Charley glanced at him in surprise. She wouldn’t have guessed he had a competitive side, but maybe it was a necessity when you grew up one of nine children.
He pointed to the page in her hand. “Want me to do it?”
“Oh. Sorry.” She turned back to the list. “Okay. We have five items. One, French kiss in front of a chateau. Two, perform a live comedy riff and get at least five people to laugh at your jokes.” She put a finger on the page. “There’s a note next to that one that says camera crew and each other do not count.” She looked at Marc. “Too bad. That would have helped. I don’t know about you, but I’m an amateur comedian at best.”
She expected at least a chuckle. Instead, he pointed again. “Keep going.”
“Three, get a stranger to dance for you. Four, jump on a train. Five, high-five Rocky.” Again, she looked up at Marc, shading her eyes from the morning sun. “I’m not sure I get all of this.”
“We’ll figure it out.” He took the list from her and stared down at it, hand on his hip. Then he scanned their surroundings with a cool, appraising eye.
“But Rocky? As in Balboa?”
“No. Rocky and Bullwinkle are cartoon characters. From the sixties.”
“How do you know this?”
He rubbed the back of his neck, dipping his chin. “I’m sort of a nerd about old cartoons.”
His embarrassment about it was cute. “Great. That will help us. I would have been looking for a completely different Rocky. A cartoon nerd. Interesting. I was a Sesame Street kid.”
“Me too. I didn’t discover the old cartoons until I grew up.”
Oh. Okay. Time to change the subject.
“The Comedy Store is right here,” Charley offered. “Why don’t we start with that one, the comedy riff?” And put off the French kiss until Luke’s lips weren’t still imprinted on hers. Which might be never, come to think of it.
“I’ll do it. You get people to be an audience while I think of what to say. We’ve got this.”
He was practically bouncing on the balls of his feet in anticipation. And if he said “we’ve got this” one more time, she might have to shake some serious sense into him. “Did you play a lot of sports?” she asked. “Maybe start with that.”
“Sports. Yeah.” He flicked his hand at her. “Go. We’re on the clock.”
For an accountant, he was bossy. But he was right.
Charley walked down the sidewalk, stopping the first person she saw—a woman dressed in black and wearing reflective sunglasses. “Excuse me,” she said politely, “I wonder if I could ask you a favor.”
The woman held up her hand and said “no,” without breaking stride.
Too much sunshine could affect people’s moods.
Next, she approached an older man who looked like her Uncle Martin, gray-haired and in walking shorts that were belted below his round stomach. “Hi. Could I ask you a favor?”
The man lowered his sunglasses. “Well, aren’t you pretty.”
Ugh.
“Thanks. It would just take a couple minutes of your time.”
“Uh-huh. And if I do you a favor, what are you going to do for me?” He winked. Not in a kind stranger way, but in a lewd way that made her want to throw up.
“Absolutely nothing. Never mind.” She kept walking.
“Hey,” he called from behind her. “Don’t go, girlie. We can work something out.”
She’d rather step in a steaming pile of dog poop. Barefoot.
She spotted two younger women walking opposite her, excitedly pointing at buildings and raising their cameras to snap photos. As she came closer, she realized they were speaking a different language. Charley stopped. “Hello?” she said to them.
The women also stopped, bobbing their heads. “Hello,” responded one, the word heavily accented.
“Could you do me a quick favor?”
The women looked at each other, confused.
“For a TV show?”
“TV,” the one repeated, nodding her head.
“Yes. Will you come with me? Please?”
“TV.”
“This way.” Charley gestured for them to follow her. She brought them back to where Marc and the cameramen were standing. Marc had his head down and was talking to himself as one cameraman filmed him.
Charley pointed at the camera and told the excited women, “Stay. Right here.” She pointed at the sidewalk and then the camera. “See? TV.”
The girls chattered words she couldn’t understand and pulled out combs and mirrors.
They had the right idea. Two down, three to go.
