Читать книгу Lindsey Kelk 8-Book ‘I Heart’ Collection - Lindsey Kelk - Страница 49

When James had said he’d send a car, I really wasn’t expecting a limo. And I really wasn’t expecting him to be inside it. Thankfully, I’d managed to prise myself out of bed at a reasonable hour and was fully prepped. Well, made-up and blow-dried. I had tried to come as far away from yesterday’s vomit incident as possible in a cute inky blue Ella Moss jersey dress, evidence of my credit card abuse in Bloomingdale’s. Nothing pukey about this little number. I just couldn’t bend over at all. Fingers crossed the superstar could be distracted enough by legs so as not to notice my lack of stellar interviewing skills …

‘Good morning, Miss Clark,’ James utched across the back seat of the limo, as though there wasn’t enough room in there. Or possibly because he was confused by my size 12 backside. Given most of the girls I’d seen at Chateau Marmont would struggle to tip the scales at 100 pounds, I could understand why he’d be concerned about my girth. ‘You’re looking very refreshed.’

I took that as code for ‘not about to vomit’.

‘Well, thank you very much, Mr Jacobs,’ I replied with a winning smile. For God’s sake, I’d already puked in front of the man, where was the point in being star-struck?

‘Let me introduce my assistant, Blake.’ James gestured towards a very stressed-looking, but very cute blond sitting in the opposite corner of the limo. For shame, I hadn’t even noticed him; I was way too busy checking out James’s huge thighs in his teeny tiny workout shorts. For my interview, of course. ‘We were just running in the hills. Well, I was, Blake was reading Perez Hilton on his BlackBerry.’

‘Shut up,’ Blake held out his hand. ‘Sorry I missed you yesterday?’

‘Oh, really, don’t be. The fewer people involved in yesterday, the better,’ I said, shaking his hand and my head politely. Blake was actually very good looking, exactly how I would describe a Californian All-American Boy: rumpled blond hair, incredibly tanned and athletic looking in his workout gear. If it weren’t for the fact that he was seriously setting off my gadar, I would have been absolutely warming him up for one Miss Jenny Lopez.

Well, if one Miss Jenny Lopez had actually made it home the night before. A quick peek in her room on the way down to meet James presented a still-made-up-from-the-morning-before bed. I looked down into my (suffering slightly from being on the floor of the toilets in The Ivy) Marc Jacobs handbag to see if she’d replied to my text. Nothing yet.

‘Yeah, anyway, I’m basically here to make sure you stick to the approved topics and if at any time I say stop, we stop and the interview is over, OK?’ Blake barked. ‘You did get the list of approved topics?’

Approved topics … I tried not to pull the ‘was that one of the pieces of paper Cici gave me and I’ve left in the hotel?’ face.

‘Absolutely.’

Absolutely certain it was one of the pieces of paper Cici gave me that I’d left in the hotel.

‘Fantastic,’ Blake continued, as though James wasn’t even in the car. I was trying to pay attention but how can anyone listen to instructions when James Jacobs is sitting just a couple of feet away and pulling a very cute ‘aren’t all these rules so silly?’ face. Concentrate. Concentrate. ‘The idea of the interview is for you to introduce your readers to “the real James Jacobs”. So really we want you to focus on his movies, his hobbies, his ambitions for the future. And you know what we don’t want to focus on.’

‘He’s talking about the sex, drugs and rock and roll,’ James whispered theatrically. Cue my first ridiculously loud and faintly hysterical cackle of the day.

‘Hilarious, James, just hilarious.’ Blake raised a well-groomed eyebrow. ‘Let’s make jokes in front of the reporter. Don’t write that down.’

‘Oh, really, I’m not …’ I paused, took a deep breath and started again. ‘I’m here to work with you, not to try and trip you up or anything.’ Wow. How professional did I sound?

‘We know, Angela,’ James reached over and took my hand. Be still my thumping, thudding heart. ‘Blake is just a little bit over-cautious. Some reporters are just out for as scandalous a story as they can get. I’m just worried that you’ll be a little bit let down – if only my life was exciting as it looks in the papers.’

Blake smiled tensely at me and nodded to James. Hmm. It hadn’t actually occurred to me that this might be hard work. How much media training had this man had? If James wasn’t going to give me anything, then what was I going to write about?

‘I’m sure it’ll be great,’ I said, pulling my all-new superstar interviewing pad, pen and Dictaphone out of my bag. ‘So, what is the plan for today?’

‘Terribly exciting.’ James stretched over to the mini-fridge (limos are awesome) and passed me a bottle of water before tossing one at Blake and opening a third for himself. ‘I have rehearsals at the studio this morning. I thought you might want to come and see the set, meet the rest of the cast?’

‘Sounds fun,’ I said casually. I was going on set! I was meeting the cast!

‘And then I thought maybe we’d get some lunch. I could show you some of my favourite Hollywood hang-outs.’

