Secrets Of The Alpha: (BBW Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance) (His Secrets Series Book 1) (11 page)

“What the hell do you think you are doing?” I suddenly asked as I stood from the table. Lou seemed confused.

“Answering the door, ma’am,” he said politely.

“I can see that, but why aren’t you making sure who is out there before you do, huh? What if it’s someone with bad intentions out there, huh? What will you do then?” I was not giving him any time to answer anything. He was just standing in front of the door confused. Vincent looked at me and raised an eyebrow.

“You okay?” he asked.

“No…not really. Lou almost opened the door without checking who was out there first,” I said, still staring daggers at Lou, who looked guiltier than ever.

“Sir…I was just…I never…” he tried explaining himself, but words were failing him.

“I’m sorry, Lou, we had a situation some time back. And Winnie here is still on edge about everything,” Vincent explained. I looked at him.

“Do you blame me?”

“But Lou’s heart was in the right place, I think.” Vincent said. I looked at Vincent and he nodded. “After all, we shouldn’t let our past define us, now, should we?” he said as he draped an arm around my shoulders. “We can’t always live in fear, baby.” I took a long deep breath and gave Lou an apologetic look. Vincent was right. Maybe I was being too hard on Lou. I wished he knew that I hadn’t meant to snap at him. I looked at him and forced out a smile.

“Go on, Lou. You can open the door,” I said humbly. Lou nodded and opened the door to find Ophagia standing out there. She looked at Lou and raised an eyebrow.

“Please come in, ma’am,” Lou said as he stepped aside.

“Ophagia, hi. Come on in,” Vincent said when he saw her. Lou, Ophagia. Ophagia, that’s Lou. He’s the new butler,” Vincent said. He was now standing up from the table.

“Butler? I didn’t know you were looking for one,” Ophagia said. “No offense, son,” she added quickly as Lou took her bag.

“None taken, ma’am,” Lou said with a smile.

“Please, call me Ophagia. Ma’am makes me feel old,” she said. Lou nodded.

“Good luck with that. He is still calling me sir even after I asked him not to,” Vincent said.

“Hi Winnie, always nice to see you,” Ophagia said. I nodded and smiled at her.

“Good to see you too. You just missed breakfast, but if you give me a few minutes I can whip up something for you,” I said as Lou walked towards me.

“Please, let me,” he said as he walked into the kitchen. Ophagia shook her head.

“Thanks, but no thanks. I already had breakfast. But I could do with some water, though. It’s pretty warm out there,” Ophagia said. Lou nodded and walked to the fridge to get her some water.

“Would you like to come up to my room, Ophagia? We can talk there,” Vincent said as Lou handed Ophagia a bottle of water.

“Sure,” Ophagia said as she started walking towards the stairs. Vincent turned to look at me. I was still a little agitated. He held my face in his hands.

“You okay?” he asked and I nodded. “Okay, I’ll be back in a jiffy. Okay?” I nodded as he walked away leaving me and Lou alone.

I looked at him from the corner of my eye and I could feel him looking at me too. I sat at the table and flipped through the newspaper, even though I was not really reading it. It seemed like forever before Lou finally finished with the dishes and announced that he was going to get started on the laundry.

“The laundry room is just down the hall,” I said. He smiled uncomfortably and nodded.

“Thank you,” he said.

“And you don’t have to do my laundry, Lou. I can still do my own,” I said as I looked at him. Lou looked at me and then shrugged.

“As you wish, ma’am,” he said before he walked off giving me a chance to finally take a long deep breath.

That was awkward,
I thought as I leaned back in my seat. I was relieved that he was gone but I could not help but feel sad about how Vincent had handled everything. If ever there was a time I felt unappreciated, it was at that moment. All I was doing was trying to protect Vincent and I was not sure he could see that. I could not help but feel embarrassed to be there, angry even. I walked to the living room and picked up the phone book I had used to circle acting jobs earlier that week. I looked at it as I sat down and took a long, deep hopeful breath as I dialed the first number.

“Hello, hi. My name is Winnie Campbell and I am calling in reference to an ad you put in the paper last week?”

“Ah, the ad campaign,” said the man who had picked up.

“Yes, the very one. I was wondering if it was still available.” I was now playing with a lock of hair around my index finger.

"Well, as a matter of fact Miss Campbell, the position is still available. But I have to ask before we go on, how old are you?” His question caught me a little off guard.

“Um…I’m thirty two,” I said. I heard the man exhale deeply and right away I knew that all was not well. “Hello? Are you still there?” I asked.

“Yes, Miss Campbell I am still here but I am afraid that you would not be a good fit for the age demographic that we’re trying to target,” he said. “See, the campaign is a sort of targeted at women in their late teens to early twenties and I’m afraid that having a…” I couldn’t let him finish. He was just telling me in so many words that I was too old for the job in question.

“Thank you for your time,” I said cutting him short before he could bullshit me any longer and hang up.

