by Katee Robert
Oh yeah, signatures. Her life was full of stuff to sign these days. Contracts, correspondence…paychecks. “Want to come in the limo with us? I’ll sign everything on the way to Deuces, and then the driver can drop you wherever you want to go afterward.”
Ah, there came the shy smile. And a blush. Mandy mumbled, “That’d be awesome. I’ll get my stuff and meet you down there.” She hurried away like Cinderella late to the ball.
“Oh, my! Did you get a load of those beet-red cheeks? Bet she’s got a hot date tonight.”
“Don’t try to change the subject.”
Stacy rolled her eyes. Kylie could be like a dog after a bone sometimes. “We’ve exhausted the subject. I told you, I’ve got this guy handled. After tonight, he’ll go away.”
“Or he’ll get really mad, and escalate from writing letters to…God only knows. You should show this to Ian first, and see how he thinks you should proceed.”
Her idiotic heart stalled at the mention of his name. She put the eyeliner down, picked up her powder brush, and started dusting her face with more energy and attention than the chore really required. “We broke up six weeks ago. Why would I speak to him about anything?”
Kylie just looked at her for a long minute, and Stacy fought the urge to fidget in her four-inch, crystal-studded Louboutins. Finally, Kylie tossed the letter onto the vanity and said softly, “How about, because he’s a trained detective, and he cares about you as much as I do?”
Frustration got the better of her. She balled up the stupid letter and threw it in the wastebasket under her vanity. “He’s a homicide detective, Ky, not a mail investigator. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not dead.” Yes, she sounded bitchy, but talking about the man she’d been trying unsuccessfully to banish from her brain for weeks didn’t put her in a warm, fuzzy mood. Then another thought struck and her mood sank to a subbasement of foul. She pointed at Kylie.
“And don’t you dare tell Trevor about the letter!” It didn’t take a genius to see where that particular game of telephone ended.
“Too late.” Her sister shrugged, not the least bit repentant. “I called him as soon as I saw it.”
“Fabulous. Now call him back and tell him to forget about the damn letter. I’ve got the situation handled. There’s no need for him to give it another thought.”
Her sister turned and strolled toward the door. “Tell him yourself. He’s meeting us at the party.”
Stacy grabbed her feather-covered white wings and followed hot on her heels. She cut Kylie off at the head of the stairs. “But he’s not bringing Ian, right?”
Kylie shrugged. “No clue. Trevor didn’t say. For all I know, Ian has plans tonight.”
Plans like a date? A vision of him smiling across a candlelit table at some faceless bimbo sent a nauseating blend of pain and jealously through her. Stop it. Shake that shit off, right now. You don’t know what he’s doing tonight, and you don’t care.
She followed Kylie downstairs and out the door, locking it behind her. What she did know for damn sure was that she didn’t want to see him. Perfect. Now she’d be all distracted until she knew whether he was at the party. She muttered “Thanks” to the driver holding the of the limo door open and ducked inside.
Mandy sat on one side, with her big canvas tote bag at her feet, diligently flagging signature lines. “These are almost ready to go.”
“Awesome,” Stacy replied, and scooted over to give Kylie room to get in. The driver managed to peel his eyes off Kylie’s spandex-covered backside long enough to nod and shut the door. Determined to change the subject, Stacy put her wings down on the seat beside her, leaned back, and smiled at her sister. “Did you see the way the driver looked at us? I think he actually drooled.”
“He drooled at you. He also totally checked out your butt when you got in the car.”
“You both look really pretty,” Mandy said.
“Thank you,” Kylie shot Mandy a smile and then returned her attention to Stacy. “Don’t bend over too far in that outfit, or you’re liable to moon the entire party.”
She grinned and smoothed a hand over her costume. The flimsy thing looked like a strong breeze would blow it right off. “Compared to some of the getups you’ll see tonight, I’m positively dowdy.”
“Oh, please. You’ve never been dowdy a day in your life. Not even when you were stuck in a big old plaster cast from toes to knee.”
