Remember When 2

by T. Torrest

  Me: Okay... Tell me what life was like once The Bank Vault was released.

  TW: Oh, you can’t even believe it. Suddenly, my phone was ringing off the hook, producers and directors alike calling my listed number because I didn’t even have a new agent yet. I scrambled around until I got hooked up with David at C.A.A., and well, you and I kind of already covered the rest from there.

  Me: Overnight stardom?

  TW: Hardly. I spent four years in Hollywood before I even got my first speaking role in The Fairways. My part in Bonded, I was only onscreen for about ten minutes total. But it was a huge film and I happened to be a part of it. It led to The Bank Vault, which, let’s face it, opened a lot of doors. I know I got lucky, but trust me, it wasn’t overnight.

  Me: Speaking of “getting lucky”, is the word around town true that you’re quite the ladies’ man?

  TW: (laugh) Layla, did you seriously just ask me that?

  Me: (laugh)

  TW: Oh, Jesus. Fine. Okay. Yes, I’ve been fortunate enough to meet a few lovely, beautiful women out on the west coast. They’re not Jersey girls, of course, but then again, few women are.

  Me: Yes, few of us can be so blessed.

  TW: (pause) (something unintelligible) (laugh)

  Me: Well, I’m glad you’re proud of your Catholic upbringing. Let’s get back to your dating history. I’m sure the female readers of Now! are interested to know if there’s a special someone in Trip Wiley’s life.

  TW: (pause) Actually, uh, I just recently became engaged.

  Me: (huge pause) You’re engaged?

  TW: Jenna Barnes.

  Me: (pause)

  TW: Victoria’s Secret.

  Me: Ah. Yes. I remember now.

  TW: But she’s been doing a little acting these days, too.

  Me: (pause)

  TW: Our relationship’s going on almost a year now. God, she’d probably kill me for not remembering the exact date we started seeing each other. You’ll edit this part out, right?

  Chapter 11

  WHAT WOMEN WANT

  I turned off the tape recorder and stared at Trip, flabbergasted. “You’re engaged.”

  Trip confirmed, again. “Yes.”

  I was stunned to the core and doing a damned awful job of concealing it. “Wow. That’s... That’s some big news. Congratulations!”

  He nodded his head in acknowledgment. “Thank you.”

  I knew who his fiancée was. I’d seen her pictures in my monthly Victoria’s Secret catalogs along with the occasional movie magazine. She was a leggy blonde bombshell with those razor-sharp hip bones that defined an inevitable career in modeling. I hadn’t been witness to any of her acting however, so I assumed her films weren’t quite yet breaking any box office records. She was not only sickeningly beautiful, but apparently brilliant as well. I’d seen her on Letterman one night talking about her days at Yale University. Yale!

  And Trip was going to marry her.

  I had a flash of some pictures I’d seen in Entertainment Weekly a few months prior. Trip had escorted Sonja Keating to a charity dinner for the Make-A-Wish foundation, but was snapped hours later leaving that same event with Hallie Simone. And who was that young blonde tart on his arm at The Viper Room in STAR over the summer? The question was out of my mouth before I had time to filter it. “You’ve been together a year? What about all those pictures of you with other women?”

  I realized I’d probably just insulted him, but Trip only smirked in defense. “Well, Jenna and I were only dating back then. We just got engaged last month.”

  “So, are you trying to tell me that it wasn’t really serious until a few weeks ago?” Saying the words aloud made me realize what I hypocrite I was, criticizing him when I was practically in the same situation.

  He swiped a hand over his face before answering. “Pretty much, yeah. Jenna was all flipped out about those pictures, which is kinda what forced me to pop the question. But it’s also the reason why we haven’t made any official announcements about it yet. She wants people to see us being exclusive for a while before we bother with a press release. You know, so they take us seriously. So, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t write anything about it in your article.”

  Was he serious? “Trip, you do realize that you just confessed that groundbreaking little tidbit to a reporter, right?”

