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Apparently he did.
“I heard you’re coming with us now,” Adalyn said.
I nodded, reading the list of cities on the screen as they scrolled along the bottom. “I haven’t even been to most of those cities before.”
“Rhett will be slammed. His schedule is so tight, but there will be days he won’t need as much hair and makeup, I’m sure.” She gave me a hopeful smile. “He’s not really the fussy sort anyway; he just needs it for all the cameras. I bet you’ll have time to sightsee a little.”
I’d rather be with Rhett. My shoulders wanted to bend in disappointment at how little it sounded like I’d be around him, but I rallied. This was okay. It was still worth it. I still got to touch Rhett’s hair and face for a month. I mean, it’s not as if I had actually believed he would take one look at me and fall madly in love. I hadfantasizedabout that happening a lot, but my rational brain was still very much alive. A girl could hope. Rhett had been so talkative, asking so many questions, like he really wanted to learn more about me. That had to mean something, didn’t it?
Or maybe I was imposing my fantasies on a real man, and I needed to accept the situation at face value: I had the opportunity to spend four weeks with a man I’d had a mad crush on for half my life. No, I would probably not convince him to fall madly in love with me and run off into the Malibu sunset with me in a hot-red sports car, but I could keep these real memories forever. I had a solid fact for Two Truths and a Lie now.
If Rhett happened to fall in love with me along the way, that would be nice too.
A flurry of activity brought my attention to the commercial break and the end of Rhett and Sunny’s segment. Rhett walked off the set and approached us. The assistants stood at attention, but Rhett walked by. He winked as he passed me. “See you next week, Beth.”
Chapter Five
I sat in the brownleather stylist chair in my home studio and swiveled back and forth, watching my reflection in the mirror. My tiny two-bedroom apartment should really be called one-and-a-half rooms, but the small second room was perfect for an old chair I found at a garage sale a few years ago and a long mirror. Now when I did my family’s hair for free, I had a great little setup at home to make it easy.
There was also a futon in here for when my mom came to stay.
Mom. I pulled out my phone and dialed her number, setting it on speakerphone. I’d spent the last three hours texting and calling my clients about rebooking with me or seeing Zoe if they couldn’t wait, and my smile voice was fatigued.
“Hi, baby!” Mom shouted into the phone.
“Where are you today?”
“Hmm,” she said, as though she had to think about it. “The Texas route.”
“Nice. And the weather?”
“Sticky.”
I could feel my skin recoil at that.
“Enough about me. Are you all packed?” She lowered her voice, asking like a seventh grader at a sleepover and not my very mature flight-attendant mother. She was based out of LA now, so we didn’t see each other often, but we talked on the phonea lot. I’d filled her in on the Rhett situation and my opportunity, and she’d squealed very much like a seventh-grade girl too.
“I haven’t even started yet. I’m still trying to get ahold of each of my clients and rebook them. I’m going to be so busy when I return. This was such a headache. I almost wish I hadn’t agreed to it.”
“Really?” she asked, disbelieving.
“No, of course not.” I looked down at my calendar and saw the next name on the list, and my stomach tightened. The bride was nice enough, but her mother was horrible. If Godzilla and Nordstrom had a baby, that would be this woman. She always looked like she was about to host a ladies’ tea but was prepared to rip your throat out if you didn’t provide homegrown honey specially harvested freshly for her scones.
“Good. The Beth I raised wouldn’t pass up an opportunity to get a Rhett-sized diamond on her finger.”
Sigh. A diamond from Rhett sounded like perfection. Completely unrealistic, but nice all the same. It was hard enough finding a normal man who would commit to forever and mean it—I wasn’t holding out hope for a movie star to be any better when he was off the screen. “Mom, I’m not crazy.”
“No, of course not.” She did not sound convincing.
I traced over Momzilla-of-the-Bride’s name and phone number with my pink pen. “You sound like you want me to get Rhett into the library alone at the ball so he can compromise my good name and force a marriage of convenience upon us.”
“Actually, I’m wondering if you’ve been watching too many period dramas with Charlie again.”
“Not lately. She’s been so busy trying to get ready for Liam Junior’s arrival.” Which Iloved, of course. I wasn’t that awful friend in movies who was angry about my best friend marrying the prince charming of her dreams and starting a life and a family that included 80 percentlessBeth time than it did pre-Liam. But there was that tiny, itty-bitty part of me that was sad about her moving forward at a faster pace than I was. Call me naive, but I always assumed we would do everything together in adulthood as we’d always done as kids and teens. Go to college together, get real adult jobs together, get married together, have babies together. Now Charlie was doing all these amazing things while I stood aside and watched.
True, I’d datedfarmore than Charlie ever did. But the girl was picky. I’m not one to say no to a free meal and a fun ax-throwing excursion, even if the guy wasn’t going to be my soul mate.
Mom made a cutesy sound at the mention of Charlie’s baby, and I felt the strong urge to redirect the conversation before she started asking for details about the ultrasound photo currently taped to my fridge. I’d taken a picture of it when Charlie gave it to me and texted it to my mom, so shereallydidn’t need to keep bringing it up every time we spoke on the phone. Mom’s crooning over an adorable baby sucking his thumb in utero was a message, and I was adept at reading between the lines. Her message was loud and clear:When are you going to date someone for longer than six weeks and settle down so I can have an ultrasound photo onmyfridge?
