Hollywood Hot Mess (30 page)

She shrugs and gives me a sarcastic pie-in-the-sky smile before disappearing into her bedroom. Who’s the lucky girl now?

Chapter Twenty-Nine

“You’re insane if you think I’m coming now, Devon!” I yell as angrily as I can without Maria hearing. We’ve been on the phone for about ten minutes and everything was all hearts and flowers until he dropped the bomb that Heather will be on his arm at the women’s center opening gala—which will totally ruin the night for me.

“It’s not an option, Carly. She has to come. As far as the world knows we just had the most romantic week of our lives.” I can tell from Devon’s tone that his teeth are clenched which probably means a hand is dragging through his gray hair, too.

“Then I’m not going,” I say resolutely, crossing my arms and punching my chin in the air even though I know he can’t see.

“This night means everything to me, Carly. I want to share it with you. I
need
you there.” These words were once all I wanted to hear. Now, I hate them. I push a sigh through clenched teeth.

“Tough shit. I need to keep my sanity.”

“Heather is for show. You know this. You’re the only one who means anything to me. It’s acting, plain and simple.”

“Nope.” I stomp my foot for effect even though he can’t see it.

“Be reasonable about this.”

“You be reasonable about it!” I retort like a little child. “Do you honestly think I could sit there for a whole night and watch you two? Sober? No fucking way!”

“You’ll have to, Carly. If this is going to work between us, you’ll have to learn to deal with it like Jamie has.”

“Fuck Jamie!” I yell, just because I’m pissed.

“Carly...” Devon drags my name out, ripe with disappointment.

“I mean it, Devon. If she’s there I’m not coming.” I press the end button and toss my phone across the room. Of course I’m being a raging bitch, but this is the only way I get the response I want from him. Sorry, not sorry.

I fire up my one-foot-in-the-grave laptop that has lived to bear the brunt of one too many horrible headlines splashed over the internet. But I’m making sweet love to it these days. Holding it close, cuddling its megapixel pictures of Devon and me like precious jewels. Why can’t he see the world loves us? Not HeaVon. Elephant-sized doses of ecstasy couldn’t give them chemistry like ours.

Our pictures are everywhere. We never saw a single flashbulb, but someone obviously saw us. Every tabloid gossip site has at least one picture from our week of love.

TMI bought the full-week spread of our sometimes risqué displays of PDA. They’ve dubbed our romp “HeaVon Can’t Wait,” which makes me smile, because when the two of us are together there is zero waiting.

Website after website, the story is always the same. They all talk about how happy and in love HeaVon appear to be, despite being rocked by scandal and whispers of an impending breakup. Which is news to me—I thought they were Hollywood’s golden couple.

It gives me hope that maybe I’ve been right all along. It’s me and Devon they want to see. Not Heather and Devon. Heather could never give the kind of show we did. She’s much too concerned with camera angles and looking perfect for that. Nope, what we have is the real thing, and that’s why everyone loves us.

“Can you get this for me?” Maria walks into my room—without knocking—in a killer red dress that’s cut as low in the front as it is in the back. She holds her arm out, an unclasped bracelet dangling between us. The covers puff up around me, hiding my laptop, when she flounces onto the bed with a sigh. She looks like she could walk off with the Miss America crown tonight. Hair all soft curls and makeup just a little bit trashy.

“You look amazing. Where’d you get this dress?” I ask as I fiddle with her bracelet, once again surprised by the sexy little number she’s wearing.

“Borrowed it from a friend.” She checks her face in the mirror.

“Who?”

“Oh, you’ve never met her.” She slides the bracelet into place on her wrist. “Do you think he’ll like it?” She smiles, running a hand over the satin skirt.

“He’s crazy if he doesn’t,” I say, pulling my knees up to my chest and watching her check herself out in the full-length mirror hanging on my wall. “Is it love, Maria?” I’m smiling sarcastically at her reflection. She snorts at me.

“It’s never love in Hollywood, Carly.” She blows at a strand of hair and reaches for my laptop. It’s still opened to a picture of HeaVon. “Except these two maybe...”

Every bit of color drains from my face when she says this and the wave of bile that swelled in my stomach when I saw Heather this afternoon is climbing up again.

“God, can’t they get a room?” She continues to click through my recent history. Every page is them, and Maria’s just as enthralled by the story as the rest of America. “Damn! Is that them going at it in the bushes?” She tilts the computer my way—as if I haven’t seen it.

