Chapter 9
IVY
A fog invaded my brain, and I shook my head to try to clear it. “Would you stop saying Ian’s dick. What are you even talking about?”
I whipped my head toward Ian. “What does she mean? Do you two know each other?”
Chloe sneered. “Apparently, you don’t need to know Ian to see his dick.”
“Just stop.”
I covered my ears with my hands. “Ian, what the hell is going on?”
“It’s not even my di...”
I screamed, and Ian threw his arms out to the side “...todger.”
“Todger?”
Chloe snorted. “That makes it sound a hundred times worse—like a small, feral animal.”
“It can’t be any worse. Ian, what’s going on?”
I folded my arms across my stomach, which had flipped and then flopped. Had I invited a perv into my house? My bed? My life?
Ian took my hand, and I gritted my teeth but didn’t snatch it away. “Let’s sit down, and I’ll explain or at least try to explain.”
“This sounds ominous.”
Something had to be explained. I shuffled my feet as Ian guided me to the loveseat, making a wide berth around Chloe, still standing there like some kind of hostile Amazon guardian of the home front...forest.
“You, too, Chloe.”
Ian waved her into a chair like he owned the place, not in the least bit as sheepish as I’d expect someone to be after flashing his privates.
When we were all seated, Chloe crossing her arms, legs and probably her teeth and me holding Ian’s hand in a death grip, Ian took a deep breath. “A few accounts on social media have been posting that I’ve been sending out dick pics to my fans.”
I covered my mouth. “That can’t be true.”
“Thanks, Tinkerbell.”
He brought my hand to his lips and kissed it. Someone who kissed hands like that couldn’t be a perv.
Chloe narrowed her blue eyes and hunched forward. “Why would someone do that? Your dick is currently on everyone’s lips.”
Ian made a choking sound while I gasped and coughed, pounding my chest with my fist, eyes watering.
Chloe flapped her hands in the air. “Metaphorically speaking.”
I recovered enough to ask, “You’ve seen them?”
“I have them.”
Chloe folded her hands like a church lady in her Sunday best.
Spreading his hands in front of him, Ian, said, “Well, then it should be obvious that’s not me...mine.”
Chloe’s gaze darted between my face and Ian’s...crotch.
“Why would it be obvious?”
I crinkled my nose.
Ian ran a hand through his long hair. “I’ll tell you later, but those are not pictures of me, and I haven’t sent anything out to anyone.”
“Who would do that to you and why?”
Chloe’s voice hadn’t lost the accusatory edge, but I couldn’t blame her. My first instinct was to believe Ian, but he could’ve sent the pictures earlier when he was—impaired.
Ian shrugged, and he dropped back against the cushions in a defeated posture. I wanted nothing more than to wrap my arms around him and press my warmth into him—even if he was a perv.
“I have an idea who might be behind it, but I don’t have any proof. Just hoping people see how absurd it is and drop it. I’m not going to address it. Haven’t been on social media in over five months.”
“Ugh, that’s awful you have to deal with that.”
I leaned over and planted a kiss on Ian’s chin before nestling my head on his shoulder. “Sheesh, Chloe. Do you believe him now? Give a guy a chance. You, of all people, know how this stuff can be manipulated.”
“I’m withholding judgment for now.”
She jabbed a finger at Ian. “But you’d better watch yourself. You may not be guilty of the dick pics, but you’re no freakin’ angel, are you? And this girly right here is special. She doesn’t need a broken heart. She’s been through enough.”
My intact heart skipped a beat, and I scooted forward to the edge of the loveseat. “Okay. That’s enough. Can we just have a truce for right now? And you don’t need to worry about me, Chloe. I’m a big girl.”
“You don’t have to tell me how special she is, and I’m not gonna break her heart.”
Ian brushed an errant strand of hair from my face and tucked it behind my ear. “Is it safe now? I’d like to unpack a few things, if that’s okay.”
“Sure, baby. Do you want me to help you?”
I captured his hand with both of mine. “I’m sorry this happened to you.”
“It’s all good, and I don’t need help.”
He pushed up from the love seat. “Maybe you two need to talk.”
Chloe cranked her head around to watch him walk toward the entryway to retrieve his bags. As soon as he turned into the hallway toward the bedrooms rolling his suitcase, she spun around.
“What the actual fuck, Ivy. How did you get here?”
“I told you in my text. We met at the book festival. We just hit it off—he’s funny and smart and charming, and hot as hell.”
