Saint Scene

I recommend waiting until after you’ve read the book to read deleted scenes. It will help you better understand the characters and the dynamics of the story in the deleted scene. In addition to this deleted scene, there is a bonus scene included in the actual novel. Stop reading here if you haven’t read His Saint yet.

In an early draft of His Saint, I wanted to explain why Saint did what he did when he called out the pop star client in public. Normally a deleted scene means it didn’t necessarily happen. However, in this case, the Gemma scene did happen, but it now takes place off the page. I ultimately decided to take this scene out because it kept us from jumping into the story fast enough. Instead of seeing Saint with the asshole client, we needed to see him getting in trouble for his actions since that was the inciting incident that kicks off his part of the story. For Augie, it was the break-in. For Saint, it was getting benched for losing his cool. Hope you enjoy this peek behind the curtain of an author’s process!

Deleted scene from His Saint by Lucy Lennox

Saint:

After twenty hours on the clock and the fifth dance club visit of the night, I was out of energy and on my last leg. I’d been promised a day off since I’d worked eight straight days guarding the mega star Gemma on her most recent tour, but two other members of the security team had walked off the job the day before, leaving me to cover for them. The young pop singer was a user and abuser to the point I was actually questioning my career choice. My stint as a navy SEAL was well and truly far in the rearview mirror.

I’d never imagined wishing I was back there, but these nights with Gemma were worse than sitting in a wet combat rubber raiding craft waiting to swim ashore into territory rife with hostiles.

Four nights before, she’d kept everyone up until the wee hours of the morning with demands to play mini golf despite the place being closed in the middle of the night. Her assistant had actually roused an irate mini golf owner to come open up the course while claiming what great publicity it would be for his business.

Gemma thanked him by smashing the windmill and three plastic gnomes before throwing up in the final hole.

The following afternoon, she’d demanded malva pudding after having had it on a trip to Cape Town, South Africa several months before. Her assistant spent three hours on the phone trying to find someone to make it. Once she succeeded, and the malva pudding showed up at the hotel, Gemma declared it looked like poop and she wasn’t going to eat it.

What was worse? She hadn’t waited until the chef left to state her opinion.

Needless to say, my patience was already at a snapping point when she announced to the bartender at the club that she wanted to have the local ice cream shop open up at 4 am in order to serve her a single scoop of her favorite flavor.

The bartender frowned at her. “The woman who owns it has two little kids at home. She’s a single mom.”

Gemma rolled her eyes. When her words came out, there was a noticeable slur. It was no surprise to any of us since she’d been drinking and doing god knew what kind of drugs for hours by then. “Then she’ll be even more interested in taking my money, now, won’t she? Someone get her on the phone.”

While the bartender simply stared at her, I pulled her aside. “Gemma, you can’t wake a woman up out of a dead sleep because you’re in the mood for rocky road.”

She literally stomped her foot and stuck out her bottom lip in a pout.

“I want what I want when I want it. Do you think people say no when Taylor Swift wants something? Or Madonna? Or Justin Timberlake? C’mon, Saint. She’s gonna take one look at you and think it was all worth it. Hell, maybe you could offer to fuck her just to add some incentive.”

I stared at her, unsure if there was any way she could possibly be joking.

“Gemma—”

She cut me off. “Offer her however much money it takes, goddammit! I want it now.”

I saw her assistant scramble to open her phone to do her bidding as usual.

“Faye, don’t,” I pleaded, reaching out to cover her phone with my hand. “Think about this. The longer we stay out in public with her in this state, the more likely we are to get some bad press. Let’s just go back to the hotel and get some sleep. I’ll go out and get the ice cream for you as soon as they open in the morning.”

“Butt out, asshole,” Gemma slurred. “Ima get my ice cream fix tonight and that lady’s gonna give it to me even if she has to leave her brats home alone to do it. And there’s no such thing as bad press. I fucking love bad press.”

She reached for Faye’s phone and threw it at the bartender, thankfully missing him by a mile and landing on the bar several feet away. His eyes widened in surprise before shooting to me.

“Shit, sorry man,” I said. “We’re going to get out of here. I’m so sorry.”

I took a few steps down the bar to grab the phone. “Spoiled fucking brat needs a spanking,” I muttered under my breath.

Just as I turned to hand the phone back to Faye, I saw the bright light of a cell phone flash in my face.

Fuck.