Taming Hollywood’s Ultimate Playboy by Amalie Berlin Page A

my past.”
    â€œHow did you get hurt?” He didn’t sound angry, as he had in the hotel, but there was more emotion in his voice than she’d expect from someone who’d stayed away so effectively. And who hadn’t felt the same way about her as she’d felt about him.
    Even if she’d avoided asking about Liam, she’d always thought he’d probably still kept up with her through Nick. Nick was a talker, and he had spent a lot of time in the hospital with her while she’d recovered. “Nick really didn’t tell you about my accident? I thought you two told one another everything.”
    â€œNo. He never did. Which is pretty weird...”
    Yes. Weird. Unless Nick knew about them. “I had a motorcycle accident when I was nineteen.”
    â€œI never heard about you having a motorcycle either.”
    â€œI didn’t. My boyfriend at the time... It was his motorcycle. After that, I had a lot of rehab. But it pretty much scratched professional swimmer off my career list. So I’m doing the next best thing.”
    He made some sound of affirmation, but it didn’t sound settled.
    Liam leaving had made her reckless, always seeking out the bad boy. That particular bad boy had made her go to the other extreme. Which made this premiere business so out of character for her that it could’ve been a joke. If someone had said to her last week that she’d be glittering from head to toe at a New York City premiere she’d have definitely thought it was some kind of joke where her dullness was the punch line. Because her life had been dull, probably. Other people would find the clientele exciting, and sometimes she did, but it was hard to be impressed by celebrities when she’d known Liam as long as she had. He was a real person, and that made them all too real and flawed as well.
    Maybe they were all wounded too. Maybe it took that kind of hurt to get someone from talented to artist.
    â€œI’m going to go find the usher,” she said, mostly because she didn’t know what else to say. “See if we can get that footstool.”
    Before her musings moved onto lamentations of what she couldn’t have.
    * * *
    â€œThe movie was good,” Grace said, shifting in the back seat of the limo, not sure of where or even how to sit now that their charade of a date was over. “You were good. Not that I expected anything different. But all those period costumes, I loved it. It felt like a real story. Not just all the flash-bang stuff that goes on in your action movies.”
    For the entire evening she’d been pretty much plastered to Liam’s side, and now, sitting with space around her, she felt cold. And lonely. Making useless small talk also felt awkward.
    â€œGrace Watson, are you saying you don’t like my action movies?” Unlike earlier, Liam had taken a spot up by the door, his legs stretched out in front of him.
    â€œStill playful, that’s good. I guess your ankle isn’t hurting as much as last night?”
    â€œYou did not answer the question but you’re correct, it’s not hurting as badly as last night.”
    She crossed her arms and lifted her brows, giving him her best told-you-so expression.
    Liam crossed his arms in response. “You want me to say it?”
    â€œI do. It’s a personal failing, I know, but yes. Yes, I want you to say it.” She knew she looked smug, that was the whole point of the told-you-so   expression.
    â€œYou were right. I should have listened to you all along, but then I would never have gotten to have the prettiest date tonight.”
    She snorted. The first couple of times he’d said it she’d been too dazed to really process the words.
    â€œYou know, the more you say it, the less I believe it.” They passed a building she hadn’t seen on the way to the theater and she stopped to get a good look at the direction in which they were traveling.