All The Pretty Lights (The "A" List #1) (5 page)

I don’t know what excites her more… having the opportunity to say
no comment
to a reporter the way she’s seen those bimbos on TV do, or the possibility that it could be Colt calling and she may actually speak to the living legend who stars in her dreams at night.

I don’t have the heart to tell her that it can’t possibly be Colt. I never gave him my number and he never asked for it.

There was a silent understanding when he pulled me in for that kiss that it would be that last time we saw each other.

“Hello. Daphne Baker’s phone.” The voice Lori uses to answer my cell is definitely not like any other I’ve ever heard her use. I can’t fight back the urge to laugh at how ridiculous she sounds. It’s a mixture of British and southern at the same time.

She rolls her eyes at me and uses the pointer finger of her right hand to press over her ear to tune me out. Turning her back, she steps away.

“Yes? She is. Is she expecting your call?” Pause. That doesn’t sound like a
no
comment
to me! Please tell me she’s not engaging them! “I’ll see if she’s available. Please, hold.”

Lori turns sharply to me, using both of her hands to cover the cell phone, muffling the speaker.

“I thought you said you didn’t get the job?” she asks.

In the one or two seconds that she’d allowed me to talk about anything other than Colton Webb, I’d managed to tell her about the interview with Katharine.

“I
didn’t
get the job. Why?” I have an uneasy feeling in my stomach.

Lori’s eyes widen. “Because it’s
Katharine Harding
calling.
Herself
. Not even her assistant.”

I feel like the floor’s just fallen out from underneath me. I’ve never spoken to Katharine on the phone before. Not even when I was calling back and forth with her office to set up the interview. I’d always spoken with her assistant, Lindsey.

“Do you want to take it?” Lori whispers to me.

I shake my head and pace back and forth. “No. No.”

“Take it!” She whisper yells to me.

I shake my head again, this time more sternly.

“One second, please. She’s right here,” my
former
best friend sells me out. She tosses the phone to me like a hot potato and then runs clear across the room.

That little bitch.

If I didn’t love her so much, I’d kick her scrawny little ass for this.

I bite down on my pursed lips and close my eyes tight. What am I doing, taking a call from Katharine Harding? As if she hadn’t chewed me out enough in person, now she’s calling personally to finish the job? Does she think she didn’t break me enough? Maybe she’s had a good night’s sleep to think about it and she’s come up with another handful of reasons of why she hates my designs. With a fresh batch of insults that could only have been thought up by putting some time and effort into them?

I’m tempted to hit the red button and end this without finding out. It’s not like it could put me in any worse light at this point.

“Hello? Katharine?” I chicken out and answer.

Lori steps closer from her hiding place as if it’ll somehow let her hear the entirety of the conversation. I narrow my eyes at her and scowl. Traitor.

“Daphne! I’m so glad you’re home safe.”

What?

Katharine Harding doesn’t strike me as the type of person to give a shit if
anyone
gets home safe. And come to think of it, she’s never used my name before. I’m surprised she even knows what it is. She’d either refused to acknowledge me directly so that she wouldn’t have to use a name, or, when she had to, she’d call me Miss Baker.
Never
Daphne.

“I know it’s early.” Actually, not only is it early for New York, but it’s even earlier for L.A. “I was hoping we could chat for a moment before I head to the office. I—I wanted to apologize for my critique of your work yesterday. I’ve given it a second look and I’m actually very impressed. I think you have potential, under the right leadership, that is. I—I’d love to discuss it further.”

I’m speechless.

“I’ll be in New York next weekend for a buyers meeting at Macy’s. I’d love to meet for dinner and discuss some opportunities. And, hey… why don’t you bring Colt along? We’re old friends and it would be great to catch up with him, too.”

It’s all starting to fall into place.

“You sneaky girl, you,” Katharine attempts some humor. “Not even mentioning your famous boyfriend. Trying to get the job on your own merits. I commend that.”

Something tells me my
merits
have absolutely
nothing
to do with this phone call.

“I--” I’m not sure how to handle this. “I’ll have to check my schedule and see if I’m free next weekend.” Sitting at a table next to Katharine Harding, with sharp eating utensils, doesn’t even remotely seem like a good idea. I’ve seen how much damage she can do with her words alone.

