She turned away and darted back to the bedroom. I followed her, starting to worry about her inexplicable change in demeanor. She pulled on her heels, and I realized that she was planning to leave.
“Wait,” I said, rushing to the dresser and grabbing a pair of grey sweatpants. “Don’t leave. Just tell me what’s going on.”
“I’m sorry,” she replied once her shoes were on.
There was pain and sadness in her voice, but the emotion in her eyes was what gutted me. It was regret.
She swallowed hard. “I never meant for this mess to affect you.”
“What mess?” I called out as she hurried out of the room. I was stumbling behind her as I tried to pull on my pants. “Damn it, Marlee, what’s happening?”
I was frustrated by her cryptic behavior, but beneath that was fear. She was running away from me, and I was worried about what that meant. She didn’t stop or respond. I came out of the bedroom as she scooped her purse up off the floor where she’d dropped it last night. Then, she was out the door.
“Fuck,” I mumbled, pausing only long enough to get my pants all the way on before I followed.
She was already at the elevator at the end of the hall when I stepped out of the hotel suite, and I decided that my luck was shitty today when the doors slid open for her immediately.
I tried to get to her before they closed, but it was useless. She watched me coming as the doors slid shut, and my fear and confusion turned to anger.
I slapped my hand against the elevator doors in frustration as I saw the digital readout above counting down. I knew that I could follow her to her room, but I was too hurt and angry right now. I needed to cool off, and clear my head. So, I headed back to the hotel suite for a long shower.
I wasn’t giving up, but I knew that I needed to tread carefully. When I saw Marlee again, I didn’t want to give her any opportunity to run a second time.
CHAPTER11
Marlee
Iwas such an idiot. I knew that I shouldn’t get involved with Bowen, that those stupid pictures on the internet could ruin his life like they’d basically ruined mine. But I allowed myself to forget all about that and get swept up in the idea of being with such a handsome man.
He was more than his looks though, and that was the real reason that I’d slept with him. I was prepared to resist a flirty smile and some piercing blue eyes, but he was also kind and fun to be around. I liked him as a person, which I wasn’t really expecting when I met him. It was hard to know what famous people would really be like, and everyone was familiar with horror stories of entitled behavior from celebrities. Bowen wasn’t like that.
I had fallen for him despite my best efforts not to.
Now, I had to worry about my identity being determined by the media. A quick google search could easily link the picture of me kissing Bowen to the ones that Brian put online. I couldn’t imagine how much that would damage Bowen’s career and reputation, but just the idea of it made me feel incredibly guilty. He’d just told me last night how important acting was to him. I would hate to have a negative impact on that part of his life.
After fleeing his hotel suite, I went back to my room just long enough to take a lightning-fast shower and change my clothes. A part of me expected Bowen to show up and demand answers from me, but he didn’t. I knew it was silly to be disappointed by that since I’d been the one who’d bolted on him. I needed to put distance between us, and forget that last night ever happened. It was for the best.
Leaving my hotel room, I skipped my daily workout and went to the beach. I wasn’t in the mood to do much today other than sulk about the loss of something great. My relationship with Bowen was over before it even really had the chance to begin.
I planted myself in the sand, under a big beach umbrella that I rented from a stand near the hotel pool. It gave me shade and a chance to hide away from a certain movie star that I needed to avoid for the next two days, until I returned to New York. I had a steamy romance book with me, but I couldn’t seem to get into it. I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to read about others finding a happily ever after.
I kicked off my shoes and buried my toes in the warm sand, watching the people around me. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves on this sunny day, and I couldn’t blame them. I just wished I didn’t feel like I had a dark cloud floating over my head, my turbulent emotions putting a damper on my whole vacation.
So much for relaxing and forgetting my problems for a week.
“Marlee?”
I turned and saw Faith standing next to my umbrella, looking down at me with a grin. She was wearing a floppy white hat and sunglasses, and her red knee-length sundress blew around in the slight breeze coming in off the ocean.
“What are you doing here?” I asked. “I figured the day before the wedding would be a busy one for you.”
She sighed and took a seat on the sand beside me. “It is, but Michael’s worried about my stress level and insisted that I take a break for an hour. He’s so overprotective.”
“You agreed to that?”
“Yes, after he threatened to tie me to the bed, and not in a kinky way.”
I laughed. “So you’ve escaped to the beach, instead?”