Catch a Falling Star (In Love in the Limelight Book 3) Page 11

  “I'm still feeling pretty jet-lagged. And we had a busy night. Good-night, Colin.”

  She went upstairs. When she came out of the bathroom, she checked herself as she turned to where she'd be sleeping. Instead, she headed towards Colin's empty room. She turned out the light and got in bed. She lay there for a few seconds, between his sheets, wishing things were different. Then she deftly rolled off the bed and onto the floor.

  Time to go to her room without any possible spies noticing. Staying flat, she used her elbows and the back-and-forth motion of her hips to ease her way across the floor, into the hall, and toward the guest room. It hurt her bony hips as they jutted into the floorboards, but the darn paparazzi couldn't get even a hint of her sleeping in a different room from Colin's.

  Wendy was almost across the threshold to her room when she felt a sharp kick in her side. “Ah!”

  “Wahaa!”

  Smack-ca-thump!

  Wendy flipped onto her back. “Colin?”

  He was lying in a heap on the hall floor.

  “Ahhh,” he groaned. “Yes, it's me! Why the fuck are you trying to kill me?”

  “Kill you? You just kicked me!”

  “I tripped over you and almost killed myself! What are you doing lying in my hallway? In the dark?!”

  Colin pulled himself into sitting position and leaned his back against the wall.

  “Are you okay?” Wendy ventured.

  “No thanks to you. What are you DOING?”

  “I'm getting into bed! Duh.”

  “On the hall floor?”

  “Colin, this was your idea. I went into your room, turned off the light, and got in bed. Then I rolled out and now I'm making my way to my bed.”

  Colin turned his head to look at her. “Do you have to do commando stuff like this a lot?”

  She leaned back on her elbows. “Sure. That night I came to see you in the hotel, nobody knew I'd arrived because I'm always switching out my cars. I'd just gotten that red Prius and nobody connected it with me yet.”

  “But weren't you driving a Prius the weekend of the adoption celebration?”

  “A Prius comes up in the rotation pretty frequently. And some nondescript cars, like a Camry or a Nissan.”

  “What do you do when you're done with them?”

  “I donate them.”

  “To who?”

  “Whoever. I have a woman who works for me who ferrets out charities or hard-luck stories. It's all anonymous, before you ask.”

  “You're going to run out of money.” Colin rubbed his knee.

  “Colin, I made a million dollars per episode the last two seasons of Ups and Downs. That's 44 million dollars right there. I'm not going to run out of money. And besides, I hardly ever buy new cars. I buy good, sound cars that are dependable. But hardly ever new. Better disguise that way.”

  “You have a person who does that for you, too?”

  “Same one who finds the charities. Jeanne. It's all the same thing, really.”

  He nodded. “I guess it is. She must love her job.”

  Wendy tossed her head, letting her hair fall behind her shoulders. “She does. But why do you say that?”

  “Someone interested in finding people to help? And economical, workable ways to help them? Those people usually end up in social work or something like that, and social work can kill your soul fast. But here's this job where you have all this money at your disposal, and it's up to you to find people who need it. A pretty sweet gig for someone who wants to go through life helping people.”

  “Yeah,” Wendy said, but she was starting to feel cold. She got the sense that while Colin looked on Jeanne as a real effing saint, Wendy, who provided the money, the plan, and the generous salary for Jeanne, somehow didn't measure up to the same standard of altruistic awesomeness. “Well, good-night. Again.” And she turned over and slithered into her room.

  Colin watched as Wendy got to the bed, pulled herself to her knees, and managed to climb in without ever raising herself more than a few inches above the covers.

  So far, she'd done everything he'd asked. And done it like a pro. She come crashing into his life like a rocket, but now that she was here, she didn't seem hellbent on making waves, doing it her way, or sashaying through his mine fields without a care in the world. Maybe this would work, if she could keep her current level of sanity for the next three weeks.

  Maybe.

