If the Boot Fits

by Rebekah Weatherspoon

“Do I get to kill her now?” he heard Helene say.

  Sam went on with a humorless chuckle. “I just ignored it ’cause I thought she was just some random person trying to get at me.”

  “This is all my fault,” Amanda replied. “I should have told you I was her assistant. If I had been honest with you from the beginning this never would have happened.”

  “I’m not sure I believe that. Doesn’t sound like subtle or chill are her thing.”

  “When you put it like that,” Amanda said before she let out a defeated sigh. A different kind of pain bloomed in Sam’s chest. This whole situation was beyond fucked up, but in that moment all he wanted was to be back in Los Angeles, holding Amanda in his arms. She had Helene and Ignacio, but he wanted to be there for her, with her as they sorted this out.

  “I’m coming back.” He looked over at his brother, who nodded in agreement.

  “No, Sam. Don’t. This is awful, but it’s not life-or-death. You do not need to rush back across the globe for this. Stay and enjoy your time with Jesse.”

  “Nah, he’s with me on this.”

  “He’s awake too?”

  “The Pleasant brothers move as a unit. A G Unit, if you will.”

  Sam smiled as Amanda finally laughed a bit. “That was a terrible joke, but okay. Tell him I’m sorry. Tell your whole family. I didn’t want this. For you, for me—”

  “Baby, I know. No one is blaming you. I’m blaming fucking Dru. Just stay offline and try and lay low for a bit. Maybe don’t go out shopping with Helene.”

  “I won’t,” Amanda laughed again. “I promise.”

  Sam assured her he’d keep her updated on his travel plans and then they reluctantly ended the call. Sam tossed his phone on the bed beside his brother and ran his hands over his du-rag. What a fucking mess.

  “I’m sorry, man,” he said to Jesse.

  “It’s okay. I got the break I needed. And you’re not gonna enjoy yourself, sitting here stressing about her. We’re not getting a flight anywhere until the morning, though.”

  “Yeah, I know.” He wanted to get back, but it wasn’t even four a.m. yet and they were looking at no less than twenty-five straight hours of travel before they were back in California. He wasn’t going anywhere in a hurry.

  Jesse stood and clapped him on the shoulder with his massive palm. “Tell Walls silence is the plan for now and let John know what’s up just so he doesn’t panic.”

  “Okay,” Sam said, trying to organize his thoughts, beyond the image of Amanda’s smile he often brought to mind.

  “You’re really into her?” Jesse asked.

  “Yeah, I am. It’s still new but—” Sam swallowed not shocked by what he was feeling now that he knew Amanda was okay. “I’m falling in love with her.”

  “I could hear it in your voice.”

  Sam watched his brother as he went back to his room, feeling like there was something he should say. “You’ll get there one day,” he called after him.

  “I doubt it, but thanks for keeping hope alive,” Jesse said, before the door separating their rooms snicked closed behind him.

  Sam got back in bed and shot John a quick email, letting him know that he and Amanda were in fact a thing, but no comment was the stance for now. Not a minute later his phone vibrated with his agent’s response.

  Sounds good. Hope to meet her sometime. Looks like a sweet girl. We’ll talk when you’re back.

  With that he felt like he should have some peace of mind, but he stared up at the ceiling, his mind scrolling through that TMZ article over and over again. He’d never been an object of gossip before. Not like this. Now he knew that he hated it and he hated it even more for Amanda.

  He’d wanted to be an actor since he was a kid. He knew the shitty parts of fame that came along with it and he knew the Oscar win and the press surrounding it would put him out there in ways no one in his family but his grandmother had experienced. He was still processing the exposure and what it meant for himself and his career, what parts to skip over and ignore and what moments to embrace and put toward his personal growth.

  He’d been working toward this and been trained for this for years and for him it was still a mindfuck. Amanda wanted none of it, but she wanted him and if he was going to be the right man for her, he had to do everything in his power to protect her.