‘That would be great,’ My head heard Hollywood hang-outs but my stomach only heard lunch. I’d spent so long sorting myself out that breakfast had been completely forgotten, and since everything I’d eaten yesterday had ended up in the bushes outside James’s bungalow, I was starving. I would have given my right arm for a Jaffa Cake. ‘Really keen to see your favourite bits of town. I have to say, I’m not loving LA yet.’

‘You’re not?’ James looked surprised but ignored Blake’s loud tutting. ‘Haven’t been completely seduced by the sunshine? Most Brits love it out here.’

‘The sunshine’s great,’ I agreed, ‘but I think my ex-pat loyalties are already spoken for. I live in New York.’ I did so enjoy saying that.

‘I like New York too, but LA is just fantastic,’ he insisted. ‘Where have you been so far?’

‘Uh, The Beverly Center, The Ivy and Toast. Where you stood me up.’

‘Yeah, sorry about that.’ James slipped in another small smile. Seriously, how did anyone ever get mad at him? ‘My flight was delayed. Serves me right for agreeing to do a movie in Canada. And no wonder you don’t love it here. You’ve been to a shopping center and a tourist trap. Trust me, I’ll show you some good places. Now tell me how you ended up in New York.’

All the way from Hollywood to Century City, I told James the tale of how I had fallen in love with New York, starting with my journey from hand-breaking bridesmaid to magazine columnist and blogger, via new handbag, new BFF and new super-sexy boyfriend. And when I put it all together, it even sounded pretty cool to me. But then, I missed quite a lot out.

‘So you’re dating the lead singer of Stills?’ James seemed impressed. ‘They’re really good. Do you think they’d be interested in working on soundtracks at all? They would be perfect for my next film.’

‘Alex really wants to work on films,’ I said excitedly. Get me, well-connected girlfriend of the year. ‘You should definitely talk to him.’

‘Why don’t you call him?’ James said, snatching Blake’s BlackBerry from his hands and passing it to me. ‘Go on, I would love to talk to him. I’m a massive fan.’

Since the pretty man asked so nicely and since Blake looked so pissed off, I dialled. And predictably Alex did not answer.

‘Oh well.’ James threw the BlackBerry back at Blake and laughed. ‘We’ll try him later. Looks like we’re here. Did you know Fox’s headquarters were the Nakatomi building from Die Hard?’

‘No way!’ I yelled, hanging out of the window like an overexcited Labrador.

‘Yep,’ James yanked me back in as we drove straight through security. ‘They were in Alvin and the Chipmunks too but the less said about that the better.’

‘Were you in Alvin and the Chipmunks?’ I asked, narrowing my eyes.

James stared straight back at me. ‘The less said about that the better.’

Hooray for Hollywood indeed.

For some reason, I’d thought I would be able to swank around the studio without a single bat of an eyelid, as if I always hung out on movie sets, as if watching Adam Sandler whizz past me on a little golf cart was just an average Monday; but I turned out to be a little bit more of a slack-jawed yokel than I had hoped. Wandering around with James wasn’t helping. Almost every other person we passed wanted to speak to him or at least find some feeble excuse to stop him and stroke his arm, slap him on the back or give his forearm an affectionate squeeze or an altogether slutty gaze. I tried not to be jealous but I couldn’t help but feel completely invisible.

‘This is where I’m filming today,’ James said, after the seventh assistant to the assistant’s assistant of the day had finished blathering on about how privileged she was to be working with him.

From outside, it just looked like a massive warehouse, sandy coloured and sun-bleached, like everything else I’d seen in LA, but once James opened the door and I stepped inside, something crazy happened. We were back in London. I turned to look out through the door. Outside, sunny, shiny LA. Inside, London at sunset. Trafalgar Square, to be exact.

‘No way,’ I said, stepping lightly, completely disoriented. ‘This is bizarre.’

‘It stops me getting homesick,’ James said, taking my hand and leading me through a maze of wires and cameras. ‘Have you ever climbed on a lion in Trafalgar Square?’

‘No.’ I stared all around me. ‘I actually never have. Isn’t that sad?’

‘You can do it now if you want,’ James said, pointing across the floor to a perfect replica of a Trafalgar Square lion, beside a Nelson-less half-column. ‘Give me your phone, I’ll take a picture.’

It was madness. Once we were inside the walls, away from the miles and miles of cables and lamps, my brain just couldn’t register the fact that we were still in LA. I couldn’t even really believe I was inside. The things they can do with lighting these days … At James’s insistence, I clambered up on top of the lion, a little bit shocked to find it wasn’t actually bronze but something slightly less solid and warm.

‘Is this going to break?’ I asked, trying to throw my leg over without flashing my pants. ‘It doesn’t feel very solid.’

‘It’s fine,’ James insisted, squaring me up in the viewfinder of my crappy phone camera. ‘Just try not to kick it or anything. Jessica Alba was on it the other day and it was fine.’

