THE BLACK BODYGUARD VOL 1 CALIFORNIA GOTHIC Chapter 7

 

California Gothic Chapter 7

Chapter 7: The Long Hollywood Goodbye

The drive back to Los Angeles was a funeral procession and we both knew it.

I felt it in the way Lana curled against the passenger door, her knees pulled up, her face turned toward the window. Felt it in the silence that filled the car like water—not the comfortable silence of the drive up, but something heavier. Something that pressed.

We'd left Big Sur at noon. By three, the landscape had flattened, the magic had drained, and Lana had stopped pretending to sleep.

"It's not the same," she said quietly.

"What isn't?"

"The light. The air. Everything." She pressed her palm to the window. "It's like we crossed some invisible line and now we're back in the real world and the real world doesn't want us."

I glanced at her. "The real world doesn't know what it wants."

"Maybe." She didn't sound convinced.

We passed a billboard for her last album—her face, twenty feet high, staring down at the highway with those sad, knowing eyes. She didn't react. Didn't even look.

"I hate those," she said after we'd passed it.

"The billboards?"

"The person in them. That's not me. That's a character I play."

I thought about this. "You play her pretty convincingly."

"That's the problem." She finally looked at me. "I've been playing her so long I forgot there was a difference."

•••

Her team was waiting at the Chateau.

A woman named Paige—sharp suits, sharper glasses, clipboard welded to her hand—met us in the parking lot before I could even turn off the engine. Behind her, a small army of assistants hovered, clutching phones and schedules and the kind of desperate energy that came from working for someone who could fire you with a text.

"You're late," Paige said as Lana stepped out.

"I'm aware."

"The studio called. They need the vocal stems by Friday. Vogue wants to confirm the Met Gala fitting. And your mother has called four times."

Lana's expression didn't change. "Anything else?"

"Abel wants to see you. Something about a collaboration. He said you'd know what it means."

Something flickered in Lana's eyes—surprise, maybe, or wariness. Then it was gone. "Tell everyone I'll deal with it tomorrow."

"Lana—"

"Tomorrow, Paige." Her voice was soft but absolute. "I just drove six hours. I need a shower and approximately forty-eight hours of sleep."

Paige hesitated, then nodded. The assistants scattered. Lana walked toward the hotel without looking back.

I stood by the car, unsure what to do. Was I still working? Was I still... anything?

Lana stopped at the entrance. Turned. "You coming?"

I looked at her. At the hotel. At the life waiting inside it.

"Kevin." Her voice was different now—softer, private. "Please."

I went.

•••

The suite was exactly as I remembered—expensive, anonymous, decorated by someone who'd never spent a night there. Lana dropped her bag in the entryway and walked straight to the window, staring out at the city she'd spent the whole drive fleeing.

I stood in the doorway, watching her.

"You don't have to stand there like a bodyguard," she said without turning. "You're not on the clock."

"What am I, then?"

She turned. The light was behind her, making her face hard to read. "I don't know yet. But you're not on the clock."

I stepped inside. Let the door close behind me.

We stood there for a long moment, the city humming below us, the weight of everything unsaid filling the space between.

Then she crossed to me, took my face in her hands, and kissed me—slow and deep and desperate, like she was trying to memorize the shape of me.

"Stay," she whispered against my mouth. "Tonight. Just stay."

I stayed.

•••

The next two weeks were a carousel.

Lana's world spun in circles I couldn't follow—recording sessions that started at midnight, meetings that meant nothing but lasted hours, people who smiled with their teeth and plotted with their eyes. I tried to keep up, tried to find my place in it, but every time I thought I'd caught the rhythm, it changed.

She wanted me close but not too close. Wanted me visible but not seen. Wanted me to be hers but not to act like it.

"Baby," she'd say, pulling me into a closet at a party, kissing me breathless. Then, five minutes later, introducing me to someone as "my security, Kevin" with a smile that didn't quite meet her eyes.

I told myself it was complicated. Told myself she was protecting us both. Told myself a lot of things.

The nights were different.

In the dark, in her bed, she was someone else entirely—soft and vulnerable and desperately, achingly human. She'd curl against me and talk about her childhood, her father, the men who'd hurt her and the ones who'd pretended not to. She'd trace patterns on my chest and ask me questions no one had ever asked—about my brother, my stutter, the years I'd spent alone.

"I see you," she'd whisper, echoing my words from the beach. "I really see you."

And I believed her.

But mornings always came.

•••

The cracks started small.

