Torn (19 page)

She stood up, walked into the kitchen, and made herself some hot tea. Sipping gingerly from the warm mug, Chelsea padded back into her home office and scowled at her brand new Apple computer. It was the one splurge from her movie money. The screen saver flickered on and patterns of synthetic Northern Lights rippled across the monitor.

Listless, she sighed. “Maybe I should just bag it and take a nap,” she said to the machine.

“Chelsea? Girl? You in there? Open up, it’s freezing out here!”

Julie
? What was
she
doing here?

Iya let out one bark and then quieted, going back to sleep. It was as though the dog realized that she’d missed the intruder window already, so why bother. Kemah merely opened a lazy eye and closed it again. Some guard dogs. The thought made Chelsea smile and she was chuckling to herself by the time she reached the door. Clearly the director’s presence had been made known at the house, and that the animals now considered her a welcomed visitor.

“Julie, what’s up?” Chelsea opened the door, and Julie practically jumped in, the wind and snow from the late April blizzard trying to follow, but Chelsea slammed the door shut.

“Jesus! Does this state always have such freak weather? It’s nearly May for heaven’s sake!” Julie cast a dark look out the window that promised a reckoning to Mother Nature, and Chelsea laughed.

“Actually, I think it does. Welcome to Spring in Montana. Give it a week, we’ll be back to green grass. So why aren’t you filming?”

“Are you kidding me?” Julie lifted a brow and unwound a scarf that looked brand new. “I don’t have any snowstorm scenes. And this is the second day in a row. If this keeps up, we’ll get behind schedule.”

“Don’t worry. It’s supposed to clear up tomorrow,” Chelsea assured her, giving her mouse an indifferent push. The screen saver disappeared, revealing her site project. “I’m almost done with the first draft of the website. The only trick I’ve had to deal with is that damn coding I want––“

Chelsea took a breath, closing her eyes for a moment before she started talking as if Julie hadn’t spoken. “I figure if I change that the pixel point margin––"

Julie’s eyes narrowed, and she crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Ty’s not much better. Fortunately for him, it works because he’s doing the angst-filled, grieving widower bit at the moment. But he’s grouchy as hell–– And if that last sentence of yours didn’t have a double meaning, I’ll eat this scarf,” Julie finished, giving the red cashmere material in question a shake for good measure.

“Julie, I’m just exhausted, okay? I’ve been working my ass off trying to pick up where I left off with my career, my household, my family, before I took on that movie role. It took a lot out of me. I’m delighted and grateful that I had the opportunity –– I’ll never need wonder “what if”, but if I never act in anything ever again, I’ll be thrilled. As for Ty… I’m sure he’s fine. His wife is with him after all.”

Brows lifting again, Julie uncrossed her arms to take the steaming mug Chelsea offered. “So that’s what this is about,” she murmured as she raised the cup to take a sip.

“Yes. It is. I’m pissed at him. He hurt me. I catch him having a quickie with Jennifer in his trailer not even
two days
after he and I ––“ She stopped herself, practically biting her tongue off to stop the words she never should have said.

“After the two of made love,” Julie finished and Chelsea reddened as she turned her face away from the older woman and rubbed the warm ceramic of the white Fiesta mug.

She nodded. “You must think I’m a real piece of work, considering where I’m at –– being jealous of a man spending time with his
wife
while I’ve got my own spouse at home…” Chelsea pushed her tea to the side with a sigh. “But Tyler… I really thought…”

Her voice trailed off as she turned her back to the other woman. She picked up the cup and walked over to the sink to stare out the window at the falling snow.

“I can guarantee you that whatever you think you saw, you saw wrong,” Julie stated from behind her, her voice calm as she took another sip of hot tea.

“Look, I know what I saw. Jennifer ––“

Julie sighed, the very sound managing to convey the disgust she obviously felt for her Ty’s spouse. “Jennifer looked like she just was tossed and, with Ty behind her, it looked like he’d done the tossing.”

“How did you know that?”

Julie shot her a look that said,
How do you think
? before responding. “Ty told me. It took me over half an hour to calm him down, to focus on his job after you left. He wanted to go straight to your house to explain.”

“To explain the fact that he’d just made love to his
wife
? What’s to explain?” Chelsea set her mug down with a thud on the counter.

Julie snorted. “No, he hadn’t just made love to his wife. –– As if Jen is capable of feeling such an emotion. Let me school you, hon. Even though you don’t believe it right now, Ty
loves
you. You.
Not
Jennifer. You’ve got to understand something about Ty. He and I go
way
back. Probably several lifetimes back. I’m closer to him than I am with members of my own family. He would never sleep with another woman while his heart belongs to you. That’s not the way he rolls.”

Chelsea felt heat spread across her cheeks. It wasn’t embarrassment as much as it was frustration and guilt. But whatever it was, it made Julie tilt her head and study her for a long, long time.

“Ah, but she
did
. You don’t know Jennifer. She’s done it before. And he wasn’t right there –– yet. Your interrupting made it so he didn’t catch them in the act, but he saw the guy leave his trailer.”

Chelsea closed her eyes, remembering the sound of the back door of the trailer slamming even as she stammered her way around Tyler’s wife. “Shit.”

“Yeah, no joke.”

Shaking her head, Chelsea walked into the living room, sat down on the couch. The couch where she’d made love to her own spouse in a bizarre act of love and desperation… for what? Now not only did she betray the man she loved, she betrayed the man she was in love with. She dropped her face into her hands. Christ. She was no better than Jennifer Benson.

Shit
.

She was worse. Tyler
had
treated their love as sacred… While she…
Damn it
.

Suddenly feeling nauseous, Chelsea flew to the bathroom, slamming the door behind her.

