by Sarina Bowen
And she didn’t give a good goddamn that she was crying again, and not the cute kind of crying that left a girl’s makeup untouched as a single tear trickled down her cheek. Hell, no. She was crying and hiccupping, mascara no doubt halfway down her face by now, and she desperately needed to blow her nose. Then the last chord wavered in the long, stretched note of a band closing the show and every instrument crashed to a halt as Nick jumped off the stage and strode straight toward her.
When he was four steps away, she broke out of her fugue and ran at him, jumping at the last second to wrap her legs around his waist. Her arm wrapped around his shoulder as his hard hands lifted her up until she was looking down at him, a hand cupping the side of his face.
“God, I fucking love you, you crazy man.” She could drown in those blue eyes and call it heaven, but she knew he’d never let her. He would always, always be there for her. “That is what I call making a spectacle of yourself.”
“Only for you, baby.” One of his hands shifted to her ass and smacked it and she threw her head back with a laugh, happiness bubbling in her like cheap champagne. When Nick Drake committed to a spectacle, he went all the way.
She grinned at him as the Gold Coast glitterati cheered. Cheered for Nick, cheered for the rockingest orchestra in town, cheered for the sheer glee of the moment. She would never let him be boring. And he would never let her down.
“I need to hear it, Drake. Tell me you love me.”
He slipped a hand up her neck to curve around the base of her skull. Pulled her head down to his so she wouldn’t miss a word.
“So much. I love you so much.”
She had her mouth on his before his lips stopped moving with the words, those glorious words that meant that this wasn’t going to end when the curtain came down. That the curtain would never come down on this. When the final lights dimmed and the theater emptied, there would still be one last spotlight, just for the two of them, and she would always feel that hot light shining.
Nick pulled away from her mouth and narrowed his eyes at her. “You’re getting all melodramatic in your head, aren’t you?”
“Oh, shut up. I’m totally not.” She laughed as he buried his face in her neck and leaned down to whisper in his ear. “I’m gonna love you forever and ever, Nicholas Drake. Center stage.”
“I thought you were all about behind the scenes.” Nick slid her body slowly down his own, firing off tingles all over the place, until her feet hit the floor and she was pressed against him from shoulders to toes.
“Not when it comes to you. We’re in the spotlight of looove, baby.” She hammed it up with a burlesque bump and grind until he smiled and shook his head.
“Forever, huh?”
The word still made her stomach dip and roll with nerves—it probably always would—but she finally believed in it. His arms were looped around her hips. She wrapped hers around his shoulders. Her face hurt from smiling so hard.
“You got it, Mr. Angel Man. The lights are never coming down on this one.”
“No drama, huh?”
She pulled his face down to hers and whispered the words right before she kissed him, this man who’d convinced her that sometimes the fairy tale was real.
“Maybe just a little drama.”
Amy Jo Cousins knows one thing for sure: the people who read and write romance novels are the smartest, funniest, kindest and most optimistic souls on the planet, and finding a place in this community has been like coming home.
She lives in Chicago, where she writes contemporary romance, Tweets more than she ought and sometimes runs way too far. She loves her boy and the Cubs, who taught her that being awesome doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with winning.
You can visit her online, where she hopes you’ll say hi! Sign up for her (very occasional) newsletter at www.amyjocousins.com, follow her on Twitter, @_AJCousins, or visit her on Facebook.
Also by Amy Jo Cousins
Harlequin Desire
At Your Service (Book 1 of The Tylers)
Sleeping Arrangements (Book 2 of The Tylers)
Harlequin E
Calling His Bluff (Book 3 of The Tylers)
Start Me Up
By Kristina Knight
For Jen, because of our in-depth and excruciatingly detailed debates over the merits of Ricky Martin vs. Lenny Kravitz. In a news car. On very long road trips through the Nebraska backcountry. You’re still my go-to secret boyfriend finder.