I clung to the lion’s neck, trying not to think about how many Jessica Albas I weighed and praying to the prop gods that this lion was built to take the weight of real people as well as Hollywood waifs. A quiet creak was enough to convince me that it wasn’t.

‘I don’t think I can get down,’ I said, trying not to panic. This was not going to be my finest moment. ‘Seriously?’

James laughed, stuck my phone in the back pocket of his jeans and held out his hands. ‘Come on then, jump.’

‘I can’t,’ I said, gripping the lion slightly too tightly with my thighs. ‘I’m stuck.’

‘You’re not going to be able to do the interview from up there, are you?’ he pointed out. ‘And I have a scene in here in about an hour. I’ve read my script: you’re not in it. Jump.’

I pursed my lips and closed my eyes. This wasn’t going to be flattering, however I hard I tried. Folding my leg underneath me and almost dislocating it in the process, I inched along the lion as far as I could before I felt myself sliding down its backside much faster than I had anticipated.

‘Shit!’ I wailed, collapsing into James’s outstretched arms.

‘This is going to be the best interview ever, isn’t it?’ James asked.

With massive quantities of self-restraint, I shook myself out of his broad, hard chest and coughed, not knowing whether to brush my hair or my skirt down first.

‘I’m probably not going to mention this part,’ I said, accepting my phone back. It was warm from his pocket. ‘But this set is amazing.’

‘Yeah,’ he nodded, looking around. ‘Always seems crazy to me when they spend a fortune on a set, though. Although I suppose they can’t go around blowing up parts of the real Trafalgar Square.’

‘You’re blowing bits of it up?’ I asked, hoping it wouldn’t be my lion.

‘Shit, I’m supposed to be sworn to script secrecy.’ James pulled an imaginary zip across his mouth. ‘You didn’t hear that from me.’

‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Are you blowing it up today? Can I watch?’

‘Bloodthirsty, aren’t you? Nope, sorry, Trafalgar Square doesn’t get it until next week.’

‘James!’ Blake yelled from the steps of the National Gallery and tapped his watch. ‘Trailer!’

‘Want to see my trailer?’ James raised a perfect eyebrow.

I raised mine. ‘I bet you say that to all the girls.’

‘Maybe a couple,’ he admitted, putting an arm around my shoulder and walking me off into a Waterloo Sunset.

If walking onto the set had been like walking into London, walking into James’s trailer was like walking into heaven. I’d never, ever seen anything so plush. It made The Union and The Hollywood look like a youth hostel.

‘This place is amazing. Why would you even have a house?’ I charged up the steps and into the lounge. Three massive plush sofas dominated the space, all pointing at a huge flatscreen TV with a beautiful low coffee table set in the centre. Under the TV was a DVD player, a Blu-ray player and several games consoles. It was basically boy heaven.

‘Gets boring after a while,’ James said, his hand hovering over a fruit platter on the coffee table before he skipped over onto a bowl of M&Ms. ‘Sometimes I just really want to fuck off back to my mum’s. You can fly direct to Sheffield now, can’t you? I could be there in a day.’

‘Sheffield?’ I gave James a questioning look. ‘I thought you were from London?’

‘Not approved!’ Blake called from the kitchen. He stuck his head around the door. ‘We’re not talking about James’s past, Miss Clark.’

‘OK.’ I launched myself into one of the squishy sofas and filed it away.

‘So, James has to go do some actual work. We’ll be, like, two hours. You’ll stay here?’ Blake pushed James through the door as he threw me a helpless shrug and disarming wink.

‘Perfect,’ I said to myself, pulling my laptop out of my bag. It was almost twelve already and my blog wasn’t about to write itself. Couldn’t hurt to at least attempt to get it in on time …

The Adventures of Angela: LA Story

So finally, I can let you in on my secret … right now, as in right this second, I’m blogging to you from the trailer of a very cool, very talented and, well, gorgeous movie star. Seriously, we’re talking A-list, super-hot, 100% amazing Ac-Tor-type person.

What’s great for me (but possibly a little bit rubbish for you), is that I’m actually interviewing him for The Look – my first-ever proper interview! But that’s not the most rubbish bit (unless I do a really shoddy job, that would be a bit tragic): what’s really sad is that I’m not allowed to tell you who it is.

I know, what a tease.

What I can do is tell you all about LA and all the adventures I’m having … Which have so far totalled a bit of shopping and puking outside a bungalow at Chateau Marmont. I am all class, I know. But seriously, what gives? Why am I not loving this place? I was so excited to leave the New York snow but LA just seems a bit empty and impersonal instead of glamorous and exciting. Am I doing something wrong? If you have any recommendations, please email me and let me know where I should be going. And yes, before you ask, I have a car.

Course, things might pick up when Mr Movie Star takes me out this afternoon … I do this all for you, you know.