A dinner at Craig's. Lana was supposed to be meeting a producer, but the producer brought friends, and the friends brought questions, and somewhere between the appetizers and the entree, I became a topic of conversation.

"So you're the bodyguard," a woman across the table said. She was beautiful in that sharp, expensive way—botox and ambition and something hungry behind her eyes. "Lana's told us so much about you."

"Has she?"

"She has." The woman's smile widened. "You're very... protective."

I said nothing. Lana's hand found my knee under the table, squeezed once.

"Darling," the woman continued, "you must tell me—is it true what they say? About the height?"

"What do they say?"

"That it's proportionate." She laughed, and her friends laughed with her, and Lana's hand tightened on my knee hard enough to hurt.

Afterward, in the car, Lana exploded.

"I'm sorry," she said for the tenth time. "I'm so sorry. She's awful. They're all awful. I shouldn't have—"

"It's fine."

"It's not fine. She was disgusting. They were all disgusting."

I kept my eyes on the road. "I've heard worse."

"That's not the point." Lana was crying now—angry tears, frustrated tears. "The point is I sat there and let them talk to you like that. The point is I didn't say anything. The point is—" She stopped, choked. "The point is I'm a coward."

I pulled over. Turned to her. "You're not a coward."

"I am. I'm a coward and I'm selfish and I'm using you and I hate myself for it."

I reached for her, but she pulled away.

"Don't," she said. "Don't be kind to me. Not right now."

We sat in the dark, the city humming around us. After a long moment, she spoke again, her voice small.

"Why do you stay?"

I thought about it. Really thought about it. "Because I see you," I said finally. "The real you. And she's worth staying for."

She looked at me then—really looked—and for a moment the mask was completely gone. She was just a girl, scared and sad and desperately lonely, and I loved her. I loved her, and that was the most terrifying thing I'd ever felt.

"I don't deserve you," she whispered.

"Maybe not." I smiled slightly. "But you've got me anyway."

She laughed—wet and broken and beautiful—and then she was in my arms, and we stayed like that until the city started waking up.

•••

But the cracks kept coming.

A week later, at a studio in the Valley, I overheard something I shouldn't have.

I'd stepped out for air—Lana was working on vocals, wouldn't need me for hours—and found myself in the parking lot, leaning against the Audi, watching the stars pretend to care about Los Angeles. Two men were smoking near a black SUV, their voices carrying in the still air.

"—heard she's difficult," one was saying. "The redhead. Del Rey."

"Difficult doesn't matter. Profitable matters." The other man laughed—a low, ugly sound. "And she's very profitable."

"Word is she's got a new friend. Big Black guy. Security."

"I heard. Doesn't matter. They all have friends. They all think someone's going to save them."

"And then?"

"And then they learn. Everyone learns eventually."

I stayed very still. The men finished their cigarettes, got in the SUV, drove away. I memorized the license plate, the shape of their faces, the way the shorter one walked with a limp. I told myself it was nothing. Told myself people talked shit in this town, that's just how it worked.

But I couldn't shake the feeling that I'd just glimpsed something I wasn't supposed to see.

•••

I mentioned it to Lana that night, carefully, without alarm.

She went very still. "What did they look like?"

"I don't know. Just guys. Suits. Expensive car."

"Did they see you?"

"No."

She was quiet for a long moment. Then she said, "There are people in this town who aren't what they seem. Who do things—" She stopped. Shook her head. "Just be careful, Kevin. Please."

"Lana—"

"I'm serious." She grabbed my arm, her grip surprisingly strong. "There are things I can't explain. Things I don't even fully understand. But there are people in this industry who treat artists like... like product. Like inventory. And if they think you're in the way—"

"Then what?"

She looked at me, and for the first time since I'd met her, I saw real fear in her eyes. "Then you disappear."

•••

The night of the Hollywood event, everything came apart.

It was a premiere—some movie I'd never heard of, starring people I'd never met. Lana had agreed to attend months ago, before Big Sur, before everything. Now she stood in front of the mirror in her suite, dressed in something black and backless and devastating, staring at her reflection like it belonged to someone else.

"I can't do this," she said.

"Sure you can."

"You don't understand." She wouldn't look at me. "Every time I walk one of these carpets, I feel like I'm selling a piece of myself. Like I'm handing over something I'll never get back."

I came up behind her. Didn't touch her, just stood close enough that she could feel me there. "Then don't."

She laughed bitterly. "It doesn't work like that."

"It works exactly like that. You're Lana Del Rey. You can do whatever you want."