  “I thought I was confiding in a friend.”

  I’d heard about these conundrums during my journalism classes in college. We’d been warned that there would come a time when we’d be forced to choose between nabbing an exclusive and protecting someone we knew. While most general wisdom leaned toward printing the truth no matter what, I already knew that I wasn’t going to sell Trip out.

  So, I cut him a deal. “Okay, fine. I will give you my word not to print anything about your engagement in this article.”

  Trip looked relieved and started to say “Thank you”, but I cut him off with, “But, you have to promise that you will call me the second you guys are ready to make an official announcement. I still have the exclusive on this, got it?”

  He leaned forward again, wringing his hands over his knees. “Uh, actually, Layla, that might be a problem.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, Jenna wants to tell everyone on-camera at the Oscars next March. Beforehand, during the red carpet interviews.”

  I looked at him in disbelief. “Six months from now? You can’t be serious.”

  I was pissed. My first real scoop as a legitimate reporter (sort of) and it was slated to be given to Joan Rivers.

  Trip looked duly chastened by my words, but made a final plea. “Look, Layla. I can only ask that you don’t print the story. Jenna and I... well, we’ve had our problems. Letting something like this slip to the press could mean the end of us.”

  Sounded like a solid relationship. Not.

  I could only look at him tongue-tied and annoyed because I already knew I wasn’t going to print the story. I’d accepted that the information Trip had shared was meant for my ears only, and I wasn’t about to betray my friend’s trust. The fact that I was a “reporter” was secondary.

  But he must have mistaken my silence to mean I was mulling it over. “Can I beg you? Darling? Please?” Trip asked as he slid off the couch, pushed the coffee table aside, and dropped to the floor in front of me. He was grinning like a madman, clasping his fists in front of my legs and laughing out, “Look at me. Look what I’m doing for you, Layla. You’ve literally got me on my knees here.”

  In spite of my anger, I started cracking up. “If you start singing, I think I’ll have to kill you. Get up, you mook. You don’t need to beg.”

  Trip squished my face between his hands and planted a huge, smiling smooch right on my lips. “Thank you! I knew I could count on you.”

  “Don’t go thanking me yet, Chester. You owe me a replacement exclusive, something that’s not only never been written before, but something that no one but you even knows. And you’d better come up with it quick.”

  He sat back down on the sofa, scratching the stubble at his chin as he thought. I saw the lightbulb go off over his head, so I pressed record on the digital as Trip offered, “Well, back before she was a world-renowned reporter, I did nail this one girl in a tent...”

  I practically jumped across the table to hit the stop button. “Trip!”

  He started laughing, gave my knee a good squeeze. “Oh, please. Let’s just acknowledge the elephant in the room, shall we? Damn, that was a good night.”

  Of course he was right, and I was flattered that our night still ranked in his memory, even after the gazillions of other girls he’d been with since. But I still felt like I was crossing some imaginary line when I acquiesced, “Yes. Yes, it was.”

  He looked at me for way too long, the memory of our one amazing night together passing between us.

  He slowly cocked a brow and admitted, “You know... I use it sometimes,” the smirk on his lips telling me more than I had any right to know.
>
  “Trip! For godsakes!”

  That caused him to bust out laughing, and caused me to turn the most embarrassing shade of crimson. But I said, “You’re so bad,” as I shook my head and gave his leg a smack, trying to regain our casual banter.

  Just then, there was a knock at the door, and Trip was the one to jump up and answer it. Sandy was there, expressing her apologies for interrupting, but explaining that Trip had another interview to get to. I couldn’t hear what he said, but he closed the door and came back over to the couch. “I was able to buy us five more minutes.” He flopped down on the sofa like he owned the place, which, I guess, in a way, he sort of did.

  I had a million more questions for him. I wanted to ask about his family, find out how things were going between him and his father. I wanted to know more about what he did in the years between dropping contact with me and striking it big in Los Angeles. I wanted to convince him that he was making a huge mistake with the underwear model, and to ask him if I’d get to see him again before he left New York.

