Page 6 of Act Like You Don't Care
His current girlfriend was an artist, a sculptor. They didn’t go out much in public.
I had no idea what he was doing in this movie, playing the villain of all parts—he had much better prospects. For me, this was a huge movie, better paid and finally the lead actor—having my name on the screen at the same time as his was a promotion. For him, it was a step down from being the lead on the credits.
He played with the bottle of water, watching the little air bubble zip from one end to the other. I got the feeling he had something to say and my heart began to beat a little faster, already anticipating a problem. You just never know, and if he told me that this was probably as good as I could ever do, I wasn’t sure I wouldn’t curl up in a ball in the corner of the studio and have some sort of crisis.
Grady glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. He still wore his casual just-talking-to-a-co-worker smile, but his eyes were serious. “I heard you’re having trouble with a fan.”
Shit, was that rumor getting out already? I’d have to get Will to see if he could figure out who was leaking this stuff andsquashthem. Hard. “It’s no big deal. I know you get some crazy stuff in the mail too.”
He dipped his head in acknowledgment, but his expression never changed. “I know you probably haven’t thought this far ahead, but if you need to hide out someplace in a hurry, you can stay at my place. Get your assistant to book you a hotel room, go into the hotel and right out the back. I’ll give you a code to the front door and you can have the guest suite.”
Was this a pass? Was this the real Grady that the handsome geniality hid? “I’m fine. It’s nothing.” I narrowed my eyes at him.
Grady shook his head. “Don’t play around with this shit. None of the stuff I’ve been getting made the studio look at hiring private security. If they’re going to spend that kind of money on you, it’s serious enough to have a backup plan for the backup plan.” He looked down at his water bottle, tilting it back and forth as the bubbles raced from one end to the other. “I’ve seen this go bad, real fast. Before my Hollywood days. Don’t throw your safety away for image. Safety is real, image isn’t.”
I felt a chill and I could almost see all my carefully nurtured independence falling to pieces around me. “We think we know who it is now, anyway. They’re checking it out. Hopefully this is the end of it.”
He grunted and played with his water bottle some more. “All the same, backups for the backups. You don’t ever have to use it, but if we actors don’t stick up for each other, who else is going to?”
I stared at him, trying to read the truth in his eyes. It felt real, but that didn’t mean it was. Suddenly, I was exhausted. Not physically tired, but sick of the bullshit and the need to constantly look for the motive behind the words. Besides, I’d never heard a bad thing said about him—maybe this once I’d just trust my instincts and believe him. “Thank you. I’ll keep that in mind,” I told him and privately reminded myself that I didn’t have to take advantage of his offer if I found out differently later.
He smiled that toe-curling smile of his. “Good. I’ll have it set up and my assistant will talk to yours.”
I opened my mouth to thank him, but at that point one of the other make-up artists called Grady’s name and he got to his feet, setting the still unopened bottle of water in the chair.
“Grady, why did you take this part?” I blurted, unable to control my curiosity any longer.
He turned back to me with that smile that made the panties drop. “I was curious.”
“Curious?” About what?
“Whether the rumors about you were true.” His smile grew a little broader.
Which ones? Probably all of them. I couldn’t let it just go, though. “And are they?” I demanded, butterflies in my stomach.
“Some of them.” He winked and headed across to his make-up chair.
I watched him go, baffled. It hadn’t sounded skeezy, whatever it was that he’d found to be true.
Then Octavio was shouting for me to come get my make-up redone and there was no more time to puzzle over the mystery that was Grady Roark.
Tam
Iwent out after the day’s shooting finished, trying to shake the weirdness of it all, but even dancing until I had a stitch in my side didn’t help me find the deep, dreamless sleep I’d been hoping for.
The next morning I crawled out of someone else’s bed late and, if I was going to be truthful about it—which I absolutely wasn't going to be with the director—kind of hungover. The guy I'd gone home with last night groaned and buried his head under the pillow. I left him there without waking him up to say goodbye, in part because I couldn't quite remember his name? Ryan? Rayne? Rowan? I was pretty sure it was an R anyway.
The cab was slow arriving, which gave me far too much time to think. I'd gone home with the R guy—oh, I didn't know why. Lonely, I guessed. Frightened a little, maybe, after that letter and even more scared that this would be the start of a slow slide into bit parts and toothpaste commercials. Frustrated after the meeting with Pete and Joon. But mostly lonely.
Funny that it didn’t help. Though maybe it wasn’t the body in the bed I was hungry for, but someone I could share the rest of me with. Someone I didn’t have to second-guess all the time. And where was I going to find that in Hollywood?
Or outside it.
Back in the beginning, when I’d first moved to California from small-town America with my fiancé, I’d thought I was complete except for the spotlight hanging just out of reach. Steve had given up his family and his faith for me—at least for a time. I’d gotten used to having my ex on the other side of the bed, having a warm body to cuddle up to at night. Having someone to come home to when I finally staggered off the set. But a Vinist born was always a Vinist. I’d heard it said that no matter how far from the main stem they grew, they were always bound by the tendrils of their beliefs. So it shouldn’t have been a surprise when Joseph suddenly left me for his religion.
Yeah, maybe I needed a period of celibacy. Focus on my career, push the envelope of what everyone believed an omega could play. Get my head screwed on straight before I started making decisions based on what I wanted now versus what would do me the most good in the future.
I stood in my big glass shower and let the water beat down over me, steaming the smell of alcohol out of my pores. The sky outside the window was just turning pink—I’d have to get moving. Quickly, I washed my hair and scrubbed at my skin, though I was still careful to cover every inch of it so the make-up department had a clean and even palette to work on.
