Bombshell (Hollywood A-List #1)(27)

He looked concerned for a second.

“Do you shave? Landing strip? I don’t care, but I want to get it right.”

I undid the top button and took the studs out of the front of his shirt. I had to kneel to get to the bottom buttons.

“Tell me,” he said.

I got to the last button. His head tilted down to me, and I looked up at him.

“Just tell me that.”

I reached for his cuff links, but he pulled his arm back and did it himself.

“My fantasy is about you.” He pointed to me. “If I don’t know this stuff, it’s about some random woman.”

He dropped the cuff links on the carpet.

“How I manage my hair depends on my mood,” I said, grabbing his cuffs. I pulled his wet shirt off and put it over the jacket. “I’m not attached to any one way of doing it. I really hope you forget this tomorrow.”

“I still have to memorize the third act,” he said. “I bet you taste like strawberries.”

I pushed him back, and he fell like a sack of potatoes, arms out, bare chest breathtaking in the moonlight. I wanted to put my hands on it. Claw at the skin. Feel the nipples get hard under my fingers. Talk filth until he got hard.

I got back on my knees and took his shoes off.

“Thank you for taking care of my daughter,” he said as I picked his legs up by the ankles and swung them around until he was straight on the bed.

Only a guy midblackout could go from subject to subject like that. It meant he was forgetting things as soon as they were happening.

“I talk during,” I said matter-of-factly as I put the blanket over him. “And dirty. And dick. And even though it’s inappropriate and against all the rules, I’d love for you to bury yours in me so hard it hurts. I dream about you f*cking me like an animal three nights a week, and the other four you f*ck me like you own me.” I patted the blanket.

“I’ll never work again,” he mumbled, half inside his drunken dream world. He couldn’t have been talking about burying his dick in me. “No one will want me if I don’t show up. Everything will be gone. All sad faces.”

“Good night.” He murmured a response. I kissed him on the forehead.

When I came back to put a glass of water and aspirin on the night table, he was passed out.





CHAPTER 20


CARA


I got up early and went to the gym. I ran, climbed, did sit-ups and a spin class, but nothing worked Brad’s words out of my mind.

He fantasized about me. That was the bottom line. I imagined his voice telling me what he wanted to do to me and replayed it over and over while I pedaled myself into a mass of sweat and burning muscles. On the screens above, DMZ flashed Brad on the red carpet with Nicole in his arms.

They were adorable, and Nicole hadn’t been out that late. Blakely wasn’t in the photos. I would have called the entire evening a success if he hadn’t shown up at my window in a wet tuxedo.

It was Blakely’s shift until after dinner. When I got back from the gym, Brad was working with Paula by the pool, doing whatever the thing was that they did. Nicole was underfoot with her toys; the space under the table was her own unique world. The ponies lay among Brad and Paula’s feet. Nicole made one of the ponies kick a ball, and it rolled out of the protection of the table. She went to get it. In the meantime, with the girl’s back turned and her father reciting a line, Paula lifted her leg and quietly crunched the Lego horse stable under her heel, dislodging the lilac plush pony that lived there. With a flick of her foot, she brushed it toward the wet drain on the other side of the table.

When Nicole got back she gasped in horror. She’d spent a ton of time on that stable.

“Hush,” her father said, oblivious.

Nicole had been well trained in hushing. From her days in the coffee shop cabinet, when her mother couldn’t get a sitter, she knew she had to stay quiet when a parent was working, so she did.

I stayed quiet too. For now.

When I got to the pool house, Blakely was curled up on the couch with an iPad. Her hair was cut short and dark brunette.

“Your hair,” I said.

“Like it? I look different, don’t I? Would you recognize me?”

“Yes. And Paula’s a bitch,” I said without preamble.

“You mean Miss Mint Julep Ladygirl Fiddle-dee-dee? Yeah. Screw her. Every time Brad wants his daughter around, she looks at me as if it’s my fault I have an hour off.”

“How was last night?” I asked.

“Boring. I was with her for an hour, then I stayed in the limo for the next two hours waiting for him to bring her back out.”

“Was she scared of the cameras?”

“A little. Not too bad.” She looked up at the clock. “I have to bring her to gymnastics at two. I’m testing the hair. See if the guy at the desk thinks I’m a stranger.”

We were interrupted by a knock on the front door.

“When you get back we’ll switch,” I said, opening the door. Brad was on the other side in aviators and a white T-shirt. The previous day came back in a flood of skin-tingling hormones. The shower, the fantasies, walking with his arm on my shoulder, me undressing him.

“I’m going to take Nicole,” he said without a greeting, then pointed to me. “You should come.”