Chapter 1 #2
She was doing it for him. At least, that’s what she’d told him a few weeks ago, when things really started to get crazy.
Honestly, she was doing it for herself.
Drew couldn’t blame her. Breaking into Hollywood was nearly impossible. He didn’t begrudge her using his success as a springboard.
But there were days when he felt more than ambivalent about their relationship, days when he suspected he was more of a springboard and less of a boyfriend in her eyes.
“There they are,” Jessica said, dripping with relief, as soon as they walked through to the arrivals hall.
A dapper-looking chauffer holding a sign that said “Oberlin” was waiting for them. So was a small crowd of wide-eyed, flushed fans. The fans gasped and launched into waving, squealing, and calling out greetings as soon as Drew took off his sunglasses and smiled at them.
“Hey, people!” Drew greeted them in turn, walking boldly into the crowd, even as a pair of burly security guards stepped in to try to hold back the deluge. “How’s London today?”
The next ten minutes were spent greeting wide-eyed and sometimes weepy fans and taking selfies. Abby was more than happy to shuffle through everyone’s cellphones taking the pictures while Jessica stood off to the side, turned away from the commotion, her own phone to her ear as she took a call.
“Mr. Oberlin, we need to move on,” the chauffer said over the commotion of fans.
“Okay, everyone, thanks so much for such a warm welcome,” Drew called out, blowing a few kisses.
He had zero doubts at that the pictures and videos of the last ten minutes would be all over social media before he got to whatever car would whisk them off to the accommodations Sleuth’s production team had set aside for him for the next six weeks.
Jessica finished her call and her perusal of the magazine and tourist information stand she’d been standing next to and moved into step with him.
“Is that your girlfriend, Drew?” someone called out. They didn’t sound nice at all.
The all-too familiar, sinking sensation of his career about to end because of an inconvenient truth hit Drew square in the chest.
Before he could answer, Jessica whipped back to face the young man who had made the accusation. “For the last time, no,” she said, scowling. “Drew and I are just friends. I’m here in London to meet with a director.”
It was a lie. Both statements were lies, actually. The trouble was, despite being an actor, Jessica wasn’t a convincing liar.
“Come on,” Abby tugged her away from the crowd and practically pushed her out the door, to where a private car was waiting for them.
Drew smiled and waved and blew a few more kisses to defuse the awkwardness. The fans seemed to lap it up, but his stomach roiled as they climbed into the car. Maybe it was because he needed to eat something or because of jetlag, but probably not.
“You handled that well,” Abby reassured Drew, who sat in the middle of the back seat between her and Jessica as the car rolled away from the airport and onto the highway. She’d already pulled her book out of her purse and was reading again.
“Every time something like that happens, I feel like I’m closer to the truth getting out and losing everything,” Drew sighed, rubbing his hands over his tired face.
“The truth is not going to get out,” Jessica said definitively.
“The truth always gets out,” Drew countered her.
“Not if I have anything to do about it,” she said with a triumphant smile.
Drew had no idea what that was about…until she thrust a flier she’d evidently picked up in the airport into his hands.
Drew stared at it for a moment. It had a picture of what appeared to be a happy gay couple on the front and a list of services and phone numbers on the back. “Rent-A-Boyfriend?” He blinked at the flier, then looked at Jessica. “What’s this?”
“I found that near the magazine stand,” Jessica said, bristling with excitement, as if she’d pulled off a coup.
“Yeah, but what is it?” Drew asked, handing the flier over to Abby when she closed her book and reached her hand out for it.
“It looks like a sort of cross between a dating service and an acting agency,” Jessica said. “I looked them up online, too, while you were posing for selfies.”
Drew’s eyebrows flew up. The tight coil of uncertainty in his gut expanded. “So what do they do?”
“Apparently, they set gay men up with other guys when they need someone to stand in as a boyfriend,” she said. “Like for family functions or, I don’t know, work outings where you need a partner for some sort of activity. Their website is really specific about them not being a matchmaking service.”
“You are not thinking what I think you’re thinking,” Abby said flatly, looking across Drew at Jessica and handing the flier back to Drew.
“Come on, it’s perfect,” Jessica argued, even though there wasn’t really any argument. “Drew needs the world to believe he’s gay in order for him to keep his star shooting. What better way to convince everyone than for him to go public with a boyfriend?”
“Hold on just a second,” Drew said, the butterflies in his gut raging like a private party at Chateau Marmont.
“No, it’s perfect!” Jessica argued. “People will stop thinking we’re together—”
“Are we together?” Drew mumbled.