Making Love (Destiny Book 1) (7 page)

I got dressed while he was in the shower and was ready to go once he had changed. When he got out of the shower, his hair was still damp and starting to curl at the ends, which made me, um, rather randy. So after a small, uh, delay, we went to breakfast.

We spent the rest of the day with Will showing me some of his favourite places, such as Venice Beach (I personally don’t see much of interest in a beach, but watching the hot guys work out was a definite plus), his favourite shops and we were going to one of his favourite eateries that night.

It was an enjoyable day but at the same time, also very strange. This was the first time really, when we couldn’t act like a couple. We walked side by side most of the time, after all, I could have been anyone (and I
was
a nobody) and Will wore a baseball cap and glasses, so few people paid much attention to us. Still, it was odd not being able to reach out and take his hand, or kiss him, or put my arm around him, and feel him do the same.

Back in London, we hadn’t really done much touristy stuff, because we were both locals. The places we went to eat, were usually out of the way places that Will had frequented for years, and the owners were somewhat protective of him and gave him out of the way tables, or stopped people trying to surreptitiously take pictures on their phones. These were also not locations that were likely to be frequented by the paparazzi.

That night though, we were going to Culina, a modern Italian which was at the Four Seasons and usually had one or two paps hanging around nearby, which meant I had to go in alone and wait for Will.

The host gave a very slight double take when I gave her Will’s name, which made me feel incredibly out of place but she quickly covered her feelings and led me to the table. Will joined me only minutes later, kissing me as he sat down.

Inside we were free to behave like a couple and I mostly forgot to feel self-conscious. The restaurant itself was amazing; we sat outside on the terrace and everything about the place, from the food to the ‘floating fireplace’ (no, it didn’t actually float) was wonderful.

Of course, so were the prices, but Will insisted on paying, even although he’d bought breakfast this morning and it was my turn. My look said we’d be having a discussion about this when we got home. His answering expression said much the same.

When we left, again we had to do so separately, taking different cabs back to the same house. Weird.

As I let myself into the house I was considering saying ‘
fuck it, let’s go public
’ but then I remembered what Lee had said and shown me. I simply wasn’t ready for that.

Will got there about ten minutes later and I was ready for the argument, which I think he could see the moment he came in. He held his hand up.              

“Please, just hear me out first, okay?” Will implored.

I nodded for him to continue and he came to sit next to me on the sofa, taking my hand and turning me so we were facing each other.

“The way I see things, is that my job is causing you to spend more money than you would normally. If you were dating a London banker, for example, you wouldn’t have needed to buy plane tickets just to see him, or to go to expensive restaurants, or to buy fancy dresses to go to those restaurants.”

Clearly he had noticed my discomfort with my dress tonight. It was lovely, but it was evidently not Hollywood lovely.

“We didn’t have to in London.”

“But I’ve lived in London for years and I have a… network of sorts, I’ve built up a lot of goodwill. Here I haven’t got that, no restaurant owners are going to go out of their way for me, so if we want any kind of normal life, we have to go to the celebrity places that make allowances for that. Places you wouldn’t be going if not for me. And you wouldn’t need your own taxi if not for me. My job pays me very well and it seems unfair for the limits my job imposes on us, to cost you money, so I simply want to pay for the costs that you wouldn’t incur if you were dating a regular person. Is that really too much to ask?”

“When you put it like that, it sounds really logical and makes me feel like a shrew.”

“You’re not a shrew and I understand completely that you don’t like taking money you haven’t earned. But I like having you here; I’ve been so looking forward to your arrival, ask anyone, I’ve hardly shut up about you. Whenever possible, I want you to continue to come and see me when I’m working away, and I want you with me at award shows and on dates to stupidly expensive restaurants, but I don’t want our relationship to hurt your bank balance and maybe make you say ‘no’ sometimes, when it’s just money keeping us apart. Please, darling, let me do what I can to take that burden off you.”

“I want that too,” I assured him. “I’ll try not to make such a fuss in the future.”

“That’s all I ask,” he smiled that big, goofy smile at me and I melted.

It wasn’t going to be easy, I hate borrowing money, even from the bank, I have no credit or store cards and no overdrafts. Getting a mortgage was hell because apparently if you don’t have any debts, you have no record of your ability to pay off said debts, but my mortgage and student loans were the only credit I deemed worthy of accepting. Taking a hand-out is even worse than borrowing, but I supposed I could keep my mouth shut.

