Lucky Star: A Hollywood Love Story (31 page)

“I stopped by to pick you up for something and when I walked past your front window, I watched you swallow her face through the curtains.” I was really beginning to hate this conversation. I’d had to sit idly by while Cameron had dated (and I hadn’t) which had been bad enough. But to have to re-live how it’d felt a second time was just mean.

His lips hitched to the right and he shook his head again. “This is going to sound like such a lie, but she was my partner in a workshop I was taking. We were rehearsing a scene.”

I raised my eyebrow. “You’re right, it does sound like a lie.”

“Scout’s honor.” He raised his fingers.

“I know you dated, Cameron, I don’t begrudge you your previous girlfriends.”

He raised a challenging eyebrow.

“Okay, maybe I do,” I huffed. “But you didn’t know how I felt so I can’t have expected you lived like a monk this whole time.”

His brows furrowed and he looked away guiltily.

Right. So he
hadn’t
been a monk then. I really didn’t want to know … but I kind of also did. I plopped down on the edge of the bed. “How many?”

He ran his hand through his hair and sat down next to me. Exhaling on a loud sigh, he said, “Three over three years.”

When Cameron and I had sex that first time, we’d been friends for about three years.

“And only one in the past year,” he added. “The actress.”

Right, the actress. The one who’d necessitated his STD test while I’d gone along with the group to get tested because … well, who knows why? Maybe I didn’t want anyone to know I wasn’t getting any?

Cameron nudged my chin and I looked up at him. His face was serious, somber. His eyes flicked between mine and then he dropped his hand.

“Three women in three years. The first one because I thought, stupidly, that if I fucked someone else it’d help get you out of my mind. The second one because it didn’t work the first time and because I couldn’t have you, I needed someone else.” His smile was a sad one.

“And then Melanie,” I finished.

“And then Melanie,” he agreed.

While I’d spent years being quietly envious of Cameron’s women, Melanie was the only one who’s presence had truly distressed me because it had been clear his feelings for her went beyond the superfluous. They had so much in common and from the moment he introduced her, we could all see she was different from other women he’d brought around. Mike had commented once that he thought Cameron tried too hard with Melanie, while I silently thought his trying so hard meant he was invested in her and wanted their relationship to work. When Cameron found out she’d been cheating on him for the entirety of their relationship, he’d been gutted. No one, including Mike, saw him for three weeks and he wouldn’t answer any of our calls or emails. Then, as if he hadn’t gone missing for a month, he turned up and was fine. As far as I knew, this was the first time he’d spoken her name aloud to anyone. We all tried not to talk about her, but if we did, she was simply referred to as The Actress.

“You loved her,” I whispered, staring down at my clenched hands.

Next to me, Cameron exhaled loudly. “I thought I could, but no.” He shifted and then he dropped down in front of me. Moving his hands to my face, he held my cheeks in his palms while his eyes bored into mine. When his hands into my hair he cradled my skull and held me still as he kissed me. Our lips separated by a hair’s breadth, he whispered, “I wanted to love her because if I did, it would mean I could stop loving you. But no,” he shook his head and our lips brushed, “I never loved her.”

“Did you ever tell her?”

“That I loved her?” he asked, quietly.

I shook my head and he shook his. “And I think she knew why.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, just as quietly.

He hesitated, and then seeming to decide something, dropped back on his heels and rested his palms on my knees. “She told me I had to give you up and I told her that was non-negotiable. Two weeks later Mike showed me a picture of her sucking off some guy.”

“We all thought …”

“I know what you guys thought.”

“If you didn’t love her, why’d you disappear?”

“Mostly because I was embarrassed,” he shrugged, “but also because I’d failed and I had to figure some things out.”

“Like what?”

“Like how I was going to move past my feelings for you.”

“At any point …” I started to ask him if at any point he thought about telling me, but then I stopped because I had been in the same position, and not wanting to jeopardize our friendship, I’d also held my secret close to my chest.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” he said, rising. “We’re here now.”

