Courting Trouble (Reality Romance Book 5) (3 page)

“Who’s your friend, E?” the blonde asked, momentarily tugging his attention away from the supernova of sexual charisma that was Elena Suarez.

“How rude of me! Introductions. Samantha, this is Stud Muffin. Stud Muffin, Samantha.”

He found himself wondering the same thing he had while watching her on that one episode of
Marrying Mister Perfect
—was she drunk, tipsy or just naturally that brash?

Whatever the answer, he had no business wondering about her.

“Nice to meet you, Stud Muffin.”

“Adam Dylan,” he corrected, extending his hand to shake her friend’s. “I’m part of the security team for the wedding and I really should be getting back to my post. Ladies.” He nodded, intending to move around them, but Elena pivoted neatly, hooking his arm and falling into step beside him.

“You can walk us down. The bridesmaids evicted us so we’re on our way down to dip our toes in the sand until it’s time for the I-Dos.”

“You’ll have a long wait.” The rest of the guests weren’t due to arrive for hours.

Her smile turned impish. “Yes, but if you had the chance to kill an afternoon playing around here at the lifestyles of the rich and famous, would you pass it up?” She didn’t wait for him to reply. “If you get a break, you’re welcome to join us down on the beach. Maybe a little pre-wedding skinny-dipping?”

“Elena,” her friend scolded.

“Fine, Sam’s fiancé might object to her skinny-dipping.” Her eyes glinted wickedly. “But I’m not engaged.”

They reached the bottom of the stairs then and Adam took her hand, detaching it from his arm. “As tempting as that is—” And tempting didn’t even begin to cover it. “—I’m afraid I’m on duty. Enjoy your afternoon, ladies.”

He ignored her pout, forcing himself to stride out the front door without looking back. Even in six months of working in Hollywood, he’d never met anyone quite like Elena Suarez. She was sexual quicksand—he’d get lost in her if he wasn’t careful. And Adam Dylan was always careful.

Chapter Three

Stars glittered overhead. Love songs floated through the warm spring air. Smiles passed from face to face. The reception was perfect.

And Elena was officially having a deeply shitty night.

The network had dropped the
Marrying Mister Perfect
franchise—and with it her chance at redemption.

The ratings had been solid in the last few years, but apparently the new president of the network wanted to move away from what she felt were exploitative reality television shows.

Elena had heard all of this from the show’s former executive-producer, Miranda, when she’d begun to pitch herself as the next Miss Right only to learn that Miranda had already moved on to a position at
American Dance Star
.

There were rumors that the show would be rebooted on one of the basic cable channels, but with all the people Elena knew at the show jumping ship, she’d have to approach the new producers through her agent. Unfortunately Dale was unlikely to do so willingly since he was convinced Elena would never make the transition to acting if she didn’t get far away from reality television now that she’d gotten some name recognition out of it.

Not that Playboy was a better gateway to Oscar nominations.

The ceremony had been lovely. Caitlyn looked gorgeous—and euphoric. The toasts had been heartfelt—everyone going on and on about how no one deserved love more than Caitlyn and Will. As if there was some measure of deservedness and they topped the list.

Elena tried not to feel a stab of bitterness that no one had ever said the same of her. Even as she tried not to let her disappointment show that she wouldn’t be able to redeem herself in the eyes of the American public.

There wouldn’t even be another season starting soon to take the attention off of her with another villain for America to hate. And even if there was another season on another channel somewhere down the road, who knew when that would be, or if it would be sensational enough to dethrone her as the reigning bitch of reality television?

Frustration welled, but she swallowed it all down—in part because she didn’t want to infringe on the happiness of Caitlyn’s big day, but also because she was a firm believer in never showing weakness.
Never
let them see you cry.

Old Elena would have grabbed a cocktail and a handy groomsman and slipped off to one of the mansion’s many bedrooms to make herself feel better, but she was New Elena now. New Elena was drinking seltzer water and determined to be the freaking Virgin Mary if it was the last thing she did.

Surprisingly, the alternative wasn’t even tempting. One drunken man in a purple tie had gotten a little too handsy on the dance floor earlier and she’d walked away without a backward glance, completely uninterested.

