Lucky Star: A Hollywood Love Story

by Rebecca Norinne Caudill

  I notched my jaw. “I don’t need you Cameron but I want you desperately. So yes, I can move past this.” I rested my hand on his forearm and added, “And it’s fair to say I like your body just fine too.”

  He laughed, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You know you’re more to me than just sex, right?” He placed his hand atop mine, his eyes searching. “It’s more than just sex, Sarah.”

  “I know,” I responded, because I did. I’d had sex before; what happened between Cameron and me was so much more than that. It defied words.

  He nodded and the worry left his face. “Don’t get me wrong. I’ll take you every which way I can, any time I can, but when we’re together it’s something more. Every time I’m with you, when I’m in you, it feels like there’s nowhere else I’m supposed to be. I feel you in my heart. You’re my home.”

  Okay, strike what I said before. I did need Cameron to complete me because the second I heard those words I felt something click into place, solid and strong. He was the other half of my soul and without him I was less a person. Our hearts recognized in each other its better half and for me to deny that connection – that completeness – was to deny us.

  “You know, I used to watch you and wonder what it would be like.”

  “You did?”

  “Of course,” he admitted. “There were times I’d look at you and, I’m not ashamed to say, imagine us in bed together, fantasize about how you’d taste on my lips, wondered how you sounded when you came.”

  My body shivered and I grew damp hearing him openly admit his desire for me. I wanted to climb across the center console and show him just how deeply the admission affected me.

  Before I could, he continued speaking. “And while I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of you, that’s not the sum of who we are. I love knowing that every minute I desire you, you want me just as much, but what I really cherish is that before sex was even on the table, I knew your mind and your heart.”

  Tears welled in my eyes and my throat tightened with emotion. I tried to keep a stiff upper lip but I had a shit poker face and with one glance, Cameron saw the thin line I walked.

  “Stay there,” he commanded gruffly. In one quick move, he was out of the SUV and around to its other side. Pulling open my door, he tugged me into his arms. “It’s okay baby,” he cooed in a low, placating voice as I unleashed a sob into his chest. Try as I might, I couldn’t stop the tears and soon my body was wracked with sobs, the pent up sadness of the past few months unburdened from my soul. Everything he’d said to me just now was what I’d wanted to hear for weeks and I was too overcome with relief to keep my emotions in check.

  “You’re it for me Sarah. Just you.”

  I nodded my head against him, acknowledgement that I heard him and he was the same for me. Wrapping my arms around him I burrowed even deeper into his embrace. “You too,” I mumbled back, finally bringing myself under control.

  “This is too much. I’m done.”

  “Wh … what … what are you …” I stuttered, terrified I’d misread him.

  “Shhh, not that silly girl.” He placed a kiss on my forehead. “I’m telling Broderick I’m not playing along any more.” He maneuvered himself out of my arms and pulled his phone out of his pocket. Stepping away, he paced the side of the road, swiping at the keyboard. “Those PR people think they’re so great at their job? Fine, it’s time for them to prove it. Me and Jillian being together is the easy, obvious story and yeah, it’d be great for the movie but it’s not necessary.”

  My voice broke on a hiccup. “Cameron, don’t do anything you might regret. I can handle it. It’s just been difficult.” Hiccup. “We’ll figure it out, make plans so that we see each other more, spend quality time together.”

  He stopped pacing, turned to me, and shoved his phone back into his pocket. “Nope. Not good enough. It’s you and me, kid.” He returned to my side and tucked me into the crook of his shoulder. The wind could have whipped around me for hours and I might never have felt its cold.

  “It’s done. No more hiding, no more lying. They can tell the truth about us or I walk. My name is out there now and if I walk away from the role of a lifetime—” he used his fingers to make air quotes— “people are going to want to find out why. If Broderick and his cronies won’t work with me anymore, I’ll have Julie book me on The View before they’re able to find someone to take my place. What will they do when I tell Whoopie Goldberg how they wanted me to hide my fiancé and pretend to be in love with my co-star. That’d be terrible PR and they’d have to perform some pretty serious damage control. If their fans out I stepped away from the movie because I loved you too much to hide you, those same women Broderick are counting on for the movie’s success will love me even more.”