Blog written and emailed to Mary back in New York, I popped in the earphones from my Dictaphone and prepared to type up my notes. Hmm. Me telling James how I ended up in New York. James laughing. Me telling James how much I disliked LA. James laughing. Blake telling me I had to stick to approved topics. James laughing. So far, all I had for the interview was: James Jacobs loves to laugh.

Before I could even start to panic, I heard my phone buzzing in my bag. Mary – Office. Meep.

‘Hi Mary,’ I said, shuffling onto the edge of the chair and actively not biting my nails. ‘You got my blog?’

‘I did, you were sick outside his bungalow?’ Mary wasn’t one for pleasantries.

‘Er, yeah, food poisoning,’ I bluffed. ‘James didn’t know anything about it, I just thought it sounded funny on the blog.’

‘Right.’ I know she didn’t believe me for a second. ‘Is everything OK? Have you got some good stuff?’

‘Yes?’

‘Do you want to send it to me?’

I stopped actively not biting my nails. ‘It’s not ready.’

‘It’s not ready?’

‘And I’m a perfectionist.’

‘Right. Send me something tomorrow.’

I didn’t know if it was a good or bad thing that she hung up without absolutely kicking my arse, but I was fairly sure that it was not good. Mary might have agreed to let me do the interview, but if things looked as though they might be going badly, she would pull me off in a heartbeat, and I was absolutely not going to let that happen. This was my chance; I really wanted it to work. Somewhere along the line, I’d got it into my head that if I could do this, then I could do anything. That maybe Mary would send me more exciting assignments than reviewing the new Christina Aguilera album. I just had to do a good job. Even if I had absolutely no experience, precedent or genuine reason to believe that I might be able to. Shit.

So what had I really learned about James Jacobs? He liked to run in the hills, he had just filmed a movie in Canada and he may or may not be from Sheffield. Hmm. Not even enough to warrant a ten-second interview on Facebook let alone a magazine interview.

OK, Angela, I told myself, as soon as James comes back to the trailer, you will be a hard-hitting journo. You will be the world’s most investigative interviewer. You will check your make-up and hope that you are still looking human. And then, of course, James will walk back in while you have two giant rings of Touche Eclat highlighting your impressive eye bags. He was shadowed, of course, by Blake.

‘Well, you, Angela Clark, are a rare beauty.’ He gave me one of his most dazzling smiles. It was a wonder he didn’t think everyone in the universe was mentally challenged, it was so difficult to actually give a coherent response when he really turned it on.

‘It’s a terrible load to bear,’ I agreed. ‘So what are we up to?’

‘I’m all done here for today.’ James stretched, touching the tips of his fingers to the ceiling of the trailer. ‘Just let me get changed and then I thought we could head out into town.’

‘Sounds like a plan,’ I agreed, watching him vanish into the other room, giving me a chance to pat (never rub) the magical make-up into my skin and check my phone. Nothing from Jenny still; nothing from Alex. It was nice to feel loved. I sent a quick text to Jenny to check she was alive, but didn’t have time to put together an Alex-appropriate message before James reappeared, car keys in hand, Blake by his side. It took time to be breezy.

‘So, where are we going?’ I asked, dropping my phone into my bag.

James held out a hand and hoisted me up. ‘We’re going to show you LA. Ready?’

Outside the trailer, James’s limo had mysteriously vanished and in its place was a huge, petrol blue truck. Oh dear.

‘A Hummer?’ I tried not to raise an eyebrow at the cliché. Very Entourage.

‘An H2H – hydrogen-powered Hummer. Don’t judge a book by its cover, Angela.’ James held open the door.

‘You are a long way from home right now, James Jacobs,’ I tested, shaking my head and clambering up inside.

‘Not approved.’ Blake ‘helped’ me into the cab with a firm shove to the arse. ‘Seriously, Miss Clark, we are not talking about James’s past in any way—’ But before he could climb into the car after me, James leaned over, slammed the door shut and ran around to the driver’s side. Sliding in and gunning the engine, he gave his assistant a hearty salute as we pulled out of the parking space.

‘Bye Blake, I’ll keep her on the approved topics, don’t worry,’ James called as we drove off, making an overly dramatic ‘I can’t hear you’ gesture at his furious assistant as he revved the engine ever louder and peeled out of the car park. ‘Now, I love that guy, but seriously, how are we supposed to do an interview with him barking “not approved” every ten seconds?’

‘Couldn’t agree more.’ I wound the window down, trying to ignore the giddy butterflies building up in my stomach as we pulled out of the studio lot and onto the Avenue of the Stars. It wasn’t just the ridiculous street name, it was cruising at high speed in a great big shiny truck. It was looking out of the window and up into the sunshine. It was the great big genuine grin on James’s face. ‘But aren’t you afraid I’ll ask you some horribly inappropriate questions and print some scandalous filth in the magazine?’

‘Here’s hoping,’ he grinned.

‘What do you think?’ James asked as we screeched to a halt.

