13.Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen

Bonnie

Bonnie:

I should be done filming by seven tonight. You’re welcome to come to my trailer anytime after eight, if you’re still up for talking tonight.

Hank:

Do you think your bodyguard would let me take you somewhere?

Bonnie:

What kind of somewhere? Eli doesn’t really like to let me out of his sight.

Hank:

He can come if he needs to, as long as he gives us some space. I want to tell you everything, but it’s not going to be easy.

Bonnie:

We’ll have to take Eli, but I’ll make sure he keeps his distance. And no pressure to talk, Hank. Really. We can just hang out and get to know each other.

Hank:

I need to talk. If we’re going to be in a relationship, even if it’s fake, I need you to know the whole me.

Hank is quiet as Eli drives us down a dark, winding lane with nothing but trees on either side. Hank has barely said anything to me since showing up at my trailer fifteen minutes ago, and I’ve done my best to match him. I’m generally a talker, so it’s been killing me a bit. I’ll have to tell Freya that I managed to keep my mouth shut for more than two minutes, though I have a feeling she won’t easily believe me.

“Take a right up here,” Hank says, leaning forward to give Eli the quiet direction. “It’ll turn into a dirt road, but we don’t have to go far.”

When he sits back, he grabs hold of my hand, though he seems just as confused as I am when he looks down at our fingers. Eli knows this thing is fake, so we don’t need to pretend for anyone. Hank also looks terrified.

“If you’re bringing us out here to kill us,” I say, trying to lighten the mood, “you might find it more difficult than you anticipated.”

He chuckles. “I can take Eli, though I’m worried about you.”

Even Eli laughs, shaking his head as he navigates the dirt road.

“There’s a really nice meadow up here, and the skies should be clear tonight. We get a few more stars in Laketown than you do in Los Angeles. ”

“You’re taking me stargazing?” Why does my heart rate kick up at that thought? It’s not like I haven’t seen stars before. And I won’t let this turn into more than I bargained for with this relationship, so nothing is going to happen.

Then again, Hank is holding my hand when he doesn’t need to. Whatever he’s thinking, it’s edging dangerously close to the line we both said we wouldn’t cross.

Telling Eli to pull over on the side of the road, Hank looks at me in the light from the dash. “This was always one of my favorite places to go when I would visit Laketown,” he says quietly.

“So you haven’t always lived here?”

He shakes his head and slips out of the car. A moment later, he opens my door and offers his hand to help me out. “I’ve got some blankets in the back. There’s one for you too,” he tells Eli with a small smile.

I’m not sure if my bodyguard knows what to think about Hank, but he takes hold of one of the blankets, handing Hank the other.

Though we only walk a little ways into the dark clearing, we’re far enough away from Eli that I feel like we’re entirely alone. I genuinely don’t remember the last time I was alone with someone other than Derek or another of my friends, and normally I would start to get nervous. But something about Hank is so calming. So far, he has never made me feel like an obligation even though that’s exactly what I am, and I don’t have words for how much I appreciate that.

He lays out the blanket and sits first, gesturing for me to decide where I want to sit. I settle close enough to him that I won’t give him the impression that I’m avoiding him, but I still leave a little distance. I figure he’ll appreciate the space, given his private nature, and I’m not about to give him any reason to clam up. I’m desperate to hear what he has to say.

Leaning back on his hands, Hank lifts his eyes to the sky. I’m more interested in watching him, but I follow his example. Then I gasp .

“I’ve never seen this many stars before!” And while it’s not like I didn’t know there were a lot more stars than what we see in LA, I wasn’t prepared for seeing the sky like this in real life. “I always thought the movies exaggerated what it looks like,” I say reverently.

It’s too hard to keep my head tilted back like this, so I lay down on the blanket, sighing as an unfamiliar sense of peace washes over me. “I can see why this is your favorite spot.” I could lay here for hours and never get bored.

Settling beside me, Hank laces his fingers together and rests them on his chest. I’m weirdly disappointed that I can’t hold his hand because of it. “ Used to be my favorite spot,” he says.

