Chapter Five
“I said no.” Spencer threw a cushion across the living room. While he and Kristen had been out, the crew had finished installing everything needed and maids had come in to clean up the place. “I’m done for the day. Get your things and leave.”
Kristen stood with her back plastered to the wall, watching him throw his fit.
“Get out.” He stood and stalked into his room.
He heard Kristen saying something to the crew and the shuffle of departing footsteps outside. It was around thirty minutes later when he heard someone playing the keyboard. He popped his head out and emerged after making sure the crew had left.
“All gone?” he asked Kristen.
She gazed up from the keyboard. “Yup.”
“Good.” He went to the fridge. “Steak and baked potato for dinner?”
“You’re cooking?”
“Why not?”
“Don’t you want to unpack?”
“It’s just clothes.” He took out the steak and potatoes. “It’ll take an hour before dinner will be ready, though. The steak needs to marinate for at least forty-five minutes.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You aren’t? I don’t think you’ve had anything to eat since the muffin this morning.”
She frowned and nodded after a moment. “Yeah.” She shrugged. “But I’m okay. Is there anything I can do to help?”
He shook his head. “Continue.” He waved his hand at the keyboard and got to work on dinner.
Though Kristen didn’t know how to cook, she was able to set the table.
By the time dinner was done, she had set place mats on the table along with forks and knives and two wine glasses. She took the bottle he’d opened earlier and set it between them while he brought their steaks to the table.
She poured the red wine into the glasses.
“I didn’t think you drank.”
“Why?”
“You’re a Christian, right?” Spencer tried to keep the disdain from his statement. Elena had showed him that not all Christians were the same, but the majority of Christians he’d met hadn’t left a good impression.
But he supposed they represented God accurately. A God who would always be there for His people—provided they met His conditions. Which was why Spencer never entertained the thought of God ever being there for him.
He was probably disqualified even before he was born. God—if there actually was one—had written him and his mother off a long time ago.
“So?” She pushed a glass toward him. “My parents knew what the world was like, especially the world I was entering. They trained me to drink since I was fifteen. It’s the best-kept secret in my family: I hold my liquor very well.”
His brows rose.
“So I can proudly say that I’ve never been drunk.”
“Really? Even I have, and I drink a lot.”
“I know when to stop.” She tipped her glass toward him. “Thanks for dinner.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Did you throw a fit just to get the crew out?”
He cut into his steak. “I think we deserve one dinner without people watching us, don’t you?”
She nodded. “Shall we discuss what we want or don’t want to talk about on camera?”
“I don’t want to talk about what happened in the Bahamas, but I don’t think we’ll have a choice. It’s bound to come up anyway, like this morning.”
“We can just refuse to talk about it. We’ll say it was an accident and move on. Unless an appropriate situation comes up and you think you’d like to explain what happened. I’ll follow your cue if that happens.”
He studied Kristen’s face for a moment. “I heard what you said to the crew when you were in your room.”
“Eavesdropping?”
“I just happened to overhear the conversation. Thanks for having my back.”
She cut into the steak. “We’re stuck with each other for six months. So let’s pretend to fall in love, have an amicable divorce, and stay friends. In the meantime, let’s agree to be friends.”
“Deal.”
She grinned and put the piece of steak into her mouth. “Mmm …” Her eyes widened. “You really can cook.”
“Did you think I was lying?”
“No. I just thought you meant like instant ramen and such.” She took another bite of the steak, and her head bobbed up and down. “This is good.”
He was glad she was enjoying the dinner. “So the list of foods you rattled off, do you actually like them?”
“Yeah.”
“Good, then the food won’t go to waste.”
“Are you really going to be cooking for the next six months?”
“Do you want to try cooking?”
She laughed and shook her head. “You don’t want me to try my hand at cooking. I’ve almost burned my parents’ place down twice. I’m banned from the kitchen, unless I’m in there to sneak food.”
“So I’ll be cooking, then.”
“And I’ll wash up.”
“Deal,” he said. He peered over his shoulder at the keyboard. “What were you playing?”
“A new song I’m tinkering with.”
“Sounds nice.”
She pinched her lips. “I don’t know. It’s me, but not really me.”
“I have no idea what that means.”
“It’s something that I would normally write, but I don’t feel that’s me anymore. It doesn’t excite me.”
“Then write something that does.”
