Frontline (11 page)

I lean forward, hoping to acquire more information. “If you’re one of his best men, why aren’t you with him tonight during his business crisis?”

“As I said earlier, your safe return tonight was Trenton’s top priority. Consequently, he redirected my services.”

Sean’s reply boosts my hope that Trenton did actually leave on account of an emergency, though his lack of good-bye still troubles me.

“So you really have no idea why Trenton took off so quickly,” I say, going for broke.

“I won’t know the details until tomorrow morning. But even if I did know more, your questions are futile, Sara. I’m unable to discuss Trenton’s business matters with anyone outside his inner circle.”

For the remainder of the drive, Sean and I discuss my job further. I keep my answers reserved and notice he doesn’t offer much insight into his own personal life, despite my casual inquiries. He has a way of alluding to things and answering my questions without providing any relevant information. I find his tactics incredibly frustrating—it reminds me of my Q & A with his boss earlier.

Our conversation has died by the time Sean pulls up in front of my building and shifts into park. After he cuts the engine, I unbuckle my seatbelt and try the door handle. It’s locked. I look for the release button, but there isn’t one.

“I’ll get that for you,” Sean says.

Before I can respond, he’s out of his seat and walking around to the passenger side.

As he opens my door, his suit jacket parts, revealing a gun slung across his chest in a holster.

I swallow slowly and tighten my grip on my purse.

My dad is a fan of the television show,
Cops
, and I’ve seen enough episodes to know what an appropriate gun is for a standard law enforcement officer or bodyguard. Sean’s weapon goes way beyond that. I understand he’s part of Trenton’s security team, but why does a CEO need that kind of protection?

I get out of the car. Sean slams the door shut and joins me at the entrance to my building. He holds the front door open and I step inside.

“Thanks, I can take it from here.”

“My orders are to escort you up to your apartment,” he says, buttoning his suit jacket.

There’s that line again.

Sean is a big guy, armed with a gun, so my common sense tells me it’s a very bad idea.

I exhale deeply. “Thanks, but—”

Sean darts behind me. I turn around, just as another tenant exits the lobby. Unfortunately, Sean catches the door before it closes, messing up my escape plan.

He flashes a grin and motions inside. “You coming, Sara?”

If I tell him no, he’ll probably follow me anyway.

“Yes, I’m coming.” I shuffle past him. It’s easier to agree. In a few minutes, he’ll be gone, Trenton Merrick will be removed from my life for good, and things can get back to normal.

We walk to the elevators in silence, Sean’s hulking presence more of a nuisance than a threat. He seems like a nice guy, and he may have orders he’s expected to follow, but I’m perfectly capable of getting upstairs to my apartment without an escort.

We arrive at my floor and Sean follows me down the hall. I rummage through my purse for my keys, grab them from the bottom where they always seem to end up, and shove the correct one toward the lock. My hand stops in mid-air.

I spin around to face Sean.

“What the hell is that?” I say, pointing to my apartment door, which now sports something that looks more like a mini safe than a lock. Even the flimsy brass hinges have been replaced by thick, shiny steel ones.

Sean takes a step closer and slips his hand inside his suit jacket.

The gun!

I dart my eyes around the dim corridor.

No escape.

Panic hits me like a battering ram. The next few seconds pass in slow motion.

Sean fishes around, removes his hand from his jacket, and . . .

The air rushes from my lungs.

“You’ll need these.” He uncurls his hand, palm up.

When I see what he’s holding, my blood runs cold.

Keys.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Sean chuckles. “What did you expect after Trent saw that ridiculous lock you had on there before? It wasn’t safe.”

“What does he care?
He disappeared without saying good-bye and then dumped me with you!”

“I told you, Sara, your safety was his
—”

“This has nothing to do with my safety. That bastard tricked me!” My voice sounds tiny and shrill. “He changed the lock on my apartment, even though I told him not to, because he’s obviously some kind of paranoid control freak. He knew I wouldn’t be home tonight and took advantage of that.”

Sean’s face remains expressionless.

“Don’t you see how wrong this is? Trenton has majorly invaded my privacy yet again, and I’ve known him all of one day!”

