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“Beyond imagining, huh? We should take out ads with that line.” Jose rolled his shoulders, pleased by the praise but also accepting it as his due. He was good looking, and damn, could he cook, but he was arrogant. “You two should come back while you’re in town,” he instructed Cole. “I can try to blow her mind again.”
Maggie shot a sideways look to Cole, who, she was certain, would never bask in a compliment like that.
The actor met her eyes and shrugged, as if to sayYou brought this on yourself.
It took a second for Maggie to put herself back together. She still wasn’t used to what happened in her gut when he acknowledged her. He was worse than the nitrous oxide at the dentist.
Maggie had no doubt Jose could succeed in exploding what she thought food was a second time. But not wanting to try to parry his mild flirting, she said to Cole, “I can call an Uber. Or it’s what, like eight blocks? I don’t mind walking.”
“Let’s do that.”
On the street outside Troncos, Maggie stopped to button her coat. England clearly hadn’t gotten the memo that by May, things should’ve warmed up, and Cole was regretting not bringing his own jacket.
“Are you going to get mobbed?” Maggie asked.
Cole almost laughed before choking it down. That might sound rude. Maggie was new to Hollywood, and she probably didn’t get that he wasn’t famous, not in the way Tasha was. “That’s more of an issue for, like, Harry Styles.Central Squarewas never big over here, and the rest of my stuff ... it’s been lower profile.”
“You don’t seem low profile to me.”
“Compared to Tasha, I am.”
Cole shot a sidelong glance at Maggie. The town houses lining the street were built of sandy-colored stone, and her silhouette glowedagainst it. The cheeky tilt of her nose, the rosy pout of her lips, the proud jut of her chin: her profile was a question mark.
The woozy feeling in Cole’s gut was the answer.
This is a work dinner, you dweeb,he reminded himself for what seemed like the millionth time tonight. If it felt like something else, something more, that was only because the neighborhood could’ve been a studio back lot. The charmingly narrow rows of houses, the converted Victorian brick factory across the way, and the inky sky above them, studded not with stars but with twinkle lights. It was the place doing this to Cole, not the woman. He needed to remember that. Anyone could get swoony when they were walking through this wonderland. That was why unwashed Americans, such as himself, ought to avoid it.
Maggie sighed—and not in a swoony way.
“You’re not letting Tasha get to you, are you?” Cole asked.
“No.” Maggie sounded as if she meant it. “I don’t think her hesitation about working with me is personal. I just want to figure out how to help her.”
“She’ll get on board.” Cole gently maneuvered Maggie around an uneven bit of pavement. “Tonight was aterriblemistake.” If he’d thought dinner would soften Tasha up, he couldn’t have been more wrong—as per usual.
“You were trying to help.”
“But not actually helping.”
“You did, though. I have a much better idea of what’s going on with Tasha now.”
“Good, because I don’t.” Something serious was up with his friend, something that had her spooked and anxious.
But he and Maggie weren’t going to solve that mystery tonight. Maggie would crack Tasha eventually. He was certain of it. She clearly had good intentions and a knack for this.
He was curious about Maggie’s previous gig. “I didn’t know there was some mess at your old job. I should’ve googled you.”
Maggie’s eyes went wide. “It’s really ... unpleasant, how it ended. Please don’t look it up.”
“I won’t.” If anyone knew how false stories, or true stories shot in an unflattering light, could haunt you, it was Cole. If Maggie didn’t want him to probe her past, he wouldn’t. “I understand how it can be when you get a bad reputation and people think they know you,” he said, very softly. “Especially when you don’t think you’re that person at all.”
For a second, he wasn’t certain if she was going to respond to that, which was fair enough. She didn’t owe him anything.
But at last, she said, “Feel free not to answer this, but how do you handle it?” She’d matched his tone: quiet, without posturing or restraint. Like a whisper in the dark. Like a confession by a lover.
The jet lag, the food, and the wine were mixing with this picturesque setting. They were making Cole feel as if he knew this woman already. As if he could trust her.
It made no sense—it made absolutely no sense—but this night was stripping away the mask he usually wore around people. And for all that he didn’t know Maggie, he suspected that she was taking off her mask too. That they were both speaking more freely, more honestly, than they usually did.
