Hitman's Hookup: A Bad Boy Romance (39 page)

“Okay, everyone. Phones away and I’d prefer if the personal lives of everyone on this set stayed
off set
. Okay?” Fox announced.

There was a murmur and a scurry as people holstered their phones.

“Great, okay. Let’s get to our places, then.”

A few minutes later, I was sitting next to Jennifer, dead-eyed and daydreaming. There was a bitter taste in my mouth as I sat there holding the script and staring into nowhere. \

The set went quiet and the cameras started rolling.

“This is what they want, Margot,” Wilder said to Hailey. They were standing in an alleyway with fake rain pouring over their shared black umbrella. “They want us to tear each other apart.”

Hailey looked up at him with her famous doe-eyes adorned in the perfect wing-tip eyeliner. She paused three beats too long. I saw Fox move his hand to the top of his hat in frustration. Then she spoke.

“Oh, James. Let’s just run
away
together! Where they can’t find us!”

I glanced around at the people standing near me. It looked like I hadn’t imagined it. Everyone looked deeply uncomfortable. I saw a few people let slip some eye rolling.

It was official: Hailey had returned to her wooden acting once again.

Now both of Fox’s hands were on top of his head, his fingers pulling at the worn canvas of his hat.

"CUT!" Fox called out.

He actually sounded angry for once instead of simply and intensely annoyed, which appeared to be his default mode.

"Jesus fucking...
Hailey
. Darling. Seriously. You look like you're acting not only for the back row, but for people currently standing in line to see the Great Wall of China. For the love of all that is good in this world, sweetheart. I need you to stop
acting. So. Hard
."

He tapped a rolled up script against his hand as he emphasized the last three words.

The set was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop even above the sound of distant traffic a few streets over.

"And you," Fox said to Wilder, "You look like you'd rather be eating glass than standing next to this beautiful young woman."

Then Fox did something that made everyone gasp.

He took his bucket hat off and threw it on the ground.

I was surprised to see he had a gorgeously thick, wavy, silver-and-white head of hair. I was expecting a bald spot or maybe some ghastly chemical burn.

"You. Wilder.
You
fucked this up.” Wilder said nothing. “Oh, you have nothing to say? I
told
you to not fuck this up, Wilder. I
told
you.”

Fox had a manic grin on his face as looked around the set wildly.

“It’s not too late!” he cried into the air. “We can do something about this that won’t completely make me the washed-up fool most of my peers think I am.”

He laughed, and he sounded like a man about to break.

Nobody said a word. Even Janna was keeping her distance.

Then Fox clapped his hands together. "I need that blonde girl. The one that Wilder was eye-fucking during the first take. Day one of shooting. Anyone remember that?”

A few people nodded and murmured.

“Right? I wasn’t imaging that? Right? What’s her name? Adele? Adelaide? Something. Something like that."

Fox rubbed his hands together and started weaving between crew members, staring into their faces.

Everyone was whispering now. Surely he wasn't taking about me. There was no way he was talking about me. Then Lydia was suddenly at my side.

"He's talking about
you
. Go!"

I whipped my head to look at her. "How could you possibly know that?"

Lydia rolled her eyes. "I told you. I got a half dozen calls about it when I was back in Los Angeles. Get up before Fox drags you over there.”

Fox was still weaving between people. "Hello? Evelyn? Olympe? Something with a vowel as the first letter. Is she here? Looks a bit like a fat model. Anyone know who I'm talking about?"

I finally found my feet and pulled myself out of the chair.

"My name is Olivia, actually," I said to him. “If I’m the one you’re talking about, that is.”

Fox burst into a grin.

“Yes! You! The hot one! Amazing.” He clapped his hands together again. "You are
exactly
who I'm looking for. And this is perfect, because he actually wants to fuck you
in real life
but he
hasn’t yet
so it could be some believable publicity for the film without destroying your onscreen flames.”

Fox turned around to face Hailey and Wilder. “Ms. Holliday? Get off my fucking set," Fox said, his voice full of cheer. "Unless you want to stick around and see what it looks like when the two main characters in a film actually want to be in the same room as one another."

It was like the entire production held its breath collectively. We were waiting for the bomb to go off.

But it didn’t.

Hailey actually stepped out from under the umbrella and into the fake rain that the stunned production guy had forgotten to switch off. She walked under the raindrops and past Fox, snapping her fingers to call her entourage to her.

She walked quietly over to wardrobe, where she unzipped her dress down to her red, lacy underwear and panties, took off the vintage pumps Lydia had found, and walked off the set nearly naked without a single word leaving her lips.

There was silence for at least sixty seconds as everyone watched her leave. Fox broke the silence.

“Good riddance," he yelled. "Okay, Ms. Olivia. I’m now beginning to remember that you are something having to do with the script-“

“She’s the supervisor,” Janna explained. “And she’s been helping with rewrites.”

Fox held up a finger like a lightbulb had just turned on over his skull.

“Excellent! Then you should probably have most if not all of this miserable
but rallying
-" he added, turning to Jennifer who was standing a few feet away from him - "Script memorized by now. So. You know the scene. Stand on this mark over here-" he pushed me bodily and rotated me until I was on my mark, which was about an inch away from Wilder's body.

I couldn't bear to look at his face, but I could feel his heart beating through his shirt. I was soaking wet having walked through the rain.

"Okay, you have no makeup or hair or wardrobe and now you’re soaking wet, but this is just a test scene anyway,” Fox said in a rush of words. He took a few steps back until he was behind the camera again. “Great. Right there. Top of scene thirteen. Ready? Wonderful," he said with no pauses.

