Chapter 29 Aiden
Chapter 29 AIDEN
I t was a good thing the interview he’d just done was scripted. Aiden doubted he had any spontaneous answers left in him; he was tapped out after that blasted thirty-six-questions nonsense. He could sense a sourness seeping into his voice, though, and the interviewer—Lydia something—was doing her best to pretend everything was fine. To try to lighten things up, Aiden made a half-hearted joke at the end, but Lydia laughed so hard it made it worse. What made people go the extra mile to please a celebrity?
Nora would have slapped his arm for that lame joke. Stop this , he scolded himself. Nora belonged in the past.
Lydia approached him after the interview, in what she must have thought as a sexy move. “Well, well, Aid—can I call you Aid? I can’t wait to see you on the silver screen this week.” The cloying sweetness of her perfume nauseated him. “Though, I must say, it’s such a shame they changed your beautiful green eyes to blue.”
If he could, he would have left without responding. But Becky’s hard stare— behave , she screamed with her eyes— made Aiden once again put on his best actor smile. “That’s kind of you.”
“Say,” Lydia continued in a flirty voice that grated on his ears, “I know you’re busy with filming, but how about we go out for drinks tonight?” She dragged her finger across his forearm. Aiden had to bite the inside of his cheek to prevent himself from flinching away.
Becky chose just then to interrupt. “You know, Lydia, Aiden is indeed busy these days.” Aiden shot her a look of gratitude. “But we can make some time tonight. I’ll arrange the reservations.”
“What?” Oh, the traitor. He couldn’t make a scene in front of Lydia, but he would make Becky pay later.
“Excellent! See you tonight, handsome. Wear something sexy.” Lydia gave him a saucy wink as Aiden and Becky left the television studio.
As they got into their car, Aiden let it out. “Bloody hell, Becky, are you mental? I don’t want to go out for drinks. I don’t want to go out with her . Did you see her leering at me? Touching me? That is not proper behavior. I feel invaded.”
“Welcome to the everyday life of a woman, Mr. Elliott,” their driver, Fatima, said in her soft voice, averting her eyes from the traffic to look at him through the rearview mirror.
Becky sighed and took Aiden’s arm. “I know, honey. I wanted to slap her away from you myself. But you need good press—don’t you give me that glare, I am immune to you—and Lydia is the right person for the job.”
“You’re whoring me out.”
Fatima let out a loud guffaw. “Beg your pardon, Mr. Elliott,” she said, still laughing.
“Laugh all you want, Fatima. It’s what she’s doing, all right. Becky is a pimp now.”
“Don’t be so dramatic, it doesn’t suit you,” Becky said with an eyeroll. “It’s only drinks; I’m not asking you to bed her. It would do you good, though. Maybe then you’d forget about that gold digger in Nashville you’re so smitten with.”
“See this window, Becky? See this beautiful open space people call sky? If I didn’t rely so much on you, I swear I would throw you out it. You did worse than that to me. You threw me to the wolves. A she-wolf, in this case.”
Becky had the nerve to laugh. “Calm down, lover-boy. We have a full day ahead of us. Let’s get you to the studio, okay? Don’t worry. All will be well.”
All was not well. He was distracted. His brain refused to cooperate. He had trouble in the simplest scenes; he forgot his lines, he almost called Anna Rheims’s character Nora... And all he had to look forward to was the sodding appointment with the journalist—because, heaven forbid, it was not a date.
That evening, out of spite, Aiden put on his shabbiest clothes. After a long lecture from Becky on how to behave, he was on his way to the Meneena, an exclusive boutique bar that apparently was all the rage. A drink itself was not a bad idea. He direly needed one—or ten—as long as it wasn’t gin.
Lydia arrived, wearing a dress so short it could have passed for a blouse. Did she think it was beautiful? Sexy? In Aiden’s eyes, it was neither. Sure, she cut a nice figure, but he doubted he would have ever been interested in Lydia, even before he had come to love—
“Hey, sexy,” Lydia said in her high-pitched voice, plastering a sticky kiss on his cheek. She grabbed his lukewarm beer and took a long sip from it, looking at him from under her fake eyelashes. An image of Nora stealing his drink came unbidden to Aiden’s mind, clenching his heart in a painful squeeze. He didn’t want that memory, and he didn’t want this beer anymore. Lydia blabbered some excuse about late taxi drivers and then prattled on about who knows what. He didn’t care.
You need the good press . Becky’s warning was the only thing preventing him from walking out. Luckily, Lydia didn’t seem to realize he wasn’t listening to her tedious monologue.
The only pleasant thing about the evening was the absence of paparazzi. The Meneena had strict confidentiality policies, so there were no cameras to document the clear displeasure on his face.
“Are you excited about filming in Jordan? I heard Verdier usually brings the cast, uh, intimately together. Maybe I could go along. You know, just to get an insider view.”