A few minutes later, she’d managed to round up a store clerk on a smoke break and two middle-aged women with giant purses and thick glasses by promising them exclusive access to a five-minute event outside The Comedy Store.
“Ready,” she told Marc.
He faced the assembled group, rubbing his hands together.
“Knock ’em dead,” Charley said in his ear.
He nodded in sharp jerks of his head. One camera trained its lens on him and the other focused on the crowd.
“Thank you all for coming.” Marc looked tense. Not a good sign.
Charley stepped to the back of the group, right behind the two young women who didn’t speak the language. She pantomimed laughing for them, pointing at Marc and then cracking up. Hopefully, that wasn’t against the rules. It wasn’t stipulated, so she could argue it if she had to.
The two women looked at Marc and laughed, then back at Charley for approval. She gave them a thumbs-up.
“So I’m from out of town,” Marc began. “And the first thing I see on the Sunset Strip is The Comedy Store.” He gestured at the club behind him. “I’m thinking…what? I can go inside and buy comedy? Do they have aisles labeled raunchy, pre-teen, or 90s humor?”
Silence. Charley poked the two women in front of her and again mimicked laughter, pointing at the camera. They laughed uproariously for thirty seconds then stopped, turning to her for approval.
The two older women looked at each other, shaking their heads. The store clerk dropped his cigarette, rubbed it out with his shoe, and turned to leave. Charley put out a hand to stop him. “Please. Stay,” she pleaded. “Laugh.”
“My break’s almost over.”
“It will only take a minute. Really. You’ll get to be on TV.”
He shook his head. “Round here, everybody’s on TV.”
“Please.”
Grudgingly, he turned back around to face Marc. “Gotta do better than that, buddy,” he said.
“A comedy store,” Marc repeated, sounding more desperate now. “You know, instead of buying milk and bread, you buy laughs. They ring you up and give you a receipt. But no returns. They don’t take back used laughs.”
Another poke in the back from Charley and the two tourists laughed.
“Good Lord,” said one of the middle-aged women.
“Are you shittin’ me?” asked the store clerk.
Charley had to do something. “I think there’s a sale today,” she called. “Buy Kevin Hart, get Kevin James for free. If you can get them both in your cart.”
That got some grudging chuckles, including from the two women she again poked, who laughed right on cue, this time clutching their stomachs and doubling over.
So she and Marc were a hit with the non-English-speaking crowd. Could be worse things. One task down. “That’s it,” she said. “We got them to laugh, right?” She looked at the crew for confirmation. They nodded.
“Thanks, everyone,” Charley said, shaking the hands of each of the five people she’d recruited. “We appreciate it. You can go on with your day now.”
“I don’t think he has much of a future in comedy, sweetie,” one of the women whispered to her. Her friend murmured agreement.
“I know,” Charley answered in a voice too low for Marc to hear. “But he has other qualities. He’s good with numbers. I think.”
“Well,” answered the woman, pulling on h
er friend’s arm to leave. “That’s something, I guess.”
“TV?” asked the tourists.
“TV. Make Me a Match. Maybe it will be on…wherever you’re from.”
They looked momentarily confused but walked away chattering with excitement.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Charley asked Marc.
“It was. Bad. Thank God you saved it.” He gave her a bear hug, squeezing so hard, Charley thought she might have stopped breathing for a second before he let her go. “Next one. Get a stranger to dance. We can do that one anywhere, so let’s knock it off the list.”
Charley looked around them. “Who looks like a dancer?”
“It didn’t say they have to be good.” Marc also scanned up and down the walk. “But I don’t see anyone I want to ask here. Let’s go to the other side.”
They jaywalked across the street, Marc holding on to her hand and waving pleasantly at pissed-off drivers.
The first person they saw was a mom pushing a stroller with twins. “Her,” Marc said. “She’s perfect.”
“Are you sure—”
Too late. Marc was already at the woman’s side, trailed by the camera crew and peering down at the stroller to tell her what beautiful children she had. The woman beamed.
