Page 3 of Kiss Across the Universe
Her trembling increased as she pushed and side stepped through the big room, making her want to hurry.
A hand caught at her elbow, anchoring her.
“Hey, ‘lannah, honey, you look sick. Bad joint?”
Alannah looked over her shoulder at the gorgeous blonde. Danya…Prince?Prinsen. Danya was some sort of assistant in a different production company, which made them colleagues of a sort, Alannah supposed. She often saw Danya at events and gatherings. Danya was always networking and making useful connections.
“You’re working?” Alannah asked Danya. Her voice came out strained and wobbly.
“Sorta. You know how it is.” Danya shrugged and smiled at the handsome man who she had clearly been talking to before hooking Alannah’s elbow as she went by. The man gave both of them a perfunctory smile of his own.
Danya looked back at Alannah. “You okay?”
Alannah could feel the trembling trying to take over her body. “I just got fired,” she confessed, her voice even more strained.
“Oh. ‘kay. Gotcha,” Danya said. “Well, have a good night!” She turned back to the actor.
Alannah stared at Danya for a moment, astonishment tangling with upset.
Then she got it. People got fired all the time in Hollywood. They were rejected, fell out of favor, were no longer the golden adored. They were the nominated, not the winners. They were the scapegoats, not the achievers. What was one more firing, among all that rejection?
Alannah turned and headed for the big wall of glass doors, her head down, thinking hard.
Yeah, so people got fired all the time, only this time it wasshewho had been fired, and for no reason except that she valued her family. Which was grossly unfair. Normal people valued their family, didn’t they?
When possibly the most luminous A-lister in Hollywood deigned to speak to you? Is that really the time to cut out and take a call from your mom?The voice in her head was cool, assessing.
Maybe she really didn’t have what it took to succeed in Hollywood. It was a cut-throat town. She’d known that going in. But she hadn’t really understood just how fickle Tinsel Town was. How much maneuvering and manipulation it took to get a deal done.
The Dale Alyards of the world would have ignoredallcalls, especially those from their family.
So what did that make Alannah? Stupid? Or too normal?
Alannah moved around the brickwork to the west side of the house. There was nothing to see on that side of the house but the dark silhouettes of Beverley Hills and the night sky beyond. No one would be on that side of the house. If they wanted a view, they would be on the deck attached to the east side of the house, which overlooked the bright lights of L.A.
When had she started to question whether she fit in here? True, she’d lost her job. But this was her fifth job since she’d moved to L.A. With her building connections she could find another job tomorrow. A few calls, a bit of waiting, and something would emerge. She could casually drop the fact that she had been chatting with Adán Caballero last night, and the calls would be returned, she knew it.
Only…did she want to?
Alannah looked around for observers, for anyone who might see what she did next.
There was no one in sight, but she caught a whiff of hashish. Someone was having their own private party nearby. They were carefully tucked out of sight.
Alannah took a last look around, gathered herself up and jumped. When her small living room coalesced around her, her relief was vast, for there was no need to pretend to be a normal human anymore tonight.
Chapter Two
Canmore, Alberta, Canada.
Kit realized his mistake assoon as he drove over the metal bridge and up the short, sharp slope to the wide cliff where the big log house sat overlooking the town of Canmore and the valley it lay in.
There were not a dozen cars parked around the house to give warning. Nevertheless, when he switched off the engine of his truck, Kit could hear the buzz of a house with a lot of people in it. There were open windows on both levels, despite the six inches of snow on the ground, and through them drifted the sound of conversations, people moving about the house, and more.
He remained behind the wheel, peered through the windscreen and weighed up his options, his fingers tapping a riff on the wheel.
Clearly, Veris Gerhardsson and his family were celebrating Thanksgiving today. Kit knew he should turn the truck around and head back home again. Only, the salmon wrapped in burlap in the back of the truck really should be either cooked or frozen in the next few hours.
Then any choice he had in the matter was taken away, for Veris himself stepped off the verandah, shrugging into a thick coat as he moved across the snow toward Kit’s truck. He smiled as he drew closer.
