Love and Rumors: A Summer Sisters Beach Reads Contemporary Romance (The Summer Sisters Book 1) (18 page)

“Real butter.” She plunked the bowl on his chest and shoved his feet off her end of the couch. She sat, using a mouse to advance the images, her hand brushing his as they shared the bowl of popcorn.

“This is weird.”

“What do you mean?” She pulled her hand back, wondering if he’d noticed that she always went for popcorn at the same time as him. She was definitely out of practice at flirting.

“All these photos. Sitting here watching and eating popcorn. Feels surreal.”

“Don’t you watch your own movies?”

“If I can help it, no.”

“You’re kidding!”

“I don’t like watching myself on screen. It feels…” He gave a shrug and sank down lower in the cushions, his long legs stretched out in front of him.

“My mother recorded my outgoing voicemail message for me. I don’t like the sound of my voice when it’s recorded.”

“Nobody does.”

“Not everyone’s heard my voice, you big jerk.”

Finian smiled and tossed a few pieces of popcorn her way. “Someone once told me it’s not all about me. Maybe it’s not all about you, either.”

Hailey snatched up the popcorn bits and tossed them back at Finian, who caught them in his mouth, leaning toward her, his shoulder pressing into hers as he lost his balance.

“I thought you loved the limelight and seeing yourself on the big screen?”

“I like the consequences.”

“Having the paparazzi jump into your love life?” She felt her cheeks flush as he glanced over at her, his eyes a bright, inquisitive blue. “Not with me. I’m not in your love life. I mean we’re not—I’m not…you know.”

“The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”

Hailey rolled her eyes and began advancing photos, jumping to some of her favorites near the end—the shots where she’d caught the other side of him.

Finian swallowed, head tipped back. “These are…” He ran a hand through his hair, his eyes stuck to the screen where he was revealed, uncovered. Raw and laid out for the viewer. Real. So very real.

He swallowed again.

Hailey bit her bottom lip and refrained from saying anything. Could he see who he could be? The side of him that she’d begun to adore? The world would eat this up and it would pull him to a higher level of fame. Something he must surely want.

His hands clenched into fists, his eyes flickering darkly. “But they’re art.”

“Of course they’re art,” she snapped, rising off the couch. “What did you expect? Department store family portraits in front of a fake cloud background?”

Finian laughed, raw and brutal.

“Don’t be an ass.” She flicked her shirt so that it hung straight. “I thought this was what you wanted. Something different. And now you’re laughing at me. How perfect. Thanks for the reminder of who you really are.”

“Head shots,” he choked out.

“Yeah, head shots.” She marched out onto the porch, slamming the door behind her.

How had she let herself believe for a few short hours that she was someone interesting? Someone special? Someone he liked hanging out with, as though they were on the same page? She’d thought he understood what she was doing, posing him in unconventional positions.

What a waste of a day. Anger and frustration welled up inside her.

The worst was that it was an amateur move not asking for a specific list of the shots he needed. He’d said he wanted something different, and she’d stupidly assumed he’d expected something other than the plain, boring standard fare which lacked interest or uniqueness.

Why had she tried to make art with him? She was supposed to be saving her cottage. Finian was Hollywood, and despite what she wished him to be, he was still an actor who wanted the easy way out. He didn’t want gritty. He didn’t want real.

And he didn’t want art. He wanted plastic. But she had given him his real emotions, served up in digital.

She opened the door to her house, shaking her head at the still form still staring at her television. She leaned in, and said, “I’ve got work to do in my studio. Let me know if you see a boring pic you want me to send to your agent and let yourself out when you’re done.”

* * *

Finn flexed his hands and reached for the garage’s doorknob before changing his mind. What could he say to Hailey? How could he make up for laughing at her, then sitting there like a stunned dork instead of running after her?

Sucking in a breath, he yanked open the door and rested his shoulder against the frame. “There’s a fund-raiser ball at the Windermere House tonight. Want to crash it with me?”

She was at her worktable, the obvious agitation in her moves leaving him uncertain.

“I don’t crash parties. Especially ones like those.”

