Chasing Love's Wings (17 page)

“Nothing, just being girls.”

“Uh huh,” he says as he stalks toward me with a shit-eating grin on his face.
 

“What?” I shrug my shoulder and produce the goofiest smile I can manage, at least
until his arms wrap around me and he gives me a big kiss.
 

“Get a room,” Beau says, and I flip her off. She laughs.
 

“We have one, thanks,” Tristan says as he pulls away from me. I look over, and Tyson
and Jolene are in a similar embrace and I suddenly feel awful that Mick and Travis
are absent from this equation.

“I should be done on set day after tomorrow. But I will have to wait until they release
me before we can leave Montana.”
 

“Good, that’s a day or two ahead of schedule.”

“Thank God. This movie hasn’t been one of my favorites,” he says as he strips out
of his jeans and t-shirt.

“Why is that?”
 

“Not used to it. All the pyro crap, it’s annoying and I’d just rather be done with
it all. I probably could’ve been done by now had it not been for all the damn retakes.”
He smiles at me.

“So, I need your help,” I tell Tristan as we’re getting ready to climb into bed.
 

“Oh, with what?”
 

“Well, it has come to my attention — two things, actually, that I need some help with.”
I smile.
 

“What would those two things be?”
 

“First of all, I found out today that Naomi is on the verge of losing her job because
of all the traveling we keep putting on her, plus Travis too.”
 

“So she needs a job so she can be around us whenever she wants. Give her one.”
 

“I thought about it. As it is, I have Jolene and Rayne in the office for assistants.
I’m not sure I can afford another one, at least not without raising some eyebrows
at the office. Giving all my girlfriends jobs.”

“Well you have Beau, too.”
 

“No, she is on my personal payroll. I do not pay her through Bold. I pay her through
the money I make from Bold. The same thing I do with Mick. They are both disassociated
with Bold in that respect.”
 

“Okay, so I’ll hire her as my assistant.”
 

I smirk at him. “You really think that will fly with me?”
 

He snorts. “Why not? It’s not like I’d be working her to death.”
 

I laugh. “This is true, but I usually handle most of your stuff, and anything I don’t
do, you do yourself. Are you really sure you can relinquish that to someone else?”
 

He ponders the idea for a moment and then he shakes his head. “No, probably not.”
 

“So that leads me into the second part of what I need your help with.” He cocks an
eyebrow at me. “I’ve learned from a rather reliable source that one of our good friends
has an agent contract expiring in November.”
 

“You mean Travis?” I give him a quizzical look. “If you want my help in convincing
him to switch to Bold, forget it. You don’t need it.”
 

“What do you mean?”
 

“Cams, seriously? You can’t figure it out for yourself? Travis has been very impatiently
waiting for his contract to expire for the last two years. He hates his agent, and
he blames his agent for the crap movies he keeps getting stuck into.”
 

“
Rebound
wasn’t that bad.”
 

“Please, Cams, that movie was bad. At least for what Trav is capable of. He needs
a better agent, capable of getting him the roles he wants to play verses the roles
he has to play to stay in the business. Would you happen to know of any one like that?”
His eyes grow wide, mocking me.
 

“I already talked to Trinity about it.”
 

He climbs up on the bed, crawling across it to get to me. “What did she say?”

“She told me to call Vincent.”
 

“Oh.”

“But I managed to fill her in on it. She said she’d tell Vincent and get him working
on it. I just wanted you to talk Trav into it, but I doubt that is something that
needs to be done at this point.” He shakes his head at me then pulls me closer to
him and I climb on the bed, knees to knees. He takes my head in his hands.
 

“No, not really, but I will let him know to be on the lookout for Vinnie’s call, or
someone’s from within the Bold organization. I’m not sure Vinnie will take him on
personally, but—” He kisses me. “I’m sure it can be arranged.”
 

“Good, then he can hire Naomi as his assistant, she has a job and can go where he
goes.” I kiss him.

“Then it’s settled.”