For the second time that day, my eyes turned to fall on something impossibly beautiful. I’d been so busy fiddling with James’s iPod in the truck, trying to work him out by his song selections (impossible: he had everything ever recorded from Strauss to The Stones – and Stills, of course) that I hadn’t even looked out of the window once we pulled onto the freeway.

Why bother? The streets weren’t interesting like in New York or London. No one walked anywhere, the strips of shops were ugly or run down; there was literally nothing to look at. But while I’d been busy not paying attention, the ocean had appeared from nowhere. The Hummer was surrounded by people laughing, running, Rollerblading. We were at the beach.

Practically falling out of the truck, I ran towards the sand, leaving a sandal behind me. ‘It’s amazing,’ I said, more to myself than anyone else. ‘Look at it.’

‘So this is Malibu. Beats Skegness, doesn’t it?’ James said quietly, presenting me with my abandoned shoe. He knelt down and cradled my bare foot in his hand, slipping on the sandal. Instinctively, I caught my breath and my balance, holding onto James’s shoulders. Which was fine until my balance and my breath decided they didn’t want to be caught and I toppled forward in slow mo, right on top of James.

‘Beats Skegness,’ I muttered.

I was only vaguely aware of the fact that my skirt had ridden up well clear of my knickers, but I was intensely aware of the tiny flecks of green in James’s blue eyes, the scar in his eyebrow from a long-departed piercing and how ridiculously shiny every single strand of his hair was. Somewhere not that deeply hidden, my biological clock set itself to Pacific Standard Time and I felt a very strong urge to have all of James’s babies. As soon as possible.

‘That’s twice you’ve fallen for me today.’ James stared up at me for a moment, then brushed my hair off my face. ‘You know your eyes are really beautiful.’

‘What?’

‘Your eyes, they’re really pretty.’ James gently pushed me off and sat up. ‘So, blue. Have you ever thought about going darker with your hair?’

‘Muh?’ Seriously, I was dry-humping him on the beach and he was asking me if I’d thought about cracking out a bottle of Nice ’N Easy?

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, gently pushing me up and averting his eyes while I put myself away. ‘I spend far too much time with make-up artists. They’re always telling me if my hair was darker it would make my eyes look bluer. Apparently.’

‘Make-up artists,’ I nodded. ‘So not all those hot women you’re forever being pictured with?’

‘Not approved,’ James smirked, taking my hand and pulling me up onto the sand. ‘Shut up and come on.’

The endless ocean melted between the cloudless blue sky and golden beach, but it just couldn’t compete with the skin-on-skin contact. I was sure that the tiny thrills that kept tickling up and down my back would go away if I could just speak to Alex. But my phone had only had the decency to buzz once and that was to remind me that the repeat of Gossip Girl was starting. Or it would be if I had been in New York and not Malibu. I gave myself a mental shake and breathed out. Either I was just going to have to put Alex out of my mind and get on with the interview, or I was going to have a week’s worth of embarrassing anecdotes and an empty Dictaphone.

‘Shall we sit down for a while?’ I asked, kicking off my sandals and pulling out my ‘I’m a professional’ paraphernalia.

‘Jesus, I suppose so,’ James screwed up his face. ‘I know you’re a journo and everything, but can we at least attempt to keep it fun? I’ll let you in on a secret, I’m not a very good celebrity.’

‘I’ll try,’ I said wryly. ‘And I can let you in on a secret too: I’m not a very good journalist.’

‘Don’t be daft,’ he said. ‘I’ve read your stuff, you’re great.’

‘Don’t you have people to do that sort of thing for you?’ I asked, trying not to be too flattered. ‘Surely you don’t actually read for yourself?’

‘There’s actually just my manager, an accountant somewhere who makes sure I don’t go broke –?and Blake. When I first moved here, I had dozens of people, but it just didn’t work. I’ve never been great at letting people think for me and talk for me, and I hate having dozens of people around me when I don’t know if they’re genuine or not. That’s one of the reasons we’re doing this.’ He tilted his head and looked squarely at me. ‘Blake is … Blake is great at running my life but I don’t think he’s the best person to put in front of journalists. All the media people out here are just, well, just too much. They have to know every single thing that you ever did or might do. There was just no privacy, ever. This, by the way, is off the record.’

I held up the Dictaphone. ‘You want me to turn this off?’

Instead of answering, he took it from my hand, turned it over a couple of times and gave it a considered look. Before throwing it hard and far into the sea. ‘Don’t worry about it.’

‘Don’t ever ask to borrow my phone,’ I said, wondering how I would write that off as expenses. Shit. ‘So let’s just sort this out. The magazine told me we were trying to do a piece to explain to all your adoring female fans that you’re not some heartbreaking Hollywood lothario but just a misunderstood artist looking for your perfect woman. What was it that you were expecting?’

‘Well, that sounds good, let’s do that one. What do you need from me?’ he asked, concentrating on running streams of sand through his fingers. ‘I’m literally yours between now and the weekend.’