For Lou and all the “guess what I saw in the back of the limo last weekend” stories. I’m still not sure they’re true, but you never failed to make me laugh. Or blush.
And for anyone who has ever been brave enough to stand up and sing when they wanted to step off the stage and run…you rock.
Chapter One
Nina Wright stared across the stately cherry wood desk, dumbfounded. Not because of the man sitting across from her, although when he walked through the front door of Wright Attraction she nearly had to pick her chin up off the floor. His five o’clock shadow was perfect, his black hair was just barely too long and his blue eyes seemed to sparkle with little bits of the Pacific. The stranger was as familiar to her as the local grocer, primarily because his face graced the tabloids nearly as often as a Kardashian.
But, no, those things were nothing compared to what she was 99 percent sure he’d just asked her to do.
She sat back, crossing her arms over her chest. “You can’t be serious.”
His posture was the exact opposite of hers. Everything about him was opposite. Where she wore a pretty Stella McCartney blouse and prim pencil skirt, he wore ripped jeans and a tight black tee. Her strappy Manolos hadn’t a single scratch. His Dr. Martens had to be from 1999 and looked like they’d cleaned up after one too many groupies in the green room.
You’re in control here, Nina. You’re the professional. He’s the client. Shoo him away like the ass he really is.
Oh, but what a fine ass he has, the part of her brain she was definitely not listening to today said.
“I assure you I’m serious. I need a non-clingy, well-proportioned date for a gala fundraiser in two days and I’d prefer she have no illusions as to what this is about.” He sat forward in his chair and Nina was sure she saw his abs ripple. She caught her breath and then forced her gaze from the spectacle and back to those blue-blue eyes. And promptly forgot to breathe again. “The money raised will keep music programs in at least fifteen local schools. To keep the cash coming I need the headlines to be about the event, not my social life.”
“Then you should go alone.”
“Going alone will keep the gossip rags talking. What I need is a pretty date for a one-night-only performance.”
Nina blew out the breath she’d been holding. She didn’t believe for a second this was a mercy date situation. More like a mercy hookup. She didn’t do hookups. Her business set up marriage-minded people who were matched based on an algorithm her aunt developed ten years before. An algorithm that had made the company a go-to in Los Angeles.
She shot a glance out the window at the press corps on the sidewalk below her window.
Well, until this morning, anyway.
“I think you’ve got my firm confused with…something else entirely, but for future reference—” she typed a few words into the search engine on her computer and flipped the screen to face him “—I am a matchmaker. A noun, meaning one who arranges relationships or marriages.” She opened the next tab and gestured to the computer screen. “I am not a madam, although madams are also nouns. There is a very large, very cavernous area between matchmaking and houses of prostitution.”
Despite her words, she knew he wasn’t confused. The man was serious, which meant he was like the ninety-nine percent of Los Angelians who believed the tabloid rumors about her business. She wanted to throw something, maybe him, out the window to the reporters scoping out her sidewalk. But that would only add to the hype surrounding her. She needed to stop the hype, not build it up more.
He blew out a breath and rolled his almost-too-blue eyes. “For God’s sake, I’m not asking you for a hooker, period. I could pick one of those up on Melrose before the event for about one-tenth of your fee.”
“No, you want me to provide you with a call girl for the night. There’s almost a difference there.” Since she couldn’t physically throw him out, she wiggled her foot under the desk and aimed a look that she hoped would get the Hollywood hottie on the other side of her desk out of her office before she climbed over said desk and volunteered to be his one-night date.
Chase MacIntyre, manager of and songwriter for Anthem, the hottest rock band on the planet, was also the son of Hollywood royalty. And the twin brother of one of America’s sweethearts, Lily MacIntyre. Best friend of Nate Lansford, lead singer of Anthem.
And he was exactly the kind of guy she needed to avoid, both professionally and personally. She had a business to run. Employees counting on her. A scandal the size of The Hollywood Bowl to survive. Being starstruck by Chase MacIntyre wouldn’t solve those problems, even though he heated up her office like the Santa Ana winds. “Why don’t you ask one of your adoring fangirls?”
