Ruined (A Barnes Brothers novel) (16 page)

“No. I just . . . well, I figured you’d want to know.” Because he didn’t want Dash saying something that would end up all over the set, he added, “Anyway, Evie is in the car with me. We’re heading out to get some food, but you know how Marin gets. Stubborn and all.”

A taut few seconds passed and then Dash said, “She’s fine, Sebastien. We spoke not that long ago, okay?”

So why aren’t you there with her instead of out at some club
?

Because that’s where Dash was, he knew it.

“Okay.” He didn’t punch the console like he wanted. Wouldn’t have done anything except hurt his hand. “Talk to you tomorrow.”

He cut off the call before Dash’s response came through and looked over at Evie.

She stroked a hand up his arm. “So . . . now that you’ve done the
nice guy
thing, how about we go do something not so . . . nice?”

He came to a stop at a red light and Evie undid her seat belt, leaning over to murmur in his ear. Any red-blooded man worth his salt would have been all over that idea.

“So . . . what do you think?”

The sound of a fist pounding hard and heavy against the door brought Marin out of a deep, dreamless sleep.

Dazed, she looked around, her eyes landing on the clock on the nightstand, staring at it in confusion.

“What the hell?”

Another knock.

Confused, she stared at the numbers glowing in front of her. It was
two
in the fricking
morning
. Why would somebody wake her up at
two
a.m.?

But the fist pounded on her door again.

So either the building was on fire or somebody wanted to die. That was all she could figure out. Pushing upright, she knuckled at her eyes and when somebody knocked again, she shouted, “If the building ain’t on fire, then you just stop that right now!”

Some might have been appalled at the twang that came out. She didn’t mind the southern drawl that sometimes crept out in her voice when she was worn out. Of course that wasn’t a
drawl
. That was just pure Tennessee bitch right there and she was so tired, she didn’t care if anybody heard the echoes of her upbringing just then.

Sighing, she got out of bed and grabbed the robe from the foot of it, shuffling toward the dim glow coming from the lavish living room area. She had one of the elegant suites and the place was more like a small apartment than a hotel room, but that meant it was a walk to the door. When the knock came again, she set her jaw.

“If you knock on that door one more time—”

She opened it mid-sentence and stopped when she saw Dash standing there.

And he wasn’t alone.

A tall man stood behind him, one who was almost insanely hot, in a nerve-wracking sort of way. She might have been scared if she wasn’t so tired. Ignoring tall, dark and scary, she focused on Dash. Jabbing him in the chest, she said, “Knock on the door one more time, buddy, and I’ll set you on your ass. The
one
night I actually managed to get to sleep and I haven’t had heartburn or anything else and you decide you’re going to wake me up at
two
in the
morning
?”

She hadn’t had any more
“spells”
as Sebastien had called them since the last one nearly three weeks before. They were almost halfway done with filming. Marin was just over three months pregnant and according to her OB, she was almost past the rough spots that hit during the first trimester.

True, she wasn’t getting sick at all hours of the day, or even in the mornings all that much. But she was exhausted and nausea still came and went. And the heartburn . . . man.

The exhaustion was the worse, though, and it didn’t help that she was stressed out like never before.

She was still trying to talk to Sebastien, but lately, he was hanging around Evie and she knew for a fact the man was trying to avoid her. Maybe he hadn’t told her outright, but she could read the writing on the wall.

It might as well read:

I’m not talking to you, Marin.

The last time she’d tried to talk to him, it was like he had sensed her presence—or maybe it was just Evie being Evie—the two of them had leaned closer together and when the woman had gone to kiss him, Marin felt like she’d been punched in the throat.

That had been four days earlier and each day of shooting scenes with him had been horrible. Sojo was even getting on her now.

Which might account for her being so pissed off now, although she doubted it. Marin never liked being woken up, even at a decent hour.

Two a.m.? Not decent. Completely not decent.