I’ve been good at holding back my curiosity since this morning’s revelation, so I feel justified when a question bursts out of me. “Did your wife really get murdered?” Well, I felt justified until I hit that last word, and now I feel like a jerk. Clapping a hand over my mouth, I beg the universe to turn back time five seconds so I can try that again. “I’m sorry,” I say, since time manipulation isn’t a thing. “That was insensitive of me.”

Hank chuckles, which is about the farthest thing from what I expected after that hideous question of mine. “It’s not your fault. That’s what I told you. And…” He swallows, and though I can’t see much of his face in the moonlight, I can practically feel his tension. “Yes. She was murdered. Four years ago, when we lived in Denver.”

What’s a girl supposed to say to something like that? Probably not what I say. “By who?”

“I don’t know,” Hank replies. “It’s a cold case.”

I want to know everything . Maybe it’s morbid of me, considering this is a real person connected to someone I know, but I want to know all the details so I can know Hank. This is the kind of thing that sticks with a person.

He must feel my curiosity because he sighs and keeps talking, his words strained. “Shelby left for work on a regular Tuesday morning but never got to the gallery where she was a curator. She wasn’t found until late that night when someone called in a tip about a body in an alley several blocks away. Any leads the police had all led to dead ends, and eventually they gave up.”

I shouldn’t ask, but I do it anyway. “How did she die?” And when Hank doesn’t say anything, I reach over and steal one of his hands so I can hold it between both of mine.

“She was stabbed,” he says slowly, as if he found some strength in my hold. “According to the autopsy, she was probably pulled out of her car and tied up before they killed her; her car was abandoned a few miles from where she was found. The police think maybe it had something to do with an art piece at the gallery—maybe a ransom or something—but no one was ever contacted. Nothing was missing. They left her phone, purse, everything in the car. There was never any reason for anyone to…”

“Oh, Hank.” I squeeze his fingers as my eyes well up. I can’t imagine how hard it is to say all of this and relive something so awful. “That’s horrible.”

He swallows thickly. “Losing her broke me. I couldn’t stay in our house without being reminded of her, so I sold it and ran away from the life we’d built together. Cut myself off from our friends. Quit my job. Left the city that took her from me. I came to Laketown to sell our vacation home, but once I got here, I couldn’t bring myself to lose my last connection to her. We’d been coming here for years, to spend a long weekend or take a vacation away from the grind.”

His lungs fill slowly, his eyes still locked on the sky above us. A breeze rustles through the meadow grass, the only sound in the silent night, and it feels like something shifts in the air with that breeze. I’ve never been somewhere this quiet, and while a part of me wants to stay in this silence forever, I’m desperate for Hank to keep talking.

He does, his words growing quieter than before. “Shelby loved coming out here. She said it was the only place she could recharge, and she was always so alive here. Especially in this meadow. I’d never seen a person frolic until the day Shelby first discovered it, and sometimes it felt like she would spend hours dancing through the wildflowers. I haven’t been back here since she…”

For the first time since he started talking, he moves, his hand tightening around mine as he turns his head to look at me. “She’s the reason I wrote the first Frost book.”

“Oh!” My exclamation comes out way louder than it should have, and I wince. But it’s all falling into place now, and maybe I’m too excited given the heavy conversation, but I can’t help it. “You wanted to solve her murder!”

He nods. “I holed myself up for over a year in a house where everything reminded me of her, and I was in a dark place. I kept going over her case, combing it for any piece of evidence they might have missed, but there was nothing. I was losing my mind. So I wrote down how I wished it had happened, just to give myself something to hold on to. I never planned to turn it into a book, but then Gabrielle started speaking to me.”