“Appears to be.” My voice cracks in a weird way and she shoots me a sideways glance. Her brow furrows and she clicks the back arrow faster. Page after page, photo after photo, Devon pops up in his full electric glory. Shit! I swing at the laptop, knocking it out of her hands and propelling it to the floor so she can’t see any more. But it’s too late. She already knows. I go rigid with the fear of being caught, staring at nothing and everything.

“Wait...Carly, you haven’t...?” The pink flowered sheets are fisted in my hands, balled into crumpled little wads. Dropping them I grab my knees, thinking maybe that will stop the spasms rocking my chest. It doesn’t. She’s opened that part of me that doesn’t close these days.

I can’t hold back the emotional dam anymore. Tears are begging to fall over my lashes, and when I close my eyes they gush like waterfalls down my cheeks.

“Oh, girl,” Maria says, shaking her head, her eyes all wide and disbelieving, like I’ve committed some unpardonable sin. My head falls to my hands, trying to hide the tears I’m ashamed to shed. She circles her arms around my heaving shoulders to try to comfort me. “Shh...Shh.”

* * *

Please reconsider. I want to share this night with you.

Why do u need me when u have her?

You are the one I want.

Ur overindulged ass always gets what it wants. My ass wants to stay here.

Please.

Not gonna happen.

* * *

Damn Devon Hayes’s arrogant ass! I’ve told him for a week I’m not going tonight. But his overentitled ego doesn’t understand what no means. I’m sprawling in the bathtub, water up to my eyeballs, cussing him like the dog he is.

On the back of the bathroom door hangs a gorgeous emerald silk dress. It’s a custom re-creation of Heather’s gold dress from the island—plunging back, burnt-out sleeves and all. Apparently he still remembers every detail of our first getaway, too.

As if receiving a custom-made gown via hand delivery wasn’t enough to make a girl giddy, there was a second box couriered to my door today with a pair of to-die-for Christian Louboutins, just my size. All gifts from Devon. All proof that he thinks I’m still coming. Asshole.

There’s a timid knock at the door.

I don’t invite her, but Maria pokes her head in. She left for a run before the gifts started arriving. Her bewilderment is understandable.

“Um...why is there a stylist setting up a makeup truck in our kitchen?” Her hand twists the doorknob, and I look down to avoid her eyes. Gift three from the impossible Mr. Hayes—when it rains it fucking pours around here.

“Because Devon Hayes is a selfish asshole,” I retort, lifting a pruned hand from the bathtub on the pretense of studying my nails with an upturned nose. I flip my hand back and forth several times, but she doesn’t leave. Instead she slips past the door, closes the toilet lid and takes a seat. Pulling her earbuds from her ears and cocking her head, she waits for an explanation. I sigh.

“He’s hosting a fundraising gala for a women’s clinic he’s opening in honor of a...friend.” I roll my eyes and turn to her, not even bothering to cover up my nakedness.

“Did you agree to go?”

“Yes.”

“Did you sign a contract saying you would show?” Her elbows prop on her knees, arms up, making a nest for her chin. I groan and slap my hand over my forehead.
Shit
. I hadn’t thought about that. I didn’t read that damn contract India threw at me. I just signed. “Then you don’t have a choice.”

“Yes, I do. What’s he going to do? Sue me?” I laugh as if I have anything he wants.

Maria struggles with whether she should be the voice of reason or the shoulder of support. “Right. Fuck him. I’ll make this girl leave,” she says, slapping her hands on her knees with a resolute snarl, the picture of solidarity. She stands, but pauses with her hand on the knob. “But Carly, if you aren’t going...why’d you let her in?” She turns back to me, her face a question mark, knowing I don’t have a problem telling unwanted people where to go.

Why did I let her in? That’s the million-dollar question. The answer’s simple. I’d do anything to see Devon. But the thought of walking that red carpet all alone
and
having to watch the HeaVon show live and in living color makes me want to jump out the nearest window.

“I just can’t do it, Maria. I can’t walk that red carpet by myself. Not with her there.” I toe the faucet and sigh so heavily the water skitters away from me.

She turns, leaning into the closed door, her face full of sisterly concern.

“I would go with you but—”

“You would?” I interrupt her before she finishes, sitting up so quickly water sloshes onto the linoleum floor.

“—I have a date,” she finishes.

“Another one?” I ask, my face falling into a despairing pout.

She nods.

“Same guy?” Damn this is getting serious.

