Not Wanted in Hollywood (4 page)

For once
Travis took in all available cues and didn’t push the situation. He
nodded quickly. “I’ll talk to you later Trudie,” he murmured before
walking away.

The ride in
Griffin’s car back to my home was silent and excruciatingly
painful. I knew Griffin was angry and I also knew that it was my
fault. I should have been honest with him from the start, so I
couldn’t really argue the point now. Griffin followed me to my
apartment and when we were inside I turned around, ready for the
argument that was coming. For a moment Griffin was silent, just
looking at me as if trying to work out what he wanted to say
first.

He cleared his throat. “So what you’re
telling me is that for the last two weeks, you have been working in
a strip bar with Cooper.”

I looked at him keenly, knowing that nothing
I said was going to help the situation.

“I haven’t been working in a strip bar with
Travis. I’ve been working at a strip bar. Travis has just been
turning up for the last week.”

Griffin continued on as if I hadn’t spoken.
“You chose not to tell me this.”

“
I knew how
you’d react,” I said.

“How was that?” said Griffin.

“You would have tried to tell me that I
couldn’t do it.”

Griffin quirked an eyebrow.

“
You know you
would have,” I said.

“Would it have worked?” asked Griffin
calmly.

“No, and we would have argued. I didn’t want
to argue. I didn’t want to mess things up between us.”

“
And this is
so much better,” said Griffin. “The way this all worked
out.”

“
How was I
supposed to know that I’d end up finding a dead body?” I
said.

Griffin threw up his hands. “Because it’s
you, you always end up finding the body.”

I wish I
could argue with him, but as I had been reliably informed by one of
the security guards at the agency I worked for, I was beginning to
get a bit of a reputation when it came to my ability to find dead
bodies.

“
I am sorry,”
I said, because believe me, I was. “I understand that I’ve messed
up and I wish I hadn’t. I didn’t mean to upset you. I was just
trying to get this job done as quickly and easily as I
could.”

“
But of
course Cooper
knew about it,” Griffin
said.

“The only reason Travis knew about this job
was because he was following a case that just happened to end up at
the bar.”

“
That’s what
you both say,” Griffin said accusingly.

I froze. “What do you mean by that?”

“Stop being so naive Trudie. We all know that
Travis wants you. I wouldn’t be surprised if he turned up purely
because you were there.”

“
It doesn’t
matter what he wants,” I said. “It’s what I want that
matters.”

“Well what is it that you want Trudie,
really, just tell me so I know.”

I took in a
deep breath. “Right now, I want you to stop and calm down, because
we’re getting close to saying something that we can’t take back and
I don’t want that to happen.”

“
You know
what I think,” said Griffin.

“
I really
don’t want to know,” I said.

“I think that you’re keeping Travis around in
case you and I don’t work out. He’s obviously interested in you,
you keep him on the line. The second you and I fall apart you go
running into his arms.”

I stopped the
nervous pacing that I had started when Griffin began this line of
thinking and looked at him. “What you just said,” I said quietly,
“was very, very ugly. I would hope that you would know that I would
never, ever do something so horrible, not only to you, but to
Travis. I thought you knew me better than that.”

“
I thought I
did too,” said Griffin.

“
Get out,” I
said.

“
What?” said
Griffin.

“
I don’t want
you in my home at the moment,” I said. “I know I did the wrong
thing but I don’t deserve what you just said. It was ugly and it
was mean, and frankly, I deserve better, so I want you to leave my
home.”

Griffin looked like he wanted to argue but
something in my face must have convinced him that he’d actually
crossed over the line.

“
Fine,” he
said and stalked towards the front door.

I heard it
slam. I walked over to it, very calmly, flicked the lock, put my
back against the door and my knees crumpled. I fell to the ground
and the tears started. I don’t know how long I sat on the ground
crying. All I knew was that I had to pull it together. Griffin and
I had argued before, but I’d always been pretty sure that we could
get past it. At the moment I wasn’t so confident that we were going
to get past this. I had a shower, cleaned up my tear ravaged face
as best I could, sent a text to Monique explaining the situation
and fell into bed. Despite my emotional turmoil, or perhaps because
of it, I fell into a deep, dreamless sleep. Tomorrow had to be a
better day.

The next morning I was woken by the sound of
my phone ringing. I cursed my habit of putting it beside my bed as
I blindly slapped the bedside table looking for it without opening
my eyes.

“Good morning ma petite.”

“
Oh hi
Monique,” I said tiredly.

There was silence.

“
Monique,” I
ventured wondering what I had done this time.

“
I just
wanted to make sure that you were okay,” Monique said.

“
Why wouldn’t
I be?” I asked
.

“
Well,” she
said. “I found a text message on my phone this morning. It came
through some time last night. Do you remember what you
wrote?”

I was still half asleep so I was having a bit
of a problem.

“
It said
‘another dead body, not my fault, men suck.’ Do you remember
sending it now?” she asked.

“
Would you
believe my autocorrect went a little wild?” I said
weakly.

“So exactly which part is wrong?” asked
Monique.

“
Technically
speaking, the whole thing sounds pretty much accurate. I possibly
should have phrased it a bit better,” I said.

“What happened?” asked Monique and I had to
give her credit for the fact that she was still completely
calm.

“I found the owner of the bar strangled to
death with the whip from the dominatrix act.” Thinking on it I
could honestly say that I had found a line that I never in a
million years had expected to say.

Monique sighed patiently. It also said a lot
about her that she accepted that explanation completely calmly.

“That takes care of the first two parts. What
about the third?”

