Moving Forward (Moving Neutral, Book Three) (14 page)

Chapter Thirty-Three

It was my third trip to Los Angeles in six months, and each time I left, I swore I was never going back again.

I didn’t bother telling myself it would be any different this time. 
The odds were about two to one that I’d be in tears on the plane ride home.

As the pilot announced the descent, I slipped into the bathroom to change into the skirt and tank top I’d brought, stuffing my
heavy jacket into my carry-on bag as well as it could fit.  I hadn’t put on makeup before leaving for the airport, so I brushed some bronzer on my cheeks and added a swipe of mascara and lip gloss.  It wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing.

Lauren had offered to send a car for me, but I’d to
ld her Tanner was picking me up.  I could almost hear the wheels turning in her head, and I was a little worried that there would be a mob of photographers waiting at the gate for us.

If only I hadn’t checked a bag, I would have asked Tanner to meet me at a different terminal.

The plane pulled into the gate, and I tapped my foot impatiently waiting for the door to open.  The last time Blake and I had flown to Los Angeles, we’d been jet-lagged and exhausted, half-asleep the entire redeye flight.  This time, I’d taken a day flight, and by the end of the six-hour trip, I was bored out of my mind.

I had my carry-on slung over my shoulder,
and I headed for the stairs, avoiding the slow escalator out of the terminal and into baggage claim.  As I walked down one flight, and then two, a mob of people waiting in the passenger area came into view.

Including a familiar leather jacket.  And a very familiar head of tousled brown hair. 

“Hey,” I smiled, walking down the last few steps as Tanner walked towards me, grabbing my body in a bear hug and picking me up off the ground.

“Jeez, Snow
—enough fruitcake?  I can barely lift you.”

“Shut up,” I sa
id, punching my fist to his shoulder.  “You’re going to give me a complex.”

He set me down, and then grinned.  “You’re light as a feather.  I’ll carry you anywhere.”

I shook my head, still smiling.  “I bet you say that to all the girls.”

“Just the pretty ones,” he winked at me.  “But I still think we’re probably better off by car.  How was your flight?”

Just as I was opening my mouth to answer, a skinny guy in rimmed glasses tapped Tanner’s shoulder.  I looked at him, confused.  Was he a fan?

“Tanner, we’ve got to redo that one.  Casey wasn’t mic-ed.”

I looked at the man, horrified, and then let my gaze spread to the rest of the passenger area.  Sure enough, partially hidden behind the escalator, two cameramen had been recording me come down the stairs.

I glared at Tanner
accusingly.  “Why didn’t you tell me they were going to be here?”

He looked at me, confused.  “I texted you this morning.”

I sighed, looking down at my phone.  Sure enough, there was Tanner’s text — unread.  If I’d seen it before getting off the plane, I probably would have made more of an effort with my hair and makeup.

“Tanner, I don’t want to be on a TV show today,” I said, hearing my voice turn a little bit whiny.  Since when did that become something I had to worry about after a
six-hour cross-country flight?

“No worries,” he said.  “Just follow my lead.”

“What do you mean?”

“I have to film today, it’s part of my contract. 
And Ted over there practically wet his pants when I told him I was picking you up at the airport.  But don’t worry — they won’t use it.”

I gave him a quick, uncertain glance, and
as the guy approached us with a black object in his hand.

“C
an I put my hand down your shirt?”  He asked me.

I raised an eyebrow. 
“Um… no?” 

“F
or the mic,” he grinned, as if I’d said something funny.  “I thought you’d done this before.”

“N
ever voluntarily,” I muttered, turning around so he could secure the lavalier to my bra strap.  His fingers were like ice cubes, and I felt myself shiver.

“Sorry about that,” he said, blowing on his fingers for warmth.  “It’s eighty degrees outside and they keep the airports air-conditioned at fifty-two.”

I smiled.  “Still better than New England—four inches of snow.”

“You can say that again.
  Ok, Casey, you’re all hooked up.”

“I don’t need to sign a release?”  I thought about the last time I’d agreed to be on Moving Neutral’s reality show, before meeting April for lunch.  I hadn’t had much time to look it over
— and I definitely hadn’t had any bargaining power to change anything — but I was starting to wonder exactly what it was I’d signed.

The guy looked at me strangely, almost like he felt guilty.  “No, um, the release you signed was
as a recurring character,” he said, suddenly fiddling with the mic receiver in his hands.  “I mean, you don’t have a production schedule or anything, but you said you’d be on the show when you’re with the characters.”