***

The next three days were all busy and I quickly got used to not showing affection in public. We weren’t usually huge party animals, so being out so often wasn’t going to become the norm and things were fine once Will got back to work. I could go out on my own without Will and not have to worry about who might see me, and we spent every evening in, usually with me cooking since he had such long days.

The night shoots were a little weird as we were on completely different internal clocks, but probably exactly the same as being with a night-shift worker. We made it work and always managed to spend a few hours together each day. Luckily, they only lasted a week, then he was back to regular shooting hours, which meant his car came at 6am and he was back anywhere between 6pm and 10pm. Sometimes he finished early, which was great, and he had days off sometimes, but my life didn’t revolve around him so I wasn’t sitting at home alone, pining.

I did go to the set a couple of times because Will wanted me to see where he worked. I chatted with him and the women in make-up, then I partly trailed around him, watching the scenes being shot, or I spent time in his trailer, either alone or with Will in between scenes, but while it was an interesting experience, I did have my own work to do and I couldn’t afford to go with him often. Plus, there is a hell of a lot more waiting around on sets than I had ever thought. I presumed they were an efficient machine and actors moved from one scene to the next quite quickly. Oh no! First they had to rehearse the scene, then they had to block it (map out where everyone would be), place marks if necessary, adjust the lighting for each mark, then finally film it, then shoot the close ups of the same scene, the reverse angles, and then the retakes until it was perfect. Added to that, sometimes an entire set up was necessary for the delivery of one line.

Will had the patience of a saint and honestly, if it had been me, I would have soon lost my cool if this was my job. I knew that I simply couldn’t care that much about getting a close up of an actor’s reaction that I would spend an hour or more of everyone’s time getting that one line perfect. I’d have gone with the wide angle.

Of course, I obsessed over those details in my own work, so all it really showed was that acting wasn’t the career for me.

Everyone was lovely to me though, chatting to me or explaining what was happening; there were always so many people standing around, waiting for someone else to finish their job, that plenty of people chatted and passed the time with me. The set was exceptionally friendly.

The make-up lady explained that it wasn’t always so nice, a bad director could ruin the mood on a set, but most of the good ones understood the difficulties and were practiced at keeping a calm, level head.

When I wasn’t with Will, I had the illustrations for the second children’s book to do, plus my regular comic strips and my freelance graphic design work. The time difference made things a little inconvenient; if I wanted a reply that day, I had to email first thing in the morning, about 8am or earlier. Even then, some people didn’t answer that day as it was nearly quitting time in the UK. I managed though, I’ve always been efficient with my time.

I Skyped a lot with my friends and family back home (they thought Will was out here travelling with a theatre production). My sister was getting more and more irate about my not sending her a picture of Will or anything but due to the time difference, she could never ask to Skype with him since he was either asleep after a night shoot, or out at work.

I would have to tell her the truth soon though, the lying was killing me.

A week after I arrived in LA, a week of fudging every time she asked what Will was up to, or what the play was, I decided to bite the bullet and tell her. Will had never been against it, it was my own fears that had stopped me, so on Sunday afternoon (Will’s day off) I texted her to make sure she was at home and the kids were in bed (as they should be at 10pm on a Sunday night) and we were Skyping minutes later.

Hannah has the same colouring as I do but our features are very different. She mostly looks like our mother while I favour our father (I know, but somehow I make it work).

“I’ve got something to tell you,” I said as my sister’s face filled my laptop screen.

“That sounds ominous.”

“No, it’s good news. It’s about Will.” Although he was taking care not to watch me, I could feel him listening to every word.

“I knew you were hiding something!” She quickly schooled her usually open features into a mask of indifference. It was something I’d noticed she did with her girls sometimes, when she wanted them to admit to something that they knew would get them in trouble.

“It’s nothing bad, Han, it’s just that… he doesn’t really work for a theatre company. I mean, he has, but that’s not really his job… kind of.”

“Okay?” I could tell she wanted to shake it out of me but was restraining herself.

I took a deep breath and before my courage could fail me, I blurted out, “I’m dating Will Braxton.”

“Who?”

“They guy who plays Dante in the Shadow Watch films.”

Hannah laughed, “Good one. I’m married to George Clooney. You might have seen our wedding pictures in Hello last year.”

“Han, I’m serious, he’s the Will I’ve been seeing since January.”

Hannah stared at me (or her laptop screen) and neither of us knew what to say. I guess she was still deciding if I was pulling her leg or not.

“Hello!” Suddenly Will’s head appeared beside me. “Wonderful to finally meet you, Hannah, I’ve heard a lot of lovely things.”

