Identity Crisis (7 page)

But she was Kendra Davis. And just when he was ready to scoop her up and carry her off to his bedroom, just when he was ready to hold her captive there for the next three or four or more hours, she stepped back with a little sigh and caught her breath. She raised a hand to her lips, almost but not quite covering her teasing smile and said. ‘You get an A-plus for practice, Garrett Thorne. You just convinced the hell out of me.’ Still breathing hard, she ran a hand through his hair, brushed a quick kiss across his lips, and let herself out, leaving him leaning against the wall, barely able to stand. For the very first time, he allowed himself to think that not only might they be able to pull this whole charade off, but he might actually enjoy it.

Kendra fled Garrett’s house, mentally kicking herself. Why the hell did she kiss him? Could she be any more stupid? Yes, they might have to kiss each other, and yes, they might have to hold each other like they couldn’t get enough of each other. But that was for Friday night. That was for the Golden Kiss Awards. That wasn’t for this afternoon. That wasn’t for the privacy of Garrett’s house. What the fuck was she thinking? She didn’t even like the man. This was her job, nothing more.

She shoved her way into the Mustang and barely managed the seatbelt with her trembling hands. But she took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and forced herself to drive around the block out of Garrett’s site before she stopped, threw on the emergency brake, and laid her head against the steering wheel, struggling to catch her breath, struggling to calm herself, struggling not to think about how badly she’d wanted to stay, how badly she’d wanted to escalate things even further. If he’d started it, she would have slapped his face or maybe kneed him in the balls. But she had started it. Her! What the fuck was the matter with her?

She fumbled in her bag and found her lipstick, trying to breathe deeply as she used the rear-view mirror to tidy her make-up. Clearly she just needed to get laid, that’s all. How long had it been now? And all this the result of too many Tess Delaney novels, no doubt. Even when he wasn’t consciously fucking with her, Garrett Thorne was fucking with her. God, he was a pain in the ass. Yet how could she blame him for her bad behavior? And now she’d have to face him Friday night as though nothing had happened, as though what she had done was simply a part of her plan to facilitate their desired end result. She would have never pulled anything so brazen and unprofessional with any of her other clients, and she’d had more than a few who were plenty willing, bigger names than Garrett Thorne, she reminded herself. When she was calm again and her hands had stopped shaking, she started the Mustang and headed back into Portland. She had a dress to buy and all the other accessories she could imagine a glam romance writer extraordinaire might need for an awards ceremony. And, in spite of her best efforts, she couldn’t help thinking of just how her version of Tess Delaney would take Garrett Thorne’s breath away. 

Chapter Seven

Garrett had gotten lucky. He’d managed to catch Dee and Ellis between travels and meetings and wrangled an invite for dinner at Dee’s place. Well, it was just burgers on the grill, but it didn’t matter. He didn’t care so much about the food. He just needed to talk. Dee met him at the door in cut-offs and a Sportswide Extreme Adventure T-shirt. She threw her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek. ‘Hope you’re hungry,’ she said. ‘Your brother believes in grilling for the masses.’

Her ease with him after everything that had happened always surprised him. She certainly didn’t hold the grudge that Kendra seemed to hold. In fact, she’d already accepted him like family. He was outrageously glad for that. Not only because he was sure she would be the dream sister-in-law, but because she had been the balm that had, in spite of everything, eased the way for greatly improved relations between him and Ellis. That had been a gift for which he could never fully repay her.

She motioned him through to the patio, where Ellis stood over the grill in faded jeans and a black T-shirt. Garrett had to do a double take. He’d so seldom seen his brother at his ease in the past few years, and he could never remember him looking so relaxed. Ellis coughed and moved out of the line of the smoke from the grill, then turned to offer his brother a smile and a wave with a spatula. ‘Hey, bro, beer in the cooler. Grab yourself one and tell us the latest.’

Dee went about the business of setting the picnic table and Garrett grabbed a beer. ‘How was Paris?’

‘Fast,’ Dee called over her shoulder.

‘And Spain?’ he asked Ellis.

‘
Muy bueno
,’ came the reply as Ellis returned his attention to the burgers.

‘Good. That’s good,’ he said, pacing the length of the patio, admiring the rhythm the two had fallen into with each other. He wasn’t sure if they’d worked out a plan for when to be at her place and when to be at his. He didn’t know if they’d decided where they would live after they married. He’d not had time to ask about the future since they officially announced their engagement. He needed to make time. It was important, maybe the most important thing ever – to see Ellis truly happy. But tonight, there were pressing issues.

‘Did you see Stacie before she headed off to Japan?’ Ellis asked. ‘I got an email saying she was overnighting here before she left. Plans for the new gallery seem to be moving along.’

‘No,’ Garrett said. ‘No. I missed her. So, Kendra does PR?’ The words were out before he had a chance to think about them, and suddenly he had both their full attention.

‘You could say that,’ Dee said. ‘Her degree’s in marketing and PR. After she graduated she went off to California to start her own business.’

Ellis laid the spatula down and dropped onto the bench of the picnic table. ‘That was why we were trying to head you off at the pass the other day at the engagement party.’

