My Charming Rival

by Lauren Blakely

  It was a question asked all day long all across Los Angeles where anyone at any minute might spot a celebrity.

  In this case, they were asking the question I wanted to hear.

  “Is that Riley Belle?” a girl in green leggings whispered.

  “Is that Riley Belle?” a young mom pushing a stroller asked.

  “Is that Riley Belle?” a guy in gym shorts said.

  I swiveled around, scanned the sidewalk then the one across the street, then I saw her. She’d just stepped out of a black town car. Her brown hair was windswept and luxurious and she wore huge red sunglasses, an orange fitted tee, and a jean miniskirt. She was tall and thin, and she didn’t look like the rest of us. She looked like a star. Even as she tried to hide behind her glasses, there was just something special about her, as there always was with a silver screen beauty. They didn’t look like civilians. They looked as if they’d descended from planets in the oh-so-far-above-average galaxy. She clutched her brown-and-tan Chihuahua–mini pin dog against her chest, then carefully placed Sparky McDoodle on the sidewalk, his petite paws touching the concrete, his leather leash firmly in her hand. She started to walk in the direction of one of the boutiques I’d pinpointed, a focused look on her face. Her blinders were on—her eyes were only on her dog and her destination down the block.

  As I reached for my camera, a lazy but loud meow boomeranged from across the two-lane street. The orange cat had caught sight of a squirrel in a tree and was waggling his furry cat butt, poised to chase. The second the tabby bolted for the squirrel, I heard the sound of nails scrabbling against sidewalk and a loud, high-pitched bark that could only belong to a very small dog. Sparky McDoodle yanked hard on his leash, so hard that Riley Belle tripped, fell on one knee, and lost her grip on the leash. Her darling was off like a shot, racing to cross the street as a blue Prius turned the corner heading straight for the pint-sized pup.

  Instinct took over. I stopped analyzing and ran into the street. The skidding sound of tires hit my ears as I stepped hard on Sparky McDoodle’s leash. I lunged for the dog before he met the black rubber of a car’s wheel.

  My heart sped up and my focus narrowed as my hands wrapped around his tan and brown belly. I scooped him up as the Prius jolted to a worried stop. Sparky McDoodle’s ears were pinned against his head, and his heart galloped at a rabbit’s pace. Expelling a deep breath I hadn’t realized I was holding, I oriented myself. Still on high alert, I found myself standing in the street, next to a parked car. The driver of the Prius was opening his door, his hand on his heart, relief etched on his face, and several people stood and stared. Then someone clapped, and I walked back to the sidewalk, stepping onto the curb as Riley flung herself at me, wrapping her arms around me and her dog.

  “Oh my God. You saved Sparky McDoodle. You saved Sparky McDoodle. You saved Sparky McDoodle.”

  She was on repeat, and she couldn’t stop saying those words. I handed Riley her dog, and he snuggled into her neck, as if he could escape into the safety of the familiar.

  “He’s so scared. His heart is beating so fast. But he’s okay. He’s okay. He’s okay,” she said, all the words tumbling out of her lipsticked mouth in a rush. Tears streaked down her cheeks. “You saved him. You saved my dog.”

  Riley pulled herself out of the hug, but kept a hand on my arm. Her voice started to break. “You have no idea how much this means to me.”

  I kind of did by then, but I figured it was best not to point that out. “He’s really a sweet dog. And he loves you so much,” I said, gesturing at Sparky McDoodle as he tried to burrow into Riley’s arms.

  “He was going after that cat, wasn’t he?”

  “I’m pretty sure he wanted to be on a first name basis with the orange tabby.”

  “I have been working so hard to train him to stop chasing cats. But he just can’t resist them,” Riley said.

  “Well, it’s kind of fun to chase something that’s running from you,” I said.

  Riley smiled that winning smile she had that won over fans and audiences and, evidently, a hard-edged paparazzo, because I was smiling, too. She was infectious. Damn her.

  “That’s funny,” she said and laughed. She gripped my arm. “What is your name?”