She shrugs and the side of her mouth turns up in a noncommittal way.

“Oh.” I turn back to toeing the faucet and she’s silent.

“Let me see if I can cancel.” She pulls her phone from the hidden pocket in her running tights and brings it to life. “You owe me one, girl. I need to face a red carpet right now like I need a hole in my head.” Her voice trails off down the hallway as she breaks her date and I jump out of the tub, wrapping a towel around me and dripping all the way to my room.

I couldn’t love a sister more than I love that girl. Thank you, God, for bringing her back into my life
.
I send a quick shout-out to heaven, which I’ve never done before. Tonight, I’m going to need all the help I can get.

Chapter Thirty

Maria grabs my hand across the seat and smiles, looking out at the gathered crowd. I want to vomit—hurl the zeppelin-sized butterflies crashing around my insides out of me. And this time? I actually might.

Nerves have never rocked my body like this. I sweat from every pore that isn’t clogged with the stylist’s prescription-strength deodorant. It’s even on my face, which is disgusting in a whole new way. And god do I wish I had prescriptions of another kind floating around inside me. Then I wouldn’t give a shit what these nasty media piranhas think of me. I can’t even keep my jaw still; my teeth chatter with fear. We’ve just pulled into the line of cars waiting to deposit passengers on the red carpet. Maria wears the damned red dress again and I worry she’s going to upstage me. Like I need something else to worry about.

Devon was so excited when I sent him a text saying I was coming he sent a car for us. And a red carpet assistant who’s sitting up front, fingers flying over the keys of his phone.

An official-looking person with a clipboard taps on the front window. The assistant rolls it down only a few inches.

“Carly Klein,” he says impatiently out the window as if this is too much trouble for him. Where do assistants get off having attitudes?

“And Maria Rhodes,” I add, leaning up to his shoulder, swallowing the watery, pre-vomit saliva that is flooding my mouth. I gag, but force it down.

“Maria Rhodes?” He turns to look at Maria as if he didn’t realize there was a pot of gold sitting behind him. He’s about the right age to have grown up making dream love to Maria. The same age as Devon. “And Maria Rhodes,” he adds out the crack with a smile. Asshole.

“Carly, are you okay?” Maria asks, her hand resting on my shoulder when she sees my hand fly to my mouth to stop the vomit again. The assistant’s head whirls around.

“Barf bag in the seat back!” he barks, and grabs at the huge backpack he’s deposited on the floorboard before him.

Maria snaps a bag open and shoves it under my chin just in time, looking away from what I’m about to do. Mustard-yellow bile lurches up from the depths of me, forcing my body forward as it spews into the waxed paper bag she’s holding. I know how familiar this is to her. The demon she fought while I was facing my own.

“Thanks,” I sputter through a raw throat, coughing, folding the bag and placing it on the floor.

“Dab, don’t wipe.” The assistant holds a handkerchief out to me. I do as I’m told, so thankful to have someone to take care of the situation so I don’t have to think about it. “Drink.” He shoves Smartwater at me followed by a tin of Altoids. “Breathe.” He leans over the seat, but his eyes are on Maria, not me. Asshole. I close my eyes anyway and breathe deeply. The nerves are quelled momentarily.

We slide from the back of the car into the holding area before the red carpet. The organizers will release us in timed groups, based on how long they think the media will want to photograph and interview us. Like prized livestock entering the arena, our bids increasing by the buzz our arrival creates.

I’m searching the gathered crowd for Devon while the assistant, his backpack pared down to just a fanny pack, puts every thread back in place for me and Maria like we’re his own personal Barbie dolls. Hollywood has turned out for Devon’s cause. The darkened area of the red carpet looks like the Met Gala—dazzling gowns, sparkling jewels, emperor penguins and all.

“I don’t see him,” Maria breathes under her breath. I haven’t said a word to Maria about what’s going on between Devon and me. I don’t have to. Girls don’t cry over crushes. They lose it over lovers.

The organizers are saving us for the end, which would be a huge honor if I didn’t feel the bile rising up again. Our arrival has been whispered up the lines of paparazzi out front, just as everyone else’s has, and based on the buzz we generated, they know the paps will hang around to snap our photo. Which leaves me to wonder if Devon has already walked. For some reason this calms me, ever so slightly. Maybe I can face one dragon at a time tonight. Get through the excruciating judgments of the media and the inevitable questions about my past and why I’ve decided to support this cause—none of which I’m prepared to answer—and then I can find a way to get through the medieval torture of HeaVon.