  I laughed around another hiccup. “I can’t believe you know the name of everyone on The View,” I teased and he tweaked my nose.

  Leaning away, I smiled up at him and he practically glowed with satisfaction. The longer I stared up into eyes that smiled down at me, the more I knew he was right. If Broderick fired him, he might not star in The Ties That Bind but he’d be able to leverage the time he’d been attached to the movie to his advantage and come out smelling like roses. He wouldn’t get this movie, but he’d get something else. Walking away from a blockbuster for the sake of love? Women would eat that shit up. He didn’t need to pretend to be a romantic hero. He lived it. If Julie hooked him up with a good PR team, they could have him on every daytime talk show within weeks, set him up perfectly as a rom-com leading man.

  “You’re a genius!” I grabbed his hands and we danced a happy jig right there on the side of the road. “Why didn’t we think of this before?”

  I dropped his hands and started pacing in front of him, laying it out as I saw it. “Think about it Cameron. Our relationship is the perfect chick flick. Best friends in love with each other but neither knows it. Drunk night leads to sex which results in a major misunderstanding. Guy can’t stand the rift he’s created between them so he crawls back to her with a huge declaration of love. In the final act they get married, surrounded by friends and family who’ve known all along the two were meant for each another. Open that movie during the Christmas season when everyone wants warm and fuzzy stories and it’s a surefire hit.”

  Cameron scratched his abs. “I’ll be damned. You’re right.” He peered at me and saw the wheels spinning in his head. “You’ve spent so much time with Broderick learning how to make a movie, developing a honed understanding of what people want to see, you could someday be your own Broderick.”

  “Hollywood’s not my dream Cameron. I only fell into it through a series of odd jobs. Just because I recognize what would make a hit film doesn’t mean that’s what I want to do for the rest of my life. I bet you anything, everything we’re talking about right now is already going through Broderick’s mind. He won’t fire you because he’ll see it too. You’re the star women want. He can sell the hell out of you. He will sell the hell out of it.”

  Suddenly serious, Cameron brought his hands to my cheeks and cupped my face in his palms. “I might have messed this up at first, but I’m going to make it up to you.” He planted his soft, warm lips on mine in a lingering kiss that communicated the depth of his feelings. What started out as an innocent gesture soon turned hot and wanting, the fire behind his feelings for me igniting a banked passion that smoldered just below the surface whenever we were near one another.

  “God, I love you,” he murmured, suckling my lips and running his tongue along the seam of my mouth. I opened and welcomed him in, wanted him to devour me, wanted to consume him.

  As I pulled him to me and wrapped my leg around his lean waist, an old beat up VW bus slowed and a young, scruffy guy in a beanie and flannel leaned out the window and shouted, “Get a room!” Two honks on the horn and a thumbs up and they sped away toward town.

  Reluctantly I pulled away, laughing at being caught making out on the side of the road.

  “We may as w
ell follow,” I said on a shaky breath. “We need coffee, breakfast, and to go grocery shopping. In that order.”

  A few minutes later we caught our first sight of the village and the working harbor beyond, the landscape dotted with spruce tipped islands in the distance. A float plane soared overhead and then into the distance. Driving past each storefront looking assessing our options, we spotted a coffee shop and parked just up the street. Coincidentally, right next to the VW we’d seen a couple minutes earlier.

  Cameron grabbed hold of my hand and squeezed. “No more hiding.”

  Entering the hip urban industrial space, we approached the counter and ordered a large cappuccino for me and a straight black coffee for him. When I smiled at the woman behind the register she grinned back, friendly but uninterested, but then to my horror, her eyes widened in recognition. Shit. I waited for her to look at me with the same snide bewilderment the woman at the airport had, but it never came. She began making my drink while another woman at the other end of the countered poured Cameron’s coffee.

  Sliding my drink across the counter, she smiled again. “Welcome to Eagle Harbour.”

  “Thanks,” I said, appreciating her the welcome despite what she must be thinking.

