Hollywood Tiger: BBW Tiger Shifter Paranormal Romance (Hollywood Shifters Book 3)

by Chant, Zoe

  Dennis shuffled into the bathroom to crank the shower to max as he said, “What time is it anyway? Mindy and I aren’t supposed to be at the location until seven, when the sun is full up.”

  “4:38. I have to go, but I suggest you two get there as early as you can, game faces on.”

  “Got it,” Dennis said.

  He ended the call and stared at his phone, then thought, What the hell. If this was the last day he saw her, why not start it earlier? He hit her number. Two rings, and she answered, her voice husky with sleep. “What is it?” He got a sudden, vivid picture of her rosy from her warm bed, hair wild, her soft lips . . .

  “Dennis?” Her voice cleared with awareness.

  “Looks like things are happening. The location is only a couple miles from here. How about getting a good breakfast into us while we put together Plan A and Plan B?”

  “Who’s cooking?” she asked warily.

  He laughed silently. “A chef at the bottom of the hill here. They do their own pastry on site. How far away do you live?”

  “Under five miles.”

  “Great. By the time you get here I can have it hot and ready.”

  “You have food, I will travel,” she said after the tiniest hesitation.

  Exhilarated to a crazy degree, he said, “See you in a few.”

  They rang off. Mate debate aside, this was going to hurt like a sonofabitch when she said sayonara, but fuck the future. He was going to ride the wave as long as it rolled.

  * * *

  This is crazy, Mindy kept thinking as she showered, conditioned the hell out of her hair and then added half a bottle of relaxer. This is totally unprofessional, she thought as she racked through her clothes, but what could she wear that would be a sleazy Payton dress but pretty for breakfast with Dennis, and how many kinds of idiot am I being?

  Nobody answered any of the questions, of course. Instead her poodle wriggled happily in her. Dogs never think of consequences, she thought as she carefully did her makeup. Dogs live in the moment. Okay, since the dog in her wanted this even more badly than she did, then she was going to approach it with dog-think rather than people-think: enjoy every second of her time with him, because once the job was over and he flitted off to Timbuktu, life would suck whether she enjoyed today or not.

  She settled on a Marilyn Monroe halter dress in hot pepper red, with shoes and lipstick to match, then walked out to her car. It was time to go.

  Her apartment was considerably closer to JP’s house then five miles—barely two, straight up into the hills. She pulled into the short driveway next to the Lexus, and when she got out, she found the front door standing open.

  “Come on back,” Dennis called from within. “Perfect timing. Just finished the coffee.”

  The enticing aroma of fresh-ground Kona drew her like a magnet down the split level house to the guest room and the terrace beyond. Dennis had dragged another little round table out. Both were covered with environmentally friendly containers that steamed gently.

  Dennis was dressed in black again, his freshly washed hair gleaming in the light of the candles he had lit and set along the balcony, as dawn was still barely a smear in the east.

  “Wow, this is nice,” she said.

  He flicked a grin her way. “Glad you like it. I figured we’d want to see what we’re eating. I forgot to ask what you like, by the way, so I ordered enough for an army. I figure whatever we don’t eat will save.”

  As he spoke he lifted container tops to reveal pancakes, croissants, blueberry muffins, fluffy scrambled eggs, crispy bacon, two kinds of omelets, pots of salsa, jam, and a bowl of fresh fruit.

  Then he glanced at her in horror. “Please tell me you’re not one of those women who eat a single bite of yoghurt in the morning and then moan about the calories?”

  “You should know by a look at me that I like food,” she said. “My least favorite step-brother used to call me Wide Load.”

  “Point the schmuck out to me and I’ll clean his clock for him,” Dennis retorted, dropping onto the wicker love seat beside her.

  There were at least six inches between them, but once again she breathed against that skin-tightening, tingly frisson of intimate space, and fought the urge to sidle up next to him.

  Instead, she busied herself loading a plate. The first bite was heavenly. The second just as good.

  As he talked lightly and intermittently about his search for the perfect breakfast place, she worked her way through each delicacy, at length closing her eyes to enjoy the excellent food, the soft early morning air . . .