But Dash didn’t seem perturbed. The guy behind him looked around a little nervously, though. Marin might have been amused by the sight of a guy who stood close to seven feet tall glancing around like he thought somebody might jump out from behind a corner and attack him.

Dash braced his hands on the door jam and leaned in, his eyes half wild. “Know who called me about thirty minutes ago, darling?
Again
?”

Oh, hell.

Marin shoved a hand through her hair. “I already told you, ignore him!”

“It’s getting kind of hard to do that when I’m this close to getting laid and the phone starts ringing every ten minutes!” he snapped. “This is the third weekend in a row! What happened, did you stub a toe in your last shoot of the day? Why in the hell is he bugging me about a body pillow?”

That startled a laugh out of her, which didn’t impress Dash much. He swore, his eyes widening until she could see the whites all around the loveliness of his irises. “Don’t you dare laugh about this!” he said, pointing a finger toward her nose. “I’m getting blue balls over this mess. Bad enough that he’s got it in his head that . . .”

He stopped, hissing out a breath.

“Hey, Dash . . .” The big guy from behind him shifted from one foot to another. “Look, you ain’t gotta go talking like that.”

“Henry, it’s fine,” he bit off.

Henry didn’t seem to think so. He drew himself up to his full height and Marin blinked, a little impressed. Wow. He really was huge. “Look, I just don’t think you need to go talking to Ms. Lassiter like that. It ain’t her fault that guy kept calling you. I . . . Man, I didn’t know we were coming to see her.” He smiled at her bashfully and added, almost nervously, “I loved you in your last movie—the one with Sebastien Barnes? I hope you do another one with him.”

The sincerity in his voice kept her from laughing, although the outright insanity of this whole debacle was about ready to do her in. “Thank you . . . Henry, right?”

“Yes, ma’am.” He glanced around and then leaned, almost conspiratorially. “Ignore Dash. He’s just pissed because we were . . . well . . . having fun and he had to go an’ answer the phone. I told him not to, but . . .”

“He should have listened,” she said soberly.

“For fuck’s sake!” Dash shouted. “He called ten times!”

Henry stiffened, his cheeks going red. Clearly the only thing intimidating about this man was that first impression, Marin decided. He was more like a teddy bear with feelings easily hurt. She smacked Dash’s arm. “Would you chill out?”

Henry scowled at Dash. “Yeah, chill out. You know what? Or don’t. Call me when you have that temper under control.” He turned on his heel and strode off. It was a wonder the building didn’t shudder under his steps. Dash turned, gaping at the man’s back for a few seconds, as if he was just now processing what his short fuse had done.

“Now that’s just another thing to be pissed off at Barnes for,” he said, looking back at her.

“You can be mad at Sebastien for calling at inopportune times.” Marin shook her head. “But he wasn’t the one standing here like an asshole and ranting at his . . . um . . . boyfriend? Hook-up?”

Dash opened his mouth, then snapped it shut. After a second, he sighed and shoved a hand through his hair. “Hook up. Most definitely a hook up. Hank’s a nice guy and fun, but he jumps at his own shadow.”

“You shouldn’t have snapped at him,” Marin said. “He wasn’t to blame.”

Dash’s eyes narrowed. “Well, I came here to snap at you. The way I see it . . .
you
are to blame. At least in part. When in the hell are you going to tell Sebastien that I’m not the baby’s dad? This bullshit of his is getting out of hand.”

“I . . .” Marin groaned and turned away. Gesturing for him to come in, she shut the door and moved over to the couch. “Look, I’ve tried. Several times. The last time I went to talk to him, he was all wrapped around Evie, okay?”

She made the bad mistake of looking up at Dash.

He could be shallow and temperamental, yes.

But Dash was also surprisingly insightful at times.

Those eyes narrowed on her face and in a second, she knew he’d seen too much.

“Son of a bitch,” he whispered. “Marin . . .”

“Don’t.” Rising, she went to evade him, but he just caught up with her, catching her arm.

