Famously Mine: A Contemporary Romance Box Set Page 15

  I narrow my eyes. It sounds reasonable enough, and I’m willing to bet his taste in food is excellent. But he’s also dated half of Hollywood, and I have no intention of being the person who officially changes his score to half of Hollywood + 1.

  “Poppy and… the new nanny will be there, if it makes you feel better. At another table because you don’t do childcare. But, you know. There,” he finishes, somewhat lamely.

  “Oh my God,” I whisper, my eyes sliding toward the nanny. “You don’t know her name.”

  “If I knew her name, would I have got her confused with you?” Hollywood’s bad boy whispers back, looking harried. “Brittney didn’t tell me.”

  I can’t help it. I laugh. The sound seems to delight Joshua.

  “Ok, fine,” I say, giving in. “Take me to dinner and convince me you aren’t the most demanding man in all of Hollywood.”

  “Any requests?” Joshua asks, as Poppy skips over to join him.

  “Somewhere worthy of these shoes,” I think about it some more, “and I want cheese.”

  He and Poppy both look down at my black patent leather, pointed toe, four inch heels. It could be my imagination, but it feels like it takes a little too long before his gaze slides up to mine.

  “I can do that,” Joshua King says, with a cocky grin.

  Heaven help me, because the man is annoying and presumptuous and, you know, my client. But I think he could be a lot more than just that.

  And that little voice inside of me, the one that says no, not him after almost every date? For the first time in years, it’s silent.

  4

  Joshua

  I’m not sure what exactly qualifies as “worthy of these shoes” in restaurant terms, but we go to a sleek, airy fusion place warmed up by murals on the walls. It’s good, but it opened up a few years ago, and there’s no longer a line to get in, which is a must when you’ve got an eight year old in tow.

  The waiter asks if we want to sit inside or outside, and before I can answer Sienna says, “Outside.”

  Sometimes I forget what it’s like to be a normal person who doesn’t have to worry about the paparazzi dogging their every move. And hey, this is Sienna’s lunch. I don’t want to be a spoilsport.

  So we’re all seated outside. Poppy and the new nanny (who’s name, Sienna discovered on the ride over, is Becky) are seated at the closest table to the water bowls the restaurant sets out for passing dogs. On the one hand, it’s a little too close to the sidewalk for my liking – one of my actor friends had his daughter ambushed a few years ago by an unhinged fan. The daughter was fine, but I don’t think I’m ever going to be over the fear that something like that could happen to Poppy.

  On the other hand, dogs. Who can argue with a kid who wants to be closer to dogs?

  Sienna and I sit at a table farther away from the sidewalk, but I still put on my sunglasses, and run my fingers through my hair to change the way it’s normally parted.

  “What are you doing?” Sienna looks at me over the top of her menu.

  “Becoming invisible,” I say, shifting my posture.

  “That can’t really work…” but she looks around, and sure enough, passersby have stopped doing double takes. She turns back to me in wonder, “It actually works.”

  I grin. Wonder looks good on Sienna Bridges. She’s got big blue eyes set in a face a little too fair for Hollywood, emphasized by scholarly glasses. She’s also got the soft, natural curves of a beautiful woman who has no need to diet to look flawless on screen and doesn’t care about competing with those who do. Combined with all that silky dark hair, it makes her look a little old-world. If someone did a modern day Snow White retelling, I’d cast someone who looked like Sienna Bridges.

  “I am kind of good at acting,” I tease, and she blushes. That looks good on her too. Not that it matters, since this is not a date. It’s a business meeting. “What do you think of the menu?” I ask, trying to distract myself.

  She looks down at the menu and starts perusing. After a while she gasps, then laughs, delighted, “Everything on this menu has cheese. Literally everything. Pasta, tacos, paninis, palak paneer. Pizza.”

  “Hey, I listen,” I say, and I don’t mean it like a line, but it comes out that way. Everything I say to this woman sounds like I’m flirting.

  Possibly because I am. But I’m trying not to.

