Celebrity 2 - Acting Out (2 page)

Cree sat silently and Evan felt the inevitable pull into sleep, numbing his ears to nothing more than the rhythm of his own breathing. What seemed like moments later, a large warm hand curled over his forearm.

Evan turned toward the low, husky voice. He smiled and opened his eyes. Cree leaned over, his clear blue eyes shocking in their vibrancy. Evan startled. Amusement flitted over Cree’s face and his lips twisted into a secretive smile.

He sat back, caught the door latch on his side and scooted toward the opening. “Your lips pucker in your sleep,” Cree told him right before he exited.

Evan’s face burned.
They did?
He hurried from the car and stood at the trunk.
“Driver, see that the boxes are put inside the house. I don’t want sleeping beauty there to work too hard.” Cree casually climbed the front steps.
Evan frowned at his back. “Cree,” he called.
Cree paused at the top step. He turned, looking expectedly back at him with his eyebrows lifted.
“There isn’t a day I don’t bust my ass to make sure your life runs smoothly.” Evan hoisted the totes over his shoulders and grabbed the stacked boxes from the driver’s hands. “If my best isn’t good enough, then let me know, so I can stop wasting my time.”
Cree’s smile widened. “That’s the spirit.” He took the steps in two loping strides and disappeared inside.
“What the fuck was that?” Evan snapped.
The driver shrugged. “You got everything?”
“Yeah, I’m good. Thanks.”
The driver pulled away as Evan faced the steps. What did Cree mean by
that’s the spirit
? What kind of asshole said shit like that when he was getting the riot act from an
employee
?
Evan got a grip on his temper and trudged the collection of electronics back to the office he’d been given. The entire lower wing was his, technically. He’d thought it strange, at first, that Cree wanted his employee living in house with him. Then he realized just how often Cree called on him to do stuff that wouldn’t fall inside normal business hours. Evan might not have to pay rent, but the tradeoff was payment made.
Cree knocked on the smoky glass of the office door. “I’m going to need you to run lines with me.”
Well, that’s something new
. “Any scene in particular?”
“Yeah. All of them.”
It was late. They’d been at the set all day. Evan really wanted a shower, a big fluffy robe, and the silence of his bedroom. He didn’t even feel like checking the personal messages from home. He knew his mom wasn’t happy he’d come to Hollywood. But he’d come, and he’d stay, until he’d done what he’d needed to do.
“When?” Evan asked.
“Five minutes.” Cree pushed away from the doorframe he’d been leaning on.
“I need a shower, about thirty minutes to decompress, and some dinner.”
Cree lifted his brows at him. It was the same
oh, really
look he’d been given on the steps when Evan snapped at him. “Talking back is becoming something of a habit for you,” he noted.
“Please?”
“I’ll call for Indian food. That’ll give you about forty-five minutes. Enough?”
Evan nodded. Cree left. Working for the famous Cree Radek was challenging already, but with exchanges like that one, and the long hours he kept, it felt more like ten years. He’d never met anyone back home who had behaved like such a dick before. Cree Radek wasn’t normal though. He was Hollywood royalty. He was sexy and talented and had those great lips.
Evan was annoyed with himself. Those great lips said a lot of irritating shit, too. If ever there were a case for a man to be more than his looks, it was Cree. He looked like a dark angel. He behaved like a spoiled, sullen, little brat. Damn that Evan kind of liked it.
Moving down the short hallway to Evan’s expansive suite, he calculated just how long it would take him to finish up in California. He needed more money, money he was earning every day he stayed here as an assistant. Besides, working for Cree gave him the access to rub elbows with Hollywood, and that was definitely part of the plan.
Grudgingly, he admitted that even being dragged to the set every day would help him reach his goal. And once he had his in, once he’d found that deadbeat, family-deserting man who’d spawned him, all bets were off.

Cree paced the white marble great room. His bare feet chilled against the cool surface and he glanced again down the hall where Evan lived. If he didn’t appear soon, the delivery guy would be here with dinner and Cree would have to go out and get the food himself.

He scrubbed a shaking hand over his face. He didn’t know what bothered him more. That he had a sexy, unapproachable assistant currently naked and soaking wet about a hundred yards away, or that he’d have to face the possibility of paparazzi shooting pictures of him collecting his dinner.

