by Logan Chance
“Mhm, I just needed a few drinks to get through tonight,” Nova says with a slight slur to her words. “No offense. And I love Chardonnay.”
She’s cute. “I’ve noticed.”
Her eyes graze over the scruff on my jaw. “Did you know that Emperor Charlemagne couldn’t drink red wine without slobbering it on his beard? Disgusted his wife so much, she had white wine grapes planted.” She snaps her fingers. “Voila, Chardonnay.”
I chuckle. “Lucky us.”
“I think owning a vineyard would be great.”
“Uh, yeah I guess.”
“You get to drink wine all day, and at night you get to sit under a blanket of stars and drink more.”
“Yeah.” I think I’d rather just stare at her instead.
“Look up there.” She points to a black sky with a million tiny stars sprinkled across it. “Beautiful, right?”
I glance up, then back at her. “Sure, ok.”
“That’s you.” She points her hand up again.
“What’s me?” I watch her face smiling up at the stars.
“See how that star is shining brighter than the rest?” She sways a bit as she gazes skyward.
I place a hand on the small of her back to keep her steady. “Yeah, I guess.” Honestly, all the stars look like little dots.
“That’s like you. In a world of billions, you’re one of the ones that shine brighter than the rest.” She turns to face me. “People watch you, admiring you, wanting to be just like you.”
“I don’t know about all that.” I gaze into her eyes, wanting to tell her she’s the moon. “I should drive you home.”
“Yeah, right. On your bike?” She laughs, stepping away. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m wearing a dress.”
Oh, I’ve noticed alright.
“You can’t drive home. Enough said.” I move over to the bike and slide on. “Get on,” I tell her.
She decides not to argue and places a hand on my shoulder. My spine stiffens as she slips behind me and I feel her heat against my back. The engine roars to life, and I reach behind me to place her arms around my waist. It’s five minutes of exquisite torture riding to her house, feeling her pussy pressed against me. When she heads to her room for the night, I’m thankful I fly back to LA in the morning.
Because I’m losing all self-control around her.
Chapter 8
Nova
“Why would you want me to look like an Oompa Loompa?” I glare at the orange gumdrop-frosted bridesmaid dress I’m in. It’s poofy, and all wrong. And did I mention orange?
My mom laughs. “You look gorgeous.”
Hardly. I park a hand on my hip that is somewhere beneath the ruffles. “Mom, give me a break.” I turn to face my mother’s best friend. “Kim, what do you think?”
Kim’s Irish green eyes smile at me. “Let’s try again.”
She thumbs through the dresses on the rack and pulls a sleek little lavender number out of the rainbow of colors.
Now we’re talkin.
If I have to do this, might as well look good doing it. I slip inside the dressing room and listen to my mom and Kim talk as I change. Today is all things wedding, and all of this just makes it more real. It’s happening.
The silky lavender dress glides down my body to flare gently just above my knees. I look at the price tag and cringe.
When I step out, my mother stands on the dais with the trifold mirror in front of her.
“Wow.” My breath escapes me. “Mom, you look beautiful.”
The classic satin and lace wedding dress hugs her figure. She turns just a bit to check out the back of the bias-cut gown. “Thank you, honey. And definitely the lavender.”
“Dahlia, this is the one,” Kim tells her.
More important, let’s hope Patrick is the one.
I change back into my white shorts and blue ombré top and spend the next thirty minutes waiting while mom is fitted and makes the final selections. When she floats into the dressing room to change, Kim brings up what I’d like to forget. “What’s it like having Ethan Hale staying at your house?”
The mention of his name causes my face to flame as red as her hair. That motorcycle ride was hot. All that power beneath me, and the way he handled it. Being so close. I went straight to my room when we got home, because I was too turned on to be around him. And this morning when I woke, he was already gone.
“Let’s just say, there’s good and bad,” I tell her.
“Nova, he’s still adjusting,” Mom scolds, gently, exiting the dressing room dressed back in navy slacks and a white top. “Give him time.”
“Adjusting to what? The wedding?” I ask.
