Just the Sexiest Man Alive(31)

“So you approve of my selection?”

“I doubt there’s anyone who wouldn’t,” Taylor quipped. She was hardly about to give him the satisfaction of knowing that he’d somehow managed to pick the one label she’d been wanting to try since getting her first issue of Wine Spectator.

“But your approval is harder to earn and therefore worth more than the others,” Jason returned.

Taylor couldn’t help but smile at that. “Yes, I approve,” she said. “At seven hundred dollars a bottle, I’d better.” She was about to say something else, but decided to bite her tongue.

“Go ahead.” Jason laughed. “I can tell there’s more.”

Taylor grinned. He thought he knew her so well. “I was just thinking that you really do lead a charmed life.”

“Ahhh . . . good, we get it out in the open. My fame and fortune.” Jason leaned in toward her. “Look—I’ll save you the bullshit speech about how I don’t like it, about the lack of privacy, all that. But there are some trade-offs.” He shrugged. “I guess I’ve just accepted those things as part of the package.”

“Trade-offs beyond the lack of privacy?”

Jason waved this off. “That doesn’t bother me as much as it used to.”

“Then what?”

He thought about this. When he finally answered, Taylor thought she heard something in his voice. Something . . . genuine.

“People think they know you because the magazines portray you a certain way, or because you’ve played a particular part in a movie. And most of the people who supposedly are close to you don’t care about who you really are anyway, because to them you’re just a product, a commodity to sell. So it’s not real. None of it’s real.”

He glanced over at Taylor cautiously, as if expecting her to laugh. She didn’t.

“Jeremy seems real,” she said in a gentler voice than usual.

This made Jason smile. “Jeremy and I have been friends a long time. He is as real as they get. Also cocky, condescending, and sarcastic—”

“How do you two ever get along?”

Jason grinned at her sarcasm. He eased back, swirling his wineglass. “You can throw all the little barbs you want, Taylor Donovan. It doesn’t bother me one bit. Because secretly, I think you like spending time with me.” He winked at her. “It’s okay, you can admit it—I already know.”

Taylor rolled her eyes disdainfully. “You’re way too confident.”

“Do you know that the average American woman between the ages of eighteen and thirty-five has seen each of my movies six times?”

Taylor scoffed at this. “Who told you that bullshit statistic?”

“Okay then, how many times have you thrown down ten dollars to see me on the big screen?”

“Not six.”

“How many times?”

She shrugged nonchalantly, trying to think of a way to lawyer herself out of the question.

Jason’s eyes widened at her gesture. “Oh, I’m sorry, Ms. Donovan, but your answers need to be audible for the court reporter.”

Taylor glared at him. “Do you have a point somewhere in this?”

“The point is,” Jason said, “that you say I’m too confident. But I say the odds are heavily in my favor that you’re attracted to me.”

There it was, all the cards laid out on the table.

“But you said it yourself,” Taylor told him, “that’s just the part you play. Your image. But what about the women who see behind the curtain to the real you? Are they just as infatuated?”

Something about her question seemed to strike a nerve, and Jason fell oddly silent. Realizing she was onto something, Taylor’s eyes probed his from across the low glow of the table’s candlelight.

“Maybe they never have a chance to see behind the curtain,” she said. “Maybe you’re always gone too quickly for that.”

Jason’s eyes met hers, and for a moment neither of them said anything. Without all the ridiculous bravado, Taylor thought, he actually seemed kind of human.

Then he tossed his napkin onto the table.

“That’s it—you’re paying for dinner tonight,” he declared.

Jason gestured to the waiter hovering attentively off to the side. “Bring us another bottle of the Screaming Eagle.” He lowered his voice to a whisper and pointed at Taylor. “The lady’s paying.”

“Of course, sir,” the waiter replied. With a flash, he was off to the restaurant’s private cellar.

Satisfied, Jason turned back to Taylor, his arms folded across his chest. “Seven hundred dollars per bottle, counselor. Let’s see how sassy you are when you’re back in the kitchen, washing dishes.” He paused, giving her a second look. “Not that your feminist ass knows what to do in there.”

At this, Taylor couldn’t help but smile. There was something about that sarcastic sense of humor of his. Sometimes, she liked it very much.

LATER THAT EVENING, Jason turned to Taylor as they were leaving the restaurant, eager to hear her verdict.

“So? What did you think of your first official Los Angeles dining experience?”

She grinned in acknowledgment. “This by far takes the award for the best place I’ve gone on a business dinner.”