Page 27 of My Charming Rival (Stars In Their Eyes 1)
“Someone famous,” she said as if the answer were obvious.
“Right,” I said quickly, as if I was doing the same thing. I should be doing the same thing. “Of course. I’m scoping for the stars. I’ve got stars in my eyes.”
“My brother says that about me.”
“Brother. Now we’re getting somewhere. Tell me about this brother since I told you about mine.”
She gave me a look as if to say I was lucky to get any information. “He’s in New York. He runs a company. He’s going to have a baby soon.”
“He is? That’s impressive. Some new advancement in science like that movie Inconceivable with the former governor of Texas who used to be the Swiss bodybuilder?”
“No! He and his wife. My God, everything that comes out of your mouth is a twisted joke,” she said, but she said it admiringly, so I was pleased.
“Why, thank you. When is this baby due?”
“Several more months. They’re having twins. My sister-in-law is awesome. She loves movies, too, but she doesn’t work in Hollywood. She’s a jewelry designer, and they’re madly in love. Even though it took my brother five years to figure out he needed to win her back after he broke up with her when she was eighteen,” she said, then told me more about Kat and Bryan, then about Bryan’s cuff link company, Kat’s necklaces, and her own parents’ jobs. She lit up when she talked about them—she was a family girl, and that was so cool. No issues, no trouble, no bitching about her parents or how she was raised. She simply liked them; I was the same way about my family, and it warmed my heart to know we shared that.
I told her as much. “Have I mentioned how cool it is that you get on well with your family?”
“Thank you,” she said with a sweet smile. “Sounds like you do as well.”
“I do. Very much so. Tell me more about you. So far, I know you’re crazy about your family, movies, and photos, you’re going to be a doctor, and you do your own nails.” I wasn’t angling for information; I was simply enjoying talking to her. I lowered my voice as I asked the next thing, sensing she was a private person. “Do you do your own nails because you don’t want people seeing you do the things the people in your photos do?”
She was instantly tense.
11
Jess
I straightened my spine. He was spot-on. He’d read me like an open book left on the coffee table just for him.
Not wanting to admit he was right, I shook my head. “No. I do it myself to save money,” I said, because I’d rather play the money card than the uptight-in-public card. Besides, I was the observer. I wasn’t the observed. Even though I didn’t warrant being the subject of any shot, I didn’t want to even take the chance that someone might see me with my shoes off, or with my mouth open, or with my guard down. Avoiding a potential Nick Balloons moment of any sort was an abiding goal in my life.
“Ah, gotcha,” William said, and nodded. He seemed as if he understood. “Let me see those hands, then.”
“My hands?” I asked, as the manicurist patted the white towel on the edge of the foot tub, a sign for William to place his foot there for drying. He did as instructed, reining in a laugh as she patted his foot down, then began filing his toenails.
“Yes, your hands, Jess. We’re in a nail salon. It’s totally acceptable.”
I held out my right hand, and he moved my fingers so they touched his palm, sending tingles down my spine. He pretended to inspect my nails closely. I pretended I didn’t care that his hands were on me. My body said otherwise, though, as a shiver of want rolled through me. I made a note to smack some sense into myself tonight, because right now sense had vacated. It had a way of doing that when William got close to me.
“Navy blue,” he said, in his low and sexy voice that left an imprint of longing inside me.
“Navy blue what?”
“If I’d have picked out a color for you, I’d have picked navy blue. To go with your eyes. They’re dark blue,” he said, looking at me.
If I were in a movie, if I were that kind of a girl who was soft and sweet and eager, I’d gasp and say you noticed. Then he’d nod once and whisper I notice everything about you.
Instead, I swallowed the dry knot in my throat.
“Dark blue is my favorite color,” he said softly, then started to slide his fingers through mine. I never knew holding hands could be such a turn-on. But as he laced his fingers through mine, flesh against flesh, my skin sizzled with the first sparks of a darker, deeper desire.
