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“Wait a second.” Her aunt brought the phone closer to her face. “Clara”—her eyes went dangerously wide—“this is Josh Darling.”
After taking the phone back, she racked her brain for any recognition of that moniker. She couldn’t remember Josh mentioning his surname. But Darling? Come on. “That can’t be his real name.”
The expression on Jill’s face would make the blooper reel of Clara’s life. “It’s not his real name . . .” She paused meaningfully as the waiter arrived to take their order. Only after they’d decided to split a margherita pizza and he’d trotted back to the kitchen did Jill resume her revelation. “It’s his porn name.”
Slumping down in her seat, Clara darted her gaze to the surrounding tables. Thankfully, no one appeared interested enough in their conversation to eavesdrop. “Please tell me that means anything other than what I think it means.”
Jill leaned forward. “You’ve never heard of Josh Darling? I’m surprised. I would think you fell squarely into his demographic. Cosmo described him as ‘catnip for millennial women.’” Her words bumped into one another as she rushed to get them out. “He looks like a nineties heartthrob. Like Zack Morris from Saved by the Bell, minus the asshole personality.”
Closing her eyes, Clara took a long breath and let it out very slowly through her mouth. Her entire life she’d chosen safety over excitement. She hadn’t done drugs. She rarely drank because she knew she couldn’t hold her liquor. She had exactly one pair of sexy panties, and she never wore them because they rode up her butt.
How in the world had she accidentally moved in with a porn star? And not any run-of-the-mill porn star, but one mainstream enough to receive a profile in a magazine she regularly browsed in the lobby of her dermatologist’s office.
“I don’t watch porn,” Clara said, barely opening her mouth. She didn’t have a problem with people taking care of business by themselves, but any time Clara saw porn, usually at the request of a soon-to-be-ex-boyfriend, it featured women getting degraded. She couldn’t help it if she didn’t find women on their knees with semen dripping down their faces sexy.
The idea that goofy, messy, bedheaded Josh made those kinds of videos didn’t make sense to her. How could the same guy who’d brought her coffee tell some girl to “take it all, bitch”? Her stomach turned over and she pushed away the basket of breadsticks.
“It doesn’t surprise me that you’re not into porn, but word around town is Josh Darling is quite the talent,” Jill said.
Clara curled her hands around her middle and wished for an antacid. “If this is a joke, it’s not funny.”
No one could find out about this. The guys from high school would love the idea that Clara “The Prude” Wheaton was sharing a shower with a man who had a penis more famous than his face. Not to mention the reaction from her mother. She strangled her linen napkin.
Jill smiled helplessly. “Looks like you might get that taste of adventure after all.”
chapter four
MOST PEOPLE WOULD have a problem with their ex-girlfriend going through their phone, but when Josh stepped off set to find Naomi holding his cell between her thumb and forefinger, he simply grabbed the device without bothering to call out the blatant violation of his privacy. They’d always shared a blurry definition of boundaries.
“Clara says she can pick up toilet paper on the way home.” Naomi’s eyes ran down his naked body with thinly veiled possession.
Josh let her look. For the sake of his career, he needed to get back together with her eventually, so who cared if she never truly butted out of his business? Their relationship was as inevitable as aging.
“What are you doing here? You’re not shooting today.” He’d checked the schedule. Ever since word got out about their breakup, producers had tiptoed around casting them together.
“I was in the neighborhood. Thought I’d drop off your fan mail.” She shook a hefty garbage bag in front of him.
“Oh. Right. Thanks. I’ll go online and start getting it forwarded.”
Cool air chilled the sweat drying on his skin, reminding him of his nakedness. Grabbing two towels from a production assistant, he wrapped one around his waist and the other across his shoulders and headed for the showers.
Naomi kept pace with him. The slinky dress she wore accentuated her natural strut. “I didn’t realize you’d be shacking up again so soon.”
Ignoring her, Josh turned the shower on extra hot and waited for the water to heat. These old warehouses always came with shitty plumbing.
“Your little text message chain sounded positively domestic.” Naomi perched on the room’s tiny vanity, swinging her long legs.
If their on-screen chemistry didn’t sell so well, he would have seriously considered telling his agent, Bennie, to put a Naomi Grant exclusion clause in his next contract. Her tenacity made her an excellent businesswoman, but it also made her a colossal pain in the ass.
“Don’t tell me you’re jealous.” He didn’t buy that for a second. Their relationship, both romantic and professional, rested on two key pillars: always wear a condom, and stay in your own lane. They weren’t the type of people who fell for love’s long con.
He and Naomi understood each other. Had extended a successful business relationship into a partnership for almost two years based on mutual respect and the exchange of countless orgasms. Usually, that evened out to enough. On the rare occasion when loneliness lapped at his heels, well, he could always turn on the TV and watch Meg Ryan, falling in love by proxy.
“I’m pretty sure I could get you back if the mood ever struck.” She fussed with her dyed red hair.
Josh rolled his eyes. “Thanks, Stu.” He used the nickname she claimed to hate, a riff on her real name, Hannah Sturm. She forbade the use of anything but her stage name on set, but he often forgot when they found themselves alone. Like so much else about her, she’d never told him the reason she hated her given name. Even though they had first met as co-stars almost two years ago, he could count on one hand the number of things he knew about her childhood.
“I can assure you, sharing household goods with Clara is platonic. I had to find somewhere to live when you kicked me to the curb.” Josh stuck his hand under the stream of water in the shower to check the temperature again and jerked it back when the icy stream pelted his palm.