“Holy fuck!”

“Language!” I hissed.

Will smiled smugly. “Sorry to intrude on your chat. Do you want a glass of wine, darling?”

“Please,” I smiled gratefully at him and he disappeared off into the kitchen.

“You’re drinking in the afternoon!” Hannah screeched. Honestly, I thought she’d be less weird about it, she’s always been the sensible sister.

“Yes, because that’s the important thing here.” I rolled my eyes. “I’m on holiday and it’s my first glass, so back off.”

She did. Sometimes she forgets she’s my sister and not my mother.

“Wow. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because it was hard enough for me to get my head around and I didn’t want to jinx it. Then after Lee and his whole ‘secrecy is best if possible’ speech, I was a little afraid to.”

“Afraid of what? Of me?”

“No, afraid you might give the game away and… well the girlfriends of famous men generally have a lot of hate directed their way, and I want to avoid that for as long as possible. Just, please don’t tell anyone.”

She nodded her head. “It’s okay, I get it now. I’m really happy for you.”

“Thank you.” I grinned back.

We disconnected soon after that as Hannah had to be up for work in the morning.

“That wasn’t so bad was it?” Will said, putting his arm around my shoulders as I joined him on the couch.

I was still apprehensive though. “We’ll see,” was my noncommittal reply. I knew she wouldn’t air her doubts with Will around, so that would come the next time we spoke.

“Look, you know I’m happy for you, right?” was Hannah’s opening gambit the next time we talked, so I knew this was going to be bad.

“I know,” I assured her.

“I just want to make sure you know what you’re getting into here. I mean he seems like a really nice guy but he’s really famous and I’ve looked online, and he has a huge following. Are you ready for what a life with him could mean? Your holiday pictures will end up in Heat magazine, and you’ll constantly be compared to surgically enhanced Hollywood babes and found wanting.”

“I know exactly what I’m getting into,” I assured her. “Lee briefed me on what to expect once we go public.”

“Who is this Lee?”

“He works for Destiny PR, he’s Will’s publicist.”

“He has his own publicist?” she shook her head sadly. “You’re getting into a whole other world here, Elle, are you sure you’re ready for this?”

“I’m as ready as I can be, Han. I’ve been through all the drawbacks and decided that Will is worth it, but even if I’m wrong and Will and I can't make it together, the press will forget about me as soon as I leave him. I really like him, Han, so what have I got to lose? I mean, I really, really like him?”

“Oh God, you aren’t in love already, are you?”

Yes. “No, of course not, but I’m not going to let my fears stop this without even trying. I know it won’t be easy, it’s already weird, but when it’s just him and me, it’s everything that’s been missing from my previous relationships.”

Hannah gave a weary sigh. “What happens when the press find out that you met and fell in love thanks to an experiment?”

“I have no idea,” I admitted. “I expect to some people it’ll be an interesting story and to others, they’ll use it as an excuse to say we aren’t really in love.”

“Well, certainly sounds like you’ve thought this through.”

“I have, Han, I’ve thought it all through and while the reality might not live up to my expectations, I’m not going to give up because of what might happen.”

“Oh hunny, I’m just worried you’re going to get hurt.”

“Every relationship comes with that chance. Even now, Bob could leave you for a 20 year old underwear model.” Although my point was serious, we laughed, because Bob was a prematurely balding, middle aged accountant, who was only middle-class wealthy, and decidedly average in the looks department.

He treated Hannah like a queen though and she adored him, which is what matters in these things.

Hannah didn’t always date average looking men though. During her A’Levels she’d had her heart broken by the school’s biggest heartthrob, Mike Steadman, who turned out to be a big time loser (and personally, I think borderline psychopath) and Hannah had been batting seriously below her average ever since. I think she now equates good looks and/or popularity with being an evil, manipulative, lying little shit.

But Will wasn’t Mike, and he never would be.

“Look, I don’t want to rain on your parade so I won’t say anything more about it, and please know you can come to me if you need to. I promise I’ll never say ‘I told you so’.”

“I know.” I smiled at her. That was our mother’s line, Hannah had never said it to me, not even when I deserved it. “Anyway, I’d better get on with my day, I have some preliminary sketches to do, then I need to go grocery shopping because we’ve got nothing in for dinner.”

“He hasn’t brought you out there to be a glorified housekeeper, has he?”

“He didn’t bring me anywhere, I booked and paid for my own ticket, thank you very much, and no, he offered to go shopping yesterday but I said I’d rather spend the day with him and do it today.”

