Sugar and Spice Page 5

  Scarlett had no problem with Jane and Caleb being friends. But she was concerned about Jane getting sucked back into dating him again. Jane had fallen madly in love with Caleb when they were together in high school, only to have him dump her after his freshman year at Yale because, according to him, she “deserved better” (which was basically boy code for I want to be free to hook up with other girls). Scarlett spent many nights last spring consoling Jane when she couldn’t stop crying about him, trying to cheer her up with funny movies and countless pints of Ben & Jerry’s.

  Besides, Jane was still recovering from her relationships with her completely dysfunctional ex, Jesse, and the perpetually unavailable Braden. She needed to keep her life simple for a little while.

  “Soooo.” Caleb glanced expectantly at Scarlett, then Jane. “What did you girls do today?”

  “School,” Scarlett said.

  “Work,” Jane added. “What are you guys up to? Naveen, are you in school or working or what?”

  “I’m a sophomore at UCLA,” Naveen said, taking a sip of his drink. “Premed.”

  “Wow. Dr. Singh!” Jane said, sounding impressed.

  “Yeah, my boy here is planning on becoming a plastic surgeon,” Caleb explained, slapping him on the back.

  Scarlett stared at Naveen incredulously. “Seriously? You want to spend your life carving up people’s faces?” she asked him. Her father was a plastic surgeon, and she had nothing but contempt for a profession that made money from making women (and men) believe that surgically altering their appearance would bring them happiness.

  “Actually, I want to specialize in reconstructive work for burn victims, accident victims,” Naveen explained. “Also babies who are born with cleft palates and other disfiguring birth defects. It’s kind of amazing what you can do for them nowadays. I mean, plastics is about more than double Ds and tummy tucks.”

  “Oh.” Well, shut me up, Scarlett thought.

  Naveen grinned at her, then turned to Jane. “Listen, thanks for the invite to the season premiere party. I’m sorry I had to miss it. Heard it was really cool.”

  “No worries. Next time,” Jane promised.

  A commotion at a nearby table caught Scarlett’s attention. She glanced up and saw half a dozen girls craning their necks to stare at her and Jane. They were whispering excitedly to one another—That’s Jane Roberts, right? And Scarlett Harp? Ohmigod!—and pulling cell phones out of their purses.

  This ignited a chain reaction in the room, and suddenly, more people were staring and whispering and snapping pictures.

  “Wow, that’s so weird,” Caleb said, peering around. “Does this always happen to you two when you go out?”

  “Not always. It happens a lot, though,” Jane admitted.

  “So what’s it like? Being famous, I mean. Is it fun? Crazy? Stressful?” Naveen asked.

  “All of the above,” Scarlett replied.

  Jane nodded in agreement. “It’s important not to take the whole Hollywood thing too seriously, though. Like, if either of us starts playing celebrity name-drop during dinner, just slap us, okay?”

  “Except now we get to play celebrity name-drop. Like at the gym tomorrow. ‘Hey, losers, Naveen and I had dinner with Jane Roberts and Scarlett Harp last night,’” Caleb bantered.

  “You wouldn’t!” Jane exclaimed.

  Caleb reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “I wouldn’t,” he said sincerely. “You know me, Janie. I’m your biggest fan, and I’ll always be your biggest fan. Not because you’re a star, but because you’re Janie Roberts from Santa Barbara who saves stray animals and likes to eat Cheerios out of an Elmo bowl.”

  Jane blushed. Scarlett frowned. Did Caleb have to be so . . . cute?

  The waitress came by and took their orders. After she left, Jane asked Caleb about his volunteer gig with Habitat Builders (he was on a leave of absence from Yale so he could “experience life”), and he told some stories about a house he was helping build for a family in need in Glendale. Naveen added some stories of his own: about his parents back in Santa Barbara, his part-time job at Mattel Children’s Hospital, and his classes at UCLA. Caleb and Naveen both made jokes about sharing Naveen’s pint-size apartment in Westwood.

  Scarlett noticed that Jane’s eyes seemed especially bright as she gazed at Caleb and laughed at something he said. This was not good. Her BFF was sort of flirting with Caleb . . . and Caleb was definitely flirting with her. And flirtation could lead to . . . well, more.

