* * *

DIRTY LIKE ME

I didn’t mean to crash the meeting.

I fully intended to knock before entering, like a civilized person. Max had other plans. For one thing he was a dog, and for another he knew we were dropping in on my best friend, Devi. Devi was a total babe, and Max totally dug hot babes. One glimpse of the door to her office, which was ajar, and he streaked past the front desk, big wet tail wagging, startling a couple of Devi’s co-workers.

“On it!” I blurted, diving after him, but he’d already hip-checked the door open. By the time I caught up, my wayward black lab was shaking off his rain-wet fur in a flurry of excitement, spraying Devi and the three other people standing in her office. I made a mad grab for his collar.

I missed.

Hovering awkwardly on the threshold, I clutched the tin of miniature pies I’d been unpacking in the lobby and mouthed a Sorry! at my BFF.

“Hey, Katie!” Devi smiled brightly, tussling Max’s ears with a friendly pat. “Max! Aren’t you wet.” She shot me a look that said something like, Nice to see you, but what the hell?

“Um… hi,” I said. Devi was a talent agent; her agency repped models and actors, so I was used to running into beautiful people in her office. Though I didn’t usually crash her meetings with my dog, wet and disheveled in my paint-stained jeans. “Sorry about my dog. Come on, Max.” I gave Max the get-your-furry-butt-over-here look, a look he knew well but completely ignored, since Devi and her pretty female guest were now loving him up.

“No problem. We were just finishing up.” Devi gestured for me to stay put, though I really just wanted to grab my delinquent dog and get the hell out of there. I felt ridiculously conspicuous in my white tank top, which I’d regretted wearing about two seconds after it started raining. As Devi wrapped things up with her guests, I took stock. Yep. Purple bra totally showing through my now-transparent tank.

Great.

Devi was shaking hands with the built dude in the short-sleeve button-down, and I noticed some tattoos on his muscular arm, but that was about it. My attention had already snapped to the other guy as some unconscious, primal part of me registered his hotness before the rest of me could catch up.

Plus, he was staring at me.

Or at least, my see-through shirt.

Devi strode to the door to see her guests out and I stepped aside, holding my tin of pies, trying to disappear into the wall. He was coming at me. Tall and broad-shouldered, his thick, dark hair in unkempt waves that gave him a decidedly just-fucked look, like some lucky bitch had just clawed through it. Totally worked on him. He wore a fitted black T-shirt, which I swore I could see his well-defined abs through, and ripped, dark jeans molded to his long, hard thighs…

My brain must have short-circuited, because my gaze got stuck on the package in the front of those jeans. When I looked up, his molasses-dark eyes were locked on mine. He stopped a foot in front of me and stared.

Fair enough, since he’d just caught me checking him out like a horny perv.

I cleared my throat, which was suddenly tight. “Pie?” I fumbled with the tin, lifting it between us, blocking his view of my bra. “They’re cherry.”

He glanced in the tin, where two dozen hand-crafted miniature pies were neatly arranged, my signature cherry filling peeking out through the crisscrossed pastry tops. Then his gaze lifted to mine again. He had the longest, darkest eyelashes I’d ever seen on a man. High cheekbones. Luscious, kissable lips. Strong jaw shadowed with dark stubble, like he hadn’t shaved in days. And those beautiful dark eyes, smoldering at me and making me blush, big time.

“Maybe another time,” he said, the deep, sexy rumble of his voice stirring parts of my anatomy that hadn’t been stirred in a crazy long time. I noticed something tick against his teeth as he gave me a faint yet heart-stopping smile. A piercing?

No. Candy.

Cinnamon. His breath smelled like cinnamon.

I glanced over at Devi. She and the others were standing in the doorway, staring at us.

Max, ever the opportunist, snuffled into the hand of the hottest guy in the world as I stood there, dazed. I noticed the big, silver rings on his fingers as he stroked Max’s velvety ears, and the tattoo on his wrist, a pair of dark wings wrapped around his strong forearm.

“Come on, Max.” I pulled Max back so he could get by. “Sorry. He, um, likes you.” Normally Max preferred the ladies, but I could hardly fault his taste.

The hottest guy on the planet said nothing. He didn’t really get a chance before the ever-charming Devi intervened and herded all three of them out the door.