  Luckily, Sienna doesn’t notice. She’s craning her neck to look at the restaurant, “Why isn’t this place packed? A cheese centered restaurant is amazing.”

  “Believe me, Poppy agrees with you. But for some reason the see-and-be-seen crowd don’t seem to.”

  When we order, Sienna hesitates between the macaroni & cheese and the tacos, so I suggest getting both. She looks scandalized, like I suggested getting a round of heroin as an appetizer. It appears Sienna Bridges does not live on the edge.

  But then she turns to the waiter and does something that surprises me. She orders both. And throws in a side of fries. And informs the waiter that we will be ordering dessert too.

  Sienna looks definitely triumphant when she turns back to me, and I mime applause, which cracks her up.

  Damn, I like making this woman laugh.

  But before my brain can go too far down that road, she pulls out that notebook of hers, “Ok. Back to work. Tell me everything you want this party to be.”

  I lace my fingers behind my head, and think about what I need to launch this production company even though she thinks I’m focused on launching champagne. “Sophisticated,” I say. “Polished, gorgeous. But not pretentious. I need it to have all the trappings of success that the people who look for that sort of thing will expect. But I also need it to feel alive. Magical. Like you can’t wait to see what’s next.”

  Sienna leans in, tapping her pen on her paper for emphasis, “But the Marigold had all of that. And if you just didn’t like that hotel, I can get another one. Frankly, at this stage a hotel ballroom is your best bet for all of those things.”

  I shake my head, “It can’t be a hotel ballroom. That feels too… after-party. Like something any actor can throw together. I need something different.”

  She bites her lip, a small point of pressure on the lush softness of her mouth, and I only briefly lose my train of thought, because I am a goddamn gentleman.

  “What is it? What are you trying to keep yourself from saying?” I ask.

  Sienna sets down her pen, “Just that an after-party association is exactly the kind of thing you want for a high-end drink like this. You want people to think of moonlight, and parties, and wild nights, and amazing vacations. You want the type of people who like being pursued to think that if they order a bottle, they can meet someone as dashing as Joshua King. And you want all of the people who like doing the pursuing to think that if they order this drink, they can be Joshua King.”

  “I never knew all it took to be me was high-end alcohol,” I say dryly.

  She waves my concern away, “You know what I mean.”

  I do. I also know she thinks I’m dashing.

  Our food comes, and after Sienna praises the waiter effusively for providing her with cheese, we dig in. She moans in pleasure as she savors the flavor, and I return to trying to keep my mind out of the gutter. Or rather, out of the sheets.

  “Ok, here’s the thing,” Sienna says, after she’s polished off two tacos and started in on the macaroni & cheese. “You’re instincts aren’t wrong. A hotel venue does make it feel a little more after-party, a little less once-in-a-lifetime, chase-your-dreams. I love the event you’re describing. But it’s not a drink launch. It’s… I don’t know. If you wanted to launch the next Facebook, but with glamour. If movies got launched, instead of leaked to the press, you’d launch it like that. But you’re not launching a movie, so-” She looks up from her mac & cheese, and trails off as she sees my face, “Oh my God. You’re launching a movie. You’re using this party to launch a movie.”

  “What? No. That’s crazy,” I laugh, and it sounds high
pitched and nervous. I think my voice actually cracks, like a teenager.

  My voice didn’t even crack when I was a teenager.

  Sienna points at me with her fork, “Joshua King. You are lying. And badly. Which, now that I’ve seen how good you can act, I find insulting.”

  “Ok, fine. I am using the party to launch… something. And it’s bigger than a movie, but for the purposes of planning this thing, it’s probably best to think of it as a movie.”

  “Bigger than a movie? What’s bigger than a movie? A franchise? Wait, no...a production company?” She drops her fork in shock, which tells me all I need to know about my poker face. Her eyes light up and she lowers her voice, “Oh my God. It’s a production company.”

  I grab her hand, “Please. Please don’t say anything.”

  Sienna looks down at her hand, then up at me, and I release it slowly, the heat of her still burned into my palm.

