“I fell in love with your book,” Gwen gushed. “I’m sure you get that all the time.”
Erica chuckled and shrugged a frail shoulder. “I do, but never before from a critically acclaimed celebrity.”
Critically acclaimed?
My brow furrowed. Surely I knew this Gwen, or knew of her. But so far, I couldn’t place her. I straightened my jacket, getting ready to casually enter the room and take command, as though I hadn’t been eavesdropping this whole time. But then…
“Do you know who else we’ll be working with?” Gwen asked. “I never heard back from Lyle.”
I pulled back against the doorframe to keep listening. If my name came up, this was my chance to be the proverbial fly on a wall.
Erica rolled her eyes. “Oh wow, I have the same problem. He never replies. It’s been such a hassle communicating with him. For a director, he’s pretty disorganized. But yes, I helped with the casting process, so I know who you’re working with. Garrick Maze is playing your Payton.” She donned a sly, flirtatious smile.
My chest swelled with pride.
Wait…
Your Payton?
So Gwen was…my female lead? I craned my neck for a better look.
“Garrick Maze?” Gwen parroted with less enthusiasm. The disappointed tone in her beautiful voice instantly cut me down, and air leaked from my mouth like a deflating balloon. “The guy who starred in
Blast Zone
?”
“One and the same,” Erica said, scrutinizing Gwen for a long moment. “You seem a little uncertain.”
“No, it’s just...”
I bore the weighty silence of her pause like one waiting for the punch line of a bad joke. What was she getting at? What was so bad about working with Garrick Maze? I heard he was a pretty awesome guy.
“Isn’t he an action star?” Gwen asked. “I’ve seen several of his big films but never a romance. I’m not sold on him as Payton. Action actors have a pretty narrow range. Is it too late to cast someone else?”
My mouth fell open.
Thanks for the vote of confidence, sweetheart!
Erica nodded pensively. “I had my reservations about him too, at first, but he was fantastic at auditions. Plus, the guy isn’t bad on the eyes and matches Payton’s description perfectly.”
Damn right, I did…do.
Gwen gave a noticeable sigh. “He’s talented, I suppose. I just don’t think he’s that attractive. Not for a romance anyway. I don’t know. I don’t believe the hype.”
Fuuuuuck.
My female lead was a ball-buster of the highest order.
Oh, I’ll show you hype...
I had endured just about enough of this.
Cracking my neck and squaring my shoulders, I strolled into the room and headed straight for the bagels. “Ah, just what I needed this morning…a good glycemic index-loaded breakfast.”
Erica noticed me first, and I smirked when she had difficulty swallowing the next bite of her breakfast. Gwen whirled around and immediately swallowed her shock.
And I had to admit, so did I…
Had my jaw not been held together with flesh and pride, it would have hit the floor. Gwen was a knockout from head to toe with green eyes, full pouty lips, and a light dusting of freckles across the curves of her cheeks and bridge of her nose. She had a
holier than thou
air about her and a contrasting fresh-faced beauty that left me panting.
On the inside, of course. Right now, I was all aplomb and casual interest. The heat in my head rushed south, and I assumed a casual stance to conceal my conflicted feelings. It was hardly fair that I found her irresistible when she couldn’t care less for me.
“You’re—” she started before her hair had even settled into place on her shoulders from the whiplash. Her gaze immediately homed in on my black eye and her lips pressed together tightly.
“Hi.” I smiled what 99.99% of women considered to be my devastating smile. Gwen fell into the other 0.01%, of course. “Garrick Maze, in the flesh.”
“Um, yeah…G-Gwendolyn Vickers,” she stammered, scrambling to reassemble the pieces of her sophistication.
Her full name jogged my memory into a mad sprint. Gwen Vickers, the soap star? Oh, I’d heard of her. “Is that so? Your frigid reputation precedes you. Good to know it’s not inaccurate. I hate false gossip.” I turned and nodded at Erica. “And Miss Erica Ellis. I’ve heard nothing but great things.”
“Likewise, Garrick.” She glanced at Gwen. “That is…um…”
Gwen shifted uncomfortably. “How long were you standing there?”
“Long enough.” I grabbed a plate and placed one piece of cantaloupe on it.