Now she sipped her seltzer and watched the dancers from the fringes, trying to fade into the crowd for possibly the first time in her life.

“
Bellissima
Elena.” Dickhead Daniel lurched up to her side, reeking of gin and beaming at her in a way she couldn’t believe she’d once found charming.

She’d never bothered explaining to him that
bellissima
was Italian the way he pronounced it, not Spanish, finding his effort at the time endearing. Of course, that was before he threw her under the bus of public opinion, back when he’d actually seemed like he deserved the title Mr. Perfect.

She couldn’t believe Caitlyn had actually invited the asshat to her wedding, but maybe that was part of why Caitlyn was so much more deserving of love than Elena was. She could forgive and forget.

Elena tried forgiveness on for size by deigning to acknowledge his presence. “Daniel.”

“Wanna dance?” he slurred, waving his glass toward the dance floor so the ice rattled.

Forgiveness didn’t stretch that far. “No.”

Daniel pouted, swaying like a drunken pendulum. “No one wants to dance with me tonight. Did you know Samantha’s engaged?”

“Yes.”

“
Engaged
,” he reiterated, as if she’d missed the significance. “Thought I had a shot there. But no. Engaged.”

Realization rose up in an unwelcome tide. Daniel was making his way through his exes, seeing if any of the Suitorettes would give him a second go. And Elena—the one he’d strung along the longest—hadn’t even been his first stop.
Dickface
.

“I screwed up,” Daniel admitted.

Elena turned to look at him, shocked by the words, by the startling hint of self-awareness in them. “Yes, you did.”

He wasn’t looking at her, watching the happy couple on the dance floor instead. “Could’ve been me,” he slurred morosely. “Caitlyn’s wife material.”

“Which is why you proposed to her if I recall.”
And not me, you drunken dipshit.

“She said yes.”

“Yes, she did. And then she changed her mind.”

“I think I loved her.”

Was that before or after you told me I made you feel like the luckiest man in the world, you slimy excuse for a human?
Elena wondered if she kneed Daniel in the balls if it would make the papers as the high or low point of the wedding. Probably both.

The song ended and the dancers left the floor. Daniel swayed, pivoting toward her, and grinned, “
Bellissima
Elena,” he said again, seeming to recall who he was talking to. “Always the sexiest Suitorette.”

“Thank you,” she said without enthusiasm.

“What do you say? You and me? Old time’s sake? There’re bedrooms upstairs.”

Revulsion must have shown on her face. “You can’t be serious.”

“You’re not still mad about the show, are you? You know why I couldn’t pick you. America would have hated me if I’d picked you over Caitlyn.”

There were so many insults in that one sentence she couldn’t seem to process them all. Her hand tightened on her glass of seltzer, the urge to throw it in his face almost overpowering.

New Elena. Be calm. You’re New Elena.

“Did it even occur to you that maybe you shouldn’t have told me repeatedly that you were going to pick me if you knew all along you were going to propose to Caitlyn?”

He frowned, visibly confused. “I didn’t tell you that.”

“You told me you didn’t want anyone else the way you wanted me. You told me that you forgot the other women existed when I looked at you. You told me that nothing you felt for anyone else would ever compare to our chemistry.”

“Well, yeah. Our
chemistry
,” he said as if she was the idiot. “Of course I wanted you. You’re the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. I never thought I’d have the chance to sleep with someone like you in my life.”

“The show isn’t called
Fucking Mister Perfect
; it’s called
Marrying Mister Perfect
. Did it ever occur to you that I might have had a different idea about your intentions?”

Daniel held up his hands. “Hey, I never made you do anything you didn’t want to do.”

“Because I thought you were in love with me!”

The words burst out of her, louder than she’d intended. A quick glance around showed that no one was staring, but if she kept shouting at Daniel that wasn’t going to last.

New Elena. Be Zen.

“I have to go.” At her words, he perked up with a look she recognized all too well and she snapped, “And no, you are
not
coming with me.”

She turned, moving rapidly away from the dance floor, along the edge of the patio. She deserved a freaking medal for not making a scene, if she did say so herself.

Her steps were quick, fueled by the sharp burn of anger and something she didn’t want to acknowledge.

Hurt.