Ugh. Of course she would have to bring that up. Verdier was famous for housing his cast together, isolated from everybody else. He said it built chemistry, but Aiden suspected it had more to do with the director’s perverse sadism.
Lydia kept blabbering about whatever. Aiden answered with a few noncommittal grunts, trying to signal he wasn’t interested without being blatant—lest he took the brunt of Becky’s scolding—but she was unperturbed about his disengagement. But after a while he needed some distance from her, so he excused himself and went for the terrace for some air.
“Well, if it isn’t the other man with the best first name in Hollywood!”
The mere sound of that slimy voice was a punch to his gut. Aiden McKenzie. Of all the people in the world, he had to bump into Aiden sodding McKenzie while trying to get away from Lydia’s brazen and most unwelcome flirtation.
McKenzie flashed him a sparkling-white grin. He had his arms wrapped around the waists of two scantily clad models.
Aiden faked a laugh, but it soon faded. His escape hadn’t worked. Lydia had followed him and hovered at his side.
“Aiden McKenzie, what a pleasure!” she said, extending a hand. Instead of shaking it, McKenzie kissed it, his light-brown eyes fixed on her cleavage in a nauseating display. “I gotta say, I’m a big fan of your work. You’re the cream of this generation of actors. You both are.” She blinked her spidery eyelashes at them both.
Having his work compared to McKenzie’s made Aiden’s spirit sink even lower. The man was a terrible actor and an even worse human being. Always dating barely legal girls. He’d made openly misogynistic comments to his coworkers. But that was nothing compared to the accusation for which McKenzie was under investigation—that he’d had a violent and abusive relationship with an underage girl. The man represented everything Aiden disliked about Hollywood. And, truth be told, he was an excellent example of Nora’s theory that fame was a disease. The only reason McKenzie could get away with everything he did was because of his celebrity status.
Lydia continued to compliment McKenzie. For his work. For his accomplishments. For how good he looked with that horrid bleached hair. For his “strong, strong arms”—stroking his biceps as she spoke.
Would anyone ever be honest with McKenzie in the way Nora had been honest with Aiden? Telling him his movie sucked and the best part was the dog? That he sang horribly—and therefore should never serenade a woman? He remembered the way she mocked his accent, the way she looked him in the eye and said, “You’re hot.” Because she didn’t know he was famous, because she wasn’t fawning over his celebrity, he trusted her. She saw his authentic self just as he saw hers.
Aiden pitied McKenzie. He’d probably never have the chance to experience what Aiden had that fateful, stormy night in Nashville. He had been truly happy. Only to have that happiness ripped away, leaving a gaping hole in his chest. He felt like he was suffocating. He had to get out of there before he did something he’d regret.
“It was a pleasure seeing you, McKenzie,” Aiden lied.
As he turned to leave, Lydia slipped a business card into McKenzie’s hand. “I’d love to interview you some time. Give me a call.”
Lydia followed Aiden as he moved away, her high heels clicking speedily against the marble floor. It seemed that, for her, the night was not yet over.
With his body still on Nashville time, though, it didn’t take long for Aiden to feel the combined effects of jetlag, emotional weariness, and the unappealing evening. His eyelids grew heavy, and he knew it wasn’t safe to doze off in Lydia’s company, for more reasons than just “bad press.” If his chivalry coerced him to stay, it was her talking about him, with high and undeserved praise, that convinced him to end it. The fatigue of the last few days fell hard on his shoulders all at once.
“Lydia, I’m so sorry. It’s been a pleasant night, but I should be on my way.”
“Yes, of course. Me, too. Is your car with the valet?” she asked with a giddy voice.
Aiden answered her question by hailing a taxi. He opened the door for her, and she took no time in sliding all the way to the other window, leaving plenty of room for him. He almost laughed at the face she made when he shut the car door and slipped a hundred to the driver, asking him to take her home safely.
“You’re not coming?” Lydia asked, incredulous.
“Oh no, my car is right around the corner. Thank you for the evening. It was most enjoyable.”
Half of that was true. Aiden’s car was indeed around the corner, a bored Fatima behind the wheel.
“Had a good evening, sir?” She had laughter in her eyes. But there was also kindness.
“No, Fatima. It was a disaster. That one is a predator not so much in disguise.”
Fatima let out her delightful signature belly laugh. “Afraid of the big bad she-wolf, Little Red Riding Hood?”
Aiden froze. Was he imagining things? Nora had said the same thing three days before, by the warmth of the cozy fire. Back when things seemed absolutely perfect. Shite . He couldn’t get her out of his mind.
“Everything okay, Mr. Elliott?”
No. Nothing was okay. “Fatima, please don’t judge me. But I am in dire need of greasy food at a dive.”
“I know just the place. Promise not to tell Miss Saunders? She scares the shit out of me.”
Aiden laughed heartily, his first genuine laughter since Nashville. Becky was right, in the end. All would be well in due time.