I sigh and Maria squeezes my hand again.

“Carly Klein. Maria Rhodes.” Another clipboard-wielding idiot calls our names.

“You girls look fabulous. Absolutely stunning.” The assistant gives us both a final boost of confidence.

Maria is pushed out first. The hungry lions roar with approval to see America’s favorite big sister all grown up and looking like a supermodel. Her legs don’t stop till they get to her throat in that dress, and boy does she work it. I’m jealous of her all over again.

I’m still admiring her when a hand in the middle of my back pushes me out of the shadows and into the blinding Hollywood lights. Quickly, I rearrange my features, slinking my shoulders back, bringing a hand to my hip and a smile to my face. It’s like being knocked over by a rogue wave at the beach, but I can’t fall and let it pull me under. I have to stand on my own two feet, regardless of how impossible it seems right now.

The lion’s den bellows, pouncing with their cameras, blinding me with a white wall of light. My eyes lose focus on purpose, protecting my vision from permanent damage.

I pose and pout, swiveling on my heels like Devon showed me, giving a sexy glance over my shoulder that drives the animals to a feeding frenzy of epic proportions.

Insecurities? Forgotten. I’m Carly Klein and they love me! My chest swells like a damned winner clutching the gold. Oh, I’ve missed this! Oh, they’ve missed me!

Maria and I pose together, hugging, talking candidly like best friends do. They eat it up! I’m really telling her she’s standing on my hem, but whispering this with a smile plastered on my face they think we’re sharing our most intimate secrets. Fools!

Near the end of the line the questions will start. I’m not ready for them, but my confidence is restored by the media’s unusually warm welcome. I can do this.

“Carly, you look amazing!” the first reporter says to me. “Who are you wearing?” Oh shit. Who am I wearing?

“It’s custom.” I smile and toss my hair.

“It’s gorgeous,” she gushes. A cameraman pans up and down the length of me. I turn so he can get the back. “So, Carly, why are you here tonight?” she asks. Who I’m fucking is the first answer that comes to mind.

“Because I’m a survivor.” I use Devon’s words instead. “I know firsthand the importance of what Mr. Hayes is doing here tonight.”
Good girl
,
Carly!
I mentally pat myself on the head.

“Would that be your firsthand experience with drug abuse or the rumored suicide attempts?” The reporter sticks the microphone back in my face and I momentarily think about shoving it down her damned throat. But I can’t. That’s what she wants me to do.

Everyone is waiting for Carly Klein to erupt like the old days. That’s the news story that really sells. But I’m not encouraged by the powder or the booze anymore, so I manage to keep a smile on my face as seconds tick off the clock like years. Maria nervously shifts from one foot to the other beside me, reaching out and holding onto my arm to still me and let me know she’s there. I hold the reporter’s glare, my eyes draining of anything but cold, hard contempt. My muscles are still frozen in a smile as I thank the reporter for her time and turn away.

The cameras go crazy again, and I assume it’s for me. But I assume wrong.

The crush of bodies and flashes and microphones and cameras pull away from me, down the carpet’s start. Sucked by some powerful force beyond their control. The force in question...is HeaVon.

Shit
. My chest threatens to implode and I can barely catch a ragged breath. At least the damned reporter with her stupid question is gone when I turn back to the dwindling handful of piranhas still tuned in to me. Maria is watching the spectacle with saucer eyes when I whisper “I’m done” over my shoulder to her. She nods her head and we walk to the end of the carpet hand in hand.

A headphoned guard stops us from entering the party, pressing his earpiece to his ear to hear over the riot HeaVon is causing at the other end.

“Roger that,” he says into the handheld microphone hidden in his giant paw. “We need you to wait right here, Miss Klein. The press was promised a picture of you and Mr. Hayes.”

“What?” I demand, gritting my teeth to keep from suggesting what he should do with his microphone.

“Your appearance contract included photos with Mr. Hayes to pre-promote your movie.” He shrugs like I should know this. I look down the swath of red to where he stands—with her draped over him like an ugly sweater. God, I want out of here! A waving hand catches my eye and I see India standing a few feet out of camera shot, sneering at me beside the security guard who obviously just sent the request.

My assistant for the night materializes from thin air and pulls me behind a group of people, immediately combing a few stray hairs and pulling out lipgloss. The blood-red color on my lips is actually cherry Kool-Aid, which will last all night, but requires constant moisturizing with gloss in order to be bearable. I grab at the gold-encrusted pearl hanging from my neck and watch Devon approach. He’s looking for something and when his eyes find mine, I know it’s me. My heart gives one hard beat that reverberates in my ears.