“Of course, darling, of course.” She pacifies me. I can tell she’s not happy with my answer. She’s probably used to people falling over themselves to accept an invitation to dinner. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll have Lindsey call later this week to finalize plans. And, just for fun, I’ll email over some ideas I had to dress Colton for this year’s Oscars. It’ll be fun to bounce styling options around over dinner, don’t you think?”

There it is, the
real
reason she wants to meet for dinner. She wants a secret meeting with Colt. I laugh to myself while I remember Colton’s very colorful opinion of Katharine. I’m sure he’s not returning her calls, so she’s trying everything and anything to get to him in another way. She must be pretty damn desperate if she’s willing to ask
me
to help her do it.

“I have to go, Katharine. Thanks so much for calling.” I hang up on the fashion titan without committing to anything.

The second the phone is placed down, Lori deems it safe enough to come over.

“What was that?” She’s awfully excited for a person that’s about to get her ass kicked.

I squint my eyes at her semi-seriously and crack my knuckles like a street fighter.

“Oh, get over it.” She pushes my hands down. “Tell me!”

“
That
,” I cast my eyes over to the phone as if it’s somehow transformed into Katharine herself, “is a desperate person who has seen the news and thinks I am a way to get to Colton Webb.”

I can see Lori doing the mental calculations to figure out what I mean. “See! This can be a good thing! This could be used to help you, Daph. They think you’re someone important--”

“I’m not.” I cut her off.

She shakes her head, dismissing me. “They don’t have to know that. Not right now, anyway. You can use this to open some doors.”

I look at her like she has grown a third ear. Does she not know me? After all these years, does she
really
think I’d do something like that? The taste of celebrity is going to one of our heads and it isn’t mine.

“No. Not gonna do it. If I can’t make it on my own, then I don’t make it at all.”

CHAPTER FIVE

COLT

Andrea McNair is one of the best publicists in the business. The McNair Group, which got started by her father forty years ago, has been around forever and is definitely worth every penny. Thanks to her, my break up with Audrey didn’t affect me the way it could have. When famous couples break up, there’s a tendency to blame one more than the other.

The second I told Audrey that it was over, her own PR team began the spin cycle, “leaking” information to the tabloids and media that there was infidelity, lying, cheating. Yeah there was. Just not by me. They seemed to conveniently leave that part out, knowing my camp wouldn’t be able to clarify the record.

If word leaked that she had cheated, fucked almost every single one of her other costars behind my back, then it could make me look weak, make me “less desirable” as Andrea worded it. “Less desirable” equals less bankable, less marketable.

I’d be nailing my own coffin if I told the truth. It’s sick, right? Let the media think I’m a cheater. Somehow, that makes me more of a “man”, sexier, more desirable. A real bad ass, while at the same time Audrey gets the sympathy vote, and as a woman, she can actually use it to her advantage in this business. It’s a win-win for both of our careers, regardless of how wrong it is.

Andrea has a way of spinning everything to keep me clean when it comes to the studios. When word had leaked out (no doubt by Audrey’s own people looking to pressure me) that Audrey wanted to forgive and reconcile, it was my ace publicist herself that told me to go along with it, not to shoot down the rumors. They made me look good.
We’re selling a fairytale, here,
she’d said.

Everyone loves the fuckin’ fairytale.

But this is yet another corner I’m being backed into by Audrey and her team. They’re smart little fuckers over there. She wants me back and she’s using her people to pressure me into it. She knows how shitty it’ll look of me if I refuse her, if I turn down America’s princess.

So far I’ve been able to get away without commenting on it. Let them think what they want, but I’m certainly not giving them any more reason to believe the rumors other than my silence.

I’ve been able to avoid her, dodging her, but as of tonight at the world premiere of TIME COP, I’ll have no choice but to see her. To pose for pictures with her, to laugh and pretend like nothing’s wrong.

The people would finally get what they’ve been waiting for. They’d get to see their golden couple together again and cross their fingers that it meant we were back to normal.

That was the direction things were heading, that is up until last night.

Last night things changed dramatically. Daphne Baker changed things dramatically. And not in the way it should have.

When it leaked that I was with another woman, with photographic
proof
to back up all the outrageous claims of a new relationship, the media should have turned on me. They should have viciously attacked Daphne as a home wrecker, a slut, a tramp, a rebound, who was stealing away the one true love of the media’s darling, Audrey Camden.