Unable to avoid him, she focused on his chest but he cupped her chin and tilted her head back until he could look into her eyes.

“He’s the father, isn’t he?” Dash demanded.

Tears, always insanely close these days, sprang to her eyes.

She tried to fight them but they spilled free and she just couldn’t stop them. “Yes.”

“Marin . . .”

As she started to cry, Dash drew her up against him.

And she let him. As the misery broke out of her, she leaned against him and wept.

***

Okay, so maybe he’d been as ass, calling so late.

He’d only tagged Dash because it had occurred to him that it might help Marin if she had a body pillow.

He’d seen her rubbing at her back and although she didn’t even look pregnant yet, he knew that sometimes when a woman was pregnant, her back hurt. He knew that only because he’d been reading about it some. He was curious—that was all. While he was reading up on Google, one of the pregnancy boards he came across had mentioned that a body pillow helped.

But if he mentioned anything to her, she’d snap at him again.

So he thought maybe Dash could do it.

Dash was something of a night owl, too. Sebastien knew that for a fact, so when he’d sent him the text at eleven, he didn’t think much of it.

It was when Dash was a little bit of an asshole in his response that Sebastien got pissed off. He didn’t have to be a dick.

If you want to tell Marin something, call her and do it, dumb-ass.

Well, so much for trying to be helpful and nice.

So he’d called Dash, intending to just . . . hell, he didn’t know. He tried to tell himself it wasn’t jealousy driving him, but he knew otherwise.

He was jealous as hell but that was beside the point. He was also irritated because he had been trying to help. One might think Dash would have appreciated that.

When Dash came on the phone, voice full of irritation and music blasting in the background, Sebastien had snapped. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe you should spend some time with your pregnant . . .” What the hell were they? They didn’t exactly act all hooked up. “With Marin?”

“Sebastien . . .” Dash’s voice was slurred and rough. “You sexy sumbitch . . .”

“Aw, shit. You’re drunk, aren’t you?”

Dash laughed. “Drunk. Horny as a fucking teenager. Gonna do something ’bout that, though. You wanna come join us? You might even like it.”

“Hell.” Dragging a hand down his face, he blew out a breath and turned to stare out the window. “Where is Marin?”

“Marin . . .” Dash huffed out a breath. “Now there’s an innerestin’ question. I know . . . I think I’ll call her. I bet she’s not afraid to try new things.”

Sebastien started to see red. “What the—”

Dash hung up.

So he called back.

A lot.

And when Dash eventually stopped answering, he put in a call to Marin, without even thinking because he had to . . . had to . . .

Well, he didn’t know, but the phone was ringing now. When he saw the time, he almost hung up, but then Marin’s voice, husky and thick, came on the line.

“Sebastien . . . what in the world do you want?”

“I . . . Marin, are you okay?” He felt out of place and useless and he had the strangest feeling she’d been crying.
Dash
. That son of a bitch.

“No, I’m not, thank you very much. But it’s past two in the morning and it’s a little too early—
or late
—for this. What do you want?” Her voice rose on the last word and Sebastien started to feel even more like an idiot.

“I . . . nothing. I’ll take care of it tomorrow.”

She hung up without saying anything and he was left standing there, glaring at the phone.

Yeah. Tomorrow.

Damn right he’d take care of it.

The phone call from Abby wasn’t exactly unexpected. They talked once or twice a week.

It was pretty . . . odd, though. Especially the timing. They were filming in Chicago.

Abby lived in Arizona. So for the call to come in at eight meant Abby was either sharing Marin’s inability to sleep or something was wrong.

So Marin answered, nodding at the woman standing behind her. They’d just finished with her makeup for the upcoming scenes so she had a few minutes.

“Abby . . . it’s early.”

“Tell me about it. Just wanted to give you a head’s up.” Abby’s voice sounded entirely too cheerful.