I tried not to think about what ‘literally yours’ could amount to and concentrate on the job at hand. Ish. ‘I have a billion questions but, to be honest, I’ve never had to work off questions before. How about if we chat, I’ll check the topics we’re supposed to cover every so often, and when I write stuff up at night, you can check it before I send it to my boss?’

‘You’ll never work for Vanity Fair, you know that, don’t you?’ he shook his head. ‘But that sounds perfect.’

‘OK,’ I nodded. ‘Before we start properly, though, I have to ask you one thing. And yes, I know I can already hear Blake giving it some “not approved”, but since you just chucked my Dictaphone in the ocean, I’m asking it anyway. Where are you from?’

‘Well, Angela Clark, I went to drama school in London—’

‘Not the biog, thank you very much. Where were you born?’ I pressed. I was getting the honest answer to this if it killed me.

‘Fine, fine, I’m surprised it’s not common knowledge anyway,’ he shrugged. ‘I’m from South Yorkshire. Near Sheffield actually.’

‘No way,’ I laughed out loud. ‘My grandparents lived in Sheffield; I spent every summer there for years. I could hear you had an accent but I couldn’t quite place it.’

‘What did you expect? They don’t really go in for “it’s grim oop north” at RADA,’ he said, flicking a handful of sand at me. ‘Where’s your Yorkshire accent?’

‘Didn’t say I was from there, I just spent a lot of time throwing a tantrum on the floor of Redgates toy shop as a child,’ I said. ‘Happy memories.’

‘Ahh, Redgates. I got all my Star Wars figures there. That’s how I knew I wanted to be an actor, I wanted a little plastic figure of me, just like my Luke Skywalker.’ He made a little pile of sand between us, then pressed it flat with the palm of his hand. ‘I thought they made figures of everyone, you know? And when my mum said they only made them of people in films, I decided that was it. I’d have to be in films. God, I haven’t thought about Redgates for years. My mum would take me there on my birthday and then we’d go to the Wimpy on The Moor. How mad is that?’

‘Mad,’ I agreed. ‘Who would have thought: James Jacobs, the toast of Hollywood, Yorkshire born and bred.’

‘Well, I wasn’t James Jacobs then,’ James grinned. ‘Just plain old Jim.’

‘Jim?’ I tried not to laugh. ‘Jim Jacobs?’

‘What’s your problem with Jim? My dad is Scottish.’

‘Nothing, I can just see why you changed it,’ I said, composing myself. ‘You don’t really hear people talking about Sexy Jim or Hot Jim, do you?’

‘I suppose not,’ he said, laughing at something he clearly wasn’t going to share. ‘It’s more of an Old Jim or Pervy Jim.’

‘Or Fat Jim,’ I added.

‘Did you just call me fat?’ He pushed me sideways, knocking me off my balance, back into the scorching sand.

‘No,’ I said, trying not to count up how many times he had already seen my knickers. ‘I called you Fat Jim.’

‘Come on, fat or not, just thinking about a Wimpy is making me hungry,’ he said, jumping up and pulling me with him. ‘Let’s go and get something to eat.’

I nodded and followed, trying not to be distracted by his denim-clad rear as we strode across the sand. He was like a walking, talking Levis ad. There was no possible way he could have spent his formative years anywhere other than an Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue. ‘So when did you leave Sheffield?’

‘Eighteen. I went to study drama in London and never went back,’ he said, beeping the car’s alarm. ‘My parents moved away and there wasn’t much opportunity for an actor up there. Well, there was panto at the Crucible but the less said about that, the better.’

‘Panto?’

‘The less said about panto the better,’ he repeated sternly. ‘It is weird people don’t know where I’m from, I suppose. I got my break here and everyone just assumes I’m from London. Are you going to out me as a northerner?’

‘Can I?’ I asked, hopeful that I would have something to write.

‘I’ll do you a deal,’ he replied. ‘You can have that if you promise not to mention the word panto in relation to me – ever.’

I thought carefully for a moment. ‘Hmm, well …’

‘Angela …’ It was more of a warning than anything else, but I did like hearing him say my name.

‘Fair enough.’

Back at the car park, I quickly checked my phone to find a couple of missed calls from Jenny. I bit my lip, my phone must have been buzzing all the time we were sitting on the sand and it hadn’t even occurred to me to check it.

‘Boyfriend?’ James asked, looking from my phone to my slightly strained expression. ‘If you need to give him a ring, I can amuse myself for a minute.’

‘No,’ I said, dropping the phone back in my bag. I was working, after all; Jenny would understand that. ‘It’s fine. Should you call Blake? I bet he’s going mental.’

‘I bet he is.’ James looked away and smiled. You could almost mistake him for normal people until he cracked out the teeth. Talk about a Hollywood smile. ‘Huh, just the twenty missed calls from Blake.’

‘Really?’

James nodded. ‘He worries constantly. It’s his job.’

‘Shouldn’t you call?’

