Playing Dirty (Stargazer #2)(27)
Author: Jennifer Echols

“You look like my girlfriend,” he said stubbornly. Then he seemed puzzled. “Or do you? You look different.” He ran his hands through her hair, flopping her locks this way and that. “No, that’s not it,” he concluded. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

She folded her arms and tried to rub away the chill bumps with her hands. “Nothing’s wrong.”

He edged closer to her. “Tell me what’s wrong or I’ll hold you down and make you come right here.” He stood and reached to the coffee table for the TV remote control. “I’ll make you come while we watch NASCAR.”

She asked him quickly, “Do you know anything about guns?”

He sat down beside her again. “I live in Alabama, don’t I?”

She took a deep breath and asked, “Would you go with me to buy a gun? I have no idea what I’m doing.”

He eyed her. “Sounds like a good reason not to buy a gun.”

“This had crossed my mind,” she admitted. “You can teach me how to shoot it. Do you know how to shoot one?”

“Everybody in Alabama learns to shoot a gun when they’re ten years old.”

“Well, maybe boys do.”

Now he looked at her hard. She was sure she’d given herself away. He was going to call her bluff and tell her she’d grown up in Alabama.

But what he said next caught her totally off guard. “Tell me what happened to you in Rio.”

She suppressed another shiver. “No,” she said with finality.

He continued to give her that hard look, trying to read her. “If I take you to a firing range,” he asked eventually, “will you wear a bikini?”

He had to be joking. He didn’t look like he was joking. And Sarah didn’t own a bikini. But if Quentin would teach her to shoot, she might buy a bikini. She might shoot in the nude if he would just teach her.

“Never mind,” he said before she could respond. “I can’t ask you to do that. The firing range is out in the woods, and there are chiggers.” He looked at his watch. “I’ve got something I need to do in a minute, and then I’m laying down some tracks with Martin. But when we’re done, I’ll take you to the firing range. We’ll bring Martin. He’s a much better shot than I am.”

“Can’t you see that I’m serious about this?” she cried.

Quentin put a heavy, warm, calming hand on her thigh, saying, “He should be sober by then.”

A cell phone rang. He pulled his from his back pocket, glanced at it, then used the remote to turn the TV to the channel that showed the feed from the camera at the security gate. “Oh, it’s Rachel.” Lowering his voice, he told Sarah, “I’m going to run down there and have a word with her about Martin before she drives up.” He handed Sarah his phone. “Don’t press seven to open the gate until I wave to you.” He jogged through the kitchen. She heard the door to the garage close behind him.

She shivered once more, hugged herself, and pessimistically surveyed the utilitarian room for a blanket. Then a movement on the TV screen caught her eye. She recognized the flash of cargo shorts and strong leg as the camera caught a glimpse of Quentin climbing over the high fence.

This didn’t say much for security at the mansion.

As he jumped down from the fence, Rachel smiled up at him. He let himself into the passenger side of her car. Their faces grew serious as they talked with their heads close together. Rachel appeared to be pleading with him, brows knitted. He shook his head no. Rachel reached forward, put her hands around his neck, and pretended to choke him. Sarah knew the feeling.

Behind her, “Stars Fell on Alabama” beeped on another cell phone. Martin called from the control room stairs, “Someone’s at the gate, wanting in. Has anybody looked at the TV feed? Oh, greetings, Sarah.” She turned around to face him. With his phone still beeping in his hand, he stared past Sarah at Quentin and Rachel on the TV.

And he was gone again, running out of the room and slamming the door to the garage behind him.

Sarah wasn’t sure what was going on, so she stayed put, waiting for Quentin’s signal to open the gate. As she watched, a flash of jeans leg signaled that Martin was climbing the fence. Quentin glanced up at him. Rachel called to him.

Even though Quentin probably had two inches and forty pounds on him, Martin put his hands on Quentin and hauled him backward through the open window, over the closed door, out of the car, and onto the pavement.

White lights flashed in the bushes beside the gate. The paparazzi. With cameras.

Sarah pulled off her heels, dashed to the bag she’d left on the counter, dug out her billfold, and sprinted out the door and down the driveway on bare feet.

She knew she had thirty hundred-dollar bills, washed and dried and looking somewhat the worse for wear after their dip in the pool, but spendable nevertheless. That wouldn’t have been nearly enough for the professional paparazzi in Rio, but it might suffice for the ragtag crew working Birmingham. If not, she had her checkbook. She couldn’t use a Stargazer check because the company didn’t want to be linked to a traceable payoff, but maybe the paparazzi would take a personal check. And maybe Sarah could expense it. She should check with Wendy about expensing bribes.

At the end of the steep driveway mottled with shade, the tall gate was open. Rachel was out of her convertible, screaming at Martin—which seemed very strange to Sarah. She’d hardly been able to make out Rachel’s demure voice at the office. Martin sat on the hood of the car, breathing hard, taking it.

Quentin stood to one side, breathing hard, too, hands on his hips, a streak of dirt across his red shirt, dried leaves in his hair, as if there had been a scuffle in the landscaping. When Rachel took a breath, Quentin broke in to holler at Martin, “Why in God’s name would you think Rachel and I were cheating on you?”

Martin might have been shamed into silence by Rachel, but he obviously didn’t feel the same way about Quentin. “Because that isn’t against band rules!” he shouted back bitterly.

Sarah had no time for this. Quentin said, “Hey,” as she dashed behind him, but she didn’t slow down. She ran past him to where the cameras in the bushes still flashed. She opened her billfold before she even stopped.

Quentin swept her up from behind and threw her over his shoulder. When she struggled, he simply adjusted his hold so that she was completely immobile. He hiked up the driveway with her as if she were a roll of carpet.