Title: Right Behind You
Rating: M for later chapters
Summary: Rachel Berry is trying to make a name for herself as an actress in Hollywood, but someone is trying to ruin her life and make sure that doesn't happen. A private investigator named Quinn Fabray somehow becomes involved in the whole thing and gets more than she bargained for. But will she be able to help Rachel?
Warnings: There's definitely going to be sexual content in later chapters. I'll be sure to post any specific warnings that are needed for each individual chapter.
A/N: Hello everyone! I'm glad to say that I'm back. I'm a little nervous about this one because it's not like my other stories, but I wanted to do something different. The Faberry part won't have as much angst as my stories normally do. I still hope that you'll give a shot.
It's a typical Monday. After a long afternoon spent following yet another sleazy, cheating, lying husband around Los Angeles, Quinn Fabray is grateful to finally walk the steps up to her apartment. She unlocks the door with a sigh of relief and goes inside.
She takes her expensive camera out of its bag and places it on the kitchen table. "Britt?" she calls out for her best friend, roommate, and business partner. "I'm back."
The sound of fast footsteps can be heard as a tall blonde comes out of one of the bedrooms and hurries into the living room. "Hey, Quinn! How was it?"
"Exhausting," Quinn says as she drops down onto the couch.
"You were gone forever."
"Yeah, this guy made stops with his girlfriend all over town. But Mrs. Johnson's check cleared, and she said she'll reimburse me on gas. At least she'll get half of this jerk's money in the divorce once I send her the pictures."
Brittany nods with a sad smile and sits down at the desk she had placed in the living room. She calls it their workstation and insisted it stay there because "every real business has a desk". Quinn didn't even try arguing with her when she came home to find it in the middle of their apartment that day.
"I feel so bad for her. The mistress was younger and prettier, wasn't she?" Brittany asks.
Quinn knows this is the part of the job that the other blonde hates, witnessing firsthand just how terrible some people can be. It gets to Quinn sometimes too. But she's seen a lot worse during her time with the LAPD before this little venture with Brittany. "She looks like she's barely in college," she answers. "She's probably only after him for his money. He'll get what's coming to him."
Brittany smiles and nods in agreement. "You're right. Oh!" she says as she swipes up a piece of paper from the desk and holds it out. "I forgot. You have a message!"
Quinn smiles and gets up to walk over to her. "From who?"
Brittany shrugs. "Some guy. I think he forgot to say his name. But he called about an hour ago. He said he really needs your help because he heard you're good at what you do and that he has to know if his girlfriend is cheating on him."
Quinn sighs. Another one of those cases…
"If he wants to hire me, there's paperwork he need to fill out first," she says.
"I know. And that's what I said to him," Brittany says. "But then he started sounding really sad and desperate. He offered to pay three times our rate if you could go out and find her tonight. It has to be tonight, though."
Quinn frowns. "Why tonight?"
"He thinks that his girlfriend is meeting up with the other guy tonight."
Three times the rate? Quinn thinks. "He does sound desperate."
Brittany nods. "He sounded really sad and upset."
"Did he leave a number?"
"No. Just his girlfriend's name and address. He said he'll come by first thing in the morning."
"Did he say what time?"
"No." Brittany shakes her head. "But he's going to have a check for us."
"I don't know about this," Quinn says. "I would feel a lot better if he would just come by and talk to me now. It doesn't take that long to sign the papers. This is all too rushed."
"It does seem pretty weird," Brittany says in agreement. "Maybe he's just super busy today?"
"Maybe."
Quinn weighs out the pros and cons of actually going through with this. On one hand, it's completely against protocol, not to mention unethical for her to do this without even talking to the guy first.
But on the other hand, he's offering a lot more money than she usually charges. Her private investigating firm has been off to a slow start since she started it with Brittany only a few months ago, and she really could use all the money she can get.
"I'll just tell him we can't help him when he calls back," Brittany says, breaking Quinn out of her thoughts.
She shakes her head. "I'll do it."
Brittany frowns at her. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah. Besides, it'll give me something to do tonight." She walks to the kitchen and takes her camera from the table and puts it back into the bag. She's glad she remembered to fully charge it last night.
