Page 73 of Caught in a Storm

“The older I get, Mar, the younger they have to get. That’s strategy. I get to look like the sort of man who goes to bed with a girl like Willa Knight, and Willa gets to jump the queue and become a household name.”

This feeling is new, so it takes a beat for Margot to process it. For obvious reasons, she’s repulsed by every word that has come out of Lawson’s mouth in the last thirty seconds. She’s relieved, though, too, and she knows it. Judging herself harshly against a beautiful twenty-six-year-old has taken more of a toll than she’d like to admit. There have been others, of course, a long, busty line of them, working backwards chronologically all the way to Nikki. But at least she can take Willa off that list.

“Does she know the truth about this little arrangement?” Margot asks. “Willa?”

Lawson looks into his tea. “Willa will be fine,” he says. “She’s talking to bloody Marvel next week. You think that would happen if she was still dating that idiotic TV actor?”

Margot doesn’t even know who he’s talking about, but the whiplash of now sympathizing with the wealthy model-turned-actress she used to hate by default is jarring.

“Can we take a walk or something?” he asks. “This place. It’s very…I don’t even know what the word is. Suburban? Or, no, normal. It’s very normal, isn’t it? We’re not normal, Mar. You and me. Certainly not you. Frankly, this place is freaking me out.”

Goddamn this son of a bitch, she thinks, because he can just come here and start digging around in her head.

Lawson grabs his jacket. “Come on, love. Let’s get out of here.”

* * *

—

When they step out the front door, Margot finds Billy, Robyn, Aaron, and Caleb sitting at the firepit at the side of the house. Billy is next to Robyn, and Caleb is next to her, like the busted-up little family that they are. When Billy sees Margot with Lawson, his eyes turn stricken. “Oh, hey,” he says. “Are you…leaving?”

“We’re going for a quick walk,” she says. “To talk.”

“That’s bollocks!” says Lawson. “Don’t believe that, mate! I’ve swept her off her feet again, and we’re running away together. It was nice meeting you all. Cheers!”

“Um,” says Billy. “Okay. I’ll be here.”

Margot and Lawson walk up the driveway. “Was that necessary?” she asks.

He leans into her gently. “Ah, lighten up, Margie. Bit of fun.” Then he takes off his jacket and drops it over her shoulders. “You’re chilly, love. I gotcha.”

It’s as heavy as a weighted blanket, and it smells like leather and…Lawson. He’s been tweaked, tightened, straightened. There’s more of him in some places, like his chest and arms. But in his waist and cheeks, there’s less. This, though, Lawson’s smell, is the same, and it enters her nose and works quickly through her nervous system like a party drug.

Shit, she thinks.

“Now that we’ve escaped,” he says, “who the hell are those people?”

She tugs his jacket tighter. “Robyn is Billy’s ex. The tall one, Caleb, is Robyn and Billy’s son. The guy with the hair, Aaron, is Robyn’s husband. Billy and I are staying in Robyn and Aaron’s guest apartment because Caleb wants us to.”

“Right-o” is all he says. One of the advantages of having a conversation with someone whose life is like make-believe is that nothing you tell him comes off as particularly strange.

A block of silent walking later, he asks if there are any bars around. “Turns out I could go for another drink after all. What do you say?”

“No. We’d be all over the Internet in five minutes.”

“Little late for that,” he says. “Between the airport and my little jaunt downtown, I’d say half of Baltimore has a shot of me on their iPhone.”

“Fabulous,” she says.

“Oh stop. Mar, you know you love it.”

“Love what?”

“This, all of it. Mattering once more.”

She laughs—again, unable to help it. “You really think any of this matters?”

“Bloody right I do. And so do you, love.”