However, they didn’t.

Somehow, by some weird miracle, defying all odds and all quantifiable data that the overly paid analysts that work for Andrea have concocted, the media loves Daphne.

They’re intrigued by her.

Thanks to several of the photos of us practically sleeping on each other on the plane, as well as the video and news of us giving up our first class seats, the media, along with fans in general, are labeling her “Darling Daphne.”

I had been pretty sure that we weren’t being watched when I had the gut instinct to kiss her on her stoop, but I was wrong. Someone was recording us with their cell phone and it’s being leaked all over the place.

I even saw one mash-up side-by-side comparison of my kiss with Daphne right next to a kiss with Audrey. Even I can’t deny the difference. Just like I had felt when I was actually kissing her, it was plainly visible the amount of feeling, of—of
passion,
in it.

Maybe it was the adrenaline of the paparazzi chase we had just been in. Maybe it was the excitement of kissing a practical stranger. Maybe it was the fact that we both knew we’d never see the other again and that was the last memory we’d have to remember the whole little adventure by.

I don’t know
what
it was.

I just know… it
was
.

And now, thanks to the lightning speed of social media, so does everyone else. They’ve got their new story and they’re running with it, even though none of it happens to be true.

“We’ve got to go with this, Colt. Use the momentum,” Andrea, with her short, stacked hair and thin little glasses peaks above the top of the newspaper she’s reading.

I’d expected to see her today, but nothing could have surprised me more when she knocked on my hotel room door so soon after I’d arrived.

“
What
momentum, Andrea? There’s no more momentum. I met her, I spent some time on a plane with her, I drove her home, I said goodbye. That’s it.” I walk behind the small bar in the main room of the hotel suite and help myself to some vodka to add to my orange juice.

Breakfast of champions.

I hear the crumpling of the paper as Andrea sets the newspaper aside. “Colt. This could be big. This could be huge. This could finally separate your name from Audrey’s, once and for all. Give you your
own
story. The latest polls show consumers are starting to turn on Audrey. She’s not grossing as much as she used to in Asia or in Europe. They think she’s too artificial, too… packaged.”

I nearly choke on my drink.

“Isn’t that what we
pay
you people for? To package us?” I point out the obvious.

She rolls her eyes at the hypocrisy. “They want real, authentic, original, organic. That’s what they want- for now, at least.”

I finish the fruity screwdriver in one long gulp and drop the glass with a heavy thud on the marble bar top. “Well, they’ll have to learn to get over it. She’s not one of us, she doesn’t know how to
do
this--” I look around at the opulent room, at the multitude of gift baskets littering the room sent by every movie executive and sponsor to kiss ass, “—this
shit.
”

Andrea pounds her small fist on the countertop as if I’ve just had a eureka moment. “That’s exactly it! They want an outsider, someone like them, being let behind the velvet rope, welcomed into the VIP room that they only dream about. A prince, choosing a commoner. They want a
new
fairytale.”

My mind races a mile a minute as I contemplate it, what this could mean. It would mean I’d finally be free of Audrey and her shadow, once and for all. It would mean that I could, for once, have a little control over how the media sees me.

It would mean that I would get to see Daphne again.

I skip the Orange Juice and add only the vodka to my glass this time, shooting the liquor down in one try.

“Fine. I’ll do it.”

~*~

Marcus has a tough time driving the car through the crowd gathered outside Daphne’s apartment building, but we manage doing it without hitting anyone. Like I said earlier, this guy’s a pro.

I can’t believe I’m actually going to do this. I feel like I’ve hit a new, all-time low, using her like this. The heavily tinted windows hide me from the reporters outside, but they know who’s inside the car.

I don’t know why they’re wasting their flash, capturing picture after picture of nothing more than the outside of a Lincoln Town car, but, nothing they do ever makes any sense to me anyway.

The longer I wait and procrastinate inside the car, the more of them huddle around the door, making it almost impossible for Marcus to open it. I’ve got to get moving. I’ll leave my conscience behind in the car for this one.

The second my door is opened even an inch, the frenzy begins. Marcus doesn’t even ask them to move anymore, he simply pushes them aside, clearing a path for me. My sunglasses help a bit, but I still have to squint my eyes against the blaring brightness of the camera lights. Pictures aren’t enough for this one, they want video.