Thinking back to that period, almost a year ago now, made her remember the first time she’d met Ian. He’d shown up at the dumpy apartment she’d shared with Kylie, and she’d experienced an immediate flare of attraction as she’d stared into the deepest, greenest, most deceptively easygoing eyes she’d seen in her life. She hadn’t made him as a cop until he’d flashed his badge and hustled her down to the police station to answer questions about two murdered Deuces clients. That he’d fooled her was odd because she’d had enough experience with Two Trout’s finest during her formative years she could usually spot a cop as easily as she could spot a Hollywood boob job. But despite her instincts, all she’d seen was thick, sun-streaked hair, a determined, slightly raspy jaw, and an array of lean, hard muscles that gave her an instant urge to climb him like a rock wall, regardless of her broken leg.
Answering their questions had taken forever and left her a sweaty, shaking mess, but miraculously, they’d believed her when she’d insisted she didn’t know anything about the murders. Ian had driven her home. Something about his self-assured smile and unshakable calm made her want to fuck with him…or just fuck him, but instead he’d done both to her. Before she’d known quite what hit her, she’d been flat on her back, with her broken leg draped over his shoulder, screaming like a porn star as he’d driven her right out of her freaking mind with nothing but his mouth.
She’d tried to even the score as soon as she could see straight again, but he’d brushed her off and told her “some other time.” Offended and, truth be told, a little humiliated at how completely she’d lost control of herself in his arms, she’d given him her best Queen B look, told him there would be no “other time,” and kicked him out. The cocky bastard had stood in her doorway, smiling his stone-sexy smile, and assured her with complete and utter confidence there would be plenty more times, starting as soon as she acknowledged they were going to share more than just body fluids. Then he’d walked out, without a backward glance.
Naturally, he’d been right. He’d infected her mind like a virus, until he was all she could think about. She’d lain in her bed night after night, all needy and aching, remembering the way he’d tongue-whipped her into a frenzy. How careful he’d been with her broken leg. How thrillingly rough and insatiable he’d been with the rest of her. When she couldn’t take it anymore, she’d broken her own ironclad rule and called him, and they’d dated for almost a year. The best year of your life, a small, unhappy voice at the back of her mind insisted.
“Thank God I’m out of it now,” she whispered, thinking Kylie would assume she meant the cast.
“You should call him,” her sister said, not fooled in the least. “You’re miserable—don’t deny it, I know you too well. He’s miserable too, in case you wondered. I know you got spooked when he asked you to move in, but there’s a lot of safe ground between living together and breaking up. I think you should talk, now that you’ve both had some time to calm down and consider things.”
Safe ground? What a joke. Because of her, and choices she’d made before she ever met Ian, there was no safe ground for them. So for once in her life she’d done the noble thing. The selfless thing. The most painful thing imaginable. She’d set him free before she ruined his life by dragging him and the family he loved through a humiliating public airing of her not-so-upstanding past. Miserable or not, he must have realized he’d dodged a bullet when she’d broken things off, because he’d done nothing to try to change her mind, and Ian could be relentless when he wanted something.
“I adore you, Ky. I really do, but you’ve developed one tiny, a
nnoying habit since entering the disgustingly sweet state of bliss reserved for brides-to-be.”
Kylie poked her in the leg with the plastic pitchfork she carried. “You don’t say?”
“Ow.” She shoved the fork away. “I do. You’re happy, and, naturally, you want everyone around you to experience the same happiness. What you have to understand is that right now I’m not at a place in my life where a long-term commitment works for me. My career is finally taking off. I need to stay focused if I want to keep the momentum going. I can’t afford the distraction of a relationship.”
“That makes no sense. You two have been joined at the hip since you landed the series, and your career has never been more on-track. Why do you suddenly think the relationship presents some dangerous distraction?”
“Because…” Dang it, she’d thought the whole “can’t afford any distractions” excuse sounded mature and logical. She huffed out a breath and scrambled for a better explanation. Something besides, Because he deserves better than an ex-juvenile delinquent,and an ex-stripper with a bad reputation. Because even if he thinks he can handle the fallout when all my shit goes public, how will he feel when his mom can’t go to the market or church without people whispering about how her son’s involved with the crazy actress whose disreputable past has been splashed all over the tabloids?