The characters?
I thought to myself.  Did he mean Sophie and Tanner?

Maybe I should have had my mom look over it after all.

“You ready?” I felt Tanner touch my shoulder.

I kept my voice to just above a whisper so it wouldn’t be caught by the mic.  “What were you going to do if I’d showed up in the trenchcoat?”

He chuckled.  “Rip off the mikes and find a janitorial closet, probably,” he winked at me.  “But I had it on good authority that Casey Snow wasn’t the public exhibitionist type.”

I shook my head, trying to decide if I was still angry or not. 

I’d already been in half the magazines in the airport.  Another few minutes on a reality show couldn’t hurt.  And, I admitted to myself, I was a little curious about what Tanner had planned.

“Ok, Casey, would you mind just going back up the stairs for a second?  We want to get you hugging Tanner, just like before.”

I looked at the guy warily.  What had just been a sweet, happy moment was suddenly going to be staged for television?

“I’ll hold your bag,” he said, slipping it off my shoulder and setting it next to his leg.  I threw Tanner a look, but he just shrugged.  Feeling like I’d lost this battle, I climbed back up the stairs.

And turned around, and trotted down again, with Tanner’s leather jacket to greet me.  A little less sure of myself this time, I let him lift me into the same exact hug, and thankfully, he cut out the part where he implied I was a fatty.

“How was your flight?” he asked, giving me a look that I couldn’t read.

“Oh, um, it was good,” I said lightly, unwrapping myself from his hug. 

“I can’t believe you even got a seat,” Tanner said.  “What airline isn’t totally booke
d on New Year’s Eve?”

“Virgin America, apparently,” I smiled.  “Actually, the flight was pretty empty—I had the whole row to myself.”

“Hang on—” Glasses cut in, walking briskly over to where we were standing, away from the cameras.  “Casey, I know you’re new to this, but we can’t use brand names when we’re on air, okay?  It dilutes the value for our advertisers, and we don’t have their consent.  Got it?”

I stole a glance at Tanner, who was doing his best to conceal a smile.  “Got it,” I smiled sweetly.

“Good, excellent.  Let’s try that again.”

Once the cameras were safely rolling again, Tanner looked over at me, a little glint in his eye.  “So, Snow.  How was the flight?”

“It was great,” I grinned back at him, actually having fun.  “They had those old-fashioned glass bottles of Coca Cola, I don’t think I’d ever seen those on a flight before.  But the guy in front of me kept kicking off his New Balances, and ew.  Stinky.”

That was a total lie, but this was actually kind of fun.

“Cut for a second—” Glasses called from over by the cameras.  “Casey, that counts for soft drinks and clothes too.  If it’s a brand, just don’t say it.”

“Right,” I nodded at him like I was trying, but a little slow on the uptake, and he seemed to buy it.  I gestured to the baggage carousel.  “That’s my suitcase over there, the Vera Bradley
—OOPS!”  I turned wide-eyed to the cameraman, acknowledging my mistake, and watched as he let out a heavy sigh. 

“It’s ok, guys.  Let’s just get going.”

Turning our backs to the cameras to walk over to the luggage area, Tanner and I exchanged a quick smile.

“Thanks,” I mouthed, and he ruffled my hair. 

My luggage was the first off the plane (a perk of the business class seat that Lauren had booked me), and Tanner grabbed my nearly-new suitcase off the carousel by himself, even though I could easily have carried it.

I looked down at the unscratched bag, which had only endured a couple of family vacations before I’d met Blake
.  Now, it was basically living a bicoastal life.

“Where are you staying?” Tanner asked me, rolling the suitcase behind him as we walked towards the exit doors, one of the cameram
an stumbling over a cord to get in front of us. 

“The Z Hotel,” I said, naming one of Lauren’s clients.  I didn’t mind if she got some publicity out of this, if they wanted to keep it in. 

Tanner’s convertible was parked out front, surrounded by orange cones.  As we walked outside, the camera crew stopped us for a moment while the airport staff quickly made a lap around the car, removing the cones.

“Red carpet treatment, huh?” I whispered. 

“The network had to get a permit on one-day notice to film this, once I found out you were coming in.  Each of those cones probably cost a thousand bucks.”

“You could have just sent Sophie to pick me up.”

“She’s in the studio.  Unless you would have preferred April?”

