To Love Jason Thorn (18 page)

I thought about pretending I had no idea
what he was talking about, but in the end, I didn’t think I could wing it.

“Yeah, Lucy showed them to me this
morning,” I admitted.

“Are you angry at me?”

I frowned and took a sip of my tea. “Why
would I be angry at you?”

“For the things they wrote in the article,
and well, getting photographed with me. It’s become a part of my life so I’m used
to not having any privacy, but you didn’t ask to be plastered all over the
internet. Did you talk to your parents? Did they see them?”

“Yeah, no. I’m hoping they won’t come
across them. And if they do…well, it was nothing after all, right? I’m sure
they already know that. It’s not like we are having a secret relationship like
they are saying.”

“Right.”

Drawing my legs up, I rested the mug on my
knee. “And, hey, at least they said I was beautiful in the article. That has to
be good for my ego, right?” I laughed awkwardly. After all, it had felt good to
be called beautiful, especially when standing next to Jason.

“Of course you are beautiful, Olive. You
don’t need to hear it from the tabloids to believe that.”

I pretty much melted and became one with
the couch.

“Thank you,” I mumbled when I could form
words. “Are
you
angry at me?” I asked when there was a gap of silence.

“Angry at you? Why the hell would I be
angry at you?”

“I don’t know.” I leaned forward and put
the mug on the small coffee table. “After all that other…stuff that came out,
maybe you didn’t want to be seen with…hell, I don’t know.” Silently, I hit my
forehead with the palm of my hand…and then hit it again.

“No, sweetheart, I’m not angry at you.”

Sweetheart?

Melted for the second time.

“Now that we’ve established that neither
one of us is angry with the other, I wanted to ask you out to dinner,” he said.

“Dinner? Me? Like
out,
out?”

“Yes. I have something I want to talk to
you about and thought maybe we could go out and have a nice dinner together.
Better than being cooped up in my house.”

“I don’t think you can ever feel cooped up
in your house, Jason. If you do, there is something very wrong with you.” His
house was pretty much heaven on this earth, at least for me—especially when he
was in it, too.

He was smiling; I could hear it in his
words when he spoke. “I’m glad you like my house, Olive. Even though I agree
with you, I think for this, I would like to take you out.”

“Should I be scared? Are you going to give
me bad news about the movie or something? Because it pretty much sounds like that,
and I’m not a big fan of bad surprises.”

“Everything is going great with the movie.
The filming starts in a few weeks. You’ll be at the set with me so you can see
it for yourself.”

At that, I sat up straighter. “I am? I’ll
be on set with you?”

“I thought you’d want to see; was I wrong?”

“No. No. I would love nothing more than to
be there. If you can take me with you, I promise I won’t even bother you. Even
once would be amazing.”

“We’ll talk about it more tonight at
dinner, okay? You’re free?”

“Yes. Yes. Dinner. Tonight?” My schedule
was wide open for him. In any case, the only date I had was with my laptop. “Where
should I come?”

“I’ll be there around seven o’clock. You
think you can be ready?”

I lowered the phone and checked the time.
It was almost five o’clock.

“Of course.”

“Great. I’ll see you later, sweetheart.”

Sweetheart…

Gah…
He
was
my
sweetheart.

“Yeah. See you later.”

Hanging up, I ran to Char’s room.

“He’s going to take me to the set!” I
announced as soon as I threw open the door. She was on her phone, texting. “Oh,
sorry. You busy?”

“No. No. Come in.” She waved me in and
pushed the phone under her pillow. “So you’re going to the set. When?”

I walked in and sat at the edge of her bed.
“He said the filming would start in a few weeks. God, it all feels so surreal,
Char. I think I’m starting to freak out on the inside. It’s actually real and
it’s actually happening.” I was already bouncing on the bed.

She smiled. “It definitely is real.”

“He said he wanted to talk to me about
something so he’s taking me to dinner tonight. I should get ready. I have to
hop in the shower first.” I rose up, but didn’t move. I wanted to ask for her
help, but she’d been acting weird lately. One day cold, one day hot… I didn’t
know what to make of it, but thought it was the pressure of the last semester.

“When I get out can you help me pick
something to wear? I’ve been staring at my laptop the entire day, I feel like a
mess.”

“Of course. You go ahead and get into the
shower. I’ll be in your room when you get out.”

“Thank you, Char,” I said and kissed her on
the cheek.

She smiled. “You don’t have time to get
mushy. Go ahead.”

I skipped all the way to my room.

***

That night when Jason picked me up, I was a
big ball of energy. I could’ve used a pep talk from Lucy, but she was studying
with other girls from her class, and Char was…well other than being sick, she
wasn’t the best person to go to when you needed a pep talk.

When Jason called me to let me know he was
just a few minutes away from the apartment, I chose to wait for him outside to
avoid Marcus’ intense glares.

His Spyder pulled in, and I practically ran
to the passenger side before he could get out.

“Why are you waiting outside? What’s
wrong?” he asked as soon as I was inside.

I took a deep breath and his scent hit me.
My eyes rolled into the back of my head.

“Huh?” I asked distractedly. “Yeah. Nothing.
I didn’t want to make you wait.”

“You look beautiful, Olive,” he said, his
eyes moving over me slowly.

Since I had no idea where he was taking me,
Char had thought it would be the safest bet to keep it simple with a black
dress. I ran my hands over my thighs, smoothing and pulling the dress down a
little in the process, which wasn’t all that helpful, so I linked my hands in
my lap and let it go. While it felt like it was too short at that moment, I
knew it looked good on me when I was standing. I especially liked how it looked
from the side; the dress curved around my ass perfectly.