"Okay then," Brittany says hesitantly when Quinn comes back to the living room. "Here." She hands her the information the man gave her.
Quinn takes it and sees an address along with a name.
Rachel Berry
Quinn begins the drive and follows the directions on her GPS. After twenty minutes, she ends up at a really nice apartment complex in Beverly Hills. She's definitely no stranger to the area, so she's not at all surprised to find that it can only be accessed with a remote control at the gates. But lucky for her, she pulls up just as the car in front of her is going in, so she tailgates them inside.
When the voice on her GPS tells her she's there, she parks her car in an empty space and picks up the piece of paper to double-check the address. She then looks up through her windshield and sees the door to the apartment she's looking for on the first floor. It seems to have its own private garage, which is actually quite impressive. She wonders what this girl does for a living to score a place like this.
Quinn can find out all of that later. Right now, she has to be focused, so she turns the car off and rolls down the window, then sits back, and waits.
An hour later, Quinn is leaning her face against one arm propped against the rolled down window. She lets out a yawn as she continues to wait for someone to come out of that door. She knows that someone has to be there because there's a light on inside. They just need to come out already. It's quickly getting dark and she's getting restless.
She jumps when her phone suddenly starts ringing. She picks it up from the cup-holder and sees Brittany's name on the screen. She answers, "Hello?"
"He called back already," Brittany says.
Quinn sits up. "What did he say?"
"He left an email address to send the pictures to."
"Can you text it to me?"
"Uh huh! And he's going to come by first thing in the morning with a check. I made him pinky swear he would."
"He'd better be. I'm working overtime here," Quinn says with a chuckle. Her phone beeps and she looks at it to see that her battery is about to die. She chastises herself for always forgetting to bring a charger. "I have to go," she says. "But I'll see you later at home, okay?"
"How late are you going to be?"
Quinn glances at the door, which still hasn't opened, and sighs. "I guess we'll see."
"Okay. I'll send you the email address right now. Bye, Quinn!"
She hangs up the phone. Soon after, the text message from Brittany comes in. She grabs a pen and notepad from her bag and quickly scribbles the email address down. As soon as she finishes, her phone dies. She huffs and tosses it into her bag.
Her ears perk up when she hears voices and whips her head around to see the apartment door opening. She watches as two people come out, a man and a woman. The man is tall and pale with dark hair. Quinn notices that he seems to be a really sharp dresser, and his body language is particular. Most likely gay, she thinks. There's no way he can be the other man in the affair.
The woman, on the other hand, is much shorter than he is. She has long, dark hair with waves that cascade over her shoulders. Her eyes are big and dark, and wildly expressive. Even from a distance, it's clear that this girl is strikingly beautiful. Quinn has a feeling that this is Rachel Berry, but she has to be sure.
The pair walk out to the front of the garage and embrace in a friendly hug. The man then walks away to his car not too far away.
"Bye, Kurt!" the woman yells out.
"Bye, Rachel! I'll see you tomorrow!"
Quinn smiles when she receives confirmation that she's found her target.
Soon after her friend leaves, Rachel brings her phone up to her ear to make a call that Quinn can't hear because of how far she is. Rachel hangs up and reaches into her purse to fish out car keys. She pushes a remote on them and the garage door then opens to reveal a brand new white Prius. She then gets inside and starts the car.
Quinn smirks as she starts her own car.
Following Rachel is no challenge at all for her. It's not like it's easy to lose a spot-free, blindingly white Prius. She trails the woman about two cars behind, making sure to keep her distance. They end up driving for just over ten minutes when Rachel turns onto a residential street nearby.
When Rachel pulls into the driveway of a one-story house, Quinn continues past and parks her car down the street to avoid suspicion. She grabs her camera and hurries out of the car. Since it's nighttime, she doesn't have to worry too much about being seen.
As she approaches the house, she ducks behind the neighbor's tree. Rachel is just now getting out of her car, so Quinn quickly gets her camera ready and positions herself.
She zooms the lens in on Rachel as she rings the doorbell. She snaps a couple of pictures. The door opens soon after and Quinn sees a taller blonde woman that seems to be a little older than Quinn herself is. She takes more pictures. She continues taking them as Rachel and the woman meet in a heated kiss. Quinn's eyebrows shoot up, but she doesn't stop taking the pictures.