Charley hurried over in time to hear Marc say, “I know how busy you have to be right now, but I have something to ask you. I’m on a TV show that’s filming its first season and I have to get someone I don’t know to dance. You look like a dancer.”
“Oh no, I haven’t danced in a long time.” The woman shook her head.
“What’s your name?”
She looked uncertainly at the camera, but answered, “Melanie.”
“Melanie, you move like a dancer.”
Pink showed in her cheeks. “My husband would—”
“Be bragging to all his friends,” Marc finished for her. He tipped his head. “Please?”
She hesitated, but finally said, “Okay. But only for a minute.”
“Only for a minute. That’s all we need.” He flashed a told-you-so grin at Charley.
Charley returned it. Clearly, he should have been the one on recruiting duty for the last task. If this woman was any indication, people didn’t turn him down.
“There’s no music,” Melanie said.
“Not a problem. I’ll sing.”
Charley looked at him in surprise. He could sing?
“Okay.” Melanie laughed nervously and moved a few feet away from the stroller. “But I don’t even know why I agreed to this.”
“Ready? Here goes.” Marc began singing in a clear, on-pitch tenor, right in the middle of the sidewalk. “You gotta go and get angry at all of my honesty.”
Seriously? He knew a Justin Bieber song? She felt as though this episode should be titled “The Secret Lives of Accountants.” Privately, she loved The Biebs, but was pretty sure she hadn’t put that in the show’s questionnaire.
Melanie began to dance, her hair whipping from side to side, as Marc flawlessly delivered the song lyrics. Passersby gathered to watch.
“Who is that?” she heard one woman ask another. “He’s good.”
“The dancer’s pretty good, too,” her companion observed.
Marc stepped closer to Melanie. They were dancing as the crowd grew larger. A man pushed his way in front of Charley, blocking her view. She stepped around him.
Marc and Melanie were on to the chorus and so obviously having a good time, an unexpected pang of jealousy struck Charley. Which was ridiculous, really. He was her perfect match, not the perfect match of a random woman on the street who had turned out to be a good dancer.
Marc finished the song with a flourish, going down on one knee as he sang the final lyric—asking if it was too late to say he was sorry. Melanie put her hands over her face to hide her embarrassment. Marc rose and hugged her, to applause and whistles from the crowd, then said something in Melanie’s ear. She nodded and grabbed the handle of the stroller.
Marc waved at the crowd, searching for Charley. She put her hand up. “I’m over here.”
He was at her side a few seconds later. “That was fun.”
“You can sing.”
“I’m a shower singer. But thanks.” He leaned down to kiss her cheek. “What’s our next task?”
His mouth brushing her skin felt nice. Affectionate, even. She smiled up at him.
“Next?” he asked again.
“Oh. Sorry. Jump on a train?”
He peered down the street. “A train. Nothing comes to mind, but…” He grabbed her hand and pulled. “Come on, let’s find it.”
“Hold on. Let’s ask.”
“We’ll find it.”
“Or we won’t. And we’re being timed.”
He stopped abruptly. “Okay. Let’s ask.”
They each asked several people before one pointed the way. “Carneys restaurant. Over there.”
“Thanks,” Charley said before rushing to keep up with Marc, who was already bolting down the street.
“I see it,” he called over his shoulder. “The restaurant’s inside a yellow train.”
Not long after, they had jumped on the small platform at the back of the colorfully painted train and been filmed waving from it, hand in hand.
It was fun. A little like being a celebrity. For a minute. Wherever they went, most people looked curiously at the cameras then at Marc and Charley. Of course, they also looked away when they realized they had no idea who Marc and Charley were.
“I’m guessing Rocky is at the Bullwinkle statue,” Marc said, “so that will be our last stop. Looks like we’re French kissing in front of the chateau next.” He lifted a brow. “I’m good with that. Are you?”
Charley gulped and nodded. If they were going to win this thing, she’d need to be kissing him. Probably a lot.