I laugh and he kisses me, twisting so that I’m laid out on the bed beneath him, and
his hands go to work ridding me of the shirt I just put on and our conversation is
over. Nothing else matters but he and I.

TWENTY-ONE
 

“I’ve got the reservations,” Beau says the next morning as soon as the boys leave
the house.

“Oh good, when do we leave?”

“Tuesday. I figured we’d be in Tarah by Wednesday. Then—” She points around the room.
“—we’re leaving on Tuesday morning.”

“When you say ‘we’re,’ what are you implying?”
 

“I mean we — us girls and the guys. You and Tristan will stay until the following
Tuesday. We’ll all be there for his birthday, then you and he can have a few days
alone.”

I roll my eyes. “That’s not necessary.”
 

“Shut up, it’s settled. This way you guys can have some alone time. A week after you’ll
get back, he’s due in New York for that romantic comedy he’s filming. Don’t ask me
the name because that’s your job.” She smirks. “Not mine.”
 

“Yes, ma’am,” I say. I notice Naomi sitting out on the porch with a cup of tea in
her hands. “Can you guys excuse me a minute?”
 

“Of course.”
 

I grab a cup of coffee and go out on the porch to talk to Naomi.
 

“Hey, girl.”
 

“Hey.”

“What’s up?” I ask her.
 

“Nothing, it’s gorgeous out here. I miss these kinds of days in Phoenix.” I sit down
next to her and take in the view of the mountains.
 

“Me too. Hey, I wanted to talk to you without the other girls.”
 

“If this is about my job, don’t worry about it.”
 

“But I am worried about it, Naomi. It’s my job to worry about it. We drag you around
to all of these places and I guess I never stopped to think about how this would effect
you,” I tell her.
 

“It’s not so much you, or this, it’s more Travis. He always wants to go places and
I feel like a killjoy because I’m tied to a job.”
 

“Has he offered you any help? I know it’s none of my business, but I like having you
around with us, but I won’t if it means you’re going to lose your job.”

She lets out a deep sigh. “The truth is, I lost my job a few weeks ago. But not because
of you or Trav. They did some major cutbacks and I was one of them.”

“Jesus, Naomi, why didn’t you tell me?”
 

She shrugs. “Because I’m all right.” She looks back out toward the mountain.
 

“I’m calling bullshit on that one. Does Trav know?”

“No. I couldn’t bear to tell him. He’d be really upset. Plus—” She stops, takes a
sip of her tea, and doesn’t continue.
 

“Plus...” I prompt her.
 

“Plus, I don’t know where Travis and I are headed. We never talk about the future,
but yet he never seems to get enough of me. The only reason he’s not here is because
he’s shooting in San Diego. But I don’t know where we’re going as a couple.”

I want to tell her to give it some time, but I’d sound like a hypocrite. I did the
same thing to Tristan two weeks ago. “Well, what do you want to see happening between
the two of you?”
 

“You and Tristan, or Mick and Beau, maybe even Tyson and Jo. I want to be with him.
I’ve never been happier than when I’m around him, and when he has to leave it fucking
sucks.” She smiles a little. “I’m sure you can understand that.”
 

I smile and nod. “Yes, I can. So here is what we’re going to do. The only reason I
can’t bring you on board as my assistant is because I have two, Jo and Rayne, in the
office. I don’t want to raise any questions with anyone in the office about why, as
a not-so-active CEO, I need three. But I will transfer twenty-five grand to your account.”
 

“Cami, no. I can’t let you do—”

“Stop, you can and you will. I want you to take care of your affairs, pay off some
bills, do whatever you need to do so that when we all decide to do things, like go
to Tarah, you’re not stressing about money. Obviously Tarah — the airfare and the
hotel — is on me, they will always be on me when I ask you to come along. But I want
you to be able to go a little less stressed out and then Travis doesn’t have to know.
If I’d known you were having troubles like this, I would’ve given you Jolene’s job
first.”

I look at her; she’s crying. “I don’t know how to thank you,” she says.
 

