Page 12 of Behind the Scenes

“Why?”

Paul shrugged. “It might be that she’s suspicious of men more than women. After her divorce, she didn’t trust men much anymore. Even with me, something changed, and I’m her manager. I always want the best for her, but she doesn’t trust like she used to. Unless you’re Lauren. They’ve known each other since they were kids growing up in Minnesota, so Lexi trusts her with her life. The rest of us? Not so much, and even less lately. I’m actually surprised she took my advice and moved here to New York. I would have put money on her fighting me tooth and nail.”

Hunter didn’t know what to say to him. He looked sad about Alexis not trusting him, but he couldn’t help him with that. All he could do was keep her safe and hopefully find out who was behind the threatening letters and gifts quickly so she could get back to living her life.

“I better get going. Do you need me for anything else?” Paul asked as he stood from the table.

“Nope. I’m going to start talking to her staff to see if I can get any ideas from what they might know. I have free reign here, right? I can’t do my job without it.”

A slight smile brightened up Paul’s face. “As far as I’m concerned, sure. I think I should warn you, though. Lexi was pretty offended by the way you were earlier. You should probably find a different way to deal with her.”

Just the suggestion that he’d have to kiss the diva’s ring or whatever she expected him to do rankled Hunter. Shaking his head, he tried to make Paul understand he wasn’t there to make his client feel good. He was there to protect her. Period.

“I’m not sure what you all think this is, but I’m not worried about if she likes me or not. I’ve got a job to do. That’s it. She doesn’t have to like me for me to do it.”

Paul’s face contorted in a wince. “Actually, she does. Let’s put it this way. She’s already told me if you’re like you were before one more time, she’s calling this all off. I don’t want to see her hurt, and I want you to get to the bottom of what’s going on here. All I’m asking is that you remember she’s feeling very vulnerable these days and running roughshod over her feelings isn’t going to help her stay safe. I know Lexi. She’ll rebel, and if she doesn’t simply kick you out, she’ll lash out in other ways.”

Hunter already hated this job, and now this guy was basically telling him he had to pamper some Hollywood diva to be able to do his job? Fuck. Persephone was going to owe him weeks of vacation time at this rate.

“Fine. I’ll try to stay as far away from her as possible, and when I do have to deal with her, I promise to be civil. How’s that?”

His offer brought a big smile back to Paul’s face. “She’s actually a great person. Give her a chance. You might find out you like her. But civil will probably be enough.”

As Paul walked into the kitchen, Hunter mumbled to himself, “Civil it is. That can’t be too hard.”

Before he had a chance to talk himself out of being civil to Alexis when all he wanted to do was his job, a woman appeared in front of him and sat down on the other side of the table. Pretty, with dark blonde hair and blue eyes, she paled in comparison to her employer. For what it was worth, though, she had a sweeter look to her that he liked at that moment.

“Mr. McKary, I’m Lauren Henderson. I’m Alexis’s personal assistant. I hope you’ll be able to solve this so whoever is torturing her will finally stop. She’s so giving to her fans. I can’t imagine who would do this to her.”

In her eyes, Hunter saw real concern and sadness over what had happened to her boss. “How long have you known Alexis?” he asked, curious if there could be even the hint of bad blood between the two women.

He had no reason to suspect Lauren of being behind the stalking, but as he always had since his first day on the job as a cop, he had to keep an open mind about everyone involved in the case. As far as he was concerned, any one of them could be guilty and everyone was still innocent.

With a big smile, she explained how long she’d been friends with Alexis Marchand, sounding almost like a fan herself. “We met the first day of school in first grade. I had just moved to Minnesota from Ohio, and I didn’t know a soul. Alexis walked right up to me before school and with a big smile said, ‘Hi, I’m Alexis!’ From that moment on, we’ve been thick as thieves.”

Hunter quickly did the math in his head and guessed Lauren and Alexis had been friends for nearly twenty years. If anyone knew the star, it was the woman in front of him. Sensing that, he wanted to get as much information about her as he could from Lauren.

“Have you always been her assistant once she began acting?” he asked.

“Even before that,” Lauren said, beaming with pride. “When she hit it big in modeling less than a year after she was discovered, she asked me to be her assistant. Of course, I said yes, so I put off college and I’ve been working with her ever since.”

“How was she discovered?” Hunter asked, suddenly curious about that part of Alexis Marchand’s history.

Lauren clapped her hands together in excitement, like she adored telling this story. “It’s almost unbelievable. She was at the mall and the owner of Ketton Modeling Agency had gotten lost driving to St. Paul. He ran into Alexis walking into the food court and knocked her tray of food out of her hands. The food and her soda crashed to the floor, and as he was apologizing for his clumsiness, he says he realized he’d just run into his next superstar. He gave her his card and told her to call him if she wanted to be a model. I remember she came to my house on her way home and asked me if she should do it. I told her of course she should. Just look at her. She’s a born model. She called him the next day, and as they say, the rest is history.”

“So she began to model in high school?”

“Yeah. And by the time we graduated, she was a star and I was her assistant.”

“You two have been together for a long time. Have you ever fought, or has it always been best friends between the two of you?”

He watched for any change in her expression, especially looking for a hint of any problem in the past as she said, “Just once. We were in seventh grade and both of us liked the same boy. He liked Alexis and they went out for a few weeks before it ended. The whole time, we didn’t talk, but I think she missed me as much as I missed her. After that, we made a pledge never to let a guy come between us again. We’ve never really fought since.”

“Never really?” Hunter asked, seizing on the way she phrased that.

Lauren looked around to make sure no one else was within earshot and said in a low voice, “Alexis is under tremendous pressure. You don’t know what it’s like to be a star like her. Everyone seems to put their needs on her. They expect her to be beautiful and charming and a great businesswoman at the same time. She’s expected to be perfect. If she says one wrong word, the press will jump on her like a pack of hyenas.”

“Is it really that bad?”

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