A flicker of annoyance crossed his face. She’d scored. Somehow the tiny high she’d expected didn’t come. Instead, she felt like reaching across the desk to… What? Pat his hand like a spinster aunt? Geez, Nina, get a hold of yourself.
“You know very well they aren’t my fangirls, they want to get close to Nate and the guys from Anthem.”
“So go solo.” She felt like a broken record but it was the simplest solution. Nina stood, ready to usher him out of her office so her life could refocus on work. But Chase didn’t follow her lead.
He shook his head but not a single strand of hair fell from its spot. “As I said, that would only make the press worse, exactly what I’m trying to avoid.”
Nina ruffled a few papers and then stacked them on the corner of her desk before sitting down. “That isn’t my problem, Mr. MacIntyre. And why don’t we try to be honest here. You don’t want a hot piece of arm candy for a single night on the red carpet. This is about your supermodel ex-girlfriend dumping you on another red carpet last week. How many headlines have there been about your poor, broken heart?” She didn’t wait for him to answer, and not because she knew exactly the number of headlines—eleven, thankyouverymuch—but because Chase MacIntyre’s supposedly broken heart had garnered interest before her own professional scandal bumped him off the front page. “A single date isn’t going to quell the rumors about why Jillian dumped you, and you know it.”
Red carpet shows, a bottle of chardonnay and a box of Ghirardelli chocolates were normally sensible Nina’s guilty pleasure—a fact not even her best friend and business partner, Cassidy, knew. For a split second last week Nina had felt sorry for Chase. That was as long as it had taken for him to marshal his control and present a stony expression to the press corps. In that split second she’d seen hurt but she had also seen anger. Arrogance.
“Jillian dumped me because she knew I was planning to dump her. It got her face on a few papers and, for all I know, may have led to her first acting gig. Jillian is exactly why I need a woman who knows the score. I’m done being the golden ticket for aspiring actresses.” Chase rubbed his hands over his face. Finally he was showing a reaction besides indifference. But, God, how she wished he had kept up the shallow Hollywood façade. She could already feel herself wanting to help. Being pulled into his orbit. Nina’s parents weren’t Hollywood royalty like Chase’s, but they were stars in the business world. The money that came attached to the Wright name brought a lot of attention her way before she’d known how to handle it. It had gotten her tender heart broken by one of the hangers-on who used her as his entrée to Wright Industries and a corner office in her father’s Hong Kong complex.
Chase pointed to her computer, the move graceful and commanding all at once. “Come on, there has to be one decent-looking chick in that massive computer file of yours who wouldn’t mind going out on a date with me and then never calling me again.”
Nina just resisted typing a few search commands into the database. “I’m sure there are several. That doesn’t change the fact that I set up relationships, not one-night stands.”
“Fine, don’t tell the girl.”
She squinted her eyes at him. “I’ll still know you’re using her. I wouldn’t do that to someone who trusts me with her romantic future. And this isn’t your first time in the glare of the spotlight. You’ve never seemed to care what anyone thought of you before.”
Chase crossed his arms over his chest and tapped his foot fast against the hardwood floor. He shifted in his seat.
“I’ll say it again—going solo is the answer to your problems. Don’t let the tabloids get to you.”
Chase twisted his mouth into a crooked smile and shook his head, the movement making his black hair catch bits of sunlight to toss about the room. Realization dawned on Nina. “You want the upper hand. And you think if she sees you on a red carpet with another woman she’ll come running back.” Nina’s heart pounded. He loved his ex. Why that should matter to her she had no idea, but it did. She couldn’t help anyone who wasn’t willing to admit their true feelings.