“A head’s up about . . . what?” Marin’s heart skipped a beat or two, because while Abby sounded
cheerful
, she also sounded determined. She hadn’t told Abby yet. She had hardly told anybody—her agent, the director. Townsend knew and a few select others had been told. She had a feeling a few more people on set had guessed. But even Sebastien and Dash hadn’t been
told
—they’d figured it out. She’d been keeping Abby at arm’s length because she felt like she was going to explode—everything wanted to come pouring out but before she told her best friend the whole story, she wanted to confront Sebastien.

And when are you going to do it?
That small silent voice jeered at her.

The hurt woman shouted back,
The next time he isn’t hiding from me or wrapped around Evie!

“My flight. I tried calling last night but you must have already been dead to the world. Have you seen a doctor yet? You sleep all the time.”

Marin winced. “Actually . . . wait, what? Your flight?”

“Yeah. I just landed. I’ll be over at the set soon. Can’t wait!”

“Abby!”

But she’d disconnected.

Swearing, Marin lowered the phone and went into the texts—nothing.

She checked her voice mail—Abby had called. Once. At a quarter til nine. When Marin had been soaking in the tub. She had a ritual, nightly baths when she was filming. Ninety percent of the time, if she was working, then she would be in the tub by eight thirty, in bed by nine thirty.

Abby knew it, too.

“You sneak,” she said softly.

“Hey, Marin . . . headed out to see you. Talk to you soon.
”

A few seconds later, a little message bubble popped up.

You keep dodging me. Something’s up. So I’m ambushing you. The way friends do. Love you, A.

Marin groaned. She went to drop her head back on the chair.

And immediately jerked it up as damnation rained down on her in the form of a diminutive Asian. He came rushing up at her, flapping his hands and fussing. “Your
hair
, your
hair
! We spent
ages
on your
hair
!”

I’m tempted to just rip it all out. Then we can do wigs.
Dropping her phone into her lap, she settled back as the stylist checked her over, muttering under his breath about ungrateful, egotistical celebrities.

***

Thanks to the fact that he’d spent some time sobering up on the way to the hotel to have it out with Marin, Dash wasn’t hungover that morning.

He was still more than a little cranky, thanks to little sleep and next to no sex for, oh . . . hell. He thought he might be looking at a record-long dry spell—almost six months. He would have ended that dry spell with Hank last night, but it was probably for the best.

Hank was adorable, but he had commitment written all over him. Dash wasn’t interested in that kind of guy for the long term. Best to avoid it altogether because he’d hate to hurt the man.

Despite what the gossip mags might say about him, he wasn’t the callus manwhore people thought. He loved sex—men, women, he didn’t care. He’d been going slowly crazy over the past couple of months, dreaming about Marin, imagining that blonde hair wrapped around his fist as she went down on him, those long legs squeezing his hips as he drove into her. And he
liked
her. That was, really, his idea of a good time. A long, lazy fuck with a person he cared about, followed by a long, lazy afternoon of laughing and then a long, lazy night of sex and more laughter.

But he’d wasted too much time on her, because it had been pretty clear she wasn’t into him that way.

He was a good sport, though, and once he realized that, he’d moved on. There wasn’t anybody on the project that appealed to him, really, save for Sojo or Sebastien. Sojo, the beautiful bitch, was gay and not interested in him. Sebastien, the beautiful bastard was straight. He wasn’t interested in him, either.

Now, Evie . . . well, she’d made a few moves, but he had this image in his head. Her vagina likely had teeth and she’d use it to ensnare a man. His last lover had been like that, and she’d ensnared Dash’s
other
lover—the only person he’d ever really fallen
in
love with. He wanted to think he was magnanimous enough to wish them well. But he didn’t. He wished them hell and at the same time, he wanted Felix to come back to him. And leave Blake wherever they’d ended up.

He’d sort of loved her, too, but she was toxic. Sometimes, love worked that way. He had no doubt that loving Evie would be like that, so when she slanted her sloe-like eyes his way, he’d just smiled and carried on about his business. He’d jerk himself off from now until eternity before he put his heart in the hands of somebody who just wanted to play with it again.