They quickly go inside and slam the door shut. Quinn swiftly moves out from behind the tree to see if she can get a view inside. The front window blinds are closed, so she rushes to the side of the house. She goes to a side window and looks inside to see she has a clear shot of the living room.
Rachel is sitting on the couch alone, but not for long. The blonde woman appears with two glasses of wine moments later and hands one to Rachel before sitting down directly next to her. The begin to have a conversation that Quinn can't hear. But judging by their body language and teasing smiles, it's clearly a light, flirty atmosphere.
She brings her camera up and takes a few more pictures. Several minutes pass and they begin kissing again. Quinn begins to feel a little bad for the boyfriend. Maybe Rachel was completely gay and not into him at all?
Oh well. That's for him to figure out. He wanted the truth, and Quinn got it for him. At least this blonde woman is hot, she thinks.
When Rachel and the mystery woman's make-out session becomes more intense as the seconds pass, Quinn puts the camera down and quickly turns away. She's gotten more than enough pictures for proof, so now it's time to leave. She may invade people's privacy for a living now, but she still knows when to call it a day.
She walks back to her car and gets in, but doesn't start it right away. Instead, she reaches into her bag and pulls a laptop out. She sighs in relief when she's able to connect to one of the nearby wi-fi routers and opens her email. She connects her camera to the laptop and loads all of the pictures she took of Rachel. She then types in the email address she wrote down earlier, and presses send.
She closes her laptop, feeling accomplished for tonight. She starts the car and begins the drive back home.
Quinn makes the drive back to her apartment and takes her time walking up the stairs to get to her door. She puts in her key to unlock it, but it's unexpectedly thrown open before she even has a chance to turn it.
"What's wrong, Britt?" she asks her roommate, who looks completely horrified.
"I called you like a million times!" Brittany shrieks.
"Hey, calm down." Quinn closes the door and puts a hand on her shoulder. "My phone died. What's going on?"
Brittany inhales slowly and, with wide eyes, says, "Okay, so don't freak out…"
It's too late for that. Quinn swallows. "What is it? You're scaring me."
"After you left, I got bored and googled Rachel Berry."
"Alright?"
"She's this up and coming actress."
"I've never heard of her," Quinn remarks. The news isn't exactly a shock with how nice that apartment was. Quinn really needs to start watching more TV and movies…
"Me neither! But I was reading some stuff about her in the news. She's dating this other actor, Blaine Anderson. You know him, right? The cute guy from the hospital show I always watch?"
"Sure." Quinn shakes her head, still not understanding her point. "So you're freaking out because Blaine Anderson hired us? It doesn't matter if he's a celebrity or not, as long as we use discretion just like everyone else. It's not like it's illegal and clients are clients." She's had this exact talk with Brittany many times before whenever the girl becomes paranoid that they'll get in trouble for spying on people.
"We're not going to jail and the government isn't going to abduct us," Quinn adds with a sigh.
"No!" Brittany shakes her. "That's not it! I'm not just being paranoid here."
"Then what is it?"
"That wasn't Blaine Anderson!"
Quinn feels her stomach drop as the words sink in. "Brittany, what are you talking about?"
"The man I talked to on the phone wasn't Blaine Anderson."
"How do you know that?"
"I watch his show all the time. I know his voice and that definitely wasn't him. This man's voice was really deep. It wasn't him."
"Are you sure, Britt?"
Brittany nods. "Positive."
Quinn sighs and walks over to the desk. "Is there any way you can give me the number he called from?"
"No." Brittany says cautiously, knowing Quinn is about to become even more upset. "It was blocked…"
"Fuck!" Quinn slams a fist down onto the desk. "Why didn't you tell me that earlier?"
"I don't know!"
Brittany was rapidly becoming more and more upset, not to mention scared. Quinn takes a deep breath to calm herself down. "Listen, this isn't your fault," she says. She knows it's mostly her own fault for going out and taking the pictures against her protocol in the first place. But she needs to be positive for both of their sakes right now. "It's going to be okay."
She takes a seat in the desk chair and rubs her temples. Brittany walks over and asks, "What do we do?"
