Ford placed two fingers in front of his lips and signaled for me to be quiet. I wanted to glare, but I held back. I could tell he was shaken by the news about his mom.
“Tell me something more important,” Scott said, saving the moment. “Are you going to vote for me?”
Ford growled, I laughed, and the three of us moved on to more casual conversation until Scott had to go home.
Jamie
Scott was mostly a pain-in-the-ass little kid when Ford and I were growing up. Ford did his best to try and keep Scott grounded, but he was the most influenced by their mom.
There was one time where Ford turned venomous on Scott. We’d all been out on the patio, playing gin rummy. A few other kids from Stillwell were there, and Billy, of course. She was obsessed with hanging with the older crowd. I’d won and was collecting the pot from the middle of the table.
Scott, who had been kicking a soccer ball around the yard, piped up out of nowhere. “What are you gonna buy, Jamie? A new life?”
Knowing my place, I ignored Scott. He was a brat who didn’t understand the real world.
Not Ford though. He stood from the table and tackled Scott to the ground, holding him there and muttering something through gritted teeth. I never figured out what he said.
With me settled in the passenger seat, Ford thanked the valet for holding the door—with a small side-eye for glancing at me—before he ran around the front to the driver’s side.
“Really?”
“What?” He looked at me doe-eyed.
“I can take care of myself. You don’t need to give side-eye.”
“Or throw punches? I mean my brother, not the valet.”
“Exactly. I thought you might throw Scott down like you did that one time he made fun of me for being poor.”
“He knows to check himself.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. It was funny to see this urban-ish LA side of Ford. It was such a contradiction to how I knew he grew up.
“Should we do dinner at the hotel?” There was the Ford I’d grown to love.
“I’d have to go change.”
“Or we could do room service.”
“Is that so?” I lifted an eyebrow at his profile.
“No assumptions, I swear.”
I didn’t want to go home alone after this magnificent day with Ford. I kept waiting for a TV crew to jump out and say I was being pranked. “I’d like to have dinner, but I do want to change.”
“No problem.” Ford gave a quick turn and wink as he spoke. Then he took a call from a costume designer screaming about the assistant producer bossing her around. I listened to Ford talk her down from her mood and say he would be back later next week. “Until then, don’t murder anyone in cold blood,” he joked before hanging up.
We spent the rest of the hour-long ride with me asking questions about celebrities Ford knew.
“It’s no biggie to me,” he kept saying.
“Not even Bella?”
“Don’t fish for compliments. Bella is nothing but the star of a movie and tied to my paycheck,” he said as we pulled in front of my house. “Do you mind if I wait here and call the other guy on the end of that fight?”
“Of course not.” I’d wondered if he was going to wade in with his assistant producer.
I ran up my steps and took the liberty of a two-minute shower, not washing my face, adding a quick touch-up of makeup, and changing into jeans and a taupe tank. Sandals on my feet, I returned to the car to find Ford fiddling with the XM radio.