  Although, Scarlett had to admit that Caleb did appear to have changed, at least on the surface. He had an air about him: more grown-up, more together, more focused. Hmm. Could this be a new-and-improved Caleb Hunt?

  What about Naveen? He seemed pretty grown-up, too, with his aspiration to help burn victims and children and all that. And he also seemed to be flirting—not with Jane but with Scarlett. He kept teasing her in a cute, funny way about being on TV (it was obvious that he, like Caleb, was not a fame chaser) . . . and making little paper airplanes out of cocktail napkins and flinging them at her . . . and looking at her with his intense, really nice (she had to admit), dark brown eyes and then looking away. Had he not heard her mention Liam’s name, like, fifty times during the course of their conversation?

  “So, yeah, my boyfriend, Liam, went to UCLA, too,” Scarlett said, louder than was probably necessary. She pulled apart one of Naveen’s paper airplanes and smoothed it out on the table. “He majored in cinematography.”

  “UCLA’s awesome for that,” Naveen said. “Does he work in the business?”

  “He’s kind of between gigs right now,” Scarlett replied.

  “Ohmigod, you guuuuysss!”

  Scarlett looked up and saw Gaby walking up to their table, teetering slightly on her red satin heels. On her arm was some guy—late twenties?—with no hair on top, way too much hair everywhere else, and a saber-toothed tiger tatt on his right bicep. Not attractive.

  “Hey, Gaby! What are you doing here?” Scarlett stood up and gave her a big hug.

  “Saul and I—” Gaby began.

  “Skull,” the guy corrected her.

  “Skull and I had a drink at the bar, and now we’re heading over to Industry,” Gaby explained.

  Jane gave Gaby a hug, too, and introduced Caleb and Naveen, whom she jokingly referred to as “Dr. Naveen.” Gaby eyed both boys appreciatively, then turned to Scarlett. “Don’t worry. I promise I won’t tell Liam about your date with Dr. Hottie,” she pretended to whisper, although everyone at the table heard.

  Scarlett gaped at her. “Gaby!”

  “Seriously. Your secret’s safe with me. We girls have to stick together, right? Come on, Scott!” Gaby said, tugging on Skull’s arm. “I think I need another Cosmo.”

  “Whatever,” Skull said, sounding bored.

  After they took off, Scarlett dug into her salad, concentrating hard on spearing each lettuce leaf precisely with her fork, trying not to let Naveen or anyone else see how embarrassed she felt. But Naveen was completely cool about the Gaby incident, leaning across the table with an amused smile and saying, “Don’t stress. It’s easy to misinterpret stuff when you’ve had as many Cosmos as she’s probably had.”

  “Yeah, Gaby does like her Cosmos,” Jane piped up quickly.

  Then Caleb brought up a funny anecdote about him and Jane and Scarlett cutting class to go to Hendry’s Beach and getting caught by the principal, who was also playing hookie there. (Scarlett tried to erase the image of Hendry’s Beach from her mind . . . and the image of her and Naveen making out on a blanket, near a bonfire, with a full moon overhead.) For the rest of the evening, Scarlett managed to relax and enjoy herself. And it really was no biggie, four old friends from high school, hanging out on a Friday night and having a meal and catching up. Besides, she planned on telling Liam every single detail about the evening as soon as she got home.

  Well . . . maybe not every single detail.

  Chapter 7

  Not Just a Friend

&nb
sp; “So I got an email from Aja’s assistant this morning, and Aja really likes the idea of having her engagement party at the Venetian,” Jane said. “The question is, how do we use that space? We’re talking five hundred guests.”

  Jane glanced at Hannah across the conference table, eager for her response since she was always full of great ideas, especially when it came to big celebrity events. Unfortunately, Madison—whose response Jane had zero interest in—opened her mouth instead, saying, “The Venetian? That place is lame. The Palms is way better.”

  Jane gritted her teeth and forced herself to turn to Madison. Of course Madison would say this, because the Venetian had been Jane’s suggestion, and the Palms had been Madison’s—and because they were on camera. Trevor and Dana must be loving this, Jane thought, knowing that one or both of them were out in the hallway, listening in on their headsets. “Thanks for your input, Madison, but Aja definitely wants the Venetian,” she said firmly. “Soooo. What do you guys think?”

