“Why you?”
She winced, trying to hide the hurt I’d unintentionally caused. Fuck. Again. This was exactly what I meant.
“I write—wrote—Um … I’m a writer and I have written several stories about you. And the show.” Her face flamed red. She pinched the area between her glasses. “Yeah, maybe this isn’t the clever idea that they think it is. I have foot-in-mouthitis around you.”
“I’m going to talk to the director,” I said.
“Wait.” Her hand shot out to stop me. She grabbed my arm and we both stared at it. If I thought my blood was heated before just being close enough to smell her and see her individual lashes, her hand gripping my bicep was incendiary.
She dropped it. “I didn’t mean to disrupt anything. I’m happy to do it, obviously. Thrilled. I just … I feel like I keep messing up with you.”
I wanted to bare my teeth and growl. She thought it was her fault? I was an embarrassing mess at interviews when I was pissed, and now I’m rubbish and too quiet being sober.Iwas the issue here. It wasn’t her fault that I barely lasted five minutes during interviews. I wasn’t fit for her company. She deserved more than this.
“It’s not you,” I ground out. “Excuse me.”
I turned away sharply. I needed to figure out a way to fix this.
* * *
Kate
For the secondtime in twelve hours, I stared in shock at the retreating form of Charles Downing.Charlie, he’d corrected. What had I said this time? He was much more volatile than the media made him out.
No, that wasn’t fair.
We had been having a good conversation. He’d seemed genuinely concerned about me, albeit a bit sleepy and grumpy. I’d been trying not to look at him, but he was somehow so much better looking close up, even slightly puffy from just waking. Maybe more so. In slid an image of him rolling over and smiling sleepily on a pillow glowing with soft morning light…
I stood up abruptly and walked off the classroom set. I would go get coffee until it was my turn for hair and makeup in a few hours. My stomach was too knotted up to eat.
The fight last night had been brutal. Pete had already sent me several texts that started with apologies and then became more and more angry.
The one that I had just gotten before Charles, er Charlie, showed up had told me I was an embarrassment to TF and to writing.
Even though I knew he was just lashing out, it was a kick to the gut.
My first evening in LA had gone so poorly. I stretched the truth in my last email to make RC think I was glad to have come.
And Iwasglad. Mostly. I wanted RC to think his pushing me had benefited me. It had. I was still here for my writing, and Pete be damned.
And then Charlie found me.
I still couldn’t wrap my mind around it. We’d had a conversation. And then … What? He said it wasn’t my fault he got upset but … uh, nobody else was around.
I hated that I couldn’t read him. I hated that I thought I even had the right to read him even more.
Back to square one. I would be professional. Distant. No more crying. No more being an overly emotional fangirl.
In the makeup chair, coffee in hand, I anxiously waited to learn what the plan was for today. I had little gel things under my eyes to help with the dark puffy circles from crying and curlers in my short hair. I looked absurd. I snapped a picture and emailed it to RC with the subject, “Am I beautiful yet?” I sent it without thinking and then cringed for a solid minute straight. How the hell was he supposed to answer that and still maintain the careful distance we’d built? Foot-in-mouthitis was worsening.
It’s not you.Charlie’s rich, deeply accented voice replayed in my head.
The guest in the makeup chair next to me—a woman who read the books while battling cancer, saying they saved her life and taught her how to fight—and I chatted a little about how excited we were. I’d sat next to her and her husband last night at dinner and enjoyed their company. Her name was Kristen, and she was my mom’s age, but the warmth that poured from this woman was nothing compared to the cold professional who raised me. She had that zest for life that I’d always envied.
I’d been debating if I should text Pete and ask him to back off when my ears perked at something my stylist was saying to the man next to her. Kristen’s hairdresser was leaning closer to hear over the sound of the hair dryer.
“I guess he threw a fit and demanded to change his interview or something,” she said.
Instantly, I knew they were talking about Charlie. The dread that Kristen’s easy conversation had coaxed out of me returned in a dizzying flash.