Did that shit actually sell magazines? Anxiety tightened a fist in his chest. They were a menace. Always in his business. Always looking for a story that didn’t exist. Always trying to follow him such that driving had become too dangerous.
They
were the reason he employed a driver.

Cree took a breath, ready to call out for dependable, capable Evan, but Evan beat him to it. His bedroom door opened and he stepped out. Cree immediately felt himself calm.

The other man’s hair had been rubbed semi-dry into spikes. He looked freshly scrubbed. His lean hips and long legs were covered in the most worn pair of gray sweatpants Cree had ever seen. They molded his thighs perfectly and looked incredibly soft to the touch. His faded gray Ball State T-shirt, having lost its form years ago, draped thinly over his chest and tight abdomen.

Bare feet lightly slapped the floor as he approached Cree. It took all his willpower not to wrap his arms around Evan and hold him close, breathing in his scent, feeling his comfortable warmth, and hoping he could talk his new assistant right into his bedroom.

The chime saved him. “Dinner’s here. There’s cash on the front table. Bring dinner into the living room.”
“Indian curry in a room loaded with white furniture?” Evan questioned.
“Are you planning on spilling?” Cree walked to the bank of windows overlooking Malibu Beach. Watching Evan walk away from him and getting a vivid look at his tight ass and surprisingly wide shoulders, was too much temptation. You didn’t fuck your assistant in Hollywood. White collar types in bread-basket America could get away with it, but in Hollywood everyone knew your business before you did.
A few minutes later the front door closed and Evan’s bare feet padded over the marble into the living room. Cree waited for the crinkle of plastic to stop, hearing the distinctive sounds of containers being lifted from the rattling bag and placed on the glass coffee table.
It sounded like Evan wadded up the bags and his steps faded off to the right behind him. Cree refocused on the reflection of his house in the large windows. Evan came back holding two soda cans in one hand and a compliment of plates, cutlery, and napkins in the other.
Cree smiled. It had taken his last assistant three months to know what he’d want to drink, or to intuit that he’d want one. It had taken Evan only two hours.
Cree watched him approach, set down the plates and one of the drinks. He popped the top on the second one and moved to stand patiently behind Cree. Their gazes met in the reflection. Neither man flinched.
“I picked up another copy of the script for you today. Make whatever notes in it that you need.” Cree turned, took his drink, and walked to the couch where he instead sat on the floor in front of the table.
Evan followed, sitting on the floor beside him.
“We’re going over the scene where Johnny is about to ask Pippa on a date, but Pippa starts gushing about Eric.” Evan scooped yellow rice onto his plate, then covered it with chicken tikka marsala. He pulled free a piece of naan. He licked his fingers and held the container of bread to Evan.
Evan handed him a napkin, then served himself, too. He passed silverware to Cree just as Cree scanned the tabletop to find it.
Perfect synch.
It made him smile.
“Page?” Evan asked.
“Forty-three. Use inflection when you deliver the lines.”
The men silently flipped to the correct spot, sneaking in a mouthful of food.
Cree put the script aside and jumped right in. “Pippa, we’ve been friends for a while now.”
“Oh. You started already.” Evan scanned the page, his finger tracing the lines until he found it.
“Pippa, we’ve been friends for a while now,” Cree began again.
“Are you kidding? Since the womb, practically.”
“We pretty much tell each other everything. All our secrets. Things we don’t tell other people…”
“This is about Eric isn’t it?” Evan-Pippa announced uncomfortably.
“Not really.”
“Because I was going to tell you, I swear. It’s just that he finally asked me out! Can you believe it? I’ve been working for the man for eight years and now,
now
he sees me? Pippa gives a girlie squeal,” Evan intoned.
“You could just squeal instead of reading the stage directions,” Cree said.
“I don’t squeal.”
Cree snorted his soda. It burned and he grabbed a napkin to hold over his face. His eyes watered and he started coughing.
“You going to live?” Evan asked, roughly slapping Cree’s back.
Cree tried to answer but he couldn’t catch his breath to say more than, “Burns.”
“I bet. Hot Indian curry and carbonated beverage were never meant for inhalation.”
Cree laughed between coughs. He dragged a piece of naan through the Kashmiri sauce and pushed the morsel into Evan’s mouth to shut him up. Evan’s lips closed around Cree’s finger tips. The barest flicker of tongue swept the underside of his pointer finger.
Cree’s mouth dried up on the spot. He pulled his fingers free and wiped them on his napkin as he purposefully redirected attention to the script. Then taking another drink, he found the next line.
“Johnny’s face falls, and he pauses for a moment before he says, ‘Eric, huh?’”
“Or you could act the stage directions instead of reading them,” Evan teased, throwing Cree’s words back at him.
Cree felt his face heat in a rare blush. “Place finding,” he explained hurriedly.
“Ri-iight.”

