Comfort Object (42 page)

“He's a good guy, though,” said Jeremy. “Don't rub it in. Don't tell him I told you how he feels.”

“I won't.” Those glances at Jeremy I'd misunderstood as jealousy
had
been jealousy, I suppose—jealousy over me. How clueless I'd been. “
I know your real name. We all keep our secrets. Sometimes it's better that way, you know
?”

“So that's why you stopped inviting him to have sex with us,” I said.

“Yeah. In a way. I'll still like watching you with other people, though.”

“You'll still share me, even after we're married?”

He frowned and took another drink. “Yeah, if we get married,” he said.

I was quiet a moment to see if he'd elaborate on that comment, but he didn't. “So…you said
if
we get married, but maybe we won't?”

“I don't know, Nell. I just… I don't know. Can't it be enough for now that I told you I love you?”

“Yes, and you gave me a ring!”

“Jesus, you're nuts about that ring! What, you have some crazy, girlish fantasies about a dream wedding? A train seventeen feet long, a big-ass wedding cake, and two thousand guests and roomfuls of flowers—”

“I know you sometimes forget that I am actually a
girl
, and that you actually gave me an
engagement ring
and told me you loved me. In that case, we do often begin to plan our weddings.”

“Nell, don't flip out on me again.”

I pulled away from him. “Why don't we just pretend we're married? We're great at pretend. We've had tons of practice.”

“Nell, we aren't vanilla people, either one of us. Why do we have to get all vanilla now and plan some stupid Hollywood wedding—”

“Ooh! I know, we can throw a pretend wedding and invite the paparazzi. You can have Martin write up a contract first. 'The employee agrees to wear a white dress even though she's been fucked more times by the groom in every orifice than any sane person would believe.'”

“Nell—”

“'The employee agrees to pretend to be married for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, for as long as this contract is in effect—'”

“Nell! Enough. Listen, there are things going on you don't understand. I've told you how I feel. You've told me how you feel. Now I want you to just shut the fuck up and go back to the way you used to be. My submissive little whore. God, Nell, don't you see? I don't want anything to change between us. I liked things the way they were.”

He pulled me back to him, but I kept my arms crossed over my chest. We stared into the fire, the romantic flame between us extinguished. I thought to myself: This man does not know how to love. This man does not know how to have a relationship that's not outlined in black-and-white and signed and dated at the bottom.

And this was the man I loved.

* * *

I didn't sleep well that night, my mind too full of frustrating questions. I tossed and turned until Jeremy threatened to make me leave the room. I made a groggy attempt to get up with him in the morning, but he took one look at me and ordered me to stay in bed and sleep. I sunk back under the covers gladly, not even hearing when he and Kyle left for the set.

I did fall back to sleep, but it was just as restive. An amalgamation of burning books, tightening collars, and a massive wedding ring that kept bumping me on the head.
Bang, bang, bang
. I put my hand up to shield myself from the irritating object, but it came at me again.
Bang, bang, bang.

My eyes popped open.
Bang, bang, bang!
The banging wasn't a dream. Someone was pounding on the door, and I was alone. I was also completely stark naked in bed.

I jumped up and ran to the closet, heart thumping. I threw on clothes and peeked out the bedroom door into the main room. Again someone banged on the door, even louder this time. I picked up my cell phone from the table and fled back into the bedroom. I locked the door and dialed Kyle.

“What is it?” He was always impatient when I called.

“Someone's at the door. They keep knocking. They're pounding now.”

“Who is it? What do they look like?” The alarm in his voice made my heart jump into a shaky rhythm again.

“I don't know. I'm afraid to go look. I'm in the bedroom.”

“Don't answer the door. I'm coming right now.”

He hung up, and a second later a fist pounded on my window. I screamed, then clamped my mouth shut. Now whoever it was knew I was here. An insistent male voice yelled in broken English. “Hello? Hello? Nell Ash-ton? Please to answer door! I have question, to ask for you!”

