Mr. Wrong

by Hart, Alessandra

  “What are you drinking tonight?” he asked, flashing me another panty-melting smile.

  I figured I may as well enjoy his attention while it lasted. “Cosmopolitans,” I said with a sheepish smile.

  “Sex and the City fan, huh?”

  “I was when I was younger. Not so much anymore. But I still love a Cosmo.”

  “Well, that’s because they have cranberry juice in them. Cranberries are amazing,” he said. “Best part of Thanksgiving is cranberry sauce, in my opinion.”

  I smiled. “I agree. Best part.”

  “Well, look at us, having things in common,” he said before nodding at the bartender and quickly ordering our drinks.

  I laughed. “I doubt you and I have much in common apart from our mutual love of cranberries.”

  “We’ll see,” he said. “Sorry, how rude of me. I didn’t get your name.”

  “Nora Valencia,” I replied. “And I already know you’re Jacob Archer.”

  “That I am,” he said with a wolfish smile.

  “So what are you doing here alone?” I asked as the bartender speedily set our drinks down in front of us. “Aren’t you meant to be having a wild threesome with a TV host and a model? Oh, there’s something else we have in common, by the way. I also have regular threesomes with models.”

  He chuckled. “You’re funny. And no, that threesome rumor is exactly that. A rumor, and nothing more.” He clinked his tumbler of whiskey against my cocktail glass. “To answer your question, I was meant to meet a friend here, but he canceled at the last minute. I was about to go home, but then I saw you from across the room, and I had to come and talk to you.”

  I looked down at my drink, embarrassed, and then I pretended to lean down and fix a strap on my left shoe for a second as my mind raced. Was this guy for real or was Angie paying him to hit on me? Yes, that had to be it. She worked as a TV writer, so she must’ve met him at some point, and then she must’ve slipped him five dollars to pretend to be my rebound tonight.

  Wait, no, that didn’t make any damn sense. Famous actors didn’t need more money than they already had, let alone five extra dollars. I quickly rose back up to face Jacob. His interest in me was likely real, so I needed to enjoy it while I could.

  “Sorry. Stupid shoe nearly fell off. Anyway, why’d you have to come and talk to me?” I said coyly, stirring my cocktail with the straw and looking up at Jacob through my eyelashes.

  “Because you’re beautiful,” he said. “Sorry, that sounds shallow, but it’s true.”

  “Well, I suppose you can’t exactly see someone’s personality from across the room, so it’s not that bad,” I replied, my cheeks turning warm from the compliment. “And thank you. That’s very kind of you.”

  “It’s more honest than kind. You’re smoking hot. I’d really love to take you out for dinner sometime, if that’s not too forward,” he said.

  Oh. My. God.

  Jacob Archer was actually asking me out!

  Shit, I needed to grab this bull by the horns while I could. What rebound date could be better than one with a famous actor? The mere thought made me giddy with excitement. Plus, on the off chance James saw me out and about with this sexy man, he’d probably feel like shit, thinking I’d easily upgraded from him to a Hollywood star. Total win for me.

  “How’s this for forward?” I replied, leaning closer. “Why don’t we have dinner tonight? As in right now. It’s still pretty early. Your friend canceled on you and mine just left, so it’s not like either of us have other plans.”

  Jacob raised his eyebrows as I spoke. He obviously wasn’t expecting such a keen response. Most women probably played hard to get with him, thinking that was the best way to ensnare a high-profile guy, but I wasn’t going to do that. Nope, I was getting on this ride as soon as I could and making sure I stayed on long enough to nab that rebound date.

  “Sure,” he said, wide grin lighting his handsome face. “There’s a great seafood restaurant a few blocks down from here. It’s one of my favorites. Wanna go there?”

  “I love seafood,” I replied, throwing back the rest of my drink. “Let’s go.”

  And with that, I walked out of the bar and into Jacob Archer’s world.

  4

  Jacob

  This was like shooting fish in a barrel.