I wanted to slug Tanner in the arm, but I also didn’t want that move to be edited out of context on national TV.  I settled for very discretely stepping on his foot.

“Ow,” he said, nudging my hip with his side.  “We’ve got to work on how you always resort to violence, Snow.”

“Tanner, this is the second time you’ve ambushed me with a TV crew.  You deserve it.”

He gave me a sly smile, putting his hand on my back to cover my mic.  “Don’t worry, Snow,” he breathed into my ear.  “I’ll find a way to make it up to you.”

I opened my mouth to protest, and then glanced back at the cameras, snapping it shut.  Tanner
gave me a little wink, and opened the passenger door of his car for me to climb through.

Chapter Thirty-Four

During the twenty minute drive to my hotel, Tanner and I talked about every topic we could think of that was completely off limits for the show—Blake, current movies, Liv, Madison, any other people we knew who hadn’t signed releases.  Finally, just to throw the camera guys a bone, we spent thirty seconds discussing the weather.

Tanner pulled up at the hotel and
overtly checked his watch. As we all pulled up to the hotel entrance, he held it up to the other videographers.

“Hey guys, I think we’re off the clock
—it’s a few minutes past nine.”

I smiled gratefully at Tanner, who motioned for me to turn around, and deftly slipped his ha
nd up my back to unhook the mic.

“You’re a little too good at that
.”

“Practice makes perfect.”

“That many dates with reality stars?” I teased him.  “Not sure that’s something to brag about.”

“Models, actresses,” he shot
me another wink.  “Everybody’s got the same equipment.”

Tanner moved to pick up my carry-on, but I lifted it myself.

I thought there would be more finishing touches to wrap the shoot, but apparently the crew had everything they needed already.  Of course, thanks to me and Tanner, there was probably only one sentence about the L.A. weather that could actually make it on air.  I grinned.

A
bellhop had arrived to get my luggage out of the car, and a second later, a middle-aged man in a suit came out of the hotel and greeted me by name. 

“Miss Snow, I’ll show you to your room.”

When we got to the floor, I was half nervous and half relieved
—it was the same room that I’d stayed in over fall break, after Blake had broken my heart and I’d had to get out of his beach house and find somewhere else to pick up the pieces.  The room wasn’t the problem, but the memories were.

This time,
though, it hardly looked the same.  There were shopping bags on most of the chairs and some spilling onto the floors, a metal clothing rack in the center of the room lined with plastic garment bags.  Even the bathroom, which I could see partially through the doorway, was covered with beauty products on every surface. 

“Is someone planning a Black Friday sale in here?” I
squeaked.

Tanner laughed, squeezed my hand and pulled out his wallet to tip the concierge.  I watched them set my suitcase on a fold-out
stand and open it.

“Do you want me to unpack?” the concierge asked.

I looked around the room, barely able to constrain my laughter.  “Where would it go?”

“Oh, we could
—” he started, but I held up my hand.  I had a feeling I wouldn’t be wearing anything in my suitcase on this trip anyways.

“Just leave it there,” I said, smiling at him.  “And thank you.”

The concierge smiled at me, and then at Tanner.  “Thank you, Miss Snow.  And don’t hesitate to let me know if you need anything else while you’re here.  My card is on your nightstand, and I’m available day or night.”

He smiled again, and shut the door behind him.

The second the door was closed, I dissolved into giggles.

“Do you think he’s a
robot? Why would I need him in the middle of the night?”

“
Vampire, probably.  You’re going to go out for ice at two a.m., and he’s going to be standing in the hallway next to your door, sleeping with his eyes open.”

“Stop it, you’ll give me nightmares.”

“Then I’ll just have to stay the night.”

“Tanner
—” 

But he was already inches away from me, his fingers wrapping themselves around
my waist.  I looked up into his eyes, warm and brown and sparkling.

And then, for a second, I thought about
Blake.  About the blue eyes peering out from the poster in my bedroom, the way I’d first seen him.  About the guitar that was sitting in our doorway, waiting for me to come back.  I paused, hesitating for a second.

“What are you thinking?” Tanner asked, pulling me a little closer.  He smelled like vanilla and sandalwood, and the closeness of his chest was almost intoxicating.

Almost. 

I pulled my body back, putting some distance between us. 

“Nothing,” I murmured, pretending it was true.  I shoved the thought of Blake Parker out of my head, and met Tanner’s eyes with a bright smile.  “So, what do you guys have planned for us for New Year’s Eve?