Quinn thinks to herself for a minute. She's never been in this situation before. And it still doesn't make any sense to her. She voices her thoughts and says, "Why would someone want these pictures of Rachel Berry? It's not like she's a huge star or anything. We didn't even know who she was before today."
Brittany simply shrugs. "Maybe they wanted the pictures to hurt her? You know, for blackmail or something?"
Quinn refuses to think that's the case. "Then why couldn't they take the pictures themselves?" Again, she gets another shrug. "Maybe this isn't as big of a deal as we're making it to be," she says. "Maybe Blaine had someone call here on his behalf? It would make sense, right? He's this big actor, and he's always busy filming that TV show."
"Yeah." Brittany nods hesitantly. "Maybe. He wouldn't want people finding out he hired us because he's famous."
"Exactly," Quinn says. "I'm sure after today, we won't have to hear about this Rachel Berry girl ever again."
"I think you're probably right."
Quinn has a dreaded feeling that she couldn't be more wrong.
Quinn decides it's best to stay at the apartment herself for when Blaine Anderson comes by. She spends most of the time praying he'll show up any minute. But as the seconds quickly tick by, her anxiety only gets worse.
She tries to be calm and collected for Brittany, who was tapping pens on the desk at an annoyingly fast pace. Quinn decides to busy herself with reading into Rachel Berry.
She mutters to herself as she reads all of the information Brittany wrote down last night, "Twenty-five. Born in LA. Went to college in New York. Moved back to LA three years ago. Blacklisted on Broadway. Only has a handful of TV and film projects under her belt…"
"It's almost noon," Brittany announces.
Quinn sighs. "I know." She looks at the other blonde when she says, "We're going to have to report this."
"Do you want me to call Santana?"
Before Quinn can answer, there's a booming knock at the door.
"That must be him!" Brittany squeals.
"Come in," Quinn calls out without any second thoughts or hesitation.
Any feeling of relief she momentarily has disappears as soon as the door is thrown open and a very pissed off Rachel Berry storms inside, and right behind her are two men.
Quinn gets up with wide eyes. "Can I help—"
"Quinn Fabray," Rachel snaps as she stops between Quinn and Brittany. "Which one of you is Quinn Fabray?"
Brittany is quick to point at the other blonde while sinking down in her chair, causing Quinn to roll her eyes. "I'm Quinn. You must be Ms. Berry."
"You!" Rachel points a finger before attempting to stomp over to her, but is held back by one of the men.
"Come on, Rachel, that's enough. The last thing you need is an assault charge," he says as he struggles to pull her back.
The man has curly hair and seems to be older than her. Quinn doesn't recognize him. She does, however, recognize the other man as the one at Rachel's apartment the night before. He hasn't said a word yet as he watches Rachel being restrained with a disapproving shake of his head.
Quinn holds her hands up. "Look, I think I know why you're here."
The older man finally releases Rachel and looks Quinn right in the eye. "You'd better start explaining."
He's just as mad as Rachel, Quinn can tell, but he seems to be better at handling himself. But before she can start answering him, she has to know who the hell he is. "Are you guys her lawyers or something?" she asks.
"Kurt Hummel, Rachel's personal assistant," the other man finally steps forward. He doesn't seem angry at all, just annoyed to be there.
"Will Schuester, Ms. Berry's manager," the curly-haired man says.
Quinn nods before looking at Rachel, who looks like she's about to burst from keeping her mouth clamped shut like her manager told her to do. There's still a murderous glare in her eyes, so Quinn takes a step back. "Ms. Berry, I know you're upset, but it seems there's been a misunderstanding."
"You have some nerve!" Rachel explodes. "What the hell did I ever do to you?"
"Nothing!" Quinn squeaks.
"Then why did you take private pictures of me—"
"It's part of my job."
"—and send them to every online gossip site in existence?"
Quinn frowns. "I'm sorry?"
"Why are you trying to out me?" Rachel screams.
"Look, I don't know what the hell you're talking about. I didn't send anything to any gossip sites!"
"For the love of God," Kurt speaks up. "We're not getting anywhere here," he says with a huff as he takes his phone out of his pocket. He swipes at the screen before holding it up to show Quinn.