“So that’s an easy one. Chateau Marmont. Let’s go.” Once again, he grabbed her hand and led her through throngs of people.
The iconic hotel wasn’t far away, its castle-like structure rising high and dignified above the activity on the Strip. “Wow,” said Charley as they walked up to it. “It’s beautiful. I’ve heard about it. History and secrets.”
“True.” Marc gave the structure little more than a passing glance before positioning them on the narrow sidewalk below the hotel’s sign. Cars roared past and lush greenery loomed overhead. “Can you pan up to get us and the sign?” he asked the cameraman.
At the answering nod, Marc turned Charley to face him. “Ready?”
“Ready.” She closed her eyes and tipped her head to the side. A painful clunk of foreheads came next. “Ow.” She opened her eyes to see Marc rubbing his head. “Let’s try that again,” she laughed.
This time, they kept their eyes open.
Charley leaned to the left at the same time Marc did. When she did a quick adjustment to the right, so did he. The sound guy snickered.
Marc put his hands on either side of her face. “How about you go that way…” He nodded in the opposite direction. “…and I’ll go this way.”
“That works.”
Awkward. They were facing each other straight on, like strangers forced to pose. Which wasn’t all that far from the truth, but still…
This time, just as he leaned in, Charley tried to shift her foot into a more playful pose, but her shoe slid on a pebble, nearly taking her down to the pavement. She stopped her fall by grabbing on to Marc’s shirt. He lifted her up and set her back on her feet.
“Sorry.” She released the fabric from her grip. “Maybe this isn’t a good spot.”
“We don’t have time to look for another one, unless we want to lose this thing. Third time’s a charm.”
Marc took charge of the situation, again holding Charley’s head between his hands. He brought her closer to him and closed his lips on hers. Their tongues touched and explored.
And…no bells, no Hallelujah Chorus, no spontaneous lifting of her foot, no stirrings of desire. Just a perfectl
y nice kiss from a perfectly nice guy.
Charley wasn’t a quitter, though. She stayed with it, mentally pushing up her sleeves and doing her best to ignore honks from passing drivers, the pungent smell of exhaust mixed with jasmine, and the bird watching them with interest from a tree limb.
She had to close her eyes again. That would help.
Abruptly, Marc pulled away. “Come on, we have to get to Bullwinkle and Rocky. Last thing on the list.”
She looked at him, wondering whether he’d had a similar reaction to their kiss. Shit. She’d hoped for something. Anything. It didn’t help that she had the fresh memory of Luke’s kiss to compare it to. Damn Luke.
Give me something to work with here, she implored the matchmaking gods, wherever they might be. No answer. They were probably busy keeping a meddling eye on Jason and Trevor.
“What?” Marc asked.
“Nothing. Do you know where to find Bullwinkle and Rocky?”
“I asked Melanie after she finished dancing. She told me there’s a statue in the lobby of city hall. It’s not far away. Just a couple of streets from here.” He grinned, before landing a peck on the top of her head. “Oh, and great kiss, by the way.”
And that was the problem.
He began to jog away, the cameramen following. Charley joined them. Marc was ahead of her all the way, but she kept him in sight despite having to make her way through people slowly strolling and peeking in store windows.
Once again, he didn’t wait for the pedestrian light, but took advantage of backed-up traffic to bob and weave to the other side of the street. By the time Charley reached the intersection, the light had turned back to walk.
“There it is,” Marc shouted, pointing ahead.
Several heads that weren’t Charley’s turned to look at him. She kept her eyes straight ahead, on him, her mind racing as she wondered how in the hell she would get her body to cooperate; it wasn’t lusting after her perfect match. A vital reaction was sleeping on the job. She had to wake it up, get it caffeine. Like that would help.
They could do this. He was a man. She was a woman. He was interested; he’d unlocked his side of the adjoining door.
And she’d slept with Luke. Well, after. She’d slept with Luke after. Dammit.
Kiss and Confess (Love Unscripted Book 1) Page 7