The urgency in his voice terrified me. I flattened myself against the wall. The blinds were closed, but I could see his shadow, and I was afraid he could see me through the cracks.

“Miss Ash-ton? Open please. I meet you. Very important to speak me!”

I hugged myself. Police? Landlord? Stalker? Some crazy murderer loose in the woods? Whoever it was, he knew my name and he knew I was here.

The pounding went on until I couldn't stand it. I made sure the chain was on, then cracked the door.

“Please, go away!”

“Miss Ash-ton! I have only few questions—”

“Get away from the door! Leave her alone!” Jeremy's voice boomed. Kyle and Jeremy were stalking across the driveway.

“I want ask only of wedding, en-gage-ment ring—”

“That is none of your motherfucking business. Turn that off!” He ripped the video camera out of the pap's hand and gave it to Kyle, who calmly started pushing buttons.

The man protested, although in the face of Jeremy and Kyle's fury—and muscles—he did it under his breath.

“You're trespassing on
my
private property,” Jeremy said. “And you've terrified my girlfriend—”

“Your fiancée, no?” the pap asked.

“Whatever the fuck she is, it's no fucking business of yours, is it?”

Sirens blared as police vehicles came roaring down the lane. “We'll see him off the property,” Kyle said to Jeremy. “You go inside with Nell.”

I stood aside, wide-eyed and jittery, to let Jeremy in.

“You okay?” he asked once he came inside the door. He took my face in his hands and brushed his thumbs across my cheeks. “You're so pale. You're shaking. I shouldn't have left you here alone.” He pressed his forehead to mine. “I'm sorry.”

“It's okay.”

“It's not okay. I don't like worrying about whether you're all right.”

I looked up at him. There was real relief in his eyes and lingering tension lines around his mouth. He had been scared.

“You thought it was her,” I said. “The stalker.”

“Nell…”

“You called the police—”

“Someone was pounding on the door. You were alone. We didn't want to take any chances.”

I looked at the floor. I didn't believe him. I wasn't safe. I would never be safe now that I was with him.

He drew me into his arms, tucked my head under his chin. “I know it's hard, Nell. Putting up with all this. I promise you, I'll keep you safe. I won't leave you alone again like this. I'll have Kyle stay here with you.”

“He's your personal assistant. Don't you need him?”

“For now he's your bodyguard, until I can hire you one of your own.”

“A bodyguard? Jeremy!” I pulled away and looked up at him.

“You'll need one, at the very least when we're back in LA”

The words hovered between us, the unspoken question.

“You will come back to LA with me, won't you?”

“I live in LA,” I reminded him. “I'll go back either way.”

The employee shall return to LA with her employer and continue to live in a state of constant agitation and confusion about what the true nature of their relationship is.

He let go of me abruptly. “Well. Okay. I have to get back to the set.”

Love

The paparazzi overran our secluded villa by noon. The sparkly ring on my finger was a top-level news item. It comprised the lead story for hundreds of papers, and they wanted, they
needed
, pictures. They knocked, they cajoled, they pleaded, they begged until the police came and moved them back behind bright orange CAUTION tape, which they walked around as soon as the police left. I wanted to open the door and scream at all of them,
You realize it's all for fucking show! This entire relationship!
It would have felt spectacularly cathartic to do that, but the truth was I didn't know anything more about the nature of our relationship than they did.

No, the only one who seemed to know or understand what our relationship was by this point was Jeremy. He went on as if nothing were wrong, as if there were no blurry lines or unanswered questions between us, or rings of undetermined sentimental worth on my finger. So while the paparazzi grew in number and rudeness, I refrained from screaming anything out to them.

Instead I slumped on the couch and watched as Kyle and another staffer from the set packed everything up. By three we had checked into a high-security hotel in Lisbon. We left a couple of days later for Italy, for another posh hotel in central Rome. By that time I had a new Italian bodyguard, a short, burly, affable man named Arturo, who looked like he could crush a Hummer into a twisted chunk of scrap metal with his bare hands.