Hitman's Hookup: A Bad Boy Romance (32 page)

We drove along and I tried not to think about how I wish I'd packed nicer clothes. I was working on a Roman Wilder film.
Roman,
I thought. It was so weird that he'd changed his name to Roman.

And now everyone called him Wilde. I thought about that night onstage with his face buried in my...well. I was just surprised that the nickname hadn't caught on sooner than it did. He was certainly wild enough in my experience, that was for sure.

I stared out the window, deep in thought as to how this trip was already turning out incredibly differently from how I'd envisioned it.

I felt my expectations climbing against my will. I shoved them back down as hard as I could.

Well-managed expectations were the key to happiness.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

WILDER

I stormed into Fox's trailer; it was parallel parked across four spots on a blocked-off street in downtown Milan.

"What in the
royal fuck
is going on, Fox?" I yelled.

Fox was getting sunscreen applied to his face by a young blonde woman holding a white makeup sponge.
Only in Hollywood,
I thought.

"I'm guessing you just found out who your new costar is, then?" he asked me, sighing and waving away the woman. He still had white smears of sunblock where it hadn't been adequately rubbed into his skin.

I didn't bother telling him
. Let him walk around like a complete asshole,
I thought bitterly. He deserved it. “What happened to Candace?”

"Wilde, what did you expect? This whole turnaround has been like seventy-two hours, which is just absolutely ridiculous. Almost nobody from the original film could drop everything that they were doing in that amount of time. Candace walked away from her contract. One of her adopted children came down with the measles.”

Fox sighed again. “Even if her kids were healthy, did you expect her, honestly, to be able to drop everything and fly out here for your little art project?" Fox said the last part and it hit me like a dozen knives.

"I just think it would have been nice to get a
fucking
courtesy call before walking into my ex in the lobby of my hotel," he replied. "She's not even an actress, Fox. She's a
singer
. Barely," I muttered pettily under my breath.

Fox sighed. "I don't know, I liked that last tune that was all over the radio. Something about 'Fuck you, go to hell, you cheating, lying prick?' I'm pretty sure that one was called
Wild Child
.” He stood up and poured himself a glass of water, drinking deeply from it.

"She's never been accused of being subtle, I'll give her that," I replied.

"You should get royalties for her selling your life story over the pop radio airwaves like that, in my opinion. You gave her some great material." I could tell that Fox was enjoying himself entirely too much.

"Don't believe everything you hear," I said, shoving down the urge to explain exactly why we'd broken up.
I
hadn't been the one cheating. Not that Hailey cared about truth. "I really don't get this. Out of all of the actresses in the entirety of Hollywood, she was the only one willing to fly out here?"

Fox shrugged. "Her people have been looking for a vehicle for her for a while now to get her acting career off the ground. Apparently they thought a movie produced by an irresponsible, overly arrogant actor was a low-risk starting point. Especially since you're footing the bill for most of this production."

There was no maybe about it. He was enjoying this. "At the worst, I'm sure her handlers just think she'll have a nice month-and-a-half vacation in Italy," he said, tapping his knuckles on the countertop twice. "That's the most I'm hoping for out of this, to be honest. It's not like we're filming
Casablanca
here, after all."

I clenched my fist angrily. "This is bullshit, and you know it. Does anybody even know if she can act? Why wasn't I consulted?"

"There weren't any other choices. She was ready to go. Came out on her private jet overnight like it was nothing. She's between albums." A look of recognition grew over his face. "You know what, I think I've solved it!" he said with a heavy veil of sarcastic enthusiasm. "She's just here to dig up more inspiration for her next album. Be sure to break her heart again, Wilder. I prefer sad, angry songs to happy ones anyway. It's the perfect ironic backdrop to my eternally sunny disposition."

And with that, Fox tapped his hand on my shoulder and exited his own trailer.

I took a few deep breaths and walked out after him, turning an opposite direction and going to stand in an alleyway where I barely refrained from punching a brick wall. This was not going like I'd planned it to. At all.