Sean lifts his eyebrows and stays silent.

In an evening that has been full of sighs
—frustrated sighs, overwhelmed sighs, passionate sighs—I look to the ceiling and wonder where the harm is in one more. It’s useless to argue. It’s pretty clear that Trenton’s employees do whatever is asked of them without question.

I snatch the keys from him. “It was nice meeting you, Mr. Mavis. Now, goodnight.”

Sean saunters backward down the hallway. “If you’re angry about something as minor as a lock, then you better prepare yourself. Because, believe me, you haven’t seen anything yet.”

His cryptic comment leaves me fuming and confused all at once. I turn toward my apartment door and fumble with one of the keys in the lock, cursing under my breath.

“Hey, Sara!”

A grinning Sean stands at the end of the corridor, propping open the door to the stairwell.

“What?”

“Have yourself a good night.” With a wave, he enters the stairwell. The door slams shut behind him.

I let out another curse and enter my apartment, eyeing the new lock. I wonder if the two keys Sean gave me are the only copies out there and how they got into Sean’s possession in the first place if he wasn’t my intended chauffeur and was just supposedly “in the neighborhood”.

My purse and the gleaming new keys land on the coffee table. Just to be safe, I decide to call the superintendent tomorrow and have him replace the lock.

Trenton Merrick will not get away with this.

“What do you mean you won’t replace it?”

The next morning, I stand before Gus, the superintendent of my building, dressed in my workout clothes. I called him when I got up and he agreed to meet me at my apartment at ten o’clock, following my yoga class.

“Miss Peters, this lock is a Schlage 2400LX.” He gestures to my front door. “It’s top of the line and very expensive, the opposite of the lock you had on here before. Not to mention it works perfectly. Why on earth would I pay to have it replaced?”

I tap my foot impatiently. “I don’t like it. Please, all I want is the other style back.”

“Did you not keep the old lock?”

I cringe. “I, uh, threw it out by accident.”

Gus shakes his head. “I’m afraid I can’t do anything to help you, unless you want to go to the hardware store and buy yourself another one. Then I’d be more than happy to install it. Otherwise, I refuse to take money out of the building’s reserve fund to fix a perfectly good lock.”

I contemplate his suggestion. “How much would another lock cost?”

He shrugs. “The lock that was on here before cost around thirty dollars, but I bought it in bulk fifteen years ago, at a discount, so I could replace the locks on every unit in the building at once. So I’d say, ballpark, with inflation . . . one hundred dollars.”

“A hundred dollars, that’s ridiculous! I can’t afford that!”

“Miss Peters, the Schlage 2400LX costs around eight hundred dollars. If you bought that one, then a basic lock shouldn’t be a problem for you. Just return the new lock and use some of the credit toward another model. Problem solved.”

If only it was that easy.

“The receipt was thrown away, too.” I glare at the lock. I should’ve taken a baseball bat to it before the superintendent got here. Then maybe he would’ve helped me. Although, if Trenton picked out the lock, I’m sure a baseball bat wouldn’t suffice. I’d probably need a grenade.

“Then, I’m sorry, Miss Peters, but you’ll just have to put up with this state-of-the-art model.” Gus picks up his toolbox and steps out into the hallway. “And next time, consult me before doing any renovations to your unit. It’s in the rental agreement you signed, page six.”

I shut the door and engage the lock, suppressing the urge to scream. Unless one hundred dollars happens to magically appear in my bank account, I’m stuck with Trenton Merrick’s Schlage 2400LX super lock on my apartment door.

I could charge another lock to my credit card, but my balance is high already and I’m only able to make the minimum payments. Being poor just sucks.

When I awoke this morning, I gave my apartment a good once-over, looking for hidden cameras or anything suspicious. I wanted to do it last night, but I decided I needed daylight to conduct a thorough inspection. Thankfully, nothing seems missing or changed besides my lock
—nothing that I can see anyway.

Part of my search included the retrieval of the
New York Financial
magazine from under my mattress. It’s rested on my nightstand ever since. Even though I want to forget about Trenton, I can’t. I not only have visual and mental reminders, but physical ones as well.

