“A train?” Brady asked as the unholy noise grew louder. We weren’t that close to the tracks, and we did hear freight trains now and then—but never this loud.
“A train with emphysema, perhaps.” Gideon strode to the window, nearly knocking over one of the light stands Lila had set up before we started recording. “What the hell is that?”
Lila steadied the light and went to join him at the window. “That…” she began, a trifle dramatically. I supposed it was an occupational hazard in her line of work. “That would be my assistant’s car.”
10
LILA
Penny’s room was the mirror image of mine, but the bed was a double, not a queen. The mattress still sagged in the middle, though.
“I’m sorry it took me so long to get here,” she said as she put a sweater into a dresser drawer. Unlike mine, her luggage hadn’t been searched by the wardens. “But just as I was about to leave, Jeff came over, and… I ended up leaving later than I meant to.”
Normally, if I found out that a woman got delayed when her boyfriend came over, I’d assume they’d gotten frisky. But with Penny and Jeff, it was safer to assume they’d gotten into a fight. The fatigue on my assistant’s face seemed to confirm that. “He’s still not happy that you’re spending the week out here?”
“Nope.” She brushed a stray hair away from her face. Her long, dark hair was tied up in a ponytail that rested on one shoulder, but a few strands had escaped. I’d kill to have hair like hers. If mine got any longer than medium length, it turned to pure frizz. “Especially not with three men here.”
“Would it make him feel any better to know that they’re jerks?” I gave her a smile that she seemed too weary to return.
“Probably not.” Right. Because Penny had a track record of falling for jerks—or at least she did in Jeff’s case.
Suddenly, I felt guilty. The fact that we were sequestered out here was my fault, not hers. “You can go back, if you want. I mean, it would be nice to be able to record some footage and get some good video out of this, but not if it’s going to mess up your relationship.” Though in my opinion, it was pretty messed up already. Why she put up with that loser was beyond me.
“No, I’ll stay. Who knows, maybe some time apart will do us good.”
The faint hope in her voice made my heart ache, but I nodded. “Maybe.”
Penny seemed to rally as she closed her empty suitcase and set it by the wall. “Besides, if I leave you alone with these guys, there might be an actual body count by the end of the week.”
“You saw my live stream before?”
She nodded. “I like that part about Early American Twig being the décor.” She looked around the dull room. “Though the decorations up here aren’t quite as bad.”
“What decorations?” Except for the light fixtures, the room looked like it could’ve been straight out ofLittle House on the Prairie.
“The paintings in the hallway.”
Oh. I hadn’t paid them much attention, but Penny was the one who had majored in art, not me. Yet we’d both still ended up out here in the middle of nowhere. There was definitely some irony in that.
I remembered something Brady had told me. “Dinner’s in forty-five minutes. Would you like a tour of the place? The area out back is pretty pleasant.” I wondered if it was the right time of the year for fireflies. I hadn’t seen them since I was young. My parents and I had lived in one of the many Chicago suburbs, and definitely not one of the more prosperous ones.
Penny looked torn. “I was actually thinking maybe I could grab a quick nap. It was quite the drive getting out here.”
“I bet it was. So sure, take a nap.”
“I’ll set my alarm.”
“Penny, it’s fine. If you’re tired, take as long as you need.” I started for the door but then turned back. “On the other hand, forty-five minutes is the perfect length for a nap.”
Penny grinned. “Meaning you don’t want to be alone with them for dinner.”
“Exactly.” I checked the time on my phone. “So I’ll be back to get you at six unless that saggy mattress swallows you up by then.”
I went back to my room, but there was absolutely nothing to do there unless I wanted to refold my clothes. Which, even though I was bored to tears, I really, really didn’t.
Those guys were assholes for taking my stuff. Who the hell was going to know as long as we didn’t show it on camera? And thank god my eReader was password protected. I wondered what it said about me that I didn’t mind them seeing my sex toys, but I would’ve been mortified for them to see the erotic stories I sometimes read while using them.
But I had nothing to be embarrassed about. They were the uncouth country bumpkins who needed to be worried.