Had that been a
moment
, Evan wondered? It was hard to tell. It passed so quickly. What was he thinking? Cree Radek didn’t give
moments
to mere mortals. And why should he? Evan worked for him. They were just running lines and, in all fairness, Evan had been the one to forget that arrangement. He’d been the one trying to tease Cree with some tongue play.

It was good he’d pulled his fingers out when he had. Curry, and he suspected any food, tasted better when licked off Cree. If he’d delayed even a second longer, Evan would have given into temptation and sucked those digits. A finger blow.

God, he’d almost slipped up. He couldn’t lose this job. Not yet. Not when he was so close to finding his scumbag father. He needed Cree and his connections. He couldn’t blow this, or Cree, for that matter.

Evan’s full cock was becoming uncomfortable. In his old sweats, it wouldn’t take much for Cree to notice the inappropriate bulge going on. Evan shifted carefully, placing the script over his lap to lay open while they ate and ran lines. It seemed like a natural placement. Maybe Cree wouldn’t notice.

They worked for another two hours, finally calling it quits around midnight.
“Let’s hit the sack,” Cree announced, his voice rasping with the same fatigue Evan felt. “We’re leaving for the set at five.”
“In the morning?” Evan asked stupidly.
Cree cracked a smile, stretching those perfect lips over equally perfect teeth. They had to have been whitened. No one had a smile that bright. He found himself staring at Cree’s mouth wishing it would come just a little closer.
“Run lines with me while I’m in makeup tomorrow.”
“At five in the morning,” Evan stated rather than asked.
Cree looked at him, humor still dancing in his eyes as he tipped his head to the side slightly. “And wear your hair like that.”
“At five in the morning?”
“You can say it as many times as you want. It doesn’t suddenly mean something different.”
Evan struggled to his feet. “Actors are insane,” he muttered. He looked down at the dinner mess.
Cree rose beside him. “Leave it. The maid will take care of it tomorrow.”
“That’s kind of gross isn’t it?”
“No. We ate it all. Now we have about four hours to sleep before we’re up doing today over again. That’s why I hire maid service to take care of stuff like this. I hired
you
to take care of me. That doesn’t include windows and dishes. So take care of me. Be ready at five tomorrow.”
Cree strolled his loose hipped gait to the open-sided staircase that led to his room. “Oh and, Walker?”
“Yeah?”
“We’ll be having days like this for the next three months. Maybe even eight months if we keep the same pace on location.”
Cree was the king of throwing statements over his shoulder and not waiting to see if there was fallout. Evan groaned under his breath. Lord help him. Enough days like this and he’d be too tired to keep himself in check around Cree. Evan needed to step up his search, because the moment he made the mistake of coming on to Cree in earnest, he’d be fired and there would be no money to support his search in Hollywood.

A week later, Evan’s phone buzzed. He looked down at it expecting to see his mother’s number. Instead, it was the number of a gripper who’d worked on set with his dad a year ago. Hurriedly, he took the call.

“Evan Walker,” he answered.
“Hi. Are you the guy who called about David Fowler?” Cree stepped into the trailer. The pit of Evan’s stomach

dropped sickeningly. He didn’t want to take this call with Cree hanging around, but hanging up on this guy after finally tracking down someone who’d worked with Evan’s dad wasn’t something he could bring himself to do either.

