Page 34 of Faking the Pass
Presley shot me a funny look, as if that had been a strange thing to say.
“Besides, I’m not allowed to tell the truth,” I told him. “I signed an NDA.”
“Oh.” His eyebrows lifted. “What happens if you violate it?”
“Each breach would cost me two hundred fifty thousand dollars.”
He whistled. “Steep. Might be worth it though.”
“No.” I pushed up to my elbows and shook my head. “I literally don’t have it.”
“The movie with Randy was the first time I ever got a significant payday,” I explained. “Two hundred thousand. And the money’s gone already. I was hoping with my next film I could start building a nest egg. Now I’ll probably never get cast in another film.”
Presley gave me a concerned look. “You already spent two hundred thousand dollars? Did you buy a sweet Lamborghini or something?”
His hands came up in the don’t-shoot-me gesture. “I mean no judgment. I’ve had teammates who basically did the same thing after coming into money following a lifetime without it.”
“No. I didn’t buy anything,” I said.
I didn’t like talking about it, but I couldn’t let Presley go on thinking I’d been out splurging on designer bags and shoes instead of paying my bills.
“My mom was sick for the past several years,” I said. “Before that she was working as a housecleaner, like me. No health insurance. Some of the doctors she needed to see literally wouldn’t take her unless they got paid up front. I charged up every credit card I could get my hands on to pay the medical bills.”
A look of sympathy crossed Presley’s face. “I’m sorry to hear that. Was it cancer?”
I nodded. “Yes. She fought it as hard as she could, but her body finally gave out. She died six months ago.”
“I’m so sorry,” he said again.
After a pause, he said, “No wonder you got engaged so fast.”
His tone said it all made sense now. If so, he understood more than I did. It was hard to explain the whirlwind that had been my “love affair” with Randy.
“Do you love him?” Presley asked.
My shoulders lifted and fell as I blew out a long breath. “I thought I did. But I guess I didn’t really know him. I only knew the parts he wanted me to see… which is the problem with marrying someone you’ve known for five minutes.”
Letting out a frustrated noise, I flopped back onto the bed again and closed my eyes, covering them with both hands.
“Now that I look back on it, I wasn’t really myself either,” I said. “Mom had just died. I was sad, of course—and lonely. I was probably a little too desperate to fill the emotional hole her passing left in my life. Randy came along and overwhelmed me with attention and gifts and talked about creating a big family, which is something I’ve always wanted. I just didn’t realize he’d be building it with severaldifferentwomen simultaneously.”
We both laughed, though it was more pathetic than funny. How was this my life?
“So the super-short engagement was his idea,” Presley said.
He’d shifted on the bed, supporting himself with one hand and looking down at me.
I looked at him and nodded. “Yeah, he claimed to be so inlovewith me he couldn’t wait for us to get married. Now I know he was just trying to squeeze it in before the movie came out to ignite interest in the film. I don’t know how I didn’t see it.”
“You were sweet and trusting,” Presley said. “You always have been. How did you meet him? At an audition?”
Sitting up, I folded my legs criss-cross and faced him.
“No, I was cleaning his house, actually. He had no idea I was an actress, and he was never home anyway when I was there. We’d never met. But one day he came home early just as I was leaving. He was really friendly—flirty actually.”
Presley arched one brow. His tone was sour.
“I bet he was.”
