He watched as Lilah returned to her game of darts with Dean and Rafael, forcing himself to tamp down the surge of betrayal he felt at seeing the three of them being so buddy-buddy. He knew Raf wasn’t that fond of her, but get a couple of drinks in him and he’d cuddle up to a rattlesnake. And as for Dean…well.
It looked like a close game, but Rafael triumphed in the end, Lilah throwing her hands up good-naturedly as he slapped her on the back. She collected their empty glasses—obviously her penalty for losing—and headed toward Shane.
“Bulleit neat, water, and whatever IPA Dean’s drinking.Please,” she said, dropping the glasses to the counter with a clink. She eyed the pitcher on the bar next to her, overflowing with tips. “This isn’t going to you, is it?”
He cleared the glasses and leaned a fresh pint glass under the tap. “Of course not.”
“Just checking.” She dug a twenty out of her pocket and dropped it in.
As he poured the whiskey, she turned away until she was in profile, pointedly ignoring him, scraping her hair into a makeshift ponytail with one hand. Over the past few hours, thetemperature in the bar had crept up to somewhere between “muggy” and “stuffy,” leaving everyone looking like glazed donuts. He tried to ignore the flush staining her cheeks; the stray lock of hair, damp with sweat, that clung to her neck; the way the position of her arms made her breasts swell above the neckline of her tank top.
“What’s with the Miss Congeniality act?” Shane asked casually, placing Rafael’s whiskey next to Dean’s beer.
She raised an eyebrow, dropping her hair and turning back to him. “You mean being friendly to my co-workers? Who says it’s an act?”
Shane filled a pint glass with ice and aimed the soda gun into it. “I dunno. Seems a little out of character, working this hard to get people to like you.”
He expected her to bristle, but instead, a slow smile spread across her face, sending an unexpected (and unwelcome) surge of heat through his veins.
“Of course. Because if I don’t make an effort, I’m a bitch who thinks I’m better than everyone. But if Idomake an effort, I’m being fake. What do you want from me, exactly?” She wasn’t drunk; he hadn’t seen her have a drink all night. There was nothing to explain the playful challenge in her demeanor—other than the possibility that she actuallywashaving a good time and refused to let him ruin it.
“I’m just waiting for my turn in the sun.” He moved to put her water on the bar, but she held out her hand, so he passed it right to her. When their fingers brushed, he thought he saw something spark in her eyes. She looked away before he could parse it.
“You already had your turn.” She tilted her head back and took a long drink before placing the glass back on the bar, half-empty. He dutifully refilled it.
“It does make things easier, though. If we all get along,” he said. “That’s why you’re doing this, right?”
She glanced over at him and gave a long, exasperated exhale.
“Maybe I genuinely like them. Maybe they likeme—as hard as that might be for you to believe.” She gracefully scooped up the drinks, meeting his eyes again, her gaze as chilled as the ice in the bin in front of him. “And maybe you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”
With that, she sauntered back over to the dartboard. Obviously, he watched her walk away, but he didn’t realize how intently he’d been staring until an unexpected voice next to him made him jump.
“So, who dumped who?”
He turned to see Natalie nursing the end of her whiskey sour.
When Natalie had first joined the cast, he’d reflexively kept a polite distance from her, not wanting to make the same mistake twice; however, once they’d established they weren’t really attracted to each other, the two of them had become good friends. Shane had even introduced her to her now-husband, a private chef he’d met through Serena.
They’d never discussed the specifics of his history with Lilah, though.
He cleared his throat, taking a sip of his own beer behind the bar. “Sorry?”
“Come on.” She slid onto the barstool in front of him. “The last time I was on a set this tense, the director was in the middle of divorcing the star. He tried to fire her, the producers intervened, it was a whole thing. They wouldn’t even speak directly to each other, they just had their assistants pass messages back and forth.”
Shane winced. “Are we that bad?”
Natalie’s expression turned triumphant. “So itistrue.”
He paused. He’d never told anyone who worked on the show about him and Lilah—besides Dean, of course. That didn’t mean other people hadn’t figured it out on their own, but it was still probably best to play dumb.
“What’s true?”
“You two. You had a thing way back when, and that’s why you hate each other now.”
Shane looked down at the bar. Suddenly, he was struck with a need to confess, to confide. Who was he protecting? Lilah? Himself? Whatever they’d had back then was long dead and buried, even if its ghost refused to leave them alone. It didn’t seem like it would make much of a difference at this point, finally confirming what everyone had already assumed.
“Yeah. Yeah, it’s true. But it wasn’t anything…” He trailed off before starting again. “It was over by the second season.”