  Not that I should have cared about any of those things. I was grateful enough just to have reconnected with my old friend. It’s not like I could have expected us to go back to being best buddies all over again just because of this one chance meeting. He had a big new Hollywood life to get back to, and I... well, I didn’t. We were on two completely different paths in life, two completely different worlds.

  Trip’s voice broke my train of thought. “Hey, I’ll be done with this crazy day in a little while, and then I need to drop by the set for a couple hours to reshoot a quick scene. Why don’t we go to a late dinner afterward?”

  I was sure that he was only asking me out so we could finalize the interview, but something just didn’t feel right about it. “Trip, I’d love to, but I don’t know if that’s such a good idea.”

  He waved off my reservations and pressed the issue. “Oh, come on. One of the restaurants downstairs serves the best Kobe beef you’ve ever had in your life. Melts in your mouth.”

  I’d never even had Kobe beef at all, much less would I be able to judge whether it was the best. I looked up to tell him as much when I registered the look in his eyes.

  The warning lights started flashing at the invitation I saw there, written all over his face. I guessed that “dinner” wasn’t really what Trip was trying to talk me into.

  Tossing over my fiancé for a night between the sheets with my ex-boyfriend wasn’t even up for consideration, but damn. It was tempting to take Trip up on his restaurant invite. I was enjoying the hell out of our reunion and was flattered by all that flirting. I thought that maybe I’d be able to keep things from getting physical while simply taking pleasure from an innocent night out with an old friend.

  I suddenly realized that I’d been staring at the cut of his square jaw, shadowed by the growth of stubble, imagining what that hint of a beard would feel like scratching against my inner thighs.

  Jesus! The sooner I got out of there, the better.

  “Trip, as much as I’d love to continue this... conversation, I think we both know how our significant others might... take things the wrong way. I think it’s best if we just say our goodbyes now.”

  He held my gaze for a long moment, the both of us trying to postpone the process of slipping away from one another, yet again.

  Trip slapped his hands against his knees, hauled himself off the couch and said pleasantly enough, “Welp, I can see I’m not going to change your mind.”

  He stood in the middle of the room and opened his arms for a hug. True to form, I didn’t hesitate to walk right into his outstretched limbs. He wrapped them around my body, and all I could do was hope he couldn’t feel my heart beating against his chest. I tried to fight it, but my lungs involuntarily breathed in, absorbing that beautiful Trip smell deep into my nostrils. The sense memory of his soapy/sugary scent wafted right from my nose and straight into my brain, causing flashbacks to appear as strongly as if I were on LSD.

  He started rubbing my back and brushing his lips along my temple, causing long-forgotten tremors to race along my spine. I found my brain trying to justify a way to say yes to his dinner invitation, a way to draw out even just a few more moments of our time together. I was dying inside, my thoughts winging off in a million different directions, lost in the long-ago yet familiar sensation of my body melting against Trip’s chest. After all that time, he was still able to turn me into Jell-O just by coming anywhere near me.

  He had to know what he was doing. He wasn’t playing fair.

  I came to my senses and pulled myself out of the embrace. I offered a polite smile and said, “It was really great to see you, Trip.”

  He slid his palms up and down my arms, reluctant to let me end our reunion. He was looking down at me with that serious, half-lidded stare that always managed to liquefy my insides as he raised a hand to my face. His knuckles brushed across my cheek, his thumb swiping a feathery caress across my bottom lip.

  Just. Oozing. Sex.

  Every instinct within me was screaming for me to flee, to run as fast and as far away as my shaking legs would allow, to stop myself from acting on what my throbbing insides were demanding... but I didn’t move. I stood there, held captive by those blue eyes aching into mine... watching as Trip lowered his face and claimed my trembling lips in a soft kiss.

  Oh. Dear. God.