  “Jess.”

  “Jess, I have to take you out to thank you. Would you let me buy you lunch or brunch or coffee or dinner or something sometime?”

  “Sure,” I said, putting absolutely no stock in the possibility that she’d follow through on her invite. It was an invite of the moment, born of adrenaline and gratitude, of a narrow escape, not of any real prospect of friendship. But she was glad her dog was safe, and so was I. The fact was, I’d have done the same for anyone’s dog.

  Riley reached into her electric-blue purse made out of a quilted vinyl material. She found a pen and a piece of paper, wrote down her phone number, and handed it to me.

  “That’s my direct number. Call me anytime.”

  I folded it up and stuffed it into the front pocket of my jeans. I supposed I could call her and ask if she’d let me into her sister’s wedding, but I had a wild hunch she’d say no. She looked at me with her big brown eyes. They had flecks of gold in them. “Now give me yours.”

  I wrote down my digits and handed her the paper.

  She tucked it into an inside pocket in her purse, beaming at me. “I’m totally calling you, and Sparky McDoodle and I are going to take you out. You have no idea. This dog is my soulmate. He is the love of my life.”

  Then her eyes shifted, and she seemed to notice something or someone down the street. She tipped her forehead to the end of the next block. “Say cheese,” she whispered to me, and then she wrapped an arm around me. “That girl always gets my picture. Can you cheat to the right?”

  I angled myself slightly as a girl in the distance with long red hair fastened in a tight braid snapped several shots from a long-lensed camera. It was Flash, or so I called her. Another young paparazzo, she must have been staking out Riley, too, and I was about to become the subject of a celebrity photo spread, something I dreaded. My only hope was I would be identified merely as the “Good Samaritan” and not as a celebrity photographer.

  In two seconds, Flash bolted, probably on her way to file the photo, and Riley turned back to me. “Thank you. My right side is so much better than my left side.”

  I nodded. “Totally understand. I don’t like my left side for what it’s worth. Even though no one takes my pic.”

  Riley nodded. “See? You understand. Everyone else also tries to placate me and blow nonsense out their mouths and say, ‘Oh, Riley, you look good from every side,’ but that’s crap. Everyone has one side that’s better than the other.”

  Riley said goodbye, and I figured it was the last time we’d exchange words, so I didn’t waste one ounce of emotion on the guilt that slithered into me over the fact that I’d be taking her pictures tonight. I shed that feeling as I slinked off, trying to make myself unnoticeable, even as a few people stopped to say I was brave, that I was awesome, that I was fast as hell to save a dog like that. I just nodded and smiled without showing my teeth, wishing I could pull out my camera and grab a shot of Riley walking into the boutique. But I didn’t want to show my hand. I couldn’t chance it. I didn’t want anyone to snap a picture of me taking a picture of Riley. Besides, now I’d have to be extra careful tonight because she knew who I was. As she walked into the boutique, I ached to take just one shot of her entering the shop with Sparky McDoodle safely in her arms.

  But I resisted.

  I looked away, focusing on tonight and earning the other half of the ten thousand dollars, not the missed opportunity of a bridesmaid fitting. I pushed my bangs off my forehead and shook my head, as if I could shake off the whole bizarre encounter. Then I saw a too-familiar face across the street. Decked out in jeans and a blue faded T-shirt, William was reading a paper while sitting on a green slatted bench. His camera was slung around his neck, resting against his stomach. He wasn’t even trying to h
ide his camera. He waved to me and grinned broadly, and I wanted to smack him.

  Because he wasn’t here for Riley this time.

  The bastard had followed me. Red smoke billowed out of my eyes. Flames of anger licked my chest. I marched across the street and right up to him. “Fancy meeting you here,” I said through pursed lips.

  “Seems J.P. keeps sending us on the same stakeouts. Riley, this time.”

  I narrowed my eyes and shook my head. “Wrong answer,” I hissed.

  His eyes widened, and he gulped. “What do you mean?”

