One of the randos sitting on the couch glanced up at them, perturbed. Giving the talent a head massage was probably not how Hollywood makeup artists rolled. Using the only hair product she had in her bag, a travel-sized bottle of Moroccan hair oil, she began styling. Zia had never done a man’s hair before, but she treated herself to a decent haircut three or four times a year, so she tried her best to make it just-got-out-of-bed sexy.
“You have lovely hair,” she said, working the ends. “So thick. Strong.”
Clay grinned. She hadn’t meant it to sound flirtatious. “I get it from my mom, she’s Italian. What about you?”
“Puerto Rican on my dad’s side, but he’s not in the picture, and my mom’s Moroccan.”
“Where did you grow up?”
“I was born in PR, but Mom moved my older sister and me to Astoria when I was three. Mom moved back to Morocco to look after her mom a few years ago. After my abuelita passed, she stayed.”
He nodded. “¿Hablas español?”
“Sí. ¿Y tú?”
“Sí. Yo estudié en Barcelona en la universidad.”
“What did you study?”
“Theater major. You?”
“Double major in business and human services at Queensborough Community College.” Finished, Zia examined her handiwork. It sort of looked the same as when she started. “What do you think?”
His gaze stayed on her. “Hermosa,” he murmured. “My hair, I mean. My hair is very, very beautiful. I often comment on it.”
She laughed and came to sit in front of him for the makeup part of her new job. He was clean-shaven: no stubble. She reached up and smoothed his thick, unruly eyebrows. An itch she’d been waiting to scratch. A smile flitted across his lips. He liked this. He liked being touched by her. For a moment, she couldn’t do anything but admire his beauty. His eyes didn’t leave hers. There was something raw in them, hidden deep. A well she wanted to swim to the bottom of.
Clay’s gaze dropped to her mouth.
“Five-minute call!” The assistant slammed the door behind her. The moment shattered into a thousand shining pieces.
“Makeup,” Zia repeated, biting back a smile.
* * *
The photo shoot took place in a warehouse. Under blinding-white lights, against a white backdrop, Clay posed in a series of casual menswear outfits—leather jacket and distressed jeans, unbuttoned white shirt and white pants, some very flattering swim trunks. Zia was quite proud of her amateur makeup effort from the three products she’d found in the bottom of her purse. Tiny bit of Burt’s Bees lip gloss, little concealer under his eyes, and mascara to make his dark eyebrows extra smooth and impressive. She could never have faked it with a female celebrity, but so much less was expected of men. And Clay was already so handsome.
The shoot was fun. Zia chatted and joked with the other assistants, fitting right in. It was easy and enlivening to drop into different worlds like this. Being a chameleon was Zia’s superpower. There was nothing she liked more than ending up in the most unlikely place. She was glowing. Every time Clay caught her eye, the glow got brighter.
At the end of the shoot, Clay found her by craft services, putting some leftover salmon and tuna salad into containers she’d charmed from the caterer. Omega-3s were good for her sister’s arthritis, and Layla couldn’t afford prime cuts of fish. “Thought I’d drop some food over to my family.”
“Awesome idea.” He helped her stack them into a tote bag. “A lot of food doesn’t get eaten at these things.”
“Twenty percent of landfills is wasted food,” Zia said. “And half of that is from businesses.”
“That much? I should know that.” Clay addressed a passing assistant. “Hey, can we do something about all this leftover food? Donate it to a shelter, and order less next time? We shouldn’t be throwing anything out at the end of a shoot.”
The assistant nodded, making a note. Zia was impressed and maybe a little jealous that for someone like Clay, it was easy to make change.
He lingered. “Thanks for that. And for today. I really like the down-to-earth approach.”
“I had a feeling you did.”
“Well, bye.” He opened his arms. She moved into them for a hug. Their bodies pressed together, hip to hip, her soft breasts against his hard chest. Warm, solid muscle enveloped her. A feeling of complete safety filled her entire being. Her eyes drifted shut, relishing the closeness. The intimacy in Zia’s life was all platonic. It’d been way too long since she’d held another person like this.