  * * *

  Amanda had no idea how long thirty-six hours was until she spent twenty-four of those hours being part of the entertainment news cycle. She’d spent most of the day with Helene while Ignacio went out to a last-minute meeting at the studio, but when he came back she figured she’d imposed on the newlyweds’ hospitality enough. Helene made her promise she’d call or come back over if she changed her mind. She almost made her promise to take her up on her offer for any and all assistance, both personally and professionally.

  She’d spent most of the night ignoring texts and then flat-out blocking numbers. When Dru made a point to send her screenshots of several of Twitter’s cruelest tweets regarding her physical appearance and clear gold-digging status, she decided it was time to block Dru’s number. She’d ordered takeout she knew she shouldn’t spend money on, then after checking in with her mom, she’d made a nice blanket fort for herself and cried herself to sleep.

  In the morning, though, she felt oddly revived. Rage energized her and helped her realize that Dru might be an unbelievable asshole, but it had forced her to do the thing she should have done long ago.

  She pulled up her spec script for Banker Down. It was old, several seasons old, but there was good stuff there. Her parents and her hometown were waiting for her and while she was still a whole day away from getting to see Sam, she was certain of one thing: She wasn’t ready to give up on her professional dreams just yet. For the rest of the day she binged the pilot of every sci-fi, fantasy, thriller, and paranormal show she could find online, and then that night, after another overpriced delivery, she started writing.

  * * *

  Amanda followed Sam’s directions and pulled into the guest space under his condo. She entered the code at the elevator up to his place. They’d been in touch as he traveled back to the States, then back to California, and decided it would be best for them to meet at his place. The closet Amanda called home wasn’t suitable for guests, and if this conversation got even more sad and depressing, they didn’t need the audience of Sam’s family checking in on them at the ranch. If he decided to cut her loose she’d send them all an apology for getting Sam mixed up with Dru’s dramatic shit. She knew he didn’t blame her, but she knew how this all looked from the outside and as far as they knew the one common denominator was her.

  When the elevator chimed, announcing she’d arrived at his floor, it struck her just how completely wrung out she felt. When she wasn’t crying, she was writing, and when she wasn’t writing, she was stressing herself to the point of exhaustion trying to imagine how this conversation with Sam was going to go. After the initial panic, reality settled in. If she and Sam decided to stay together, large-scale public scrutiny would be a part of her life. She was strong, but she didn’t know if she was that strong.

  She didn’t know how to feel when she saw him leaning against his doorway. She swallowed and matched the hesitant smile that stretched across his face as she made her way down the hall. The last few days made it pretty clear, but the emotions warring in her were proof that life wasn’t fair. She walked up to him, forcing her hands to stay by her sides.

  “Good to see you, Cha-Cha.”

  “Likewise, Tex.”

  “Come on in.”

  “Thanks.” Amanda slipped by him as he held the door open for her. She couldn’t help but brush his bicep as she went by. He followed, letting the door close behind them. She looked around, thinking of how modern and sterile white this place was compared to his grandmother’s palatial home. It made sense for a young, single guy who had suddenly added a lot more zeroes to his checks. But it wasn’t Sam. The white paint and the gray furniture lacked his
warmth. The black-and-white art on his walls, while gorgeous, lacked his joy. No wonder he went back to Charming every chance he got.

  “You’re not here much, are you?” she asked as she turned to face him. She instantly forgot her own question when she saw the look on his face. It was close to the same look he gave her when he saw her standing in the middle of that hotel room in nothing but a towel. This time though, there was something more behind it. More heat. More care. More need. She was powerless against that look.

  “I am here to have a very important, very adult conversation about our future, our mutual expectations, how I can issue a formal apology to your family, especially your grandmother, but right now all I can think about is the way you’re looking at me and how much I missed you and how a good, dirty make out session that leads to the bedroom is what I really need,” she blurted out.

  “You don’t owe my family an apology. They aren’t upset with you. We should definitely talk about our expectations and our future. I’m hoping that conversation involves whether you wanna have kids and where you think is the best place to honeymoon.”

  Amanda laughed and kinda hoped he was only joking a little.