“Patrick says one day he was just a normal guy, and the next, he was this mega superstar.” My mother steps over. “He just needs to find his balance in this life. He’s so far up he needs something to ground him.”
I let that sink in. His fame is fairly new, and I feel a little bad for him. To go from obscurity to his level can’t be easy.
“Time to celebrate,” the sales associate interrupts, bringing in a silver bucket filled with ice and a bottle of champagne. She sets three flute glasses down on the small table, pops the cork, and fills them to the brim.
I take a sip and let the bubbly hit the lump in my throat.
No matter how many times my mother has been married, seeing her in her wedding dress always makes me teary. Seeing her walk down the aisle turns me into a blubbering baby as well.
But, it’s the hope my mother has with every marriage that gets to me. The hope that this time it’ll stick.
And I hope she’s finally found something with Patrick.
After confirming the order, we exit the storefront, and I say goodbye to Mom and Kim.
People mill about on the sidewalk enjoying the cloudless sky and low humidity. I’m off today and Ethan won’t be back for two more days, so might as well enjoy my freedom. I need a cowboy hat for an upcoming segment, so I decide to do a little more shopping and head down the cobblestone sidewalk of Main Street, toward the shopping center in the heart of town. It was a big deal when we got the mini-mall, because people thought it would take away from the local businesses. It hasn’t. It’s been here for five years, and nothing’s changed, except, now, we can enjoy chain store coffee and free wi-fi.
When I step inside, I head straight to Clean Cuppa and order my favorite: an iced caramel macchiato with extra caramel.
When I exit, coffee in hand, ready to shop, I hear a strange click.
“Are you Nova Sparks?” someone yells right next to me. He might as well have blown a horn in my ear. I jump, crushing the plastic cup in my hand. My treat splashes all over my shirt. And then I’m blinded. A light flashes in my face, and it takes a minute for me to realize someone is taking a picture. Repeatedly.
“What the heck?” I kind of sort of yell at the man behind the lens.
Shoppers stop and gawk, and I make a quick detour to the trash can before hustling toward the exit. The cowboy hat will have to wait.
“You’re pretty hot,” the stalker calls out behind me. “How are you and Ethan getting along? Rumor says he’s in town.”
My footsteps fall faster across the pavement. Ignoring him doesn’t work. He tails me with his questions, like we know each other, like he didn’t scare the bejeezus out of me and ruin my shirt.
“Where is he staying?”
“Is Harley with him?”
“How does he feel about his new stepmom?”
I spin around to face him. “Stop following me.”
“Come on, give me something.”
The flash clicks incessantly.
“How’s this?” I give him the finger and power walk down Main Street toward my car.
“Thanks, Nova,” he calls out.
A quick peek over my shoulder reveals he’s given up his pursuit, and I let out a relieved breath.
When I get to my car, I slide in and lock the doors with shaky fingers. And then, unlike peopl
e in movies, I check the backseat to make sure no one pops up screaming more questions. It’s empty, thank God.
“What in the world?” I whisper to myself, slumping back against the seat.
It takes a few minutes for the shock to subside. I’ve always felt safe here, but now, not so much. It’s a little creepy he knew where to find me. I couldn’t even tell you what he looked like.
I drive home in a daze. When I get there, I’m out of my car and into the house so fast my feet don’t touch the ground. I lock the door and close all the blinds—just in case my new paparazzi friend decides to pay me a visit. That’s a really sobering thought. Surely, he wouldn’t go that far? It’s a bit unsettling, standing in my living room, wearing a coffee stained shirt that smells like caramel, to realize the magnitude of the invasion on Ethan’s privacy.
It’s also a little unsettling that I’m alone. And it’s a lot unsettling that an unwelcome thought of how quiet it is here without Ethan just pranced its way through my mind.
I turn on the tv to drown out my thoughts and remove my soiled shirt on the way to my bedroom, where I change into comfy cotton shorts and a Harry Potter tee. Feels weird to strip again without closing the door, and I almost expect Ethan’s handsome face to peek around the door at any second and catch me in my bra and panties.