“Chelsea? You okay?” Julie’s voice, concerned, came through the wood.

“I’ll be right out.” Chelsea rinsed her mouth with fresh water. She splashed cold water on her face, took a few slow, deep breaths. How had her life gotten so complicated? It was supposed to be living happily ever after with her husband and their children, not falling in love with another man. Certainly not getting ––
No
. She shook her head and vigorously rubbed her face with a towel.

“Chelsea?”

“I’m
fine
.” Chelsea opened the door and walked out of the bathroom, looking fierce. Julie took a step back.

“Whoa, Girl. Where’s the fire?”

“You’re right. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
Yes, you do.
Chelsea set her jaw, and ran her fingers through her tousled locks, willing her head to be quiet.

Julie put an arm around Chelsea’s slumped shoulders and gave her a reassuring squeeze. “Look, you’re going through a tricky time right now, and I sympathize. I can’t even
begin
to imagine, but I do feel for you. It’s not easy falling in love… especially when it’s with someone other than the person you married.”

Chelsea groaned. “Crap. It’s that obvious?”

The older woman tilted her head to one side as she mulled over the question. “No, not really. Not to anyone who doesn’t know Ty. And my guess is also not to anyone who doesn’t know you.”

Chelsea thought of Jake. “Oh, man…I am such an asshole.”

Laughing, Julie’s arm dropped from Chelsea’s shoulders. “You may be a lot of things, Girl, I don’t know. But an asshole? I don’t think so.
Trust
me. Being not only black and female, but
gay
, black ––and did I mention female?” She laughed again, continued. “Working in a dominantly white male profession has brought me up close and personal with
many
an asshole. It doesn’t fit your job description in the least.”

As they were meant to, Julie’s words brought a smile to Chelsea’s face, even a reluctant laugh.

“There, you see?” The director wrapped her scarf back around her neck, walked back over to the door. “Do me a favor, Chelsea. Give my boy Ty a call, please, okay? He’s miserable, which, in turn, makes me miserable, which makes the movie set no fun to be around.”

The younger woman nodded. “I’ll call him.”

“Now?”

Chelsea rolled her eyes. “Right after you
leave
.”

“Right.” Julie grinned; sparkling white teeth in a dark chocolate, deceptively fine-boned face, and opened the door. “Subtle, Girlfriend. Real subtle.” She paused in the threshold, ignoring the wind and snow blowing against her back. “And don’t forget to pick up your last paycheck. It should get here in a couple of days or so.”

~ * ~

Tyler paced the width of his hotel room, not knowing –– or particularly caring –– where his wife was at the moment.
Soon to be
ex-
wife,
he reminded himself. He’d called his lawyer earlier that morning. The official, formal divorce proceedings were now in progress.

The thought ceased his pacing, bringing him to a stop in the middle of the room to stare at the television. Elizabeth Webber was in a passionate lip-lock with Jason Morgan.
General Hospital.
Tyler shook his head, picked up the remote, and switched it off. He’d gotten his start on
General Hospital
. Funny how he still watched it, from time-to-time, over a decade later.

Tyler sat down on the edge of the king-size bed, absently jiggled his left leg. He looked out the window, watched the snow falling fast and furious. He shook his head, amused by Nature. Julie, however, wasn’t amused. His best friend was completely annoyed with the snowstorm as if Nature had deliberately produced the storm just to sabotage her movie.

But the snow –– it made him antsy. The movie set was temporarily closed until the storm was over, which meant that he had no possible way to see Chelsea. He couldn’t go over to her home –– not with Jake there. Jealousy flared, and he tamped it down.
Don’t. Don’t even go there
.

Chelsea wouldn’t risk coming to the hotel, not with his wife here.

He stood up again, scowled. Damn Jennifer! Why had she even bothered to come here? What was the point? Her motive? Did she even
have
one aside from driving him insane?

Chelsea’s shocked face when she saw him in the trailer, his wife –– fresh from sex with another man –– at the door, hovered in the window pane as the snow retreated from his vision. Like a bad movie, that scene replayed repeatedly in his head since it happened. Shit. He could use a drink. Maybe that would dull the ache in his heart. Yeah, right. Where was Julie anyway? She always seemed to know when he needed to talk to her. Lately, all he’d been doing was growl.

The soft knock on the door startled him and he turned around, grinning. The woman was psychic. Friends didn’t get any better than Julie. Tyler strode over to the door and flung it open. “Julie! ‘Bout time you got here! I was going crazy ––“

His heart leapt into his throat at the sight of the woman before him, cutting him off. Her dark hair, curled in ringlets damp with melting snow, was wind-blown; her normally mocha-hued skin looked pale. Her brown eyes were huge in her face as she stared at him as though she’d never seen him before.

“Chelsea. What’s wrong?”

“Tyler. I… I slept with him. I’m sorry. I thought you’d had sex with Jennifer and I ––“ she cut herself off, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip. “I’m so sorry!” She blurted the words, unshed tears shimmered in her eyes.

Tyler glanced up and down the hall, then reached out and pulled her into his room, slammed the door shut, and locked its deadbolt. “Chelsea? What are you doing here?” He flipped the latch over the hook; his wife still had a key, but with the deadbolt and the latch, she wouldn’t be able to get in unless he let her.

“Julie came by the house this morning. She explained everything.” Her eyes closed briefly, then opened, searched his face. “Tyler, I’m so sorry. I had no right to jump to conclusions like that and ––“

Chelsea nodded again and Tyler sent Julie a mental kiss.
Thank you! Thank you!

“Tyler… I was going to call, but then –– I-I couldn’t. I had to see you. Tell you how sorry I am ––“