  I’d never met a woman so eager to be with me. They were all eager, of course, it’s just that they usually acted coy and played hard to get for a little while, so Nora was knocking the concept of being forward right out of the park. I hadn’t expected to score a date with her so soon, but here I was, already walking her to an expensive seafood restaurant up the road from her favorite bar.

  I guess James was right about her after all. She really was a man-eater. Either that or she simply didn’t mess around and got straight to the point, which was a quality I’d actually deeply admire if she wasn’t such a nasty, dog-thieving individual.

  So far she’d come across as friendly and witty in an adorably dorky kind of way, and it was difficult to see how such a monster could lurk underneath that beautiful, charming façade. But I knew it was there, and by the end of this date, she was going to regret screwing with any man, ever, because I was going to show her what sort of assholes could be out there waiting for her if she kept screwing over all the nice guys.

  By the time I was done, I was going to have her tearfully crawling back to James, begging for his forgiveness as she realized what a good guy she’d used and thrown away. Forgiveness that wouldn’t be forthcoming, of course. She didn’t deserve it, and she wasn’t going to get it, but still, it would be funny to see or hear about her begging him if things went my way.

  I hadn’t forgotten about the dog, either. I was going to find out where she lived over dinner and figure out a plan to steal him back.

  Overall, tonight was going to be the icing on the cake of what’d been a great day for me already. My agent had called me earlier to tell me that Meridian was giving me the lead part in a new sports movie that was starting production soon, and I couldn’t be happier. It was tipped to be the biggest sports movie of the decade—a biopic about Walter Simmons, a recently-deceased former star football player. Scoring the lead was going to be a major coup for my acting career.

  Hopefully my acting prowess could also help convince Nora that I was a truly terrible person.

  I was nice enough to open the door for her and pull out her chair when we arrived at the restaurant, and I made polite and friendly small talk with her for a few minutes until a waiter arrived to take care of us.

  After that, all bets were off.

  “We’ll take two Surf and Turfs with extra lobster, please. Lots of extra lobster. And we’ll decide on drinks later. Also, can I smoke in here?” I said to the waiter, completely ignoring Nora’s request for crab linguine and another Cosmo. “Sorry, I just think it’s better for the man to order,” I added, turning back to her once the waiter had finished taking our order and informing me I couldn’t smoke inside—not that I was really going to anyway. I just needed to look as bad as possible.

  Nora stared at me, her eyes quickly widening. “What do you mean?”

  I casually shrugged. “As the more powerful, dominant gender, most decisions should be left to us. You know what I mean?”

  She frowned. “No, I really don’t.”

  “I’m just saying, women are usually small and weak and pathetically emotional. It’s all those period hormones, right?”

  Christ, this was funny. I didn’t actually agree with a single word of what I was saying to Nora, of course, but the look on her face was priceless.

  She narrowed her eyes. “Men are filled with massive amounts of testosterone—which is a hormone, by the way—and that governs their emotional responses a lot. Most violence in the world is committed by men. Angry men. So if anything, I’d say men are the more emotional, hormonal ones who can’t be trusted to make decisions without rashly punching someone in the face.”

  I leaned closer with a
smirk. “Sounds like you’re already getting a bit emotional over this topic,” I said. “Proving my point for me. Just face it; women aren’t as good at staying neutral and making decisions. Unless it’s a decision about which shoes to wear to which social event.”

  “Wow. That’s got to be the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” she said, crossing her arms.

  “Agree to disagree,” I said, patting down my pocket. “Shit, I just realized. I forgot my wallet. You can pay for us, right?”

  She raised her eyebrows, then nodded slowly. “Sure. I guess it’s the twenty-first century, after all,” she said. “Despite women like me apparently being so emotionally inferior and terrible at decision-making, we actually have jobs and money.”

  I gave her a beatific smile, ignoring her sarcastic jab at my earlier sexist comment. “Great.”

  “Would’ve been nice if you hadn’t ordered two of the most expensive things on the menu with extras, though,” she muttered under her breath.