She didn’t even deign to look his way. Not good. But was it because she was feeling unsure, or was she still pissed off?

“Besides,” she continued, “I’m not the kind of girl who has things she can wear to something like that. If I were to take you up on your gallant offer, which I am not.”

She looked up at him, her eyes filled with pain.

“I’m sorry I laughed. I didn’t mean to.”

She nodded, head bent again. She was more unsure than super pissed. He raised his eyes upward in thanks. He could coax unsure into sure. The problem was, that she was back to being tough Hailey. Real-life, hard-nosed Hailey. Not the woman he’d chased with shaving cream, making her laugh and squeal until he’d been so turned on he’d had to concentrate way harder on his shaving than he should have in order not to cut himself.

That Hailey had glowed. All her burdens had lifted and she’d bloomed. But now she was closing her petals as if expecting a storm to break her stem.

“Please,” he said, his voice low. He wanted this woman at his side. To keep him from being the big jerk he was so used to becoming. To be the man she saw through the lens of her camera. Bigger in soul than he felt.

He wanted to be someone who made eyes twinkle for, all the right reasons, when people saw him coming. The reasons that made Hailey’s eyes light up before she caught herself and acted indifferent to his arrival. Not the reason Hollywood twinkled. Not the way people expected the worst when they saw him and wondered what buffet table he’d break when he fell over drunk, or which lucky woman would get laid upon it so he could feast on her mouth for all to see. Arrogant prick. That was who he’d become.

But with Hailey he was himself. His old self. And it felt okay to be that person. Really okay. Safe in ways it had never felt with anyone else—even his family.

In fact, he felt so okay that he’d even argued with Derek over the artsy role his film buddy, Bruce Proust, had offered. Last week it would have been a flat-out “No, thanks,” as the offered role was something he used to do before Hollywood. Something Derek told him would do no wonders for his career. It was as though Finn had killed that part of himself—the artistic, creative side—in order to succeed in Hollywood. But this afternoon Hailey had dug it up, breathed life back into it and shown him that it had been merely hiding out, waiting for a safe place to play. She’d quite simply captured the art side of him and presented it as if it was obvious.

Everything he was wrestling—who the world thought he was, who he thought he should be, who he was, and who he wanted to be—she’d ensnared for him to ponder. At first he’d been so stunned it was as though someone had dropped a grand piano on him. All those emotions. The light and angles. The way he looked. The way he held himself... It was art. Art that he had believed could no longer apply to him in his fake world of Hollywood and false images.

Finn hadn’t known what to say. How to react. Sitting there, he hadn’t been able to rev his engine out of the rut of stunned-ocity he was facing. But now, maybe he could make up for his lack of response. He could take her out, bring to light that blossoming Hailey he’d been so smitten with earlier. Return the favor by bringing a part of her back to life.

Plus he felt a strong urge to keep her close until he figured himself out. On the other side of the sealed door was his real life, and Hailey was the key to the lock he didn’t even know he’d been trying to pick.

She cut him a glance, her posture stiff. Professional Hailey.

He adopted a formal business tone. “I’d like photos of myself in a tuxedo.”

She gave a small harrumph. “Fine. Put it on and we’ll snap off a few uninspired poses that will lack originality right here, right now. No need to take me out in public in order to do so. I’ll only want to artify you.”

Finn swallowed and shut his eyes. Regret speared through him and he moved to where she was standing, turned her around and laid his palms on her shoulders, making her face him.

“I’m sorry if you thought I was laughing at your photos. They are amazing. I wasn’t expecting it, and it hit me, Hailey.” He took a hand off her shoulder, placed it over his heart. “It hit me here.” He moved his hand to his head. “And here. I don’t expect you to understand, since you don’t know me. You only know who you’ve let yourself believe I am.”

“I know who you are.”

“No, you don’t.”

She turned away, picking up her camera. “Come on, let’s get the shots over with so you can go crash your fancy party.”

“The tux isn’t with me.”

She heaved an impatient sigh, hand on hip.

“And I’d like shots of me…” His mind ran through various ideas. He needed her with him tonight. At any cost. “In crowds. And in the night, outside. And…a dark lawn. The whole man-of-mystery thing.” He frowned at her shaking shoulders. “What?”

