“We’re on your team,” Jay reminded him.
Carter’s jaw hurt with the amount of pressure his back teeth were taking. “I know. Just… just keep the others silent.”
Jay nodded to those leaving the room. “I’ll spin it…don’t worry. It’s what you hired me for.”
Rubbing a frustrated hand over his face, Carter managed a half smile while the cell phone in his hand rang. Answer the f**king phone, Blake.
Answer the f**king phone.
****
At least the detectives waited until they hit the car before they started in. “What about “low-profile” did you not understand, Eliza?”
“I’m not in the mood for a lecture,” she told them. She’d had a right-shit day, starting with a press conference she really didn’t want anything to do with. Moving on to the twisted media who couldn’t recognize a red light at an intersection if it was flashing in their face. Then onto a proposal from a gorgeous, successful man who, if she were being honest with herself, she had the ultimate hots for, but to whom she promptly said no…and ending with, but not limited to, being driven to destinations unknown by two of L.A.’s finest!
Yeah! She’d had a shitty-ass day!
“Standing in front of every media station in the greater Los Angeles area, and at least two national channels, isn’t exactly low profile.”
Dean, the overweight detective in the passenger seat glared at her. The last time she’d seen him he was chewing nicotine gum like it was crack. From the slightly yellow teeth peeking through his lips, Eliza guessed the cigarettes won.
James, his skinny partner drove while keeping a keen eye on his rearview mirror.
Yeah, Jim was short for James…and the fact that putting their names together spelled out James Dean wasn’t lost on her.
“I’m not eight,” she told them.
“But you look exactly like her.”
Her…damn it, her mother had a name. Not that she’d remind them.
“She is dead. Has been for a long time.” No one knew that more than Eliza.
Dean twisted in his seat and poked a yellow finger in her direction. “She gave everything to protect you. The least you could do is stay hidden so she can rest knowing you’re safe.”
“Hide you mean?”
“Hide, live life out of the spotlight…however you want to put it. Shouldn’t be hard. Zillions of people aren’t splattered all over the damn TV.”
“Yeah well…life happens.” Life with a duchess as your best friend and an influential politician suggesting marriage.
Nibbling on her fingernails, Eliza took two seconds to wish things in her life were different. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to live a normal life with a sexy man like Carter protecting her.
Wasn’t gonna happen.
She glanced at James who had stayed painfully silent during their drive. “You don’t have anything to add,” she asked.
“We’re being followed.”
Unable to stop her natural instinct, Eliza shifted in her seat and noticed Carter’s bodyguard in the dark sedan following them. “It’s okay. He’s harmless.”
“Your boyfriend’s?” Dean asked.
“Carter isn’t my boyfriend.”
“Looked like it to me and half of America. Even those in prison with privileges.”
Taking a deep breath and blowing it out thought clenched lips, she sputtered, “You’re reaching, Dean.”
“I’m not and you know it. You’re biting your nails. You know this shit stinks.”
Asshole.
“How are the cigarettes? Still smokin’?” It was mean, but he wasn’t playing fair and Eliza didn’t care. “I’ve lived my life like a good little witness-protection-program girl. I’m done. You got that…? Done!”
“I don’t think you have a clue who you’re dealing with if you think you’re done. This isn’t a joke, Lisa—”
“It’s Eliza. I haven’t been Lisa since I was nine.” Just one of the many changes she had to make in her life. “Take me home.”
“That isn’t wise,” James finally said.
“Take me home.”
Jim met Dean’s eyes. She couldn’t help but wonder if they’d take her into custody for her own protection.
Jim took a sudden turn back toward the freeway. Toward her home in Tarzana.
She sat back in her seat with her purse in her lap.
“I hope you know how to use that gun,” Dean said.
How did he know? Of course he knew. Jim and Dean seemed to know everything about her life.
“Anytime you want to have a shoot off, or whatever you call it, you let me know.”
“I might just do that,” Dean said.
Jim laughed. “You’d lose,” he told his partner.
She let a half smile meet her lips.
“So. Was this a scare tactic, or do you two know something?”
Dean looked at Jim and then the rearview mirror.
Neither of them said anything.
Scare tactic. Which worked when she was a kid trying out for the cheerleading team. Not so much now.
They turned off the freeway and down her street.
“Get back to the studio, Eliza. Brush up on your Tae Kwan Do. Stay alert,” Dean told her as he turned into her driveway.
“And for the sake of God, call us if you find the butter in the wrong place in the fridge. Got that?”