“
Griffin was
called in and I hadn’t told him that I was working there. He didn’t
react well,” I said quietly.

“
A man like
that wouldn’t,” Monique said. “I would expect he was disappointed
that you didn’t feel that you could tell him
everything.”

Great. Like I
didn’t feel bad enough already.

“
Although the
fact you felt that you couldn’t tell him may mean there are
problems between you that are deeper than just this one incident,”
Monique said soothingly.

Monique wasn’t exactly Griffin’s biggest fan
either. During the time that I had known Griffin, he had managed at
some point to alienate pretty much everyone in my life. My friends
and family weren’t obvious about the fact that they weren’t fond of
Griffin, but they wouldn’t exactly be upset if the two of us broke
up.

“
So what are
you going to do?” asked Monique softly.

“
What I
always do,” I said. “I’m going to go get my car which is currently
sitting outside the strip club and then speak to Alistair about
what he wants me to do today. As far as I’m concerned I am still
working.”

“What about Griffin?”

“
I apologized
last night. He knows that I’m sorry for what I did and he still
said some things which I’m going to have trouble dealing with. I’m
not going to beg him to forgive me, especially not after what he
said.” I was adamant. Regardless of how many tears I had shed over
Griffin last night, I hadn’t deserved what he dished out and I
really wasn’t looking at getting a second helping.

“
Your
decision ma petite, but if you need me for anything just call,”
Monique said.

This is the
reason I love working with Monique. That and the fact not many
bosses would be quite so accepting with the body count I seemed to
be racking up, as my friend Jorge called my unfortunate ability to
find the nearest dead body. Of course in my defense I hadn’t killed
anyone myself. Also, none of the bodies had actually been my
clients, so I was still not considered the poisoned chalice that I
may have been if circumstances were different, and Monique was
slightly less patient than she seemed to be.

I had almost finished getting ready when
there was a knock at my front door. My heart jumped into my mouth
at the thought that it might be Griffin, looking to work things out
after the debacle last night. I composed myself before opening the
door and made sure I put a smile on my face.

“
Men suck,”
said Crystal.

Swallowing my disappointment I waved her in
and followed her to the living room.

“
They really
suck,” she repeated.

I hoped she
didn’t expect me to argue with her, because at this moment she was
preaching to the choir.

That sounded
like there was trouble in paradise though. “So,” I said. “What has
Edwin done this time?”

“
He’s
agreeing with my father,” said Crystal.

That couldn’t be good. A few months ago
Crystal and Edwin had run off to have a quickie wedding in Vegas
after being friends for ages. Crystal is the daughter of a very
rich man and she has a very large trust fund, but no thoughts of a
prenup had occurred before the marriage happened and Crystal’s
father had been having a few issues with that.

“So what is Edwin agreeing with your father
about?”

“
Dad wants
Edwin to sign a postnup,” Crystal said.

“A postnup?” I queried.

“
Yes, it’s
like a prenup, but you sign it after the wedding.”

“
Okay,” I
drawled. “What is the problem with that? He signs a postnup, your
father gets off your back and everyone’s happy.”

Crystal
looked at me sourly. “No, not everyone’s happy. I’m not happy. The
postnup says that there is a possibility that we might break up. I
cannot have an out clause, at all. If I have an out clause I may
end up like my mother, the woman who has had nine, or maybe ten
husbands. I can’t keep up. I cannot have an out clause.”

There was the
problem. Crystal was terrified that there was a part of her that
was just like her mother. I could have told her that she was being
an idiot. She is nothing like her mother. She’s warm and caring and
loyal. Nothing like her mother. For some reason Crystal had got it
into her head that when it came to marriage and relationships, her
genetics were going to win over the nurturing that her father had
done.

“
He’s just
trying to do the right thing by you,” I said. “Do you realize how
lucky you are that you have found someone who cares so much about
you, they are willing to do something like this for you? Even
though it probably upsets him that your father is focusing on the
possibility of you breaking up. You should be grateful that he
loves you so much.”

Crystal stopped. “What has Detective Dumbass
done?”

See, this is
why you shouldn’t talk to friends when you are in an emotional
state. They are able to pick up on the subtle clues in your
language and actions. The fact that she was calling Griffin,
Detective Dumbass instead of Detective Hottie which was her usual
form of address, meant that she had worked out exactly why I was
slightly distressed and having trouble seeing her side of the
postnup issue.

“
The owner of
the strip club died last night,” I said.

“
And
considering that this is you we are talking about, I am going to
assume that he didn’t have a heart attack while watching one of the
acts,” Crystal said dryly.

“
No he did
not,” I said tightly. “He was strangled with the dominatrix’s
whip.”

Crystal giggled and slapped a hand over her
mouth. “I’m sorry, that was totally inappropriate. It was just not
what I was expecting you to say.”

“
No, go
ahead,” I said airily, waving my hand around. “I’ve been told
several times in the last twelve hours about how nobody is
surprised that the man died and that I found the body.”

“
So Griffin
is mad that you were working at a strip club and didn’t tell him,”
Crystal said, cutting straight to the heart of the
matter.

“And because Travis has been at the club for
the last week keeping an eye on me.”

Crystal grimaced. “Okay I can see what the
problem is.”

I nodded. “I
can too and I apologized last night, but then he said some things
which were a bit harsh and I kicked him out.”

Crystal eyed
me speculatively, but I really didn’t want to go into the
accusations Griffin had flung in my direction. It still hurt pretty
badly that he thought I was capable of being that kind of
woman.