  “I won’t say anything,” Sienna says, and immediately my heart calms down. Which is ridiculous. I know she could be lying. She could easily sell this story to the tabloids. But there’s some part of me that trusts her, implicitly.

  “But you should tell me the truth. The whole truth,” Sienna continues. “Clearly this event is important to you. But I can’t plan it right if I don’t know what I’m planning. And we’re down to the wire. We don’t have time to do the guess and check method, where I don’t find out I’ve gone wrong until after I’ve already invested weeks in preparing something.” She puts both hands on the table and leans in so I know she’s serious, “I can pull this off. But I need you to trust me enough to tell me the truth. And then trust me to give you what you need.”

  I want to. I’m surprised by how badly I want to tell this woman the truth. Tell her how excited and terrified I am that this thing I want desperately is finally happening.

  But I can’t. Obviously I can’t. It’s too big a risk.

  Sienna sighs, and turns to wave the waiter over.

  “Wait, that’s it?” I ask. “You’re leaving?”

  “I’m not leaving, you doofus. I’m ordering dessert, because I have to spend months working my ass off for an event that will probably fail because my client won’t give me the details I need to do my job correctly. Which means I deserve chocolate. A lot of it.”

  I avoid her eyes and go back to my taco salad. I don’t envy the waiter who has to tell her they only serve cheesecake.

  5

  Joshua

  It’s 10:30 p.m., and I’m slouched in the window seat that overlooks my driveway. Theoretically, I’m waiting for Brittney to show up and get Poppy, who’s asleep on the couch in the living room. Really I’m sipping whiskey and trying to get what Sienna said out of my head. I’m going to fail because my client won’t give me the details to do the job correctly.

  On the one hand, she’s right. If I’m not willing to tell my event planner what kind of event she’s planning, I’m kneecapping our success from the get-go. On the other hand, I’ve known Sienna one day. I haven’t even told my family about my production company dream, let alone that I got the Ouranos script. That’s partly because they’d take it as an invitation to try to convince me to come back to New York and work in the theatre world with them. But it’s also because I hate telling people about any of my projects before they’re done. Too many of my artsy friends spend their nights smoking and drinking and talking about all of the stuff they’re going to make. And then they never make it.

  And I’m terrified of that being me.

  I hear tires squealing, and I look up to see Brittney’s black Prius with the hot pink stripe skid to a stop in my driveway. Brittney is the only woman I know who can make a Prius sound like a motorcycle without a muffler. She jumps out of the car and dances up the driveway.

  I meet her at the door, “I take it the meeting went well?”

  Brittney grabs my face and kisses each cheek, “Joshua King, you’re an angel for watching Poppy because GUESS WHO JUST LANDED THE MOST SOUGHT AFTER PRODUCER IN THE WORLD FOR HER NEXT STUDIO ALBUM???”

  “Shh! Poppy’s sleeping.”

  She mimes zipping her lips, but she can’t contain her glee, and does a little happy dance in my entryway. I hold up a hand and she high-fives it, then walks past me into my kitchen, and helps herself to a protein bar. “Unfortunately, I hear your business meeting didn’t go as well as mine,” she says, and I start.

  How could she know… “What are you talking about?” I ask.

  “You got the nanny confused with your P.R. person? Because you’re a dweeb who’s horrible with names?”

  “Oh that,” I muster a laugh.

  Brittney tilts her head, scenting a story, “Why, what did you think I was talking about?”

  This time it’s my turn to mime zipping my lips.

  Her eyes go to the whiskey in my hand, “It’s a girl, isn’t it?”

  “What? No.” Honesty makes me add, “Well, technically yes, but not like that. This is a business thing - that girl, I mean a woman.” God, I’m babbling. This is what talking about your dreams does to you. It turns you into a useless babbler. I take a gulp of whiskey, “Why would you say it was a girl?”

  “Because you’re drinking whiskey at home on a weeknight. You only do that if you had an audition, or if you’re thinking about a girl. And you didn’t have an audition, so…” she shrugs.