She sees a TMZ headline that reads, 'Former Broadway Star and Hollywood Newcomer Rachel Berry… Batting for the Other Team?'. Underneath the headline is one of the pictures Quinn took the night before. She's horrified to see that under that reads a caption that says, 'Photographs courtesy of Quinn Fabray'.
"Explain," Will says.
"I didn't do this!" she yells.
"You didn't take the pictures?" he asks.
"No! I mean yes! But someone hired me to do it! I had no idea he was going to do this."
"Who?" Rachel and Kurt both ask at the same time.
"I don't know," Quinn says desperately.
"How can you not know?" Rachel takes a step towards her, only to be stopped by Will's hand on her shoulder. She pushes it off.
"Someone called here and said that he was your boyfriend. We just assumed it was Blaine Anderson. He said he was worried that you were cheating on him."
"Except it wasn't Blaine," Brittany pipes up. Quinn throws a sharp glare at her.
"So you just took some stranger's word for it and stalked me for pictures to give to him?" Rachel screams even louder.
"And how do you know it wasn't really him? You are cheating on him, after all," Quinn points out.
It's Rachel's turn to roll her eyes. "We're not really dating, you idiot. Blaine is gay."
"Rachel!" Will hisses.
Quinn's mouth opens, then closes. It does this several times before words are finally able to come out. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean for any of this to happen."
"That doesn't help me at all right now!" Rachel screeches.
Kurt pulls her to the side. "Rachel, calm down. We've already had enough panic attacks today." Rachel nods and squeezes her eyes shut as she breathes deeply through her nose.
Will moves right in front of Quinn and lowers his voice. "You'd better pray that Ms. Berry doesn't decide to press charges against you. We could have your firm shut down, and I can personally see to it that you never find work again," he says in a menacing tone.
Quinn swallows at the thought, then quickly shakes her head. "Do you have any idea who would do this?" she asks Rachel. "I mean, it's not like you're super famous or anything." She quickly backtracks with, "No offense."
"I think what Quinn is trying to say," Brittany says in an attempt to help her friend out, "is why would someone do this to you when they could go after people that are even more famous? Like Brad Pitt or Katniss?" She glances at Quinn before nodding to herself in approval of the wording.
Rachel's eyes widen. "Because it's personal." She turns to Kurt and quickly says, "Do you think maybe it's them?"
She's met with a sigh from both Kurt and Will. Quinn frowns. "Who?"
"No one," Will interjects.
"She has this conspiracy theory that someone has been trying to ruin her career for a while now," Kurt explains.
"It's true! And this," Rachel taps his phone, "proves it."
"You've been saying this for years, Rachel. And you're just overreacting again. No one is out to ruin your life. This is probably just the work of some jerk who was bored and decided to mess with you."
Quinn looks back and forth between the two, still confused. She then looks at Will, who's pinching the bridge of his nose, and then Brittany, who just shrugs at her. "Okay, what exactly are you talking about?" Quinn asks Rachel.
"Nothing!" Will says.
Rachel ignores him. "Someone has been out to get me. They've been stalking me ever since college."
That's weird, Quinn thinks. She voices her next question, "Did you ever report it?"
"Of course I did!"
Will's phone suddenly starts ringing. He looks at Rachel then quickly goes outside to answer it.
"Do I have to remind you that the police never found any real evidence of that?" Kurt says.
Rachel huffs at him before looking at Quinn. "I have a sixth sense. I just know I'm right about this."
"Right," Quinn says. She honestly doesn't care. She's still reeling on the question of whether or not she's going to be getting sued out the ass, which Rachel still hasn't said anything about.
Will comes back into the apartment. "I have PR working overtime to fix this mess." He points a finger at Rachel and says, "Remember, you were just coming back from a club with some girlfriends, and had too much to drink. Girls do it all the time."
Rachel nods sadly. "Let's go," she says. She gives Quinn one last glare before storming out of the apartment with Kurt hot on her heels.
"We might be seeing each other again soon," Will says to her before leaving.
As soon as the door shuts, Quinn and Brittany silently look at each other as if to say, "Did all of that really just happen?"
Quinn sits on the couch and drops her face into her hands. "Fuck!" she yells.
"That was crazy," Brittany says, like she's just experienced the greatest rush of her life.