“You know, you shouldn’t lurk in doorways,” Gwen said with a nervous laugh. “It’s probably the one good piece of advice Disney taught us. Is that what happened to your eye? Did you sneak up on someone who didn’t react well?”
I flashed my teeth in an exaggerated grin. “Just living up to my narrow-ranged unattractive hyped-up action hero image.”
Gwen’s cheek flushed a dark red and her throat rippled as she swallowed hard. I should have been thrilled she felt uncomfortable, but when she bit her lip all I could think about was kissing her. My teeth nipping at her mouth. My tongue slipping inside.
Erica thumbed behind her. “I’m going to go grab a cappuccino.” Quickly making her exit into the adjacent room lined with various vending machines, Gwen and I were left all alone. The tension mounted the longer we stared at each other.
“Ah, Garrick,” boomed a voice from the same doorway I had been standing in. Over my shoulder, I spotted Lyle Steinberg, dressed to the nines in one of his infamous mismatched suits. His thick, black-rimmed glasses sat askew on his face, which he corrected after pushing his thinning black hair out of his eyes. His bushy beard made seeing his smile unnecessarily difficult. Aside from losing a little weight, as evidenced by the way his slacks sagged, he hadn’t changed since we’d worked together on another project last year. Creating a square lens with his hands, he placed them over his view of me. “So glad you could make it. Doozie of a shiner there, but if it doesn’t fade completely by filming, make-up can deal with it. If not, I’ll have Erica write something into the script.”
I hadn’t realized how anxious I was about Lyle seeing my eye until then. The guy was scattered but cool. “Sounds good, Lyle. Thanks.”
“When were you going to notify me that you accepted the role?”
I laughed, and tossed my plate and uneaten fruit in the garbage. “I replied to your email the same day you sent it, sir.”
The director’s hands danced a flurry of gestures. “Dreadful thing, e-mail. Anyway, I see you’ve met Miss Vickers. Wonderful, just wonderful. What a pair you two will make. Splendid. Grab some breakfast, and we’ll get started in the conference room across the hall. Or maybe it’s the one next door. What room is this?”
I cast a glance at Gwen then at her drowning bagel. Drawing my attention back to her annoyed face, I played the winning hand just as Erica breezed back into the room with a steaming Styrofoam cup. “I already ate.” I patted my abs. “I never do bagels anyway. Trying to do the eat-clean thing. Gotta take care of my body, right?”
Gwen frowned. Erica brought herself to an abrupt halt, closed her eyes, and exhaled an ominous sigh. Lyle, on the other hand, was perfectly happy in his oblivious corner of the universe. “Ah. Well, then, why don’t you come along with me now? I need to run off a few more copies of the script, and I’m dying to know what’s new. And maybe you’ll tell me the story behind that black eye.”
Not going to happen. Not the true story anyway. “You got it, boss,” I said, turning to bow to the girls. “Ladies.”
With a farewell nod, I turned on my heels and strolled out with Lyle. A moment later, I heard the rustling of plastic and a dull thud, as though someone had dropped an untouched bagel into the trash.
* * *
Lyle presided over the meeting, as Gwen, Erica, two other guys, and I took our seats in the conference room. I recognized Tyler Tapia—about five-foot-ten, brown hair, eyes outlined by black-rimmed glasses, and glued to his phone. The other guy—blond, blue-eyed, and built like a jock-boy-next-doorsy type—topped my own six-foot-one by a couple of inches and took a seat quietly.
Tyler was an enigma to me. He sat on a strangely untouchable tier of the acting world, in spite of his age. I’m pretty sure he was only twenty, even though he’d been in the business for over a decade. A tad nerdy at first glance, he radiated a suave sexiness when the glasses came off. With mussed hair and a tight, graphic tee that showed off his lean, muscular build, I was fairly certain he could pass for my brother. Mysterious and inventive, he could be and do anything with unnatural ease. Guy could have probably gotten into Harvard and joined NASA, for all I knew. Yet he never graduated high school, was always glued to his phone, and was too busy to give the world the time of day.