  The gentle sense of anticipation.

  And opened her eyes to see him watching her, twin candle flames dancing in the yellow-rimmed black pupils of his eyes.

  She put her fork down on her empty plate. “What?”

  “I like watching you eat,” he said with that dimpled smile. “Actually, I like watching you do everything.”

  Heat flared through her at the warmth in his tone. “You realize that’s practically a challenge to shove part of this muffin up my nose. Or your nose.”

  “What?” He spread his fingers across his chest, pretending an injured air. “You think I’m kidding?”

  “I think you should finish that food before it gets cold. Which would be a crime—it’s too good to be disrespected. And by the way, didn’t you say this was a working breakfast? Did something change?”

  His grin thinned, his expression positively piratical. “My friend Greg called this morning. Basically, we’ve got to stick to Haskell as close as we can. Something’s going on, but this much we know: this is the endgame. We are going to nail this SOB.”

  “At a location shoot?” Mindy asked doubtfully. “I mean, what’s he going to do to get him caught in front of a zillion spectators? From everything I’ve ever heard, those are about as public as you can get.”

  “I know. Which is why I’m confused as well. But others can handle the covert stuff. Between the two of us, we should be able to lock down the head honcho. He’s not going to go anywhere without one of us right there with him.”

  “Okay,” she said. “Though the thought of hearing that horrible laugh one more time, hurr hurr hurr,” she grunted, “makes me want to toss my cookies.”

  “Okay, then we won’t talk about him until we’re done. It really would be a crime to spoil this breakfast.”

  “Except,” she noted, “your plate is empty.”

  “As is yours,” he murmured, still with that steady gaze.

  The warm tingling had flared into heat. “So by breakfast, you didn’t mean the food?”

  “The meal,” he said low in his chest, “was delicious.” His gaze drifted down her body as he leaned an inch closer, his breath stirring the top of her hair. “But what I was thinking of was dessert.”

  Her breath caught.

  He leaned closer, and said even more softly, “One question driving me crazy is, what are you wearing under that skirt?”

  Who was she kidding? She was already wet.

  “If you show me yours, I’ll show you mine,” she whispered back.

  The first time, they didn’t even make it to the bed. The second time was a reprise of the shower, only he took her from behind as she knelt hands and knees on the shower bench, hot water pounding all around as he brought them to a volcanic climax that left them both squeaky clean and utterly wrung out.

  Presently they lay side by side in the bed as a ray of peachy-gold early morning sunlight touched the candles, paling the flickering flames, and began to climb slowly across the terrace.

  “Tell me,” he said suddenly, picking up one of her hands and playing with her fingers.

  “Yes?” she said drowsily, faint alarm kindling far, far below the surface of her placidly sated mind.

  “That grandmother of yours that Mrs. Haskell mentioned? The one who thought she was a Shetland Pony?”

  “My great-grandmother. Yes.”

  “Did you ever consider that she was one?” he asked mildly. />
  She shot him a suspicious look. “Are you making fun of my great-grandmother?”

  “Not at all.”

  “It’s just that you’re the first person, ever, who has suggested that. She was perfectly sane.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “The sanest person I ever knew.”

  “She sounds like it.”

  “You’re agreeing with me,” Mindy said warily. “Nobody does that. Unless . . .”

  “Unless?” he prompted.

  “Nothing.” She bit his ear. “Unless you’re hinting that you think I’m insane. Menace.”

  “No,” he moaned in fake agony. “Don’t go there, Mork. I had to beat up every kid in fourth grade before they stopped the Dennis the Menace crap.”

  She grinned unrepentantly, loving the way his entire body quaked with laughter, silent except for that rough growl deep in his chest that reminded her of a purr. “Men-ace!”

  The last came out a squeak when he nipped her earlobe.

  “Ah,” she squeaked, laughing. “We’ve got to stop. We have to turn back into Payton and Dan, and not be late.”

  “I know. But I want every second of Mork I can get.”

