Fall in Love Book Bundle: Small Town Romance Box Set

by Grover Swank, Denise

  It had worked. Gotten her out of her head as I lavished her lips with crimson, lined her blue eyes with smoky gray liner. Lucia had requested me at her next shoot. And the next and the next, and as we both grew increasingly more famous, our friendship became one of the most important things in my life.

  People always asked if it was hard to be best friends with a famous supermodel. But it really wasn’t. Sure, sometimes when she stopped by my apartment and I was wearing stained sweatpants and my old Clash tee-shirt—and she was just coming from yoga, dewy with sweat and looking like she’d just stepped off of a Maxim cover—yeah, sometimes it was hard.

  Except I had found that true friendship could exist without jealousy. And that described my friendship with Lucia.

  “Hey,” she said. “How ya doin’? What do you need? Are you nervous? Excited?”

  A longer pause.

  “Do you need me to break you out of this situation and drive us across the border? Because I will. Thelma and Louise-style but without us dying in the end.”

  I laughed, taking a tiny sip of champagne. The bubbles made me sneeze.

  “I feel fine. Happy,” I said, running my fingers over the giant diamond ring Clarke had slipped on my finger barely three months ago. “I just want it to get here, you know?” I said, and Lucia nodded as she listened. “I want to be married to Clarke. To leave the reception and float away on our magical honeymoon.”

  I trailed my fingers through the balmy summer air. Everyone was here in the city—my entire family from both Los Angeles and Mexico. All four of my older brothers plus their wives and partners and children.

  It was happening. This time tomorrow night, Clarke and I would be married.

  I glanced at Lucia again, smiling. “I’m really ready. Lo prometo.”

  I watched as she suppressed a look I couldn’t quite understand. But it was gone just as quickly, so I had probably imagined it.

  “Good,” she said, reaching forward to squeeze my hand. “And I’m really happy for you.” Another squeeze. “Although, if I was being honest, I’m a little surprised you wanted such a tame bachelorette party.”

  “Really?”

  Lucia laughed nervously. “Yeah, I guess. I thought it’d be like one of our usual nights in the city. Sushi at Katsuya. Cocktails at The Varnish. Burlesque and dancing at The Edison. Tip off the paparazzi early so we’re in all the gossip rags. Go to bed at dawn.” She poured a little more champagne into her glass, offering me more, but I shook my head. “That kind of night. But you’d be wearing a cute white sash that said Last Night of Freedom or something.”

  My chest hurt, just a little. I took a deep breath, and it eased.

  “I know,” I said. “And I know you would have planned a wild night filled with scandal that we would have talked about until we were ninety.”

  “We can still go, you know,” she said, starting to slide off the hood. “I keep an emergency stash of high heels and see-through shirts in my trunk. I’ll call my agent and get us on the list at—”

  “No, no,” I said laughing, pulling her back up. “You’re nuts, mija. I just want to sit here with my best friend and drink a responsible amount of champagne. Talk about my wedding day. Look at the lights.”

  Lucia was smiling, but it looked strained. She was usually vivacious and funny and down for anything. But she looked… weighed down in some way.

  “Clarke likes to stay in,” she said simply.

  I nodded. Shrugged.

  “He’s definitely a homebody. He didn’t even have a bachelor party,” I admitted, which I did think was odd at the time. But his friends had busy work schedules, and it just didn’t pan out. The only thing that matters is we’ll be married. Together forever, he’d said.

  “And I like that. It’s… different. I’m not twenty-two anymore, Lu.” I clinked my glass against hers again. “You’ll know what I’m talking about soon. When you get older.”

  “But I’m never getting older so…” she said dryly, tapping her finger against her lips.

  I rolled my eyes. Super models were on a tight time limit, age-wise. Something she obsessed about every day. I watched her face go from joking to serious again.

  “I never want you to lose yourself,” she said softly. “With Clarke. I never want… Marriage doesn’t mean you’re not an individual anymore,” she said, then chugged a mouthful of champagne.