My leg muscles feel sore from my workout with him on the stairs last night. During yoga this morning, I tried to ease the pain and lose the memory of his hands feeling me up, but downward dogs didn’t exactly help matters. The instructor’s poses made me think about the many different ways Trenton and I could have sex, and I ended up leaving the class feeling horny and worked up instead of calm and Merrick-free.

The telephone rings as I head into the bathroom. It’s not a long distance ring, so it isn’t my parents, which means I don’t feel bad about ignoring it. Whoever it is can leave a message.

During my shower, the phone rings continually. I towel off quickly and change into some sweats. Worried that the call might
be important, I check my answering machine. The light isn’t blinking.

The telephone rings again. At times like this, I wish I had caller ID.

As I pick up the receiver, my heart races.

“Hello?” My greeting is dusted in j
ust the right amount of frost.

“Hello, Sara.”

Trenton’s cool reply sends a pleasurable shiver down my spine.

“Oh, it’s you, Mr. Merrick.” I place my hand on my hip. “I’m surprised you didn’t get one of your men to contact me instead. Isn’t that your usual protocol?”

“I believed this call required my personal attention. ”

I roll my eyes.

“Let me make this clear,” I say, refusing to let him woo me. “I only answered the phone to stop its incessant ringing.”

“Sara
—”

“I refuse to be harassed in my own home.”

“Sara,” he says, gruffly this time.

“What?”

“I suppose you want me to explain my quick departure last night.”

“What does it matter? Your actions never back your words. You said on the stairs that you’ll always put me first and that I should trust you, but then you take off without saying good-bye and you leave me with Sean, who is nice and all, but carries a fucking gun.”

Silence.

“A gun,
really
? And it wasn’t some Mickey Mouse piece, either. I know the difference.”

I refrain from mentioning that my limited gun knowledge comes from a television show.

“Whatever weapon Sean arms himself with is his business.”

I scoff. “I’m not stupid, Mr. Merrick. Sean’s not worried about getting robbed on the subway. He carries it for work, though why he needs that type of firepower is beyond me. It’s far too heavy duty for a run-of-the-mill bodyguard, even if he is protecting a gazillionaire.”

“Sean is one of my best men. I chose him to drive you home for that reason specifically.”

“Yeah, yeah, he fed me that bullshit line already. If you really cared about me, Mr. Merrick, you wouldn’t have left so abruptly. A good-bye would’ve taken all of two seconds and then you could’ve been on your merry way. I deserve better than how you treated me last night.”

If not for the sound of Trenton’s steady breathing, I would’ve assumed he wasn’t on the line anymore. An apology right about now would be nice.

“You know, despite all the mystery that surrounds you, as well as your elusive answers to my questions last night, I gave you the benefit of the doubt and held onto the hope that Trenton Merrick, the selfless, kind humanitarian, was real. Now I realize it’s only an act.”

Trenton’s continued silence reinforces my decision.

“Please don’t contact me again. That means stop calling me and don’t you
dare
think about showing up at my apartment like you did yesterday. If you do, I’ll call the police and have you arrested for stalking, or trespassing, whatever. I don’t care.”

“The police.”

I detect a hint of sarcasm in Trenton’s voice, which only makes me angrier.

“You know, I’m not usually a snarky bitch, but it seems you bring out the worst in me, Mr. Merrick.”

I hear him intake a sharp breath.

“Don’t say that, Sara.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because you bring out the best in me.”

Stay strong.

“Well, if last night was you at your best, Mr. Merrick, then you leave a lot to be desired. And just so you know, I’m having my lock changed today.”

It’s a lie, but I don’t feel guilty. I will
get it changed eventually, once I save up enough money.

“Don’t touch the lock,” he says sternly. “I changed it for your safety, to protect you
—”

“Ha!
The only person I need protection from is you, Mr. Merrick. Good-bye!”

I slam the phone down, snatch the
New York Financial
off my nightstand, and hurl it across the room. The pages flutter as the magazine flies through the air, hits the wall, and crashes to the floor.

Cover up.

Damn it.

