Love Unrehearsed (15 page)

“I understand you are upset—”

“No! You have no fucking clue how upset I am. She’s sitting here bleeding! And what if she were pregnant? Did your men consider
that
while they were assaulting her?”

A very distinguished, slender man in a dark blue suit and tie placed a heedful hand on Ryan’s shoulder. “Monsieur Christensen, please, allow me.” The man pulled a wallet from his inside coat pocket and flashed his ID. “Gérard Bertrand, Personal Attaché to the Prime Minister. I am here on his direct orders regarding this matter and I have heard enough. Let me have the file and remove those handcuffs from her at once.”

My breath stuttered with overwhelming relief. Ryan brought the freaking cavalry with him. I guess the prime minister fully expected us to attend dinner with his family tonight, after all.

So many people packed the small office, all speaking at once in a blur of French and English. The handcuffs were removed, much to my relief. Ryan continued to fuss over the blood on my chin. Trish’s phone was fused to her ear.

I knew he was angry. “I’m so sorry,” I pleaded desperately, hoping they both would find the grace to forgive me. As social errors go, this was way beyond using the wrong fork at dinner or mispronouncing a translated word.

“Shh. Everything is going to be okay,” Ryan whispered, pressing my hair back from my cheek to wipe a new tear away.

A tall man with a thick mustache and wiry gray eyebrows approached. “Monsieur Christensen, Mademoiselle Mitchell. Please accept our most sincere apologies for this misunderstanding.”

Ryan blocked the hand outstretched to me. His own hands balled into tight fists again.
“Misunderstanding?”
he growled at the audacity. “Look at her! You call this brutality a
misunderstanding
? How about I beat the shit out of one of your boys like this—”

Mike pressed a hand into the center of Ryan’s chest.

The man tucked my file under his arm, unabashed. “I assure you, I will personally investigate this matter. You have my word.”

“Your word means
nothing
to me,” Ryan spit out angrily. “Your investigation can’t possibly begin to right this wrong.”

I stood and interrupted, wanting nothing more than to get Ryan and myself out of this potentially explosive situation. “Excuse me. Am I free to go?”

The man’s eyes darted to mine and a faint smile crinkled his lips. “
Oui, mademoiselle.
You may depart. No charges will be filed.”

I nodded, brushing my fingers over the numerous scrapes on my face as if that would hide them better. “Can someone please take me back to the hotel?” I was done being humiliated and scared out of my mind. The need to grab my passport, dark sunglasses, and an airplane ride out of hell was driving me toward the door.

Ryan covered me with his jacket and with his hand pressed low on my spine, guided me outside and into the backseat of a waiting sedan.

Trish was busy, calling in favors and sending texts to God-knows-who to cover this up. I wanted to curl up into a ball and die.

David was obviously distressed. He glanced at this watch. “We need to get you back to the Hotel Britannique for your photo call, Ryan. There’s still time. We can put this setback behind us and still stay on schedule.”

“No,” Ryan said flatly, pulling me tighter to his chest when I tried to squirm away. I presumed we’d end up in a fight once he got me alone.

“Listen, I know this has been traumatic,” David continued. “The Burberry thing was just a filler. Everyone else is at the photo call waiting for y—”

“I said
no
,” Ryan spat. I felt the tension in his grip on my shoulder. His lips were pressed to my forehead when he breathed, “We’re going back to our hotel.”

Despite Ryan’s declaration, David was still trying to persuade him to continue on with his scheduled obligations when we entered our lavish suite. “Okay, so what do you want me to tell the producers when I have to explain why you weren’t at the photo call? And the premiere is at six. Our car has to leave here by five thirty.”

“I’ll handle dealing with the studio execs,” Ryan’s agent, Aaron, said. “Under the circumstances, it’s unfortunate but they’ll understand.”

David was unrelenting. “But if we intend to cover this up
properly,
he should make it to all of his scheduled appearances. Being a no-show only confirms the suspicions. He needs to be there, Aaron. You know it as well as I do.”

Ryan wasn’t listening to anyone. He marched off to the bathroom.

Trish had every electronic device known to man fired up and was multitasking her ass off trying to counterattack all the negative press before it surfaced.