He pulled me from the bed and kissed me, a deep, passionate claiming. He was right. Our pasts didn’t matter; we were together now and had our whole lives ahead of us. 

Thirty minutes later we stood in the doorway of Gather, the restaurant where Drea and Alex’s friends hung out in the evenings. Cameron scanned the crowd for her and then taking my hand, tugged me in the direction of a massive fireplace made of river rock that took up the whole back wall of the post-and-beam building. In front of a roaring fire sat a group of about 15 people distributed across leather club chairs and a green velvet couch that made up a lounge area within the otherwise formal dining space. Glasses and beer bottles covered every available inch of the planed logs that served as cocktail tables, while the group joked and laughed with one another in between bites of seared tuna nachos.

“Cameron! Sarah!” Alex jumped up from her perch on one of the chairs and ran over to give us each a big, welcoming hug. “So glad you guys could make it.” She squeezed my arm and turned to face her friends.

“Everyone, this is Cameron and Sarah, the couple I was telling you about.”

I took in the group nervously, but didn’t feel any outwardly malicious intent from any of them. I liked both Drea and Alex a whole lot, could even see maintaining a friendship with them long after we left Eagle Harbour, but after our experience with the gossiping Sue and Dolly, I was leery about meeting anyone new. Even though, as Cameron reminded me on the drive over, there was no need for me to be on guard any longer, I was still leery of strangers’ intent where he was concerned.

“Cameron and Sarah, this is everyone.” She swept her arm in a wide arc to encompass the group. Some of the men waved lazily while others did that half stand, half lean thing guys often did when in lieu of a regular handshake. The women who were sitting paired off with each of the guys smiled and raised their hands in hello.

Living in L.A. I was used to being surrounded by good looking people. It was unreal how pretty some of the people I’d met were. And yet, this group of people was beautiful in a completely different way. Each man had a sort of scruffy lumberjack-meets-surfer-meets-hipster thing going on that I could objectively admit was pretty damn hot. But, and I thought this without pride or guile, there was no way in hell any of them held a candle to Cameron in the looks department. No one could argue with me that he was a superior specimen of manhood few could match.

“What’re you having?” one of the guys asked as he lifted his hand to hail a waitress. I scanned the drinks on the tables. From the Yelp reviews I’d read, I knew the restaurant had a local IPA on tap, and since I loved hops, I asked for one of those.

“They serve scotch?” Cameron queried, surprising me in his choice of drink. When we’d first met, he’d just started dabbling in drinking bourbon and then it was only as part of a cocktail. Once or twice over the past couple of months I’d noticed my bottles emptying faster than I was drinking them myself. Then there was the night he’d come to bed tasting of peat and brine. There’d been a number of nights in the not-too-distant past I knew I’d turned to booze to numb my pain. I wondered if he’d done the same.

“A couple of whiskies, but nothing special,” a guy in red-checked flannel responded. “But if you’re okay drinking beer, you should really follow your girl’s lead and get the IPA. It’s brewed locally.”

“Quit being modest Hal,” Drea said, then turned to us. “What he so
humbly
failed to mention is that he’s the brewer and his IPA is fucking badass, award winning concoction.” She winked and blew him a kiss. “So are the smoked porter and the blonde.” Her smile could have lit up the room. No doubt, she was desperately in love with Hal. That he seemed to look back at her just as dreamily made me happy for her. In all the time we’d hung out, she hadn’t mentioned him so I wondered what their deal was.

“Two IPAs it is then,” Cameron said.

“Here, take my seat,” yet another flannel-clad man said, standing up to vacate a leather club chair. “I have an early day tomorrow. ‘Night all,” he raised his hand in farewell and weaved his way through the crowd and out the door.

“That was Pat,” Alex informed us as Cameron sat down in the empty chair and I perched on the arm next to him. “He runs a sport fishing company and has a charter tomorrow for some guys up from Seattle. It’s late in the season but if he takes them down the coast a way, they’ll probably be able to pull in some Chinooks.”

