To Hate Adam Connor
“But writing it and saying it are two very different things. I bet Jason gets a boner every time you say cock.” I grinned. “Do you try out scenes with him? Like when you get horny while you’re writing a specific scene, do you call him to say, ‘Come home and do me, Jason’? Does he have a killer dick, Olive?”
Trying her best to ignore me, she got off the bed to look at the other dresses that were hanging on the rack the stylist had left behind, as if she could escape me. “How about this one?” she asked, holding up another beautiful dress that was powder pink with almost nonexistent straps and a plunging neckline.
“First of all, you suck at changing the subject; we need to work on that.”
She huffed and turned her back to me again as she fumbled with the remaining dresses.
“Second, there is nothing wrong with wanting a big dick that can please my vagina. And last but not least, why are you so intent on letting my boobs out to play tonight?”
“Because I don’t want to stick out.”
“Oh, I think it’s too late for that. You wrote the book and they turned it into a movie. Not sticking out is out of the question, I believe, and I’m not sure my boobs would be of any help in that matter anyway. Do you think they have magic or something?”
“Fine. Try this one,” she ordered, pushing the powder pink dress into my hands.
“Fine,” I said, walking around her to get to the rack. “Then you’re trying this one.”
Olive looked at the white dress in my hands: it had a low dip in the back and it would fall all the way down to the floor on her. She was going to look mesmerizing.
“White?” she asked.
“Yes. White. Go change.” I gave her a little push and a pat on her ass, then she disappeared into the bathroom.
The only reason we weren’t getting naked in front of each other was because we wanted to make a grand entrance each time we tried a new one, build up some excitement.
“So…” she yelled from the bathroom as I sat my ass down on their bed.
“So?”
“So…how was it with Adam Connor? Every time I start mentioning him you tell me you hate him and then change the subject, and unfortunately for me you are good at that.”
“And what makes you think I won’t change it now?”
“Because you’ll pity me? Because all you said when you jumped over the wall to this side after Aiden went to sleep was how much you disliked Adam, and that’s not fair. Because how can you not talk about him to me when you spent…what four, five nights at his house? By the way, I have no idea how you got him to agree to that considering the way you met each other.”
“Maybe I’m not talking about him because I signed an NDA?”
“Don’t give me that crap, Lucy. You know I’m not asking about any private conversations you happened to overhear. I’m just asking what he is like. Like, what did you guys talk about? Did he smile at you? Did you wake up at night and take a peek in his room? Does he sleep naked? Half-naked?”
I snorted and reached for Olive’s phone. “I wonder who sounds like the psycho here.”
“I’m just asking because those are the things I’d expect you to do.”
“Thanks, Olive. I can answer one of the questions you have.”
“Please tell me he walks around naked.”
“I think I need to have a talk with Jason. Doesn’t sound like you’re getting it on the regular.” I opened the Internet browser on her phone.
“I am getting it every day, thank you very much.”
My lips twitched. I loved pushing Olive’s buttons.
“I’m just curious. Call it research if you will.”
“Sure. Just research,” I drawled, laughing. “What the heck are you doing in there?” I yelled. “Get out here so I can have a look.”
She opened the door and stepped out. “I had to pee first.”
“Whoa.” I exhaled, my eyes bugging out. “Holy shit, that looks good on you.” She looked down at herself and pursed her lips as if she wasn’t sure. “You don’t even have to try anything else, Olive. I’m telling you, that’s the dress for you.”
“You think so?” She walked over to the mirror, looking over her shoulder to see the back. “I love how light it feels on my skin, but it’s pretty low in the back.”
“It’s perfect. I’m not letting you wear anything else. Jason is going to flip.”
Her lips tipped up, and she smoothed the dress down as she kept her eyes on the mirror. “I think I like it too.”
“Trust me, it’ll drive him crazy every time he puts his hand on your back.”
“Okay. I’m sold.”
“And,” I said, waiting for her to look at me. “It looks beautiful on you. It’s going to be an amazing night, Olive. You have nothing to worry about.”
She took a deep breath and exhaled. “How do you know I’m worrying?”
I quirked an eyebrow at her and patted the spot next to me. “Because I happen to know you very well.”
She smiled a little shakily and sat down. “Is it too obvious that I don’t like this part all that much? I’d much rather see the movie for the first time with just Jason and you—not with all the cameras and all these other people I don’t even know. It’s something very special to me and they don’t even know me.”
“You can ignore everyone, Olive. This is your night with Jason, try to think of it like that. No matter what, it’ll be a beautiful night. Everyone will talk about you. You should be proud of yourself.”
“I wish my parents could’ve come, but they don’t want to have all the lights and cameras on them. We’ll go out there with Jason next week and watch it with them. You being with me tonight helps calm me a little, which is a shocker, but I’m still all jittery.”
“You’re telling me.” I shook my head. “You hate it when I wake you up early, yet this morning you woke me up at five AM. I think that was my first clue as to how nervous you were.”
She gave me a sheepish smile and dropped on her back. “Going to other galas with Jason was okay, but this feels different. I don’t want the focus on me, but Megan said I’d have to do interviews with Jason. I’m gonna screw up.”
Megan was Jason’s publicist, and she was a badass.
“You’re gonna be just fine. I’ll be there. Jason will be there. After you get over the first part, the interviews, and all the flashing cameras, it’ll be amazing. The movie will be amazing.”
She nodded and closed her eyes. “Okay.”
I reached for her phone and lay next to her. “Here, let me show you something. I wanna scream and jump up and down, but I’m afraid that’ll just freak you out more.”
“Is it something bad? If it is, forget about it, I don’t want to know.”
I unlocked her phone and pulled up Amazon’s website. “Do I scream and jump up and down when it’s something bad?”
“One can never know what you’ll do.”
“Har har. Here, look at this.” I held the phone up between us so she could see.
“Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh.” She was back to being number one on the Amazon charts, and quite possibly all the other platforms, too. I dropped the phone on the bed, and we stared up at the ceiling in silence. “You’re a killer author, Olive, and I’m proud of you.”