by Christa Wick
But the "sow" remark? Yeah, she'd seen that coming from miles and miles away. The look of shock and disgust on Shayna's face—that, definitely, only she knew it would soon be reflected on faces all across America.
She could imagine the Instagram photos, women and men with their features contorted for comic effect to display a range of unfavorable emotions, with captions that passed for witty on the internet.
Just saw what Declan Bain fucked last night—does PETA know?
Would her mom see it? Nancy normally didn't go near the internet except for her book groups on Facebook. But Dodgy Roger might point it out to her.
At least no one had snapped a picture or knew her name, at least not yet.
Exchanging the comforter for the fur throw, she wrapped it around her and gathered up her clothes before speed walking to the princess suite on the opposite side of the second floor. Hearing the front door slam, she added a final burst of speed and crossed the threshold into her room, immediately locking the door.
Declan would argue with her, of course. He seemed to relish getting her wound up. She had to get dressed and out of his house before he had a chance to wear her down.
Standing and stepping into her underwear, she grabbed her phone from the top of the dresser and hit the power button. She had three texts, two from Cammie saying she was awake, the third from her mother. She clicked on Cammie's and typed a quick reply.
"Pack ASAP. Please!"
She stuffed a leg and then the other into her jeans, then fired off a second text to Cammie. "Text me when you’re done."
She'd get her stuff together and wait for Cammie to have hers loaded in the car, then they could go down together and leave. Declan might have lost his cool with Shayna, but Melanie had a feeling he'd keep it toned down with just her and Cammie in the house.
It wasn't as if Melanie would be insulting him as she left, just telling him this was something she couldn't do, that last night had been amazing, but it would never be repeated.
Fastening her bra, she slipped a breezy blouse on top, her body already sweating from all the drama of Shayna's visit and the building heat outside the house.
Looking around for the slip-ons she'd worn last night, she froze as a determined double knock landed on the bedroom door.
Declan had come upstairs and found his bedroom empty.
"Getting dressed," she called, considering it only a half lie since her feet were still bare.
"I've seen it all, remember?"
Somehow, despite the rage she'd seen boiling in him during Shayna's tirade, he had recovered enough to inject a little dry humor into his voice.
"Seen it," he continued, "in various positions, all of them mouthwatering."
Her heart skipped a beat at the rapid change in tone as his voice dropped low and seductive.
She shook her head and pulled another set of slip-ons out of her bag.
Her phone chirped as Cammie replied.
Gf, are you crazy or what?
Melanie's thumbs flew across her screen in response.
I really need you to not argue with me on this one.
She put the phone down, opened the top drawer and scooped all her bras and panties out.
Declan repeated his knock, his voice changing yet again as he seemed to realize her intent. "Mel, do you really think there are doors in my house that I can't unlock in two minutes or less?"
Damn! She hadn't paid attention to the outside of the handles, whether there was a little keyhole or anything like that. Fine—she had two minutes or less to pack. Massachusetts was colder than Los Angeles, anyway, and it was very early October. She really only needed her laptop, tablet, phone, checkbook, and wallet. With just that, she could walk out the door to the nearest public transportation. Cammie could stay and pack in leisure without worrying about Declan.
Melanie started stuffing everything into her backpack, fingers fumbling with the zippers as if they were as set as Cammie on delaying or thwarting her departure.
Computer? Check.
Tablet? Check.
Stylus? Freaking hundred dollar art stylus...sneaky, hiding piece of...
Check!
Swiping the phone off the dresser to stuff in her back pocket, Melanie half flung it as Declan fumbled with the lock and her fingers went numb. She spotted it about two feet away, took a step and managed to kick it under the dresser.
Hell. She dropped to her knees as Declan opened the door and entered the room.
"If you're trying to hide," he mused lightly, "all of the furniture is too low to the floor. Even a hamster couldn't crawl under there, Mel."
Ignoring the joke, she reached, the phone at an odd angle to where she had lowered her body. She pressed her cheek against the wood face of the drawer and gained another inch.
And lost it a second later as Declan wrapped his hand in her hair and reeled her to him.
"I know you want to run," he started, the slight pull on her hair forcing Melanie to settle onto her haunches.
"Let go."
He did no such thing. Dropping onto his knees next to her, he tightened his grip.
"But running isn't who you are."
"You don't know who I am." Her voice turned growly. "Now let go."
"I know you've spent three years in the business," he argued. "That's three years around bitches like Shayna and the jerks who worship her type. I know you've got hustle and talent."
Lifting her gaze, she tried the death stare on him.
He laughed.
"Mel, I've seen fiercer looks on kittens...and one drunk squirrel."
Slowly, he unwound his hand from her hair, his fingers gently combing through the strands so everything settled around her shoulders with no trace of his having used it to rein in her panic. Dipping down, he slid his longer arm under the dresser and retrieved her phone, tossing it behind her where it bounced along the bed.
"Now we're going to talk—like adults."
She crossed her arms over her breasts, resenting his insinuation that she was acting like a child. He watched as she shoved her hands in her armpits then lifted his brows with a tired amusement.