  I ignored her and summoned a waiter to bring us a bottle of the most expensive wine on the menu. Nora was visibly annoyed at me already, as evidenced by her flashing eyes, but to her credit, she was mostly keeping her cool.

  “Hold on,” she said after a moment. “If you didn’t bring your wallet, who paid for those drinks you got us back at the bar before we left? I completely forgot about the check.”

  I waved a hand. “No one paid. I’m used to getting free shit, y’know? I just walk in and people hand stuff to me. That’s a perk of being really fucking famous.”

  She looked horrified at my flippant attitude about not paying for things, and I grinned. Truthfully, I’d given the bartender his payment along with a huge tip when Nora quickly ducked down to fix a strap on one of her shoes earlier, but I didn’t want her to know that. I wanted her to think I was the asshole of the century, and giving big tips to bartenders wasn’t conducive to that at all.

  “I…um…I suppose that makes sense,” Nora finally replied, clearly forcing a smile. “I guess there’s a lot of perks to being famous.”

  “Yeah. Like the women. There’s so fucking many of them frothing at the mouth over me, all wanting to get slammed. Honestly, it’s like a pussy buffet out there,” I said.

  “How lovely,” she replied, her voice turning frosty.

  She quickly gulped down her wine in one big mouthful. Good. I was already pissing her off enough to make her start pounding the booze just to deal with me. She was persistent, though, I’d give her that. After all, she was still here with me, wasn’t she?

  “Yeah, you should see this chick who guest-starred on my show a few weeks ago. Biggest tits I’ve ever seen, hot as fuck. Only fifteen. But you know what they say… if there’s grass on the field, play ball.”

  Another horrified expression flitted across Nora’s face, and she swallowed hard. “That’s a disgusting thing to say. She’s fifteen!”

  “Aw, come on. It was a joke,” I said with a wink. “But not really. She was hot.”

  “Jesus Christ,” I heard her mutter under her breath.

  “So what do you do, anyway?” I asked, pretending not to notice how awfully things were going already.

  “I’m a film consultant for Delos. Basically, we help movie studios ensure that everything is accurate in the scripts and filming. Like fact-checking, or making sure a particular scientific thing is even remotely feasible. Stuff like that. My specialty is sports, although I can do everything else too.”

  I yawned loudly. “That’s… nice. I think it’s really cute that you’ve got a little job to occupy yourself with until you get married.”

  Nora’s mouth was practically hanging open by now. “Are you serious?”

  I held up my hands, palms facing her. “Oops, sorry, I forgot what a feminist you are.”

  She looked like she was about to say something, but then shook her head and didn’t bother. She was pretty resilient. I was surprised she hadn’t threatened to leave yet, although to be fair, I hadn’t brought out the big guns just yet. I still had a lot more to give.

  I kept the conversation going for another fifteen minutes or so, easing up on her and actually saying some normal, nice stuff for once, because I couldn’t have her storming out of here just yet. No way. I needed her to stay for the entire date.

  Just as she looked like she was finally relaxing, I started being a dick again.

  “So where do you live?” I asked. I didn’t give her a chance to reply before I went on. “I don’t know if you know this, but I have a mansion in Beverly Hills. Really nice area, as you can imagine. Was pretty cheap—only cost me a few million. But it’s still probably more than what you’re used to as a regular person, right?”

  I put ‘regular’ in air quotes.

  Nora glared at me. “I live in Brentwood. It’s very nice too.”

  “Oh, whereabouts in Brentwood?” I asked. “I know lots of people who live there.”

  She hesitated. I could tell she didn’t want to tell me exactly where she lived, but she also didn’t want to seem rude, despite how rude I was being myself. “In Ellesmere Circle,” she said. “It’s a gated estate in the area. Very big.”

