Gretchen shrugged and looked at him with a crooked smile that made him think maybe he should be insulted. “It’s got to be better than stitching up a torn bridesmaid’s dress, right? It’s not so bad to be around me. At least I don’t think it is. I’m fun, aren’t I, Murray?”
“Absolutely. You’re going to have a great time with Julian. Just don’t get him talking about his movies. He’ll be insufferable.”
“What’s wrong with my movies?” Julian asked with mock injury in his voice. He didn’t really need to ask. He knew better than anyone that all the films he’d done in the past few years were crap.
He’d started out at an acclaimed theater program at the University of Kentucky. He’d gotten a full scholarship out of high school, praised for his senior performance as the lead in The Music Man. He’d intended to go on to graduate and do more stage work. Maybe not musicals—he wasn’t the best singer—but he enjoyed the acting craft. Then his life fell apart and he had to drop out of school. Desperation drove him to commercial acting, and with a stroke of luck, he ended up where he was now. It wasn’t the creative, fulfilling career he’d dreamed of when he was younger, but his paycheck had more zeroes than he’d ever imagined he’d see in his lifetime.
Everyone laughed and they spent a while critiquing the plot of Bombs of Fury as their food arrived. The conversation continued on various subjects throughout the evening, flowing easily with the group. Gretchen had been quiet at first, but after talking about her work and mocking his, she started to warm up. Julian actually had a good time, which was rare, considering he was having to eat salmon and steamed broccoli while the rest of them were enjoying tastier foods. It should be against the law to be in the South and not be able to eat anything fried.
When it was over, they headed out to their cars as a group. He walked Gretchen to the passenger door of Amelia’s SUV and leaned in close to her. “I had fun tonight.”
“Yeah,” she said, nervously eyeing him as he got close to her. “It was a pleasant surprise to run into you.”
“I guess I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon.” Tomorrow was the welcome party and their first official time out as a couple.
“Okay. Good night.”
“Good night.” On reflex, Julian leaned in to give her a kiss good-night. He was stopped short by Gretchen’s hand pressed against his chest.
“You know, no one is watching us. You don’t have to pretend to want to kiss me.”
Julian smiled. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my years in LA, it’s that someone is always watching. But even then, I would still kiss you.”
“Why?” Her dark eyes searched his face in confusion, her brows drawn together.
She honestly didn’t think she was kissable. That was a shame. She was very kissable, with pouty lips glistening from just a touch of sparkly lip gloss. If he were interested in that sort of thing. Tonight, however, he was more focused on their cover and getting it right.
“I’m going to kiss you again because you need the practice. Every time I touch you, you stiffen up. You’ve got to relax. If it means I have to constantly paw at you and kiss you until you loosen up, so be it.” He’d had worse assignments.
Gretchen bit her bottom lip. “I’m sorry. I’m just not used to being touched.”
He wrapped his hand around hers and pulled it away from his chest, where she’d still been holding him back. “It’s not that hard. Just take a deep breath, tilt your head up to me and close your eyes.”
She did as she was instructed, leaning into him like a teenage girl being kissed for the first time. He shook away those thoughts and pressed his lips against hers. He’d intended it to be a quick kiss, knowing it would take a while for them to work up to a convincing one. But he found that once they touched, he didn’t want to pull away.
Gretchen smelled like berries. Her lips were soft, despite the hesitation in them. A tingle ran down his spine, the kind that made him want to wrap his arms around her and pull her soft body flush against his hard one. He settled for placing a hand on her upper arm.
She tensed immediately, and in an instant, the connection was severed. He pulled away and looked down at her, standing there with her eyes still closed.
“You did better this time,” he noted.
Her dark lashes fluttered as her eyes opened. A pink flush rushed across her cheeks as she looked up at him with glassy eyes. “Practice makes perfect, I guess.”
He laughed softly. It certainly did. “I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon. Be sure to bring extra lipstick.”
“Why?” she asked, her brow furrowed.
Julian smiled wide and took a step back toward where Murray was waiting for him. “Because I plan to remove all of it several times.”
Gretchen made her way back up to Julian’s hotel suite the next day. This afternoon, she wasn’t as nervous as her first visit, but she still had butterflies in her stomach. She was pretty certain that last night’s kiss had something to do with it. She’d been kissed by only four men before last night, and none of them had been movie stars.
She couldn’t even sleep last night. His threat to remove her lipstick several times over lingered in her mind. He was going to kiss her again. She felt a girlish thrill run through her every time the thought crossed her mind, quickly followed by the dull ache of dread in her stomach.
There was nothing she could do about it, though. She had to live through this. It was only four days. She could make it through four days of almost anything. She knocked at his hotel room door and waited, anxiously tugging at her paisley wrap dress.
“Hey, Gretchen,” Julian said as he peeked around the door with a head of damp hair. “You’ll have to excuse me—I was running late. Come on in. I’ve just got to finish getting dressed.”
He stepped back and opened the door wider. As Gretchen entered the suite, she realized he’d been hiding his half-naked body behind the door. Just his hair wasn’t wet; all of him was. He had a bath towel slung low around his waist, but otherwise, he was very naked.
She didn’t even know what to say. As he closed the door behind her, all she could do was stare at the hard, tanned muscles she’d seen in the movies and on advertisements. His body didn’t even look real, although she could reach out and touch it. It was as if he was Photoshopped.
“Gretchen?”
She snapped her head up to see Julian watching her with amusement curling his lips into a smile. She could feel the blood rush hot into her cheeks when she realized she’d been caught. “Yes?” she said.
“Go ahead and grab a seat. I’ll be right back.”
“Yeah, okay.”
Turning as quickly as she could, she focused on the couch, gluing her eyes to the furniture so they couldn’t stray back to Julian’s naked, wet body.
He disappeared, thankfully, into the bedroom. The moment the door closed, she felt the air rush out of her lungs. Sweet Jesus, she thought as her face dropped into her hands. She was about as smooth as chunky peanut butter. There was no doubt that Gretchen was miserably in over her head. There had to be a better person to do this than her.
“Sorry about that,” he said as he came out a few minutes later. He was wearing a pair of charcoal dress pants and a navy dress shirt that made his eyes seem as if they were an even brighter blue. “I didn’t want to leave you out in the hallway while I got dressed. I hope that was okay.”
“It’s fine,” she said dismissively. Hopefully convincingly. “It’s not like you don’t run around like that in half your movies