If the rumors were true, it was one of his healthier addictions, the kind that wouldn’t land him in rehab for the second time. Or third or fourth. I’d never actually seen him drunk or high, and I was hoping I never did. The guy was too talented to throw his career away, which almost happened when he was fifteen and disappeared from the spotlight for three years. I’d worked with out-of-control addicts before, and the drama was a royal pain in the ass.
“As you may have guessed,” Lyle began, tapping on the mahogany table, “I’ve gathered you all here today to get acquainted before we start shooting.
Straightlaced
will follow the book as closely as possible. I’ll be working hand-in-hand with Miss Ellis”--he gestured to one side, then, realizing she wasn’t sitting there, quickly corrected his hand to the other side--“to minimize inaccuracies and misconceptions. Let’s go around the room and share a bit. Garrick, we’ll start with you, since you’ve got top billing.”
Comfortably settled into my chair with arms folded and heels crossed, I grinned at everyone, lingering the longest on Gwen who avoided my gaze like bad sushi. “Morning, everyone. I’m Garrick Maze. I started acting when I was fifteen. This will be my first TV show. Until now, my work has largely been in film. I’ll be playing Payton.”
Gwen smiled, though she still avoided looking directly at me. “My name is Gwen Vickers. I was on the daytime soap series,
Diamond Eyes,
for three consecutive years until my role wrapped up before Christmas. I’ll be playing Lacey.”
Lyle nodded to the jock guy in the seat next to Tyler. “And you, sir?”
“Hey, I’m Shane.” A dazed gleam hung in his eyes, as though he were trapped in an alien world, and we all spoke foreign languages. I could have guessed his next statement before it even left his mouth. “I’ve uh...never acted before. I’m playing Mitch.”
“What?” Gwen’s tone was incredulous and for a half second she looked embarrassed by her outburst before she wiped her expression clean.
“I’m playing Mitch,” the guy repeated, checking the rest of our faces for any sign of support.
“No. Before that.” She rewound an imaginary tape with her fingers.
Understanding dawned on Shane who repeated himself a second time with less enthusiasm. “This will be my first acting job.”
“You’re kidding, right?” Gwen said, looking like she’d swallowed a bug.
“No,” Shane said. “My little sister was auditioning for Lacey. I just drove her and happened to get the part, I guess.”
“You guess,” Gwen echoed then turned to Lyle. “Mr. Steinberg, this book made the New York Times Bestseller List. The fan base is
huge
—they’re expecting seasoned professionals. I’m sorry, Shane. It’s nothing personal.” She glanced at Shane for a moment. “But Lyle...isn’t this a bit of a risk?”
Lyle’s chest filled with air, as he considered his response, but all heads turned when Tyler spoke.
“Actually,” he said without looking up from his Galaxy, “the success of a book turned visual doesn’t necessarily correlate with that of its printed parent, let alone the popularity of its top billers.” He paused to scroll down something on his screen. “Look at
Eragon, The Great Gatsby, The Golden Compass, The Scarlet Letter, Bicentennial Man, Stardust, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, The Time Traveler’s Wife, Water for Elephants, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Inkhart
…” he rattled off.
Holy crap. It was like he had the line memorized long before the meeting.
“All of them bestsellers with a star-studded cast, yet they crashed and burned at the box office. Why? Because literary stardom doesn’t necessarily translate to visual success. So, it’s not so much us, the actors, but our screenwriters who dictate whether we’re eventually picked up or not.”
I looked at Shane. “That’s his way of standing up for you.”
Gwen crossed her arms and glared at Tyler. “I wasn’t speaking to you. I was speaking to our director. And your attitude could use some work.”
“My bad.” Tyler let out a long, heavy sigh. “Are we disputing my argument or my attitude?”
Again, Gwen looked flustered before quickly regaining her composure. I found it fascinating, the way she could so quickly hide her reactions. Sure, she was an actress, but she wasn’t playing a role right now. Did that mean she was
always
on? That she never just let herself be who she was, shields down? And why did the idea of that bother me so much? Why did it make me want to take her aside and spend time with her and keep at her until I learned everything about her that she normally kept hidden? Because I got the feeling, despite her balls-to-the-wall attitude we were getting glimpses of, she hid a lot.