It was miserable to love somebody who just didn’t get it.

Brooding over that—and commiserating with Marin—he didn’t see the storm bearing down on him until somebody shouted a warning at him. Then it came too late.

Big, hard hands grabbed him and jerked him up.

It wasn’t the first time he’d had somebody pull something like that, so he reacted the same way any man in his right mind would have. He shouted, swung—and ended up under more than two hundred pounds of solid muscle.

Dash was a fit guy, but he was all long, lean muscle.

Sebastien Barnes was muscle, all right. But while he might be
long
, the muscle on him wasn’t
lean
.

Rumor had it he’d grown up brawling with those brothers of his just for fun, too.

Although it wasn’t the glint of fun shining in Sebastien’s eyes now. He was out for blood.

“Oh, for fuck’s s—”

That was all he got out before Sebastien shoved a forearm against his throat. “You keeping running around and tomcatting on her, I’m going to cut it off, you son of a bitch. You made her cry, asshole.”

Sebastien let up on the pressure and Dash sucked in a breath but he was torn between swearing and laughing. He didn’t have to wonder about what in the world Sebastien was going on about, because he already knew. He’d been on his way out the door when the idiot had called and now . . .

“Let me up, you dick,” he said.

“Did you hear me?” Sebastien said, putting his weight back on Dash’s throat.

“Hey!” Tony Ortega came bearing down on them, followed closely by a couple of the security guards.

But it was the sound of Sojo’s voice, followed closely by Marin’s, that caused any real reaction.

“Uh-oh,” Dash said as Sebastien slowly rose. Giving the man a wicked grin, he rolled to his feet and smiled at him tauntingly. “I bet we’re going to get called to the principal’s office, Seb. Want to get our stories straight?”

Marin was gaping at them both. Sojo jabbed a finger in their direction. “Get your asses to my trailer.
Now
.” Then she looked over at Marin. “You, too, darling.”

“Me?” She pressed a hand to her chest. “I didn’t . . .”

“You, too.” Sojo’s voice brooked absolutely no argument.

The devil in Dash made him want to laugh and he almost did. But Sojo must have sensed something because she gave him a dark look and turned on her heel. Most of the director types were all cut and dried, all work and that was it. Generally, that was Sojo. But if she sensed something might upset her steady ship?

Well, hell would freeze first.

Dusting off his clothes, he tucked his hands into his pockets and started to walk.

There was one good thing to all of this. He didn’t have scenes until later and wasn’t due in for makeup or wardrobe for another hour. At least he wouldn’t have to face the wrath of wardrobe because he’d dirtied his clothes.

If Sebastien had brought that hell down on him, he would have
really
been pissed.

***

“Boy, did I pick a day to come visit.”

Marin groaned at the sound of Abby’s voice coming from behind her.

She shot her a quick look and waved at her before leaning over to Sebastien.

“What in the
hell
was that about?” Marin hissed under her breath.

Dash was between them and Sojo and she was hoping it was enough to keep the tall—and somewhat scary—woman from hearing them, but Sojo barked out, “We’ll all hear the answer to that one, Marin.”

Rolling her eyes at Sojo’s back, she shot Sebastien a hard look. Then, knowing she wouldn’t have time until later, she leaned over and gave Abby a quick squeeze. “Hey.”

Abby hugged her back. “You better go. I don’t want to incur her wrath.”

Sebastien lingered until she’d finished and nodded at Abby without saying anything. A muscle in his jaw pulsed, his eyes unreadable.

He kept his gaze focused straight ahead for the longest time, but as they drew nearer to Sojo’s trailer, he finally slid her a look. Then he caught her hand and stopped altogether.

When he reached up and touched her cheek, Marin could have sworn her heart stuttered in her chest. “You were crying,” he said simply.

Then he started to walk again, shoulders a straight solid line.

Staring at his back, she thought those words through, confused.

“You were crying.”

