Page 32 of One Life to Loathe

“And I thought we were going to be friends.”

He scratched his upper lip, seemingly debating. “I’m not sure I’m going to be a very good friend,” he said finally.

“You’ll be fine,” I assured him. “I think you’re better at it than you want to admit.”

“I don’t have any friends, though.”

“Well, you do now.” I saluted him with the drink Hank shoved in front of me. “To new friendships and high viewership numbers.”

He burst out laughing. “You really are the sun, aren’t you?”

It was perhaps the nicest thing anybody—not just him, we’re talking anybody—had ever said to me. “I try to be.”

“You’re good at it.”

Would I be able to keep it up, though?

TO NOBODY’S SURPRISE, THEY PAIRED ME WITHLeo at dinner. They put all the couples next to each other for more bonding. Dinner was raucous. Sylvia and Ed seemed to be trying to outdo one another to see who could tell the most ridiculous stories. If half of them were even close to true, I would’ve been surprised.

Leo’s proximity did funny things to my heart and head. Now that I knew his origin story—and why hadn’t I googled him when I heard he’d been cast?—I was stuck between sympathy and annoyance, because it wasn’t sympathy making my heart flutter. Occasionally, it made my heart pinch, but it wasn’t the cause of the fluttering feeling I couldn’t quite seem to shake. No, the fluttering was something else.

I was starting to think it was his stupid face. Why did he have to be so handsome? It was as if he’d crawled out of the pages of some men’s magazine and plopped himself down in a chair next to me.

While I ate my weight in shellfish—Leo laughed at least eight times when the servers had to clear plates of discarded shells from in front of me—he stuck to a steak and a baked potato. He didn’t even put any sour cream on it.

“I have to maintain my weight,” he explained to me when I made a face. “I’m supposed to be a vampire. Vampires don’t get bellies.”

“Yeah, but…it’s a dry baked potato.” I leaned over his plate and cursed myself for having that fourth drink. I was tipsy now, and I regretted it. Thankfully, I didn’t have to be on the set until ten o’clock the next day. I had plenty of time to hydrate. I’d still drank too much, and that wasn’t like me. I blamed Leo. His proximity was making me stupid.

“I happen to like dry baked potatoes,” he countered.

I looked back at the crab carcasses that littered the table in front of me. “You don’t like shellfish?”

“I’ve never really tried it.” He was sheepish. “I don’t branch out often when it comes to food.”

I had questions. I didn’t ask them, though. This was the most open he’d been with me since we’d met. My questions all revolved around his situation when he was growing up. Perhaps he’d never had the opportunity to try shellfish because his father was a jerk and his foster home couldn’t afford it. I knew if I brought up either of those topics that he would shut down. I didn’t want that.

“We’ll go out to dinner, and I’ll let you try some of my stuffed lobster one night,” I suggested.

He cocked an eyebrow. “We’re going out to dinner?”

“Friends go out to dinner.”

When he smiled, something inside of me loosened. He looked ten years younger and eighty degrees hotter when he smiled. It was probably best that he didn’t do it all the time because my panties would catch fire on their own accord if he did.

“Maybe.” He glanced up at the clock on the wall. It was getting late. “I’m about to go to bed.”

Was he inviting me to join him? Wait … of course not. What a stupid assumption to jump to. He most definitely wasn’t inviting me.

Then what was he doing?

“You’ve had four drinks,” he continued.

“Thanks for keeping track,” I replied dryly.

“I don’t care how much you drink. You’re a big girl. It’s just…” He trailed off for a beat, seemingly considering it, then sighed. “I don’t want to leave you down here with Ed.”

I darted a look toward the man in question, who was in the corner talking closely with one of the production members. She was young—not even twenty-five—and she giggled at whatever he whispered to her. “He’s going to run through the whole production crew, isn’t he?” I realized out loud.

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