Chapter 8 #2
“In exchange for my witness statement at court, social services agreed to move me out of Falkirk for my protection. They placed me in a village near Edinburgh with a couple who only fostered three kids at a time. Emma and Nick were nice. Wary of me at first, I think, but then once I showed them I was willing to work hard, to improve, they were very generous with their time and money.” He smiled softly, and I felt another wild flutter in my belly that I attempted to ignore.
“I tried to pay off their house for them when I got my first big check, but they were having none of it.”
“They sound like nice people.”
“They are. Don’t get me wrong, I’d stayed with nice foster parents before, but they just had too many kids under their roof.
Emma and Nick could give us the attention we needed.
” He went on to tell me about how he buckled down at school, earned excellent grades, and how his high school girlfriend got him into theater.
“And then you got accepted into RCS?” I was super impressed by that when I was researching him for membership because it’s such a prestigious school.
“Aye. And the rest, as they say, is history.” North sipped at his whisky and lounged back in his chair. “So now that I’ve spilled my guts, tell me the truth.”
I frowned, confused. “About what?”
“You obviously knew about some of my background before I came here. Did your research. Is that why you treated me like a foul smell from the moment we met? Because you thought I was scum?”
Indignation flooded me, and I was so agitated I stood up. “Is that what you think? That I think I’m better than you because I grew up with money and you didn’t?”
He shrugged lazily, and I wanted to throw my whisky in his face for his assumptions. Yes, I knew that was hypocritical, but this guy really got under my skin. “What else am I to think?”
“Not that.” I marched across the room and poured the Lagavulin into my glass.
“I’ll have some more, thanks.”
Grumbling under my breath, I strode over to him with the bottle and snarled, “You’re lucky I’m not pouring it over your head.”
Amusement glinted in North’s beautiful eyes as I filled his glass. “Then tell me why.”
Later, I’d blame it on the whisky and the fact that he’d lowered my defenses with his brutal honesty about his past. Settling back down, I locked eyes with him and admitted, “I don’t trust actors.”
Surprise slackened his features. “At all?”
“Except for Lachlan, and perhaps Brodan Adair, yeah. I don’t trust actors.”
“Why the fuck not?”
His boyish ire made me smile, but I smothered it since he looked so piqued. Then he shook his head. “No, that can’t be it. You are far nicer to other actors here than to me. It’s a ‘me thing.’”
With more nonchalance than I felt, I confessed, “You’re kind of my type. And I have a terrible record of dating actors like you who treated me like shit.”
Stunned, North stared at me for a second too long and too fiercely. Heat crawled over my skin, and I could feel my body reacting to his focused attention. “Are you …” He cleared his throat. “Are you telling me that you’re attracted to me and that’s why you hate me?”
That tension stretched between us again, but this time it was straining to snap for a different reason. Like, if it snapped, it was because we’d jumped each other.
Wrenching my eyes from him, I looked down at my glass. My cheeks burned hot, and my body thrummed with need. Oh, shit. “I don’t hate you.” I forced out and then said as a reminder to myself, “I just don’t trust you.”
“That’s nice to hear after what I just confessed.”
I winced at the slight hurt in his voice. “Sorry. I really am. It’s not your fault. But I can’t change how I feel.”
“Well, that’s not good enough.” North shook his head. “I want to know why, when you know so little about me, that you’ve decided I’m untrustworthy.”
“I’m sure you’re great. But I have a no-actors rule because of my unhealthy attraction to your type.”
“To my type?” My explanation seemed to piss him off more.
This was going so well.
“I’m not being judged for myself? I’m being lumped together with a bunch of guys you think are exactly like me? Well, that’s wonderful. That’s what everyone wants to hear—how not fucking special you are. One of many! Just like all the others.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re being a drama king right now.”
“Fuck you. See how you’d like it if I lumped you in with a ‘type.’”
Hmm. That would hurt my feelings. Why did I always say the wrong things to this man? And why couldn’t he be an asshole who bottled up his feelings and didn’t tell you what he was thinking? For the second time, I apologized. “I’m sorry. You’re right.”
“Not good enough,” he repeated. “I told you my sob story. Now you tell me why you’ve treated me like crap for the misdeeds of others.”
God, when he put it like that … I groaned and rested my head back on the armchair. “I have been kind of a bitch, haven’t I?”
“Terse and unfriendly, yes.”
My lips twitched. He couldn’t even call me a bitch. I melted a little more. And then thought, what the hell? North had just laid out some pretty vulnerable stuff about himself.
Guess it was my turn.
I lifted my head to meet his inquiring gaze. “Guys have hurt me a lot. Not just guys. Friends too.”
He scowled unhappily. “In what ways?”
I shrugged. “I grew up in Malibu where everyone knew who my dad was. My first boyfriend, Montana, was cool. His dad was an actor so Montana didn’t give a shit who my dad was.
We broke up because he went to college on the East Coast and I stayed behind to look out for Allegra.
I guess I didn’t realize that a guy might use me because Montana was so sweet.
” Feeling my skirt dig into my side, I unzipped it without thinking. “That’s better.”
North’s attention zeroed in on the area where my skirt had loosened, and I felt a shiver of insecurity. Could he see my belly rolls? Could he tell that I did not have a flat stomach and never would?
“Continue,” he forced out, his voice sounding hoarse to my ears.
“What is there to say?” I replied with a false insouciance.
