by Ali Parker
I lifted my leg and shook it like a dog might. "That feels good. Scratch my belly and move lower?"
"Gross." She popped me and sat back. "Spill, Ethan. I know you've been struggling with something since she signed the papers. What happened?"
"I already told you, D. Shit. The story doesn't change. She came over for a conversation, I did as you asked and played gentleman. It sucked to not let her see the real me, but obviously they prefer the mask." I put another balloon to my lips, blowing hard.
"I don't believe you." She reached out and gripped the balloon, pulling it hard. My hard work deflated before me, and I picked up another and pulled it tight between my fingers before releasing it and laughing as she squealed.
"Look, she wanted something to happen between us, and I sure as fuck did too." I shrugged. "But, you were right. I need to respect her as my co-worker and not give in to the animalistic urge I have to see how far I can press my-"
"Okay." Deza stood up and lifted her hands. "Save it for the screen. I don't want to hear anything else about the shit running laps in your head."
"Just the stuff about you?" I reached out and gripped her hand.
She turned and looked down at me. "Don't hurt her, okay? She's new to all of this, and you don’t know her story at all. Rise above your horniness and help a sister out."
"You or her?" I lifted my eyebrow in genuine confusion. I didn’t know her story. Hell, I didn’t know Deza’s it would seem. At twenty-four I was still operating off of a ‘me-only’ persona. Something inside of me shifted, and I couldn’t tell if it were for the better or not.
"Her, you nugget-head." She tugged her hand from mine and popped me in the head. "And don't be telling no one that she tried to kiss you. Lies only hurt the liar."
"What? That's a fucking lie." I chuckled and rubbed my hands over my chest. "She did try to kiss me, and you'd be proud to know that I carefully turned her down."
"Are you serious?" Deza put her hands on her hips and scowled. She was a small fry, a good head and a half shorter than me, and yet she had the ability to make me wiggle in my seat. She was my mother, my sister, and my best friend most days. Seeing that I didn't have any of those things in my life, she was keeping up quite well.
"Yes." I shrugged and stood up, not liking the way she hovered above me. "She said she was just testing me with the kiss thing. I guess she wanted to make sure I wasn't the total cock everyone believes me to be."
"You're not a cock, and no one believes that you are but you." Frank walked back into the room and rolled his eyes. "People are just personifying James Bond onto you."
"Testing you?" Deza seemed to ignore Frank's comment.
I didn't mind so much if people's perception came directly from my on-screen roles, but that wasn't the case at all. I'd been a cock in public in my late teen years, and it'd been a hard pull to get back on track... while faking it.
"Yep." I walked toward the door. "I'm going to get something to drink. I'll be back when the party starts."
"Don't be late." Frank glanced over his shoulder as Deza walked toward me.
"I'll walk you to the elevator." She moved past me into the hall, surprising me a little.
"I'm a big boy now. I even put on my own undies today, the right side out." I wagged my eyebrows at her. "Wanna see?"
"No, pain in my ass, I don't." She slipped her arm into mine and glanced up at me. "I don't think that Riley was testing you for a minute. She's a very straightforward girl, and if she wants to know something, I believe she would just ask."
"Then what do you think she was up to? Trying to sexually harass me in my weakened state?" I pressed the back of my fingers to my head as we stopped by the elevator.
"I swear you're bi-polar."
"Tri... but what's new."
"She has feelings for you." Deza shrugged as if her words didn't mean much.
"Already? Impossible. She doesn't even know me." I reached out and pressed the button on the wall in front of me as I let out a yawn.
"Of course she knows you, Ethan. She's been watching you grow up on screen for the last ten years. We all know you, or think we do." She patted my back as I walked into the elevator and turned around to face her.
"Right... You guys know Ethan Lewis, the actor, but you don't know me."
"I do, sugar cakes."
"This is true, and you're still around. Sounds like you need a raise." I gave her a weak smile as the door closed and carried me down to the first floor of the production studio.