“Gabrielle was inspired by Shelby, wasn’t she?” When Hank nods, I sit up, still holding on to his hand because I’m afraid he might fall apart if I let go. Lying down feels too intimate, but at the same time I want to stay close to him. “That’s why she feels so real. Because she is real! But you flipped the script so she wasn’t the victim anymore. And—oooooh.” It’s all coming together now. “ Frosted Peaks is about a young museum curator who accidentally walked in on an art heist and was stabbed, just like…”

I swallow my comparison to Shelby, wincing when I meet Hank’s sorrowful gaze. Oh . My stomach twists painfully as tears fill my eyes. What am I even saying? “I am so sorry, Hank.” That’s not really enough to convey how deeply I feel that, so I keep talking. “I have this problem where I get too caught up in the story of something and forget that it’s real life. I’m not trying to be insensitive, I just think it’s incredible that you gave yourself closure in your book by letting Gabrielle solve the murder. You’re sure it wasn’t her friend at the gallery like in the book? The one who wanted her job?”

Hank sits up too, his gaze now fixed on our hands. “No. Kelli—her coworker in real life—was almost as broken up by the whole thing as I was, and she isn’t an art thief like in the book. Nothing was ever stolen, and she wasn’t dating anyone so there’s no equivalent to Logan’s character either. I just needed a way to solve the murder that made sense so I could breathe again. And you’re not being insensitive. This is exactly why I wanted to tell you. I hoped you would understand why it took me so long to agree to this relationship and why I’ve been a terrible boyfriend so far.”

Guilt threads through me, thick and hot. “Hank. I should never have—”

“You didn’t know.” He quirks his lips up in a small smile. “Maybe if you had, you would have found a better person to play this role with you.”

I snort a laugh despite the gravity of this conversation. “Are you kidding? After that harness debacle, you’re being hailed a hero. I almost hope we get even more set disasters so you can keep coming to my rescue.”

“‘ Even more set disasters’?” The alarm in his voice sends a shiver through me, though that could also be from the crisp breeze that picks up around us again, this time strong enough to make the trees sway. “How many disasters have there been?”

More than is normal, though I probably won’t tell him that. Although, I do like the concern in his eyes. Even in the darkness I can tell he’s worried about me. “Oh, the harness has been the worst so far. And you were there for the tire exploding. It’s just been little things, like props going missing and Jonah getting stuck in his trailer a couple of times.”

Hank grips my hand tighter. “Is that normal? ”

Now that I know what Hank went through with his wife, I’m not about to stress him out. “There’s always something that goes wrong when filming, no matter what it is, and action movies like this one are more involved, so it stands to reason more things will happen. It’s kind of exciting, the way it all keeps you on your toes.”

“You and I have different definitions of exciting.”

“Says the man who walked across a cliff in the Alps.”

His smile is extra adorable after all that sadness. “Shelby was the adventurous one. Hank on his own is boring.”

“You are far from boring, Hank. And thank you. For trusting me with your pain. I know that can’t have been easy.”

Letting out a deep and weary sigh, he looks up at the stars again as if they might contain the answers to the universe, though I’m not sure either of us know how to read them if they do. “I’m tired of hiding from the world,” he says, his words heavy with truth. It reminds me of what he said to June when he was still deciding if he wanted to help me. I don’t know if I can call what I have living . “I’ve spent so long pretending that I don’t need to let anyone into my life, but then…”

“But then you met me,” I finish for him, fighting my grin. “Your crazy fan who inadvertently roped you into becoming one half of the country’s most popular couple.”

Though I can’t tell for sure, I’m pretty sure he rolls his eyes. “Then I met a woman who doesn’t bat an eye when talking about murder and somehow manages to make me want to leave my house and face a town who all know Shelby died but don’t know how. Laketown loved Shelby whenever we came to visit, and they’ve spent the last four years trying to get me to face the world, mostly so they can get answers from me, I’m sure. They don’t actually care about me outside of being the town’s most mysterious hermit. And yet you’ve still gotten me into town more than once. ”

I could be wrong, but I would guess this town likes Hank just as much as they liked his wife and want to see him happy again. How could they not adore him? I can understand why he would want to hide from all the pain, but even if I still have a lot to learn about this man, I already know he’s worth knowing. Laketown—and the world—would be better off with him a part of it.

