Close Enough to Touch (13 page)

Willa laughed, though her voice carried not even a hint of
humor. “Well, interesting seeing you here.”

The woman walked away, leaving Grace with a cold sweat
prickling over her brow. What if Willa knew Scott? What if she’d heard rumors?
What if—

Her darting gaze caught on Cole. Willa walked past and he
glanced from her to Grace, as if he suspected the tension. Scalding heat rushed
up to paint Grace’s face red.

But it was okay. It was just a casual connection. No reason to
be alarmed. Really, it was inevitable that she’d see somebody here that she
knew. Hollywood was a strangely incestuous place. Sometimes it felt like some
giant backwoods family. You were related to all of them, even the ones you’d
never met.

It was fine.

But her face burned. Her ears and neck felt on fire. She wanted
to sink into the earth. She wanted to run away. Again.

Would Cole try to stop her? If he did, then she’d have an
excuse to turn on him. Slap his face, yell crude insults, confirm everything he
seemed to think about her.

Damn, that would’ve felt good.

But she only finished entering the measurements of the ranch
for Eve’s site files, then emailed them to Eve and sent a copy to the location
manager. By the time Grace looked up, Cole had disappeared, and so had Willa. In
fact, the whole population of the yard seemed to have shifted toward the main
house. A big black SUV with tinted windows and giant tires had pulled up. The
crowd hovered nearby. Madeline Beckingham had arrived.

* * *

C
OLE
’
S
BRAIN
HAD
FROZEN
up, split down the middle,
and was now insisting on sluggishly crawling along on two separate, equally
unpleasant tracks.

On one side, he watched his old lover Madeline Beckingham slip
from a shiny black SUV, as beautiful as if the past thirteen years hadn’t
happened. It made no sense. He’d aged from a smooth and happy
twenty-one-year-old kid to a hard-worn thirty-four-year-old cowboy with plenty
of lines around his eyes to mark the years.

If Madeline had aged at all, he couldn’t see it. She looked
just as bright and luminescent as ever. Her hair was vivid red and straight as
silk. Her skin a slight golden color that should have looked unnatural with the
red hair, but somehow, she made it look like the skin tone every redhead should
have been born with. Not that she’d been born with any of it. What she’d been
born with was money. And she’d made herself into exactly the beauty she wanted
to be.

The sheen of her had blinded him to the hard edges underneath.
She was still good at that masquerade, it seemed. After all, in the time that
had passed, she could only have gotten harder.

The other half of his brain was keeping track of his new lover,
which was probably not the right thing to call a woman he’d slept with once and
then kicked out of his place.

Funny, but Grace seemed like the other side of the coin in this
situation. Same danger as Madeline. Same hardness. But Grace put all her hard
edges on display, and saved the softer ones for private.

Both of them made him feel like a goddamn fool.

Cole tugged his hat lower over his eyes and tucked his thumbs
into his pockets as he watched Madeline’s entourage surround her. He was a safe
distance away: twenty feet or so, and leaning against the shady side of the tack
house. He didn’t think she’d see him, and at first, she didn’t. But then she
waved her assistants off, walked a few steps across the yard until she had a
relatively solitary space, and spun in a slow circle, a wide smile overtaking
her face.

“This is perfect,” she crowed. “Perfect! Oh, my God, the
pictures didn’t do it justice. It’s exactly what I wanted. We’re going to have
to do a quick setup here. The summer colors will only last another six or seven
weeks. I—” Her spin came to a graceful stop. She was facing him. She was looking
at him. “Are you kidding me?” she called. “Cole? Is that you?”

For a moment, he considered leaving. Just turning his back and
walking away. It wasn’t worth this. His land, his relationship with Easy, his
plan for the future—none of it was worth facing this woman. But she rushed
toward him, and he couldn’t summon the will to run like a coward.

“Oh, my God,” she said breathlessly. “Cole! I can’t believe
it’s you. You’re
here?
”

“Where else would I be?”

Her arms snaked around him and held him tight. The moment
headed straight for discomfort and quickly tunneled into awkwardness when he
only held his arms up and away. Madeline didn’t seem to notice. She kissed his
cheek and squealed.

“I had no idea! You didn’t leave any word when you left. As a
matter of fact…” She stepped back and crossed her arms. “I completely forgot
that I’m furious with you. You just disappeared.”

“I came home,” he said gruffly.

She forgot her pose of anger and laughed, waving a hand that
seemed to dismiss everything, including him. “All right, it doesn’t matter. Is
this your ranch?”

“I work here.”

“Perfect.” She looped her arm through his and tugged Cole out
into the sunlight. He’d spent a lot of the past hours worrying about this
moment. About seeing her. About how he’d react. But it was so surreal that it
didn’t feel like anything at all. She was someone he’d known intimately. Someone
who knew things about him that no one else knew, but she felt like a stranger.
No, that wasn’t it.
He
felt like a stranger when he
was with her. A stranger he didn’t like at all.