“I’m trying.” She took another sip of wine. “So what else do you not want to talk about?”
“My family—my mom.”
“Your father?”
“Never existed in my life.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “That must be rough. I think they’ll push to meet the families, though. I mean, it’s only natural when we’re married.”
“I don’t want my mom involved in this.”
She shrugged. “We’ll say no. If they do push, we’ll just go on to my family. How about that?”
“Are you close to your family?”
“Very. My parents are my everything.” Her lips curled when she paused. “They’re my biggest fans and my strongest supporters. They’re always there for me when I need them, and they’re always there for me to run to if I need a hiding place.”
“That’s nice.”
“Are you close with your mom?”
He nodded slowly. “My mom went through a lot to bring me up.”
“I can imagine. It isn’t easy to be a single mom. May I ask what happened to your father?”
“She was never married. She had an affair, and the man refused to acknowledge the affair and me.” He waited for Kristen to say something disparaging about his mother, to blame his mother for putting herself in that position.
“That’s terrible.” Her brows furrowed. “Your mom must be so brave. I think the world is especially tough for single moms.”
He studied Kristen for a moment. “Don’t you think my mom deserved whatever treatment she received?”
“What?” She stopped cutting at the steak and looked up at him. “Why would you think that? Have people said that to you? They’re as terrible as the man who abandoned your mom.” She paused for a moment before continuing, “Is that why you don’t want her on the show? You’re hoping to protect her from what people might say if they found out about your past?”
He shrugged. “I just don’t like to involve her with my work.”
“Okay. I’ll do my best to back you up on that.”
A corner of his lips curled. “Thank you. And what about you?”
“I don’t want to talk about Alvin, but I don’t think that can be avoided either.”
“What happened between the two of you?”
“You haven’t seen the coverage? I’m a prude, Spencer. I’m too much of a daddy’s girl. I’m safe and boring.”
“Seriously.”
“That was what he said.”
He frowned. “And you still forgave him? I thought you guys were trying to work it out?”
“When the affair broke, he begged me to forgive him. He said it was a one-off. He was drunk and he made a stupid mistake. He promised it wouldn’t happen again and that I was the one he wanted.” She shook her head slowly. “But it wasn’t a one-off event. During the month when we were in counseling, more news broke. And I realized he was still lying, so I broke it off.”
“You broke it off?” He finished up his food and pushed the plate aside. “But they’re making it look as if he broke it off to pursue Ruby.”
“Yeah. And I’m the prude who couldn’t hang on to my man.”
“Why didn’t you say something? Just tweet that you were the one who broke up with him.”
“I didn’t know he was saying that until I got back from my parents’ place. At that point—actually at any point—it’d just look pathetic for me to try and defend myself.”
“I give you my word that when we divorce, I’ll have nothing but nice things to say about you. You’ll always be the one who got away.”
She laughed softly. “Thank you. Likewise.”
Kristen unzipped her bag and hung up her clothes in the closet. She had started out the day berating herself for letting Heidi talk her into doing this, but her perspective had changed after the grocery trip.
Spencer seemed to have come around. If they continued to have each other’s back, the next six months wouldn’t have to be torture.
She wasn’t Spencer’s type, which was good. So there wouldn’t be any actual falling in love, which could end up being messy. They could be friends, and that was what they needed.
When she finished unpacking her clothes, she pulled out the box she had tucked into the corner of her bag. She sat on the bed and opened the small black velvet box. A cushioned interior, with a slit where a ring used to sit, stared back at her.
She’d returned the ring to Alvin when she broke up with him, but she still kept the box. She wasn’t sure why.
As a reminder perhaps. A reminder that she was done dating anyone from this industry.
Hollywood was filled with an endless stream of parties and pretty faces, and there was no way she could compete with all the vivacious women.
The next person she dated would be someone simple, someone safe. Someone like that would appreciate the person she was.
She closed the box and put it on the corner of the desk.
An empty box, just like the empty promises Alvin had given her, just like what she and Spencer were doing. Nothing in Hollywood was real. Sure, there were loves strong enough to overcome the craziness of Hollywood. She’d seen how in love Kerri Adams’ parents were. Even after so many years, they still only had eyes for each other.
But those kind of loves were few and far between.
She wouldn’t be able to hold onto anyone’s affections, not in Hollywood.