Brock watched as Evie left the building, his heart throbbing inside of his chest. Evie Munroe. Rubbing a hand over his face, he shook his head. He wanted to go after her and…and what? Kiss her? Yeah. Talk to her? Hell yeah!
Promise her forever.
Brock froze and looked around, startled by the thought.
“You okay?” Monty asked, looking up from the schedule he’d been reviewing.
Was he? Brock wasn’t sure.
Monty glanced pointedly after Evie. “Do you need to go after her?”
Brock heard the gentleness in his tone and was shocked. “Why would I do that? We’re done filming for the day.” He looked around, pain stabbing through him as he watched the stage manager starting to disassemble the set. “Hell, we’ve finished the movie!”
“Yeah but…” Monty glanced over at the door, then at Brock again. “Sorry, Brock. I just…I had the feeling there was something going on between you and Evie.”
Brock’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t gossip about Evie,” he snarled.
Monty held up his hands and backed up a step. “Hey, no harm meant, boss,” he said with a nervous chuckle. “No one has said anything bad about Evie.”
Brock understood what Monty hadn’t said though. “Are they saying anything at all?”
“Other than the fact that you two make a cute couple?” He chuckled quietly, then stepped back at the renewed rage in Brock’s eyes. “Sorry, but…well, it’s pretty obvious that the two of you are a thing. I thought…I thought that you two were more than just a fling though. It looked like it was getting pretty serious.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Brock demanded, practically stomping into his “office” to gather up the rest of his papers. Someone else would be moving in tomorrow. They’d need the space and he’d be over in the editing room for the next several weeks.
“I don’t know, boss. Just...everyone thought that you two were together. You know? The secret looks, the sighs, and making such a point of arriving and departing at separate times.”
“Why would leaving or arriving at separate times make the rest of you think we were a couple?”
Monty eyed Brock with wide, uncertain eyes. “Well, at the beginning, we all knew that you two hated each other, but you’d also come and go together. It was as if you were trying to…I don’t know…one up each other?”
Brock sighed heavily, bracing his arms wide on the makeshift desk. “I don’t hate Evie.”
“I know, man. You love her, right?”
Love? Brock shoved away from the desk. Immediately, he remembered Evie the other day, her eyes straying to that cabinet. A long time ago she’d mentioned something about a fix, a crutch. But he’d watched her even more carefully after that. She hadn’t been on any sort of chemical assistance. Plus, she never drank alcohol. He’d been with her every night and, lately, every morning as well. She filled her water bottle up from the pitchers provided by the catering crew. There wasn’t time for her to have snuck in alcohol. She didn’t even drink wine at dinner. Only water.
Had he missed something? He should have peeked into that damned cabinet, but he’d wanted to trust her. He hadn’t wanted to sneak around and poke into her privacy. Not without evidence. Hell, he hadn’t even continued with the drug testing after the first few weeks. Every test had come back negative after they’d culled the initial drug users.
No, he hadn’t missed anything. Evie didn’t…well, whatever her crutch was, he couldn’t figure it out.
But love? Hell no! He didn’t love anyone! He wasn’t capable of love. His mother had taken care of that. When she’d…well, when she’d given up, he’d lost his ability to love.
Although, if anyone could heal that wound, it would be Evie. She was soft and gentle, caring and generous. She was…but he didn’t love her. He couldn’t love her! Just the thought brought back that horrible moment when he’d walked in on his mother, splayed out on the floor. No pulse. A syringe on the floor beside her hand. No color in her cheeks, which meant she’d been dead since he’d left for school that morning.
Love! He hated the word!
What he felt for Evie was…it was tenderness. Caring. Yes, that’s it. Brock cared for her. Caring wouldn’t leave him vulnerable, he thought. Caring meant that they could have a future together, but that neither would be hurt if they later decided to walk away, that things weren’t working out.
So, why the hell did the idea of Evie ever leaving him, walking out of his life, make him feel like punching the wall?
“Hell!” he muttered, then noticed that he was drawing attention; the crew was peering curiously at him. “Nothing,” Brock assured them and they went back to disassembling the set.
Evie. He needed to get to her. Talk to her.
But if he was angry, and all he wanted was to get to her, see her, touch her…feel her in his arms…what did that indicate about his feelings?
He grabbed his bag and hurried out of the room. When he moved across the set, not a single person dared to stop him.
Slamming through the door, Brock breathed in the fresh air, closing his eyes to keep himself from doing something stupid. Like admitting that he was madly in love with Evie.
He wasn’t. He couldn’t be! Damn it, love left a person vulnerable! It made a person hurt!
Even now, the thought of never seeing her again…he ached to hold her.
No! He wasn’t in love with Evie. Not a chance!
He tossed his briefcase into the back of his SUV and drove out of the parking lot. But he didn’t go home. Nor did he go to Evie’s house. He just drove. He needed to clear his head, to make sense of this insanity. And to remind himself that he didn’t “do” love.