I was feeling a little angry as I made another call, but even that one went just as bad as the one I had made earlier. Actually, every call I made for the next forty minutes went the same. Too old, not enough experience, too little experience…there was even one who declined because I didn’t sound like I had a very camera friendly face. What the hell was that about? And as much as the little experience, I wanted to yell at them and tell them that if they didn’t keep on rejecting me that maybe I would have had enough experience under my belt. I was pissed off more and more as I sat there making those calls but the one that really got to me was the one I made last. It was a casting for a dead woman on CSI.

“Hello, hi. My name is Winnie Campbell and I saw an ad on your website. You need someone to play a dead woman on a TV show?” I asked.

“Yes, we do. Thank you for calling.” It was a woman this time round. “I will need a few details before I can call you in for the meeting. Is that okay?” she asked.

“Sure.” This was the best call so far; at least that was what I thought at that moment.

“Alright, Winnie. How old are you?” she asked. I was a little reluctant after what happened last time.

“Thirty-two.” I was waiting for the bombshell that would drop any time now.

“Great and do you have a recent head shot?” she asked.

“Sure. I can email you right now,” I said as I grabbed Vincent’s iPad that he had left there. “I have also attached my resume just to make things easier.” I quickly downloaded the headshot and resume from my email where I had saved them and sent it to her.

“Okay, I got it…” the woman said. She sounded a little distracted but I thought that was because she was opening the email I had just sent her.

“Hhmmm,” she suddenly said.
That cannot be good,
I thought as I leaned back in the chair.

“You never told me that you are a little…inexperienced,” she said.

Inexperienced? Is she for real?
I wondered as I sat there. “What do you mean inexperienced? My resume clearly states that I have had a number of acting jobs before.”

“Yes, but all these was from four years ago,” she pointed out.

“I really don’t see what that has got to do with anything,” I suddenly said.

“It has everything to do with it, Miss Campbell. You have very little acting experience and, even if I was not considering that, you have been MIA from the industry for a while,” she said. I couldn’t believe what she was saying.

“Are you saying that I cannot play dead just because I haven’t worked recently?” I asked angrily.

“Well, actually…” I never gave her an opportunity to finish what she was saying. I was too agitated. I shook my head as if she could see me.

“You know what, all the job entails is lying still for a few minutes with some
Walking Dead
makeup on my face and maybe legs. I don’t even get to play the flashback scenes? You are literally telling me that I cannot lie down perfectly still for a few minutes, is that it?” I had never been this annoyed.

“Actually miss…” I could not bear to listen to her anymore. I hang up angrily and leaned back in the chair, rubbing one side of my temple.

I sat there, breathing hard and my heart was beating hard in my chest. If that was not blatant disrespect, I didn’t know what was. I looked at the phone book and sighed when I noticed that I had called almost twelve prospective jobs and they had all turned me down. No one wanted me, the message was loud and clear. I didn’t know how long I had been seating there when I finally realized that even though Lou had said he was going to do some laundry, he didn’t have any to do. I had done all of Vincent’s laundry the day before and since I had told him I would do my own, he was literally jobless at that very moment. But for an idle person, he had been gone too long.

I put the phone down and walked to the laundry room and indeed, Lou wasn’t there. I slowly made my way back to the kitchen, wondering where he could be. I then made my way upstairs and raised an eyebrow when I saw Lou standing outside Vincent’s room with his ear pressed up against the door.

“Hey!” I said a little louder than I had expected as I ran up the stairs. “What the hell do you think you are doing?”

Lou stood up straight and balanced the tray containing two wine glasses and held up a finger. I could not help but think that I was right about this good for nothing man. I mean, what was he doing snooping around outside Vincent’s door while he was having one of his important meetings anyway? I looked at him and crossed my arms on my chest as he knocked on Vincent’s door softly.

“Yes,” I heard Vincent calling from inside the room. “Oh, Lou. Come on in.”

I stood there looking at Lou walk into the meeting that I couldn’t be part of, the same meeting that was only supposed to be a few minutes long but was now dragging on. I sighed in humiliation and slowly made my way back downstairs.

As I went to bed that night, I wanted to speak my mind and tell Vincent that being left out of what his secret meetings over and over was making me feel sidelined. He had often told me that we were a team, but judging by how many times he had left me out I was beginning to feel more like a placeholder than his woman.

I lay in bed and looked up at the ceiling as I slowly drifted off to sleep. I was not sure what time it was when I woke up later that night. I felt a familiar weight on my hip and I turned to find Vincent lying next to me with his arm draped over me. A smile played on my lips as I looked upon his sleeping face. It felt nice to have him there with me. It was so perfect, comforting even. I slowly pulled myself away from him careful not to wake him up and slowly tiptoed to the bathroom. I was halfway across the room when I saw a dark shadow quickly pass by me. I turned around surprised, but I couldn’t see anything.

Could that have been Lou?
I wondered as I walked to the bathroom. But if that could have been Lou, what reason would he have had to be up at that time of night? I shook my head as I flushed the toilet. My mind was on overdrive. There was probably nothing for me to worry about. That shadow could have very well been a bat flying past the window for all I cared.
What the hell?
I wondered when I climbed back into bed. Vincent was not there anymore. I hated the fact that he was able to creep out so silently. I hadn’t heard a thing and I was only a few feet away. I looked out the window and saw a crescent moon in the sky and sighed. I had no idea where he had gone and I couldn’t help but worry.