Angelica Greene was a black widow.
And I refused to be her prey again.
“Me.” I said as I pulled down the long driveway where my clients all owned houses. Seven beach house mansions lined the cliff.
I was renting the one in the middle.
Smack dab between three of Hollywood’s hottest musicians, their wives or significant others, and Jaymeson.
She’d look out the window and see beach houses.
I looked out the window and saw emotional support for both of us.
But mainly.
Her.
Because the past had finally come knocking.
And it was time to stop running.
For both of us.
“Me?” She repeated, “What does that even mean?”
“You’re going to be living with me during filming. Just think, I won’t have to put a bracelet around your ankle that way.”
YOU KNOW THE dream people have when they’re kids? You’re naked in front of all of your classmates. They point and laugh while you try to cover up whatever parts you can with two hands all the while wondering why your feet are frozen in place. I mean, why don’t you ever run in those dreams? Why do you just stand there? Logic would say to run, right?
Instead, you stand, paralyzed with fear.
And the worst part?
It feels so real.
Like it’s really happening.
Like something you won’t ever recover from.
I was experiencing one of those moments, only I wasn’t dreaming — trust me I even pinched my arm to make sure.
Because standing in front of Will’s beach house wasn’t just my brother, actor Lincoln Greene with his girlfriend, Dani — because that would be normal right? He was in town shooting, he was blood, end of story.
I could live with that story.
But no.
It was my nemeses.
My past coming back to my present.
In the form of every single Hollywood heartthrob I’d either kissed or been semi friends with staring back at me. Seaside was the new it town, and they were the ones who’d made it that way.
Rock god Zane Andrews smirked at me and gave a little wave before shoving a marshmallow in his mouth and wrapping an arm around his girlfriend, Fallon. I thought he was still on tour.
I’d thought wrong.
My eyes fell to the couple next to them.
Demetri and Alyssa.
His smile was strained, just like it always was whenever I was in his presence. Years ago, we’d had a thing, or maybe it had just been a thing on my end. I’d been so desperate for any sort of attention that when it was encouraged by my publicist at the time to be seen with either Demetri Daniels or Alec Daniels — I decided on both.
It was a bad choice.
Followed by a series of bad choices that ended up landing me in the hospital and losing everything I’d worked my ass off to build.
My chest felt like someone had pressed down on it, like my heart was failing and the only way to save me was compression after compression until my sternum cracked.
Alec Daniels stared right through me like I was the devil.
Satan.
Darkness itself.
I flinched when he put a protective arm around Natalie, his wife, and the baby girl she was holding.
And suddenly it was too much.
The pain.
The loss.
The memories of what I could have had with these people if I hadn’t been so selfish — so afraid.
I could have been friends with them.
I could have had a life with them.
Everything.
Instead I’d basically made Alec, lead singer of AD2 dive back into addiction — and held his hand while doing it, knowing it was wrong.
I closed my eyes.
So much hurt filled the space between me and these people.
So. Much. Hurt.
But turning around meant facing the other person I’d hurt, first by accident and then by choice.
Will touched my back giving me a little shove toward the group. “We’re having a first day of filming barbecue.”
“Great.” My throat was so dry I sounded like I’d taken up smoking in my spare time.
“Sis,” Lincoln was the first to approach; he pulled me in for a hug and breathed into my ear. “Just don’t be yourself.”
It stung more than it should have.
I was the older sister.
I was the example.
And there he was, successful, a damn good actor, in a committed relationship with a girl who actually tolerated him.
And look at me.
Still standing there.
Naked for everyone to see.
I didn’t realize tears were filling my eyes until it was too late.
Until Demetri Daniels of all people, with his cocky-as-hell smile stepped forward, pulled me in for an unexpected hug, and lowered his voice, “Remember, in this industry the weak get eaten alive.”
I didn’t trust myself to speak.
“Oh, and we don’t hate you.”
I snorted out a strangled laugh. “That’s… so reassuring.”