Oddly, I don’t feel satisfied after my verbal tirade or my assault on the magazine. I feel empty. I suppose in my own twisted way, I’m going to miss Trenton
—or at least the idea I created of what I hoped he’d be like. Obviously, I held out for something that just isn’t there.

As I flop onto my bed, the telephone rings again.

My heart skips a beat.

Maybe he does care enough to apologize, after all.

Then I remind myself that an apology doesn’t solve everything. Trenton’s world is too mysterious and possibly too dangerous for me. I need to distance myself from him before I get too involved. Not only that, but by calling me again, he’s completely disregarding my orders, which means he doesn’t value what I say. Not cool.

The phone continues to ring.

Definitely not cool.

Who the hell does he think he is anyway?

I grab the receiver. “Listen, you—”

“Sara?”

My eyebrows furrow. “Valerie?”

“I’m glad I caught you,” my boss says. “I need you to come in for the night shift tonight.”

I frown. “Tonight? But I don’t work until—”

“Tuesday night. Yes, I know. But Lindsay called in sick, and with tomorrow being Memorial Day, I need all the staff I can get.”

I consider Valerie’s request. If I accept the overtime, then I can get my lock changed. However, I’m exhausted and I really don’t want to work a night shift. Unlike some of my colleagues, I’m not good at napping during my break.

I sigh. It really does suck being poor sometimes.

“Okay, I’ll come in.”

“Excellent. See you tonight.”

I set the receiver back down and stare at the phone. As pitiful as it is, I feel disappointed it wasn’t Trenton calling back.

After eating a bowl of oatmeal, I sit down in front of the television. Nothing interests me as I flip through the channels. I should sleep, in preparation for my shift, but my mind is racing so I know it’s useless to try.

I watch a James Cagney film on
Turner Classic Movies
until noon when my buzzer rings.

Could it be . . .?

I glance down at my sweatpants and T-shirt. I look ragged, but at least I’m wearing a bra this time. As I walk toward the door, I coach myself not to fall under his spell. No matter what.

My visitor pounds on the door, choosing to forgo the buzzer now.

I exhale a deep breath.

Remember, stay strong, Sara.

As I grasp the chain, I pause, recalling Trenton’s warning the last time he was here:

Ask who it is before answering the door.

“Who is it?”

“Who is it? Damn it, Sara, it’s me. Open up!”

I giggle and hurry to open the door.

The woman that greets me on the other side is a black-haired beauty dressed in all white. With her long, lustrous hair, big green eyes, full lips, toned body, and creamy skin, Kelly Sheridan is the kind of girl all guys, even ones like Mr. Merrick, make fools of themselves over.

“What took you so long?” She glides into my apartment.

“And what’s with the
who is it
crap?”

I blush as I shut the door. “Uh, nothing. You just can’t be too careful these days, you know?”

She glances at my door. “What’s with the new lock?”

“Don’t ask.”

“So, I have a shift tonight from seven to eleven and I was thinking we could hang out beforehand.” Kelly removes her compact from her knockoff handbag and sits down on the corner of my bed to touch up her lipstick. “Denim is off this afternoon, too, which is rare. She’s just finishing her Jane Fonda workout and then she’ll be down.”

“I have to work tonight. I got called in.”

She shrugs. “Who cares? Come out with us anyway.”

I realize if I stay home alone, I’ll go crazy thinking about Trenton. I need some serious girl time if I expect to get over him.

“Okay, I’ll go.”

Kelly nods and returns to her compact.

“So what are we going to do?” I ask.

“I don’t know.” She dabs her lips with a tissue. “Shopping and dinner in Soho?”

“The usual, then.”

“Yup. Unless you have a better idea.”

I don’t.

Kelly and I talk for about half an hour over the murmurs of
TCM
before Denim Jacobson shows up, dressed in a summery frock, her curly auburn hair clipped with barrettes. I met her and Kelly in the lobby a few days after I moved in and we’ve been great friends ever since. The three of us are all the same age and single.

As usual, Denim’s heart-shaped face looks like it got made over by circus clowns. She’s worked at the MAC counter in Macy’s for four years and the dramatic style she wears during her shifts, as required by all employees, has unfortunately trickled over into her everyday life. I love her to death, but she’s not good with moderation.