"What should I do?" Quinn cries.
"I would start by locking your bedroom door at night, because it looks like that Rachel girl wants to kill you."
Quinn groans. "Not helping." She runs a hand through her hair. "They're going to sue me and everything is going to be ruined."
"You don't know if they're going to for sure," Brittany says.
"You heard what that curly-haired fuckboy said!"
"But it's still up to Rachel," Brittany points out. "You just need to get on her good side. Then when she sees how awesome and not terrible you are, she won't sue you."
"And how am I supposed to do that?"
Brittany shrugs. "You're smart. You'll figure this out. You always do."
Quinn sighs. She gets up and grabs her bag and keys.
"Where are you going?"
"I need to be alone," she says. She opens the door, but stops to look back at her roommate, who tends to worry about her. "I'll be back later."
She drives all over town, yet ends up not really going anywhere in particular until she arrives back at her apartment. She's been gone for hours, and it's well past dark.
"Dammit," she mutters when she sees Santana's car. She sighs and kills the engine before getting out of the car.
She quietly enters the apartment and looks around when she hears voices coming from Brittany's room. Her and Santana have never been able to stand each other, and Brittany more than likely filled her girlfriend in on the events of the day. Quinn really isn't in the mood to fight tonight, so she silently sneaks into her own room.
She sits on the bed and grabs her laptop from the night stand and begins reading more about Rachel. She doesn't know why, but the brunette has her curious.
A lot of it is what she was reading earlier, and now there's the pictures Quinn took plastered everywhere. She blows out a puff of air. This is really bad, she thinks. She has no idea how she can fix this.
She skips over those articles to read some older news stories. It doesn't take long for her to see that Rachel has quite a reputation for being a diva.
There's some interviews that Quinn reads. Some are a few years old from Rachel's Broadway days. Some are newer. She pauses when she comes across a question asking Rachel what it's like going from Broadway to Hollywood.
Rachel says in the article that she's just grateful to have this chance to start over after everything she's been through. She says she's sad that Broadway didn't work out for her, but she was born to act and she wasn't going to let anything stop her. She's going to keep trying.
Quinn feels a weight on her chest because she knows what it's like to nearly lose a lifelong dream. On some strange level, she understands Rachel. And with the guilt weighing down on her, she knows she has to make this up to her.
She comes up with only one option. Before she can change her mind, she gets up and grabs her keys.
After the disaster that was today, Rachel had decided to unwind at the end of the night with a relaxing bath and some wine.
When she gets out of the tub, she wraps herself up in a bath robe and heads to the kitchen. She grabs one of the wine bottles off the rack, but pauses when she's suddenly reminded of the previous night as well as the events that followed.
She scowls before shoving the bottle back and goes to the living room instead. She turns on the TV and pulls up Funny Girl from her movie library and presses play.
She manages to make it about twenty minutes into the movie before her phone starts ringing next to her. She groans. She specifically told everyone not to bother her for the rest of the night.
She picks it up and sighs when she sees that it's Cassandra July calling for the millionth time. She can't ignore her forever, so she answers this time. "Hello?"
"I've been trying to call you all day," Cassandra says angrily.
"Well I'm sorry if I wasn't exactly in the mood to talk," Rachel replies sarcastically.
"You know, this is so typical of you. You have to make everything about you. Newsflash, Rachel, it isn't just your face in all of those pictures!"
"I don't know what you want me to say! You're acting like this is all my fault."
"You can at least say you're sorry this happened to me," the other woman says. "I knew I shouldn't have gotten involved with you. You're nothing but drama, and it follows you everywhere."
The last comment particularly stings. Rachel seethes. As calmly as she can, she says, "My people are taking care of it, so you don't have to worry. You can wake up tomorrow and go back to your life like nothing ever happened."
"Rachel—"
"Everything will go back to normal," she repeats. "Also, don't call me ever again." She hangs the phone up and tosses it to the side.
No longer in the mood for the movie, she turns the TV off and grabs the script that's been sitting on her coffee table all day. She thinks it can't hurt to go through the lines a few more times before shooting tomorrow's episode. After she wrapped her part on Blaine's show, she landed another guest role on a high school drama with a guaranteed five episodes in her contract.
