One moment, one life time (A Taylor Lautner love story)

Chapter 11

That little omission surprised me. I turned my body so I could look at him. “What? You didn’t have to do that? Wait when did you do that?” Thinking back on the evening I couldn’t recall any time that he would have had his phone out to even send that message.

With the sweetest smile he said “When you went to the bathroom…And I know I didn’t have to. You had completely captivated me by that point and I knew some of the producer friends of mine would kick themselves if they didn’t get the chance to realize what opportunity was in front of them.”

“Those were some of the people that came by to say hi towards the end right? The friends of yours?”

Sarah broke in with “Wait…the producers from Summit? I thought I hadn’t seen them at the gala earlier in the evening. But what about the other two I got calls from?”

Taylor turned to her as I settled back into him. “I sent out a message to 6 of my producer friends. 4 of them are from different companies, Summit being one of them. Several people wrote back that they weren’t available last night to come to the gala but that they would look into the project. I hadn’t heard back so I assumed they were either not interested or had figured out how to get ahold of you themselves.”

Shamelessly Sarah said “Wow…being linked to you could be really good for my girl here.” She was kidding but it was really close to the difficult conversation that we had been having. Both Taylor and I took a deep breath. Sarah caught the reaction, which I knew she would, she was really good at reading people, and asked “There’s something you’re not telling me. What’s going on?”

Shaking my head I told her “There’s already rumors floating linking us together. Saying we’re shacked up together…Well not us but Taylor and a mystery woman.” I shoved at my cuticles absent mindedly like I always do when I’m irritated but trying to keep control of it.

Watching me, Sarah added “but you don’t want to be the mystery woman….Hmmm….well I will say from a publicist stand point the press from you two being together would be amazing for book sales and your brand in general.”

Her omission instantly made me extremely nervous.

Taylor pulled back quickly making me turn towards him “Wait…you don’t want to be the mystery woman?...What does she mean? That you don’t want to be with me or that you want them to know who you are? There was panic in his voice. That was exactly why I didn’t want him to know that.

Thanks a lot Sarah. Of course all she could say was “wow I opened a can of worms there. Sorry. I’m gonna see myself out so you two can talk. Let me know what’s going on Kaley.” And without either of us turning to her she just left closing the door behind her.

Once I heard the door close I closed my eyes, for a moment, to calm myself before proceeding. Even though I had had my eyes dropped to my lap since he finished talking I knew he was still staring at me. I looked up into his eyes that had so much worry in them. I placed one hand on his chest and spilled everything “Yes I want to be with you. Up until you told me there is a mystery woman linked to you, I didn’t want any part of the paparazzi that you have to deal with….” I saw his eyes soften up a little. “After that a part of me got jealous…of myself I know…I wanted them to know that I was the lucky one…” I dropped my eyes to my lap “I…I…wanted you to want to show me off I guess….Stupid I..”

Before I could get the rest of that out he gently grabbed both sides of my face in his palms and turned my face up so my eyes would meet his. “It’s not stupid” he whispered as he brushed a loose hair off my face. “And I’d be very proud to say you were my girlfriend…but I don’t think we’re there yet…are we?” He searched my eyes for a few moments more. “I have some really intense feelings for you and I can tell you have them for me too. But because of our schedules over the next month we won’t be spending much time together to see where things might go. I don’t want to let them know about you, have them chase you at every stop and have me not there to protect you. I don’t want the stress of that to destroy your feelings for me before I’ve even had a chance to develop them.” There were tears in my eyes now. How could he care so much for me already? “Please don’t cry baby” He said as he wiped the escaped tear from my cheek.

“I’m not gonna cry” I said probably more to myself for strength. “So is that why you’ve been so quiet today?”

“You caught that huh?...I guess I’m not as good of an actor as I thought I was...Ya I’ve been fighting with myself over what I want” My eyes must have gave away the drop in my heart because he continued with “let me be clear I’m not wrestling with whether or not I want to see you again. If you were here longer than just today I’d see you every moment I could. I’m wrestling with my want to show you off and my need to protect you. I want to show you off to everyone I know but I NEED to protect you.”

“You know I’m plenty old enough. I’m older than you even.”

“I know you are. But in this I’m more experienced than you.”

“Ok…so what are you planning on telling your agent?”

“I don’t know. I’m gonna tell him a lot of what I told you…about how I want to protect you until we have more time to be together. I can’t keep you from them forever if you and I are going to have any kind of a relationship but I don’t want to announce that we’re together without you being around me.”

“I know.” I said as strongly as I could.

We sat staring into each other’s eyes, reeling and raw from too many truths told too quickly. Up until his phone chimed in his pocket anyway. He broke to pull it out of his pocket. I saw that it was a text message from someone named Elliott. Noticing that I noticed he said “Elliott is my agent”

“Oh…”

“He says he’s available to meet me now. Are you gonna be ok if I leave for a while?”

“Ya. But I thought you were gonna go up to your room and leave from there?”

“I am. I’m gonna head up the back stairs the one flight to my room, get changed, then take the main elevator down to the lobby just like I would normally when I leave.” I had to take a deep breath at all the planning it takes just for me. He paused and waited for me. “When I get back I’ll call you and we can figure out what our plans for tonight are.” I nodded and he stood up to leave. Halfway to the door he turned around. “When do you leave tomorrow again?”

“Hold on.” I said as I sent a quick message to Sarah. Her response was almost instantaneous. “We leave right after check out at 11am.”

He let out a huge sigh and said “that’s sooner than I thought, ok…” And he turned around looking defeated and walked to the door.

“Wait” jumping up just as he put his hand on the door. He turned just in time to catch me, literally, as I jumped into his arms. I wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed him passionately. He caught me at the waist and lifted me up slightly, pulling me into the kiss. When we broke the kiss and he slowly lowered me to the ground I smiled and said “I just needed a good bye kiss.”

Taylor laughed and said “if that’s a good bye kiss, I should leave more often. I’ll see you later”

He turned and exited my room with one last smile as I was closing the door behind him.