Page 1 of Saving Ian Pope

Part I - LA

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Blind Item #7

This former boybander is nowhere to be found after rehab stint. Has he gone on another bender for a career ender?

Chapter 1

IVY

Fabio wobbled in the slight breeze, and I jumped up from my chair to rescue him. As I grabbed his hunky cardboard shoulders to reposition him, I tripped over the twine connecting him to the stakes of the romance booth. Fabio and I did an awkward dance, and he wound up between my legs in a compromising position. Had been a minute since I had a man between my legs

“Are you alright? Is this bloke taking advantage of you?”

From my hunched over posture, I glanced over my shoulder into a pair of dark sunglasses obscuring the eyes of the dude with the English accent. I couldn’t read the expression in his eyes, but the guy, his face shadowed by a baseball cap, struggled to maintain his composure.

I straightened to my full height, which came to Fabio’s armpit, hugging the cardboard cutout to my chest. “I’m fine. Just putting Fabio in his place.”

The Englishman cracked a smile and then tipped his head toward the inside of the booth. “I think you have a customer. Go. I’ll handle...Fabio.”

“Thanks.” I relinquished my cardboard boyfriend to the care of the guy with the tattooed arms and headed for my table, stacked with my two latest romance novels. I tripped on the table leg and knocked over a pile of books in front of the woman with a ring in her nose. “Sorry. I’m here.”

The woman, her canvas bag from the LA Festival of Books already bulging, picked up one of the books scattered in front of her. “Just the one I want. Can you sign it to Aurora, please? How much?”

I plopped down into my chair, re-ordering the books. “These are free today.” Not that I could afford to give anything away.

Aurora clapped her hands together, her long fingernails clicking. “Sweet. I’ll take both, then.”

As I finished autographing the second book with a flourish, my gaze flicked to the right. The Englishman, the New York Yankees baseball cap pulled low over his forehead, his longish, brown hair sticking from the bottom, had wrestled Fabio into submission and stood beside him, mimicking the studly pose, awaiting my approval. While his body didn’t quite match the physique of the iconic romance cover model’s, he made up for the lack of beefcake with a boyish sexiness.

I put a finger on my chin and shook my head at him. Hopefully, his guilt for laughing at my predicament would prompt him to storm into the booth and demand the remainder of my stock, so I wouldn’t have to lug them home.

At the thought of unloading the rest of my books onto an unsuspecting Brit, a smile stretched my lips as I slid the signed books toward Aurora. “Thanks for stopping by. Hope you enjoy them.”

I glanced past the shoulder of my happy customer at baseball cap man, who’d taken a step into the booth, ducking beneath the awning, even though it wasn’t necessary. He wasn’t particularly tall, more average height, but his aura took up a lot of space. I couldn’t see his face, shadowed beneath his hat and obscured by the dark sunglasses, but something about his presence had captured my attention—most likely because a man checking out the romance novel booth was a rarity.

He picked up a book from one of the racks and turned it over carefully to study the back, but I could tell he was as aware of me as I was of him. A little thrill ran down my leg.

I cleared my throat. “Now that you’re intimately acquainted with Fabio, you should definitely pick up a romance to read. Have you ever read a romance novel before?”

He glanced up, holding the book over his heart, the tattoos on his hand and arm as colorful as the book cover. “Uh, not that I’m aware of, but I could start.”

“Put that one down.” I grabbed the two books I’d been hawking all day and waved them in the air. “You should start with these two. I write romantic suspense, so you get a few dead bodies along with the romance. Or you could get them for your mother, sister, aunt, granny...”

He'd been walking toward me, as I blathered on, and parked in front of my table, plucking his sunglasses from his face and hanging them on the neckline of his white T-shirt, some obscure band name printed on the front.

I swallowed and stuttered to a stop while gazing into a pair of warm, brown eyes. Dropping the books, I licked my dry lips and reached for the diet soda on the corner of the table, knocking the empty can over. “Wife, girlfriend?”

He smiled at me, and it reached his crinkling eyes. Some chord of recognition reverberated in my chest, and I gripped the edge of the table to avoid melting into a puddle.

“I don’t have a wife, or a girlfriend, for that matter. Are you telling me your books are for women only? You don’t believe a man could enjoy a good romance?”

I flicked back my hair and straightened my shoulders. I was supposed to be promoting romance here, not turning away potential readers. “I think you...he could. And it won’t cost you a thing to try them out. My books are free today.”

His soft lips turned down in an adorable pout. “You shouldn’t give away your creativity.”

“Oh, I don’t, typically.” I picked up a book. “It’s my publisher. All these books are my promo copies to give away to entice...new readers.”And maybe random hot Englishmen. “I’m not allowed to sell them. Would you like one? You really should take both because they comprise the beginning of a new series for me and should be read, in order, to understand the whole story.”