  “I wasn’t actually here on a Riley stakeout. I was here for another reason. J.P. didn’t send me on this assignment. I sent myself, based on a tip I got myself. Ergo, you weren’t sent here by J.P. Ergo, you’re following me.”

  “Or I’m working for another agency now?” he offered up meekly.

  I shook my head. “What’s your story? What’s your real story? Because you’re not really a paparazzo.”

  17

  William

  * * *

  I could have spun a new lie. I could have concocted some sort of fable, pretended I didn’t see her, or stalked off to my bike.

  But she’d busted me, and it was time to man up.

  Her arms were crossed and I swore I could see smoke pouring forth from her nostrils. She was going to walk away when she heard. But she deserved the truth. She didn’t deserve, though, to have everyone nearby witness our conversation. A throng of onlookers across the street watched Jess. Some even had their cell phones poised, ready to capture her.

  “Can we go somewhere and talk?” I said quietly.

  She looked around, glancing up and down the sidewalk. “The street is fine with me.”

  “Right, and me, too. But you still have crowds of people checking you out.” I pointed to the other side of the street as surreptitiously as I could. She stole a look. “You’re the girl who saved the star’s dog.”

  She huffed, grabbed me by the camera strap, and dragged me around the corner to a quieter block, then pulled me into a long entryway that led into a store selling polka-dotted dresses for toddlers that would become stained with organic ketchup or fair-trade-harvested chocolate syrup the first day they were worn.

  “You’re not a paparazzo,” she repeated. “You didn’t recognize Lolanna, you didn’t go for the shot of the LGO ladies at the salon, you barely even tried to get Riley and Miles’s picture at Venice Beach, and on top of that, I know J.P. didn’t send you here because J.P. didn’t send me here. Who are you?”

  I swallowed, then took a deep breath. I didn’t try to curl up my lips or sling a zingy comeback. Instead, I answered her without sarcasm or a smirk. “You’re right. I’m not here on assignment. J.P. told me earlier today he won’t have any more work for me because I only got one shot—Monica. I don’t recognize celebrities, Jess,” I said, and it felt like a confessional, and I was glad I no longer had to lie about my terrible inability to spot famous faces. Telling her I’d lied wasn’t going to win her over, but I still had to come clean. “I’ve been moonlighting for a private detective agency in the hopes of finding a permanent job so I can stay in the States after I graduate.”

  Her jaw dropped. “You’re a private detective?”

  I shifted my hand back and forth as a seesaw. “Sort of.”

  “Sort of? What the hell?”

  “I’m doing some work for one. Well, a security firm.”

  “And that work involved following me? Me?” She tapped her chest, as if she could make it extra clear precisely who I was hunting.

  “I’m not following you, per se.”

  “Me per se? What the hell is me per se?”

  I scrubbed a hand across my chin, wishing this didn’t sound so clandestine. But there was no true way to finesse saying I was following you but I really dig you too, so can we still go out?

  “My Uncle James runs a security firm. He has a private investigation division. I have to go back to England in two months when my student visa expires, unless I can score a job with a company here willing to sponsor me for a work visa, so I’ve been doing everything I can to find work because I’m dying to stay. I’d done a little bit of work here and there for a private investigator in London my first two years at university. I took photos of cheating wives, cheating husbands, suspicious business partners, that sort of thing people hire private detectives for.”

  “Hate to break it to you, but I’m not married, not cheating, not in business with anyone, and not doing a single fucking thing wrong,” she said and emphasized her indignance by poking me hard in the sternum.

  “Ouch,” I said because it actually hurt.

  “Oh, I’m so sorry. Are you wounded?”

  “I’ll manage,” I muttered, thinking asking her to be my date this weekend might not pan out. Call me crazy, but I had a wild hunch Jess wasn’t so fond of me right now.

  “Who are you working for? Who is your uncle’s client?”

  “I can’t tell you everything.”

  She raised her hands, giving me a clear brush-off. “Whatever. I’m done. See you later. I have work to do.”