We were hosting a large press conference that evening to make the announcement of who would be joining me on Down Low and then moving into a dinner and dance event for the crew. We were packing up and leaving for Rio the next week, and tonight was the night to try and gel a little as a team and have some fun doing it.
"Hey you." I looked up to see Nancy walking toward me. She took good care of making sure I looked the part no matter what she had going on. As my make-up artist, she'd seen me through some rough fucking mornings and helped me to disguise my pain through some less-than-stellar life choices.
"Hi, Nancy. You wanna come make me look pretty before this thing starts?" I gave her an award-winning smile and wrapped an arm around her frail shoulders. She could have been my grandmother and I would have been better off for it. At least I'd have some family besides my brother Liam.
"You bet, handsome." She glanced up at me as I pulled from her and opened the door, holding it to let her go through. "Your dark circles are getting worse. Are you using the cucumbers on your eyes?"
"Nope. I use them for other pleasures." I winked and offered her my arm.
"Dear God, please tell me that you just ate them."
"Something like that, yeah." I nodded toward my trailer. "We going in there for this rendezvous or do you need light?"
She chuckled. "Go get dressed and meet me in your dressing room. Your trailer has an odd vibe to it."
"Wait, what? Like what kind of vibe?" I crossed my arms over my chest and gave her a look my mother would be proud of if the old bitch paid any attention to me.
"Just a vibe." She shrugged. "Forget I said anything.”
"Oh, hell no." I moved toward her and gripped her shoulders lightly. "Is it at least a good vibe?"
"Yeah, of course." She adverted her eyes.
"Liar. What's the vibe in there?" I glanced back and tilted my head, trying to think if she meant smell instead of vibe. It always seemed fresh and clean to me, but maybe she was one of those clean-freak people.
"It's dark and the place is bare, Ethan."
I turned and released her. "It's a temporary place to live while we're shooting."
"You've had that trailer for three years. It's not temporary." She reached up and brushed her fingers over the soft skin below my eyes. "Have you decorated your house yet?"
"No, but what does that have to do with the vibe in my trailer?" I snorted, not wanting to dive into whatever she was headed toward, and yet she wouldn't let me escape the truth.
"It has nothing to do with the trailer, and everything to do with you." She poked me in the chest and offered me a weak smile. "Get dressed in that black button down and grey slacks. Actually, put on the slacks and bring the shirt with you."
"You're trying to seduce me again, aren't you?" I winked and took a step back as she chuckled.
"We all are, love." She turned and left me there with the realization of what the vibe was.
Emptiness.
Chapter 2
Riley
"Excuse me! Excuse me! Waitress!" The older lady that stood, yelling at me from the back of the restaurant, had been giving me hell since the moment she sat down at my table.
I cleared my throat and apologized to the guy who was trying to order at one of my other tables.
"I'll be right back. Sorry about this." I gave him a sweet smile that I didn’t feel and walked back toward her in time to watch her drop down into her chair with a loud huff. "I'm sorry, ma'am. What can I help you with?"<
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"Firstly, you can take this steak back to the kitchen. I said medium rare and this is not medium rare at all." She poked at the steak on her plate and glanced back up at me. "What did you write down? Medium well?"
"No, ma'am. I wrote down medium rare. I'm happy to-"
"Let me see your tablet." She extended her hand and watched me with complete disdain. It had been that day already, so having the wicked witch of the west seated in my section was no big surprise. The fact that I had exactly thirty minutes after my shift to drop off a late paper with my English professor and change for the Eon press conference that night had my stomach in knots. I'd been running back and forth to the bathroom my whole damn shift.
"Wilma. Jeez." The little old man beside her offered me a weak smile. "It's all right, dear. Just get the steak fixed."
"It's not all right. Let me see the tablet." She popped the table twice, causing me to jump. Where I wasn't at all docile, having someone snap at me when I was riding on E and headed toward a long night of hiding myself behind a facade of indifference was too much to handle.
