Free Brainrush 04 - Everlast 01: Everlast by Richard Bard Page B

breathlessly, unbuckling his pants.
     “That’s almost six hours from now.”
    “Yesss,” she moaned as his mouth found her breasts.
    The doorbell rang, followed by raps on the door. They both
heard it but their bodies demanded that they ignore it. The knocks came again,
louder.
    Lacey’s body stiffened.
    “Go away!” Marshall shouted.
    Lacey placed a finger across his lips.
    “I-I’m so sorry, Lacey,” a young woman’s voice said from the
other side of the door.
    “Crap,” Marshall muttered, recognizing Penny’s voice. The
twenty-two-year-old was Lacey’s assistant and constant companion during
filming. They’d become the closest of friends over the past few years. His
shoulders sagged as he got out of bed, yanked on his pants, and opened the
door.
    Penny cringed when she saw him standing there bare chested
and disheveled. Words rushed out of her. “Oh, God. It’s not my fault. The
director called an emergency meeting and he wants her there.” She had a pained
expression on her freckled cherubic face, as if waiting for him to forgive her
for the embarrassing intrusion.
    “It’s okay,” he said with a sigh. “Come on in.”
    She hustled past him and beelined toward Lacey, who had
already slipped on a pair of jeans, a sweatshirt, and sneakers.
    “We’re supposed to be downstairs in two minutes,” Penny
said, zipping up Lacey’s bag. She extended the handle and rolled it toward the
door.
    Lacey threw her arms around her husband and kissed him hard
on the mouth. When they broke free, she whispered, “To be continued.”
    Then she and Penny whisked past him and hurried down the
hall, and the sight of her leaving made his heart ache. She offered him a pouty
lip and a wave before disappearing into the elevator with several others. The bustle
of activity outside the rooms hadn’t waned, as others grabbed their belongings
and headed out. He recognized most of them from the party, including the
champagne-serving waiter—now dressed in street clothes—who appeared to be
having a heated conversation with two other men as they hovered near the
stairwell exit. Marshall shook his head in resignation and moved back into the
room, finding little solace in the fact that he wasn’t the only one whose plans
went awry tonight.
    Thirty minutes later, the noise in the hallway had finally
dissipated, but the noise in his head hadn’t. He was amped up, and his attempt to
get some sleep had been in vain. So he got up and opened the closet safe to
retrieve his iPhone. That’s when he discovered that Lacey’s was there, too. In
her hurry to leave she’d forgotten it. It wasn’t uncommon since, unlike him,
she hated the concept of being at the beck and call of anybody who wanted to
ping her. However, with the current crisis she’d probably need it. He pulled out
both phones and powered them up, figuring he’d check her messages to see if he
needed to forward any to Penny. He lay back on the bed to wait for them to boot
up.
    The doorbell rang again.
    “Who is it?”
    “Room service, Mr. Erickson.”
    Marshall grinned. It was probably a surprise from Lace, a
consolation gift she must have asked Penny to order from the kitchen. Maybe his
favorite desert—lemon meringue pie.
    Make that my second favorite desert , he thought,
recalling how sexy she’d looked earlier.
    “Coming,” he said, rolling to his feet. He’d taken one step
when both phones rang with the “Danger Zone” ringtone.
    The doorbell rang again, only this time it sounded like an
alarm in his head.
    “Give me a minute,” he shouted, grabbing her phone and
running in a crouch toward the door. “I’m getting dressed.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    He took a quick glance through the peephole and saw the champagne
waiter, and any doubt of the danger he was in evaporated faster than data from
a demagnetized hard drive. He pulled up the message screen and confirmed the
worst. His heart rate tripled but his fingers didn’t hesitate as they pulled