Lucky Star: A Hollywood Love Story

by Rebecca Norinne Caudill

  I meandered into the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee but saw Cameron had already taken care of it. Propped against the pot, he’d left a note written in haphazard penmanship that rivaled a doctor’s, telling me to enjoy my coffee and he’d be back soon. Taking a sip of the brew, I laughed, remembering that we had vastly differing opinions on what constituted a good cup of coffee. One of the many things we’d need to figure out about our living arrangements was to manage our differing opinions on coffee. For me, the darker and richer the better, while Cameron liked lighter, fruitier blends whose caffeine levels were too much for me. Noting that he’d brewed the pot from his favorite beans, I reminded myself to set the automatic timer tonight before bed so coffee the way I liked it would be the first pot of the morning. And no, you didn’t miss that. Cameron already had a stash of his favorite beans tucked away in my freezer which he replenished frequently over the past year. I snickered. Again, how had I missed all the signs? The guy kept coffee at my house, for fuck’s sake.

  Opting for a glass of orange juice instead of Cameron’s high-octane java, I strolled into the living room where Duke happily snored in his corner. Curling up on the couch, I tucked my feet up under my robe. I normally spent my weekend mornings painting or getting caught up on my backlog of magazines, but neither activity tickled my fancy today. I didn’t know how long Cameron would be gone, but it wouldn’t be too much longer. Noting the time on the clock, I gave myself thirty more minutes of relaxation before I’d start to get ready for the party myself.

  Calling to Duke, he obligingly trotted over and settled on the couch next to me to resume his snooze. Tucked up against my legs, I rhythmically swept my hand back and forth along his fur. As Duke rolled onto his back and presented his belly to me for some prime rubbing, I heard the sound of Cameron’s truck pull into my driveway. I’d given him a key when the first time he’d dog sat for me I wasn’t surprised to hear it rattle in the lock.

  He walked in, carrying three very large duffle bags, on his back like a Sherpa while rolling a sat, beaten down suitcase behind him. I didn’t think the contents of those four bags was everything he owned, but having been to his apartment many times before, it probably came damn close.

  “Oh good, you’re up,” he observed, as he lugged the heaping mass in the direction of my – our – bedroom. “Just give me a couple of minutes,” he hollered from the other room and I heard him opening and closing several drawers and doors, looking for somewhere to put everything he’d brought with him.

  I laughed into my glass. Best of luck with that, buddy.

  Hearing Cameron rooting around in my armoire, Duke hopped off the couch and scampered into the bedroom to join him. “That’s a good boy,” I heard Cameron say in that silly voice everyone uses when speaking to dogs, and I pictured him crouched down on his haunches in front of Duke, giving the dog’s head a nice hard rub. I probably should have been jealous that Cameron had supplanted me in Duke’s affections, but they were honestly too damn cute together for me to begrudge their mutual adoration.

  A couple of minutes later Cameron emerged from the bedroom and after pouring himself a mug of coffee, joined me on the couch.

  “So umm … I moved in.”

  I smirked and raised my eyebrow at him. “I can see that.”

  “Should I have asked first?” His obvious uncertainty caused a twinge of unease in my belly.

  This was new territory for us and while our living arrangements were something we probably should have discussed before he’d made an arbitrary decision without consulting me, the question of whether or not he was going to move in was moot. Of course he was moving in here because I sure as shit wasn’t moving in to his studio. Petulantly, I thought he could have at least said something to me first.

  “It’s not a matter of asking,” I began, not wanting to say the wrong thing or give him the wrong impression. “But it’s definitely something we should have discussed, don’t you think?”

  “I know,” he admitted, blowing out a long breath. “The second I turned down your street I got the feeling I hadn’t gone about this the right way. I should have said something, talked to you before showing up with all of my clothes and other worldly possessions.”

  “Obviously you would be moving in here so I shouldn’t be bothered by it. I just wish you’d given me some warning or something.”

  “Yeah, damn. I’m really bad at this.”

  I laughed. “I wouldn’t say you’re bad at it, but you might be a tad impulsive.”