  “That is absolutely not true.”

  She cocks her head.

  I think about it, “Ok, maybe it’s a little bit true.”

  She boosts herself onto the kitchen counter and pats the surface next to her, “Come on. Sit next to Brittney. Tell me all your problems.”

  I roll my eyes, “It’s not that big a deal.” I mean, my entire career is riding on it, but whatever.

  “Joshua,” she says, in that serious Mom voice she uses when Poppy is trying to pull something over on her. I don’t have an equivalent Dad voice, which is probably why Poppy is better behaved at Brittney’s house than mine. Brittney smacks the counter next to her empathetically, and I give up and join her.

  “Tell me what’s going on in that head of yours,” she says, and goes back to demolishing my protein bar.

  “Basically, there’s a thing I’m working on that’s… a big deal. But I can’t tell people about it. Not yet.”

  “This isn’t a problem. You’re great at keeping secrets,” Brittney says, which is true. It’s also a pretty concise explanation of why our relationship ended. Why a lot of my relationships end, now that I think about it.

  I’m not great at the whole … talking part. The part in romantic comedies where the guy stands up in front of a roomful of strangers and declares his feelings? That’s my nightmare.

  “The thing is,” I say, “I need help, on this one part, which means I might need to tell the secret. And I found the perfect person to help. But I’ve only known her for a day, and if I’m wrong to trust her…”

  “Ah,” Brittney nods sagely. “You’re worried she’s the ambitious sort. Trust your gut if this feels wrong. You’ll find someone else.”

  “No, it’s the opposite,” I hop off the counter, restless. “My gut says trust her. But that’s ridiculous, right? I don’t know her.” I pace some more, than turn to Brittney and throw up my hands. “What do I do?”

  She folds the empty wrapper carefully, and I know she’s thinking just as carefully as she replies, “My therapist says there are two kinds of people. Over-Thinkers and Over-Feelers. Neither are wrong, you just have to know which way you lean and take it into account when you’re making a big decision. For example, I’m an Over-Feeler.”

  I put a hand to my chest, “I’m shocked!”

  She ignores me, “You’re an over-thinker. So if your gut is speaking up so loud it’s finally strong enough to fight that big overthinking brain of yours, than I’d fucking listen to it. But that’s me.”

  Brittney hops off the counter and rolls her eyes, “You though, you’ll probably just research the problem to death.�
� She heads to the living room to get Poppy.

  Research. A lightbulb goes off in my head, “Brittney, you’re a genius.”

  It’s midnight, and I’m still at the computer. Everything on the internet supports my first impression. Sienna Bridges is squeaky clean. She was graduated from NYU on the Dean’s list, after which she moved with an actor friend named Jax to L.A. Jax’s face looks vaguely familiar – I think she might have been an extra in one of my action movies last year. Yeah, I think I remember Darian talking to her a few times.

  But once Sienna got to L.A., she changed all her social media to private, and it’s just professional stuff. A LinkedIn profile, showing six years of slowly and steadily working her way up her firm’s ladder. A few old press releases where she’s listed as the contact. Some photos of events she’s thrown.

  I flip through the photos. Every event is stunning, and unique, and perfect for the thing she’s selling. And some of the events are for pretty high-profile clients. The kind of high-profile another person would have name-dropped by now.

  A slouch in my chair. There is no reason not to trust Sienna. She’s professional, she’s discreet, and any benefit she’d get from telling my secret would be short term, and jeopardize the reputation she’s slowly and painstakingly built.

  Plus, there’s that gut feeling Brittney was raving about.

  I stand up, and reach for my phone. I’m going to tell Sienna. I’m going to tell her the whole truth and bring her on board. It’s the right decision, but I can’t tell if I’m excited or dreading it.

  I go to dial her number, when I remember I don’t have it. And even if I did, calling a woman after midnight could be misconstrued.

  Instead, I set an alarm for 9 a.m. to remind myself to get her number and call her, as soon as we hit acceptable business hours. I go to bed, but I toss and turn, restless.