“So …” I said, taking stock of everyone we’d met so far. “Brewer, sport fisherman, coffee shop owner. It’s like you guys run the town.”

“Just you wait. You haven’t met everyone else. That’s Shea,” Hal said, pointing to a lovely pixie across from us who was deep in conversation with the bearded surfer to her right. “She’s the owner-slash-chef of a farm-to-table restaurant Pat supplies most of the seafood for. And the guy she’s talking to? That’s Stewart, the mayor.”

Hal saw my double take and laughed out loud. “Yeah, least likely mayor, right? He’s fourth or fifth generation and his dad was the mayor before him. He’s lived in Eagle Harbour his whole life except when he went away to university. When he got a degree in political science instead of seeking his fame and fortune in Victoria or Quebec, he came home. You wouldn’t know it from looking at him, but he’s actually a pretty big deal. I mean, as big a deal a mayor in a Canadian province can be.”

“Shea, Stewart.” When they turned to Hal’s voice, he deftly introduced us as if he’d known us for more than ten minutes. “This is Cameron and Sarah. Sarah’s an associate producer and Cameron? Well, you already know about him.” He smirked, confirming they’d all the gossip.

When I jokingly scowled at him, he shrugged apologetically. “What can I say? News travels fast.”

“No thanks to Dolly,” I intoned.

“If it makes you feel any better I didn’t hear it from Dolly,” he responded on a laugh.

“No?” Cameron asked.

“Nope,” Drea said, plopping down in Hal’s lap and smooching him on the lips. “That little bit of information came from me.”

“Oh, okay.” Since I told Cameron everything I heard about anything, I wasn’t surprised Drea had told the man she loved about the movie star she’d met and befriended a few days earlier.

“Speaking of Dolly,” Alex interrupted, leaning forward so I could better hear over the din of

“Nothing yet,” Cameron replied, lifting his hands to take our beers from the waitress. “But it’s only a matter of time.”

He took a sip and nodded Hal’s way. “Dude, this is awesome.”

“Spruce tips,” Hal responded, acknowledging the secret ingredient that gave it an extra oomph above and beyond the Pacific Northwest hops.

Drea smiled proudly and informed us it won the gold medal at the Canadian Brewing Awards.

“I had to start shipping it to the mainland as fast as I could brew it once that happened,” he added. “It was the first truly experimental beer I ever made back when I was still brewing out of my garage. When we started Eagle Harbour Brewing, I knew it had to be a mainstay seasonal.”

“It’s really excellent,” I agreed, taking another sip. “We’re going to need a few growlers for the house while we’re here.”

“Sure, stop by tomorrow and I’ll give you a tour and you can try everything.”

I rubbed my hands together excitedly. “Be careful or you might not be able to get rid of me.”

“You ain’t kidding,” Cameron laughed. “I’ve never met a girl who loves beer as much as this one.” He planted a kiss on my neck sending shivers down my spine.

“No wonder Drea liked her from the start,” Hal commented, then planting a kiss to his own woman, said, “We fell in love over hops and barley.” His eyes caressed Drea’s face with warmth and relaxed affection. It was clear watching the two of them together they were deeply, openly in love.

We spent the rest of the evening by the fire consuming several excellent beers, ate our respective weights in tacos, and talked about what it was like to live and work in a small town versus in the thick of Hollywood. While the group was naturally fascinated by Cameron’s career, they never seemed overly interested in the idea of him as a celebrity which I appreciated since he was about to be thrust into the spotlight in a major way. Once that happened, the chance of him meeting new people who didn’t think of him as a movie star was going to be incredibly unlikely.

“Looks like we closed the place down,” I remarked, taking in the empty space that had been full to bursting when we’d arrived. It was beautiful as most every other commercial property in town we’d visited had been and I noticed a sort of running theme to most of them – organic materials paired with industrial chic design that featured a lot of wood, stone, iron, and glass. The large windows overlooking the dark, silent water beyond reminded me of the house we were renting, if it had been build on an industrial scale.