Someone called Clay’s name. Zia pulled away.
He pressed a folded scrap of paper into her hands. “Gracias, Zia. Por todo.”
Clay was hurried off, the center of a traveling circus onto the next town. Zia headed for the exit, feeling like a tightrope walker who’d just made it safely back to solid ground.
20
Zinc Bar was a well-regarded jazz club in New York’s West Village, the backroom of which generally hosted a respectful audience of locals and tourists. Except for Monday nights. Monday nights were different.
They were reckless. Wild. Completely unhinged. And that was because Zach Livingstone was in the house, whipping the crowd into a Dionysian frenzy. Look at him now, standing in front of the Steinway, shirt soaked, hair a mess, fingers dancing up the keys.
“C’mon, New York, let’s hear you!”
Darlene revved into their crowd-pleasing closer, “Rehab” by Amy Winehouse. “ ‘They tried to make me go to rehab—’ ”
“ ‘I said, No, no, no,’ ” scream-sung the crowd.
The set started lukewarm, the audience chatty and distracted and not planning on getting wasted on a Monday. But song by song, Zach worked the crowd, getting them hot. Now, people were dancing on tables, doing shots, and making out with strangers. Darlene was on the floor, in the crowd, belting it out in that smoky, sexy voice of hers, “ ‘Yes, I’ve been black, but when I come back—’ ”
“ ‘You’ll know, know, know!’ ” shouted the crowd.
Despite the chaos, Zach never missed a note. This feeling of being in sync with another musician, and the audience, and himself, was better than anything. Even sex. And there was no one he was more connected with than Darlene. Maybe it was the way their differences fit together: she was technical, he was instinctive. She was polished, he didn’t own an iron. American, Brit; Black, white; girl, boy. Or maybe it was just that indefinable thing called chemistry. Offstage, it was muted. But onstage, it was neon bright, and everyone in the club could see it and hear it and feel it in waves.
They finished with a flourish, crowd and musicians singing as one: “ ‘He’s tried to make me go to rehab, I won’t go, go, GO!’ ”
The crowd went nuts, cheering and screaming and stamping their feet. Darlene caught Zach’s eye and laughed, the stage lights bouncing off her hair and body. She looked absolutely bloody beautiful.
This gig was always, without fail, the highlight of Zach Livingstone’s week.
Offstage, Zach high-fived the bartender and returned with two shots of tequila. He and Darlene did them together, and it filled him like fire, like starlight, like love. He shouted over the still-noisy crowd, “You killed it!”
She waved it off. “I was pitchy in that last chorus—”
“Mitchell! You crushed it!” And somehow they were hugging, which they never did, his arms around her soft, perfect body, holding each other hot and close, spontaneous and free.
Life was very, very good.
After a few too-short seconds, she let go. He could see her organized brain putting a wall back between them, moving them onto load-out and logistics. A young man with surfer-blond hair and an obnoxious tan swaggered in front of them. Annoyingly, Zach was forced to back up.
“Hey.” The surf rat smiled at Darlene. “Ripper of a set. You guys were on fire.”
Australian. How soon till this idiot mentioned kangaroos?
Darlene smiled back modestly. “Thank you so much.”<
br />
“Yeah, you had me bouncing around like a bloody kangaroo.” Australia ran a hand through his hair just to show off his bicep. “Buy you a drink, gorgeous?”
As if Darlene was going to go for this peroxide prole. She only dated men with brains the size of planets. Her last boyfriend, Awful Charles, was a smug git who was constantly publishing articles about what an intellectual wanker he was. With his scrub of ginger curls, and Father Christmas paunch, Charles was no pinup, but he was a celebrated mind, and he and Darlene dated for what felt like forever. So Zach was more than surprised when Darlene accepted the offer. “Vodka tonic. But we need to load out first.”
Australia grinned. Zach readied himself to step in, but before he could, someone slung an arm around his neck. “Hey, lady-killer.” The female version of Zach—summer-blue eyes, thick brown bangs—smirked at him. It was his older sister, Imogene. Behind her were their parents, Mark and Catherine.