  That same pull was there, that thing between us that always brought us dangerously close to spontaneous combustion. I kissed him back, too far gone to think, just giving myself over to my racing heart and my imploding nerve endings. The kiss went on for an eternity, his tongue exploring the contours of my lips, willing them to part, his arms imprisoning my body to his demanding length, the dizzying swirl of emotions playing their way through my brain. My knees were going weak and I clung to him, my hands grasping his broad shoulders, broader than I remembered. Better, I thought.

  The feel of those full lips against mine was even better than my memories. Maybe it was because that was our first adult kiss, or maybe it was just that he’d had so much practice in the previous years. It’s not like I really cared to figure it out at that moment.

  At that point, I was consumed with the sweet pressure of his soft lips, his palm sliding around my neck, pulling my face closer to his, our mouths opening for one another. He angled his other hand down my spine and across to my hip, drawing me tighter against his hardening body, holding me fixed to him, his hot breath mingling with mine.

  He pulled back just enough for me to see the stunned look in his eyes, feel the soft whisper against my lips when he said, “My God… I almost forgot...”

  My mind gave up all rational thought, the battle having been won over by the sound of his aching voice. I slid my hands into his hair, knocking his hat to the floor as I grasped that beautiful golden mane in my fists, pressing my body to his, hearing him moan against my mouth and feeling his insistent hard-on driving into my hip.

  He’d taken the slightest step toward the couch, walking me backwards, and I knew he intended to throw me down on it, tear my clothes away, and take me right then and there... and I was going to let him.

  And that’s when Sandy walked in.

  Chapter 12

  THE GUILTY

  I finished watching Sea Breeze, and turned off the TV in disgust. According to the IMDb, it was Jenna Barnes’ only known movie role to date, and I just couldn’t resist checking it out.

  Unhealthy? Yes. Could I stop myself? No.

  I was consumed with a warped sense of self-satisfaction, having seen Trip’s fiancée’s acting skills for myself. Let’s just say I thought she’d better stick to her day job: Stripping down to her underwear for money. The tramp.

  I knew from my catalogs that she was beautiful, but I didn’t further the opinion that she was extraordinarily talented or anything. But then I figured that maybe her talents were more impressive off screen. Seemed Trip was a magnet for such “talent”. I’d seen a few pictures over the years of random s
tarlets he had escorted around Hollywood, so I didn’t realize his latest arm candy was anything serious. After watching her stupid movie, “serious” was the last adjective I could use to describe her.

  I’d dropped by the video store on the way back to my apartment. I didn’t need to check out of my suite at the TRU until the next morning, and it would have been nice to treat the stay at the luxurious hotel as a mini vacation. But I knew there was no way I’d be able to sleep under the same roof, in the same building, knowing Trip was only one floor above me in the penthouse. After our kiss, I thought it would be best if I didn’t invite any further temptation my way.

  I had recovered from my initial mortification at being caught in such a compromising position by Trip’s publicist/assistant. While I was breaking from his arms and smoothing my hair and suit back into place, he didn’t seem embarrassed at all, leading me to believe that the scene Sandy walked in on wasn’t so uncommon. For them at least. I knew that she was probably being paid as much for her ability to keep her mouth shut as she was for her skills as an assistant, so I didn’t worry about our little indiscretion going public.

  I was feeling overwhelmingly guilty about my kissing mishap. I didn’t even know what it would have done to Devin. Not that I would have ever told him, but even if he found out, I hoped that he’d be able to shrug the entire matter off like it was the non-event that it was. As jealous as he was about some things, he was also egotistical enough that my momentary lapse in judgment might have been treated as nothing more than an amusing little misadventure.

  Something about that just pissed me right off, and I found myself getting irrationally angry at an unsuspecting Devin for his unlikely response to the imaginary scenario that played out in my head. Where did he get off?

  When I started thinking about my afternoon debauchery, I found myself getting worked up all over again.

  I had to call Lisa.

  I grabbed my cell phone and punched in the number I knew by heart.

  She answered on the first ring. “I can’t believe you made me wait until nine freakin’ o’clock for your call!”