  “I wouldn’t worry about that, mija,” I said, laughing fully now.

  Her face softened a little, and she laughed with me.

  “Okay,” she started. “Not to bring the night down, but I wouldn’t be your best friend if I didn’t tell you the truth. I’m Team Josie, always. Also—”

  I glanced at her, slightly worried.

  “Also, I know I was joking about the Thelma and Louise thing. But if you need…” she looked around suddenly. “If you actually didn’t want to get married to Clarke. If you… I don’t know, if you wanted me to just drive us away from here. From your parents and your brothers and the venue and the cake and the bouquets of roses… I would. In a heartbeat. No questions asked. No judgment.”

  She was gripping her plastic cup so tightly I thought she’d crack it.

  And then the strangest feeling washed over me—a sudden desire to jump in the car and whisper “go,” because she would.

  Lucia would do anything for me.

  But then I shook my head fiercely, effectively tossing that wayward thought back out into the hot California sky. I wasn’t sure where it had come from, and I was deeply uncomfortable that I’d even entertained it for a second.

  This was Clarke. My soul mate. The love of my entire life. Sure, things between us had moved fast—I’d always thought I’d never be married. Never be tied down to another person, never have to rely on another person. I’d been relying on myself successfully for years—proudly, even. I put myself through cosmetology school while working two jobs. Pulled myself, tooth and nail, up the ladder, finding and securing the best celebrity clients as the years went by. Routinely worked twelve-hour days and still found time to go dancing with Lucia, both of us addicted to the pulsing thrill of L.A. nights.

  But then… well. Then Clarke happened, like a tornado I couldn’t help but be sucked into. Most people in my life, including Lucia, were shocked when I told them we were engaged.

  Too soon, I heard them whisper.

  They didn’t get us, and really, they didn’t have to.

  “I appreciate that,” I finally said, pulling her in for a sloppy hug on the hood of her car. Kissed her cheek. “Really, I do. Tu amistad significa el mundo para mi.”

  “Si,” she said softly. “Your friendship means the world to me too. Siempre.” Lucia pulled back, wiping her eyes quickly, although it didn’t hide the small tear that slid down her cheek.

  “Lu?” I asked, concerned. I held up the champagne. “It’s my night, remember? I haven’t been a Bridezilla once, but heaven help me, I will turn into one if you don’t finish the fuck out of that champagne.”

  She laughed with me and obliged, knocking her cup back. She reached into her pocket and turned on the speakers in her car. An old Mary J. Blige song came on, her smoky voice lilting through the open windows. I grinned, leaning back on the car, laying my head next to Lucia’s.

  “You know champagne makes me weepy,” she finally said. “Now let’s talk about all the things you’re excited about for tomorrow.”

  “The dress,” I said, watching a few stars twinkle above us. They were particularly resolute, shining their light through the layers of smog that coated the L.A. sky. I loved that sky. I was a child of smoggy sunsets and hot asphalt summers; mariachi horns coming from my neighbor’s house on a Saturday night; abandoned cars parked in front of vibrant graffiti; break-dancers in front of crisp white mansions.

  I would never live anywhere else.

  “Your dress is perfect,” Lucia said softly. “What else?”

  “The first dance. When I get to say I do. The first moment that Clarke
will see me, walking down the aisle.”

  My throat tightened with a sudden spike of emotion as Lucia held my hand, both of us gazing up toward the stars. The music continued as we finished the champagne, our voices blending together.

  Tomorrow, everything would change.

  Tomorrow, my dreams would come true.

  Chapter 1

  Josie

  Two years later

  “I think I got it,” I said, sketching out ideas on a white sheet of paper. “Shay Miller wants ‘wild child’ meets Haight-Ashbury with a dash of wood-nymph sprinkled in.”

  I pictured the texture of leaves woven through blonde hair, peace signs, and suede fringe.

  “Gold eye shadow. Bold lips.” I glanced up at Lucia, who stuck her tongue out at me. I laughed. “I’m thinking… deep magenta. Maybe some body paint.”

