Rumor Has It (Limelight) (31 page)

My stomach pitched and my pulse sped up as I tried to control my reaction. “I need to give my current job a couple weeks notice and I’ll need a week to find a place to live out here. So…three weeks?” I tried to remain professional and stoic but I could feel the corners of my mouth edging up.

“Excellent. There’s only one thing we haven’t discussed yet.”

“Okay.” I’d assumed he meant salary or benefits since I’d basically already accepted the position without even asking for any of those details. I wasn’t exactly negotiating from a position of power though.

“You’re in a relationship with Mason Nash, correct?”

“We’re dating…” Was that considered some kind of conflict of interest?

“I’d like to know more about that.”

“I’m not following.”

“Let me be more specific. I’d like to do an exposé on the real Mason Nash. The one only those close to him see. The behind-the-scenes guy. Tell us what no one else knows. He’s a pretty private guy…we want the inside scoop.”

“You want me to see if he’ll do an interview with you guys?”

“No. Ellie, we want
you
to write the piece. Use your inside knowledge to give us a picture of Mason no one is familiar with.”

He wanted me to sell-out Mason. “So what you’re saying is you want me to do this behind his back?”

“I wouldn’t put it that way exactly but I’m sure you’ve been privileged to information no one else has.”

“And if I say no?”

“Then I’ll understand. Unfortunately I may have to re-think our need for a new employee, but hey—no hard feelings.” I sat there in stunned silence for a moment. He used the opportunity to continue his line of bullshit. “Let’s be honest…how long do you think this fling with him is going to last? Celebrities like him move through women like a model changes outfits. Think of yourself, what will you have after he’s done with you? If you do this at least you’ll have a promising career.”

If I was a man I would’ve punched him. He obviously took me for some gold-digging whore out to take what I could get from Mason. He had the wrong woman. I grabbed my purse from beside me and stood up. “This meeting is over.”

“Don’t be so quick to dismiss this opportunity, Ellie. I’ll give you a few days to think about it.”

“I don’t need a few days. I already know what kind of person I am and it’s not the kind who would do something like that.” I stormed out of his office with fire in my gut and the sound of my own blood rushing through my ears. I didn’t recall making my way out of the building or hailing a cab but the next thing I knew I was pulling up to LAX.

Unlike my last interview this time I was confident my not getting the job was more a reflection of him than me. I wouldn’t allow a jackass like Steve Parsins to reduce me to feeling ashamed. I had nothing to be ashamed of.

I had to wonder if it would always be this way. Was being with Mason going to affect my prospects in my chosen field? Would every potential employer want me to give them the inside track because I was with Mason? Even if they weren’t as blatant as Steve had been, would I be free to come in and talk about my time with Mason the way a normal twenty-something with a boyfriend would? Or would I have to worry about being quoted in some magazine or gossip site somewhere?

My flight to Boston didn’t leave for a few hours. Since I had time to kill and a lot on my mind I went to the airport gift shop in search of some light, frivolous reading material to get my mind off the interview.

I was perusing the magazine shelf when one of the covers caught my eye. There between
People
and
In Style
was a cover with a picture of Mason kissing a pretty blond that most definitely was
not
me.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

The headline screamed “Nash Rekindles Old Flame.” Mason and the attractive woman were pictured walking down the street. She wore a blue floral dress fitted perfectly over top of her voluptuous body and Mason wore a grey t-shirt and jeans. His arm was slung around her shoulder and he’d pulled her into him and was kissing the top of her head. She was smiling. It was an intimate gesture, one that Mason had done to me many times before.

I had to swallow back the bile I felt rising in my throat. I grabbed a copy, stalked to the register, almost bowling over some guy browsing in the business section, and threw the magazine on the counter.

“Will this be everything?” the girl asked. I nodded and threw a ten dollar bill down. She looked at the front of the magazine. “Don’t you love him? He’s so hot. I’m loving that he and got back together with Rebecca Stark. Didn’t they make the best couple?” She passed me my change.

I threw it in my purse without looking and stormed off.

I sat in the first open seat I saw and flipped through the magazine until I reached the article about Mason. More pictures of him and Rebecca Stark were plastered over the pages. I didn’t know who she was but she looked vaguely familiar so she must be in the business. Her blond hair and stacked figure told me she probably spent her time in front of the camera, not behind it.

I scanned the article. The only mention of me in the story was a quick reference that Mason must have found it too difficult to deal with my “issues” and let me go. Either that, they speculated, or he was playing the both of us. Apparently he and Rebecca had dated up until a couple of years ago but had recently stepped out together in New Jersey where he’d played a couple shows before heading to New York.

I told myself not to put too much faith into the article, knowing full well what kind of bullshit they’d make up to sell magazines. It was much easier to tell myself that than it was for me to believe it. The visual proof was difficult to ignore. There was no mistaking the fact that they were holding hands in some pictures and kissing in others. I told myself it could all be lies several times but I couldn’t shake the sick feeling of dread in my stomach. I paced the airport from one end to the other before I finally decided to call Skye and get her take on it.

When she picked up I filled her in on what I held in my hands. She immediately went into best friend mode, telling me all the reasons why I shouldn’t be worried.

“You know first-hand the lies the press will put out there. You can’t jump to any conclusions until you’ve spoken to Mason,” she said.

“I know but what am I supposed to think when I’m staring at photo after photo of him with his tongue down her throat?” I don’t care who you are. No girl wants to see pictures of her man being intimate with another woman, past or present.

“You think you don’t know the whole story. You remember how they twisted around that photo of you and Mason and something like that could be exactly what’s happening here.”