  Chapter 19

  LOLA

  I'm in bed before Arlen, but wrapping myself in the down comforter doesn't seem to be smothering my jumpy nerves. They're still snapping and zapping like live wires downed in a storm. When Arlen finally climbs into bed wearing nothing but his boxers, I look at him from my nest of blankets. “Settle down, already,” I tell him. “Moving the blankets makes a draft.”

  “Wimp,” he says, and wrenches off my covers.

  “Hey!”

  Then he flips me onto my stomach and straddles me with his knees on either side of my hips. He runs his hands underneath my tank top until he slides it off.

  “This isn't going to work,” I protest.

  “Yes, it is,” he says, as his fingers knead into the muscles of my back and neck.

  “Mmmm ...”

  “Lola, you're feeling jumpy because your whole family is so intense, and oddly connected. My God, when you fell for me, it sent shock waves across the country that brought Charlotte running. And you and Charlotte weren't even close.”

  “Mmmm … so?”

  “So, you and Colin are so close. You're just feeling some of the repercussions of his sudden engagement.”

  His hands feel so good as they work across my body that I have trouble keeping track of what he's saying. “But then why haven't I felt any shocks this whole time they've been seeing each other?”

  Arlen leans down to whisper right into my ear. “Why do you think?”

  I shiver from the heat of his closeness. Then it hits me. I flip over to face him. “Wait. Are you saying ...”

  “I recognize the feel of one of Wendy's publicity stunts.”

  “You mean … they're not really engaged? Wendy is making the whole thing up?”

  “I don't think she's making it all up. I think there's something between them. I do. But I wouldn't be surprised to hear that Colin was as shocked as all of us to learn that he's engaged.”

  My mind races. “But … he's going along with her.”

  Arlen locks eyes with me. “You saw the video, Lola. Of Wendy outside the restaurant. And you heard it.”

  “Jon Robin.” And my voice is scarcely the shadow of a whisper.

  Arlen nods. “I think she needed a bone to throw to the paparazzi and she threw them Colin.”

  “And he's playing along.”

  “His decision, Lola.” Arlen smirked. “And I don't think that decision is all about the kids. So let him do whatever it is he's doing.”

  He runs his hands up my stomach, across my ribcage, over my breasts.

  “Arlen,” I groan, starting to squirm the tiniest bit. “You want to have sex? Now?”

  He leans down and starts kissing my neck. “Yes and yes.” He kisses me softly on the lips and I want more.

  My hands move to his hips, my thumbs hook into the waistband of his boxers.

  As he slides off my shorts and panties, I can't even remember why I was upset.

  Chapter 20

  THE STORY OF WENDY AND COLIN

  Wendy woke up in the dark of the night, an even darker dark than usual. What was going on? This wasn't her bed. These weren't her sheets. The sheets were soft and worn, like when she was in that miniseries Dawn's Early Fight and she'd done that scene in the crack house. All her character had to herself each night was a chewed up mattress and an old sheet.

  But she wasn't in a crack house, real or staged. Was she? She didn't do drugs, or at least she hadn't done them for over a decade, so probably not a crack house.

  “Wendy.”

  She jolted against the mattress. The whispe
r came from below her somewhere. She didn't move a muscle.

  “Wendy, it's me. Colin.”

  She could feel her pulse calm down. Oh, right. She was in Colin's guest room, and all the blinds were drawn and the curtains swished over them. But where was he? Under her bed?

  “Down here.”

  Wendy inched to the side of the bed and looked down to the floor. It was dark, but she could make out his form when he waved. But she couldn't really see him. What if it wasn't him? What if one of the paparazzi had gotten into the house? Or what if it was something like that urban legend where the woman thinks her dog is by her bed licking her hand when her dog has already been murdered? Holy creepy crawlies, was he going to start licking her hand? Wendy shrank back from the edge of the bed with a gasp.

  “Wendy,” and something touched her arm.

  “Aaaah!” She flipped away to the other side of the bed.

  “Wendy! It's me. Colin. Are you even awake?”

  She didn't say anything.

  “It's really me,” he said. “Matteo beat you at Madden when I got there for the adoption party.”