  Ray, the creative director for this shoot, nodded vigorously. “As usual, Josie, you’re a goddamn genius.”

  “Why, thank you,” I said, pressing my hand against my chest. “Although Lucia is the best canvas.”

  Lucia responded by contorting her face into a terrifying grimace.

  “See what I’m working with? Pure poetry.”

  Lucia burst out laughing.

  Ray rolled his eyes. “Remind me to never book the two of you for a potentially career-changing project ever again.”

  Lucia and I exchanged a look. Both of us had worked with Ray Freeman often throughout our respective careers, and he was never not overwhelmed and anxious. He was in his early forties, white with salt-and-pepper hair. Brilliant creatively, but at least half a dozen times over the past day, Ray had gripped my shoulders, shaken me, and said this is a career-changing project, Josie.

  The chance to work with Shay Miller, L.A.’s current fashion obsession, was a big fucking deal. He’d recently launched a new fashion line called Boho and wanted Lucia, and our friend Taylor Brooks, in a provocative photo shoot that would display his bohemian, funky clothing.

  And out of every single celebrity makeup artist in the city—and there were many—Shay Miller had chosen me.

  I picked out colors and palettes from my giant black bag. I loved the texture of gold, and it would shimmer on Lucia, but I also wanted to test out something charcoal-colored.

  “Sit,” I said to Lucia who complied dutifully. She immediately took out her phone and began scrolling through her many social media platforms.

  “Eyes closed.”

  “But then I can’t Snapchat,” she whined.

  I tilted my head at her. “At this point, can’t you just do it from memory?”

  She grinned cheekily, then fluttered her eyes closed. I leaned forward, gliding on a blend of colors. Testing and seeking, my endless quest for artistic perfection.

  “I’ll keep working on it,” I said softly to Ray. “Send Shay some mock-ups and my initial ideas. Prove to him I can do it. When do we leave?”

  “In a week. And he already thinks you can do it. That’s why he hired you. And you’re going to do great,” Ray said before sighing loudly again and sinking into a chair. “And, just so you know, we’ll be on location for three days. Up in Big Sur.”

  “That far?” I asked, tilting Lucia’s head to the left and right. Even with her eyes closed, her fingers were flying over her cell. “I’ve never been there before.”

  “Shay liked the idea of it. It’s kind of a bohemian place, and the main location is this old bookstore called The Mad Ones. Which used to be famous. The town is right along the coast, very rural. Just a bunch of hippies and artists living along the cliffs.”

  “Huh,” I said, writing something down. “Sounds like I’d hate it.”

  Ray flashed me a grin as Lucia snorted. All three of us were born-and-raised in Los Angeles, and would never even consider living elsewhere.

  Especially not someplace described as rural.

  “Also there’s no cell service up there and very little internet,” Ray said calmly.

  Lucia’s shoulders stiffened.

  “It’ll be all right,” I soothed. “It’s just three days.”

  My best friend could barely go a minute without checking her thousands of fan notifications—let alone 72 straight hours.

  “I think there’s an internet cafe?” Ray said, and Lucia literally growled.

  “Somehow we’ll find the will to survive, Lu,” I said sardonically. “And eyes open.”

  Her blue eyes looked annoyed. But also gorgeous with the eye shadow. Gorgeous and very… bohemian.

  “What do you think?” I asked, turning to Ray. Lucia struck a pose.

  Ray shook his head, muttering beneath his breath. “A goddamn genius.”

  Lucia and I high-fived.

  * * *

  An hour later and we were sipping kale smoothies on a patio, watching the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles on a Monday morning. Punks on skateboards and a man dressed as Santa Claus hula-hooping. Men and women in high-end business suits, barking into cell phones. A few celebrities in giant glasses, ducking their heads down to avoid the flash of the paparazzi (Lucia and I had already posed sweetly for a few of them).

  The morning was sticky with heat, the sun rising up between the palm trees and the bright pink jacaranda.