  “We can definitely move things to my bedroom, but I wanna check in with you first. Are you okay?”

  “No,” she said honestly. “Are you? Your privacy was violated by a madwoman with an unearned grudge.”

  Sam chuckled a bit, then held out his hand as he nodded toward the gray sectional in the middle of the living room. “Come sit down.” Amanda joined him on the couch, resisting the urge to climb into his lap so she could soak up all his warmth and maybe kiss him a little.

  “Helene said the same thing, that I didn’t do anything wrong, but I shouldn’t have told Dru about us. When she asked, actually, when she demanded that I set you two up, I saw red. Literal red. I had no idea what jealousy meant until that moment.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah. I just—I still can’t decide what hurts more. That I care what strangers are saying about me or the fact that I actually trusted Dru. I knew what she was like, but something in my head made me think I was somehow exempt from her poison. It was too much to think of her trying to use me to spread that shit. She had no idea how much I care about you. And this might sound how it’s going to sound, but I hated the idea of her hurting you, but I also hated the idea that she thought she was good for you. Like she’s what you need.”

  “I appreciate that, Cha-Cha, but what about what you need?”

  “Well. For now I need a job. Helene said she would make up a job for me and put me on her and Ignacio’s in-house staff payroll for a year.”

  “That sounds great.”

  “It was very kind of her, but I can’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “’Cause I don’t want it to impact our friendship. What if I—”

  “What? What if you take advantage of Helene’s kindness? Try and sleep with Ignacio? Sell stories about them to the tabloids?”

  “Yeah, you know me.”

  “Exactly. You wouldn’t do that to Helene ’cause you’re actually a good person and you’re a good friend. Someone tried to hurt you and me, and you didn’t try and scramble and point fingers, you’re sitting here thinking about my family and how they are handling this. You’re not Dru. You’re the most beautiful woman in the world—”

  “Don’t tell Twitter that.”

  “Actually . . .”

  “Actually what?” Amanda asked as Sam pulled his phone out of his back pocket.

  “I have a little something to show you. While Twitter is a garbage heap of a garbage fire, I found that you and I have a solid number of people who support our undeniable love.” Sam made a dramatic show of clearing his throat. “‘Starting the Protect Amanda McQueen at All Cost prayer circle. Who’s with me?’ There are four hundred responses, about ninety-eight percent positive.”

  “What about the other two percent.”

  “Bots. Russian bots. I’m sure of it, but wait. There’s more. ‘Wow. I didn’t know who Sam Pleasant was until about twenty minutes ago, but he’s fine and he clearly has taste.’ There’s a picture of us both. Several people agree with this assessment. There are more tweets about you crushing people with your ample thighs, but some of them were a little much and then I started getting jealous.”

  “That’s so sweet,” Amanda laughed.

  “Oh, there’s more. ‘Um, Amanda McQueen is stunning. Can you say cheekbones? Yas, bitch. Get your man.’ There are a lot of tweets making it clear that I am the type of man people think you should have.”

  “I guess the Internet isn’t all bad.”

  “It’s not.” He took a deep breath. “This is life now, Cha-Cha. For all of us. People have their opinions and twenty-four hours to just spew them out into the ether, but that doesn’t change the way I feel about you and I hope it doesn’t change the way you feel about me.”

  “It does though.”

  Sam’s eyebrows shot up as his chest sank. “Oh yeah? Okay.”

  “This all felt too good to be true from the very beginning. A nobody assistant dating an Oscar winner—”

  “Nah, that’s not gonna work.”

  “Oh.”

  “You’re more than just your job. We’re not going to sit here and act like you’re less-than ’cause your career isn’t going the way you thought it would. Remember when we were sitting at my grandmother’s table and you were telling me how lucky I am to take risks because I have this amazing safety net?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, you know what I’m looking at right now? The catch of the day.”

  “What?” Amanda burst out laughing. “That doesn’t make one damn lick of sense.”