‘He’ll wait. Now strap yourself in, I drive like a maniac. Apparently.’

‘You don’t say,’ I clicked my seatbelt. ‘Where are we off to now?’

‘Honestly? You’ve got me completely worked up,’ he said, gunning the ridiculously loud engine. ‘So there’s only one thing to do …’

‘Oh my God,’ I moaned. ‘I think I’m in heaven.’

‘You’re amazing.’ James looked so shocked. ‘I can’t tell you the last time I had a meal with a girl that ate the bread. Or even the burger.’

‘Well you might want to prepare yourself,’ I warned him, reaching across the table for a giant handful of fries. ‘I’m about to go into carb overload.’

There appeared to be several perks to hanging around with a movie star. You could leave work and go straight to the beach in the middle of the afternoon; you could talk your way out of a speeding fine by signing an autograph for the policeman’s fourteen-year-old daughter; and you could get a table at 25 Degrees, the most amazing burger restaurant in the entire world, just by smiling at the waiter. I had tried not to feel smug as we cruised past all the people waiting for a table, but it was hard. Yes, it was the James Jacobs, and yes, he was with me. I knew that he was only with me because it was sort of his job but it was still a little bit lovely.

What wasn’t as lovely was panicking about what kind of state I was in when all these people were staring. I hadn’t so much as touched up my lip gloss since we left the studio. And while I wasn’t completely unused to people whispering behind their hands about the man I was with, this was on another level. Loads of people knew who Alex was in Brooklyn, but the difference was that you could be standing in line for coffee in the Starbucks nearest to Alex’s apartment and three of the five people in front of you would also be in bands. While here, as far as I could see, no one else in the restaurant had been nominated for the Best Fight, Best Kiss and Best Actor at the MTV Movie Awards last year. And I was absolutely certain there wasn’t another contender for Heat’s Torso of the Week within a hundred-foot radius.

‘I just have to …’ I couldn’t quite finish the sentence; nothing seemed particularly appropriate. So I just shuffled along the leather banquette clutching my (beloved but now slightly sandy) handbag. James nodded, blissfully lost in his giant burger. The restaurant was long and narrow, making it impossible to hide from the dozens of pairs of eyes that followed me all the way out to the toilets. And I couldn’t really blame them: I would have stared too.

‘Are you seriously James Jacobs’s girlfriend?’

What I wouldn’t have done was follow me out, grab my arm and ask a really rude question. But then I wasn’t a huge, angry-looking girl with bright red dyed hair and a bum-bag.

‘What? Are you retarded or something?’ she demanded, arms now folded, her face absolutely enraged.

‘Sorry, no, I’m …’ I paused and looked back. James was still scarfing his dinner, absolutely oblivious to the attention he was receiving. ‘No, I’m not his girlfriend.’

‘Yeah, I totally said there was no way you were his girlfriend,’ the girl looked visibly relieved. ‘But my sister …’ she paused to point over at a skinny girl with matching dyed hair waving from a small table opposite the bar. ‘She said you were because she heard you talk and you were British. Are you his sister? You don’t look like his sister.’

‘I’m interviewing him,’ I said, completely flustered. Now I just really needed a wee. ‘So no, I’m not related to him or going out with him. Excuse me, I’m just off to the bathroom.’

‘I’ll wait here, you totally have to introduce me,’ the girl yelled after me. I couldn’t believe it, did Blake have to put up with this all the time? I couldn’t help but wonder what that girl would have done if I had been his girlfriend. I’d dealt with the fact that there must be girls that had crushes on Alex (and the less pleasant fact that, before we’d met, he’d been a bit of a slag), but that was all ancient history. The threat from Alex’s groupie following was incredibly limited compared to that of an actor. And James was something else altogether; every woman with eyes knew who he was. And once you combined his celebrity with his looks and the hateful fact that he was actually really, really nice, it was difficult not to have a bit of a crush on him. Not that I did. Honestly. Well, not that I’d ever cheat on Alex.

And I knew Alex would never cheat on me. Would he. Would he? No, of course not. Not even if I was away in LA and he was back in New York without me, writing his new album, getting all excited out and about in Brooklyn, maybe having a drink with the rest of his band who were all single and surrounded by that limited but not inconsiderable number of groupies I was just thinking about.

Couldn’t hurt to give him a call.

I sank into one of the velvet couches in the gorgeous lobby. 25 Degrees was nestled inside The Roosevelt; it was such a gorgeous hotel and I felt as though I was letting it down in my simple jersey dress, even in the middle of the afternoon. Glancing around, I counted no less than eight people making calls around me. No need to worry about a tut and a sigh, then. In fact, I couldn’t think of a venue I’d been to yet where people weren’t on their phones. I speed-dialled Alex and let it ring. It was almost five in LA, so almost eight in New York, too late for him to be asleep, way too early for him to be writing. Maybe he was just out. Maybe he was surrounded by groupies. Hot skinny blonde groupies plying him with compliments. And drugs. Oh God, they’re definitely giving him drugs—

‘Angela?’