  “Colin?” And her head started to clear.

  “Yes.”

  “Right,” she said with a sigh. “What are you doing on the floor?”

  “Are you inviting me up?”

  “No.” She tossed him a pillow.

  He caught it and lay down on the braided rug next to her bed. “I crawled in from my room.”

  Wendy looked down, even though she couldn't see much more than his outline in the dark. “Why?”

  “I couldn't sleep. I kept wondering something. And you know the answer.”

  “Oh.” Wendy licked her lips.

  Wow. Colin actually wanted an answer from her? Colin wanted to know something that she knew and he didn't? Something he was admitting she knew and he didn't?

  “Why me?” he whispered.

  Wendy could hear nothing in the aftermath of his words but the erratic beating of her heart.

  “Why did you have sex with me?” he clarified. “After so long. After nobody for so long?”

  Wendy's heart beat triple time. Why him? She had to answer that? Now? That seemed unfair. He hadn't seemed affected AT ALL by her confession down in the kitchen. But now, in the dark, when they couldn't even really see one another, he was ready to talk? About her? And him? Her and him. Oh, God. Her and him.

  “Is it because of Lola?” he prompted.

  And suddenly, all the fiery promise of the moment iced over, making Wendy feel like she'd just stepped out of a hot tub on an Alpine slope. Lola? The woman with the love of legends was eclipsing her heat, even now?

  She pulled back from the edge of the bed, not trusting herself to speak.

  “I mean,” Colin said, his voice so unruffled and steady, “I can't hurt you because that would be hurting the show and hurting Lola. And I'd never hurt Lola—you've always known that.”

  Wendy pulled the sheet more snugly around her.

  Lola. Lola was like this big, warm sun that everybody revolved around. And she gave them the heat and light they needed to survive. But Wendy? She was a dark little moon with not enough gravitational pull to draw anyone into her world. Not even Colin. After that night in the hotel, and after all the soul-stripping confessions, not even Colin. She sighed.

  “I didn't think about it,” she confessed softly. “I didn't go to the hotel that night because I'd considered it and decided you'd be safe to get intimate with. I went there to rip you to shreds. Then you touched me.”

  Silence. She couldn't even hear any movement or rustling or breathing from him.

  “You grabbed my wrist,” she said. “And that was it. Your touch just lit me up. Burned me down. I didn't think about it.” Her voice dropped to a thread of a whisper. “But I've been thinking about that night ever since.”

  “Me, too,” he whispered.

  Wendy slid toward the edge of the bed and looked down. Colin lay propped up on one elbow, his face closer than she expected. “Really?”

  “Really.” And he sounded confused that she would even ask. “Wendy, I've never been so completely lost in the moment with someone in my whole life. It's like I wasn't Coach Scott and you weren't Wendy Hunter. We were just ...”

  But he didn't finish the thought.

  Wendy lay back down and looked at the dark ceiling she couldn't see. “I know,” she whispered.

  “Then why are we doing this, Wendy? Why are you up there and I'm down here?”

  “Because … that night in Lola's office … I wanted you so much. And you backed away. You had more reasons to like me than you'd ever had before, but you didn't even want to try.”

  “But Wendy ...” He stopped talking as if he wanted her to fill in the rest.

  But she didn't.

  “Wendy,” he said again. “Come on. We were in the middle of a pretty complicated situation.”

  “I know. And now we're in the same house and the world thinks we're engaged. So now it's easy.”

  “Well … yeah.”

  “Is that what you teach your kids, Colin? When it's easy, go for it. But if it puts a ripple in your schedule, forget it?”

  “That's totally different.”

  “How?”

  “Everything I teach the kids, most ostensibly about football, it's about building a life. We're not building a life. We're just caught in this bizarre charade.”

  Wendy laughed. But it was a quiet, rueful sound, even to her ears. “That's what you're not understanding, Colin. The bizarre charade? That is my life. My life is comprised of a lot of bizarre charades. It's like you're just cherry-picking the parts of me that you want. And you want nothing to do with the rest. And I get it. But it doesn't feel like it would feel good to be with you like that.” Because I want all of you.