She turned to me then, and her eyes were wet. "That's the thing. I don't know who that is anymore. Lana Del Rey. I don't know if she's me or I'm her or if there's even a difference."

I reached out, very slowly, and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Then be someone else tonight. Be Liz. The girl from the coffee shop. The one who drinks tea and watches the world through sunglasses."

"Liz doesn't exist."

"Sure she does. I met her. She was beautiful and sad and real." I smiled. "And she owed me a dance."

Lana stared at me for a long moment. Then, slowly, she smiled—that real smile, the one I loved.

"You're insane," she said.

"Probably."

"You know that, right?"

"I've been told."

She kissed me—quick, soft—and then she was laughing, and I was laughing, and for a moment the weight lifted and we were just two people in a hotel room, about to go to a party.

It didn't last.

•••

The carpet was chaos.

Flashbulbs exploding like artillery. Voices screaming her name, my name, any name that might get a reaction. People pressing against barriers, reaching for her, hungry and desperate and wrong.

I stayed close, one hand on the small of her back, scanning constantly. That was my job. That was always my job.

She handled it beautifully—posed, smiled, answered questions that meant nothing with answers that meant less. The mask was firmly in place, and from the outside she looked every inch the star.

But I felt her trembling.

Halfway down the carpet, I spotted them in the crowd—the believers from Nobu. The woman with the Polaroid. The man I'd punched. They were closer now, pressed against the barrier, their faces lit with the same terrible hunger.

"Lana," I murmured. "Keep moving."

She glanced where I was looking and went pale. "Oh God."

"Keep moving. Don't stop."

We kept moving. The believers followed along the barrier, calling her name, reaching for her. The woman was crying—real tears, or something that looked like them.

"You signed this for me!" she wailed, waving the Polaroid. "You looked at me! You saw me!"

I positioned myself between them and Lana, moving her toward the entrance. Almost there. Almost safe.

Then the man lunged.

He came over the barrier like something possessed, his face twisted, his hands reaching. I reacted on instinct—stepped into him, caught him, threw him back. The man crashed into the barrier, into the crowd, into chaos.

Screaming. Flashbulbs. Security swarming.

And in the middle of it all, Lana standing frozen, her eyes wide, her mask completely gone.

I grabbed her, pulled her inside, didn't stop until we were in a hallway far from the noise. She was shaking—really shaking, her breath coming in gasps.

"Hey," I said, taking her face in my hands. "Hey. Look at me. You're okay. You're safe."

"I can't—" She couldn't finish. Couldn't breathe.

"Breathe with me. In. Out. In. Out."

She tried. Failed. Tried again.

"In. Out. That's it. You're doing great."

Slowly, painfully, she came back. Her eyes focused on mine. Her breathing steadied.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"Nothing to be sorry for."

"I'm sorry for all of it. For this. For them. For asking you to be part of this mess."

I looked at her. At the woman I'd fallen for. At the life she couldn't escape.

"You're not a mess," I said. "You're just living in one."

She laughed—weak, broken, but real. "Same thing."

"No. It's not."

•••

We didn't stay for the movie.

Back at the Chateau, she curled against me on the couch, still in her dress, still shaking occasionally. I held her, said nothing, let the silence do what words couldn't.

After a long time, she spoke.

"I can't keep doing this."

"Okay."

"I mean it, Kevin. I can't. The fans, the press, the people who think they own me. I can't."

I waited.

She pulled back, looked at me. "Come away with me. For real this time. Not a weekend. Not a trip. Just... away. Somewhere no one knows us. Somewhere we can just be."

I looked at her. Thought about it. Really thought about it.

"What about your career?"

"I don't care about my career."

"Yes you do."

She started to protest, then stopped. Because we both knew it was true. She cared. She'd built her whole life around it. However much she hated it, it was who she was.

"I can't leave," she admitted quietly. "And you can't stay. Not like this."

"Lana—"

"Don't." She put a finger to my lips. "Don't lie to me. I see the way you look at them. At all of it. I see how much you hate it."

I couldn't deny it. I did hate it. The falseness, the hunger, the way it was slowly eating her alive.

"I love you," she said. "I think I've loved you since the coffee shop. Since you sat down like you had nowhere else to be and just... stayed."

"I love you too."

"Then why does that feel like goodbye?"

I didn't have an answer. We held each other as the night deepened, as the city blazed outside the window, as everything we'd built crumbled around us.

In the morning, she was gone.

Just a note on the pillow, written in her looping hand:

I'm sorry. I'm always sorry. That's the problem. — L

AtilA