  “I think we need to have a sit-down with Aja and persuade her to go with the Palms,” Madison persisted. “I’m friends with the events person there and I’m sure he’ll give us a fantastic deal.”

  Hannah regarded Jane, her brown eyes full of worry. Jane shared Hannah’s unspoken sentiments—how were they going to keep this meeting from degrading into The Madison Show? Because lately, Madison seemed to have perfected the art of hogging the cameras, shamelessly baiting Jane with snide, bitchy comments, and in general focusing any and all attention on Madison Parker. She had been at Fiona Chen Events for only a week, and already she was dominating the shoots there with her provocative remarks, on-camera meltdowns, and, of course, her formfitting, cleavage-baring outfits. Worse, Madison’s reign of terror was not limited to L.A. Candy. Jane had no idea how many more times she could stomach seeing Madison on The View and other shows, rehashing her teary-eyed, Oscar-worthy rendition of “I thought she was my friend and now she’s blaming me for everyone finding out that she slept with her boyfriend’s best friend. She’s the one who did something terrible, not me!” Jane knew that her publicist, Sam, was working hard on a media counterstrategy. Unfortunately, the press—and the public—couldn’t seem to get enough of Madison’s poison.

  Madison opened her mouth to say something else—then hesitated when her cell vibrated on the conference table. “Sorry, I’ve gotta take this,” she mumbled, scooting out of her chair. As she rushed out of the conference room, Jane noticed her reaching down her dress, presumably to turn her microphone off. What was that about?

  Then Jane’s own cell vibrated. It was a text from Dana:

  CAN U AND HANNAH PLZ DISCUSS MADISON’S IDEAS?

  Great. This was Dana’s code for Can you and Hannah please say mean, nasty things about Madison while she’s out of the room? Not that Jane didn’t want to. But there was no way she was going to play into Dana’s (and Trevor’s and Madison’s) hands on this. She really was going to have to talk to Trevor about Madison—soon.

  “I was thinking that maybe we should do a Caribbean theme,” Jane said brightly to Hannah. “You know, because Aja grew up in Martinique?”

  Hannah nodded enthusiastically. “I love it! Maybe we could do something with—”

  There was a knock, and the door opened. A young guy walked in. Jane’s eyes widened. A young, really cute guy. “Um, excuse me. Sorry to interrupt. Fiona asked me to bring these over,” he said, setting some files on the table.

  “Oh, yeah, thanks. Do you . . . I mean, are you new?” Jane asked him. She had never seen him around the office before.

  The guy ran a hand through his curly auburn hair and smiled shyly. “Sorry, I should have introduced myself. I’m Oliver. I just started today, as an intern.”

  “Cool. I’m Hannah, and this is Jane,” Hannah spoke up. “How’s it going so far?”

  “Great. Except I screwed up Fiona’s coffee order this morning. I have to remember that she likes it half-caf, half-decaf—”

  “With a touch of soy milk and a level, not heaping, teaspoon of raw honey,” Hannah finished. She and Oliver laughed.

  Jane laughed, too—she’d started out as Fiona’s intern herself, and she’d been there, done that—except that Hannah and Oliver suddenly seemed barely aware of her existence. They were looking at each other and happily sharing what had become their private joke, in that electric, intimate way two strangers had when they were . . . well, connecting.

  Hmmm, Jane thought. This might actually be a good thing. As far as Jane knew, Hannah needed a love life. . . . And then Jane remembered that the cameras were still rolling. Was Oliver miked? Had he signed a release agreeing to be filmed? Did he realize that his little flirtation with Hannah would air in front of millions of viewers?

  Poor guy, he probably has no idea what he’s in for, Jane thought.

  It was almost six o’clock when Jane found herself stuck on Sunset Boulevard, fighting bumper-to-bumper rush hour traffic. Braden had texted her earlier and asked if she had time to meet him for a “good-bye drink.” The good-bye part of it had almost made her heart stop (she hadn’t heard from him since they spoke on the phone during the PopTV party last week, and she had no idea what was happening in his life), but then she had read further and seen that he had scored a role on a feature film. He was flying out to Banff in the Canadian Rockies for the shoot tomorrow and wouldn’t be back in L.A. for a couple of months.