‘Of course, you had no way of knowing that she loves Tess Delaney novels, and certainly no one would suspect that from Kendra,’ Dee said. ‘But I don’t know anybody as tenacious as Kendra when it comes to getting what she wants, and once she found out that Tess needed help with PR, if anyone could figure how to get to Tess, Kendra could.’

‘Could and did,’ Garrett said, slugging back half his beer.

‘Shit,’ Dee half whispered. Then she dropped onto the seat next to Ellis. ‘What happened?’

‘Kendra’s going to be Tess Delaney for the Golden Kiss Award, or rather Kay Lake is. I’m going as her date.’

For a second neither Dee nor Ellis said anything. They only sat looking at Garrett as though he’d suddenly grown a second head. Then Ellis spoke, holding his brother’s gaze. ‘Garrett, are you sure this is a good idea?’

‘It’s not like I have any choice in the matter, is it? I’ve got less than a week before the award dinner and Don hasn’t found anyone but Kendra.’ He waved his hand. ‘I mean, I didn’t know K. Ryde was Kendra, and obviously Don doesn’t know either. We nearly gave each other a heart attack, Kendra and I, when she showed up at the Pneuma Annex and discovered Tess’s true identity.’

In spite of herself, Dee almost managed to hide a snigger, and Ellis was biting his lip, trying to keep back a laugh of his own. ‘That would have been a sight to see,’ Ellis said.

Garrett glared at him. Then he turned his attention to Dee. ‘Is Kendra really that good?’

‘Let me put it this way,’ Dee said, scooting forward on the bench. ‘The Shelby Mustang she drives? A gift from Devon Barnet.’

‘Jesus,’ Garrett said. ‘Are you serious?’

She nodded. ‘A gift for a job well done. No one knows that, of course. Devon Barnet and everyone else K. Ryde ever worked for are sworn to secrecy. Well, anyone who actually ever met the real K. Ryde. She’s good all right.’

‘Still,’ Ellis said, returning to the grill to check the burgers, ‘I’m surprised she’d even consider working for you, knowing how emotionally attached she is to you.’

Garrett flipped his brother the finger. ‘Kendra’s not working for me. She’s working for Tess Delaney.’

Dee nodded. ‘Well, that makes sense. She’s a ravenous reader, but not of romance, not until she discovered Tess Delaney. Kendra doesn’t believe in romance.’

‘Has she talked to you about any of this?’ Garrett asked.

‘Of course not,’ Dee replied. ‘Kendra loves a good bit of gossip as much as the next person, but when it comes to keeping secrets, the woman’s a fortress, and when it comes to her work, the woman’s a fortress with a shark-infested moat around it. In fact, she’ll probably not be happy that you’ve talked to us about it.’

‘You think she can pull it off, then?’ Garrett asked.

‘Of course she can pull it off.’ Dee sounded like Garrett had just asked her the stupidest question ever.

‘Question is, bro,’ Ellis called over his shoulder, ‘can you let her pull it off and stay out of her way?’ Then he turned and offered a wicked smile. ‘I certainly hope so, because I’m guessing she’ll probably kill you if you mess it up for Tess.’

Somehow Garrett suspected that might just be the case.

Kendra had never needed a lot of sleep. It was a part of what made her good at what she did. If she needed to go to a party at night and do research during the day, she could manage it on an hour of sleep and a cup of strong coffee. Back in the early days, no one would pay any attention to a young woman a little too blonde and a little too pretty to look like she knew what she was doing. But she
did
know what she was doing, and when that blonde became a brunette and took a job as the PA for the mysterious K. Ryde, she had more work than she could manage. In the beginning, that was cool. In the beginning, she juggled the roles flawlessly. And it didn’t really matter because no one ever saw K. Ryde. Ryde was like Charlie from
Charlie’s Angels
, only she imagined him much edgier, much scarier – that is, when she imagined him at all. K. Ryde was only male because that’s what people naturally seemed to think, and that suited Kendra just fine. K. Ryde controlled the business from behind the scenes, leaving Kendra Davis free to recreate herself again and again. At first she did it only for the job, only when K. Ryde needed her incognito. But it was so freeing to be someone else. She’d never felt such power. Soon she realized she could just as easily become someone else to explore the night and the people who hung out in it. In the beginning, it was thrilling and exciting. She felt alive and free and totally untouchable. Of course, it was just an illusion. But she didn’t know that back then.

At the tiny desk squished in the corner of her studio apartment, she opened her laptop. With a few clicks, she pulled up an old photo album, one that no one else would ever be able to find if they just happened to be browsing her files. She understood about alter egos far better than Garrett Thorne could imagine. She understood about secret identities, about people who didn’t exist anywhere in the real world, about people who existed only in her head. There had been so many. Most didn’t really have names unless they needed to, and most were gone the next morning, the next week or two at the latest. She pulled up the picture she was looking for, feeling her skin prickle as she viewed it after all this time. It was taken by the man she’d been with that night, a man who had grabbed her phone away and started snapping photos of her. It was later that she’d learned his name. Too late. She hated photos of herself. She tried to get him to stop, but it was only on her phone so it really didn’t matter. She could delete them later. She didn’t know why she never did.