“Guys!” Zach hugged them one by one. His family had seen him and Darlene play only once or twice over the past two years. “What are you all doing here? You didn’t tell me you’d be in town!”
“I had meetings in the city.” His dad’s voice boomed over the noisy club.
“And Mum’s helping me with the never-ending search for a wedding dress. Honestly, kill me.” Imogene was getting married to Mina Choi, her girlfriend of five years and fellow overachiever, at the family’s Hamptons estate in September. In Love in New York had been hired a year and a half ago to plan the wedding. The key vendors had all been locked in before Eliot passed, but Zach hadn’t quite gotten around to sharing the current state of the business, purely out of loyalty to Liv. Fortunately Imogene had been more focused on finding a dress that wasn’t a giant marshmallow.
“We wanted to surprise you, Zach.” His mum’s vaguely pretentious habit of elongating random vowels produced his name with an extra syllable: Za-ach. Catherine looked formidably refined in a snow-white sheath dress. Her pale blond hair was expertly twisted into a cross between a seashell and a croissant. His mother’s bloodline boasted some distant dukes, but in his parents’ circle, that ancestry was as common as pennies and postmen.
“We’re starving,” Imogene announced, hooking her arm into his. “C’mon, Zook: let’s go stuff our faces with pasta.”
Relishing the chance to interrupt her conversation with the Aussie tosser, Zach asked Darlene if she’d mind handling load-out so he could have dinner with his family. “I swear I’ll make it up to you,” he said, bribing her to stop by for a cocktail or two before she went home, with the promise his father would pay. “Best negronis in the city.”
Darlene rolled her eyes but agreed, so Zach guided his family to Babbo, an elegant Italian restaurant a few streets over, slipping the maître d’ a fifty to secure them a prime table.
Zach’s father, Mark, had met his wife, Catherine, at Oxford while studying business. Zach and his sister had grown up in a London neighborhood chosen for its proximity to good restaurants and gilded theaters. He’d spent his childhood in box seats at the Royal Opera House and all-ages gigs at the Roundhouse. Zach was permitted to study his first love of music, as long as it was at the prestigious Royal Academy of Music. There he was a middling student academically, but very popular socially (If Zach applied half the attention he gave to the female students to developing his own considerable talent… et cetera). When Imogene got into Harvard Law School, Zach followed his big sister to America, settling in New York. His parents soon followed, buying a house in the Hamptons and a pied-à-terre in Chelsea, after Mark received an offer as managing director for a New York–based venture capital fund. His mum sat on several charity boards, but her idea of philanthropy was largely attending black-tie balls. Zach was on a visa and still felt close to his English roots. The accent, after all, was a bloody effective aphrodisiac.
“So, Zachary,” Mark began, after the wine was poured and they’d all ordered mains. “How are things?”
“Same old, same old.” Zach leaned back in his chair, still feeling high from the show. “Sex, drugs, rock ‘n’ roll.”
His father’s mouth hardened. His mother looked openly appalled.
“Guys, I’m kidding!” Zach said. “I play jazz, not rock ‘n’ roll.”
Imogene laughed.
His parents traded a coded look. “What about grad school?” Catherine’s question was as delicate as the pearl drop earrings hanging from each lobe.
“Grad school?” Vague memories of tossing this out at a previous family dinner emerged. “Yeah, that’s on the back burner for now.”
His father had both hands flat on the table. “That’s what you said last year.”
“I didn’t realize we were keeping score!” Zach tore off a hunk of bread and drenched it in olive oil. “Grad school isn’t in the cards for me right now.”
“So grad school isn’t in the cards.” Mark ticked off his fingers. “And neither is a full-time job, or an internship, or any kind of postgraduate education.”
“Way to make a guy feel bad,” said Zach, even though he didn’t. His phone buzzed. Not Darlene: just a random girl.
Catherine fingered her neckline of her sheath. “What about… relationships?”
Zach almost choked on his bread. “I’m sorry: it sounds like you’re inquiring about my sex life.”