CHAPTER TWELVE

OLIVIA

After having a major
Pretty Woman
moment in my glamourous Four Seasons hotel room, flouncing around like cameras were following me; I took a shower. After I pulled myself away from the incredible water pressure, I realized that I hadn't bothered packing any makeup.

I looked at the clock. I had two hours before I needed to be on set. I argued with myself for a good five minutes before I called the concierge and asked in Italian if they knew of the closest makeup store.

I nearly dropped the phone when they replied. "There is a shop around the corner, but the spa is also available to send someone up to do your face for you and your hair."

When I asked the price, they informed me that anything I put on my tab would be covered by the production team. I ordered that makeover so quickly it was like I was asking for a lap dance at my own bachelorette party.

Then I called the kitchen and ordered a plate of fresh pasta with pesto and a glass of sparkling water. The makeup people were there in five minutes. I asked for a more natural look, terrified I'd look like a
RuPaul's Drag Race
contestant in broad daylight if I let them be too heavy-handed.

It came down to this: I wanted to look amazing for my first day on set. For Wilder. I couldn’t pretend otherwise. I had no idea if Wilder was going to be there or not today. I'm not the only woman who has done that for a man, and I won't be the last.

I ate my pasta while the hair stylist talked to me in rapid Italian about her family and baby. She took twenty minutes to give me what was essentially a hundred-dollar ponytail. But I had to admit when I looked in the mirror that I felt incredible.

After they left and I had devoured the contents of the breadbasket -something I'd been too self-conscious to do in the presence of my styling team - I picked up the hotel phone and dialed Lydia's number back in the States. If the movie was covering everything, I might as well take advantage of that to make a long-distance phone call.

"Lydia?" I said into the phone.

"Talk fast, hon," she replied quickly. I could hear about half a dozen voices in the background and the sound of furiously working sewing machines going behind the scenes.

"Okay, this won't take long," I said, looking at myself in the mirror as I spoke on the phone. I almost didn't recognize myself. "Did you know this was a Roman Wilder film?"

Lydia paused for a half second too long. "Uh, no," she said quietly.

"Lydia!" I knew she was lying.

"Okay, okay, hang on a second, I can barely hear you," she shouted. I heard fabric and metal shifting and then the sound of a door being opened and closed. Instantly, the kerfuffle around her dimmed to a faint background noise. "I am now in the
closet
of my studio. Are you happy?"

I said nothing. She could dance around the subject all she wanted but I was getting my answer come hell or high water.

She sighed. "Okay, Liv. Yes, I did know it was a Roman Wilder movie."

"Does he know I'm going to be on the set?" I asked. I realized it was a ridiculous question the second it was out of my mouth.

"Um, you mean do you think that the most famous actor on planet Earth has been informed the script supervisor is a woman he fucked onstage in his college auditorium's theater? Yeah, no," she said. "I doubt your name came up at all, frankly. From what my contacts tell me him being a producer is essentially just a vanity project. He's really not that involved and you're not
that
memorable."

"You don't have to be mean about it," I replied, feeling stung. "Then why didn't you tell me?"

Lydia was quiet for a moment. I heard a tapping noise that sounded suspiciously like she was drumming her fingers on a metal object.

"Because I thought you'd come up with a million reasons not to go. Which is ridiculous because I know you're broke as shit and also, it's
Italy, Olivia
. Italy! I didn't want to risk you turning it down. Besides, why are you worried? It's just another job, right?" She paused. I knew what was coming. "Just like the way he was 'just another fuck'?"

In the weeks after I had sex with Wilder, Lydia had needled me for endless details about that night. She had continued to mock me about it until I snapped one day and told her never to mention his name again.

I couldn't recall the exact wording of my many diatribes against Wilder, but I was certain the phrase 'just another fuck' had been used by me as a defensive mechanism after he had humiliated me at the auditions.

"Right, well." I stared down at my bare feet on the thick carpeted floor. "The production is paying my hotel tab. So I just got my hair and makeup done."