Growing up as the bad seed of Two Trout, she knew what it felt like to be the object of whispers and malicious looks. Her takeaway from the whole god-awful place had been a tough skin and a general disregard for what other people thought of her, but she wouldn’t wish the experience on anyone. She sure as hell wouldn’t wish to inflict that kind of treatment on people who had been nothing but nice to her.
“Because?” Kylie prompted, and jabbed Stacy again with the plastic pitchfork.
“Ouch. Cut that out or you’re not going to like where the fork goes next. Look, we’ve been over this, Ky. I don’t have time to invest in a relationship. I’m on the set, or doing publicity, or auditioning for movie roles for when the series goes on hiatus.”
“Ian understands the demands on your time. He’s got a pretty demanding job too, you know.”
“Exactly.” Stacy latched onto the argument like a lifeline. “We’d never see each other, and we’d grow apart. It’s doomed.”
“Or…you’d move in together, like Ian suggested, and appreciate the little, everyday moments all the more because you don’t take them for granted. Why don’t you just admit you got cold feet?”
Yeah, that’s what everyone thought, including Ian. Or maybe he’d seen right through her act, but not called her on it because he realized she’d done him a favor. Life with her was no picnic. She’d managed to run her daddy off from in the womb, and most of the other people in her life, except Kylie, disengaged as soon as they got whatever they were after.
Ian wasn’t after anything except the right woman to spend his life with. Call her crazy, but she’d never seen the point of auditioning for a role she didn’t have a prayer of winning. She stared out the tinted window at the parade of lights, cars, and costumed revelers along West Hollywood’s famed Sunset Strip. “I did not get cold feet,” she said softly.
“You so did. A classic case. He asked you to move in with him and you bolted like a bunny rabbit. If I look up ‘cold feet’ in the dictionary, I don’t see your picture, because you’ve already run for the hills.”
Mandy snorted and tried to hide it by clearing her throat.
Stacy glared at her assistant. “Ha. Ha. Are those signature pages ready?”
“Here.”
She took the stack of flagged papers and the pen Mandy handed her. The weight of her sister’s hand on her knee drew her gaze away from the pile. Kylie stared at her with sympathetic eyes. “I’m not laughing. I just want you to be happy, and Ian made you happy. You two just”—she held her hands up and laced her fingers together—“you fit each other.” She dropped her hands to her lap. “Think about what I’ve said, okay?”
Stacy forced her lips into a noncommittal smile and got busy signing. She could think about her reasons for the breakup until she fried every last one of the hundred billion brain cells in her head, but nothing changed. Despite Kylie’s belief to the contrary, they actually didn’t fit. She’d spent almost a year ignoring the little warnings her mind had tried to send her heart. Hello, he’s a cop, and you’re an ex-stripper, not to mention your hometown’s poster child for authority issues. Anything wrong with this picture?
She signed the last flagged page with a flourish, put the pen on the stack, and handed everything back to Mandy.
“Did something else happen between you two?” Kylie asked. “Besides the whole moving in together discussion?”
Damn. God might as well have given them one mind to share, because Kylie read hers so easily. “No,” she said quickly, and flipped her hair behind her shoulder. “Not really.”
Hell yes, something had happened. One rare, wide-open Saturday after she’d surprised him in the shower with a deliciously dirty morning scrub-down, Ian had told her to “put on something pretty” and get ready for the best burgers and dogs she’d ever tasted. She’d thought he planned a drive to one of the casual little restaurants along the Pacific Coast Highway, but no…he’d driven them to a sweet, postcard-perfect Southern California neighborhood, parked in the driveway of a sweet, postcard-perfect house, and introduced her to his sweet, postcard-perfect parents, and a good portion of the neighbors who were gathered for a barbecue. She felt like a trespasser on the wrong set. Instead of Vegas Vixens, she’d stumbled into a modern-day Leave It to Beaver.
“Which is it, ‘No’ or ‘Not really’?”