He’d called last night.

Yeah. She’d been crying—
over him
.

But . . .

Sojo was standing by the door of her trailer impatiently. Dash went to duck inside and he half turned, caught her eyes. Giving her a cocky salute, he disappeared, followed quickly by Sebastien. Sojo grimaced and then went inside, leaving the door open.

It was pretty damn clear that she expected Marin to get her ass inside.

And Marin would.

She had no choice.

Sebastien’s words made complete sense to her now.

He thought Dash had done something to make her cry.

From the corner of her eye, she caught sight of Evie, but she ignored her. Abby was talking to Tony, probably getting the rundown—oh, man. This was all going to
suck
. Jamming her hands into the pockets of the robe she’d been given to wear over her wardrobe for the day, Marin strode ahead, jaw tight, her head spinning. How in the hell was she supposed to fix this?

They were all inside, Sojo seated on a chair that made Marin think of a throne. Sebastien was leaning against the counter in the kitchen, his stance casual, but she wasn’t fooled. He was on edge and pissed, the scar on his face paler than normal, seeming stark against the harshness of his features.

He was still so beautiful, but it was a hard beauty now.

She wanted to go to him and kiss him, brush his hair back from his face and press her mouth to his, then trace that scar, move down—

“Sit down, Marin,” Sojo said softly.

Marin frowned at the woman who was, for now, essentially her boss, but she did sit, curling up on the couch with all the casualness she didn’t feel. Dash was in an armchair, looking for all the world like he was ready to watch a football game. The avid light in his eyes made her think he found all of this highly entertaining.

“Tell me something, Marin. You’ve got some . . .” Sojo ran her tongue across her teeth. “Information that we’ve been protecting. Do I need to be careful of what I say here?”

“They both know,” she said, irritated already.

“Excellent.” The way Sojo’s golden eyes gleamed made Marin feel like she’d just been cornered by a lioness.

As the woman leaned forward, Marin wondered if maybe this was what a mouse felt like when it was being stalked by the house cat. The idea pissed her off and she squared her shoulders, realizing she’d been slinking back into the cushions of the couch.

“Any idea what these two school boys were fighting about, Marin?” Sojo asked.

“Well . . .” Marin drew the word out slowly. “I can’t speak as to what was going on in Dash’s mind, although from what I could tell, he was just taunting Sebastien. Sebastien was the one who started it.”

“Indeed.” Sojo’s smile widened. “And just what do you think was going on in
his
mind?”

“He hasn’t had a good brawl with his brothers in a while,” Marin said sourly. “He probably needs one of them to come up here and knock him around, help him blow off steam. Maybe he saw Dash and thought a fight would do him good.”

Dash tried to turn his laugh into a cough, but it didn’t work.

Marin didn’t look at him.

Sojo arched a brow. “You really think this was about Sebastien needing to . . . brawl?”

“You don’t know him like I do.” Giving Sojo an innocent look, she lifted a shrug. “I was around all of them growing up. It was like if they didn’t fight once or twice a week, they stopped getting oxygen to their brains. And he hasn’t spent much time around his family lately.”

Sojo looked like she wanted to laugh, but she didn’t.

Throughout all of this, Sebastien stood stone-faced, staring at the wall, saying nothing.

He might have gone on saying nothing if Sojo hadn’t shifted her tawny eyes his way and said in a silky voice, “Well, Sebastien?”

“Well, what?” He sounded bored, like she wanted to discuss the weather.

“Are you just suffering from a massive testosterone buildup? I could call Zach, see if he’d fly out here for a tussle. If I’d known that was the case, I would have told Abigale to make sure he came with her. It could be fun . . . and a fascinating promo for the movie.” Sojo studied him the way one might examine a rare and strange insect.

Marin really didn’t envy him.

But she had to admire him. Maybe it was because he’d been the object of such intense female scrutiny before. After all, Denise Barnes had one hell of a look and Sebastien had been known to end up on the wrong side of his mom before.