I set my tin of mini pies on Devi’s desk, feeling kind of windblown, like I’d just stepped in out of a storm rather than a light Vancouver mist. Really, a girl should be warned before a guy that hot gave her the most thorough eye-fucking of her life.

Did I really offer him pie?

Cherry pie?

Ugh. So fucking smooth.

I tidied Max into an obedient ball on the rug beneath the desk and willed him to stay put as Devi returned, shutting the door behind herself.

“I know,” she gushed. “So fucking hot, right?”

Um, yeah. But I knew better than to answer that honestly. The last time I casually inquired about a hot guy I glimpsed at my best friend’s office, she took it upon herself to hook the two of us up on a blind date. And when a hot male model gets set up with someone he assumes will be some equally hot female model, but turns out to be just some regular girl, things do not go well. For the regular girl.

Luckily, Devi didn’t even wait for my response. “Jesus, Katie.” She strode over, a takeout coffee cup in each hand. “What the hell?”

“I know. Max just bolted for your office—”

“Not that.” She gave me a no-contact air hug, then glanced down at my chest. “You look like a sexy drowned rat. Heard of an umbrella?”

“My hands were full.”

Devi scowled. “Do not tell me you rode your skateboard in the rain. I hate it when you do that.”

I rolled my eyes a little. My glamorous best friend had never understood my love affair with my skateboard. Of course, she drove a luxury SUV her parents bought for her and lived in her own suite in their giant house, so she didn’t exactly relate to my thriftiness. In the case of my preferred mode of transportation, she just saw it as risky behavior. Unfortunately, my big sister agreed with her. “Becca already gave me the lecture when I stopped to pick up the coffees.”

Devi set my cherry-vanilla latte on the desk with a little harrumph and eyed the mini pies with suspicion. “You’ve been baking.”

“Just some pies.” I flopped into one of the chairs facing the desk, which still had hot guy pheromones all over it. I sucked back a deep breath, savoring the lingering scents of cinnamon, leather, and the faint, intoxicating musk of a warm, clean male.

“Katie.”

“What?” I glanced up; Devi was studying me accusingly.

“Just pie?”

“And some scones.”

She raised a slender eyebrow.

“And a few cookies,” I added.

“What flavor?”

“Chocolate chip.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And pecan butter ripple.”

“I knew it. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit. You look…” Devi looked at me sideways. “Horny.”

“I am not horny,” I lied. Who wouldn’t be after getting eye-fucked like that? My head was still dangerously deprived of blood.

Devi sat down behind her desk. She looked gorgeous, as always, her dark hair smoothed out, flawless cappuccino skin set off with velvety red lipstick, sleeveless black top tricked out with a chunky necklace and leopard-print leggings, all of which she’d probably worn specifically for the meeting she’d just had. Fashion was just one of the many ways Devi built rapport with people.

I, on the other hand, considered myself coordinated if I managed to pull on matching shoes.

“Spill.” She gathered up the slew of model photos that littered the surface of her desk, stuffing them into a file folder. “I’ve got like ten minutes before my next meeting. What’s up?”

“Nothing. We just miss you.” It was true; my best friend had been pulling a lot of overtime, which was great for her career but not so great for me.

“I miss you guys too.” She reached beneath the desk and pet Max. “But that’s not the reason you busted in here.”

“Again, sorry. Just wanted to talk to you. I figured this may be my only chance to do it face-to-face.”

“Talk about…?”

I took a breath and sighed. “I think… I may be ready.”

Devi lit up, then caught herself and cooled her reaction. “Oh?” She was trying really hard not to jump for joy. It was kind of cute.

“I know you’ve been telling me this for a long time. I just had to get there myself.”

“For sure.”

“For so long I just wasn’t ready, you know? And then maybe I was, sort of, but I was scared. And then it just got easy to keep avoiding it. But now…”

“Now?” Devi fluttered her dark eyelashes hopefully.

I sipped my latte. “Are you sure you have time for this?”

“Hell, yes.”

“Okay. I think I need to go on a date.”

“Halle-fucking-lujah!”

“Alright. Ugh. I’m so bad at this.” Just saying it out loud to Devi made me nervous. Especially when she got all sparkly about it.

“What? Dating?” Devi sipped her coffee, waving a manicured hand in the air. “You always say that, but you never date. How do you get good at anything unless you practice?” She waggled her eyebrows, making me grin.

When it came to dating, Devi was a total pro. I, on the other hand, was pretty much a born-again virgin, more or less by default.

“You’re going to meet someone who blows your lid off, babe. You just have to put yourself out there.” Devi’s cell phone buzzed and she glanced at the screen. “Oh! I should take this.” She picked up. “Hey, Maggie!”

I wandered over to the stack of magazines on the coffee table. These days, I was getting used to sharing Devi with her other life. Just one more hint from the universe that I needed to get a life of my own.

I sank onto the couch and flipped through a French Vogue. Max came to lay at my feet and I toed his soft fur with my sneaker. Devi was such a natural with people. She’d forgotten more hot men than I’d ever dreamed of meeting. The concept of not putting herself out there wouldn’t even cross her mind. But for me, the whole idea of exposing myself to rejection and failure made my stomach churn.

Still, she was right. I wasn’t about to meet guys sitting at home with my dog.

Not like I hadn’t tried.

“Okay? Oh. Okay…”

I glanced up at the odd tone in Devi’s voice. Bad news? Her eyes met mine, but I couldn’t quite read the look in them.

“Mm-hmm. Right. Okay… no, no problem. I totally understand.” I went back to my magazine while she finished up the conversation, which was brief and consisted of a lot of “Totally,” and “No problem,” and “Of course.”

I looked up again when Devi hung up. She was staring at her phone, like it might somehow explain to her what just happened. “Well. That was interesting.”

“A client?”

“No. Maggie Omura. You just met her. Kind of.”

“Oh.” Right. The pretty dark-haired waif with the hot guy and the even hotter guy. “Max liked her. Didn’t you, Max?” At the sound of his name, Max woofed contentedly.

Devi leaned back in her chair, assessing me. “You also just met Jesse Mayes, which you’re playing it awfully cool about.”

“Who?” I slurped whipped cream from the top of my coffee.

Devi sighed. “Honestly, Katie. Are you kidding me? Jesse Mayes?”

“What? That guy who just left?” I pretended to be enraptured with a deodorant ad in my magazine. “One of your models?”

“I wish. Jesse Mayes is only one of the hottest rock stars in the world and as an incredibly cool young person you should really know what I’m talking about.”

I assumed she added the “incredibly cool young person” comment since last week we got into an argument when she said my apartment looked like an old lady lived in it. And after I’d rigidly defended my music collection (on vinyl), my home phone (on a cord), and my TV (which didn’t exist), I realized she had a point, and maybe she was just scared of losing her best friend to spinsterhood at the age of twenty-four, which was probably a realistic fear.

I gave her my best stink eye anyway. “So?” Then I went back to my magazine, because in truth I had no idea who Jesse Mayes was. Other than the hottest guy in the known universe.

“So,” she said, “I thought you liked Dirty.”

“Dirty what?”

“The band. Dirty.”

“Oh. Who doesn’t?” I looked up again. “You mean, he’s in that band?” I knew music. Kind of prided myself on it. But people? People were Devi’s domain.

“He’s their lead guitarist. And he sings like a sexy beast.”

That, I could believe.

“He just put out a solo album and they’re shooting a music video in town. The woman they cast to star in it with him as his music video girlfriend bailed.” Devi tipped her pretty nose in the air. “Not from our agency, of course.”

“Of course,” I said, but she’d lost me somewhere around sexy beast. I was now trying to recall every Dirty song I knew, and imagining how Jesse Mayes would look playing guitar, and singing under a spotlight all covered in sweat.

“Anyway.” Devi sipped her coffee, eying me over the rim. “Long story short. I met Maggie at a party a while back. She works with Dirty as the assistant to their manager, you know, the dude with all the tattoos.”

Uh-huh. Hottie number two.

“She’s involved in a lot of their publicity and whatnot and naturally we’ve been in touch.”

“Naturally.”

“She called me up last night. They’re looking to recast, but they’re having some issues getting Mr. Rock Star to commit to what he wants. Maggie knew they’d be in the neighborhood today, so she took the opportunity to haul his ass in here and have him choose one of our girls.”

“That’ll be some lucky girl.” I kept flipping through the magazine, but I didn’t really see the pages. I was too busy trying to picture Jesse Mayes with his shirt off.

“Exactly. They just hired one of our models.”

“Well that’s good for you, right?”

“It’s great for me. Katie, pay attention.” Devi stood, came around her desk and took the Vogue from my hands. “They changed their minds. They just called to drop her.”

“Oh. Well, that’s shitty.” Why was Devi all up in my face about it?

She dropped the Vogue on the coffee table with a resounding splat. “They dropped her because they want you.”

* * *

If there was one thing I hated about being a rock star, it was shooting music videos.

They were tedious as hell, or more specifically, limbo. It was all hurry up and wait, all fucking day.

They were also total bullshit. I’d spent half the morning shooting take after take after take. Fake singing with my guitar, fake singing with my shirt off, fake singing with my guitar with my shirt off. And fake was a total fucking turn off.

I’d spent the rest of the morning on my phone in one of Brody’s spare bedrooms while the wardrobe girls dressed me up like a damn doll. Maggie had even gotten in on it, popping up between a couple of wardrobe racks with a pair of jeans that looked exactly like every other pair I’d tried on.

Fuck it.

I dropped the jeans I was wearing, and this time let my underwear go along with them. I kicked the jeans off my feet, stood there buck naked and said, “Make this one count, ladies.”

Maggie took it like the pro she was and handed over the jeans with a frown of disapproval. One of the wardrobe girls seemed to have swallowed her tongue and got busy looking anywhere but at my dick. The other one almost said something as I stepped into the jeans, commando, and zipped them up. Almost.

“Perfect.” I turned to leave.

“Jesse!” Maggie called after me. “We still need a shirt.”

“Whatever.” I yanked on my T-shirt as I went. “I’ll wear whatever.”

I headed downstairs, into the fray, waving off the half-dozen people who wanted to talk to me along the way. Any one of them probably would’ve fetched me anything I wanted, but I was already tired of being poked, primped and waited on.

All I really wanted was to get this day fucking over with and get down to L.A..

There were way too many people crowded into Brody’s place. Film crew, band management, security, wardrobe, makeup, and the many models that had been hired for the shoot were making the massive house feel like the bus we used on our first Dirty tour—totally overrun with hangers-on.

The house was strewn with lights, camera equipment, and all kinds of crap that was being used for the morning-after scene in the living room. It might’ve just been easier to actually throw a party and let everyone trash the house rather than make it look like the aftermath of a shaker. Zane had suggested it; no surprise Brody vetoed that one.

I passed the living room, where they were setting up for that scene, crew prepping a camera on the dolly track. Zane was in there, the only women in the room swarming around him like bees on a honeycomb, dabbing at him with makeup sponges and finger-styling his beach-blond hair while he ate a bowl of something with chopsticks.

Zane and Dylan, two of my bandmates in Dirty, were doing cameos in the video, the second single from my debut solo album. Since the album was called Sunday Morning, Brody had asked me what I’d be doing on an ideal Sunday morning. I said, “Fucking,” he ran with it, and the concept for the video was born. Zane and Dylan would be passed out in the living room in the aftermath of a party along with a bunch of babes, which would take about two seconds to shoot since all they had to do was lie around. Meanwhile me and the model that was playing my girlfriend would be getting it on, which would probably take hours to shoot, since I had to fake-sing the entire song to her while we went at it and the camera probably had to catch it from a billion different angles.

I was bored already.

I stalked into the dining room, which was mostly empty. Just a bunch of hot chicks fussing over their reflections in the big wall mirror and making goo-goo eyes at Dylan, who was in the adjoining music room, kicked back behind the drum kit in his kilt, talking to Brody, eating a sushi cone and being characteristically laid-back, borderline oblivious, about the attention.

I was about to dive into the sushi myself when the lone girl on the other side of the table snagged my eye.

She looked different from the other girls loitering around the house. For one thing, she was short for a model. The other girls were also completely ignoring the food. This one was hovering over it, looking adorably confused in her oversized bathrobe.

“You alright?” I took one of the avocado rolls she’d been eying and popped it, whole, into my mouth.

She looked up at me, and her already big eyes went wide. They were a pretty blue-green, a nice contrast to her dark hair. She looked familiar, maybe. But then again, I’d spent the last month having hundreds of photos of models shoved in my face.

“Um… I’m just not sure what to eat? They gave me a straw for my drink, to protect the lipstick, and the robe to protect my clothes.” She held up the water bottle she was holding, a straw poking out the top. “But I’m not sure how to eat without destroying this.” She made a sweeping gesture to indicate her face.

“Eat what you want,” I told her. “They’ll retouch it.”

She nibbled on her bottom lip, unsure.

“Eating your lip will probably do worse.”

She let go of the lip and blushed a little. I could see the color on her cheeks even through the high-def makeup they’d lacquered onto her already flawless skin. She smiled a little. “Thanks for the pro tip.”

“And you’ve got lipstick on your teeth,” I said, popping a cherry tomato into my mouth.

“Shit.” She ran her tongue over her front teeth.

“If you’re really worried about it, have some of these.” I put the bowl of cherry tomatoes in front of her. “They don’t even need to touch your lips.” I winked at her and she blushed again.

This girl was too cute. Unfortunately she was fangirling at me big time.

Then again… I hadn’t fucked a groupie in a hell of a long time.

“Hey, Jesse.” Maggie walked in. “They’re ready for your next shot. Then it’s time for your scene with Katie.”

“Who?”

“Katie.” Maggie looked from me to the girl in the robe and waved a thumb at the girl. “Your girlfriend du jour. You met her at the agent’s office.”

I looked her over again, slowly—what I could see of her in the bathrobe. “What happened to the blonde?”

Maggie looked annoyed. “You didn’t want the blonde, remember?” I did remember. I just liked messing with Maggie. “You said she was, quote, ‘forgettable,’ as soon as we left the office.”

“Because I had no idea which one you chose.” It was true. I’d pretty much been writing song lyrics in my head the entire time she and Brody perused the models on offer.

Maggie’s eyes narrowed. “I knew it.” She made a gesture toward the girl in the robe again, who was standing there like a fawn caught in the headlights of a Mack truck. “Good thing we picked someone else. Katie. Remember?”

I stared at the girl, and finally it came to me.

Girl in the wet shirt.

She’d looked different then. No makeup. Damp hair. Kind of flushed.

Unintentionally sexy.

Now she looked awkward-sexy.

Maggie made a noise of exasperation. “Don’t mind him,” she said to Katie. “He’s been in a bad mood. For like a year.”

“I remember.” I held Katie’s gaze, ignoring Maggie. “Cherry pie.”

Her cheeks turned pink again. Damn, she was cute.

This shoot just got a hell of a lot more interesting.

“There’s pie?” Zane walked in, and it took all of two seconds for his gaze to find Katie. And stay there.

Great.

“Who’re you?” he demanded.

“Um, Katie,” she said.

Zane, being Zane, went all the way around the very long table, took her hand, and kissed it. “Sweet to meet you, Katie. I’m Zane.” He gave her his ultra-intense, ice-blue-eyed Viking stare down; the one that generally got him any pussy he wanted.

“Cool,” Katie said. She stared at Zane, because that’s what women did.

“Alright,” Maggie said, rounding the table and hauling Katie away. Maggie was one of the few women I’d ever met who was immune to Zane’s bullshit. “Don’t mind Zane. He’s like that with everyone.”

Not everyone. Just women he wanted to fuck.

When the girls were gone, Zane looked over at me. He froze on the receiving end of the look I gave him. “What?”

I turned to leave, just as one of the wardrobe girls came in with a shirt for me.

“Not that one,” I said, and walked out.

* * *

I’d never felt so out of my element in my life.

The thing was, I’d been sitting on the sidelines of my own life for so long that I’d kind of forgotten what my element was.

Which was how I’d ended up here. I’d let my best friend convince me, Katie Bloom, regular girl with not one shred of modeling or acting experience, that I could play super-cool girlfriend-of-a-rock-star in Jesse Mayes’ hot new music video.

What the fuck was I thinking?

Today was the first time in my life I had legit palm sweat.

I rubbed my palms on the plush robe, my hands tucked into the pockets as I followed Maggie through the massive house she said belonged to Jesse’s manager, Brody, the guy with the tattoos from Devi’s office. I’d met him for real this time, and he had this intensely sexy business-meets-rock-’n’-roll thing going on that made me all tongue-tied. I was relieved when the incredibly nice Maggie rescued me from that conversation. Same, when she did it again with Zane. Because what the hell would I say to Zane Traynor, the most charismatic frontman to rock a pair of leather pants since Jim Morrison?

Yeah, I’d hit up Google since getting hired for this thing.

A lot.

Dirty’s lead singer had the body of a love god and a voice he’d clearly sold his soul to the devil for, and yes he was gorgeous, but I only stared at him because it was that or get sucked into eye contact with Jesse Mayes again.

And that was a serious threat to my sanity.

When the man looked at me, things happened to my body that I could only describe as temporary but all-consuming hormonal insanity. It was dizzying, thrilling and terrifying, and I needed to get my shit together before we shot this scene. I was supposed to be all cool and girlfriend-like, hanging out by his side at a party or whatever, not swooning like a pent-up virgin who might combust if he bumped shoulders with me.

It didn’t help that he’d brought all his larger-than-life friends to the shoot.

Sure, I’d seen pictures of all the members of Dirty on the web. But since this shoot was for Jesse’s solo album, I didn’t expect Zane or Dirty’s drummer, Dylan Cope, to be here.

What the hell did I expect?

Maybe some kind of sterile sound stage with an efficient, all-business film crew calling the shots?

This felt more like a party, people crammed into every room of Brody’s architectural marvel of a house, which was in North Vancouver, up the mountainside in Canyon Heights, and probably cost high seven figures.

The film crew looked a lot like what I’d always thought roadies would look like, the roadies looked like criminals, the security guys looked like straight-up bikers, and the management team, which consisted of Brody, Maggie, and various underlings, looked like rock stars.

Jesse, Zane, and Dylan? They looked like something out of a Greek goddess’s masturbation fantasy.

I’d never met people like this in real life.

When I’d first arrived, Maggie had mercifully plucked me from a roomful of women who looked like they’d come straight from backstage at a Victoria’s Secret fashion show. I must have looked as out of place as I felt in my Rolling Stones T-shirt, paint-splattered jeans and purple kicks; apparently all my jeans had paint on them, which was something I’d only realized that morning.

Honestly, what the hell was I doing here?

For the second time today, Maggie deposited me in one of the upstairs bedrooms that had been taken over by the wardrobe team, promising to fetch me in ten minutes.

Ten minutes until my scene with Jesse Mayes.

My palms were sweating again.

The wardrobe girls freed me from the robe and stood me on a little platform to stare at me. Which wouldn’t have been all that weird, given their profession, if I wasn’t totally naked except for a bra and panties. It was definitely not my comfort zone, but since there were only a couple of models and the wardrobe girls in the room, and they did this all the time, I tried to convince myself it was no big deal.

Not terrifying in the slightest.

They had me do a quick change in the adjoining washroom, keeping the champagne satin and black lace bra, but switching out the matching panties for a pair of skimpy black lace boy shorts, which showed a hell of a lot of cheek. Luckily, I had decent cheeks.

“Oh, so perfect,” one of the wardrobe girls gushed when she saw me, and I told myself it was kind of cute and not at all weird that they cared so much what I’d be wearing under my clothes, since no one was going to see it.

Then one of the makeup girls walked in with a makeup palette, her little tool belt filled with brushes and sponges, and started painting over a bruise on my thigh with her magic makeup that made it look like I had no pores.

And that’s when it hit me.

These were my clothes.

Like, all of them.

Because apparently I was about to be filmed in Jesse Mayes’ music video wearing nothing but panties and a bra.

“Is there time for me to use the washroom before I go down?” I asked anyone who would listen, hot panic rising like bile in my throat.

“Sure,” the makeup girl said. “Just try not to smudge the makeup.”

I dashed into the bathroom and shut the door, just in time for the first heave. I grabbed onto the beautiful marble sink and wretched, as quietly as I could, my stomach clenching as I dry-heaved. Thank God nothing came up. Kind of glad now that I never actually got to eat any of that sushi.

I swallowed, heaved, swallowed again, and focused on getting control of my breath. Aerosmith was rocking “Sweet Emotion” on the sound system in the next room, so at least I knew no one could hear me.

I squeezed my eyes shut and breathed, long, slow and deep. Then I dug through the pockets of my discarded jeans and found my phone. I called Devi with fumbling hands, a toxic blend of nerves, anger and humiliation broiling in my gut.

“Is he as hot as you remembered?” she answered, and I could hear the self-satisfied smile in her voice.

“Hotter. Devi. What the fuck.”

“Huh? Are you okay?” Alarmed. She sounded alarmed now and I would’ve felt bad if I wasn’t still swallowing down the bile.

“Did you know they want me to do this thing in panties and a bra?”

“Oh,” my best friend said. “That.”

“Yes, that,” I hissed. I would’ve straight-up yelled at her for the first time in our lives if I wasn’t afraid all the pretty people in the next room might hear me. I tugged at the skimpy lace of the boy shorts which now felt several sizes smaller than when I first put them on, trying, and failing, to cover more of my ass.

“Katie, Jesus. Seriously, are you okay? You sound all frothy.”

“Yes, because I’m foaming at the mouth. You never told me I’d be doing this thing naked.”

“One. Panties and a bra does not equal naked. You wear less at the beach. That sexy-ass string bikini of yours?”

“That’s different.”

“How is it different?”

Ugh. I hated it when she out-argued me. Which she did all the time. Hence, me standing here in sexy underwear that wasn’t even mine. “I don’t know. It just is.”

“It’s not. And two. I didn’t get around to telling you they’d changed the plan because I knew you’d freak out and bail and I really, really think you should do this.”

“What do you mean, they changed the plan?”

“That party scene thing? They called yesterday to say they’d altered it a bit, so your scene with Jesse will now be a one-on-one thing. Like, just the two of you.”

Just the two of us?

What was she talking about?

“Devi, what the hell did you sign me up for?”

“Nothing. It’s just a love scene.”

Cold. I suddenly felt shivering cold. But the contents of my stomach… a churning ball of hot lava. “What do you mean, a love scene?”

Like, sex?

Simulated sex, on camera?

With Jesse Mayes? Hottest guy in the universe?

Hot panic. Bile rising…

I swallowed hard.

“All you have to do is fake make out with Jesse,” Devi said, like it was the simplest thing in the world. “He’s gorgeous, right? And you were all worried you’d have to dance on cue or strut around or something. This way, you don’t even have to perform.”

Right. Because pretending to make out with a super hot rock star while a camera crew filmed it was a daily occurrence for me. Totally natural.

“Not to mention I got you more money. You know, for doing it in your skivvies.”

Slowly. In through the nose, out through the mouth.

“Katie?”

“I’m breathing.”

“Where the hell are you?”

“In the bathroom.”

“Okay… so breathe and then get your ass out there. We went over this. We drank wine. Remember? You’re gonna rock this.”

Rock this. Right. Despite Devi’s confidence in me, I was pretty sure Jesse Mayes was the one who was going to rock this.

I was very possibly going to throw up.

For the first time since I started dry-heaving, I caught my reflection in the mirror: the reflection of the girl who was about to fake make out with Jesse Mayes.

Half-naked.

I blinked and stared, trying to imagine that girl in a music video.

She had a lot more makeup on than usual, but okay… it’s not like there was nothing there to work with. Face kind of heart-shaped. Symmetrical features. Slender, arched eyebrows and decently high cheekbones. Full lips. Largish blue-green eyes framed by dark lashes. Pale Irish skin with a few micro-freckles dusted across a decently cute nose.

I looked over my figure in the lingerie, which was much sexier than I’d realized, now that I was seeing it through the eyes of the girl who was about to wear it in front of Jesse Mayes. I’d always been kind of petite, nothing like the other women they’d hired for this, but at least I had curves. I used to be a tomboy, actually. A skater kid, I dressed like the boys I hung out with and looked like them too. It was hard not to still see that girl in the mirror. I was kind of a late bloomer, but I had bloomed.

And someone liked what they saw, enough to hire me for this, right?

“Katie?” Devi sounded worried now. I didn’t like being the one to make her sound that way.

I tried to wrap my head around the idea of walking out there, in this, in front of Jesse Mayes, and all his hot friends, and the camera crew and the security guys and all those other models—real models… and I just couldn’t. I couldn’t. My palms were still sweating as I clung to the sink.

“Shit, Devi,” I said in a small, parched voice. “He doesn’t even know who I am.”

“Should he?”

“Um, yeah? I thought he picked me. But he didn’t even know I was hired.”

“So? You were hired. I know you feel all weird about it because you’ve never done this before, but who the fuck cares? Trust me, babe. This is the kind of thing some girls, beautiful girls, bust their asses trying to get their whole careers and never do. This is Jesse Fucking Mayes.”

“Yeah. I’m aware.”

Both Devi and Google had filled me in on the extent of the man’s fame, informing me that Jesse Fucking Mayes was nothing less than a rock god, a sex god, and a total heartbreaker.

Not to mention that his current girlfriend was none other than Elle, the super hot female bass player of Dirty.

Even if I could muster the nerve to walk out there in this lingerie, I, Katie Bloom, was not built for that kind of pressure.

“You know we rep an actress who just shot a love scene with Leonardo?” Devi went on. “And an actual Victoria’s Secret model. They passed on all of them. They want you.”

“Uh-huh.” That part, to be honest, still didn’t compute. But it did make me feel more nauseous. “Why the hell did I agree to do this? You know I hate being in the spotlight.” I shut my eyes, fighting back the spins.

Devi fell silent. She knew, alright.

She’d been there, standing by my side at the altar while the minister looked on with grave sympathy and the minutes ticked by. While everyone stood looking at me in my white dress; everyone but the one person who was supposed to be there.

The one who’d just walked out.

I wanted to disappear then, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t escape that horrible moment that just stretched on and on.

I was still reliving it, almost two years later.

“And that’s exactly why you need to do this,” my best friend said.

“Why, exactly?”

“You know why. Look, Katie, I’ve been there with you. Through all of it. I’ve watched you mope around for the last two years of your life—”

“One year and ten months. Let’s not exaggerate.”

Someone knocked on the bathroom door. “Katie?”

It was Maggie, here to take me to shoot my scene. I pictured Jesse Mayes out there, waiting… Shit, would he be half-naked too?

“Just a minute!” I called as sweetly as I could, even as the bile rose up again. I tried to choke it down, but it was winning.

“Okay,” Devi pressed. “I’ve watched my best friend in the entire world feel bad about herself for a year and ten months, all over some asshole who didn’t deserve her anyway—”

“Devi—”

“Wait. He never deserved you in the first place, and we both know it. I know you know it, deep down, that he was a total dick and the way he hurt you was despicable.”

I threw up. Quietly.

Just a bit, in Jesse Mayes’ tattooed manager’s beautiful marble sink.

“But the fact that you’re still letting it run your life,” Devi said, oblivious to my vomiting, “…Katie, that’s on you.”

This.

This was exactly why Devi was, and would always be, my best friend.

She loved me when I needed love. And she tough loved me when I needed a kick in the ass. Unfailingly.

“You’re right,” I croaked. I swished some water around my mouth and spat in the sink, rinsing the vomit down the drain.

“You need to grab this moment by the balls. Take your fucking life back, babe.”

Devi was always trying to get me to grab something by the balls. Usually life. Sometimes a man.

I’d never been more grateful for it.

“Okay,” I said.

She was right, and I knew it.

I couldn’t let what happened to me almost two years ago on that shitty day, the day that was supposed to be the best day of my life but turned out to be the worst, ruin my life.

And if I didn’t take drastic action, that was exactly what was going to happen.

“I’m doing this.”

I dabbed at my mouth with a tissue, making sure there was no trace of vomit on my made-up face as I studied myself in the mirror.

“Fucking right.”

“And by the way,” I told her, “I love you.”

I hung up and rinsed my mouth with some of the mouthwash that had been left, thanks to some small miracle, on the little tray of guest toiletries.

Then I took a deep breath, opened the door, and went to make out with a rock star.

* * *