I sat on the sofa, wallowing deep in guilt for causing all of this, wishing I could disappear back into the quiet of my apartment. I just couldn’t shake it no matter what I tried to do. The fear and mortification were swirling in my chest like an angry tornado, sucking up every other emotion in its wake.

I’d never been in
any
trouble with the law, not even as a kid, and having my first taste of it was terrifying. Hanging out with Marie and my other best friend, Thomas’s sister Melanie, I came damn close a couple of times, but somehow, some way we always came out in the clear.

Several times Thomas and I came close to getting busted, like the time the cops pulled us over when we were driving back from a keg party at North Bay beach. God, I shook all the way home from that near miss. Or the time we were interrupted by shore patrol having insane sex at two in the morning out near the bluff.

Despite that, nothing as bad as
this
had ever happened before. And the ramifications that would stem from this were too numerous to even begin to comprehend.

Ryan sat next to me, scrutinizing my injuries. My breath hissed uncontrollably from the sting when he rubbed a warm washcloth over my cheek.

His eyes were so repentant. “Sorry, honey. I’m trying to be gentle, but we have to clean these cuts.”

As much as I loved him tending to me, I wanted to pull the cloth from his hand. I felt like I didn’t deserve that gentle hand.

David ended a phone call. “Marcia Gay Harden’s assistant is going to come up and stay with Taryn while you’re at the premiere, Ryan. Jenna’s people are all busy.”

“I’m not going,” Ryan said softly, wiping my lip with the utmost care.

All eyes landed on him—even mine.

David became overly animated in the midst of his talent-manager meltdown, ranting on and on about not believing what he had just heard.

“I said I’m not going,” Ryan repeated. David started arguing but Ryan paid no attention to him. An eerie calm was over him.
The calm before the storm. perhaps?

I felt Ryan’s hand tremble lightly when he tipped my chin up. “I need to call the concierge and get some medicine for you,” he said softly. “I got most of the dirt out of the cuts but I’ll be able to do a better job once I get you in the shower.”

I stilled his hand. “Ryan, please. I’ve ruined enough. You have to go.”

His nostrils flared. “I’m not leaving you. Not like this.”

I took the washcloth from him, ignoring the fact that the once-pure-white towel was now tinged pink. “It’s only for a few hours.” I tried to smile encouragingly, feeling as dirty and stained as the cloth in my hand.

His lip quivered ever so slightly as he shook his head. “I can’t.”

I locked eyes with David, wishing he wouldn’t hover. I was about to do him a huge favor. “Can you please excuse us for a moment?”

I hoped David could read me enough to know that I was trying to do the right thing. Mike, bless his soul, cleared everyone out of our suite.

Ryan pulled his shirt off and tossed it to the floor. “Don’t try to talk me into going.”

His tone left no room for argument. I was resigned to the fact that I wasn’t going anywhere tonight anyway, including a stately dinner with the prime minister of France and his family.

“The world is not going to come to an end if I miss the premiere.”

So he thinks.
Maybe not, but his fans would surely be outraged.

He cracked open a bottle of water, gaping at me. “What?”

“You have obligations,” I hesitantly muttered.

“I don’t give a
fuck
.”

I shook my head to disagree. He was just reacting to his own emotional overload, which I’ caused. “This is your career, your movie. I won’t let you ruin that. Not for me.” I searched my bag for anything resembling an aspirin.

Ryan frowned. “I’m not going without you.”

I stopped in front of him on my way to the bathroom. “Yes, you are.” As I turned for the bathroom doorway, a stick of nasty pain shot into my ribs again.

One lift of my shirt and a sideways glance in the bathroom mirror confirmed my suspicions. I had a gigantic black and blue mark across my waist at least six inches long. It reminded me of the colors of the sky at dusk, wrapped in tender pain.
Well, at least it wasn’t the right side like last time when the car struck me, but it sure looks the same.

Ryan gasped. “What the
hell
is that?”

He startled me. I quickly dropped my shirt, tugging hard on the hem.

That’s when he saw the gash on the back of my forearm for the first time as well. His long fingers circled my wrist.

A puffy red welt and scabby road rash decorated my arm.

“It’s nothing.” I pulled my arm away.