I pulled my notepad from my front pocket and handed it to her as I picked up her plate and walked it back into the kitchen.
"This was supposed to be medium rare." I set it on the counter as the chef pulled it close and rolled his eyes.
"That is medium rare. See this?" He poked at it and blood oozed out onto the plate. "Learn your cooking temperatures, Riley. You're wasting my time."
"Great, well, the woman at my table is having a fucking conniption because it's not medium rare to her. Can you please throw another steak on the grill for her? Today's not the day for this." I put my hands on my hips, suddenly so damn tired of my old life.
Barely skimming by from paycheck to paycheck left me angry and quick to tear someone's throat out. The situation with my mother losing our house and lying about keeping my things safe in the process unraveled me even more. I had a bright future ahead of me for sure, but seeing that I was stuck in the present, the future was a world away.
"No. Take it back out there and tell her that the steak is medium rare. Period." He narrowed his eyes on me before turning around and going back to the insanity in the kitchen. The rumors at the restaurant that I’d seen Ethan Lewis had half the place loving me, and the other half not wanting anything to do with me. It was like I was ‘selling out’ by trying to make something better of my life. Fuck them too.
"Fine." I turned and walked back out to the table.
"Here. Obviously it's not you who's an idiot, unless you put in the wrong thing when you typed it in. Where is the ticket you submitted? I want to see it," the woman barked and handed me back my notepad.
The masculine voice behind me caused me to jump. "Hey, we're just going to grab something from somewhere else. This is taking forever."
"No, don't do that. I'll be right with you. I promise." Inadequacy raced through me, and I couldn't help but wonder for the hundredth time why I had decided to wait tables. Nothing was more stressful. People were rude, uncaring assholes on good days...
"I was talking to you first!" the woman barked and stood up.
"You know what? Get your own damn steak." I took off my apron, pulled my keys and what little bit of cash I had from it, and tossed it on the table. "I hope no one ruins your day like you've ruined mine."
I turned and walked out of the restaurant not feeling free like I wish I did, but worrying about how I was going to help Charlotte pay rent until my first advance from Eon Productions came in. I wished it was the worst of my worries, but it wasn't. Facing Ethan Lewis for the first time in almost a week was.
I'd lied about the almost kiss at his house a week before. Shameful pride left me trying to backtrack and cover up my need to push our budding relationship into something it never would be, nor should it. Even more than that, the sickening realization that he was seeing someone, or at least sleeping with her, was devastating. Why I thought an icon like him didn’t have women warming his bed every other night of the week was beyond me. He wasn’t living a normal man’s life. He wasn’t a boy I’d met at school at the coffee shop and our love affair would soon start.
He was Ethan fucking Lewis and this wasn’t the movies. I needed to remember that above all else.
I got into my clunky car and tried to start the engine only to have the car sputter and die.
"No. Please. Come on. Not today. I just made up half an hour. Don't take it back from me," I growled and rubbed the dashboard as I tried again. "Come on, baby. Start up."
Nothing. The fucking thing wouldn't even turn over.
I let my head drop as someone tapped on my window. My manager, Gerald.
"Fucking awesome." I opened the door and got out of the car seeing that I didn't have the ability to roll the window down.
"Where are you going? Someone confronts you over a steak you mess up, and you quit? That doesn't sound like you at all. What's gotten into you? This isn’t how the real world works. It’s not a film." His words were far harsher than they should have been due to his tone and the ugly scowl on his face.
"I'm tired, Gerald. Taking one more person's shit today is likely to send me into being postal. I thought it would be best to walk out instead of try and explain to the woman who was ripping me a new one that her order was right. That I didn't mess up, the kitchen didn't mess up, no one fucking messed up. She wants someone to beat down, and honestly, I'm too beat down by my own shit right now to take anyone else's."
"That's stupid." He put his hands on his hips and narrowed his eyes. "Get back inside and apologize to her."