  She obviously added that last part as a clear ‘don’t bother looking for my house, there’s at least fifty or so in that area, so you won’t be able to find me,’ statement, but I smiled to myself anyway, having already gotten what I needed. On our short walk to this restaurant earlier, she’d mentioned what sort of car she drove and what color it was (because I asked about it in a sneaky way). So my method of nabbing the dog from her was simple: I just had to get into the estate and cruise around for a while until I found the place with the right car.

  I actually knew Ellesmere Circle quite well, and it was a relatively upscale estate in the already-wealthy neighborhood. As such, there weren’t many people living there who drove old Toyotas, so it wouldn’t be too hard to find her house (unless she liked to park inside her garage, but here’s hoping she didn’t bother due to the already-safe nature of the estate). I’d also be able to bypass the security gate to the neighborhood, because all I had to do was flash a grin at the guard and tell him who I was.

  Easy.

  The dog would be back in James’ arms by tomorrow at the latest.

  “What about your hobbies?” I asked, changing the subject so it wasn’t too obvious that I was trying to scout her address for nefarious purposes.

  “I love watching sports,” she said. “And also the usual pastimes, I suppose. Movies, music, cooking.”

  “Cool. Nice and basic,” I said, managing to make the word ‘basic’ sound as snide as possible.

  “What about you? What are you into?” she asked, although I could tell that she didn’t really care at this point.

  “Serial killers,” I said, setting my knife and fork down on the table with such a loud clatter that she jumped in fright. “I’m really into researching them. This one guy used to skin women and make lampshades and other stuff out of them. Even made a bowl out of a skull.”

  Our meals had long since arrived by this point, and Nora was mid-bite with a chunk of lobster as I started raving on about skull bowls and skinned women. She looked like she was about to vomit, and she quickly set the food down and took a big gulp of sparkling water.

  “That’s… um… an interesting hobby,” she managed to choke out after finishing the entire glass of water.

  “Yeah, it is. You know, this other guy started raping and killing women because his girlfriend wouldn’t do anal. Isn’t that fucking awful?”

  She nodded. “Yes, that is awful. What a terrible reason to start killing people! Not that other reasons are any better.”

  I plastered on a confused expression. “Huh? No, I meant it’s awful that the girlfriend wouldn’t do anal. I mean, no wonder he went on a killing spree.”

  Nora almost choked on the mouthful of food she’d just spooned into her mouth, and she glared at me. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Yeah, mostly
.”

  “Mostly?” she said, hazel eyes blazing hotter as she reached for her wine. Christ, she was sexy. Such a shame.

  “Well, I mean, you’re right, it’s awful that he was killing people. But seriously, more women need to try anal. I won’t date a girl for more than a week if I know she won’t at least give me a go at the backdoor.”

  “Good to know,” she said, gripping her wine glass so tightly that I worried it might shatter in her hand.

  “Don’t worry, though,” I said with a cocky wink. “You look like you’d love it. I can tell. And this meal is gonna cost you nearly five hundred bucks, which I imagine feels about the same as being fucked in the ass for someone on a salary like yours.”

  “Okay, that’s it,” she said, loudly pushing her knife and fork into the center of her plate. “I’m leaving. Don’t worry about taking me anywhere. I’ll catch an Uber home.”

  I feigned confusion. “Why are you leaving? I thought things were going really well.”

  “You did?” she said, voice dripping with scorn.

  I nodded and leaned forward. “Yeah. I thought you might want me to take you home and continue our date in more…private circumstances. If you catch my drift.”

  She stared at me long and hard, and I fully expected her to slap me or tell me to fuck off. Instead, she finally gave me a brisk nod.

  “Okay. Sure,” she said, getting to her feet.

  “Wait…what?” I replied, my eyebrows shooting up. What the hell? Had she really just agreed to take me home? Honestly, was this woman crazy? Surely I’d misheard or misunderstood her.

  “You heard me,” she said, picking up her purse and arching a brow at me. “My house. Let’s go. Now.”

  5

  Nora

  Jacob Archer was by far the biggest asshole I’d ever met in my entire life… and I was going to sleep with him.

  Don’t judge me too quickly. I had my reasons. Two, to be precise.