“All right, all right, I’m sorry.” She held her hands up, knowing that she’d pushed me just a bit too far.

“I’m thinking of staying on longer, actually, I like the sun and I’m settled and I honestly can't wait another three or four weeks to see Will again.”

“It’s expensive to change flights.”

“I know.” I gave her the fakest smile I’ve ever given everyone. I did not mention that if I did stay on, Will had insisted on shouldering the cost of my ticket. It was hard enough for me to deal with that, let alone listen to Hannah drone on about the need to be self-sufficient.

That was rich coming from a woman who only worked part time but she insisted that the difference was a marriage licence.

Whatever!

“So have you told Mum yet?” she asked.

“No! And you aren’t to either! You know she couldn’t keep a secret if her life depended on it.”

Luckily, neither of us has to speak to her very often. Visits are even more rare since she moved to Manchester for her job and met husband number three.

“Okay, you have my word. I’ll talk to you soon, okay?” Hannah said.

“Okay. Give my love to the lovable rogues.” That’s what I called her daughters, Cara and Caitlin, because they were always into some mischief or other.

“Bye Elle.”

“Bye Han.”

We both sounded a little sad. I really hoped that my dating Will wasn’t going to become an issue.

***

I extended my stay to three weeks, then four, but then I insisted that I had to get back. It would only be two weeks until Will returned then, and I really couldn’t make my life all about him. Work wasn’t the issue, but I had friends in London and I hate those women who give up their friends the moment they get a boyfriend. That had never been me and it never would be.

Of course, I had been Skyping regularly with everyone back home, but it wasn’t the same.

To be honest, it scared me a little how easily I had slotted into Will’s life out here, and I needed to be by myself for a while, just to check that I was still me. Yes, I know how weird that sounds. Sue me.

It took me years to get over having a mother who always put her own needs first, and I was aware that giving in and continuing that cycle was part of my nature now, and I was wary of it.

Two weeks without Will was fine anyway. I could handle two weeks.

God, I was going to miss him like crazy!

But I would be fine.

He came to the airport with me, I had a night flight in the hopes I could get some sleep and the jetlag wouldn’t be too horrendous, but I wasn’t sure how successful it would be.

We had to say goodbye in the town car but I didn’t mind; he wouldn’t be allowed through security anyway, and there was no point us both queueing for check in.

We took our time saying goodbye but the driver didn’t seem to mind. When I finally disengaged myself from him and headed inside the airport, I felt like crying, but I didn’t.

It would only be two weeks until I saw him again so getting upset was silly. Especially as it was my choice to leave now.

The check-in line wasn’t too big (I always arrive early for flights) and I was surprised when the check-in woman told me I was in the wrong place.

“You should have gone through that check-in,” she said, pointing to a queue-less VIP desk.

“Pardon?”

“Your ticket is first class, Ma’am.”

“I’ll kill that son of a bitch!”

“I can check you in here, if you’d rather?” she was looking at me as if I might be deranged. Hell, I’d been upgraded to first class at no expense to myself; maybe I
was
deranged.

I took a deep breath to calm myself down.

“No, its fine. Just a misunderstanding between me and my boyfriend.” I toddled over to the VIP check-in and tried to remember the arguments Will had made about covering my expenses, and remind myself that he had upgraded me because he was trying to do something nice for me. Obviously he hadn’t told be because he knew I’d be upset.

It was kind of sweet really. Actually, it was
very
sweet, I was just a sourpuss.

First class meant not only flying in luxury, I waited in luxury too, in the executive lounge, with free drinks, free wifi and free snacks.

The seats on the plane were fantastic and were the reclining kind, as in they recline into a 6’6”, flat bed, complete with privacy screens, so I even managed to get a decent amount of sleep. Not having the snoring idiot next to me from my flight over was also a big help.

When I awoke, I took a wander into the cocktail lounge to stretch my legs.

It was heaven!

I didn’t allow myself to think about the cost because as the saying goes, what the eye doesn't see, the heart doesn't grieve over.

I was feeling pretty refreshed when I landed and hailed a cab back to my flat. Marie had offered to pick me up but I didn’t want to bother her. As we drove, I texted everyone who needed to know that I’d arrived safely and I arrived back at my flat at 10pm. With the time difference, it was almost exactly 24 hours after I’d left Will’s house, and I was not at all ready for sleep, so I unpacked, then watched some of the TV I’d missed and by 3am, I was ready for bed. Combined with the small sleep on the plane, I was hopeful I’d wake feeling refreshed in the morning.