  He winced and I rushed to continue. “It’s okay though. I’m not bothered by it, if that’s what you’re worried about. I just don’t know where we’ll put everything.” I dragged my eyes around my living room and small dining area. Nope, no room in here for additional storage either.

  “I don’t need a lot of room.”

  The way said it was so sad; he sounded like a little orphan boy begging a family to take him in. Can I stay? Pretty, pretty please? I shook my head to dislodge the unease his statement left in my heart. How terrible was I if he felt like he had to beg me to stay? And if those four bags were the entirety of what he brought with him, I felt bad about that too. Surely he had some personal mementos or bric-a-brac he’d want to have with him so the house felt like ours, not just mine.

  “What about décor or furniture?”

  His head jutted back and his eyebrows raised as if I’d asked him when he was bringing over his pony. That is to say, he looked at me like I’d lost my damn mine. “You have seen my furniture, haven’t you? And do you really want what passes for art in that place coming within a fifty-foot radius of your home?”

  He had a point. With the exception of a very beautiful leather chesterfield sofa he’d picked up an estate sale last year, most of his stuff had come with the apartment, had been picked up at yard sales, or were hand-me-downs from friends who’d gotten married and weren’t allowed to bring their bachelor-era digs with them to their new lives. And because his lease stipulated he wasn’t allowed to hang anything on the walls, he’d never actually invested in any art. I’d tried giving him a painting once as a birthday present but he’d shook his head glumly and told me I’d have to keep it safe for him. I’d ended up hanging it on the wall of my dining nook so he could see it whenever he stopped by. “How’s my painting doing?” he’d often ask when he walked in. In the meantime, he’d had to live with the “art” his landlord had installed before Cameron moved in. He wasn’t lying when he told people he had a five-foot-wide velvet portrait of dogs playing poker hanging over his sofa.

  “The chesterfield should come; we’ll find room for it somewhere.”

  “Done,” he said, obviously happy I was okay with it coming with him. I knew he loved the sofa and while it wasn’t necessarily my style, I secretly loved how comfortable it was.

  “I’ll also empty out a dresser so you can put your things away, and I think I can make room in the armoire for more of your stuff. How many pairs of shoes do you have?”

  He paused before answering and I noted he looked sheepish. “Twenty.”

  “You have twenty pairs of shoes?!”

  He nodded, completely serious. “Yes.” I waited for him to explain, but none was forthcoming.

  “Cameron, I don’t have twenty pairs of shoes.”

  “That’s because you live in flip-flops, navy blue Converse, and black flats.”

  I couldn’t tell you the first thing about Cameron’s shoes – probably because whenever I looked at him his feet were the last thing on my mind – but he could tell you exactly what I wore on mine nearly every single day?

  “Wait, you don’t have a foot fetish do you?” I joked. I didn’t think he had any hidden kinks, but I was still discovery things about him so maybe he did and I’d never known it.

  His eyes went wide and he started laughing. “No,” he answered and then his eyes went dark as he scanned them up my body. “Not that.”

  Hmm, I’d have to explore what that look meant some other time.


  “So … one dresser drawer, a quarter of the closet, and my couch in your painting room.”

  He shifted in his seat to face me. Sucking in a breath, his brow creased and he exhaled. I waited for him to speak, but the words seemed to fight with him. His nervousness made me nervous and the butterflies so often hanging out in my belly these days transformed into a whirling dervish of some other flying insect that wasn’t quite so sweet.

  Finally, after what seemed like forever, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, black velvet box. “I didn’t do this right the first time.” Dropping to his knees in front of me, Cameron took my left hand in his and placed a soft, openmouthed kiss to the middle of my palm. When he looked at me, his face was full of joy.

  “Sarah Anne Travers, will you do me the great honor of becoming my wife?”

  Opening the box revealed a late-Victorian, early-Edwardian era engagement ring with a raised diamond at its center. A filigree wrap with two small, triangular sapphires flanked the larger stone. It was a work of art, the painstaking work of a master jeweler, and the most stunning ring I had ever laid eyes on. Tentatively, I reached out to touch it but then let my hand drop. I couldn’t believe it was mine. That he was mine.

