“Just specific bar fights,” I say, wanting to make him smile a little.
It works. “Yes. Specific. You don’t have anything to worry about, I’m not…I’m not like gossip sites make me out to be.”
Well, I can certainly understand how he feels. “I’m not either.”
“Sounds like the fake love of a good woman is going to soothe the inner beast,” I tease.
“That’s what I’m hoping,” he says with a tentative smile.
“So, I keep you out of bar fights, and—”
“I fake love you so thoroughly that women want to be you—”
“And men want to be you,” I finish for him.
“And both of them will want to rush to your movies,” Claudia says. It strikes me that River and I are basically in the middle of the weirdest job interview ever.
“You have a movie coming out soon?”
He nods. “December. It’s my first drama, and I need to prove that I’m viable in the genre.”
I nod.
“Well,” Claudia says, clapping her hands together. “Keith and I wanted to invite you here for a chemistry test of sorts, and I’d say you both passed?” She looks to Keith for confirmation, which he gives enthusiastically.
I look over at River. “Well, I guess you’re officially my first fake boyfriend,” I tell him. “Congrats.”
He laughs. “Thanks. I did tell the kids in my eighth grade class that I had a girlfriend who lived in Canada, so I’m sorry that you don’t have the honor of being my first. Although I guess you’re the first one who actually exists.”
“I’ll take it.” I look at Claudia and Keith. “One thing bothers me, though…” I look over at River, who has Gigi sleepily draped over his left forearm. “River and Skye? Isn’t that too…I don’t know, on the nose?”
“We were hoping to make that work to our advantage.” Keith says.
River shifts in his seat. “How so?”
“Instead of coming up with some cutesy portmanteau like Skyver for the two of you, we’re going to push Elemental,” Keith explains.
Bile creeps up the back of my throat and I instinctively wretch. “I hate it. Please don’t do that to us.”
“We need a hashtag to use on social media,” Claudia says, trying to appeal to my business sense. “We’ve got a couple hundred fake fan accounts to get it trending once your’re ready to be outed.”
“Use Skyver, I’m begging.”
She sighs, exasperated. “We’ll try, but I guarantee your fanbases will come up with Elemental on their own, so you might as well get used to it.”
I guess I’ll jump off that bridge when I come to it. “When are we going to be outed?”
“On the red carpet at Friday’s premiere,” Claudia says.
“Won’t that get everyone talking about us instead of the movie?” River asks.
He’s already concerned about overshadowing me, which earns him a point in my book.
“They’ll be talking about you by circulating pictures with the two of you standing in front of a step and repeat with the movie logo all over it. Trust me, it’ll drive traffic if we do this right.”
“What does doing it right entail?” I ask.
“You two are great actors, but you’ve really got to sell it. Get to know each other, get comfortable showing affection. Sell. It.”
I gulp and look over at River, who’s staring right back.
“Yeah,” he says, his voice a rough whisper. “I think we can do that.”
Claudia and Keith give us a rundown of what they have planned for us so far. We have my premiere coming up on Friday, a party for a cologne that River did some modeling for a couple weeks after that, then Claudia wants us to take a long weekend trip to a beach house in the Caribbean that Keith’s venture capitalist brother owns to show people that things are getting serious. After that we’re going to plan something for the holidays, and then the showmance calendar is tentative until after River’s premiere in February.
The prevailing idea is that we’ll “break up” at the beginning of March, with a few friendly coffee dates to show that things are on good terms.
Then both of us can move on to real relationships, with our careers firmly in the stratosphere if everything works the way it should.
Gotta love Hollywood.
Claudia and Keith leave us alone for a few minutes after the meeting is over to get our bearings.
“How do you feel about things?” he asks, gliding his hand along Gigi’s back.
I sink back into the couch cushions and sigh. “Having my life splashed all over the internet is my least favorite part of this whole job.”
“Mine too.”
“I intentionally try to insulate myself from that, so I don’t really keep up with it. That’s why I’m not that familiar with your work,” I admit.
He lets out a huff of a laugh. “I wouldn’t expect you to be. You’ve been in some critically-acclaimed projects. I’ve been in Sucker Punch Three.”
“Sucker Punch Three probably banked more than half of my projects ever did.”
“Yeah,” he sighs. “We all know the almighty dollar rules the world.”
“That it does. I hope this winds up being worth it.”
He glances up at me, blue eyes pinning me in my place. “It will be.”
I swallow down the butterflies swarming in my stomach. He reaches out and takes my hand, his strong fingers wrapping around mine. I gasp and look down at where we’re touching. It’s new and surprising, but it feels right. Which is wrong, because this is fake. Fakeity fake, fake fake.
River grins. “We’ll probably have to practice that a little.”
“Practice what?”
“Touching, kissing. It’s gonna have to be part of the act if we’re gonna sell this like Claudia and Keith want us to. You not being repulsed by holding my hand is probably a start.”
He’s teasing me, but for some reason I can’t let the idea that I could ever be repulsed by him take root for even a second. “Trust me, I’m definitely