“This is
my
cowboy,” Madeline was
saying to a group of people who were too well dressed to be actual crew. “Be
sure to get Cole anything he needs while we’re here.”

“Actually…” He pulled his arm free of hers. “I’m taking care of
things for Easy during the shoot. So let me know if you need anything.”

“Anything, huh?” Her eyes swept down him so quickly that he was
almost sure no one else noticed. Almost. Before he could stop himself, he
glanced toward the table where Grace had been sitting. She was still there, and
she looked in his direction, but she was in the middle of a conversation with
another woman and quickly looked away.

“I’ve got to check on the horses,” he said, not looking back
toward Madeline.

“You know…” Her hand closed over his wrist before he could move
away. When he glanced down and saw her red nails against his skin, a cold sweat
broke out at the nape of his neck. “We’re going to get filming pretty quickly.
Four weeks, I’d say, so we don’t catch the fall colors. You up for another
go-round?”

He’d loved the sight of long red fingernails back then. The
scrape of them trailing down his skin. He raised his eyes and met her gaze.
“Excuse me?” he said coldly.

She smiled as if she’d just eaten something delicious. “My God,
Cole. You’ve only gotten more handsome. How is that even possible? You’ve got to
be in the movie. Please.”

The movie. She was asking him to be in the movie. Cole wanted
to feel relief, but he wasn’t that stupid. After all, that was what she’d said
the first time.
Be an extra. Help us out. Tell me
everything you know about ranch life.

Jesus, that had been a rush. Being singled out like that. Being
approached by Madeline Beckingham, a woman who’d been famous since she’d
directed her first film at nineteen. A woman who’d been famous
before
that.

At first, he’d thought her interest had just been about his
riding. His skills. When he’d realized she’d noticed more than that… Shit, that
had been so much better.

Cole reached for the hand wrapped around his wrist and
carefully removed it. “I’ve got to check on the horses,” he repeated. But she
didn’t look the least bit discouraged as he turned away. No didn’t mean no for
Madeline Beckingham. It was just the opening volley. And somehow Cole had never
managed to win a round. In the end, he’d lost every single one.

CHAPTER TWELVE

“I
NEED
YOU
TO
GO
to the county offices to file the last of these permits,” Eve said,
tossing Grace the keys to her car.

“But…” Grace caught the keys even as she shook her head. “You
need me here.”

“Nope. You got us caught up on paperwork this morning. I’m
going to spend the afternoon shooting photos for the production files.
Finally.”

So this virtual stranger was just going to let Grace take her
car? “Okay,” she said softly. “Right now?”

“Now!” Eve urged, making a shooing motion as she walked
away.

“Okay.” Grace looked down at the little Lexus icon on the key.
It was a nice car. Not flashy, but very nice. She didn’t understand these
people. Eve knew she had nothing. No car. No family. Not even a halfway decent
phone. Grace could just get in Eve’s car and be out of Wyoming before she was
even missed. When she was sixteen, she might have actually done that.

But maybe nice people didn’t think that way.

“Grace!” Eve shouted. “One more thing!”

For a split second, she was sure Eve had realized how stupid
she was being and changed her mind. But then she saw that Eve was walking toward
her with Madeline Beckingham, so she pushed to her feet and moved out from
behind the table.

The scrum of people who’d surrounded the director moved
instinctively along with her, but they hung back a little. Eve winked as she
drew closer. “Ms. Beckingham, this is Grace Barrett, the one I told you
about.”

Grace shook her hand and tried to suppress her frown of
confusion. “It’s an honor to meet you.” That was her standard greeting with
directors and producers. Whether it was honest or not depended on the
person.

“You’re good with makeup?” the director asked without
responding to the greeting.

“I am. I’ve worked in the industry for almost ten years.”

The woman’s gray eyes studied Grace’s face with cool
calculation. “You do a good job on your own makeup, but I need something more
natural. Can you do that?”

“Um.” Grace glanced at Eve, hoping for a clue. “I’d need my
kit, of course. But I can create any look you like.”

“She’s good,” Eve cut in. “Her portfolio is amazing.”

Madeline nodded. “Okay. They’ll be here in two hours.”

Grace was clearly missing something. “Who will?”

“That damn documentary crew. They want to film me unscripted, I
guess. Madeline Beckingham in the wild! Apparently documentary crews don’t
believe in makeup or hairstyling. And we don’t have a styling crew here, so I
guess it’s you.”

“Okay. Sure. I’ll be happy to.”

“Great.” She’d already moved on to other thoughts and her eyes
roamed away. “Cole!” she shouted, raising a hand as her face broke into a
smile.

Grace turned to look, expecting to see some other Cole behind
her. But it was Cole Rawlins in all his cowboy charm, leading a bridled horse
out of the barn. He froze, his gaze catching Grace’s for a long moment.

