Sugar Baby Beautiful(48)

“Technically any movie by Darcy Entertainment is my movie even if I’m not directing. Just make sure she stays in check. This will get messy otherwise.”

As soon as I hung up, another call came in. My mother. I didn’t want to do this with her now, but she would just keep calling. “Mother.”

“You sound sick.”

I coughed. “I am but getting better.”

“Where are you? I called the office, and they said you were on the set of a movie?”

“I’m in North Carolina. I’m producing a movie.”

“Honestly, Theodore, you shouldn’t overstretch yourself. Between management and the gala, you don’t have time to produce. Make sure to do something for yourself.”

“I am. I brought someone with me.” I smiled.

“Not the girl you brought to the house?”

Here it came. She was very particular about the women around her sons. Sometimes I even pitied Tori. “What about her?”

“She’s a waitress.” No matter how she tried to say it, it still came off snobbish.

“Well, as of this morning, she apparently became my personal assistant.” I got out of bed, still a little bit dizzy, and headed to the bathroom.

“You can’t be serious. Did she even go to college?”

“Mother—”

“Theodore, I’m glad you’re moving on, but I don’t want you to get hurt again.”

Why was everyone so damn worried about me getting fucking hurt? I was a grown man. If I got hurt, I got hurt and moved on.

“Mother, I like her. As of now, I’m with her. I really don’t care if she’s a waitress, or whether or not she went to college. Please get used to that. I’m sorry. I have to go.”

“Fine. Love you.”

“Yeah, me too.”

I heard her sigh before hanging up. She was still waiting for me to say the words back, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.





Felicity


1:04 p.m.

“So, you’re his personal assistant?”

I glanced up from the script to look at Charlie, the woman with short blue hair, who had done my makeup yesterday. She handed me a bottle of water and took a seat beside me.

“Whose personal assistant?” I accepted the water.

She tilted her head to the side. “Mr. Darcy? That’s what he said.”

“Oh… yes.” This was the thing about lying. Once you started, you had to keep at it. “Sorry. I was so focused on this story. I’m doing my best not to skip to the end.”

“It must be really interesting working for a man like him. I can’t figure him out. He’s very cold, yet he does things like fund a brand new director’s movie.” We glanced at Mr. Hamilton, who looked much better now that the filming was going fine. “All of us were wondering where he came from. But apparently he was working as a hotel janitor. He basically threw this script at Mr. Darcy while he was on the way to the bathroom. The next day he’s being called into Darcy Entertainment, and now he has his film. Crazy, right? Who does that?”

Theodore Darcy.

“It just goes to show you,” she went on, slipping me a photo. “Sometimes real life is better than the movies. I hope you have a good day.”

I pulled the sticky note off the photo and read: No one else saw but me. We got there as the rain started. It was so cute I had to take it. :)

She had taken a photo of me in Theo’s arms, kissing under the rain. The only light was coming from the movie screen, but she’d captured our faces perfectly.

“Ms. Harper?”

Nolan was beside me. “The crew is about to break for an hour or two. Would like to go anywhere or have me bring you anything to eat?”

Eat! I’d completely forgotten. Theo might not have gotten up yet.

“Do you know any place I can get soup or something?”

He nodded. “Would you like me to go for you?”

“No, I’ll do it.” I gathered up my things and went to the car. He rushed in front of me, making sure to open the passenger side door for me. “You don’t need to do that.”

“Didn’t you just give a speech about people doing their jobs? Well, Ms. Felicity, this is my job, and I’m proud of it.”

I hadn’t thought about it like that. I wondered how annoyed I’d feel if someone came into the diner and told me not to serve them. Instead of getting in front with him, I took a step back and allowed him to open the door for me.

“Of course, ma’am.”

Leaning against the backseat, I flipped to where I was in the script. I wanted to know how Margaret and Ernest ended up, and as I read I thought they wouldn’t get any happy ending, despite the fact that they both loved each other. Ernest tried to get back to the life he had before the war, but he just couldn’t. He was breaking down and pulling her with him. The scene Theo had read to me was actually the saddest. Margaret didn’t get into the car. She didn’t choose him, which was ironic because she so badly wanted him in the beginning. The story skipped to Ernest alone in the house, holding the handkerchief Margaret had made him. His final line was: