four
We finally left the hotel around eight, heading for my place so I could show him where I lived and pick up some things. I did want him to sleep at my place. I wanted him in my bed and in my shower and on my couch, even if this was all rented furniture. But sweet damn—I wanted another round in that giant shower, and we had all weekend for me to have him s’more up my place.
Enough with the freaking s’mores.
This distance thing was making me a little insane.
We caught a cab in front of the hotel, and it was so quick I didn’t even have time to worry about anyone seeing us. Maybe I did need to relax a little. New York was really different from L.A., and in his ratty jeans and ball cap he looked more college student than famous, so I doubted anyone would recognize him. And he wasn’t worried about being seen with me, so what the hell?
We made out like teenagers in the cab on the way to my apartment. When we arrived, I nodded to the doorman as we walked inside. “Hi, Lou.”
“Evening, Lou.” Jack nodded as well, and Lou nodded back.
I kept him at arm’s length in the elevator, and when we finally made it into my apartment he was like an octopus, arms everywhere. He finally settled in behind me, hands clasped firmly over my tummy, chin planted on my shoulder.
“Okay, give me the grand tour,” he said.
“Well, this is pretty much it. It’s not big. I don’t need a lot of space, and it’s close to the rehearsal studio. Kitchen, living room, bathroom down the hall, and bedroom is the last door on the right,” I said.
“It’s nice,” he said, looking over my shoulder.
“Eh, it’s okay. It’s no Laurel Canyon. That’s home to me,” I said, leaning back against him.
“But you haven’t even lived there yet. How can it be your home when you’ve only slept one night there?” he questioned, kissing my neck right under my ear.
“Mmm, and what a night it was,” I said with a giggle, turning to wrap my arms around his waist.
His hands came to my face, bringing me forward into another soft kiss. “Yes, it was. But really, how can that be home? I mean, do you truly consider L.A. home?” he asked, looking at me with questions in his eyes.
“God, yes. It does feel like home. When I first found my house, I knew it would need a lot of work, but I knew it was my home. I could clearly see myself living there. And even though I had to leave for this job, wherever I go, that house is home.” I closed my eyes, thinking of the warm California sun, and I could almost smell the lemon trees on my front porch and the honeysuckle in the backyard.
I opened my eyes to see Jack studying me carefully.
“What’s that look for?” I asked.
“So you are planning on moving back, right?” he asked, running one hand through his hair.
“Hell yes, ya goofball! I didn’t spend all my savings on my house just to sell it again! I don’t know how long I’ll be out here, and I love New York, but when this is over? I’ll be back home.” I pulled him against me. “What about you?” I asked, my face pressed into his shirt.
“What about me?” he asked, his breath warm and sweet in my hair.
“Where are you going to live when all this is over? Will you go back to London after the premiere, or are you planning on staying in L.A.?” I asked, a little afraid to hear the answer.
“Well, I don’t know, to be honest. That was the plan—London is my home—but there’s a film we’re in negotiations with that would be filming in L.A. in January.”
“Wait, so you’re thinking about moving back to London?” I asked, surprised.
“That’s where I live, Grace. Who knows what’s going to happen after this movie comes out. This could be my swan song. I could peak at twenty-four.”
“Oh, please. The world is going to need much more Joshua,” I said.
London?
Shhh.
“Hmm, we’ll see. Maybe no one’ll come and see it. Maybe they’ll think it’s rubbish,” he muttered.
“George, please. It will be amazing. And if nothing else, you’re so pretty, they’ll pay just to see you romping around half-naked in your period clothing,” I teased. I knew how much Jack wanted to be taken seriously as an actor, and I was forever telling him how pretty he was, just to mess with him.
“And I’m sure the men who will be coming to see your show will only be coming to see your acting chops, not your fantastic tits,” he teased back, earning him a very grown-up tongue stick-out.
“Oh, love, if you’re going to show me your tongue, I may have to give you something to lick,” he threatened, wiggling his eyebrows like a villain in an old-timey movie.
“You’re sick, Hamilton. Truly sick.” I laughed, pulling away from him.
“So we’re going to see a movie, yes?” he asked, tooling around my apartment.
“Yes, there’s a theater about six blocks from here. I’ll check and see what’s playing. Then we can grab something after that, sound good?” I pulled my laptop from my bag and sat on the couch.
“Oh, I’ll be grabbing something after the movie, that’s for certain,” he said, winking at me.
“Dirty bird,” I muttered as he disappeared down the hall toward the bedroom.
“You love it,” he shouted over his shoulder.
I laughed quietly and signed on. My TMZ homepage came up immediately because I was a sucker for all things celebrity gossip. I could hear Jack putzing in the bedroom, so I figured I could indulge in a few minutes of celeb surfing. Guilty pleasure. I scrolled through the pictures of the latest buzz: An actor checking into rehab, another actor leaving rehab. A singer who’d been threatening to retire for twenty years heading back out on tour. I skipped ahead—not a lot of celebrity news. I was about to zip over to the movie times site when an interesting snippet caught my eye:
Jack Hamilton seen out on the town with actress Marcia Veracruz. Are these two on again?
What? Wait a minute. Back up.
Once Time comes out, maybe he can afford to buy a new car! The two were spotted having lunch in Venice a few days ago before climbing into Jack’s old, beat-up MG.
I felt sick.
Breathe, just breathe.
Ever since he was cast as Joshua, women everywhere have been wondering whether this Brit boy is single. Well, ladies, it appears this time traveler is spoken for! Just two nights ago, Jack Hamilton was spotted driving away from an L.A. nightclub with his latest gal pal, actress Marcia Veracruz. The two were previously in a confirmed relationship, and although they took a break, it appears things are still hot and heavy between them.
I felt really sick. I tried to close the laptop, but I couldn’t make my hands move. They were clenched too tightly into fists.
Ask him. Don’t flip out. Just ask him.
Hell yes, I was gonna ask him.
I stared at the pictures, examining his face: smiling, ball cap pulled securely down over his curly hair. Then I forced myself to look at her, really look at her. She was smiling too, her face inclined toward his as they left some club in L.A. together.
She was pretty.
She was really pretty.
Not good . . .
I heard Jack coming down the hallway, and part of me wanted to clear the screen, pull up Moviefone, and shove this Marcia thing in my famous mental drawer—the Drawer, where everything unpleasant goes to be avoided—but we were past that. We were way past that. And if I’d been honest with myself, and not such a chickenshit, we would’ve dealt with this months ago when I saw her text that night in the dark.
Instead, true to form, I’d refused to deal, letting this build to the point of full meltdown before acknowledging it. Why? Because a battle raged constantly between the cool, tough exterior Grace and the sad, frightened, still-sees-herself-as-the-fat-girl Grace on the inside. Jack’d had a tiny peek or two at Inside Grace, but he had yet to experience the full mess in there.
Hey, why deal with things directly, when they can fester and become an emotional storm of epic proportions? I never claimed to be the mature one in this relationship, that’s for sure.
I second that.
“Hey, Gracie, I think we should skip the movie and just stay in and have a shag, what do you say?” he deadpanned, stopping in the archway to the living room. His hands were pressed against either side of the archway, his hair raked back and crazy, his lower lip sucked in between his teeth, and his eyes blazing deep green. He grinned at me, taking my lack of speech as proof that his seduction was working.
He sauntered closer, leaning over my shoulder. “What do you say we close this thing while I take these pesky clothes off you . . .” Then he saw the pictures on the computer.
He froze.
“Explain this, please,” I said in a low voice. When I was mad, I was dangerously quiet.
“Shit, Grace, I was going to tell you about this. I know how bad it looks, but really, it’s nothing.”
“Explain this now, please,” I asked again, my voice even quieter. I was beginning to shake, I was so angry, but beneath the anger was a profound sadness. This is what I’d been afraid of since the beginning.
“Grace, Marcia is just a friend. I swear. You can ask Holly,” he said, moving the laptop away and sitting on the coffee table in front of me, watching my eyes. I think my expression told him to tread lightly.
“Holly knows about this?” I asked, closing my eyes and feeling prickling behind my eyelids.
“Well, yes, she does. We talked about it earlier this week when these pictures first came out. I know this looks bad, Grace, but truly, she is just a friend. And Holly actually thinks we can make this work in our favor, since the pictures are already out there—”
“I know you used to date her, Jack. Don’t try to tell me you didn’t. What are you doing, going out with your ex-girlfriend? I know I must sound like some crazy bitch, but right now I’m feeling all kinds of crazy, so start talking,” I said, my voice getting a little louder.
“Okay, yes, we used to date. But we’re just friends now. I promise you there’s nothing going on! She knows all about you. I talk about you all the time. That’s actually one of the reasons we’ve been hanging out so much lately. Her boyfriend travels a lot, and she never sees him. So we hang out sometimes. It’s harmless. I swear, Grace.”
“Y’know, it’s not so much that you’re hanging out with her, which I can overlook. Hey, we have no claims on each other. You can hang out with whoever you want. But the fact that no one bothered to tell me, and that you and Holly even discussed this? I feel sick. I really feel sick,” I said, my voice getting louder still.
Jack was quiet, looking at the floor.
My stomach was twisting and turning. “Do you have any idea how this makes me feel? I feel like an old fool. Maybe this is the kind of person you should be with—someone who fits with you better than I ever could.
“And I’m sorry, but a girl does not text you in the middle of the night if all she wants is friendship.” Tears were beginning to run down my face, and I wiped them angrily away.
Jack’s face had grown angry as well, but it flashed confusion when I mentioned the text. “What text? What are you talking about?”
“She texted you in the middle of the night weeks ago, before I left L.A. You were asleep, and I picked up your phone to shut it off. Yes, I read it. I shouldn’t have, but I fucking did. I would say I’m sorry, but you know what? I’m not really sorry. I wanted to see who was texting the man asleep in my bed, with his hands all over my body, at three in the morning.
“And looky what we have here! The same girl you’ve been photographed with all over town. Shocking, really,” I said sarcastically, getting up and pushing past him to stand in the kitchen.
I was still crying, but these were angry tears, pissed-off tears. All that shit I’d been pushing away for so long was coming home to roost now, and all I could do was hang on and let it come out.
Jack was still quiet. He finally rose and stood in front of me, his face stormy.
“Gracie, I am going to say this once. Was I wrong not to tell you I was hanging out with my ex-girlfriend? Yes, probably. Was I wrong to not tell you sooner about the conversation I had with Holly? Yes, definitely.
“I’ve never done this before—had a relationship with someone who lives across the country, while I’m going through the biggest thing professionally I’ll probably ever go through. And you know what? There will probably be more pictures of Marcia and me together. In fact, I can guarantee it. She has a movie she’s promoting, and our managers are milking this thing for all it’s worth.
“But even if you don’t trust me, which you clearly don’t, you know Holly would never do anything to hurt you. She was bloody well pissed when she saw these, as she should be. I have my head up my ass sometimes, and I didn’t think about what these would look like, or how they might make you feel,” he said, breathing heavily.
“Well, I think—” I started, but he put his finger over my lips.
“I’m not finished. You seem to think I’m going to fuck around on you. And these pictures do look terrible if you’re thinking about it in that way. You’re here, I’m there, and it sucks. But there has to be some trust between us. Do you agree?” he asked, removing his finger.
I glared at him. “Yes, I agree, but—”
“Grace, you either agree or you don’t. Yes or no?”
“Yes, I agree, and I do trust you,” I said, a fresh wave of tears starting.
“I trust you too. Otherwise I’d be asking you why there are a pair of men’s trainers by the front door. A less-trusting boyfriend would wonder about that.” He arched an eyebrow at me and looked over my shoulder.
I followed his gaze and saw Michael’s sneakers. He’d left them here the other night, changing into boots when it started raining.
Shit.
I looked back at Jack. He seemed curious, and a little . . . apprehensive?
“Grace, you’re a beautiful woman. I see how men look at you. I know there are other men who want to be with you. Whose shoes are those?” he asked.
I grabbed a box of Kleenex and blew my nose loudly, getting control again. “They’re Michael’s. He was here earlier in the week. We were working on a scene, and he changed his shoes. I didn’t even notice they were still here until now.”
Jack had nothing to worry about; Michael and I were just friends.
Friends who used to have feelings for each other.
But Jack doesn’t know about that.
“Did you and Michael ever date, Gracie?” he asked.
“Date? No,” I answered quickly. That was true. We never dated.
“Are you sure? You two seem to have more than friendship in your past. I noticed that right away. And when I said I see how other men look at you? He looks at you that way,” Jack added, his face going dark.
“No, we never dated. But yes, there were feelings there—years and years ago. That’s all over, though. We truly are just friends,” I assured him, breathing a little more easily now.
“Ah. Like Marcia and I are just friends.”
“Ugh,” I said, rubbing my eyes.
“Do you see how much easier this is if we just tell each other what’s going on?” he asked, reaching out his hand. I hesitated for a second, then took it.
“How the hell did you get so mature at twenty-four? Seriously, I’m like a basket case next to you,” I said, breaking the tension a little.
“I’m British. We’re born more mature,” he said with the sexy half smile that always turned me to mush. “Feeling better now?” he asked as I blew my nose again.
“Yes. But don’t ever let me find out something like that courtesy of TMZ again, okay? I can’t take another surprise like that,” I said fiercely, as he crushed me against his chest.
“I promise. That was a shitty thing to do. And don’t let Michael get too comfortable over here. I don’t want to have to piss in the corners to mark my territory, but I will if I need to,” he said.
I laughed in spite of myself. “Well, you tell that Marcia I’ll be very glad to meet her next time I’m in L.A. And make sure to tell her I said to keep her hands to herself, in the meantime. I can go along with seeing pictures of you two together for publicity’s sake, but the second I see her hand on your ass, the bitch is going down.” I grabbed his collar and pulled him closer to me.
“Fucking Nuts Girl, how could I love anyone but you? You’re insane,” he said, lowering his mouth to mine.
I let my hand slip down to his buns and gave him a squeeze. “This sweet ass is mine, and don’t you forget it. Now give mama some sugar,” I said, and kissed him hard.
We never made it to the movie. But we had made it through another potential shitstorm, and we kept our shit intact. We were an odd couple, to say the least, but for now, all was well in Jack-and-Grace Land.