“Come here! I need you to talk to Bill Seasons about how many
cattle we can get into that corral next to the barn.”

Cole’s jaw tightened, but he tied the horse off and started
over. Grace noticed that he was favoring his right leg. She’d never noticed it
before. He clearly tried to hide it.

“I’ll go,” Grace said, holding up the car keys to signal Eve
that she was leaving. “I should be back in plenty of time.”

As Grace turned, she caught sight of the one person she wanted
to see even less than Cole. Willa James picked her way across the dirt yard in
high-heeled boots. She stopped in Grace’s path. “Not her,” she said loudly, a
tight smile nearly hiding the movement of her mouth.

Madeline Beckingham sighed. “Willa, are you talking to me?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Spit it out, then.”

“Not her.”

Grace’s stomach turned to ice. This was it.

“Don’t let her touch you.”

“Are you talking about the makeup girl?”

“Yes.”

“Do I need to solve this like a Scooby-Doo mystery, Willa? Let
me take a guess. Is she the one who did Felicia’s makeup for the Golden Globes
this year?” She laughed at her own joke.

“No. I recognize Grace. She’s from L.A.” She sounded caught
between delight and contempt.

“I’m aware of that,” Madeline said wearily.

“I bet you don’t know that she skipped town because she’s a
thief.”

“That’s not true!” Grace said, feeling as if she were playing a
scene in a movie. This wasn’t really happening. She knew it wasn’t, because she
should’ve felt mortified, but she didn’t feel anything at all.

“It is true,” Willa sneered. “I just talked to her ex. She’s a
thief. Not to mention the rumors of a little substance abuse problem.”

Eve and Madeline both looked from Willa to Grace. “That’s not
true either,” she said, her voice a little shaky. Did it sound as if she was
lying?

Willa rolled her eyes. “Call Frank Edison and ask him why he
fired her from her last job. Which was about six months ago, by the way, because
nobody else will hire her. Her boyfriend kicked her out after she stole eight
thousand dollars from him.”

Grace shook her head, staring at Willa in shock. A defense
formed in her mind, but it all sounded so stupid. She’d say the same things if
she actually were a druggie thief, after all.
It’s not
true. I didn’t do it. It’s all a misunderstanding.

But apparently she didn’t need to say anything at all, because
someone jumped to her defense. Not her defense, actually, but…

“Jesus, Willa,” Madeline Beckingham scoffed. “A substance abuse
problem? I’ll be sure to fire the whole cast then.”

“Ms. Beck—”

“I don’t give a shit what her problem is as long as she can
make me look good on HD film in natural sunlight. She can bathe in the blood of
virgins for all I care.” She smiled. “Maybe
that’s
why she’s in Wyoming. Virgins are few and far between in Southern California.”
She laughed at her own joke again, but nobody else in their little group
laughed. That didn’t bother Madeline. She just chuckled and shook her head.
“Come on, Cole. Let’s find Bill.”

Cole. Great. Just great. Grace didn’t turn around to look at
him. She waited for their footsteps to fade away. She waited for Willa to huff
and stalk off. And then she made herself meet Eve’s gaze.

“It’s not true,” Grace repeated, her voice hoarse with emotions
she still couldn’t feel. “I swear. It’s not true. I mean, I was fired by Frank
Edison, but it had nothing to do with my work or alcohol or anything. It was a
personal disagreement. And the other thing, the money, that’s about an
ex-boyfriend. We broke up and—”

“Okay.” Eve’s expression seemed purposefully blank. “We’ll talk
about it later in private.”

“Sure. I…I’ll be back in an hour then.”

Eve’s gaze touched on the keys in Grace’s hand.

Oh, God.
“I’m sorry. I can see if
someone else could give me a ride. Maybe…” But there was no one else. Maybe if
she asked Cole—

“Just be back in time to do her makeup. And charge production
your normal fee for makeup work, okay?”

“Sure. Yes.” They both stood there for a moment. Eve had to be
wishing she hadn’t volunteered her car, and Grace wished she could think of a
way to let her off the hook. But she needed to get to town, and Eve couldn’t
lose two or three hours of her day driving her. “Okay,” she finally said. “I’ll
be back as quickly as possible. Without speeding, I mean.”

“No problem.”

Newfound maturity or not, Grace hoped she ran into Willa alone
sometime soon. She wanted to slap that bitch across the face. She wanted to hurt
her. Because the feeling was returning to Grace’s body and she felt like she
might throw up. That’d be a nice, funny way to reinforce the rumors that she was
some sort of addict. Thank God she hadn’t eaten since eight that morning.

Face burning, she got into Eve’s car and pulled carefully away,
determined not to even stir up one piece of gravel. She just disappeared as
quietly as she could and tried to decide if she should keep on driving. Because
the worst part about the lies Willa had told was they were so close to the awful
truth.