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“It’s a wine rack,” Gabe answers. “You put all your bottles on it.”
“Oh!” Her face lightens. “It’s so thoughtful!” Her eyes sweep over us with warmth. “I really love it. Thank you. Now I just need to buy some decent wines to put in it. I really can’t believe you spent all day doing this for me.”
“We needed to do something to keep our minds off whatever was happening in LA,” I admit.
She takes Gabe’s hand, leading us toward the firepit. Forrest moves to light it as she speaks, all of us hanging off her every word.
“It wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. We talked about Roy?—”
“Is he coming back?” Gabe interrupts with a growl. “Because so help me?—”
“Let her finish,” Forrest interrupts, and Gabe clamps his mouth closed.
“Go on,” I urge, sitting in one of the deep, high-backed wooden chairs.
“No, he’s not coming back. Roy is gone. They moved him onto another project. We’ll get a new director, but she comes with a warning, too. She’s tough and no-nonsense.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Gabe wants to know.
“It means we have to listen to her,” Forrest translates.
“That’s the impression I got, too,” Stella sighs. “I haven’t met her, but I’m already afraid of her.”
“All right. We’ll manage her,” Gabe concedes. “What else?”
“I’m on very thin ice. I don’t think I can afford even a hiccup going forward.” Stella drops her head. “I just want to get through this next couple of weeks as seamlessly as possible, guys.”
“We will,” I promise her. “We will, won’t we?” I look meaningfully at the others.
“Damn straight, we will,” Gabe agrees. “And they won’t fire you.”
“No, stop that, Gabe,” Stella pleads. “I don’t want to take them on. I just want to keep my head down and work so we can get out of here unscathed. Can we make that pact, together?”
I nod immediately, Forrest following suit. Gabe takes a little longer to accept, but when he reads the concern on her face, he eventually caves.
“You’re right, Heartbreaker,” he teases. “We’re almost at the midpoint now. We can make it through as long as we watch out for one another.”
Relief courses through her body in a wave, and she impulsively throws her arms around his neck. “Thank you,” she breathes. “Thank all of you. I’m so glad you three were the ones I was teamed up with.” She drops her arms and exhales again. “I need a shower and then a glass of wine,” she announces.
“I’ll put a burger on the grill for you,” Forrest suggests, and she puts her hands together in a gesture of gratitude before disappearing into the house. The moment she’s out of earshot, Forrest speaks. “I told you, dumbass,” he mocks Gabe. “She didn’t even know what it was.”
This time, it’s Gabe who kicks a rock at Forrest.
CHAPTER 15
Stella
Ileft out a lot of what transpired at the meeting, mostly to spare the men, but also because it had really damaged my ego, and I’m still reeling, all these hours later.
“You’re a nobody that we took a chance on, Stella,” one of the producers told me coldly. “You have no right to be acting like a diva.”
Tears of hurt flood my eyes even now when I think about the painful truth of her words to me. She was right, after all.
“If it wasn’t for Forrest Marlowe sticking his neck out for you, you’d be long gone. Who the fuck do you think you are?”
We were just having a little fun!I’d wanted to cry out, but I didn’t. They didn’t want to hear my excuses. They just wanted to hear me say that I’d behave, and that’s what I promised them.
“Yoo-hoo!”