“My next boyfriend was a struggling actor who fucked me until he realized I would not get him an audition for my dad’s next movie.
He said to my face when he broke up with me, ‘What is the point of sleeping with you if you won’t help me out? ’”
“That motherfucker,” North fumed, leaning forward in his seat, his glass held so tight in his hand I could see his knuckles straining.
I smiled at him for taking umbrage on my behalf. “Yup. And he wasn’t the last. I dated Preston Holden for three years.”
North’s expression shifted. “I’ve met Preston. He seems like an all-right bloke.”
It didn’t surprise me they’d met. Preston won an Oscar two years ago for Best Supporting Actor.
“Oh, yeah, he’s just dandy.” Preston had worked a lot during those three years, so we probably only saw each other for the equivalent of one.
“He was talented, so I helped him get an audition for my dad’s movie and he got the part.
I surprised him by showing up to the set one day and found him fucking his costar in his trailer. ”
“Jesus.”
“Oh, it gets worse. He dumped me while he was still inside her.” I raised my glass, hiding the pain that sliced through me at the memory. “Cheers to being told that you were no longer of use and that I was getting fat while he’s literally inside his beautiful costar.”
North stood slowly, visibly agitated. “Please tell me you are fucking kidding.”
I stared up at him owlishly. “Goodness, we haven’t even gotten to Lucas yet.”
“Lucas?” he seethed.
“My last boyfriend.” I nodded and gestured back to his chair. “Sit.”
“I’m too enraged to sit.” He enunciated each word as he paced. “So what the fuck did this Lucas do?”
I watched him pace, surprised he was this indignant on my behalf.
“Uh … well, it was my fault, really. I promised myself no more actors after Preston, but Lucas Grant was all charming and cocky and sexy.” I waved a hand at North as if to say like you, and he scowled even more ferociously.
“He’d been in a few small movies, and he’d written a script that he wanted my dad to see.
I explained I couldn’t get that in front of my dad, and he seemed to be understanding.
At the time I was working as the hospitality manager for my friend’s new restaurant, Curiosity.
We hired a girl named Caitlyn Branch to run the social media.
And she was kind of overeager and sweet and seemed fascinated by me, so I took her under my wing.
She changed her name to Ariella and started dressing like me and following me everywhere, and it became suffocating.
I tried to distance myself from her a little, and I don’t know if that pissed her off, but she sent me a video of her fucking Lucas. ”
North stopped pacing to stare at me, dumbfounded.
I nodded, the terrible ache I’d buried threatening to take hold. “When I confronted Lucas, do you know what he said?”
“I’m afraid to ask.”
I couldn’t hold North’s gaze any longer. “He said that I was fat and bad in bed, but he didn’t want to break up with me in case it hurt his future chances of working with my father.”
“Fuck.” North exhaled harshly. “Aria.” He sat in the chair across from me, and I forced my attention back to him. He seemed as if he was in pain. “Please don’t tell me you believe any of that shite.”
I gave him an exasperated look. “If people repeat a pattern with you, you kinda start to believe what they’re saying.
Friends have tried to use me to get to my father.
I’ve been used by different boyfriends to get to Dad, and all of them cheated on me and all of them made it clear that I wasn’t sexy to them, that they didn’t enjoy our time … in bed.”
Suddenly, North slammed his glass down on a side table and lowered himself to his knees in front of me.
I gaped at him as he braced his hands on the arms of my chair and leaned right into me.
The smell of his cologne mingled with the scent of whisky and heat.
There was nowhere to look but straight into his beautiful eyes because our noses almost touched.
“They were callous, ruthless wee pricks who couldn’t admit that they were scummy, callous, ruthless wee pricks, so they laid the blame at your feet.”
“North.” I pressed a hand to his chest but didn’t exert pressure. “Don’t.”
“What? Tell you the truth? I could give a rat’s arse who your father is.
You’re Aria. A woman so sexy and beautiful that I felt guilty for checking you out the first day we met because I wanted you.
A lot. And I had a girlfriend who I cared about.
I wouldn’t have done anything, but just wanting you that much made me feel like a bit of a bastard.
” His eyes lowered to my mouth, and my body tingled to life under his stare, at his proximity, at his words.
“But she dumped me because I no longer made her look good.” His eyes returned to mine.
“It’s not the same, but I understand a wee bit. ”
“North … I have serious trust issues,” I warned him. “I can’t date anyone.”
Determination hardened his gaze. “Then at least let me show you how beautiful I think you are. Let me prove you’re dynamite in bed. Let me take away what the arseholes planted in you.”
“Why?” I whispered hoarsely.
“Because it’s a fucking travesty that a woman as charismatic and sexy as you would think otherwise.”
I wanted to.
I wanted to push him to the floor, unbuckle his jeans, and ride him until there was nothing but the pursuit of pleasure.
But fear pushed in, icing the heat in my blood.
No.
Somehow, I knew if I let him, North could hurt me worse than all the others.
Patting his chest gently, I eased away from him. “I think we’ve both had a lot to drink. We should try to get some sleep until Allegra remembers we’re in here.”
North didn’t hide his frustration or disappointment, but he moved away from me. Scrubbing a hand over his unshaven cheeks, he gestured to the couch. “You take the sofa. I’ll push two chairs together.”
Nodding, I waited until he’d moved out of my path and then I reclined on the couch, bending my knees to fit. I gave him my back and murmured, “Good night, North.”
His deep voice made me shiver as he replied, “Good night, gorgeous.”