She hated that he still had the ability to hurt her. She wanted to be impervious to it all, immune to feeling like she was somehow less when he told her he wanted to marry Caitlyn and Sam, but he’d only ever wanted to fuck her.

He was the asshole.
He
was the one America should hate.

But he was Mr. Perfect and she was the Slutty Suitorette.

Heat burned behind her eyes and she veered toward the house. Bathroom. In instinct born out of reality television, she needed to get somewhere no one could see her before her cracks started to show.

Up the stairs, she ducked into the bridal prep suite where she’d toasted dreams coming true with Caitlyn only hours earlier. And dreams were coming true. They just weren’t hers. She was the Slutty Suitorette. She didn’t
deserve
her dreams.

The en suite bathroom was unlocked and Elena stepped inside, her heels clicking sharply on the tiles. Facing herself in the mirror, she was surprised to see her face looked almost normal. Which was good. She couldn’t hide up here forever.

Not that she was hiding. She just needed a few minutes to regroup. Even the Slutty Suitorette was allowed to be rattled when the man she’d thought she would marry told her he’d only ever seen her as a sex toy.

A high-end sex toy he hadn’t expected to ever get, but a sex toy nonetheless.

“
Elaaaaay-nuh
.”

The call came from inside the bridal prep suite. A lilting male voice she didn’t recognize.

“Oh Christ. What now?” she muttered, reaching for the bathroom door right as the knob began to turn.

The door swung open and a man lurched in. The man in a purple tie. She didn’t know him—hadn’t even gotten his name when they were dancing—but she knew he was a wedding guest with wandering hands. Someone’s embarrassing cousin or frat brother, no doubt. Some idiot who had a little too much to drink and decided he had carte blanche to pat every bottom in the room.

“There you are.” He grinned sloppily. From the bleary look in his eyes, he hadn’t sobered up any in the last hour.

“Here I am.” She waved toward the toilet at the back of the expansive master bath. “It’s all yours.”

She made to move around him, but he sidestepped, blocking her path. “How’s about a kiss?”

She almost rolled her eyes. “Sorry. I don’t kiss men in purple ties.”

He leered, yanking at his collar. “If you wanted me to take my clothes off, all you had to do was ask.”

Nice try, Casanova.
She tried to move past him, but he barred her way with one arm and her patience with drunk leches evaporated. “What if I want you to piss off and get out of my way?”

“Is that any way for a lady to talk? But then, you aren’t a lady, are you?” He grinned, sloppy drunk and obviously suggestive, his long arms caging her between him and the counter. “I think that’s my favorite thing about you, E-
lay
-nuh.”

“Gee, thanks.”

She tried to duck under his arm, but he moved faster than she would have given his drunken limbs credit for. “Hey. Where do you think you’re going?” He wrapped both of his arms around her waist from behind, turning her so they were facing the mirror.

She glared up at his reflection, huffing a lock of hair out of her eyes. “Back downstairs. My boyfriend will be looking for me.”

She hated that ploy. Hated that dangling an imaginary boyfriend over the head of a drunken asshole would often get him to let her go when telling him to piss off and die failed, but it had a remarkable success rate.

Not tonight though.

Purple Tie laughed. “You don’t have a boyfriend, but I could be your boyfriend for the night.” He rubbed his crotch against her ass. “What do you say, E-
lay
-nuh?”

She pushed against his hold. He wasn’t huge, but she was on the petite side and he had a good ten inches and eighty pounds on her. “Sorry. Not interested.”

“Now, that I don’t believe. I know you. You’re always interested.” The hands that held her tight against him began to move over her hips, her waist, her ribs.

She caught his wrists, trying to yank his hands away from her body without success. “You don’t know shit about me.”

“Sure I do. I watched every episode.” He leaned in close to her ear. “Twice.”

That fucking show.
She twisted, trying to wriggle free, but he used her movement to spin her until they were face to face. He pivoted and pinned her against the wall with his body.
Fuck.
She needed to get out of here. Now.

She brought up her hands to scratch his face off, but he caught her wrists, slapping them against the pretty filigreed wallpaper. “Come on,” he crooned encouragingly, grinding his pelvis into hers. “Where’s the Elena from the show? Let me see what got you all the way to the top two.”

His lips mashed down on hers, along with the sickening awareness that no one knew where she was.