  Cameron placed the ring on my left hand, the band sliding home perfectly on my finger. As if it was supposed to be there; almost like it had been made especially for me. It being an antique, that was a flight of fancy on my part, but it felt right, like the ring had found its new home.

  “It was my great grandmother’s.”

  “When did … how … but ...”

  Staring down at his grandmother’s ring on my finger, he rubbed the pad of his thumb over my knuckles. “I was in Ohio picking this up the day Julie called to say I had a meeting with Broderick to discuss the role. I told my parents I was in love with you and that I was going to marry you someday, if you’d have me. I flew back that same night.”

  “I don’t understand,” I whispered.

  “Don’t you?” His eyes flicked between mine and realization dawned.

  Cameron had proposed while still inside of me, and while that had been unexpected, it hadn’t been as spontaneous as I’d initially believed. There’d been a small part of me that worried he hadn’t meant to ask the question at that moment, and maybe that was true, but now I knew he’d always meant to ask me at some point. Whether it had happened after having made love or at some other point didn’t matter. He’d come to me on Friday already knowing that some day he’d ask. He’d wanted me, always.

  As the knowledge took root in my heart, my eyes welled up with tears. Goddamn, I hated crying, but if ever there was a moment where it was called for, that was now.

  ***

  While I was giddy to be officially and unequivocally engaged to Cameron – I even have the ring to prove it, I thought, staring down at my hand for probably the millionth time since he’d placed it there – after reading those texts, I had not been looking forward to the party, celebration of that fact. Sure, I wanted our friends and family to see how right we were for one another, but those damn texts swirled in the back of my head, reminding me that not everyone cared about something as wonderful as promise and commitment between two people who loved each other.

  And so I smiled happily, chatted with those I knew supported us, proudly showed off his grandmother’s ring, and did my very best to ignore the assholes who’d so callously told Cameron he was making the biggest mistake of his life. That they acted pleased for him publicly while their private thoughts were the exact opposite did nothing to lessen my disgust. At least if they’d openly rejected our engagement I could have thrown them out of my house. Instead I’d had to act happy to see them and smile merrily at their fake exclamations of “Congratulations!” and “You lucky dog!” I must have done an admirable job of pretending because no one seemed to notice that whenever one of them came too close I’d walk away as soon as I could.

  I felt like my face was going to crack in half from the amount of smiling I’d been doing since our first guests arrived at four o’clock and my feet were screaming at me to sit down and take a load off. Finally, blessedly, our guests drifted home and I was able to shower and climb into bed before midnight. Cameron climbed in next to me and pulled me into his embrace.

  “That makes it official.” He nuzzled his lips against the spot where my neck met my shoulder, the one that was so sensitive to his touch and did crazy things to my libido. “No backing out now.”

  “As if I would.”

  “Good.”

  He dragged the covers away and trailed a path of kisses down my neck to my chest, just above the top of my camisole. He continued licking and suckling my skin as his large, warm hand made its way under my shirt and cupped my breast before rolling my nipple between his fingers. “Any way I could convince you to get out of your clothes?”

  I sighed happily and stretched my body on a satisfied groan as my tense and sore muscles contracted and then relaxed. “I’ll make you a deal. You undress me, have your wicked way with me, and I promise to do the same for you some time when you’re too tired to do anything but just lay there.”

  “Deal.” He smiled wickedly and regardless of how tired I might be now soon, I knew, my body would respond to his touch.

  When my shirt was gone, he took my nipple between his lips. As he sucked, nibbled, and laved at my flesh I felt my exhaustion slip away, to be replaced by a hot and driving desire. I rolled us over until I was on top, straddling his hips. Rubbing myself against him, I ran my lips along the seam of his lips and he welcomed my tongue into his mouth. Cameron placed his hands on my hips and pushed me down onto the length of his rock hard shaft as he lifted his hips to meet me. Needing him deep inside of me, I lifted my hips and he helped me slide my cotton panties down my legs before tossing them across the room. As I sank down on his thick, delicious cock, Cameron feasted on my breasts, rolled the sensitive buds of my nipples between his strong, capable fingers. He surged forward and I took the whole of him in, deep. When he tweaked my nipples in his fingers and pulled on them, I felt the exquisite ache shoot down my body to ignite my core.