  “When do you leave for Paris?” I asked, biting my straw.

  “Two more days,” Lucia sighed then slapped on what looked like a fake smile. “That’s when I meet with Sabine to go over the Dazzle contract. And then off to Big Sur.”

  I shook my head in disbelief. “I still can’t believe you fucking scored Dazzle, Lu.”

  It was one of the largest cosmetic lines in the world. And they wanted Lucia to be their cover girl for two years. The only down-side was they were moving her to Paris. A reality that made me alternately thrilled and nauseous.

  Because Lu and I were inseparable.

  “You’ll love it there. Right?” I said, kicking her leg beneath the table.

  She was gazing into the distance with a strange expression. “Oh, of course,” she said and then took a giant gulp of smoothie. “I mean…it’s Paris. What’s not to love?”

  “Your best friend won’t be there, mija,” I said. “But you’ll get a lot of French cock.”

  Lucia spit out her smoothie, laughing into a napkin. “Nothing gets me more turned on than the idea of a disembodied penis with a French accent.”

  My cell phone buzzed. A text from Jason. Had a great time last night. When can we do it again?

  I ran my hand over my bare left finger—an old reflex—then turned the text toward Lucia.

  She leaned in, read it. Arched an eyebrow at me. “What are you going to text back?”

  I grinned. Composed a message: Never. We can never do it again.

  Lucia shook her head. “Fucking maneater.”

  “Hey,” I said, palms up, “I tell them from the beginning. It’s one night, and that’s all. I can’t help it if I’m absolutely extraordinary in bed.”

  “Josefine Torres,” Lucia laughed. “The Maneater of Los Angeles.”

  Briefly my throat tightened, a hoard of memories clamoring to be let out. But I swallowed against it.

  “That’s me,” I sighed, turning back toward the hot, burning sunlight.

  Chapter 2

  Gabe

  When I was just a gawky fourteen-year-old, my dad shoved a backpack into my hands and informed me I was not to come back to the house until the sun had set.

  “Where am I supposed to go?” I had asked.

  “Out there,” he’d said. “The woods. Where we live.”

  “By myself?” I’d asked in the endlessly petulant tone of teenagers. “And do what?”

  “Walk,” he shrugged. “Find a trail and follow it. You know your way around this forest.”

  Which was true. You couldn’t really live in Big Sur and not be familiar with the wilderness. I’d spent the majority of my formative years under a canopy of redwoods, leaping over logs and climbing branches and running through creeks. I kne
w, because of television, that a lot of kids played on things called jungle gyms. Or on street corners or small, orderly patches of grass called backyards.

  But in Big Sur, the Ventana Wilderness was your backyard, and there wasn’t anything small or orderly about it.

  So I was familiar with the forest. I wasn’t familiar with what I was being asked to do.

  High school had started a few months earlier, and so far the experience had been atrociously awkward. My friends had grown a foot overnight, were going on dates and sneaking out to party.

  Meanwhile, I was a late bloomer: still at five-and-a-half feet tall with no facial hair, and every social interaction felt like it was happening in a foreign language.

  Things that had once come easily (like talking) now felt like a giant mystery. A mystery that everyone else seemed to have the answers to while I was left stubbornly in the dark.

  I’d been listless and sulky. Even my siblings, Austin and Isabelle, didn’t want to be around me.

  My parents definitely noticed.

  “Learning to embrace nature, to search for stillness. It changed a lot of things for me,” my dad had said, indicating the great big world outside our window. “And I learned to embrace it at a very important time in my life.”

  He glanced at my mother, eyes softening. She winked at him.

  “This is going to sound like complete and utter nonsense to you right now. But focus on your surroundings. The grandness of it, the sheer size.” He placed his hand over my heart. “The stillness.”

  “What the fuck?” I asked. Puberty had made me aggressively defiant.

  But my parents were nonplussed by my teenaged antics. “The woods,” he repeated. “Go. And don’t come back until you’ve learned something. I packed you lunch and dinner.”