  Now, heading over to Big Wangs, the dive where she (and Scarlett) had first met Braden last summer, Jane thought about him and the stormy path their friendship had taken since that time. That first time they met, Jane had felt that same immediate connection between her and Braden that she had sensed between Hannah and Oliver—a connection that never went away, even after she found out that he had a sort-of girlfriend, Willow, and even after Jane started dating his best friend. Still, it was no excuse for her to cheat on Jesse with him, and she would never forgive herself for that, not only because of the pain she caused Jesse but because of the insane media frenzy that erupted afterward. Jane had been publicly humiliated by the awful headlines and the pictures, and Braden even stopped speaking to her for a while.

  Now, finally, she and Braden were back on track as just friends. (Or whatever they were.) He had been kind to her during her last, really awful weeks with Jesse when Jesse was drinking so much and treating her so badly. He hadn’t tried to take advantage of the situation or the situation afterward, when Jane and Jesse were officially broken up. Jane had been on her own for over a month now, and Braden hadn’t made a move. Not even close. They’d continued to exchange phone calls and emails and texts, but they hadn’t met up.

  Did that mean Willow was still in the picture? Or that Braden simply had no interest in Jane “that way”? Why did she even care? She was happy being single; it was soooo much easier than having a guy in her life.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden, unpleasant jolt; someone had bumped her car from behind. “What the hell?” she exclaimed, whirling around. She saw a flash of bright light, and then another—and then she realized that a guy in the passenger seat of the car in back of hers, a black SUV, was snapping her picture. He had a professional-looking camera and lens. God, he and the driver were paparazzi!

  She turned back to the wheel, prepared to step on the gas (the traffic was starting to clear), when the SUV bumped her car again. Feeling a surge of panic, she picked up her cell and speed-dialed Braden’s number.

  Braden answered on the first ring. “Hey, I was just about to leave my apartment. Are you—”

  “Braden!”

  “Jane, what’s wrong?”

  “These paparazzi are following me in their car. They keep hitting me from behind to try to make me get out of my car or something, and—”

  “Where are you?”

  “Sunset. I’m almost at Vine.”

  “Okay, here’s what you do. . . .”

  Braden told her to drive directly to his apartment, giving her the exact directions. “Once yo
u get to the back of my building, go down into the parking garage,” he finished. “I’ll text you the security code. They can’t follow you in there. And then come up the elevator to my apartment.”

  “Okay,” Jane replied shakily.

  Hanging up, Jane did as Braden had instructed her, thankful that the gridlock had eased up enough for her to proceed down Sunset. In the rearview mirror, she could see the black SUV following, trying to edge into the lane next to hers so they could photograph her through a side window. She increased her speed, then made a sharp turn onto El Centro without using her signal. The SUV managed to keep up, but barely—now there were several cars between them. Good.

  Five minutes later, she reached the back of Braden’s building. She entered the security code, the gate opened, and she drove in. Ten seconds after the gate closed, she heard a car screeching around the corner. She parked quickly between a couple of minivans and waited, craning her neck to see the action on the alley.

  The black SUV cruised by slowly and didn’t stop. There were probably several parking garages on that alley, and the two guys would have no clue which one she had driven into, or if she’d simply kept going.

  Jane grinned triumphantly. Ha!

  After making sure that her back fender wasn’t damaged (it wasn’t), Jane went up the elevator. She took a couple of deep breaths, trying to calm down. She was fine. Her car was fine. Now she just wanted to put the whole thing behind her so she could enjoy the evening.

  Upstairs, Braden opened his door before she could even ring the bell and scooped her up in a fierce hug. “Are you okay? Did they hurt you?” he demanded.

  “I’m fine,” Jane reassured him. “Thanks so much for the escape route. It totally worked.”

  “I should probably just have told you to call nine-one-one.”

  “I thought about that, too—except, that’s probably what those guys wanted. To get pictures of me talking to the police, all upset.”

  “God. Okay, well, come on in. You could probably use a drink.”