deadpanned, scraping her hand across her face tiredly. “You should get some rest.”
“So should you.”
“Still on duty, apparently.” She flashed Atlanta a wry smile to show she wasn’t really complaining. What had happened tonight was bound to leave anybody shaken up. Besides, Beck was still feeling guilty for breaking protocol to investigate the SUV, even if Atlanta had — bizarrely — reassured her earlier.
“How do you make time for your personal life with a job like this?” Atlanta asked.
Beck clasped her hands together, sucking in a breath. “I don’t. Then again, I could ask the same of you.”
“Right.” The answer didn’t seem to satisfy Atlanta. “Still, doesn’t it ever get tiring?”
“I like keeping busy,” Beck muttered guardedly.
“So you don’t have somebody waiting for you at home, then? A family, a partner, a friend?”
She shook her head, swallowing down the lump in her throat as she remembered Atlanta’s harsh words. What do you go home to when you’re done here, Beck? “I think you established that in Paris, didn’t you, love?”
Atlanta wrinkled her nose. “Did I hurt your feelings, Miss Harris?”
“What am I doing in here, Atlanta?” Beck huffed, standing again and pacing restlessly. Her silk shirt slipped off one shoulder, but she made no move to adjust it. She was past caring. “What are you really asking me?”
“Nothing.” Atlanta’s voice rose in surprise as she straightened on the bed, frowning. “I’m just curious. I’d like to know who my mother hired to protect me. Is that a crime?”
“You’re always playing games. Always looking for something from me. What?”
“Beck.” Atlanta rose, catching Beck’s wrist so that she was forced to stop. Beck wouldn’t look at her. She was tired, and she’d had enough of Atlanta’s torment. Enough of all of it.
Atlanta said nothing, instead stepping in front of Beck so that it wasn’t so easy to avoid eye contact anymore. A muscle feathered in Beck’s jaw as she swallowed, turning rigid when she finally, reluctantly, met her gaze. What she saw there took the breath from her. Atlanta, free of both her makeup and her mask. Brown eyes glistening with warmth and apology. Mouth puckered with worry. Was it real, Beck wondered, or just another game to play?