  And then she surprised me by asking what the hell was going on with the handsome movie star to my right. “Look, I shouldn’t say anything, and you can tell me to mind my own damn business, but I just have to ask. He’s not really with her, right?”

  Did she really think I’d answer that question? When she continued to look at me expectantly, I realized she did. I felt trapped. Unsure of what to say, what the appropriate response was. Cameron had just told me we were done hiding but since he hadn’t heard back from Broderick and I didn’t want to rock the boat – yet. Before I could figure out my response, Cameron wrapped his left arm around me and extended his right hand toward her. “Cameron Scott. Good to meet you.” The woman clasped it and they shook. “This is my fiancé, Sarah Travers.”

  My jaw dropped. Well, I guess that settles that. He hadn’t been fucking around when he told me he wanted to tell everyone he met that we were together.

  “Nice to meet you Cameron, I’m Alex.” She bestowed us with a gleaming smile that transformed her from girl-next-door cute to extraordinarily beautiful. She wasn’t wearing a shred of makeup that I could see, but she had a natural vitality that was enhanced by her healthy, active good looks. Just a shade past the first blush of youth, she wore her freckles and the beginnings of a few deep laugh lines like the badges of honor they were instead of covering them up under layers of concealer and powder.

  Over her shoulder she called to the other woman, “I told you it was fake.”

  I had just taken a sip of my coffee and it was all I could do not to choke on her words. As I sputtered and coughed, she laughed and turned to her companion. “You owe me five dollars Drea.” She extended her hand toward me in welcome.

  Sensing my confusion, Alex explained that Dolly – the woman who worked for Steelhead Airways – had phoned her sister Sue and filled her in on mine and Cameron’s public display of affection. When Alex had run into Sue at the co-op a few hours later, Sue – being one of the biggest gossips to ever walk the earth – launched into the scandalous tale of the Hollywood hunk who had openly flaunted his mistress in their quiet, little seaside town. Dolly, added, was one of Eagle Harbour’s biggest gossips, second only to her sister Sue. Thus, by the time Cameron and I had wandered out of our safe haven this morning, it was all over town he was in Eagle Harbour before filming began in Vancouver.

  As Alex filled us in on the island’s chain of gossip, I felt my cheeks redden and my ears begin to ring. I was focused so intently on not showing any outward reaction that I almost didn’t notice when Drea, a perky brunette dressed in skater wear, had taken over the tale. As the rumor began to spread, the town’s major gossips – of which there were surprisingly many – had broken into two factions: those who were so invested in the story of Xander and Arabella that they’d become obsessed with the idea of the two actors who played them falling in love in real life, and those who’d taken one look at the pictures of Cameron and Jillian’s supposed dates and declared them “just friends.” Obviously, I loved anyone who fell into the second camp.

  Alex was firmly on the side of “no romance there” while Drea maintained that because she didn’t know either Cameron or Jillian and hadn’t read the books, she couldn’t care less who they dated. I was more than happy to welcome her and any of her ilk into my metaphorical clubhouse because they were a gang of people I could enjoy.

  As we grew more and more comfortable with each other, the ringing in my ears lessened and the black dots that had begun floating in front of my eyes disappeared. I recognized the signs for what they’d been: I’d been on the verge of a panic attack that would have resulted in even more gossip had I fainted upon Cameron being recognized. Clearly the idea of being labeled his whore was more upsetting than I’d anticipated.

  “I can’t wait to tell Sue she was wrong about Cameron and that you’re actually his fiancé. Her head is going to explode,” Alex exclaimed with more glee than I would have thought possible. “She thinks she knows everything about everyone and proving her wrong is going to be sweet, sweet revenge.”

  “Revenge?” I asked?

  Do I even want to know?

  Drea started laughing and punched Alex in the shoulder as she walked past. Calling out over her shoulder, she filled us in on the long-standing feud between Sue and Alex. “When we were in high school Alex dated Sue’s son Mitchell. Suffice it to say, the relationship did not end well.”

  “That was what … ten or fifteen years ago?” I asked, guessing at their ages.