  “Oh my god, I love fucking you,” I whispered on a moan, my breathing ragged as I neared the first of my orgasms. That was the thing about being with Cameron. If I didn’t come at least twice before he did, he hadn’t done his job properly. He wouldn’t seek his own release until my body was spent from our lovemaking.

  “Fuck me Sarah,” he bit out between grunts of pleasure. “Fuck me hard.”

  I ground my hips down and felt the first evidence of my orgasm spiral out across my skin. My limbs tightened and I saw pinpricks of light behind my eyelids. He glided upward, impaling me on the velvet steel of his cock, and I broke apart a tidal, the feeling of pleasure so intense that I could do nothing but sob his name.

  Cameron rolled us over and continued thrusting into my pulsing, throbbing core. Then, flipping me onto my stomach, he locked his arm under and around my torso while his fingers danced over my sensitive clit. He fucked me hard and steady from behind, exactly the way I liked it, each thrust hitting my g-spot. Inch by incredible inch, he found his home inside of me. When my orgasm hit, an immense, overwhelming crescendo of all my senses, I felt him everywhere – behind me, in front of me, inside of me – and I couldn’t focus on any one thing. Sight, sound, smell, taste were no longer separate entities; they’d become all of me, the only thing that mattered. Wanting the feeling to go on and on and on, I pushed back onto his cock, met his powerful thrusts, and then I strained forward seeking out those exquisite fingers that played me so expertly.

  I could tell he was nearing completion from the short, heated gasps he left on the back of my neck. “I’m going to come baby,” he whispered in my ear. “Push back on me, hold me tight.”

  I did as he asked, gyrating my hips in fast, insistent circles as he pumped himself into my soft, warm flesh. He sucked in a ragged breath and arching his back on one final thrust, he cried out my name, abandone
d himself to the pleasure my body alone could provide. He exploded within me and I came again in a blinding, dizzying burst of ecstasy, my pussy milking him as pulsating waves of pleasure rocked my body.

  “You feel so good,” Cameron said, as we collapsed in a heap of sweaty, sated limbs.

  “Looks like I have a meeting with Broderick and the studio’s PR team tomorrow at 2 p.m.” Cameron said, scrolling through his email one last time before calling it a night.

  “Yup, I’ll be there.”

  “I never thought to ask, do you go to all of Broderick’s meetings?”

  I set the alarm on my phone and placed it on the nightstand next to me. “Not all of them, but I’ve been handling some of the behind-the-scenes publicity so he wants me there for the hand off.” I paused. “I’m the one who’s been calling up bloggers and leaking them information about the movie to keep that crack head Leslie Laney from getting herself publicly attached to a role.”

  He snickered. “Did she really think she was up for a part?”

  “Who knows what that woman thinks? I can guarantee she was never on Broderick’s list of prospects. Maybe she thought if the rumors were loud enough he’d be forced to see her?” I shrugged, because who the hell knew what went on in Ms. Laney’s head when she was sober, never mind when she’d gone on one of her binges as she so obviously was now?

  “I can’t imagine having to act opposite her.” He shivered dramatically. “Can you imagine having to kiss her?” He stuck his finger in his mouth and mimed gagging. Because apparently he was twelve. I put my hand to my head in the shape of a gun and mimed blowing my brains out. Because, apparently, so was I.

  “You don’t even know the half of it. The list of directors who won’t work with her is longer than anyone lets on because no one will insure her presence on any respectable movie set. She’s done.” I paused, “And with that, so am I.” I turned off my bedside lamp, kissed Cameron goodnight, and plopped down on my side of the bed, fluffing the pillows under my head just so.