  She closed her eyes, the alarm growing into a hard thing in her chest. She’d let the poodle be happy, but it was time to be a people—rational. Careful. Protecting them both. No, protecting all three of them, poodle, Mindy, and Dennis.

  “I have loved every second with you,” she murmured into his chest. “It’s been so good I want to go out on the high.”

  “Do we have to go out at all?” he asked,

  She sat up and gazed at him, not missing the subtle widening of his eyes, as if he’d surprised himself. Grown-up, she reminded herself. Grown-up with a poodle inside. “It’s me. It’s just that I am terrible at relationships. Look at the example I’ve had! And you’ve been so awesome it would be a criminal act to spoil the memories.”

  “Got it,” he said, but low—his gaze sliding away. “And I’m not much of a bargain. I live out of my go-bag. That’s no way to treat someone.”

  She should stop there—but she couldn’t help it.

  “Do you like living out of your go-bag?” she asked.

  “What? Oh. Yes—no. Sometimes I wish I had a better home base, but I know better than to settle for the yoke of a salary just to get something like this.” He waved a hand around the guest room. “It’d become a prison, and a cubicle job would turn me into a maze rat.” As he spoke he got up, and methodically began picking up his clothes, still not looking her way.

  The sense of shared intimacy had vanished, and she picked up her things and retreated to dress. A spurt of anger at the impossible situation made her leave her hair wild after all. Let it poodle. Thinking he would somehow guess about the dog inside her was idiotic—no, it was displaced worry about how the breakup would happen. Because of course it had to happen.

  By the time she emerged from the bathroom, he had picked up the food containers and carried them to the kitchen. When they reached the driveway, Dennis paused, his face in shadow from the early morning rays when he looked down at her. “Shall we drive separately?”

  “Might be easier,” she said.

  “Let’s see if we can park near one another,” he suggested.

  As it turned out, she was able to fit the Honda into a tight spot, but the Lexus, so much larger, required some circling outward. She waited in the Honda until he texted her, Found a spot. On my way.

  She dumped the text into an archive to be saved with the other brief messages from him, and every one of those photos from the bar that first night. She felt like a teenager, but the hell with it.

  He appeared, swinging his cane, a short time later. They had ten minutes to go until they were expected, but as it turned out, it took all of that ten minutes to squeeze their way through the crowd gathered behind the yellow police tape and traffic cones.

  First bored cops checked their pass against their IDs, then they were passed to thuggish looking security guys who wore dark glasses even though the sun was barely up. Last was a huge, handsome blond man Mindy sort of recognized, until Dennis said, “Hey, Hank. What’s up?”

  “Nothing in my pants,” Hank growled with a rude glance Mindy’s way. Then this charmer held out his hand for Mindy’s ID, even though she was standing right next to Dennis. Her indifference to his good looks sharpened to hatred between one heartbeat and the next.

  “G’wan, sweetie,” Hank said to her with a smirk, letting Dan and Mindy pass the last tape barrier.

  Along a side street, now guarded by a police car parked at the bottom of the road, was a row of huge trailers. The generators growled on all of them, a/c vents blasting though the outside air was a perfect 75 or so. But Mindy knew that the temperature would climb with the sun.

  Inside the row of trailers, caterers had set up folding tables full of fruits and pastries under flimsy canvas pavilions. None looked as good as the feast that she and Dennis had shared. Mindy’s heart constricted, and she didn’t know if she wished that breakfast had never taken place or not.

  No, she would never regret it. Another precious memory to take out later.

  “This way,” Dennis said softly, limping beside her. “I hear Haskell over there.”

  “Why the cane?” Mindy whispered back. “I meant to ask.”

  “When the job first began I was just recovering from an injury,” he said under his breath. “I decided to stick with it. Never know when you might need a cane.”

  Why would anyone ever need a cane if you weren’t injured? She glanced down at it, and her insides swooped. Oh, did he mean as a weapon? Trepidation made her breathe deeply. She worked hard not to get caught because it would be humiliating, because she didn’t want the cheaters getting away with it, and of course she never wanted to risk anyone putting together the occasional well-behaved poodle with her pretty collar and cute fake backpack with Mindy. But she’d never considered violence.