A laugh burst out. “Finian Alexander, bad boy of Hollywood, the world’s hottest bachelor, are you afraid to go alone?”

He straightened his back. “No, of course not.”

She gave him a look of challenge, arms crossed.

He came near, crowding her, almost hating himself for the way he planned to push her buttons. “What about you? Are you afraid of coming with me?” He eased closer until their shirts brushed. “Afraid of walking into the limelight?” His voice dropped an octave. “Afraid of being seen with me?”

Hailey gave a shaky laugh and leaned back against her table, hands braced against it, her chest pushed out in an effort to get away from his looming presence.

Oh, he had her. Had her bad.

His groin tightened and he refrained from touching her, having her. Consuming her.

“Are you?” He let his breath roam over the exposed skin at her neck.

She crossed her arms, bumping against him, chin raised. “Fine.”

“You’ll come with me?”

“If only to keep you from making me claustrophobic.” She pushed him backward. “When does this monkey business start?”

“Half an hour.”

“Half an hour!”

“You’re with me. We can be fashionably late.” He sent her a wink. “Don’t forget your camera.”

“Photo shoots outside the studio cost double.”

“That’s fine.” He leaned over her again, all smiles, knowing he was too close and loving every second of it. “My last movie was a blockbuster hit.”

“And I can tell that fact did not go straight to your head.”

He grinned at her. She was fun. “Let’s get ourselves outfitted like the sexy beasts we are.”

* * *

Holy dyno. Hailey was…she was…
every
thing.

The one English class he’d taken in college had told him not to use more than one adjective when describing something, but, hot-damn, adjectives were all he could think of while staring at Hailey move across her sister’s living room to the entry where he was waiting.

Breathtaking.

Stunning.

Out of this world.

Gorgeous.

Curvy.

Unbelieveable.

Delicious.

A fifteen on a scale of ten.

Bedable.

Hot and sexy.

He’d dropped her off at Maya’s house—another of her multitude of sisters—so she could get decked out while he borrowed her wheels to go get himself a monkey suit. Obviously his invitation had gone to her head as she’d been like a giddy teenager when he’d dropped her off to raid her sister’s closet. But a crazy transformation worthy of a sci-fi show had happened in the thirty minutes he’d been out. She was mellow, graceful and demure. And she’d shined up, big time. Soft makeup and lipstick that made her shapely mouth luscious in all the ways that turned a man on and made him think of things south of the border. Hair in soft curls. A red dress—quiet, serious Hailey in a knockout dress. It hugged her curves, its swooping neck bunched with lots of extra material, creating soft folds across her chest. Her shoulders looked strong and entirely kissable. That hint of cleavage he knew would keep him close all night, wondering, waiting. Hoping.

He wanted to take her home. To his parents. To his bed. He wanted to kiss her, and have that kiss last for the next fifty years.

Instead, he lifted her hand and lightly brushed his lips across the back. “You look utterly amazing,” he told her.

She let go of his hand and he was unsure where to put his own. He needed to touch her, hold her. He quickly leaned forward, brushing her cheek with another light kiss, unable to move away.

Her cheeks flushed, the color spreading across her chest. She took him in with careful, quick glances. “You look nice, too.”

“He looks hot, Hailey,” said her sister. “Come on, admit it. You want to bump uglies big time.”

Finn shot Maya a grin and she gave him a double thumbs-up. He was going to have to tell his friends about Canadian women, because he could only imagine what these hotties were like in the sack. His groin tightened as extra blood hurried to the area, in case he should decide to listen to the devil on his shoulder and take Hailey behind the bushes lining her sister’s yard.

At the car he offered Hailey her keys. She paused, then accepted them. It was almost as though she expected him to drive. Interesting. She liked to be pampered and taken care of. He could do that.

Easily.

“She’s wanted to go to one of these things since she was a kid,” Maya called after them. “Make sure she gets the full experience!”

Hailey grumbled something about sisters that he didn’t quite catch and carefully slipped behind the wheel.

“Maya’s nice,” Finn said, settling into the passenger seat.