  I reached for her arm, clasping my hand around her wrist. She flinched, but turned back to me.

  “I can’t tell you everything,” I said. “But I can tell you everything I know to be true. James’s firm was hired by a publicity shop. They rep a bunch of actors, talent, writers, whatnot. They wanted to know how the paparazzi were getting so many shots of their clients. That’s the assignment I was on.”

  “How?” she asked with a scoff. “Because that’s what paparazzi do.”

  “They wanted details. Specific details. How the tips work, how a stakeout works. To better help clients who are always getting captured on camera when they don’t want to be.”

  “And they assigned you to follow me? Why me? And don’t say it’s because I’m the best, because I’m not.”

  “They didn’t assign me to follow anyone in particular. They just want general intel to share with their client. James won’t even tell me who the client is who wants the info. I swear I have no idea. I went to J.P. and I pretended I was a photog so I could get a sense of how it worked, what he heard, how the assignments came in, how a stakeout went. I’m just supposed to get intel for James to share with his client.”

  “And what have you learned, private dick?”

  I spoke softly. “That when you’re pissed —”

  She cut me off again. “Don’t. Don’t make one of those cutesy little comments that guys make in the movies. Like when you’re pissed, you have this vein in your forehead that pops out, and it looks so adorable,” she said in a sing-song voice.

  “Do people think veins in foreheads are adorable? Maybe it’s an American thing, but that’s not really what does it for me when it comes to a hot girl like you.”

  “I’m not even going to ask what does it for you when it comes to a hot girl because that is so not the conversation we’re having right now.”

  “Can I tell you what I’ve learned, Jess? Since you asked.”

  “Fine.”

  “That when you’re pissed, I don’t like it. And I don’t want you to be pissed. Because I like you. I like spending time with you. Because I’m completely attracted to you, I love kissing you, I want to go out with you—that is all real.”

  She rolled her eyes. It was a champion-level eye roll. “How does that have to do with anything? You wanted intel. You used me. You kissed me and used me and followed me. Whatever happened between us is over.”

  I couldn’t let that happen. I had to lay it out for her as best I could, regardless of whether asking her to be my date this weekend was even still a remote possibility. The truth mattered more than the job James had for me. The truth mattered because I wasn’t the kind of guy who lied to a girl about liking her. I liked Jess, and if the State Department booted me out of this country in two months or not, I wanted her to know the truth.

  “The kisses weren’t lies,” I said, and nea
rly reached for her hand, wanting to reassure her through touch. But words would have to suffice, since her arms were crossed over her chest. “The conversations weren’t lies. I love talking to you and hanging out with you and taking you to the movies. And for the first two days, I didn’t follow you. We were on the same shoots, and yes, I was trying to learn what I needed for James simply by taking the pictures, too. But you were so good at the job, and so good at getting pictures, and I’m dying to stay in America. I love it here. You’re lucky enough to be from here and to get to stay,” I said, my voice now a desperate plea for her to understand me. I didn’t know that she, or anyone, frankly, would, but I needed to try. “I want to stay in the same way that you want to go to medical school. It’s my future, it’s my dream. My student visa ends soon and I’ve been looking for work everywhere and I keep hoping I’ll get this job or that job, but I’ve been getting turned down for everything, which sucks royally. Here was this chance with James and I’m trying desperately to keep up, so I followed you here to see what you were up to next,” I said, and it pained me to admit it, but the truth was all I had to stand on. “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”

  “You should be sorry. That’s crappy,” she said, her features tight and angry. “Following people is shitty.”

  “But don’t you kind of follow people for your job, too?”

  “Are you calling me out on being the pot calling the kettle black?”

  “Kind of, yeah. But it’s true. I follow people. You follow people. What’s the difference? Neither of the people we follow wants to be followed.”

  “Nobody wants to be followed, William! But the people I follow are celebrities. So it’s fair game. You played me, so I’ll see you later,” she said, holding up her hand like a stop sign, then turning her back to me as she began to walk off.