They know the rules, these people, although they rarely follow them. Law has it, that they can’t step foot on private property without permission. Marcus acts as a bouncer blocking their path from following me as I take the steps to the door of the building.

Snap. Snap. Snap.

It’s like listening to hundreds of muted thuds behind me as they snap away. I didn’t call her to warn her that I’d be coming over. Firstly, she never gave me her number, and I didn’t want to freak her out by calling even though my people have gotten her digits easily. Secondly, I didn’t want to take the chance that she’d tell me not to come.

The reporters’ voices drown each other out as they shout out their questions. I won’t be answering any. I want to keep them guessing. Whichever answers they come up with on their own will be far better than any I could give them anyway.

Daphne’s doorbell is the third one down- a simple, worn, white button next to a piece of masking tape with the name BAKER written on it.

I press it.

This building doesn’t have an elevator, I’m sure of it, so I anticipate waiting a moment or two before it’s answered. I know she’s home, otherwise the paps wouldn’t be gathered around outside, waiting. They would have followed her to wherever it was that she was going.

I use the extra little bit of time to adjust the bouquet of flowers in my hand.

Please let her answer. Please let her answer.

I’m going to look like a jackass out here in front of all these people if she doesn’t let me in. Just as I’m picturing the worst, the door finally swings open. However, this is
not
Daphne.

“Um—hi.” It never occurred to me that someone else would answer for her. “I’m here for Daphne.”

The brunette standing opposite me with her awkward, megawatt smile booms loudly. “Of course you are, Colt! Please, come in!”

I’ve taken hundreds of acting classes. I’ve been in about a dozen feature films. In my early years, I’d done commercials and TV. Never, ever, before have I seen a worse actress.

This girl is hamming it up for the cameras, her body stiff even though she’s trying like hell to appear casual. She’s projecting her voice loud enough to be heard by the crowd. A breathy laugh escapes my tight lips. She’s eating this shit up.

I smile, playing along. Who knew I wouldn’t be the only one playing a little game, here? “Thanks.”

I notice her pause a second pushing her hair back over her shoulder dramatically as she poses for one last round of pictures while closing the door.

We leave Marcus outside to handle the paps, knowing that they’ll be desperate for some more shots. I wouldn’t put it past any of them to climb the tree outside to look in. But, I don’t have to worry about any of that. That’s why I have Marcus. That’s why I have the muscle.

“Colton Webb,” the wannabe actress finally drops her pretense and behaves like a star struck fan. “The. Colton. Webb.”

I widen my eyes and smile tightly. “And you are?”

“I’m Lori. Daph’s best friend. Like sisters, we’re so close. Almost as if we’re the same person. We share
everything
.”

Yeah. This isn’t getting awkward.

I focus on the nickname Lori’s used for Daphne. Daph. I like it. “Is
Daph
home?”

Lori nods, still staring at me like I’m a magic little elf. “Uh huh.”

Silence. More staring- her staring, not mine.

I nod. “Can I see her?”

“Uh huh,” she replies.

More staring.

I look up at the ceiling, to the side, at my shoes. I finally give up waiting. “Should I just go up?”

Lori looks like she’s just snapped out of a daze. “What? Oh—oh yeah, of course. Please, after you.”

She’s either being incredibly polite, or she wants to walk behind me to check out my ass. I’m betting on the latter of the two. Whatever. Might as well let her get her kicks. Thanks to Gunnar, my trainer, and the countless hours of work I put into it, I know I’ve got an ass worth looking at.

“Keep going?” I ask my tour guide even though she’s more concerned with my body than with giving me proper direction.

There’s a loud whishing sound as she leans in behind me and actually sniffs my shirt. “Um, no. This is it. Second door on your left.”

Thank God. I’m having flashbacks of this movie I did years ago about a crazy stalker. Following her instructions, I walk to the appropriate door and rasp my knuckles on the old wooden door.

There’s an old metal knocker on the front of the door that bounces when Daphne opens it.

We stare at each other, neither one of us saying anything. I can tell she’s just showered, her hair is up in some kind of a towel, twisted high. Her cheeks look flushed, and her skin naturally perfect with every bit of makeup scrubbed off. The smell of her shampoo mixes with the flowers in my hand and create a delicious aroma.