“The hell it is.”

He shifted to face me and tried to lift my shirt but I held the hem, pulling it taut.

“Let. Me. Look,” Ryan ordered, growling through his teeth. It was clear that he wasn’t asking. It was obvious that his tolerance was all used up.

Tired of fighting it, I acquiesced. Ryan’s eyes scrunched together as if he were in pain, too.

I didn’t know what to say other than “I’m sorry.” I pulled my shirt down as if it would hide my shame. “Please, go to your premiere. I’ve already done enough damage to your career for one day.”

I turned the water on, planning on using the shower water to cleanse my wounds and mask more tears that I needed to shed before I drowned internally. After my shower, I’d pack. Overwhelming feelings of failure made me want to run and hide.

“No. Taking care of you comes first for me, sweetheart.”

If he only knew how much I felt the same.

Ryan carefully pressed his body into mine, wrapping his arms around my shoulders in a tender embrace as if I were frail. “And I want you to stop saying you’re sorry. You have nothing to be sorry about.”

I shook my head and tried to tear away from him. God, he couldn’t be more wrong.

“I should have listened to you and never ventured out on my own. And now . . . now I’ve humiliated us both. I don’t even know how you can stand to be so nice to me right now.”

Confusion blanketed his face. He freed one arm long enough to turn the shower off. The bathroom was turning into a sauna, steamed up tight with fog.

“Do you think if I had any other job, your first trip to Paris would have been different?”

I tried to push him away. “Ryan, don’t . . .”

He lifted my chin, refusing to let me go. “Or would the paparazzi have been stalking you when you strolled the streets of a safe foreign city? Instead of being out there enjoying all the sites with you as a couple, protecting you like a man should, you were left to fend for yourself,
again
. Do you think that makes me happy or feel worthy of you? Let me tell you,
it doesn’t
. And now, seeing you injured like this . . .”

“Stop it, Ryan. Please.
None of this
is your fault. You had nothing to do with this. It was my stupid decision to go out. I didn’t think it would be a big deal to go shopping on my own. I know better now. I won’t make the same mistake twice.”

His frustrated growl raised up a notch. “
Do not
put this on yourself, Taryn.”

My mind raced. “How can I not? You’re here trying to do your job. I was the one making headline news wrestling with the cops. It seems like every time I try to make it easier or find my place I end up making it ten times worse somehow.”

I had to hold it together before I completely lost it. “I just want you to be happy, Ryan, without jeopardizing your career. The media is going to rip you . . . I can’t stand it, knowing I caused you pain and humiliation today. You have no idea how sorry I am. I should have stayed out of the way.”

I walked back into the bedroom and grabbed some of my clothes, shoving them back into my suitcase.

“What are you doing?”

“Packing.”

“We don’t leave until the morning.”

I ambled around the room collecting my things, feeling soreness in my bruised knee. I knew if I stopped moving the tears would flow and I really didn’t want to cry in front of him right now.

“You’ve spent enough time today worrying about me,” I muttered ruefully. “Please just . . . You need to get ready for your premiere.”

His face fell. “Babe, are you hurt somewhere else? You look like you’re limping.”

If I tell him, he’ll blow off the premiere for sure. Well, not because of me, he won’t.
I tried to shove the pain aside. “No.”

Ryan marched over to me, ripped my shoes from my hand, and hurled them across the room.

“Stop fucking packing! “What part of
I’m not going without you
didn’t you understand? You expect me to what, just roll out of here without you so I can come back later to find that you’ve run off?”

I shook my head, adamantly denying his assumption. I doubted France had a big enough rock for me to crawl under.

“You think I don’t know your MO by now? How you willingly martyr yourself for my greater good? Dammit, Taryn. You think all this shit means that much to me? I can’t believe you’d think I’d just leave you here alone after all you’ve been through today.”

He threw a few of his own clothes into his open suitcase. “You wanna go? Fine. Let’s go. We’ll be on the next fucking plane home.”

I set my jacket down. His newfound anger frightened me. “I wasn’t going to leave.”
Well, not that I would ever admit
. “It’s just . . . I feel like shit for bringing this on you. I’m mad, and embarrassed, and frustrated.”