  She glanced around at the crowds of people, feeling vaguely reassured. Nobody was going to pull out guns and the like with a zillion people already holding up their cell cameras and shooting, or busy Tweeting, even though nothing was happening outside of a lot of people busy walking around with cables and light reflectors and sound equipment.

  Haskell’s braying voice reached them through the open door of the biggest, fanciest of the trailers, alone in the middle of the circle of production equipment, like a king’s castle surrounded by a moat.

  “Ready?” Dennis gave Mindy a fleeting smile.

  “Ready,” she breathed.

  He closed his hand around hers, and she was grateful for the warmth. They walked up the short steps together, and found a crowd inside the trailer, which was stuffed with plush furnishings.

  Haskell saw them, roared a string of orders, and sent people scurrying. One of those who ran past, looking wretched and anxious, was Emma Gordon, Mindy noticed. The girl clutched a mass of papers, a script with a load of post-its sticking out, and a laptop clutched under her arm. A pang of pity wrung through Mindy, and she smiled at Emma, who gave her a wan, distracted smile in return.

  “There you are, Danny-boy! And you look good enough to eat, honeybunch,” he added, with his usual repulsive leer at Mindy.

  She simpered back, wondering why it was that Dennis could talk about dessert and she practically fainted with desire, but this guy was just disgusting.

  “Hey, tell you what, I’ve got a few things to see to, so why don’t you two run out to the catering table. The kids will bring you anything you want. Including Bloody Marys if you want to start the day right.”

  Here it comes, Mindy thought, bracing.

  Sure enough, “Hurr, hurr, hurr,” Haskell chuckled in that oily voice.

  “Har, har, har,” Dennis laughed back, almost as fake. “C’mon, darling. We’ll be right outside, Jerry. Lemme tell ya, we are so excited to be here.”

  “And I’m excited to have you on board. We’ll just execute our busi
ness, as soon as Michael and I shoot down a few flying ducks here.” He indicated a young guy who looked as harassed as Emma.

  Dennis waited until they were outside the trailer before saying, “Michael is the director. Agent Sloane says he’s only done a few kid cereal commercials, and before that was an assistant director on a reality show that lasted one season. Even I can see that he’s totally out at sea.”

  Mindy looked around at the gathering crowd both inside and outside the partitioned area. At the far end, several big guys stood around in blond wigs and furs. Mindy sniffed, and said, “Horses?”

  “If I’m right, the Vikings are supposed to charge up the street here with swords and horses, chasing a gang of hoodlums with pistols and automatic weapons.”

  “Chasing?” Mindy asked. “Wouldn’t automatic weapons make the fight last about two seconds?”

  “Yes, and I also wonder where the Vikings got the horses. Unless they somehow managed to bring horses a few thousand miles to the Pacific Ocean before they went through the alien gate.”

  “Wow,” Mindy said, spotting some guys and a couple of girls decked out in gang colors, with their weapons tucked in pants or slung across their backs. They and the Vikings milled around, carefully eating or drinking coffee while trying not to mess up their costumes and makeup.

  Hank loomed up. “Boss wants you now.”

  Dennis and Mindy had shut up the moment the guy approached. They followed Hank, Mindy walking next to Dennis, so she heard his soft intake of breath.

  She looked a question, and he flicked a glance at Hank’s broad back in his jacket. He frowned at a faint bulge, then breathed, “He’s carrying.”

  Carrying? The meaning hit her. A pistol? Why would a film executive want some thug lurking around with a gun?

  Her neck prickled. Haskell waved from the top step of his trailer, and when they got inside, it was to find him alone, except for a weedy young man cradling a laptop in his arms, lid open.

  “We’re about to roll,” he said. “Danny, it’s time. I’ve showed you good faith, now it’s your turn to trust me. You want in, I need that check.”

  “I know,” Dennis protested. “I told my guy, but he said with a weekend coming up, it was so hard to get banks to cooperate, especially with sums over a million.”