She met the eyes of the rest of the group. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting everyone. I’m Poppy Hart.” She gave a dramatic wave of the hand.
She got exactly one wave back—from Decker, who was wiggling his fingers like she was amusing. From the others she just received a few tentative smiles back, but nothing concrete that said she was a part of the group.
Then Decker did something that took her by surprise. He walked over to her and slung his arm over her shoulder. “Poppy, this is the crew. Crew, this is Poppy.”
“Hi, Poppy,” they said in unison as if this were an AA meeting.
“Oh, look,” Wasim said. “It’s time to sit down for the table read. I’d better find a seat.”
“Me, too,” Jessika said, following hot on Wasim’s heels.
Clive said not a word, while Diana shot Poppy anI’m watching youlook and walked toward the four tables that were positioned to make a square.
They all knew damn well the table read was a good tenminutes away and there were place cards for the seating assignment, but she let it go.
“What was that about?” she demanded to know.
“Don’t look at me.” Decker chuckled. “I heard you lost your shit and made Wasim cry.”
“That’s not funny. I’d never make anyone cry.” He must be joking, because she’d be horrified to know she’d made someone cry. “On the other hand, he was inches from the molding. Original molding.”
He lifted a brow. “Yeah. I know. Being on a construction site is like being on a playground with a bunch of little kids swinging tetherballs.”
“What exactly did Wasim tell you?” Because she couldn’t fix it if she didn’t know the damage.
“Oh, he didn’t tell me. He told Harry, the drywall guy, who told Jessika, who told Clive. And Clive couldn’t wait to spill the tea and told me the second I walked up.”
“What is this, DIY telephone?”
“Just wait until the set is on lockdown and we’re a week in.”
Her throat went dry. “So the whole crew knows?”
“And the production team.”
“How did this happen? Things like this never happen to me. I’m likeable.”
He laughed. “I thought that for the first fifteen minutes of our date, then you went all WWE on me.”
“Because for the first fifteen minutes you pretended to know my name. Speaking of that, I’m still not talking to you.”
He chuckled. “Are you sure? You’ve been talking to me plenty. In fact, this sounds like the beginnings of a second date.”
“How do you figure?”
“For one, you keep staring at my lips. And another, you were checking out my ass a few moments ago. Next thing you know you’ll be kissing me in front of the porch light.”
“Never going to happen.” She walked off.
“Until it does,” he called behind her.
Ignoring the tingling zinging around her belly at his comment, she found her name at the head of the table and took her seat. A minute later Kiki sat to her right. Today, she was dressed in steel-toed shoes, black denim jeans with holes in the knees, and aCall me a designer one more time and I will wreck your ballstank. Her silky, jet-black hair was in two space-girl buns on top of her head and her lipstick was stain-your-lips blood-red.
“Thank God you’re here. I need an ally,” Poppy said.
“Is everyone still talking about how you made Wasim cry?”
“You were there. Did you see a single tear?”
