Chapter 1
If Holly Ainsworth had a dollar every time someone yelled, “how much?” she’d have enough money to buy a first-class plane ticket to the Bahamas. But, instead of relaxing on a white sandy beach soaking up the balmy sunshine and sipping a strawberry daiquiri, she sat on a dirty bench at a Sydney train station, staring at the timetable board. The train to Melbourne was departing at 8 p.m., in forty-five minutes. The last thing she wanted to do was return home. There was a good reason she’d fled in the first place—demanding parents and her ex-fiancé’ Oliver’s, betrayal. But after five months living in Sydney, she was broke and, as of tonight, unemployedandhomeless.
Gaining curious stares from commuters ambling past, she tugged down the faux leather miniskirt rising up her fishnet covered thighs. The flimsy material didn’t stretch far.
Defeat pressed against her chest and she sighed. How life had changed. She had no other choice but to go home. Because going back to Declan’s apartment where she rented a room, wasn’t an option. For months, he’d encouraged her to take their friendship further. Promised he wouldn’t hurt her or break her heart like Oliver had. She was still hurting from Oliver’s, affair and found it hard to trust again. Eventually, she grew the courage to start a relationship with Declan and she’d planned on telling him tonight after the fancy-dress party. But she’d left him alone for ten minutes, to grab a drink, only to find him sucking face with a slutty nun. Apparently, he was sick of waiting for her to make up her mind. His actions just cemented what she believed—men couldn’t be trusted.
Holly shivered in the cool, autumn evening. In her rush to leave the fancy-dress party, she’d forgotten her coat. Nor did she have her key to Declan’s house, so she could gather her things before racing to the station.
“I’ll give you fifty dollars for a quickie in the men’s bathroom.” Startled, Holly swung around to discover that a man with a thinning comb-over and silver-framed glasses and reeking of perspiration had sat too close to her, while she lost herself in thought.
“I’m not what you think I am.” Holly propelled herself from the seat, desperate to get out of the station and away from the creepy man hoping for aquickie. She crossed her arms over her middle trying to cover as much skin as her gold bra top would allow.
Nearby, she spotted a café. Hopefully, she could sit there safely while waiting for the train.
She needed to keep a sharp eye on the time because there wasn’t another train until the next morning. If she missed it, she’d have to figure out where to spend the night. She’d wiped out most of the money in her bank account on a train ticket. The cash in her purse wasn’t enough to get any decent accommodation. Unless she stayed at…
No. Her parents would hear about it and be on the phone asking questions. And then she’d have to listen to her mother gloat about how leaving the family business was a huge mistake.
The night air caused goose bumps to explode over her skin, and she longed for her coat. She tried finger-combing her teased hair into soft waves but her honey, brown locks looked more like just-had-sex hair and didn’t help to detract from the skimpy clothes. To top a bad night off, she wobbled on throbbing feet over the cracked, uneven footpath in six-inch stripper heels like she’d been working hard all night.
The café came into view. Before she ducked inside, bright lights up ahead and a bustling of activity caught her attention. Forgetting about her outfit, curiosity drove her to walk to the park to check out the commotion. Normally Rydon Park was a quiet place for people to sit and relax or walk through on their way to the train station. Now the green grass and landscaped gardens were filled with cameras, microphones, cables and other bits of equipment Holly didn’t recognise. A small version of train tracks cut through the park with a man sitting on a cart holding a camera on his shoulder. A cherry picker, with another man and a camera, hovered above the ground.
She’d wandered onto a movie set. How wonderful!
Movies had always fascinated her. Not so much the stories but the way makeup transformed actors. Good makeup turned a plain woman into a beauty queen or a beautiful woman into an unattractive mess. Makeup changed a person.
Much like what she’d done to herself for the party.
It wasn’t hard to cake on cosmetics, it was an artform to create yourself into a character. After hours of watching YouTube videos and using her sister and friends as guinea pigs, Holly had the knack for applying makeup.
Checking her watch, she still had twenty-five minutes before her train left. Enough time to catch a closer look at what and who they were filming.
At the edge of the park, a group of people corralled in an area to her left. They were shouting something. She moved closer. Then she caught the name, Ethan Doyle. Oh my God, the big blockbuster action hero was here? She wanted to catch a glimpse of him.
Thanks to her stripper heels, she could peek over some equipment blocking her view. She only saw men and women scurrying around with clipboards and wearing headphones shouting instructions to whoever listened on the device.
Maybe if she stood with the fans, she’d get a better view? With the number of people huddled together, she didn’t like her chances of squeezing herself through to the front. Luckily, so far no one had paid any attention to her lurking in the shadows; they were too busy telling the fans to, ‘please be quiet’. Now was her chance to move and score a better look. She spied a long white trailer of some sort she could hide behind it to get closer to the action.
With every step she took, she sank into the spongy grass and uneven ground stumbling like a drunk. Worried she’d twist an ankle, she slowed down. Before she made it to her intended hiding place, a crew member turned and headed her way. She was reading something from her clipboard, if she kept going, she’d run into Holly.
Holly swivelled her head left and right, looking for an escape, her heart pounding. Could she get arrested for trespassing? With a movie being filmed with huge Hollywood stars, she didn’t want to stick around to find out.
The closest thing to hide in was the trailer. Maybe it was some kind of office and hopefully empty. With her decision made, she took a step forward when the door to the trailer flung open.
“Well? Have you found her?” Ethan Doyle, Hollywood superstar and last year’sPeople’s sexiest man alive stood at the top of the steps asked clipboard woman who was heading their way. Dressed in a navy buttoned shirt rolled to the elbows and black pants, a gun belt hung low around his waist and a shiny silver pistol sat in its holster on his hip. His olive complexion was marred with a cut on his forehead. Blood dripped down to his manicured stubbled chin—the makeup done so well it looked real. Jet-black, tousled hair completed the bad-arsed look. And he was so much hotter in person. How was that possible?
Thankfully he didn’t notice Holly hiding in the shadows near the steps. Maybe she could still slink away.
Instead of fleeing, she froze on the spot too starstruck to move.
The woman Holly had been trying to avoid jogged over and stood next to her. Holly’s stomach dropped. Was she going to be thrown off set or worse, arrested? The woman clutched Holly’s arm and pulled her forward.
“Right here, Ethan. Hooker number three. If you’re done with makeup, you’re needed by the fountain.”
Wait, hooker number three? What the hell were they talking about?
Ethan Doyle glanced at Holly, giving her a hard, green-eyed stare. “The one that was missing?”