The rest of the day is spent cleaning and pretending none of this matters. I’m an adult, and it was one isolated incident. Ethan deals with this daily.
After a dinner of chicken cooked on the new grill, salad, and wine, I settle on the couch to watch tv. It’s so odd to not have him here. I stop on one of those gossip/entertainment shows when I see Ethan’s smiling face. Harley Morgan sits beside him, beaming. She’s gorgeous: glossy dark hair, blue eyes, and camera perfect features. A Megan Fox to my, hm, I’m going with Blake Lively, because why the hell not?
They talk about their movie and every so often, she looks over through her thicket of lashes and gives him a little nuzzle with her arm against his. Like a cat marking its territory.
It’s the strangest thing to see him when I’m sitting in the same spot he slept. He seems more human now. Especially after that motorcycle ride. Now I know what the flesh and blood feels like. And now I wonder just how well Harley knows the flesh and blood. Not that it’s any of my business. Who cares if she’s had sex with him? Or if they’re having sex right now. Not me.
I switch their perfect faces for Netflix and toss the remote aside. Somewhere in the middle of my Stranger Things marathon I fall asleep and dream about wild sex with him on his bike while paparazzi yell questions at me.
The next day all hell breaks loose.
Chapter 9
Ethan
“We need to talk,” I text Nova.
“What’s up???” she replies.
Despite the gravity of the situation, I smile at her extra question marks, and this is no time to be smiling. I’ve been in LA five days, and in that amount of time, Nova has managed to become a headline.
I send her the picture.
The picture of her looking very fuckable in little white shorts and a dirty shirt. The picture with her blue tipped middle finger in the air.
“WHAT IS THAT?????????” she replies in an explosion of question marks.
“She is not happy,” I mutter to myself.
Jared, my personal assistant, sits on an outdoor couch at my home in LA, watching me.
“Can you blame her?” he asks, looking over his glasses. “That’s her introduction to the world as your stepsister.”
I don’t know if the world is ready for Nova. I don’t know if I’m ready for Nova.
“She’s not my stepsister yet,” I remind him. “Let me call her.”
Part of me doesn’t want to acknowledge the fact that I’m glad I now have an excuse to call her, to hear her voice, because that would mean I’ve thought about her, maybe jerked off to those thoughts, and I certainly have not. Today, anyway.
I step away to the edge of the property.
“Please say that’s not what I think it is,” she answers on the first ring.
I hear the rush of her footsteps and a door closing. She must be at the salon. My mind creates an image of her there, nervously biting her lower lip, her eyes filling with anger. Probably dressed in something sexy.
“Listen, the first rule of paparazzi is do not engage with the paparazzi.”
“He jumped out of nowhere, Ethan, and I crushed my coffee and spilled it on myself,” she whispers. “I was really looking forward to that coffee.”
Oh, damn. That explains the dirty shirt. I can totally picture a smiling Nova, in all her petite glory, being excited by something as simple as a cup of coffee. “I’m sorry,” I tell her.
I’m not sure why I feel bad, but I do. I scrub a hand along my neck, trying to rub the guilt away, and gaze out at the ocean.
“Did you make the coffee?” she asks.
I laugh, something I haven’t done all week. “No.”
“I’ve been dying for an opportunity to say that to you.” She sighs. “Ok, back to the important stuff.”
“I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon. You’ll get the full Ethan Hale lesson in paparazzi.”
“Can’t wait.”
When I disconnect, my agent, Vickie Walters, stands propped against the patio table. Fuck. I was really hoping she’d bail on her threat to show up here when I refused to go to her offices.
“Was that the incest waiting to happen girl?”
Jared rises from his seat, his eyes wide. “I’ll leave you two alone.”
“I already said no, Vickie,” I remind her. “You’re not going to change my mind.”
“Listen,” she coaxes, turning on the charm to take the sting out of her words, “it’s not that bad.”
“Make the studio happy, right?
“Yes. And who knows, maybe you’ll actually enjoy it.”
The cut of her red hair is as sharp as her skills. She represents some of the hottest actors around.
