Starlight (Peaches Monroe #2)(45)
Author: Mimi Strong

One more drink later.

Mitchell showed up at the door, with two tall men towering behind him.

“Hello, boys!” I said.

“We’re playing a game,” Mitchell said. “One of these sexy boys is straight, and it’s up to you to figure it out.”

I pointed at the teutonic blond. “I hope it’s that one.”

“Gunnar,” the blond man said, reaching out to shake my hand, then going in for the hand kiss.

Hand kiss? Oh, Gunnar was the g*y one, for realsies-for suresies.

The other tall man, with sandy brown hair, said, “I’m Daniel. I’ve heard a lot about you, Peaches. Now I’m extra-sorry I didn’t get a call-back for the shoot with you.”

“Me, too.” I grinned up at his bright, white teeth. Wow, they were really white. He looked like he just stepped off the hot-male-model factory line.

“May I?” Daniel leaned in and kissed me, right on the lips. He lingered, the scent of his skin and after shave getting into my head.

A mouth kiss? Daniel was over-compensating, which meant he was the g*y one, not Gunnar.

I frowned at Mitchell, who merely shrugged and looked angelic. Classic Mitchell.*

*After six drinks, I could have sworn Mitchell and I went way back to high school. Did I say I’d had five drinks earlier? I meant six.

Gunnar looked past me, sneaking a peek at the apartment. The table was pushed back over to the window, and the folding chairs were gone.

He said, “Any girlfriends you want to invite along?”

I laughed, then veered dangerously close to sobbing like a drunk, hysterical girl. Shayla should have come with me to LA. I was not equipped to handle any of this stuff alone.

“Just me,” I said, forcing a grin. “Mitchell, how will we all fit in your Miada?”

Daniel offered me his elbow like a gentleman. “We have a limo and driver. Come on, let’s have some fun and get our pictures taken.”

I gasped, my hands on either side of my face like some cartoon drunk version of myself. “Photos! The paparazzi! I look like crap!”

Mitchell helped himself to the contents of my purse. I didn’t even know how he found my purse, considering I’d been searching for it the last half hour.

The boys deemed my green sundress to be party-appropriate. Mitchell quickly powdered my face and applied a pink lipstick to my lips. “Never go dark for a night out,” he said. “The flash makes your skin look pale and even the smallest smear of lipstick will give you a fallen-star look.”

“Perfect,” Gunnar said. “That’s a good pink, and you can leave some on my neck later.”

“You’re bad.” I swatted at him.

Then we were on our way.

I walked out Keith’s door and shut it behind me. Who would be returning there first? Not me.

The tall escorts each took one side of me, linking my arms with theirs, and we walked through the quiet courtyard and out the gate to a waiting vehicle—a stretch limousine.

“Now we’re talking!” I said. “Let’s find some trouble.”

Mitchell smirked as he held open the door.

I climbed into the limo, and no sooner had I gotten settled than I had a champagne flute in my hand.

“Here’s to new friends,” Mitchell said.

“And future old friends,” I added.

We clinked glasses and the air tinkled with magic. Magic, I tell you! Exclamation point necessary!

Going out in LA bears absolutely no resemblance to going out partying in Beaverdale.

First of all, nobody in LA wears polar fleece shirts or those fleece-lined jackets Shayla refers to as Canadian Tuxedos.

People have to dress up to get into the good clubs, and they line up out front behind velvet ropes. Yes, velvet ropes. That shit you see on TV is real!

In our first line of the night, my three men posed for the lady with the clipboard. I didn’t know what to do, so I smiled really big, like a pageant contestant.

She looked me up and down. “Team Peaches,” she said, nodding. The woman had a little junk in her black-jeans-wearing trunk, so call it my lucky night that I encountered the only plus-sized club promoter in the city. She sent us in to the club, only to get smacked in the face by loud music and a cloud of cologne.

I coughed a few times and gradually acclimatized, like an alien visitor on Planet Swanky. We wandered through the club, which could also be called Planet Hoochie, and I spotted some upper levels separated by staircases and guarded by security staff with headsets. I craned my neck to see who was up there. In amongst some fine-looking ladies were a few men as tall as Washington fir trees. Basketball players. Famous ones.

I got the fame-proximity giggles. The next platform we walked past had a skinny white guy in a ton of jewelry, with two ladies on either side of him. This made me giggle so hard.

Mitchell looped his arm around my waist and asked, “What’s so funny?”

I wiped a tear from the corner of my eye. “I don’t know. It’s like a petting zoo in here, but with famous people instead of zebras.”

The four of us squeezed our way around an empty table and leaned in, elbows on the table.

The blond hottie, Gunnar, asked if I was having fun, and the other guy, Daniel, ordered a bottle of champagne for the table. Mitchell just gave me that look, like, Do I know how to show you a good time, or what?

I nodded back at him. Yes, you do, Mitchell. Yes, you do.

Three hours later.

I’d just tinkled on someone’s front lawn, and my whole body was sticky from letting the guys drink champagne from my boobs in the limo. Or did that start at the club? I couldn’t remember, and it didn’t matter.

My feet didn’t hurt at all, which concerned me, because they’d been hurting an hour earlier, after all the dancing. I checked that they were still attached to my body.

I climbed back into the limo, saying, “Achievement unlocked! I just tinkled on someone’s lawn. I’ve never done that before. It’s quite liberating. Now I understand why you men are always widdling everywhere.”

Daniel slid closer to me on the bench seat of the limo and kissed my shoulder. “Let’s go skinny dipping.”

I slid away, keeping a little distance between us. Flirting and dancing was fine, but I wasn’t about to play hide-the-swizzle-stick with my second model of the trip. Besides, after all that booze, I couldn’t even feel my woowoo.

The other guys didn’t say much, because they were making out.

“They’re so cute,” I said, smiling at the two guys, one tall and one short, both blond, kissing in a tender way. “You don’t see that much where I’m from.”