“I’m trying. I really am.”

“You need to call him,” she said.

“I’d rather wait until I see him. That way I can see his reaction when I show it to him.”

“Make sure you call me or text me as soon as you’ve talked to him.”

“Will do. I’m going to turn my phone off until I get to Boston in case he tries to call. If I talk to him he’ll be able to tell something is wrong.”

“Okay, hang in there.”

“I’ll try. Thanks.” I appreciated Skye doing her job as my bff and trying to cheer me up. My mindset was mildly better when I got off the phone but I couldn’t seem to stop torturing myself by pulling out that damn article to look at it again and again. I probably could’ve recited the stupid thing word for word by the time I boarded my plane.

If this was the girl he’d once been in love with who’s to say he hadn’t met up with her in Jersey. Maybe he felt bad I’d already taken the time off work and was waiting to end things until the week was over. Or maybe he was trying to get away with playing the both of us. My imagination ran wild as I flew across the country. It was the longest flight of my life. I was antsy and nervous about seeing Mason and the possibility of hearing things I didn’t want to.

By the time I landed I knew Mason was already at the arena for sound check so I took a cab to the hotel. Since I’d left my phone off I didn’t know if he’d sent a car or not. I felt bad about it but I didn’t want to chance a phone call with him right before his show. I knew myself well enough to know I’d bring up the magazine cover; regardless of what the truth was, it wasn’t fair to him or his fans for me to spring something like that on him right before a show. Thankfully he’d left my name with the front desk and I had no trouble getting a key to the room after showing identification.

I took a long soak in the bath to relax and changed into a pair of yoga pants and tank top, throwing my hair up into a messy bun. I ordered some comfort food from room service and got comfortable on the bed. I forced myself not to look at the magazine article again. Not that I needed to—the images were permanently burned into my retinas. It was after midnight and I was a few episodes deep into a
Law and Order SVU
marathon when Mason returned to the room.

One look at him and it was evident he hadn’t taken the time to shower after his show. He wore a pair of tearaway pants and white tank he’d probably thrown on after getting off stage. His hands were fisted at his sides, accentuating his muscled arms underneath his tattooed skin. He leveled me with his stare from across the room.

“Why’d you have your phone off? Did the battery die or something?”

“No, I turned it off. I
was
flying.”

He clenched his jaw. “You had it off well before you got on your flight.” I said nothing, not sure how to start this conversation. I didn’t want it to come off accusatory, although I wasn’t quite sure how to avoid that.

Mason saved me the trouble. “You saw the magazine.” It wasn’t a question, but a statement of fact.

I nodded my head slowly, not breaking eye contact.

“I tried to call you as soon as I heard about it but you had your phone off. You have to know that’s all bullshit. Tell me you know it’s bullshit, Ellie.”

“Is that your ex-girlfriend in the picture?”

Mason swallowed hard. “Yes, but—”

“When I asked you in Virginia if you’d ever been in love and you said yes, was that the girl you were in love with?”

He hesitated this time and I knew it was. “Yes,” he answered quietly.

“If it’s bullshit how did they get a picture of the two of you together?” I kept my voice even through sheer force of will.

“I don’t know. All I can tell you is that I was not with her when I was in New Jersey.” He scrubbed a hand over his shaved head.

“So what…they photoshopped you into the picture or something?”

“I just said I don’t know where the picture came from. I was not with her! You don’t believe me?” He sounded angry now.

“I don’t know what to believe, Mason. I know how the press can turn things around and make them seem one way when they’re the complete opposite. But I don’t know what to think when I see those pictures. I’ve had images of the two of you together cavorting through my head all day. I can’t turn them off.” I brought my knees up to my chest and sunk my head down. Frustration brought tears to the corner of my eyes but I refused to let them fall. I wanted so badly to believe him.

“I know how it looks. You gotta believe me…I would never do that to you.”

I bounded off the bed to my purse. I grabbed the magazine from it, flipped to the pages with pictures of him and Rebecca and held it up into his face.

“What do you expect me to think when I see something like this?” Mason’s eyes darted over the page, taking in the pictures. “I don’t care what the article says about me, I know that’s all bullshit. But what about these pictures?”

He grabbed the magazine from me and walked past, concentrating on the pictures. “These are old.” He let out a long sigh and sat on the end of the bed. “Come here, I’ll prove it.”

A seed of hope formed in me at the confidence and calmness in his last statement. I moved to sit beside him on the bed and he passed me the magazine.

He pointed to his left wrist in the picture. “See this here?”

“Yeah, what about it?” All I saw was his sleeve of tattoos on the length of his exposed arm. I wasn’t sure what he was getting at.

“Look at the difference.” He pointed to his left wrist and I saw that he had Latin words tattooed across his wrist that weren’t in the photograph. “I got this long after we broke up. This picture was taken when we were together, but years ago. How else can you explain the tattoo missing in the picture?”

I glanced from his wrist to the picture and back again as relief washed through me, followed soon by mortification. “This isn’t me.” Mason remained silent. “I’m not some insecure girl who freaks out at everything.”

He wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me close. “Don’t worry about it. I know how it looked. But you’ve got to understand that this won’t be the last time something like this happens.”

“Why didn’t I take one look at that picture, know it was a lie and put it out of my mind?”

“Because you’re human, Ellie.”

“I don’t like feeling this way. I’ve never been the girl who needs constant reassurance from the guy she’s seeing.”

“It’s a lot to take. I was new to it once, too, so I understand. It means a lot that you’re willing to go through it for me.”