  “I know. It sounded way better in my head. I know you don’t want to lean on me and Helene, but I’m saying this right now, not as the man who is going to dick up and down as soon as we finish this conversation, but as someone who genuinely cares about you as a friend and respects you as a writer. And . . . I read your Banker Down spec.”

  “Oh God.”

  “Nah, oh God. It was good! And I’m saying that as a huge fan of the show and someone who reads a lot of scripts. It’s damn good. So, Ms. McQueen. You have this net. You have the support. What are your dreams and how do we help you achieve them?”

  Amanda took a deep breath and looked back at Sam’s painfully handsome face. They’d already shared so much in such a short time. She could be honest with him. She could tell him what was really in her heart and at the top of her career bucketlist.

  “I want to show-run a sci-fi series with no less than four seasons on HBO and figure out who we need to bribe to make sure it’s an Emmy winner, every time.”

  “Four seasons on HBO and an Emmys sweep. Got it. What else?” Sam asked.

  “Well, I think I need to work something out with Helene’s glam squad. If I’m gonna be photographed with you I need a perfect five minutes face.” Amanda paused for a moment before she reached over and took Sam’s hand. She missed his smooth skin and his warm touch. She didn’t want to go any longer without either in her life. “I don’t want to hide anymore. Not behind Dru, not behind any job or this notion that there is no part of any spotlight for me. I have no desire to be out in front, but I want to be with you. By your side.”

  “I want all of that for you. I want to help make it happen if you’ll let me.”

  Amanda couldn’t speak. She’d had her parents and Helene, but it was really something to have Sam on her side. A nod of agreement would have to do. Sam moved closer, pushing his leg under hers on the couch. Amanda almost gasped as his warm fingers spread out over her thigh. She couldn’t wait any longer. She leaned forward and brushed her lips against his, then again and once more until he kissed her back. His arm came around her waist and Amanda let herself lean back against the cushion, far enough for Sam to climb over her. She sighed into his mouth as he settled his weight between her hips, letting her feel every inch of his gro
wing erection against the fabric of her jeans. Amanda broke the kiss before her body took over and she started rubbing herself along his length in a shameless display of the need fighting to get out.

  She looked at him, drawing her fingers over his lightly stubbled cheek.

  “Where’s your cowboy hat?”

  “Out at the ranch. Attracts a little too much attention on Sunset.”

  “That’s a shame. I like you in that hat. You should keep a spare here. Warm up this place a bit.”

  “I think we need to get you a proper hat. Shade those beautiful eyes from the blaring sun.”

  “I’ll need a different hat for every day,” she said, biting her lip.

  “A different hat for every day of the week. With boots to match,” Sam replied with a smile and she knew this was it for her. It was too early to say the words out loud, but she’d found her man and she wasn’t going to let him go.

  Epilogue

  Amanda let out several quick breaths and fought the urge to fiddle with her gown. She’d survived the hard part. She’d survived the short walk from the hotel to the luxury SUV that would take them the short drive to the Met. And the hardest part, the red carpet.

  It had taken a lot of doing, but between Sam, Miss Leona, and Helene calling in a biblical amount of favors Amanda had been outfitted with a once-in-a-lifetime ensemble. A flowing gown made of royal blue, bright red, and sunny yellow, complete with a gem-encrusted cape with a train that felt three blocks long. She’d ditched that heavy-ass garment as soon as possible, but from the moment she’d taken Sam’s hand and stepped down from the high luxury car, she knew they’d both pulled it off. A handsome prince with his own waist-length red cape, and Amanda, his Snow White.

  Her glam squad had finished the look with a full Fenty face, complete with blood red lipstick and false eyelashes that practically brushed her forehead. Her phone was tucked in an apple-shaped clutch covered in bright red Swarovski crystals. Daryl, Miss Leona’s wig technician, had crafted a bob lace front of beautiful white ringlets instead of Snow White’s signature soft black curls and installed the unit with such precision that when Amanda finally looked in the mirror, she had to remind herself shocking bright white hair wasn’t naturally growing from her head. The red bow in her hair was lined with wire to keep its arches and knot in perfect place.