“I missed my single, carefree days, okay? I liked being able to do whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted.” She flipped her hair again and shrugged. “Call me selfish, but I’m not the kind of girl who likes to spend her Saturdays at a boring backyard barbecue just to please some man.”
“Me either,” piped Mandy. “Besides, a backyard barbecue is a cheap date. He should take you out to nice restaurants.”
Kylie shook her head and stared out the window. “I know it’s not about a backyard barbecue.”
It was, in a way. She’d had the time of her life, sitting between Ian’s father and another neighbor, listening to them reminisce about their boys’ obnoxious misadventures in suburbia. But somewhere around the time his mom had glanced across the table and smiled at them, Stacy had realized she belonged in this close-knit group of family and friends about as much as a hooker at High Mass. In their minds, “wild behavior” meant TP-ing old Mrs. Cranston’s Continental, or swiping a bottle of vodka from the liquor cabinet, drinking the whole thing, and puking in the next-door neighbor’s hot tub.
Kylie turned back to her, eyes serious, lips unsmiling. “Ian loves you. Yes, relationships require compromise, but—”
“Compromise isn’t my strong suit, Ky. You know that.”
She needed to end this conversation, immediately, because she couldn’t use the words “Ian” and “love” in a sentence without bursting into tears. She’d never been able to, which was one of the reasons she’d never told him how she felt.
“You’re running scared from the love of your life, and you’re going to regret it.”
Doubtful. She prided herself on being a no-regrets kind of girl. But that afternoon at Ian’s parents’ house, she’d suddenly realized some of her choices had the power to affect other people in ways she hadn’t anticipated—and that they hadn’t signed up for. Would Ian find it hard to face his family and friends when it came out that his girlfriend had her own signature pole-dance move? Maybe, whispered a tiny, insidious voice at the back of her mind, which is why he asked you to move in with him instead of marrying him. He wanted an escape hatch, because he still had doubts. Well, she’d sprung the latch on his escape hatch, and damn him, he’d sprinted through without a single look back.
“Ian Ford is not the love of my life”—God, she hoped that was true—�
�and I sure as hell wasn’t his. From what I can tell, he’s over me. He broke the bounce-back record. And you know what?” She flipped her hair out of her face. “I’m over him, too.” A part of her still couldn’t believe he hadn’t called, texted, shown up drunk on her doorstep…nothing.
“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard you say.” Kylie poked her again with the pitchfork, then jerked the damn thing out of reach when she grabbed for it. “Be glad I don’t smack you over the head. The only reason I haven’t is because I know every word you’ve uttered since we got in the car has been a big, fat lie.”
“Says Kylie, the amazing human lie detector?”
“You keep flipping your hair. I don’t know if you think the move distracts people from the bull coming out of your mouth, or what, but you’ve done it since you were a kid. Mom and I always joked that we knew you were lying when your hair started flying.”
The comment coaxed another snort from Mandy. This one Stacy ignored.
“You’re nuts, just like Mom. I can’t believe I never realized this before.” She crossed her arms over her chest and sank back into her seat, not really caring if she looked like the pouty little brat she’d once been. She preferred pouting to picking through the dangerously sharp remains of her shattered heart.
Tonight she fully intended to party like a rock star, dance her ass off, and get Detective Ian-freaking-Ford out of her head.
Chapter Two
Ian closed his eyes and let the hot spray of the shower rain down on the top of his head. Maybe it would pound some resolve into him, because he was uncomfortably close to chucking his “wait Stacy out” plan, tracking her down, screwing her brains out, and, somewhere in the process, telling her he refused to allow her emotional baggage to sink their relationship. Unfortunately, if he did that, he might as well hand his balls over in a pretty pink gift bag.
Irritated to find his thoughts traversing this same well-worn trail for the billionth time since their breakup, he grabbed a bottle of liquid soap from the recessed tile shower shelf and squirted some into his hand. The smell of Stacy’s fancy soap filled the small space. Nice going, stud. Wrong bottle. The scent provoked memories, just to mess with his head. One fine Saturday morning she’d stood right there in his shower and washed him from head to toe, with some un-fucking-forgettable detours in between, because when it came to their bodies, Stacy was game for anything.