Last year, Dalton Bruce was found passed out in his car with drugs and hookers all over him, and Vickie worked her magic and was able to keep all of it out of the press. She’s good.
She has a lot of connections and knows when to use them. And in this industry of madness, she’s made a pretty big name for herself as being the ‘Wolf Of Hollywood.’
Basically, no one fucks with her. Not her clients, not the press, no one. Except, me.
I smile. They can think they’re pulling the last string, doesn’t mean I’ll give the performance they expect.
Chapter 10
Nova
Is this really my life now? Is this what I have to look forward to being related to a movie star: driving home from Walmart, at midnight, in my pajamas, with a stack of gossip mags as my passenger? And not for anything, it’s not even a cute picture. I look like a snarling jackass. And the headlines, my god.
Ethan Hale’s new family pissed off!
Ethan Hale’s sister salutes you!
My face plastered everywhere with my finger in the air isn’t something I’m sure the executives at KTVM will appreciate. And, ugh, Lisa isn’t going to be happy either. This won’t exactly help her convince the powers that be in Seattle that I’m what they need.
In all honesty, I didn’t think about the fame in this sense when my mother mentioned that Patrick’s son was the Ethan Hale. All I could think about when she laid that info on me at dinner, was his freaking hair.
I never thought for one second how this would affect me in the long run. How people will now put me under a microscope like a specimen to study. I was worried about Pity Falls, not the whole country.
But, what’s more upsetting than sneaking into Walmart in the dead of night and explaining to Jean Moore what really happened as she scans my face on the pile of magazines I snatched from the rack— this is his life, times a million. I’ve had one incident; he’s had to fend off the paparazzi every time he steps foot outside for years. And if not the paparazz
i, then fans. I’m not sure the tradeoff is worth it. I like peace and actually drinking my coffee instead of wearing it.
The lights of my car spotlight my house as I pull into the drive. I grab the stack, scurry inside all the way to the kitchen, and plop them down on the counter. Staring at the angry image of me, I shake my head at how surreal all of this is. When I look up, I scramble back and scream loud enough to shake the earth off its axis.
Ethan stands in my kitchen. He laughs. Hard. Laughs when I’m nearly in cardiac arrest.
“You scared me half to death,” I shout. “What are you doing here?”
According to himself, he’s not supposed to be in Pity Falls until tomorrow, and I kind of assumed he’d be getting a hotel this time.
“That was priceless. I haven’t laughed that hard in a long time.” He moves closer, still grinning, still chuckling a little. “I decided to skip out of LA a little early.” He looks at my pile and then back at me. “Is that where you were?”
When he showed me the picture, I almost completely melted down. At first, I was going to ignore it, but then I couldn’t sleep and decided to take a drive to see for myself.
“I haven’t even read it yet.” I flip the tabloid on top open and thumb to the picture of myself. The article is a paragraph and mainly about him.
“I’ve conditioned myself never to read gossip rags.”
“Aren’t you curious what they’re saying about you?” I ask.
“In the beginning, yes. I wanted to know every little thing being said. But, most of the time it wasn’t true, or they took something innocent and twisted it. Other times it’s stuff about my movies. Things that aren’t that vital for me to read.”
I give a little nod, studying him. Such self-control it takes to not give in to the poking. Because, honestly, I want to shove my foot up this guy’s ass. And I’m not a violent person. “I’m sorry they lie in the magazines.”
He leans in. “Well, are you the one writing the lies?”
I smile. “No.”
“Then there’s no reason to be sorry and no reason to read this garbage.”
He places his hand over mine, and this feels very much like a moment. I can’t really move because I don’t want his hand to leave mine. And it doesn’t. He rubs his thumb, slightly, and a firestorm of want blazes across my skin. Through my skin, into my cells. I try to appear unphased by his touch—by the look in his eyes. The blue is a slim halo around the black of his dilated pupils. I read an article once that said dilated pupils are an indicator of sexual attraction. My brown must be completely gone. “I should go to bed,” I manage to get out.