"Maybe we should set parameters on what talking like adults entails."
"I'm leaving, end of discussion."
His mouth twitched, grew narrower at the same time his nostrils flared. "I hope your follow up statement doesn't include something about you moving to Worcester."
Feeling a pout begin to push her mouth forward, she mashed her lips into a thin line. "I already told you I'm not going back to work on that damn banana hammock movie."
Slowly reaching out, he cupped one side of her face. "And I said you don't need to worry about money."
Arguing with him was exhausting, especially when he touched her so tenderly, his gaze earnest and full of an affection she didn't think he could fake, even as good an actor as he was.
"I want to go home." She kept the whine out of her voice but not the slow creep of defeat. "Last night was amazing, but that's all it was—a night."
His face hardened. His hand retreated to his side.
"Shayna's got the kind of memory you'd expect if you crossed Stalin with an elephant," he warned, his tone slicing from crisp to sharp. "She saw you on the set one of the times you were dressing me—"
Something whipped across his face, another flash of anger, maybe.
"What?"
He shook his head. "No detours down memory lane, baby girl. Just believe me when I say she'll remember where she saw you if she hasn't already. By the end of the day, she'll have your name and the address you had on file for the film."
Melanie sucked a sharp breath in. Cammie's name was the only one on the apartment's lease, but Melanie had listed the address with the union and all of the work agreements she'd signed since moving in with the dancer. Whatever trouble Shayna might make by sending the paparazzi over to the apartment would hit Cammie, too.
Melanie wasn't sure Cammie's family fully understood what she did for a livi
ng. Based on some of the half-heard phone conversations, Melanie was pretty sure they thought Cammie was a waitress at the clubs and kept all her clothes on.
The corners of Melanie's mouth began to pull down toward the end of her chin.
"Don't," he softly teased and tried to erase the frown with a stroke of his fingertips. "It'll freeze like that."
She moved away, crawled up onto the bed, her feet touching the floor and her elbows propped against her knees. She opened her mouth to make one last protest but couldn't get it out before she buried her face in her hands.
Cammie would need someplace to stay other than the apartment.
"Won't the photographers be camping out here, too?" she mumbled around her palms.
Hell, there had probably been at least one up in the palm trees when she crossed from the main house to the guesthouse and back again last night. For all she knew, her image was already up on some gossip site.
"Yeah," he admitted, joining her uninvited on the bed. "Are you asking for your roommate's sake or yours?"
"Cammie's," she whispered. There was no way to keep her own name out of it, but she could try to keep Cammie's face and name from being plastered around as some side dish of speculation.
"You stay here, with me," he offered, "and I'll get her someplace nice to stay and pay off the rest of your lease."
Her head shot up at the proposal. Nothing in his tone sounded meretricious, but she was skeptical.
"Stay?" she asked.
His mouth twitched. Half irritation, half amusement, but he sounded perfectly casual as he answered. "Any bedroom in the main house you want to claim is yours."
She scowled at the ambiguous response then covered her face again.
"I need a shower," she said from behind her hands. "Coffee with lots of sugar and cream and a little time to think."
"Wouldn't think of demanding otherwise," he said before planting a soft kiss on her shoulder. "You get a shower while I make the coffee."
25
Stepping out of the shower fifteen minutes later, Melanie found Cammie, not Declan, holding a tray with two lattes on it.
"I know you were expecting someone tall, golden and hotter than a ghost pepper," she said, putting the tray down and handing Melanie a cup. "But I insisted on satisfying myself that you were okay. I mean, he seems like a great guy who definitely digs you, but..."
"I might injure myself with my own drama?" Melanie asked with a raised brow.
The astute, down-to-earth blonde had warned Melanie before about Melanie's propensity for...
Her mouth twisted as she tried to remember Cammie's word for it.
Oh, yeah, "engaging in confirmation bias."
Cammie's theory was that, if Melanie thought Declan couldn't possibly desire her or, even if he did, that the world would never accept her by his side, then Shayna's little performance would be twisted until it perfectly fit Melanie's view of the world.
Woe is me.
"I was going to say that I don't really know him and appearances can be deceiving." Cammie took a sip of her latte then winked at her friend. "But now that you mention your unfaltering opinion that the whole world despises big girls, there's a definite possibility that you might have been up here murdering your chances with one of the planet's hunkiest hunks."
Melanie's face contorted into something forlorn. He was more than just a hunk. When he was in action, whether before the camera or just moving through life, he absolutely took her breath away. The way he spoke, especially when his voice went all husky or his eyes did all the talking, the way he moved—everything.
"So, I'm just gonna come straight out with it," Cammie started before hiding behind a longer sip on her latte. "Declan...he, uh...told me about the offer he made you...to help shield me, put me up someplace for a while and get us out of the lease on Normandie—if you 'stay' with him."
Melanie offered a blank stare and Cammie reached out to curl her hand around Melanie's arm.