  Standing in front of me, Alex pursed her lips as if she was mortally offended and I worried I’d misjudged her age … by a lot. “Nah, I’m just shitting you. It was fourteen years ago.”

  “So for fourteen years she’s held a grudge against you?”

  “Pretty much,” Alex chirped and then went to deal with a refill.

  “Okay, I have to hear this. What could possibly have been so bad that all these years later you’re still locked in some endless battle?”

  “It’s not a battle,” Drea put in. “More an elaborate game of one-upmanship.”

  Cameron laughed and asked what we both wanted to know. “What does that even mean?”

  Drea leaned against the counter and sipped her coffee. “Sue heard some gossip about Alex and instead of asking her if it was true, convinced Mitchell to break up with her.”

  Having placed the pot of coffee back on its heating pad, Alex rejoined us. “True.”

  “Do we even want to know what the gossip was?” Cameron asked.

  When the two woman shared a look between them but didn’t answer, he scoffed. “Come on, you all’ve been gossiping about me and Sarah for the last 24 hours. You owe us.”

  “I think I like you,” Drea pronounced on a smile. “You’re ruthless.”

  Cameron looked fondly at me. “I ain’t got nothing on this one.”

  Alex joined Drea in leaning against the counter. “Dolly told her she saw me having sex in our classmate Stewart’s car.”

  “Well, okay then,” I said, immediately seeing the problem.

  “It’s not what you think though,” Drea added with a smirk. She looked at Alex and her friend nodded. “Sue is a holy roller and Alex and Mitchell had made a pact to save themselves for marriage.”

  I dragged my eyes to Alex and she shrugged. “Also true.”

  “Sue wasn’t pissed Alex had cheated on her son,” Drea continued, “as much as she was that Alex was no longer pure enough for the precious Mitchell.”

  My eyebrows shot up my forehead. “Oh my god,” I laughed out. “What happened then?”

  Alex poured more coffee into her and Drea’s mugs and as she did, filled us in on the rest of the story. “Well, first of all, that wasn’t me in Parker’s car. It was my older sister Jack, but Sue didn�
��t care. I was tainted by association and she stood up in church the following Sunday and told everyone.”

  “She didn’t!” If my eyebrows went any higher they’d be on the back of my head. If Cameron’s jaw dropped any lower, it’d hit the floor.

  Out of the side of his mouth, he mock-whispered, “Where in the hell did you bring me?”

  Drea cracked up. “Don’t worry, we’re not all bad. Sue and Dolly are the worst of it. Most of the rest of their holy rollers moved further up the island a few years ago to open up a mega church closer to Victoria.”

  “That must have been a relief for you,” I surmised.

  Alex shrugged again, but this one wasn’t quite as relaxed as the previous two. “Not really. My boyfriend went with them.”

  Oh shit. Now I’d really stepped in it. Cameron and I stood there not knowing how to respond to that while Drea stared down into her mug of coffee with a scowl on her face. Then, breaking the tension, Cameron launched into our own terrible story.

  Thankfully Alex bounced back from her awkward moment of melancholy and she and Drea laughed with Cameron as they plotted Dolly and Sue’s comeuppance. It had become one of Alex’s missions in life to publicly denounce the the two sisters’ gossiping ways whenever she could. I stood drinking my coffee and let the conversation wash over me. We’d been found out and what was worse, it was by two of the biggest gossips this side of the Pacific who also had very definite feelings about harlots who lured righteous men from their women. I pretty much accepted that it was only a matter of time before word got out that Cameron was here without Jillian. Mentally girding my proverbial loins, I braced myself for what was going to be a major shit storm.

  As I watched him charm Alex and Drea, my phone vibrated in my coat pocket. Pulling it out, I saw it was my mother calling. Holding my phone up, I caught Cameron’s attention and mimed that I was walking outside to take the call. He smiled and mouthed back, “take your time.”

  Hitting the talk button, my mom didn’t even wait for me to say hello. “Darling, where in the world are you?” she asked, as if I hadn’t already told her I would be in Canada for the next couple of months. “But more importantly, do you know where Cameron is?”