He smiles, as much as he can without revealing our secret to the world. And everything about me calms. All I want is to run to him. To wrap my legs around him and ride him down the red carpet. But I can’t even look at him, too worried even this will spill our secret to the world.

Miraculously, as if it’s a choreographed ballet, Heather falls off his shoulder to give an interview when Devon turns and saunters my way in the lazy, easy way that breaks every heart it meets. He’s all sexy smile, smoldering navy-rimmed gaze, and a bespoke tux tailored to the stitch. My own half-broken heart rises up my throat, swelling into my brain before bursting with release the moment his hand circles the curve of my lower back.

“Are you ready?” he asks with a husky voice and a smile, bringing back memories of lovemaking that cause my insides to clench like a vise. I nod.

He leads me back to the cameras. They pop like lightning the moment they see us. Through the silk it feels as if his hands are on my bare skin and all I want is to be tangled in sheets with him.

“Breathe...” The heat of his whispered word lingers in my ear. “And smile.” He leans into me—all smiles, all Sexiest Man Alive, all man of my dreams. I actually swoon into his arms, momentarily knocked off my stilettos. He holds me firmly against him.

The media goes wild once again, yelling and screaming. They love us! And the smile is back on my face.

“Devon! Devon!” they scream. “When will we get a peek at your new film?”

“Soon, real soon,” Devon answers, turning beside me and pulling me into him. I’m sweating again...but in different places.

“Is it as hot as everyone says?” another reporter questions.

“Hotter!” he teases. “I don’t know if the world will be able to handle this little angel all grown up.” He turns, making love to me with his eyes and the riot his suggestion causes is nothing but a distant hum in my ears. I hold his gaze for what seems like an eternity wondering why in the hell these fools can’t see the truth for themselves. We’re practically eye fucking each other, and the electricity flowing between us is as palpable as a heartbeat.

“I’ll see you inside.” He whispers a promise in my ear, sending the bulbs flashing again to catch our secrets. Oh, if they only knew. He releases me and thankfully Maria is there to catch me. I rub at my forehead, trying to put my insides back in place. When I look up, I’m face-to-face with Heather.

Black from head to toe—hair, gown, nails and shoes. Harlot-red lips pucker as she stares down her nose at me.

“Nice dress,” she offers with a smile that goes no further than her lips. The cameras are watching so we can’t say what we really want to.

“Nice nose,” I offer, hoping she’s smart enough to get my insinuation.

We square off for one tense moment, neither backing down.

“Enough,” Devon hisses in her ear. We both turn on our heels and nothing more is said. For now.

* * *

“Snap out of it, Carly.” Maria’s voice is desperate, echoing against the bathroom tile. As a last resort, she rears back and slaps me across the face hard enough to get my attention but not leave a mark. I snap out of it long enough to shoot her a nasty look. “He’s not worth this. Nobody is,” she pleads at my elbow. Her words get lost somewhere between my ear and the sensible parts of my brain. Rage and fear are coursing through my body again and this is the only way I’ve ever been able to make the feelings go away. Numbness.

I lean over the marbled countertop, peering down at the white line, knowing all my problems will be gone in a sniff.

I was on my way to throw up again after watching the HeaVon show longer than I could stand. It seems like fate that Maria and I busted in on two forty-something Hollywood wives who forgot to lock the bathroom before cutting their blow on the marble vanity. Idiots.

When I asked them for a bump the bumbling blonde in the disco ball dress refused, saying she was too proud of how far I’d come to enable me. I really hate that bitch.

Her more sympathetic friend winked at me and pressed the dregs of her vial in my hand as they left. Her? I love.

The red carpet I was prepared for. Facing the pity of everyone at the gala and being ignored by Devon? I’m not. And I can’t take it anymore.

“Come on, Carly, let’s go. Don’t do this.” Again Maria is the voice of reason I should listen to. But I don’t.

Leaving won’t solve my problems. I could run to Antarctica and still be just as alone as I am in the ballroom surrounded by hundreds of people. With one sniff and that delicious drip, however, I can make it all go away. Like magic. Float away on a fluffy pink cloud, numb to the velvet hammer of Devon’s disregard or the biting fangs of the media’s scrutiny. Away from Heather’s narcissistic pout and India’s baleful sneer.