Page 4 of Scarred Heart

“There’s no need.”Her face fell a little like I popped her balloon.The girl needed an agent.Somebody to give her this sort of advice since mine was only supposed to be that of the legal variety.

“You’re not the first actress who thought they may be able to get away with that,” I explained.“Trust me.Pros like him see straight through it.It might end up doing more harm than good if he thinks you’re a fake or a kiss-ass.”

I was starting to wish I had never mentioned this event while studying the contract she’d received from the studio.I had looked at the invitation as a professional courtesy and was on the fence about whether or not I wanted to go in the first place.When she found out I was invited, she had done everything short of standing on her head to get me to add her as my guest.There were other things I could be doing that I would’ve enjoyed more than wearing an empty smile and posing for a photo when appropriate.

Not that I was in a position to be a snob about any of it.My practice was barely two years old, and it had only been within the last quarter that I’d been in a position to take on a third paralegal.It was time to start thinking seriously about expansion.That meant showing my face at award lunches and other events.

“Oh my God.”Something over my shoulder caught Penny’s eye.Her already fair skin went white as a sheet.“He’s coming this way.Lex Landry.I can’t breathe.”

“Relax,” I whispered, caught between a tiny bit of irritation and the impulse to laugh at her.She had already signed on to do a brainless action movie with the studio.The time to impress him and his dad and the other big shots would come once filming started.

I turned slightly to ask a server for a glass of chardonnay, giving me a glimpse of the man Penny was hyperventilating over.From the corner of my eye, I could just make out the sight of him cutting through the crowd.All in all, he wasn’t a bad guy.At least, I had never heard anything about him beyond rumors of being a womanizer, which was nothing special in this town.So long as the women consented and they weren’t coerced in any way, it was none of my business.

“Don’t be too eager,” I warned, looking down at the floor and composing myself the way I hoped she was.She wasn’t my only client who’d signed on to make movies at his studio.I needed to maintain a warm relationship.My client roster was healthy, but I was in no position to take chances.

“Mr.Landry.It’s so nice to see you.”Gone was the nervous, fidgeting girl.Now she was a sophisticated, worldly woman who oozed charm and confidence once Lex reached us.“Congratulations to your father.I haven’t been in town long, but I know what an honor this award is.”The girl was smooth.If she were half as convincing in front of a camera, there was a solid career ahead of her.

Lex stood a step behind me, chuckling.“Thank you.Forgive me, but I’m no good with names, Miss…” Only a guy in his position would cut to the chase like that.

“Penny Hargrove,” she purred.Meanwhile, I accepted a glass of ice-cold wine once it reached me and took a long sip, pretending I wasn’t listening to every word.Let her make her impression.

A second male voice rang out over my right shoulder, softer than Lex’s.“You look like somebody I used to know.”

That voice.Rich, deep, like warm honey rolling down my body, coating me in sweetness.The last voice I thought I’d ever hear again.The world stopped for a second.The room went silent or was that my heartbeat drowning out everything else?

Suddenly, I was twenty again, with my entire life ahead of me and nothing but hope and dreams to sustain me.Images flashed across my mind’s eye, covering the six months Spencer Collins was part of my life.Everything he’d shown me.A world I would never have known if it hadn’t been for him.

What a shame it wasn’t enough to make up for everything that came after.

My mind caught up to reality, and everything came rushing back.When I looked up, stunned, my head spun, and goose bumps covered my skin.The sight of those icy blue eyes made my heart skip a beat.

It’s like something out of a movie.

Amazing, the things that will go through a person’s head at a moment like this.Confronted with the man who’d changed the course of my life.Somebody I told myself it was better not to see since the past was the past.I didn’t need him.

Yet, there he was in front of me, the last person I ever expected to set eyes on again, especially at an event like this, with half the town in attendance to honor one of the few men in the industry with no skeletons in the closet.Sometimes, that was more than enough to earn accolades.There were too many horror stories in this business, enough to outweigh the dreams of fame and fortune.

Fame and fortune I had once dreamed of.

Fame and fortune stolen from me by the man now invading my space, destroying my composure.

My hand closed tighter around the stem of my wine glass, and my jaw ached from clenching my teeth as the past and present collided in my head.

“Rowan McNulty, right?”He was playing dumb, but it didn’t matter to my pounding heart.No one had ever said my name the way Spencer did.Any hope of my overworked mind pretending I was imagining things was lost when I heard it spoken in a voice that still haunted my dreams sometimes.A voice that, at one time, I would have done anything to hear.

“That’s my name,” I somehow managed to choke out while holding his gaze.How I could speak while staring at him was a mystery I couldn’t afford to investigate.He had barely aged a day, and the changes time had brought on only made him more handsome.

“Do we know each other?”His head tipped to the side, blue eyes tracing a path over my body.Damn my nipples for tightening the way they did while my heart beat faster and my mouth went dry.Damn for doing this to me.Looking me up and down like I was a prize heifer after vanishing off the face of the planet and abandoning me.Pretending not to remember me when we both knew he did.What gave him the right?

“This is a small town,” I pointed out.“It only feels big.”It was a miracle I could force out a single word with my jaw so tightly clenched.

How?Where had he come from?For years, I told myself he was gone, out of my life, and good riddance.I didn’t need him.I never had.I only thought I did.

“I know.”He snapped his fingers, his mouth twisting into a smirk that confirmed he was playing a game.“You went by a different name when we knew each other.Rowan Leslie, wasn’t it?”

Nobody had called me that in years.“You have a good memory,” I murmured, wearing a thin smile.Now that the shock started to clear up, something else took its place that turned my bewilderment into something harder.“I wouldn’t have expected anyone to remember that.It’s been such a long time.”

“It has.”He still had the power to look straight through me and see what was inside.I wanted to escape his perceptive gaze before he saw more than I wanted to reveal.Every instinct told me to leave, to go, to put this behind me and not turn back.

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