“I hope you won’t resent me for this relationship that got thrust onto you, but I’m glad I got you out of the house, Hank. People need people, and you shouldn’t be alone.” Though I’m already holding his hand, I let go so I can offer him a handshake. “I know you already have June, but could I be your second official friend?”

He chuckles. “Technically you would be my fifth friend.”

“Oh?”

“My neighbor, Chad, was my first friend. Then Chad’s wife, Hope, followed by June. And there’s Heather, but she’s a new addition.”

“I haven’t met Heather.” And yet I’m already jealous of her.

Hank smiles. “She’s great. I think you would like her.” Then he takes my hand. “So if you’re okay with being my fifth official friend…”

“I’ll take anything you give me, Hank McAllister. You’re already my boyfriend, but I would love for you to be more than that.”

“We’re doing everything backwards, then?”

“No one ever said relationships have to happen a certain way. Besides, I like friendships way more than all that love stuff. That stuff gets messy, so I tend to avoid it.”

“Why?”

Well, there’s a million-dollar question. I would answer it if I could, but the night is getting colder, and I would imagine Eli is eager to get me back to the safety of my trailer. I would love to keep learning about Hank, but now that it seems he’s going to try to flip the switch, I should retreat. Unlike him, I don’t have any good reasons to avoid love other than general fear of what comes when it ends .

Lying back down, I shiver and glance at my phone. It’s barely nine o’clock, and I don’t want my time with Hank to end. I also don’t want to talk about myself.

“Do you know any of the constellations?” I ask, moving my eyes to the stars.

He takes a second to answer. I wonder what he’s thinking. “Some of them.”

“Will you teach me?”

For the next half an hour or so, Hank points out the constellations he knows and tells me their stories. I try to listen, particularly because he’s an excellent storyteller, but I can’t stop thinking about what happened to his wife and how hard that must have been on him. I’ve never lost anyone like that, but part of that is because I’ve never been close to anyone like that. The sympathetic heartache that I feel for this man is painful enough, and I’m glad I haven’t set myself up for that kind of pain.

Eventually, I sit up and let out a sigh. “I should probably get back before Trevor sends out a search party. I think he and my makeup artist are in cahoots and hate it when I don’t get enough sleep.”

Hank frowns as he gets to his feet and pulls me up next to him. “Do you always do what your makeup artist tells you to do?”

I laugh. “It’s not like she controls my every move.” That’s Trevor’s job, though I suppose he’s usually doing whatever Fran tells him to do. And if not Fran, my agent is the one telling me where to go and when, and the director decides which scenes we’re doing and how I should act them.

As Hank gathers up the blanket, I consider his question more seriously. I have to wonder if he wasn’t really asking about the makeup artist. When was the last time I made a choice for myself? Do I even want to make my own decisions? Historically, my choices have rarely turned out well for me, and I much prefer relying on the expertise of others. My life has been infinitely better that way .

“Bonnie?” Hank holds out his hand, the blanket tucked over his other arm. “You okay?”

Instead of taking his hand, I smile and tuck myself up against his side, hugging his arm as we walk back toward the car. “I’m processing a lot of things tonight.”

“Sorry.”

“No, I’m so glad you told me about Shelby. I feel like I understand you so much better now.”

“I know our relationship isn’t real,” Hank says, “but I’d like to think our friendship is. I thought it was time I trusted you.”

We meet Eli at the car and continue our silence as he drives us back to the production area. I’m not sure why Hank is quiet, but I’m worried he’s expecting more from me. He was incredibly vulnerable tonight, and I love that he trusts me. But he doesn’t have a public life. He can trust more easily than I can.

It’s not like I expect Hank to sell all my secrets to the press when it would only damage his own image and privacy. But that doesn’t mean I can share all my woes. I don’t have many woes to begin with, but sharing them would only lead to heartache when this all ends.

The more I give of myself, the fewer pieces I have to hold on to. If I’m not careful, soon there will be nothing left of me.

I’m not willing to risk that.