“Zach!” his mother hissed, glancing around. “Please. We’re just worried about you. Might we remind you that by the time Genie was your age—”
“Please don’t drag me into this, Mum,” Imogene said.
“Yes, we’re all aware how brilliant Imogene is,” Zach muttered.
“She was clerking for a Supreme Court justice!”
“C’mon, guys,” Imogene said. “Zach’s just having the fun I never had because I was so busy being boring and studying all the time.”
“Zach is twenty-six,” Catherine said. “A young man clearly in need of the grounding a solid relationship would bring.”
“I have solid relationships!” Zach exclaimed. “God, you’re making me out to be some sort of depraved Don Juan—”
“Zach?”
The table looked up.
Zach felt a hard jolt of alarm. “Lauren!” The woman he was intending on breaking up with was at his table. Under usual circumstances Zach would find her skintight miniskirt quite delightful, but right now it seemed a little… revealing. “H-Hi.”
“You always said Babbo was fantastic, so I’m here with my roommate.” She tucked a lock of blond behind one ear coyly. “So funny running into you.”
“Yes, absolutely, um, hysterical.” He didn’t want to hurt Lauren, he just couldn’t imagine a successful relationship with her. Or, anyone. He’d get bored, or (more likely) they’d get bored. So it was safer to enjoy an extended fling, then sensitively end it. But, not in front of his parents.
Lauren addressed the table. “You must be Zach’s family. So nice to meet you. How long are you in town?”
His mother’s smile was tight. “We’ll stay the night and drive back tomorrow.”
Lauren let out a laugh. “To London?”
Zach winced.
Catherine cut her eyes to Zach. “To Southampton.”
It was a stupid lie, but one he regularly told. It just made things easier if his girlfriends never expected to meet his family. Lauren glanced back at Zach, who smiled weakly. Christ, he was a knob sometimes. He could see her deciding to give him the benefit of the doubt. “Okay, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow night.”
“Tomorrow night I have rehearsal with Darlene.” Zach glanced at his parents—See? I’m responsible! “But I’ll, um, definitely give you a call. Sometime.”
He may as well have dumped her then and there. A ripple of emotion distorted Lauren’s face before she pressed her lips together, gave Zach a perfunctory smile, and began to walk off. She’d taken only a few steps before swinging around. “Are you sure you’re not too busy calling the girl who texted you the other night? The one wanting to suck your
big D?”
Catherine dropped her salad fork.
Panic shot through Zach’s chest.
Lauren continued, her voice rising. “Meant to ask you about your last STD check, but obviously I should just get tested ASAP.”
Zach’s entire face was on fire. He could barely get the words out. “I’m always, um, careful…” But Lauren was gone.
Zach was adept at handling his family’s outsize expectations. But this was different. This was a screwup. Of Titanic proportions. He cleared his throat. “Funny story, actually—”
“Oh, save it, Zach.” His mother was uncharacteristically sharp. “Your father and I are withholding your trust until you get your act together.”
He understood each word separately but not in that exact order. “I’m sorry, what?”
“Your trust fund,” his father said. “You’re not getting it.”
Still, utterly incomprehensible. “But—but—but that money’s mine. That’s my money.”
“No, Zachary, it’s our money,” Catherine corrected. “That you’re clearly not mature enough to handle.”
“But Imogene—”
“Spent hers on a portfolio of well-researched investments and charitable donations.” Catherine cocked her head. “What would your plans be?”
Zach gripped the side of the table. His entire life had been leading up to his twenty-seventh birthday—the age his parents felt a young person’s brain finally finished developing—whereby an embarrassing amount of money would be discreetly bequeathed to him to do with whatever he damn well pleased. Which was play music with Darlene, have sex with random bridesmaids, and enjoy life to the best of his ability. That’s why he didn’t need a job or further education or even a plan. It was crude to admit, but the fact was, his family was rich. He was rich.
Except now, he wasn’t. He racked his brain for an angle, a convincing argument, a counterpoint. None emerged. No! This could not be happening.
It Had to Be You Page 10