She has several auditions lined up for other shows and movies, but they're all still small roles. Maybe this isn't where she envisioned herself being in her career at this point in her life, but she's not going to give up.
Rachel huffs when the doorbell rings. "Can I just have some time to myself?" she vents to no one as she tosses the script down and gets up from the couch and makes her way to the door.
She opens it to see one of the blonde imbeciles that she met earlier. This one was Quinn Fabray herself, if she recalls correctly. Rachel's breath hitches in surprise.
"Ms. Berry," Quinn starts, "I—" is all she gets out before the door slams in her face.
Quinn sighs. She rings the doorbell again, even though it won't do any good. "Rachel?" she calls out. "I swear I'm not up to anything. Can you please just hear me out?"
Rachel crosses her arms as she silently weighs her options. She can just call the cops and easily have this woman taken away. But if the police show up, her nosy neighbors will no doubt gossip about it. And the last thing she needs is tomorrow's tabloids saying there were police at her apartment.
"Rachel?" Quinn calls out again.
And her neighbors will definitely come out if Quinn keeps shouting like this. She opens the door. "If you have a camera or any recording device on you, I'm calling the police," she says sternly.
Quinn holds her hand up. "I don't!"
"What do you want?"
"I just want to talk."
Rachel narrows her eyes and stares at her for a moment before walking away, leaving the door open. "This better be quick. I have to be on set early in the morning."
Quinn can't believe she's actually letting her in. She hurries inside and closes the door. She quickly follows Rachel down the hallway into a large living room, checking out how nice the rest of the apartment is along the way.
"Sit," Rachel demands as she points to a couch. Quinn could probably laugh if she wasn't so nervous.
Rachel sits down across from her and says, "Hand your phone over to me, please."
Quinn does an eye roll and takes her phone out of her pocket and does as she's told. When Rachel places it face-down next to her, she says, "Happy?"
"For now," Rachel replies. "Again, what do you want?"
Quinn leans forward and recites the speech she's been preparing. "Look, I'm really sorry for everything that's happened. Had I known what was going to happen with those pictures, I never would have taken them. I'm mainly hired to expose cheating husbands and wives, and I should've used better judgment before I followed you."
Rachel sighs. "If that's all you have to say, then I really need to get to—"
"I want to help," Quinn blurts out.
Rachel pauses. "What?"
"You're convinced that someone is after you, right? That's what you said."
Nodding skeptically, Rachel says, "Someone is out to ruin me, yes. The police have never been able to do anything about it because the incidents seemed isolated. No one believes me when I say it's the same person."
Quinn wants to know more about these incidents, but that can wait for later. She considers the idea that Rachel is just being overdramatic about the whole thing, but she doesn't care. Because right now, she needs to get on Rachel's good side, and worry about the rest later.
Just get on her good side, like Brittany said. Even if that means playing along with whatever crazy conspiracy theories this drama queen has come up with. So be it.
Rachel clears her throat. "So when you say you want to help…"
"I want to offer my services free of charge."
"You do?" Rachel says with a frown. Quinn nods. "Why should I let you? You're clearly not the best investigator."
Quinn rolls her eyes. "Last night was a fluke. I'm one of the best in all of Los Angeles, trust me."
"And why should I trust you? After you violated my privacy and—"
"I'm a better person than you think," Quinn interrupts. "What I do is nothing personal on my part. And again, I'm sorry that you got caught up in all of it. But if you just give me a chance, I'll prove myself. If you give me any information you have, I swear I'll find whomever it is you're looking for."
Rachel is quiet as she ponders Quinn's proposal. After a few minutes pass by, she finally says, "Fine, we have a deal."
Quinn smiles. But before she can say anything else, Rachel continues. "I still don't trust you. At all. So I'm coming by tomorrow with a nondisclosure agreement. Then we'll talk."
"That's great," Quinn says. She stands up from the couch, eager to get out of there. "I guess I'll see you tomorrow."
As she turns to leave, Rachel says, "If you screw up again, I won't be so forgiving."
Quinn blinks at her, then nods, and walks away.
A/N: Like I said, it's just something different that I wanted to try. Thank you for reading! Be sure to let me know what you think :)