Steam (Homecoming Hearts #4)(2)

“Ashby,” Trent growled. He raised one of his thick, dark eyebrows, the way that always made Ashby squirm. It occurred to him that Trent might have worked that out.

“Uh, yes?”

“Stop overthinking,” Trent said gently. He smiled, changing his whole face to show the kind man Ashby knew was hiding underneath the gruff exterior. He rubbed his fingers against Ashby’s collarbones through his shirt.

“Okay,” Ashby said, nodding. “Okay, no more thinking. Um, does that mean I can kiss you instead?”

Trent’s smile widened and Ashby thought he might just melt into a puddle right there.

“Yeah,” Trent drawled. His tongue licked his lower lip, making it glisten in the dimly lit hotel room. “Let’s try starting there.”

Ashby was only too happy to comply.





1





Trent





All Trent wanted was a damn coffee.

It didn’t used to be like this. Sure, he’d been in the limelight one way or another for the past eight years. But since his last film had hit the box office things had gotten so crazy he struggled to get anywhere without being hounded.

As soon as he ventured into the lobby of his apartment building in downtown LA, he knew he was in trouble. Camera flashes went off like the Fourth of fucking July, lighting up the night. Trent suddenly wondered if it wasn’t too much to call his driver and ask him for a lift.

The coffeehouse was only around the block, though. A wave of resentment rose within Trent that he would be denied the simple satisfaction of buying his own damn cappuccino. So he shoved his hands in his leather jacket and continued walking out from the elevator.

Someone must have put up a new blog post or started a new rumor for there to be that many guys waiting outside his door like a pack of wild hyenas. They were already yelling and waving at him as he walked over the marble floor towards the wall of glass.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Charles,” the reception clerk, Mario, called out to him from his desk. He was an older guy who had manned the building for as long as it had been standing, or so Trent had heard. Normally he was hard to rattle, but now he was wringing his hands. “I didn’t know if I should have called the cops?”

Trent held up his hand and hunched his shoulders slightly as he neared the door. “It’s okay,” he grunted.

Goddamned freedom of the goddamned press. Today of all days Trent just wanted to hide away from the world. But his hangover hadn’t dissipated from that morning and he’d gotten a craving for one of Java Jem’s hazelnut brews. He couldn’t make them in his apartment with his own machine and the shop didn’t deliver.

Besides, if he turned around now, that would be letting those jackals win.

He tried to make himself look smaller as he released the door lock and stepped out onto the sidewalk. A difficult task at six foot three and two hundred and thirty pounds. But he dropped his head and let his shoulder-length hair cover his face as much as possible.

“TJ! TJ!” they bayed. There had to be two dozen guys flocking around him. The cameras were going off in a dazzling, continuous stream of flashes.

“TJ! Are the rumors about you and Elsie Hadden true?”

“When’s the baby due, TJ?”

Baby? What baby? Trent tried his best not to shake his head. He just kept his gaze down and continued walking as they moved with him like a swarm of wasps. He’d discovered over his years of rising fame that the best thing to do was to ignore the shit the paparazzi spewed as much as possible.

He didn’t want to be ungrateful for his achievements. So many people would give anything to be in his position. Not only a successful five years with one of the hottest boy bands on the planet, but then an action movie career that was only getting bigger. But with it came the bat-shit crazy lies which blogs and magazines were willing to print in order to get sales and views.

Trent hadn’t even seen Elsie in years. They’d maybe crossed paths at a couple of awards ceremonies and parties. But generally, she moved in the music industry circles still, while he’d switched to the insane world of Hollywood.

Yeah, there had been that one time in New York in the bathroom of that club. And the weekend in Miami. But they’d never really been a thing. Much like most of Trent’s lady friends, things had fizzled out before they’d ever gotten serious. Why were the paps bringing her up again now?

“How long have you been back together?”

“What does Penny have to say about it?”

Penny was yet another nice girl who had eventually gotten bored of Trent’s lack of commitment and moved on. The press had liked her with Trent because she was an Instagram star and had a fitness program. Seeing her with a reprobate who apparently never stopped drinking made for a controversial visual, even if he was ripped.

She was better off without him. Trent was happy for her and her new guy.

Flash! Flash! Flash!

Trent was going to trip on the sidewalk if he wasn’t careful. It was taking forever just to make a five-minute walk to the damn coffeehouse. He was going to have to buy a whole box of pastries as well to make this journey worth it. At least he could give one to Mario to try and apologize for making his night awkward by blocking the front of his building. Again. Trent was fully aware he wasn’t the only tenant there.

“When’s the baby due, TJ?”