She studied the photo for a long time, as though she could undo it if she stared long enough, as though she could make that night and everything that happened after disappear. Of course, she couldn’t. The picture she could delete, but the scars were permanent. Even she wouldn’t recognize herself if she hadn’t known it was her in the photo. Her hair was black, cut into a bob that just brushed the bottoms of her ears. It was short enough to show the temporary tattoo of a flock of delicately drawn birds ascending over one shoulder and up the pale column of her neck to disappear into the black nest of her hair. The outfit she wore was blood red and strapless, short and form-fitting; the black boots rose halfway up her thighs.

The man had called her the Bird Woman. He hadn’t known her as anything else. He hadn’t known anything about her. At least not until later, when her world fell apart.

She shivered and pulled a sweat jacket from the back of the chair onto her shoulders. After that, Kendra had moved back home to Portland, back home to the arms of her friends, back to where she could heal. Whatever the hell that meant.

The Bird Woman had been the last of the strangers who had lived their short lives out in her body. Until now, at least.

For the tenth time she went to the closet and pulled out the emerald green gown she’d bought for Tess Delaney’s debut. It was off the shoulder, cut low across the collar bones to show plenty of cleavage. It made her look like a princess at court. Kendra was hardly the princess type, but she figured Tess Delaney, if she’d existed in the real world, probably would be. And, in truth, the dress looked like it was made for her.

She studied her reflection in the mirror and ran a hand through her hair. She’d been blonde since she’d returned to Portland. That was her true color. But that was Kendra Davis. She really couldn’t picture Tess Delaney as a blonde, nor did she want her to be. She would take care of that Friday morning. She wouldn’t have to cut it much. She figured Tess was the sort who wore her hair long.

She walked back into the darkened main room of the studio half wishing she’d asked Harris to come over for pizza and a movie marathon, but it was a work night, and Harris needed more sleep than she did. Still, he would have dropped everything to come and be with her if she needed him. So would Dee. But there was nothing wrong with her, not really, just a bit of not-so-happy nostalgia. And tomorrow, when she became Tess Delaney, it would be a part of her job, and that would make it easier. She would never go back to the dark places that had pulled her in those years in California. Everyone had their dark places, and being Tess Delaney was anything but a dark place. The woman was bright and optimistic and hopeful and full of happy-ever-after good cheer. And that was something Kendra would be glad to have. Though it certainly didn’t seem like Garrett Thorne had a lot of it, unless she was badly misjudging, and that wasn’t very likely.

There had been more email exchanges, each one with Kay Lake sounding totally in control of the situation, but as the time drew nearer Garrett found himself less and less sure. Sometimes he tried to blame it all on Kendra Davis. How could he trust such a volatile, unpredictable woman? How had he ever allowed himself to be talked into such insanity? At other times he reminded himself that it had, ultimately, been his idea, that he had been the one who refused to out Tess Delaney. And yet he doubted himself. Could he really pull it off? Could he really go to the Golden Kiss Awards with Kendra Davis on his arm, with her projecting out to the world her version of Tess Delaney? How could her version be anything close to how Tess really was?

Tess Delaney wasn’t real, he reminded himself for the thousandth time. Kendra could play the role any way she wanted to and it wouldn’t matter. That thought only served to make him more nervous.

By Thursday night he was a basket case. A glance at the clock on the nightstand informed him that it was almost three in the morning. He’d only been in bed an hour. Up until then there was no reason to even attempt sleep. The beer he’d drank to make himself sleepy had only made him have to pee, and now he lay awake, every muscle tense, staring at the ceiling. He grabbed his BlackBerry from the nightstand and texted with shaky fingers.

Are you awake?

He regretted it the moment he’d done it, but there was no taking it back. God, Kendra would probably not even see it until the morning, then she’d think he was the neurotic mess he actually was. So much for good role playing. His BlackBerry rang in the darkness, causing him to jump.

‘Garrett, are you all right?’ Kendra spoke without greeting, and the concern he imagined he heard in her voice made him instantly feel a little better, if a little silly.

‘Fine.’ He could feel the embarrassed heat rising up his throat. ‘Can’t sleep. Nervous, I guess.’

‘There’s no reason to be.’ Her voice was softer than he remembered it, warmer. ‘I promise it’ll be OK.’

‘Why aren’t you asleep?’ he shot back, trying to sound a little less neurotic. ‘It’s the middle of the night.’

‘I don’t need much sleep,’ she said, with a chuckle that sounded a little rough, as though maybe she had been sleeping, or at least she should have been.

Or maybe it was her bedroom voice. Suddenly, his body was at full attention. He took a deep breath and hoped she wouldn’t hear his heart, which was now juddering in his throat. ‘Me neither. I usually write best after dark. But these days the writing hasn’t been going too well.’

‘Sorry to hear that. If you don’t mind my asking, as a fan I mean, what’s Tess writing these days?’

It pleased him more than he cared to admit that she was his fan … Tess’s fan. He felt himself smiling hard. ‘Imagine
Dallas
does
50 Shades of Grey
with a hint of
Jane Eyre
and a dash of
Bridget Jones’s Diary
thrown in for good measure.’