"I don't want you making any decision based on what you think my needs are." She gave Melanie's arm a soft squeeze. "This is your heart you're deciding. I've always known I was going to have to come clean some day with my family and I'm not ashamed of what I do to give my..."
Cammie swallowed hard, her brown eyes suddenly swimming with the threat of tears.
"What I do," she continued, "to give my little brothers and sister a better life."
Melanie blinked against her own need to cry. She absolutely would make a decision that took Cammie's situation into consideration. They were best friends and Melanie had dragged her into this mess.
But she needed to know what the real situation was.
"They aren't all your siblings, are they?"
Cammie was a few years younger than Melanie, the youngest of her three "siblings" was a six-year-old boy. If he wasn't her brother, she would have conceived him when she was around sixteen and delivered him when she was seventeen. The next youngest, a girl, would be twelve soon. That was a six-year gap and Cammie was always evasive about which of her mother's children shared the same dad.
"Matt is mine," she confessed and wiped at her cheeks.
"From..." she couldn't bring herself to finish the question.
Cammie recognized where she was going and shook her head vigorously. "No, thank God. I don't know what I would have done—other than prayed a whole lot hoping I would magically figure it out. No, I went a little mental after the prosecutor wouldn't file charges."
She shrugged. "Figured I might as well slut around if that's how everyone was going to treat me."
She paused for a second then growled. "Fuck, that Shayna bitch really pissed me off...everything about her, but the question about whether you drugged him really makes me want to gouge her eyes out."
Cammie's cheeks burned a bright red as she sucked in fresh air. "Like it's some kind of joke."
Melanie took her friend's coffee away and wrapped her in a tight hug. Pulling back, she kissed Cammie's wet cheeks then dried them.
"Are you okay to be alone for a little bit?" she asked.
Cammie nodded and Melanie gave her another hug.
"Okay. I need to find Declan. I'm going to stay, but he will have to do more than find you a safe place to live while things die down."
26
Declan had the waffle iron out and a serving tray filled with freshly cut melon and strawberries. Feeling a giant twinge of hunger, she sat on a kitchen stool across from where he was working the iron and bit off the tip of a fat strawberry.
He sighed, the sound colored with dreamy, erotic undertones. She glanced up to see his gaze locked on her mouth, not the iron.
"Your waffles are starting to smoke."
Despite the rough start to the morning, she couldn't help but laugh as he rushed to stop the waffles from getting ruined by his inattention. It reminded her of Cammie just a day earlier coming out of the bathroom to find a real life movie star and sex symbol standing in the dinky living room of her apartment while she had her hair wrapped around a hot curling rod.
Only this time, Melanie was apparently producing the effect on Declan that he had produced on Cammie.
"I hope that tease in your voice means you're staying," he said, his tanned cheeks flushing a light rose.
Sweet heavens, was there a sexier man on the planet?
"I have a few concerns," she started.
Between leaving the bedroom and having him ogle her while she did something so innocent as take a bite of fruit, Melanie had tentatively decided that, if she was going to be crucified by the likes of Shayna, she might as well enjoy the benefits of Declan's company.
"Fire away," he said, giving the waffle iron a quick wipe with a wet paper towel before pouring fresh batter.
"If Cammie and her car haven't already been photographed, I want to keep that from happening. I don't know what I can do about the home address, but I don't want her identified as associated with any of this."
Nodding, he flipped two waffles onto
one plate and two onto another. He slid one in front of her and the other toward the empty spot next to her. Reaching into his pocket to pull out his phone, he pointed his chin at the empty spot.
"Tell your friend to come down and eat. I need to make some calls."
Three hours later, Cammie was gone, having been hustled into a sedan with tinted windows dropped off by a rental company. Tucked into her back pocket was the address of a furnished condo in a safe neighborhood that was hers rent free for the next six months. And a certain frighteningly expensive attorney had already called the property manager for their apartment, closing out the lease and reminding the company of the tenant's privacy rights.
But all of the miracles Declan had worked in such a short time couldn't keep Melanie from pacing back and forth. She had done it while Cammie was still there, and it had only worsened once her friend was gone.
For starters, she worried about everything getting back to her mom. Even though her mom didn't follow the kind of sordid gossip Shayna was likely to kick up, some of her friends, especially her Facebook friends in her reading groups, did. So it was a question of how many people might see any of the press coverage and link the Melanie Archer in the press to Nancy Winslow's daughter Melanie. Not to mention that Roger was probably following his nephew in the news.
Melanie only hoped that her mother having kept her maiden name would keep the press from finding her. And that Nancy Winslow's friends wouldn't rat her out. After three years working in LA around the studios, Melanie knew even the smallest fact related to someone as big time as Declan was worth a couple hundred dollars. Heck, she'd had payoff offers while working on the last movie if she could so much as tell them how he liked his coffee.
Other offers had been more disturbing. Corbin Dash at Celebrity Zone had offered her ten thousand dollars to sneak a camera into the fitting area! If a grainy shot of Declan's bare ass was worth ten thousand, what would CZ pay for information about him fucking his chubby wardrobe girl?