  “Wendy ...” But he didn't say anything else.

  And she didn't say anything. She heard him sigh.

  “Throw me a blanket?” he asked.

  So she did.

  “Good-night, Wendy.”

  “'Night.”

  Chapter 21

  RAY

  The flight attendant keeps looking at me as she walks past, as if she's going to say something to me but doesn't. Almost everyone else on this flight is asleep, but my jittery agitation keeps me alert. After two sparkling waters with lime haven't dampened my nerves in the least, I can tell she's thinking better of offering me alcohol. She thinks I might have a problem.

  And I do.

  If I get near another drop of the stuff, who knows what secrets I'll give away. Hell, one shot of Jim Beam and I'd probably be waking up all of first class with tales of the costume magic on Girl and Beast that had made the Girl seem curvy and the Beast seem broad and straight. Right.

  Yeah, I better not drink anything.

  Especially not before I see Wendy.

  I have to tell her. This might mean the end of my career, and well it should. I almost completely screwed up everything for Lola and Arlen and the kids. And Wendy saved my ass. And their asses. All by throwing Colin Scott to the wolves. She'd done that because of my colossal fuck-up. And what could I do about it now? Exactly nothing. But I have to tell her. I have to confess that when my boyfriend dumped me, I got so drunk that I almost gave up the story of the century. And if Wendy hadn't been so instantly brilliant on the stairs of that restaurant, I would have been responsible for ruining a lot of lives.

  Jesus.

  Jesus Jesus Jesus.

  I have to tell Colin, too. I'm the reason he's now the hottest thing trending on social media. And I know Colin Scott enough to know that he WILL NOT like that. I will have to tell him that I'll be his slave for the rest of my life. I need to pledge fealty to him. Maybe he'll make me the team's water boy forever.

  I hope Lola is okay with all of this when she finds out. I mean, she pretty much gave me to Arlen last summer. So now it's no big deal if I switch to Colin, right? Except Colin has nothing to do with the show. And Lola fucking depend
s on me.

  I am so screwed.

  Chapter 22

  THE STORY OF WENDY AND COLIN

  Colin's eyes popped open and he looked around, all confused and bleary-eyed. Was he on the floor? Of the guest room? He spotted the digital numbers on the clock by the bed. 4:30. It was morning? Of what day? He leaned up on his elbows and shook his head to clear it. That's when he saw her. Wendy was sleeping on the bed on her stomach with her arms thrown over her head, like she'd partied and passed out.

  Wendy Hunter.

  Yesterday hadn't been a dream. Nope. It had been the weirdest day of his life. What was he going to do now? Wendy was in his house, in his bed, in his life as his world-renowned fiancée for the next three weeks. What on earth was he supposed to do with a hotter-than-hell fake fiancée who couldn't shut up or stay in the shadows if her life depended on it?

  He kept looking at her lying there, sleeping.

  Colin slumped back onto the floor. Think. Think. Think.

  In football, you watched and studied what the other team did and then you made adjustments. But he had no game film on Wendy. At least not on Wendy Hunter in real life. But did that matter? Wendy was here to put on a show for her paparazzi. And Colin knew all about Wendy and her masterful manipulation of of her own publicity.

  Problem was, Wendy and Colin weren't even playing the same game. Wendy needed to convince the world that she loved a down-home high school football coach.

  And Colin? He needed to get on with his plans and control the damage of Wendy's announcement. The final vote was next week and Colin had to do some fancy footwork before then.

  He stood up and looked down at the sleeping Wendy, tangled up in his sheets. She was on his turf. This was his home field, his game. And wasn't she here to convince the world that she belonged, heart and soul, to country hick Colin? To prove that she wasn't just some glittery shell without a soul? Fine. She was going to play his game, by his rules.

  He got up and got dressed for his morning run. But before he put on his T-shirt, he flicked it across Wendy's butt.