Playing in SECRET (Corrigan & Co. Book 9) Read Free

and hot different way that will probably
keep me hard 24/7, and also keep me on my toes as how to best
complement her clothes with mine. Or rather, how my stylist can best
complement them.
    “Got it. We’ll just
have to remember to send pics of what you’ll be wearing to my
stylist so she can coordinate.”
    “You can’t pick
something out yourself?”
    Um, no. “I could try,
I guess.”
    “Does someone wipe
your ass for you, too?”
    “That’s not fair,
Audrey,” I say, grabbing her arm. “I have to take care of my
daughter, worry about remembering my lines, get wherever I’m needed
all day, every day, and smile every time I walk out the door. I also
do my own stunts. So excuse me if I don’t really care what I’m
wearing and would rather let someone else pick the color of my tie.”
    “I’m sorry, Blake.
I shouldn’t have been so bitchy. You’ve just been the poster boy
for my anger for so long now. I don’t know how to be nice to you.”
    “Did you throw darts
at my poster?” I ask, joking.
    “Yes. And I used
pictures of you and your friends for target practice during my
training.”
    Whoa. I wasn’t
expecting that; although, I guess I should have been. “I truly am
sorry.”
    “I want to believe
that you are, it’s just twenty years too late.”
    “I know. Can we maybe
start over?” I ask her as we climb into the backseat of the car I
hired for tonight.
    “No. I think your
daughter is great, and I take my job very seriously, but you and me?
Never going to happen.”
    “Haven’t you heard
that you should never say never?”
    “Why me? Why now? If
it’s because you can see my curves, and I don’t have braces or
thick glasses, then you should just move along. Because inside—where
it counts—I’m still that same teenage girl you never gave a
second thought to, the science nerd you and your friends thought
nothing of hurting. I may have gained some confidence, but I haven’t
changed. I won’t change who I am.”
    “I thought of you.”
    “Of how to torment
and humiliate me, maybe, but not me. Because if you had, you wouldn’t
have done it. Any of it.”
    We’ve arrived at the
restaurant on the beach where the party is, and she reaches for the
door. I stop her. “We have to get out together.”
    She closes her eyes and
nods. “We do. I know. I just…I forgot for a moment. It won’t
happen again. I’m sorry.”
    I see the sorrow in her
eyes, and I don’t know if it’s because she’s upset about
forgetting her job, or if it’s because she was remembering what we
did to her. What I did to her. Either way, I’m going to do everything I can to prove
to her that even though she hasn’t changed, I have. I don’t follow the crowd, and I would definitely never hurt
her—or anyone else—intentionally again. Well, maybe the bastards
who are after Jeanne, but not anyone else. I also try not to throw my
celebrity around; although everyone, including Audrey, knows we’re
having our reunion in late winter instead of early fall because of my schedule. I couldn’t leave a set to be here, and no one seemed to
mind. Then again, I didn’t ask.
    * * *
    Audrey
    I can do this. I. Can.
Do. This. I just have to think of Blake as some random guy I’m
assigned to help, and not the one I’ve been partly in love with for
more than half my life. Because if I don’t, there are only two
outcomes to this situation I’ve found myself in. Either I’m going
to fall for Blake, and then find out he’s the same asshole he’s
always been, which will crush me yet again. Or I’ll fall for him,
and he’ll be the guy I’d always dreamed he would, and when he
walks away this time, it won’t just crush me—I’ll be
annihilated. Because the one thing I’m sure about is that this is
all temporary. The movie star doesn’t end up with the chemistry
nerd, not in real life at least.
    “You ready?” he
asks me, and I look up to see that the driver has opened the car
door.
    “Yeah.”
    I adjust my top