I had to hold the received away from my ear as Lydia's screams rocketed through the line and pierced my eardrums. "I KNEW IT!!! You still have feelings for him! I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!" She said this last bit in a sing-song voice. I knew she was doing her obnoxiously endearing happy dance in the tiny closet space and the thought made me reluctantly happy.

"Lydia, calm down. It's not like he's going to rip my clothes off the second he sees me."

Lydia guffawed. "He isn't called Wilde for no reason, Liv," she replied. "I have a lot of friends who have worked on his sets. You really never know what he's going to do next."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

WILDER

I was sitting in my canvas and wood folding chair with my name embroidered into it. I'd dreamed as a kid of having this kind of chair on set with my name on it. Truth be told, these things are uncomfortable as shit for a guy as big as I am.

They were sort of comfortable when I'd first started out, but as I'd drastically changed my body shape through weightlifting and copious amounts of calories, I resembled more of a bear than a skinny, fit guy. And these chairs always felt like they were two seconds away from snapping.

Hailey's chair was about ten feet away from mine. She was having her nails painted as she yapped incessantly into her iPhone. The main makeup artist on set, a woman I'd worked with before named Beverley, was touching up some of the makeup covering my tattoos.

My short-sleeved black-fitted shirt that I'd be wearing for this scene showed all of my arms. This meant a ton of work for Bev, but she didn't seem to mind.

"You got a new one since the last film we were on together," Bev said to me, pointing at a black four-leaf clover on my bicep. When I didn't respond, she followed my eye line over to Hailey.

She rolled her eyes. "I bet that's awkward for you, huh hot stuff?"

I just shook my head. "That was a long enough time ago that it doesn't matter."

"Really? I saw online that you all were together like last week.”

“Yeah, well she sort of just
showed up.
Apparently that’s her new thing.” I clenched a fist and tried to push out of my memory the sloppy sex that had happened with Hailey that night. I’d been drunk, and she’d been, well.
Hailey
.

Bev laughed. “My daughter still sings that
Fuck You
song she wrote about you. The radio edit, obviously," she added with a smile. "It's catchy as hell."

"Thanks," I grunted sarcastically. "I think that song is more well-known than all of my films put together."

"It smashed like a dozen Billboard and radio play records. What the hell do you expect?" Bev snapped the jar of liquid makeup shut and rubbed the tip of the brush onto a white cloth. "Get over it, big boy." She slapped me on the arm. "You know what they say in the biz: all publicity is good publicity." She walked away just as Fox showed up to call everyone onto the set.

"Let's get together, people. I want this scene to be shot from three angles which means three takes. No extra takes for sneezes or for phones ringing or for
actors
forgetting their damn lines
," he added with a meaningful look at me.

I saw that Hailey was still on her fucking phone. I felt anger boiling up inside of me and I marched over to her, grabbing it out of her skinny, pale hand and shutting it off. I slammed my hands down onto either side of her, resting my palms on the thin wooden arm rests.

"If I have to fucking work with you, you're going to make this as smooth as possible, princess," I said to her.

She looked taken aback but only for the briefest of moments.

"Handsome," she whispered to me. "I'm running the show here. You can be assured that I won't take up any more of your time than is necessary." Then she pushed me off of her and walked over to the set, where wardrobe fluffed out the bottom of her skirt as she sat down at the small bistro table.

All of the extras were sitting in their 1950s garb around a makeshift coffee shop patio, a waiter with a tray standing in the doorway.

"We're all just waiting for you now, Wilde," Fox called out.

Jesus Christ.
I opened my mouth to retort that this was only because Princess Hailey needed to be put in line, but I shut it at the look on Fox's face. This was my time to not be a child anymore. I needed to remember that. I walked over to the other side of the railing that separated the seats from the street.

The crux of the scene was this: I was supposed to be strolling by when I saw the most gorgeous specimen of a woman I'd ever seen in my life. Or so said the hastily-revised script that a brand-new scriptwriter had finessed into something resembling quality; as opposed to what it was before, which was utter and complete shit.