Page 64 of Rebel Romeo

I settle into the back row and eat my peanut butter and jelly sandwich quietly while everyone else piles out of the theater. Even though my rent is covered for the year, I’m still saving. There’s never a guarantee when you’re an actress and if I can save for a while, even if this show buckles under previews, I can survive another year or more in New York off these paychecks.

Holden and Missy are the last ones out the door and despite everything… despite the anger and the scowling looks I thought I’d seen Holden casting her, they leave the theater hand in hand. Cuddling. Close.

It sinks the dagger deeper into my heart. For a brief moment in time I thought he would have stood up for me with Missy. Maybe he still will behind closed doors.

But for now, it’s just me, eating alone in the theater. My home away from home.

Thirty minutes later, people start to shuffle back in, but we’re not officially starting yet. Holden goes up to the light booth to work with the designer. Missy heads backstage to take a phone call. And Nolan is called to his dressing room to try on some costumes.

So I’m basically still sitting alone in the back of the theater when Jill pokes her head inside. “Hey!” I launch out of my seat and tackle her in a hug, nearly spilling the carton of coffee and box of pastries she’s holding.

“Whoa. Easy. Our day old donuts at the cafe aren’t that great!”

Near tears, I can’t bring myself to tell her about the phone call just yet. Instead, I wipe the corners of my leaky eyes and say, “I’m just really happy to see a friendly face.”

Sniffling, I pull away and wave Maggie down. “My friend brought the cast and crew coffee and donuts. Is it okay for us to put them out?”

Maggie’s eyes brighten and she skips over to us. “Only if I get first pick!”

With a grin and a wink, Jill opens the box for Maggie. “Why don’t you set these up backstage? The green room was painted yesterday, so you probably don’t want to put them in there because of the fumes. But the swing room should be good! I’ll make an announcement to the cast before we start.”

Maggie takes a jelly filled donut and salutes us as Jill and I go backstage. “Has today been better?” Jill asks.

I’m not sure how to answer that. “In some ways… acting wise… yeah. I guess it has been.”

“Acting wise,” she repeats, giving me a strange look. She knows something’s up. She always knows. Years of friendship make it impossible to hide anything from each other, especially in the face of this sort of grief. “You can talk to me, you know that.”

“I know,” I say with a sigh. “And I will. Just not here.” I shoulder open the door to the swing’s green room.

“As long as you know you can talk to me?—”

Jill’s sentence is cut off by Missy’s unexpected yelp. I blink and it takes a long moment for me to fully register the sight in front of me. Missy with her dress around her hips… sitting on the makeup counter.

And a man…

Kissing her.

Pressed between her spread thighs.

A man who’s not Holden…

Nolan.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Holden

Five years ago…

You would think by now, Addison would have gotten the hint.

But for some reason, she was under the impression that by sleeping with any and all of my teammates, she’d somehow make me jealous.

Every minute she could, she was leaning on me, touching me, brushing her breasts to my arms. So it wasn’t any surprise when she lunged onto my back before class, squealing, “Piggy back ride!”

“What the fuck!” Out of instinct, I caught her, wrapping my hands around her thighs and squeezing them into my ribs so that she didn’t go flying off my back and break something.

But the impact knocked me off balance. My bad shoulder slammed into the wall beside me and I grunted in pain. It was at that unfortunate moment that Katherine’s eyes lifted from where she was reading her script and snagged on mine. They flitted briefly up to Addison, then landed back on me, gleaming like two sapphires beneath the surface of water.

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