‘Hey, I just wanted to …’ Check you weren’t in the middle of a drug-fuelled orgy with a bunch of groupies. Or Kate Moss. ‘Are you OK?’

‘Yeah, sorry, I can’t talk,’ Alex sounded as if he was outside and I was instantly homesick for the sound of sirens and honking horns. Groupies honking their horns at my Alex … ‘I’m just getting on the subway.’

‘Going anywhere nice?’ Like Kate Moss’s hotel room?

‘We’re gonna try out some new stuff at an open mic night in the city,’ he said. ‘See what it sounds like live.’

‘Really?’ I was surprised at how upset I was. He was going to try out new songs without me? ‘Wish I was there.’

‘Did you want me to wait until you got back?’

‘Yes. Will you?’

‘No.’

‘Oh.’

‘You were kidding, right?’

No, I thought. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘of course. Let me know how it goes?’

‘OK, talk later.’ And he hung up.

‘Yes, the interview’s going great. No, I’m not going to have an affair with James but it’s sweet that you’re worried,’ I muttered to myself as I redialled Jenny.

‘Angie?’ she answered.

‘You’re all right then?’ I asked, faking annoyance. ‘Where were you last night? With Joe?’

‘No,’ she sniffed. ‘Sorry Angie, I can’t talk, I’m busy. And you don’t want to get in trouble with your movie star.’

I didn’t know what to say, she sounded slightly peeved. ‘Everything is fine with the interview. I wanted to check you were OK. I was worried when you didn’t come back to the hotel last night.’

‘Not worried enough to call before this afternoon or come out last night though, huh?’ she countered.

‘Miss J, come on!’ I heard Daphne yelling in the background. ‘Are you talking to that British chick?’

‘Sorry Jenny, I was so ill and I knew I was going to have to actually be able to think today. Can’t we go for dinner tonight?’ I asked. Moody Jenny was not fun.

‘I don’t think I’ll make dinner, we’re out,’ she said, vaguely. ‘I’m sorry, I know you’re working. I just hoped we were going to get to spend more time together. Where are you?’

‘The Roosevelt.’ I looked around at the beautiful interiors. ‘It’s so gorgeous here.’

‘Is James with you?’ Jenny asked, slightly more interested. ‘Could he get us on the list for Teddy’s?’

‘If I knew what that was, maybe.’

‘It’s the club in the Roosevelt.’ She sounded excited for the first time since she’d picked up the phone. ‘Go ask him and then call me back.’

‘I might have finished your burger,’ James said, not at all apologetically as I dropped back into my seat. ‘But if you wanted to order something else, I could absolutely help you with it.’

‘I’m fine,’ I said, idly picking at a tasty chip. ‘Suppose we should really crack on with the interview.’

James frowned. ‘Actually, I’m a bit knackered. How would you feel if we held off until tomorrow? I could do with an early night.’

‘Fair enough,’ I nodded. An early night? Not very Hollywood hell-raiser. ‘I ought to get one myself but I have a horrible feeling I’m going to end up out with my friend.’

‘Do you know where you’re going?’ he asked, polishing off the last bit of my bun and starting on the fries. ‘There are some right shit-tips around here if you’re not careful.’

‘She said something about Teddy’s? That’s here, isn’t it?’ I really couldn’t bring myself to ask him to get us in. It was just too embarrassing.

‘Yeah, Teddy’s is fun,’ James chewed thoughtfully, ‘but – and don’t take this the wrong way – it’s really hard to get in. What time were you thinking of going?’

I shrugged. ‘Don’t know – late, I think. Jenny is out doing … something.’ It bothered me that I didn’t know what that something was.

‘There’s no point really getting there before eleven. Tell you what, I’m going to go back to the hotel and then why don’t I come back and meet you here? I’m sure I’ll feel better later, and if I’m with the enemy, I’m less likely to get into trouble,’ he said before draining his Diet Coke.

‘The enemy?’ I was completely confused.

‘Journo,’ he nodded towards me.

‘Oh,’ I almost laughed out loud. ‘Sorry, I feel like I’m letting you down.’

James set down his glass and pushed my hair back behind my ear, his hand lingering against my flushed cheek. ‘It is a shame,’ he agreed.

His thumb traced my cheek, his fingers twisting themselves into my hair. His dark blue eyes found mine, searching them with something like a smile that just made it to the very corners of his mouth. I breathed out slowly, thinking what a good job it was that I hadn’t finished my burger, when my stomach did a triple somersault and my heart was catapulted to somewhere in my throat.

‘Well, I’d better let you go,’ I mumbled against his cool palm.

‘Sorry,’ James said, dropping his hand and his eyes. ‘I’d better let you go.’

This was absolutely, definitely going to be harder than I’d hoped, I thought as I staggered out of the restaurant. But maybe for completely different reasons than I had imagined.