Page 38 of Off Script

“How was the atmosphere? Did you put on the Maxwell charm? Did you two . . . you know?” Doug waggled his eyebrows in a way that he shouldn’t. Ever.

“Stop that. Nothing happened. She’s too pissed at me. We’re frenemies at best.”

Jada may have been caustic at times, but that didn’t negate the fact that she was beautiful and funny. Even though things were rocky between them, every genuine smile he got from her or any tiny crack in her armor enticed him. He wanted to understand what made her tick, what it was about her that kept drawing him in. He couldn’t tell whether this impulse came from a need to simply make sense of the attraction or to escape it.

“Frankly, I don’t care what you two do privately as long as it doesn’t screw up what we’re trying to do publicly. Is that clear?” Doug said.

“Crystal clear, Captain.” Tristan saluted him.

“Good. When are you seeing her again?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Good God. Make it soon, why don’t you? The public needs to see you out together more often,” Doug said. At his reprimand, Tristan thought back to how Jada mentioned facing off with her agent today.

“Maybe I should catch up with her after the meeting?” Tristan suggested after filling Doug in.

“Good idea. If she’s battling Terminator Kane, she’ll need all the help she can get.” Doug shuddered.

Holy crap. Tristan paused as a slow realization crept up on him. “One last thing, Doug. Are Daniel Kane and Avery Kane related?”

“Yeah, the snot-nosed brat is her son. Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” Tristan gave Doug a reassuring smile, but inside, a parade of red flags went up.

Somethingveryweird was going on between Jada and the Kane family. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the right to ask. Although Jada wouldn’t let him pry into whatever was going on, a fierce protectiveness came over him. Forget fake-dating obligations. He sincerelyneededto check in on Jada now that these misshapen puzzle pieces had started falling in his lap. Whether she wanted to confide in him or not after talking with Avery, Tristan would be there, waiting for her.

12

Jada hated waiting.

She usually considered herself a patient person, but not with this. Not with Avery. Any time Jada had a confrontation with the woman, she had to put on emotional battle armor beforehand. For the most part, Jada had gotten the hang of fending off the blows from Avery’s cutting remarks. Like the catty observations about why a production had gone with someone else over Jada, or pressuring her to try out for things Jada wasn’t interested in “just to pay the bills.” But today she had deeper concerns other than Avery’s habitual rudeness.

For starters, with Daniel in town, he might come to the office to visit his Mommy Dearest. They had run into each other here several times postbreakup, Daniel chitchatting with his mom, smugly monopolizing her time when Jada had an appointment. She could never be sure that he planned it that way but it had always felt intentionally vindictive. Another way to punish her for leaving him. She didn’t want a repeat of him dropping by, especially while trying to explain her “relationship” with Tristan to Avery. And if Daniel didn’t show up today, he’d still probably have told his mom about their encounter at the lounge. It would be perfect ammo for Avery to ask Jada if she could handle a relationship with a womanizer like Tristan when she’d run away at the sight of her ex.

On top of the Daniel anxiety, having to tell a lie this big made her nauseated. Some people thought of acting as artistic lying. But for Jada, being an actress didn’t automatically make you a good liar. She certainly wasn’t. The first time Jada had ever lied she’d been eight and had just broken her mom’s favorite vase. She did a piss poor job of covering it up, and her mom shamed her into never doing it again. No wonder her conscience secretly sobbed with guilt over agreeing to date Tristan . . .andfor releasing the video.

Oh God. The nausea was getting worse. Jada bent over, not quite putting her head between her knees because it would look superweird to the receptionist, but enough to slowly steady her breathing and rapid thoughts. Maybe Mikayla was right when she insisted over and over that so much of Jada’s anxiety would go away if she left Avery for a different agent. But who would take her on? Her resume and experience were fine but not enough for an agency to want to poach her from Avery—whom most people feared. Her connections were too powerful once she chose to wield them. If she truly wanted to, Avery could blacklist Jada to the rest of the entertainment community, claiming she was unprofessional or telling her own twisted version of what happened with Daniel.

When Avery’s equally frightened assistant gave her the go-ahead to enter, Jada’s nerves had calmed due to the deep breathing exercises. Then they sky-rocketed all over again when she walked in and saw Avery’s sour expression. The woman had an unnerving tendency of staring at people intensely over the rim of her glasses. Jada suspected she was copying Meryl Streep’s iconic version of this fromThe Devil Wears Prada. It was hard to deny their intimidating resemblance.

“Avery, welcome back. How was the trip?” Jada asked.

“What the hell is going on?” Avery barked. “First, that video gets released, and now I’m hearing you and Tristan are supposedly a couple? The truth. Now,” she demanded.

Jada followed through, recapping the agreed-upon story from Doug’s press release. As her agent gave her a stone-faced expression, Jada struggled to get her last words out convincingly.

“So, although I don’t know how that video got out, I can assure you, Tristan and I are seeing each other. This has all been blown out of proportion.”

Avery unclenched at last, blowing out a loud sigh. Rubbing the bridge of her nose in frustration, she asked, “Why didn’t you say so in the first place when I called?”

“It didn’t seem like the right time.”

“Damn it, Jada. How are we supposed to milk juicy press like this if you don’t clue me in? I thought by now you would have learned something about publicity from me, but apparently, you’re still oblivious.”

The most ironic thing about breaking up with Daniel had been the way it had changed Avery. When Jada first started acting, Avery genuinely seemed to care about helping Jada learn the ins and outs of the business. She had heard a few whispered stories about the agent’s temper, but it had never been directed at her. But postrelationship, Avery morphed into an overcritical mother-in-law, resentful that her son’s “girl” couldn’t keep her man happy or her house in order. It didn’t matter that the two had actually broken up. Avery’s perception of Jada had been tainted.

Putting on her whatever you say, Mama Kane, daughter-in-law smile, Jada said, “It’s new, and I’m still not sure how it’s going to go.”

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