“Okay, Dru. I’m gonna head home,” Amanda called out. “I’m gonna go.” Dru was in the other room watching some weird dating show on Netflix. Their day hadn’t been half bad. Dru behaved herself on set and she’d gotten a call for a different made-for-TV romance. Travis Cooper was already signed on to play the male lead. Most women in their age bracket had at least a little bit of a thing for him since middle school, so she had that to look forward to. Amanda missed Sam like crazy, but at least Dru wasn’t making things worse.
Amanda grabbed her phone off the counter and stuck it in her back pocket. When she went to grab her bag she gasped, scared shitless at Dru’s sudden appearance by the coffeemaker she never used.
“Jesus Christ. You scared me. I’m heading out. I’ll see you in the morning?”
Dru didn’t say anything. She just shook her head, then tilted it a little to the left.
“What?” Amanda asked.
“There’s no fucking way.”
“What are you talking about?”
Dru’s eyes narrowed as she came into the kitchen. “Turn around.”
“Why, what is it?” Amanda spun around. “Is there something on my back?”
“Beyond a little extra padding? No.” Amanda rolled her eyes at her horrible fat joke. “That’s not what I was looking at.”
“What is it?”
“Oh, nothing. Just you. Hanging out with Sam Pleasant.”
Amanda’s whole body went cold. “What?”
Dru strolled over and shoved her phone in Amanda’s face. “You little fucking liar,” she said with a smirk. Amanda looked at the screen. Dru was on some gossip site and sure enough there was a picture of her and Sam on the dance floor at Claim Jumpers. Her back was to the camera, but Sam’s face and that unmistakable cowboy hat were in clear view. You could see Zach and his own tan Stetson just off to their left. There was a small circular picture inset of the larger photo that showed a magnified image, making it clear those were Sam’s pearly whites flashing in the middle of that dive bar. Apparently that woman had managed to hide one photo from the bouncer’s view. Or maybe someone else had taken it.
Either way it was definitely on CelebGossipCentral. com. Amanda scrolled to the bottom of the article, skimming for certain details. It named the bar, went into detail about what Sam was wearing, it even mentioned that Evie Buchanan and her beau, Zach Pleasant, were also two-stepping the night away. Amanda was cited as an unnamed friend. Unnamed friend. She could handle that. But the speck of anonymity still couldn’t stop her from nearly shaking. This was not good.
She swallowed and handed Dru back her phone. “Sam Pleasant went to a bar with friends. What does that have to do with me?”
“How stupid do you think I am? Your hair is up the exact same way and you are wearing that same cheap sweater.” She plucked at the fabric covering Amanda’s shoulder. “They haven’t figured out who you are. They don’t give a fuck who random hangers-on are, but I need to know. How the hell do you know Sam Pleasant? Why the hell were you keeping this from me, and when the fuck are you going to introduce me to him so we can start our A-list baby-making empire?”
“Excuse me? What?”
“How do you know him?”
“I don’t. That’s not me!” Amanda sensed she was caught, but she didn’t care. Everything was all so new. She wasn’t ready to let Dru have a single piece of it, especially when Sam was halfway across the planet with his phone on Do Not Disturb.
“Mandy. Please. I look at that big dome and those discount braids every day. I know what you look like from that angle. I know it’s you. I know you lied about taking care of your friend’s baby this weekend ’cause you were somehow hanging out with Sam in his hometown. You have an in and I want that in too.”
The odd smile on Dru’s face let Amanda know that Dru wasn’t angry for being kept in the dark. The opposite. She was very pleased. Pleased with herself for figuring it out and pleased with herself for having trapped Amanda in a corner.
“I seriously have no idea what you’re talking about. Also, you’re the famous one between the two of us. If you want to meet Sam Pleasant, ask some other famous person to introduce you.”
The expression on Dru’s face dropped, like maybe she’d tried that already and it hadn’t worked. She shook the moment off and kept pressing.
“Are you saying this isn’t you?” Dru swiped her finger across her phone screen again and brought up one of Helene and Ignacio’s wedding photos. In the foreground the bride and groom were in each other’s arms. In the background were Amanda and Sam. Amanda had seen all the photos that had been published in People magazine and this wasn’t one of them. She’d been very careful to keep an eye on their professional photographer, careful to practically run from the man anytime she saw him coming. Someone else had taken this photo and apparently posted it.
“How—”
“You seriously think I’m stupid. This is easy Internet Stalking 101. Some dingus violated what one would think was an ironclad pre-wedding NDA and posted it on their Instagram. When I saw the pictures at the bar I knew that updo looked familiar to me. I did a little digging and I remembered I’d seen something in the background of one of Helene Sawyer’s wedding photos. And there you are. Slow dancing with Sam. Color me impressed. I didn’t think you’d be able to even speak to a guy like that. Let alone dance with him.”
In this photo, even though the resolution wasn’t great, even Amanda could tell it was definitely her. The shape of her face, her round cheeks