"I'd rather eat a turd." I leaned down into the car and got my wallet out of the console. "Thanks for the last few years. I quit."
"Don't ask me for a reference. Quitters don't get advances in life." He moved back as I pulled my phone from my purse and started toward home. It was five miles, but I was praying that I could get a hold of my best friend Charlotte, or if nothing else, my fuck-buddy Jace. Surely someone would be free.
"Okay. Thanks for that. It was only three years of my life of never missing a shift, getting here early and always smiling no matter how much my life or this shitty job sucked." I shook my head in disgust and pulled the phone to my ear as it rang. He continued to yap, but I walked down the street with my chin up, ignoring him.
How ready I was for a different life. I wasn't sure the life that Ethan lived was necessarily the one I was after, but one where I didn't have to search for change in the bottom of my car for gas or a loaf of bread at the store would be righteous. To have people pawing at me and worshiping the ground I walked on sounded horrid, but I would take that any day for a paycheck capable of pulling me out of poverty.
Charlotte's phone sent me to voice-mail, and I growled loudly and called Jace instead. He answered on the first ring.
"Hey, baby girl. What's up? Need me?" The laughter in the background told me quickly that he wasn't alone.
"I'm stuck on the side of the road off Vance and Timmons. Can you come give me a ride or are you too busy?" I kept my tone light. Jace was a good guy with a healthy lust for women – all women. He didn't deserve my shit, and after us being friends with benefits since our senior year in high school, he didn't much put up with it either.
"I'm good. Just leaving a barbecue. I'll be there in three minutes. I'm actually just down the road. Must be your lucky day." He chuckled.
"Not really, but thanks." I dropped the call and stopped on the side of the road to find somewhere to sit. It was still chilly out, but would be warming up soon. Spring in Los Angeles was fantastic and half the reason I still lived there. The other half was the hope that I'd eventually make it as an actress, and it would seem I had.
I still couldn't wrap my mind around the idea of being a part of a motion picture. One that people bought tickets to and gathered their friends to see. They would buy buckets of popcorn and a cold soda to sit down in a cold theater and see me. Well, see Ethan Lewis, but me too.
Ethan Lewis.
A long sigh left me as I brushed my fingers through my short strawberry-blond hair and tried not to ride that train of thought too long. Between his wavy chestnut hair and warm brown eyes, I was barely keeping my nose above the water. He had a million personalities that ranged from cheeky to sweet to insanely sexy to dominant. I wanted to know about each of them and get intimate with him in ways that would leave us both drowning.
But... I was being unreasonable. I was a nobody for now. That would change over time, but even that scared me to think about. And even as a nobody, I didn’t look anything like the slutty blond he’d obviously taken to his bed after our meeting the week before, nor did I look like Trish Desmount. They were glamorous and I was plain.
“And filthy.” I glanced down at my white shirt that was stained with food from my long shift at the restaurant.
"Hey, sexy. You need a ride?" Jace smiled and waved me over to his navy blue mustang. "I got a car and a cock with your name on it."
“You finally had my name tattooed on your jimmy?” I laughed as he scoffed.
“Come find out, Riley.” It was a challenge I wouldn’t make good on for a little while the way my calendar was stacking up, but as soon as I could… I would. Having him paw at me sounded delicious, fun, healing.
I gathering my stuff and realizing that my folder with my paper that was due was back in the employee locker room at the restaurant. "Fuck," I grumbled and walked to the car.
"What's up, buttercup?" He reached over and cupped the side of my face, pulling me in for a long kiss.
I melted into it as my eyes fluttered close. He was like coming home. How quickly I could see us turning into something more than we were, and where I wanted that a week back, I wasn't so sure anymore. Ethan seem to be working to take up more and more of my mental energy, and funny enough, he hadn't done a damn thing to deserve the space. He had actually done everything not to.
"I left my paper back at the restaurant." I kissed him again and moved back, licking at my lips and enjoying the subtle peppermint flavor of his tongue.