She pushed away from her desk and opened the office door with a flourish. She had to get him out of here before she got herself into even more trouble than was currently on her plate. She glanced out the window to the photographers clustered along Wilshire Boulevard waiting to grab a snap of her for their next Hollywood Madam edition. Three of her female clients had gone rogue on a fourth—and married—client. When the women found out their beau was not only dating all of them at once but married, they tried to blackmail him. The man’s wife was standing by his side before the press and laying all the blame on Nina’s business. Saying Wright Attraction was set up to help married men have affairs, that Nina had preyed on her husband’s sexual addiction. She suppressed a shiver. For the past thirty-six hours the press had been camped in the shade of the high-rises along her block, talking to other business owners and waiting for their next shot at her. She cringed. At least ten more photographers had their cameras trained on her office since Chase walked through the front door. Panic clawed at her throat.
She’d done her best to re-vet every client on the list once she took over the business, but there were two thousand files, and she had only been at the helm a few weeks.
“I’m not putting my firm’s reputation on the line to find you a one-night stand to make your ex jealous.” The press may have missed him coming in but at least one of them would recognize the man leaving. Not good. So not good.
He unfolded his considerable height from her Queen Anne chair, bringing his broad shoulders thisclose to hers. Her eyes were level with that oh-so-delectable chest and her mouth watered. She stiffened her spine and vowed to show him no reaction at all.
“You need me just as badly as I need you right now.” He tipped her chin with his index finger, and their gazes clashed. His eyes were too blue. Too intense but she couldn’t look away. “Because everyone is hanging on the Hollywood Madam headlines in the tabloids. Three of your oh-so-innocent clients tried to shake down one of your male clients, your oh-so-cheating-on-his-wife client. The press is having a field day at your expense. You know exactly how it feels to be under their microscope.”
“Yes, I do. But I also know I’ve done nothing wrong.” Nina took in a slow breath. “And you wouldn’t have come here if you thought my business was shady.”
“What I know and what everyone else thinks are two very different things. How many clients have you lost since the headline went live yesterday morning?”
Before he could answer, Cassidy piped up from behind the massive front desk. “Three hundred, give or take the fifteen or so messages that have pinged my inbox since you two started grousing about madams versus matchmakers.” Nina shook her head but Cassidy came around the desk anyway. She wore a maxi dress and jean jacket with Roman sandals on her f
eet. And she looked Chase up and down like he might be her lunch.
“And it’s only Monday,” Chase said, shooting Nina a superior look, as if he knew she would beg to find him a date in another moment or two. Not going to happen. Nina beetled her brows at Cassidy, willing her to stay out of this, but her assistant ignored the silent plea. He turned as if spotting an ally. “I bring a lot to the table, no matter what you both think of my motives.”
“We could use the good press,” Cassidy chimed in, her high-pitched voice sounding loud in the quiet room. “But one night won’t do it—it would take a solid week or more to even make a dent. And that’s assuming one of the reporters does some checking to find out that we made the match. That the girl and Chase are falling head over heels for each other.” Cassidy shrugged. “Kind of a tall order, considering the flak we’re dealing with right now.”
That was all Nina needed to hear. As much as she dreaded seeing the next headline aimed at her business, she also didn’t want to set up this disaster in the making. “See? Won’t work. Find your own date.”
“There are photographers outside right now. They could connect the dots very easily.” Chase held his hands just off of her shoulders and Nina tried to ignore the little zing of awareness that seeped through the thin silk of her blouse. The man wasn’t even touching her so why was she acting like a teeny-bopper with her first crush? He tilted his head to the side and twisted his mouth again, studying her like she was a singer waiting to take the stage. He made a motion with his finger. “Turn.”
She couldn’t stop her feet from automatically following his direction.
“Mmm-hmm.” He paused and those sea-blue eyes roamed over her body, lingering for a second on her breasts before continuing his perusal right down to her pink-painted toenails. And back up again. Nina’s toes curled at the interest in his inspection. Bad, Nina, you do not want nor need Chase MacIntyre’s appreciation right now. You need to get him the hell out of this office.
