Page 29 of Anyone But the Superstar

I scoff. ‘No, I don’t.’ Cursing my manifestation powers that seem to only work for evil, I slide my phone open, wondering if concierge can help me deal with a rogue Hollywood douchebag or if I’m going to have to call the police. I’d really rather not because once the police are involved…

Oh my God. Thepolice.

I jerk my eyes up to his, realization dawning. Idoknow what picture he’s talking about.

I can tell the moment he knows that I know. He folds his arms across his chest, his smile turning to a dark smirk. With his hair tousled, his gleaming brown eyes and his biceps bulging as they shift across his chest, he looks every bit the smoldering, sexy leading man that Google told me he was at the press junket.

And yet it’s the memory of him curled up in the fetal position with a look of horror and pain on his mangy, bearded face as he holds his damaged junk that comes to mind. The memory I immortalized with my phone’s camera before I left the hotel room that night.

I stifle a giggle, not wanting to poke the bull, as it were.

Even so, Felix’s eye narrow as I fake-cough.

Mike, with his usual epic timing, chooses this precise moment to break wind. Audibly.

In seconds,Peoplemagazine’s Sexiest Man Alive winner’s normally handsome facial features are contorted into an expression of such contempt and revulsion, it’s near savage. And almost identical to the face he makes when kneed in the nuts.

I give up and laugh.

Felix

My fists clench as the recent object of my desire and torment laughing at my expense.

Like,reallylaughs.

Head back, neck exposed, her spontaneous laugh echoes around us, just like it did at the bar.

And much to my annoyance, just like at the bar, my lower half reacts.

I almost bought her confusion. The knit of her eyebrows, the slight tilt to her head. All of it had me second-guessing if there even was a photograph. That maybe my nut-pain had somehow skewed my memory and that what I should really be focused on is finding out why Anne is in the condo Jack set up for me in the first place. And with her brother’s cat no less.

My nose wrinkles at the smell emanating from said cat. Anne may have regaled me with hilarious stories, but no imagination, even an actor trained in improv, could do the real animal justice.

I didn’t tell Anne that I have a slight…aversionto cats because it didn’t seem relevant at the time. Mike Hunt was an abstract figure, an idea, not something tangible and flatulent that would one day be within clawing distance.

Slowly, too slowly, Anne’s amusement fades. ‘That’swhy you’re here? The picture?’ She shakes her head. ‘Isn’t breaking and entering beneath you? I thought Hollywood stars had underlings for this sort of thing.’

‘I didn’t break in.’ I reach into my pocket, pulling out what the concierge gave Jack and me. ‘I have a key.’ I dangle it between us.

Wrong move. Mike’s shoulders drop, as if ready to pounce.Remembering what Anne said about his obsession with shiny objects, I toss the key a safe distance – across the kitchen and down the hall.

Mike scrambles after it.

Anne follows the cat, turning back to me, frowning. ‘Why do you have a key?’

‘Why did you take that picture?’ I counter, feeling safer now that the cat is out of sight.

She giggles again. While I’m happy to bring the conversation back to my number-one priority, her continued amusement isn’t helping my Portuguese temper.

Fueled more by embarrassment than any sense of justice, my tone hardens along with my body. ‘I don’t know what kind of deal you were hoping to make but I’m telling you right now, it won’t be enough to cover the lawsuit I’ll bring your way if you try and sell it.’

Her head jerks back, cutting her laugh short. I have a fleeting moment of satisfaction, until disdain colors her features.

She stalks toward me, looking far more threatening than the pouncing cat. When she’s a foot away, I drop my hands in front of me, bracing for impact and trying to ignore the enchanting smattering of freckles visible on her flushed cheeks.

Instead of her knee, she lifts her hand, her index pointed at my sternum. ‘Listen,Johnny.’

I flinch as her finger jabs forward, just shy of contact, while a wave of heat washes over me at the mention of my impromptu alias.

---