“Whoa, whoa.” Diana held up her hands. “Is itthatkind of an escort service?”
“No!” Lee laughed. He sent Diana a cheeky smirk, then said, “But I wouldn’t say no to a little slap and tickle with someone famous. It’s been ages since I got horizontal with anyone.”
“TMI,” Diana said. “But you’re telling me you didn’t do the nasty with either of your previous fake boyfriends?”
“No,” Lee said, standing and stepping to the side to grab his zip-up hoodie. Although he immediately had second thoughts about how formally he should be dressed to meet someone famous. He had a much more stylish pair of glasses he could change into, but they were an outdated prescription. “I haven’t had the time or the bandwidth to hook up with anyone since Dan died,” he confessed, deciding the hoodie was good enough for a meet-cute.
Hopefully meet-cute. It could end up being the biggest meet-ugly in history, for all he knew. Celebrities could be horrible and arrogant, he was sure.
“Well, don’t rule anything out,” Diana said as Lee ventured back to his computer to shut things down. “You are a smut writer, after all. You need to do research about more than just the way the contemporary world works.”
Lee laughed out loud. “Thanks for that vote of approval, babe,” he said, reaching for the mouse and moving the cursor to shut down the window.
“Let me know how it goes,” Diana said, smiling at her camera. “And text me immediately if it’s either super bad or super good.”
“I will.” Lee shook his head then closed the chat window.
Worst case scenario, he’d at least have a hilarious story to tell Diana later. And no matter what happened, it would be fuel for a story. Everything was fuel for a story if you let it be. Even Dan’s slow, painful decline due to bowel cancer had taught him things about life and love and grief that had made it into his books.
Whatever Javier was about to throw at him, he was certain it would inspire something in his books. He hadn’t been lying when he told Diana he was ready for a change. He would always love fantasy, but it was only ever going to take him so far. Dan had wanted to see him top the bestseller lists and be celebrated. Dan had bugged him about finding an agent and going traditional with his books more than a few times, too, but Lee wasn’t sure that was for him. He loved the freedom indie publishing gave him. He loved the challenge of making a career all on his own and the pride that came with seeing success on his own terms.
Although with the market being what it was these days, maybe Dan had had the right idea after all.
It was an argument Lee had with himself all the time, and as he navigated the District Line into the heart of London, then walked along Upper Thames Street toward the rendezvous point, he had it again. What did he want for himself and his career? Was he happy muddling along as a midlist author with a small but devoted following or did he want to take his shot at being a list-topper with legions of fans doing his marketing work for him?
It would have been nice to have people who did his marketing for him.
That thought put a grin on his face as he reached the coffee shop and headed through to the back and up a narrow staircase to the first-floor dining area. Since it was the middle of the afternoon, that part of the shop wasn’t busy at all. There was only one other person there, a college-aged woman sitting at a table near the window, working on a laptop with headphones on, oblivious to the world.
Javier sat in the far corner, talking to a man with dark chestnut hair and broad shoulders, wearing what looked to be an expensive leather jacket and jeans. As soon as Javier spotted Lee, he sat straighter and waved Lee over.
Lee waved back and put on a smile as he wove around tables to cross the room. “Hey,” he said when he got close enough…then stopped dead when the man with Javier turned to look at him.
Gorgeous brown eyes, sensual lips, and small, diamond stud earrings in both ears. Lee’s heart dropped straight into his stomach, and his dick stirred with the memory of watching the man play some incredibly hot and convincing sex scenes on the small screen.
He couldn’t believe that Javier wanted to fake set him up with none other than steamy heartthrob of the moment, Drew Oberlin.
three
. . .
The whole thing was a bad idea. Drew was sure of it from the moment he’d hung up the phone after talking with Javier Rivera and explaining what he needed. The fact that Javier had figured out immediately what he was looking to accomplish by hiring Rent-A-Boyfriend was a dead giveaway to the fact that everyone else in the world would see right through him once he was seen in public with a man.
“Seriously, this is a good idea,” Jessica had explained as she and Abby had prepared to go out to explore London’s nightlife the evening after they arrived. “You’ll have your London fling, the press will stop hounding you, the accusations will stop, and we can all go back to the way things should be.”
She lifted to her toes and smacked a kiss on Drew’s lips that left a lipstick stain.
Drew wiped it away, leftover adrenaline from the call making him jumpy. “You guys go enjoy yourselves,” he said, heading into the flat’s kitchen as Jessica and Abby left. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
It was a weird thing to say since, to be honest, there wasn’t much Drew wouldn’t do. The press had loved following his escapades since he’d blasted onto the public scene. It was weirdbecause he should have been going out with his friends and painting the town red. He loved people, loved dancing and music and mayhem. He didn’t drink as much as people assumed he did and he definitely didn’t do drugs. His career was far more important than a temporary high. And he’d been faithful to Jessica for five years now without questioning it. Other women just didn’t interest him, not that way, though more than a few had tried to get with him in the last few months.
Under any other circumstances, he would have gone out all night and come home exhausted and slept all day. Maybe it was the jetlag or the fact that there was a table reading for the first episode ofSleuthin the morning, followed by costume fittings and dialect coaching.
Oh, and the quick meeting he’d set up with Javier Rivera to talk about getting him a fake boyfriend.
Drew was so wrapped up in the major deception he was about to pull on the world that he didn’t think he’d be able to sleep. Luckily for him, jetlag was more powerful than any panic that he was making a decision that could ultimately bite him in the butt and destroy his chance of getting everything he wanted in life.
When he woke to his alarm in the morning, Jessica was sprawled on top of the bed next to him, still dressed from the night before and snoring lightly. Drew slipped out of bed without disturbing her, hopped into the shower, then dressed and puttered around the small flat without waking either of his friends while waiting for a car to come pick him up.