“Well, my buddy told me I should call you back. He says you work for Cree Radek.”
“I do, does that matter?”
“’Course it does. Cree Radek doesn’t hire idiots.”
“Good to know.” Evan caught the curious glances from his boss. He turned his back, using Cree’s tote as an excuse to break eye contact. He dug out a bottle of water and tossed it to Cree.
Cree caught it easily. “Who’s that?”
“Just someone.”
“Usually. Unless you’ve taken to talking to dead air,” Cree joked.
“So, can what can you tell me?” Evan asked the man on the phone.
“I worked with him. He got into some trouble on set, though. Always had a flask on him, if you know what I mean.”
“Walker, when you’re done?” Cree asked dryly.
Evan nodded at him. “I just need a minute,” he whispered. To the man on the phone, he murmured acknowledgment. “I know what you mean.”
“So,” and Evan could almost hear the shrug in his voice, “he was escorted off the set about halfway through filming. That’s it.”
“Do you know where to find him?”
“He turns up. You want me to give him this number if I see him?”
“No, but call me and let me know where to go,” Evan said.
The guy laughed. “That’s a loaded one, ain’t it?”
Evan laughed, too, although the joke didn’t strike him as funny.
He’d already been in hell. So had his family, because of the asshole who’d impregnated an underage girl and left her to raise a son alone. There’d be retribution and even if the State of California couldn’t find him to force him into back child support, Evan owed it to his mother to make sure
he
did. She’d deserved so much better than she’d gotten.
“If you know anyone else that can tell me anything, pass my number along,” Evan told him.
“I’ll do that.” There was a pause. “Mr. Walker, I’m always looking for side work. If you hear that a company needs to hire a gripper, or a camera man ’cause I do both, do me a solid.”
“I’ll look today,” Evan agreed.
“Thanks, man.”
Evan disconnected and slipped his phone in his pocket. “Do we need to run lines again?”
“What was that about?” Cree asked.
“Personal business.”
“Sounds like you’re looking for somebody.”
How much should Evan tell him? Over the past week, he’d discovered that Cree disguised a lot of his thoughts with silence. But if he listened closely to the questions Cree asked, or the things he did, it told him more than a heartfelt confession ever would.
Like now. If he took that question at face value, which it could be, Cree was being nosy and perhaps a little territorial about Evan using business hours for personal phone calls. But it didn’t have that feeling behind it.
Instead of answering Evan’s business directed question about returning to lines, Cree had deliberately refocused on Evan. And that told him that Cree saw a little too well how the phone call affected Evan. Cree was showing concern.
Or at least he thought Cree was. It wasn’t an exact science, but he did seem to read Cree better now than when he’d first been hired.
“You can tell me, Evan. I could help you.”
Evan’s ears rushed. In the two weeks he’d worked side-by-side with Cree, he’d never called him anything but Walker. Evan had followed his lead, only calling Cree “Mr. Radek.”
He liked the way Cree’s lips formed his name, the flash of white teeth pressing Cree’s bottom lip before sliding out of view.
“What makes you think I need help?” Evan asked, fixated on Cree’s mouth to see if he’d use his name again.
“I know you get calls. That’s the first one you didn’t end the minute I walked in the room. That call was important.”
Looked like Cree had learned a few things about Evan when he wasn’t looking. Cree closed the distance between them. Evan felt suddenly naked. Not only did Cree look at him like he could see inside Evan’s head, but Evan had nothing to occupy his hands. Nothing he could pretend was more interesting than the man closing the distance between them.
“Maybe,” Evan said, hoping that would satisfy Cree’s curiosity and put them back on track for work. Anything to keep Cree from getting close enough to see how badly Evan wanted to kiss that gorgeous mouth and say stupid things about how pretty his eyes are.
“Maybe you’ll let me help, or maybe you’ll tell me who you’re looking for?” Cree asked. “I have connections.”
He knew Cree had connections. While he’d needed the job to pay for the search and living expenses, and to get access to the movers and shakers in Hollywood, he hadn’t been angling to take advantage of star-power.
“Just
maybe
,” Evan said.
It was possibly the dumbest thing he could have answered, because it inadvertently issued a challenge to Cree to uncover the secret. Evan should have just told him, but he’d been harboring this mission, of sorts, for long enough that the outcome really mattered to him. Like a dog with a bone, he wasn’t ready to share it. It was his burden, his fight, his pain, his life. None of those things involved Cree Radek.
Cree stopped a foot from Evan. It was too close. God, just way too close. He cocked his head, and hands on his hips, he simply stared at Evan.
Close in height, Evan couldn’t even use that as an excuse to look anywhere else. Besides, with Cree in front of him, why would he
want
to look anywhere else?
“I’d help you,” Cree said finally.
“I know.”
Cree nodded slowly. “When you’re ready to ask, the offer stands.”
“What
other
offer will stand?” Evan could have smacked himself.
Cree’s brows did the trademark lift. “What are you asking?”
“Nothing,” Evan choked out nervously.