"Speed, marker, ACTION!" he called out.

I looked up at Wilder, and without saying a word, reached toward his face to kiss him. Our lips met. His were soft and warm beneath mine. I felt the entire world go silent around us.

It seemed like minutes before Fox yelled, “CUT!”

Fireworks were going off in my ears and my eyes, and my body was shaking and slightly limp. Fox walked over to Wilder and clapped a hand on his arm.

"Now
that
, dear son, is chemistry."

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

OLIVIA

I was sitting in the conference room of the hotel with Fox and Janna.

It was early; before six in the morning. A platter of Italian pastries rested in the center of the conference table next to a black telephone that was on speaker. Some guy from corporate back in Los Angeles was squawking over the line.

I had no appetite and could barely follow what the disembodied voice was saying to me. I was still in shock over the day before.

After the test scene, Fox had rushed me into wardrobe and makeup immediately. Lydia had to grab clothes that were supposed to be for the extras since Hailey was as big around as my right thigh and nothing intended for her would fit me.

We’d stayed on set until one in the morning. Production was now seven days behind schedule; everything that Hailey had filmed would have to be tossed out.

Janna assured Fox, who seemed to have come entirely unglued and didn’t care about anything, that with some extra hours and some script tweaks we would only need to be in Italy two extra days.

Fox had just laughed at her and given her a bear hug, walking away and chattering to himself under his breath.

I fixed my focus back on the speaker phone. The guy was
still
talking.

"You'll be required to attend all press junkets, red carpet events, and premieres, as well as any award shows -"

Fox reached forward and muted the conference call button on the phone. "That is in the
highly
unlikely event that this piece of shit movie we're making wins any awards," Fox said with a goofy grin.

I laughed. He hit the button again and the suit's voice came through the speakers. "...Okay with that I presume?"

I panicked and replied loudly, "Sorry, repeat that last bit?"

"Are you okay with everything that we just went over? I have digital copies my secretary is sending over for you to sign."

I paused. My ears were ringing and my vision was going black around the edges. I was freaking out.

Fox leaned forward. "We're going to call you back, alright?" He didn't wait for a response before hanging up.

"Olivia, I know this is all very new to you," Fox said to me kindly.

I took a deep breath and felt my vision come back into focus. “I'm okay with everything. Sure," I replied.

Fox took his glasses off and put his hands flat on the table, reaching out to stroke the back of my own hand in a fatherly way.

"If I didn't think you could do this, I wouldn't have put you in this position. But if you're not comfortable, you've
gotta
say the word. I'm not trying to scare you, but I want you going into all of this with eyes wide open. The press will find out every detail about your life, any relationships you've had in the past; anything about your family. They will
hunt
you. You are today's big story. It will feel like an eternity to you but it is only a moment in time for the press. Then they will move on to something else.”

I nodded slowly. “Okay. I think I can handle that.”

Fox sipped from his tiny, white ceramic espresso cup.

"God, I miss Folger's. Am I a stereotypical foreigner or what?" he laughed. "I think you can do this. You can handle all of it. It's a few weeks of shooting, a few months more of press chaos, then that's it. You'll get offers of other roles and you can either take them or turn them down, it's up to you. But I saw the work you did on the script. You're hired on any future movie I have behind the scenes if you want the job. So you don't need to worry about that. You just need to ask yourself:
is this what you really want?"

I stared at him, thinking about me looking in the mirror as a kid and pretending to accept my first Oscar trophy. But didn't all kids do that?

I thought back to Lorna telling me I needed to take chances and be spontaneous.

After that night with Wilder in college, I’d been burned enough to drop that assignment.

Until now.

I cleared my throat. "I guess I have to look at it from the perspective of how I would feel looking back if I didn't take this opportunity," I said slowly. "And I know I would regret it."

Fox clapped his hands together and beamed at me. "Then let's go make a movie!"

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

OLIVIA

Lydia chewed the slice of garlic baguette she'd pulled off of the loaf and stared absentmindedly at her phone screen.

I sipped from my glass of fizzy lemon water and stared across the way at Wilder, who was speaking to a wildly gesticulating Fox. It had been a few easy days on set re-filming all of Hailey’s scenes. I was having a blast, even though all of it still felt surreal.

"Any more internet updates about me?" I asked, trying to sound casual. I’d honestly never been so happy in my life not to have a reliable internet connection.

Lydia shook her head. "Nope," she said. "All the same stuff, calling you a mystery woman. Congratulations, it seems like none of your friends past or current are inclined to speak to the press."

“Anybody figured out that it was me in the gym with Wilder?”

Lydia shook her head. “Some idle speculation but nobody knows for sure. Your bandana kept you safe.”

I leaned back and stared up at the cloudless blue sky.

"You know, I always admired those celebrities who say they don't Google themselves," I said, reaching over and pulling off a few chewy bits of baguette.

"They're full of shit," Lydia replied, still not looking up from her phone.

I laughed. “
I’m
not Googling myself.”

Lydia shrugged. “Yeah, well. That’s you. You didn’t
want
to be famous, yet here you are doing this bizarre thing. The rest of all have Google alerts on our names.”

I looked back over at Fox and Wilder. They both looked like they were getting angrier with each other by the minute.

“What’s that about do you think-“

I was cut off by a shrill cry from Lydia.

“Oh Christ!” she exclaimed. I tore my eyes away from Fox and looked at her, panicking.

"What?" I asked her, feeling intensely nervous.