I clasped my hands together, pinning them between my knees. “I like him.”
“Don’t forget rich and famous.”
“That, too.”
“Does he get mobbed everywhere you go?”
“He keeps a pretty low profile. The hat helps. The sunglasses help even more during the daytime. You know LA. People here are more blasé about seeing celebrities than elsewhere and tend to give them their privacy.”
I twisted my fingers. “Was the dick pic thing bad? Do people actually believe he sent them?”
“I did. Maybe I still do.”
Chloe lifted and dropped her shoulders quickly. “Of course, I have an ulterior motive for being pissed off about it after you told me he’s spending the next few weeks in your bed. People are savage online. You know that, which is why you avoid social media. And Ian Pope has not exactly been a saint the past few years. You do know that, right?”
“I looked him up.”
I curled my leg beneath my thigh, unsure about how much of his life Ian wanted me to share with others. “He was in rehab for three months. Got out two months ago and has been clean and sober since then. He seems fine to me.”
“Rehab in some fancy celebrity place.”
Chloe smacked her forehead with the heel of her hand. “Sounds like a prescription for disaster for a new relationship, or...what is this?”
A smile tugged at my lips. “Not sure, yet, but it’s nice.”
“It’s weird.”
Chloe kicked her feet up on the coffee table between the chair and the love seat. “You guys have known each other for what? Twenty-four hours? He already has a pet name for you, you’re mooning around asking if he needs help unpacking, and it’s clear that you can’t keep your paws off each other. Sex must be phenomenal.”
“It’s been closer to thirty hours, and yeah, the sex is great.”
The smile I’d been battling spread across my face.
“Don’t let it blind you to his faults. He’s had plenty of fuckups.”
Chloe threw a pillow at me. I caught it with one hand and buried my warm face in it. She asked, “Does he know about you?”
My head shot up at the same time Ian stepped from the hallway. “Tink, I need to ask you a question. Can you help me with something?”
“Yep, sure.”
I rose on a pair of unsteady legs. Had Ian heard Chloe’s question? As I walked past Chloe, I whacked her on the top of the head with the pillow.
I walked into the bedroom and heard Ian clinking around the bathroom. I grasped the door jamb and leaned into the bathroom. “What do you need?”
He nodded at the counter. “I don’t want to crowd you. Where should I put my stuff?”
I squeezed past him and swept up several items that I used infrequently and shoved them into a few drawers. “You can have this space.”
Was I really giving a man space in my bathroom? Maybe Chloe was right. I was in danger.
Putting away his stuff, he caught my eye in the mirror. “Thanks for believing in me out there. I became aware of the buzz this morning. Jack sent me the pictures and some of the posts. I didn’t want to tell you. I reckoned you might find out later, but I didn’t want to spoil anything between us. I wasn’t trying to hide anything from you. Does that make sense?”
Did it ever.
I slid behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist, resting my head on his back. “It does. I’m just livid that someone is subjecting you to this garbage and that so many people believe it.”
He covered my hands with his and moved them up to his chest, so I could feel his heart thumping beneath my palm. “I don’t even know if most people believe it. They just get off on the buzz and piling on.”
“Who’s responsible for it?”
I poked my head around his body to watch his face in the mirror.
“I don’t know for sure.”
He dropped my hands and rearranged some items on the counter. He knew.
“What do you want to do for dinner? I’d like to take you out to thank you for...today.”
“You know what I really want?”
I jabbed his side with my elbow. “I wanna see those pictures.”
“You naughty girl.”
He flicked my earlobe with his finger.
Covering my heart with my hand, I said, “For purely educational purposes. You told Chloe it should be obvious why the dick isn’t yours. I’d like to see with my own eyes. Unlike Chloe, I am intimately familiar with your...todger. I’m an expert witness, at this point.”
For the first time since we encountered judge, jury, and executioner Chloe, Ian gave me that brilliant smile that could light up a room bigger than this one. “Not sure I like the idea of you ogling someone else’s package, but I suppose in the name of judicial fairness, you should have a peek.”
We walked into the bedroom, and Ian plumped up a pillow against the headboard and got comfortable, positioning his back against it. He patted the bed beside him. “Get prepared to be blown away.”
“Not sure that’s the phrase you should be using in connection to dick pics.”
I hopped on the bed beside him and hovered over his shoulder as he scrolled through his phone.
“Here you go.”
He held up his phone. “This is supposed to be me.”
I gasped. “No fucking way.”