“Where are we going?” I asked after I was
buckled in and he pulled away from the curb.

“I thought Soho House would be best for
privacy. At least we won’t get photographed.”

“Oh, the private club thingy? You have a membership?”

“Yeah. I’m not a huge fan; I prefer the
privacy of my own home, but sometimes I have to meet industry people there for
lunch or other business meetings.”

“I understand.” Did that mean we were about
to have a business meeting?

The rest of the ride was awkwardly quiet.
Apparently neither one of us had anything more to say, which I didn’t think
boded well for me.

After he pulled into the garage and
completed the check-in, he casually put his hand just above my bum—practically
jumpstarting my heart—and guided me to the elevators.

When the silence became too much, I asked,
“Is everything all right?” I didn’t mind comfortable silences, but I had a
feeling that something else was going on with him. He looked distracted.

He was frowning when he looked down at me.
“Yeah. Why?”

I gave him a sad smile. “I don’t know. You
aren’t talking. You seem tense and not so happy to be here.”

His eyes softened and he gently tugged at
my hair. “It’s not you, little one. Just had a stressful day.”

Nodding, I swallowed and looked away from
his warm eyes.

Exiting the elevator at the top floor, we
walked up the stairs and through the somewhat crowded bar, and then into the
coolest dining area I’d ever seen in my life.

The entire rooftop was filled with lush
olive trees and other plants. The lanterns and twinkle lights hanging through
the branches lit up the whole space and created the perfect setup for a
romantic evening. But, from the look on Jason’s face, I could see that this was
far from a romantic evening for him. Trying to ignore the beautiful view of LA,
we followed the front desk girl to a table that was mostly out of the sight of
the other patrons.

“Jason!” some guy yelled just as we were
about to sit down. I couldn’t see the owner of the voice, but Jason waved at someone
and sat down across from me.

“One of the producers of my last movie,” he
explained with a smile on his face. I smiled back at him.

Without any further conversation, we
ordered our drinks and food, and then I simply waited for Jason to spill the
beans.

“I thought you would enjoy the atmosphere
here,” he said right as a waiter brought our drinks. Jason had downed his
whiskey before the poor guy could even place my Lemon Drop in front of me. He
ordered a new one for himself and suddenly pushed back his seat and rose up.

“I need to say hi to a few people, I’ll be
right back,” he said and walked away from me.

Staring at his back in shock, I reached for
my cocktail, took a sip, and then another big one.

The waiter came back with Jason’s second
drink, but Jason hadn’t returned yet. I had to force myself to smile when he
gave me a snobbish look.

“Awesome,” I muttered, taking out my phone
to text Lucy.

Me: I’m sitting on a beautiful rooftop,
surrounded by olive trees and twinkle lights—alone.

Lucy: What do you mean alone?

Me: I don’t know what exactly, but something
is wrong with Jason. We just sat down, ordered our food and drinks, and he
jumped up and left to say hi to a few people.

Lucy: That doesn’t sound too ominous. I’m
sure he’ll be back.

Me: Well, it is. He’s been acting weird from
the moment I got into his car. No eye contact, no nothing.

I leaned forward a little to see if I could
spot him. Sure enough, he was standing next to a group of ten or twelve people
who were having dinner. A beautiful blonde woman joined the group and instead
of sitting down, she came to stand next to Jason when she saw him. She touched
his arm, leaned in to whisper something into his ear, and said something funny
enough to make Jason throw back his head and laugh. Then his hand sneaked around
her waist…and I sat my ass back down.

Perfect.

Remembering I wasn’t out with Jason but
with
Jason Thorn
didn’t ease my worries. I’d take the other guy any day.

Me: I don’t think I’m feeling well. I want
to come home, Lucy.

Lucy: Hey, it’ll be okay. You are a cat. A
purring, content one. I’m sure he wanted to talk to you about the movie. Didn’t
you say so yourself? If he upsets you, I’ll kick his ass, don’t worry.

There was no way that cat crap would work
this time.

Before I could text back, Jason returned to
the table, muttered an apology, gave me a strange look, and reached for his
drink again.

Feeling deflated, I played with the edge of
the table and kept sipping my drink as I tried to focus on the beautiful view.

At some point, he asked a few questions
about how my new novel was coming along, and I answered all of his questions
with unnecessarily long answers. Eventually though, I gave up trying to engage him
in conversation when he started texting with his agent.

Our food came—we had both ordered
salmon—and—surprise, surprise—we ate in silence.

If picking at the poor fish counted as
eating, that is.

My phone vibrated twice, but I didn’t check
to see who it was. No matter how many times she texted, I was no cat—especially
not a purring one. Halfway into our awkward and very disappointing dinner, I
gave up on the food too and just leaned back in my seat to gaze at the city
skyline. I hated sulking in general, but sitting across from Jason and
sulking…well, it was all kinds of wrong. Even so, there was no way I could act
like I was having the time of my life at that moment either.

“Olive?”

So lost in my own head, I flinched when I
heard Jason’s thick voice.

“Yes?”

He tilted his head and furrowed his brows.
“Are you okay?”

“I don’t know. Are you?” I asked back.

He scratched at his stubble. “What do you
mean?”

“You’ve barely said a word to me ever since
we sat down, Jason. Not that you were a chatterbox in the car, but you
literally spoke maybe twenty words to me. Since you were the one who invited me
out, I have no idea what’s happening, but I’m going to wait until you finish
your dinner so you can take me home. Better yet, if you can tell someone to
call me a cab…do they even do that here? Anyway, if they do, I can get myself
home.”