“Just be yourself, have a good time, and don’t stress about it. If you need anything
— anything at all — you come to me. If not me, go to Mick. I’ll make sure he has instructions
to help you, no matter what, and he doesn’t have to involve me.”

“You’re too much.”

“Not really. It’s the least I can do. I don’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

She reaches over and hugs me. “Thank you, Cami.”
 

I hug her back. “Of course, it’s what friends are for.”

She laughs.
 

“Hey, guys,” Jolene says as she comes out of the house, followed by Beau. “Okay out
here?”

“Absolutely,” I say as Naomi wipes her eyes before turning toward them.
 

“Cami, remember that bar we used to go to all the time?” Jolene asks.

“Yeah, Stomp or whatever it was called, the one over off Grand?”
 

“Yup, that’s the one. JD has put the building up for sale.”

“No way. I thought he was going to pull it back together?”
 

She shrugs. “That’s what I thought, but I’m guessing something happened. The band
has been playing gigs around town. I was gonna try and catch him this weekend, try
and talk to him about it.”
 

I immediately start spinning around a couple of different ideas. “What if we bought
it?”
 

“We? As in who?” Beau says.
 

“We, us girls. What if we bought it?” Beau looks at me like I’ve lost my mind.
 

“Yeah, because we have that kind of money.”
 

“All right, fine, what if I bought it. Bring it back to life.” I turn to Jolene. “Would
JD run it?”
 

She shrugs. “I don’t know, not sure if he is backing out because he can’t do it, or
if he lost any funding he may have had. Either way, that spot is a damn landmark in
the city. I’d hate to see it go to some stupid idiot that tears it down.”

“Well, we can’t let that happen, can we.” I pull out my phone.
 

“Who are you calling?” Beau asks.
 

“Your fiancé.”
 

“Oh.”

TWENTY-TWO
 

******
 

Tristan

******

“You have no idea how glad I am to be going back to Phoenix,” I say as we all climb
on board Bold’s plane in Billings.

“I second that one,” Beau says as she takes her seat. I watch as she gives Cami a
look, then nods. It’s an encouraging nod.
 

I look at Cami, expectant.

“So, do you want to know what I’ve been doing these last two days?”
 

“Of course, I always want to know,” I say, curious as to where she is going with this.
 

“Well, I’ve been doing two things, actually. One, planning your birthday party.”
 

Oh no. “You’re kidding, right? I don’t need a party.”

“Too late.” All four of the girls say all at once.

“So what are we doing for my birthday?” I say a little dramatically, and I wonder
idly how bummed she’ll be that I’ve already made plans for my birthday party.
 

She’s bouncing up and down in her seat. “We leave Tuesday for Tarah.”
 

I knew that already. “Who told you that?” I watch as confusion washes over her face
and it dawns on me: She still doesn’t know about my plans to take her to Tarah.
 

“You’re the one who has the penthouse reserved, don’t you?” she says, looking over
at Jolene. “That’s why you couldn’t keep a straight face when I was— Well dammit.”
Beau busts out laughing. “You bitch,” Cami says, then laughs. “You knew?”
 

Beau puts her hands up in mock defense. “Not until Jo came to me that night, told
me that there were already plans in play for you and Tristan to go. I guess we’re
just tagging along.” Well there goes my romantic weekend with Cami. “That’s also why
we’re leaving so early. We didn’t want to intrude on Tristan’s plans completely.”
She looks at me. “We’ll stay for your birthday because, well, you don’t have a choice.”
She smirks at me. “And then we will leave you two in peace.” She looks back to Cami.
“We did, however, make separate room reservations, so you and Tristan can have the
penthouse all to yourselves.” She winks at me before the smirk of satisfaction spreads
across her face.

“So, great, I get to spend my birthday with a bunch of women.” I laugh playfully.
 

“No, the guys will be there too,” Cami tells me, and I wink at her. I’m not mad; in
fact I like the idea of having our friends there.