Hollywood Rebel by Misti Murphy
Chapter Three
Summer
Two months later
The doors to the elevator whoosh open and Bernadette Knight glides from the metal box. Her spindly, black heels click across the polished concrete floor of the Knightly PR offices. Her gaze locks on me through her owl eye red framed glasses.
I jump out of my chair and reach for her coffee at the same time. It foams from the plastic lid and drips down my finger.
“Ouch, that’s freaking hot,” I murmur as I swipe several napkins from the pile I gathered when I’d picked up her double espresso latte, no sugar, no whip and wipe up the excess. On the plus side, at least it’s still perfectly heated to the same temperature as the sun.
She thrusts her arm out as she gets to me, and I press the cup into her hand.
“Summer.” She swings to the left to bypass my desk as she peels the lid off her coffee and takes a regular sized mouthful of the beverage. “Walk with me to my office.”
Seriously, there’s no way she ought to be able to drink that without melting the inside of her mouth. Unless she’s some kind of demon. I pick up the notes I’ve been working on all week for the meeting we’re having this morning and hurry to catch up with her.
“You’ve been with Knightly for a while now,” she says.
“A few months.” Four long months of networking and glamorous parties and bringing Bernadette her lattes and picking up her dry cleaning and anything else she wants.
“Do you feel… useful?” She turns sharply at the door to her office, and I almost lose my feet in my hurry to keep out of her way. It’s not that she’s mean or rude or a terrible boss, exactly. She’s actually touted as the PR boss you want to work for. If you can get through the first six months, that is.
This is my chance to try and convince her to let me show her what I can really do, and it isn’t coffee orders or photocopying. “I think I could achieve more, given the opportunity to put my real skills to work.”
“You want a client?” She blinks at me as she places the coffee cup on her desk and peels off her fitted jacket to reveal a masculine cut white business shirt she’s teamed with three strings of pearls.
“I want a client.” I hug my notes to my chest. Is this really happening? Am I finally going to get to practice my chosen profession?
“Good.” She flips through the files on her desk. Top celebrities, business magnates, politicians. The cream of the crop rely on Bernadette’s skills to fix their social presence because she’s the best. It’s why I took this job, despite the high turnover rate.
I can feel my excitement in the apples of my cheeks. The beginnings of a smile curve my lips, but I’m not home free yet so I stifle them. “Good?”
“Don’t repeat me like an imbecile. You’re supposed to be a communications expert. Graduated top of your class.” She picks up several folders, snags her coffee again, and moves toward the door.
“I did. High distinction.” My own heels sound more like a herd of baby elephants as I race to follow her down the hall to the conference room.
“And have you got any bites?” She glides to the head of the table. Places each color-coded file down separately.
Bites? As in I need to find my own break-in client? I mentally face palm myself. Of course I do. Of course, she expects me to show my value to her company before she’ll trust me with her clients. It’s a total duh moment. Only she has the Hollywood market well and truly cornered, so how am I going to do that?
“Summer?” Dropping delicately into her seat, she crosses her legs and gives me a pointed look. “Please tell me that hiring you wasn’t a waste of time. Who are your leads?”
My brain starts racing as my colleagues begin to enter the room. There was that guy on TMZ who was caught making out with his best friend’s fiancée; that could be promising. Or I know for a fact that that gym bunny Mandy Valentine was caught binge eating her weight in chocolate while making money out of convincing housewives to only eat protein and do some incredibly complicated exercise routine.
Jolene, the other girl who started about a month before me, sneers as she walks past me to take her seat. “I’ve been talking to Mandy Valentine. She’s signing with us today.”
Shit. Well, there goes that one.
“Great work, Jolene.” Bernadette offers her a rare smile.
“Thank you.” Jolene freaking beams before turning her snide and yet perfect nose up at me.
“Okay, everyone take a seat,” Bernadette addresses the room. “Let’s get this meeting started.”
I take the last vacant chair in the room as Bernadette starts asking everyone about their current clients. I’m sitting right at the back. Behind Brian, who always smells like the bad kind of spicy burritos. Where I can pretend that I’m not here and I wasn’t beaten to the punch by Bernadette’s little suck up or blow my chance at keeping this job.
A pair of stone-cold pewter blue eyes fill my mind. The curve of a devilish mouth and high cheek bones. Chiseled abs and there is not enough lipstick to ever smudge out the image in my head of his manhood.
I doodle on the side of my notes.
Rebel Maddox.
What an asshole. What a total jackass.
The only reason I’m thinking of him now is because I’d gone to the doctor for my annual physical yesterday and their gossip rags are so old, he was on one of the covers. Hollywood’s Rebel Without A Cause: The Bad Boy Breaking Hearts And Screens.
Yeah. I snort softly to myself. Nice play on his name and an old Hollywood classic. Too bad Hollywood doesn’t want him anymore.
“Summer?” Bernadette calls on me.
I glance up from my doodle of, erm, apparently a mighty big penis to find my fellow coworkers waiting for my response. What was the question?
Jolene practically vibrates with glee.
“Your client list.” Bernadette arches a brow. The last time she did that Tom Madison packed up his office. And he’d been with the company for three years.
I gulp. I am so screwed. If I don’t come up with someone on the spot I’ll be clearing my desk by the end of the day. “Rebel Maddox.”
“Sorry, come again?”
A couple of my colleagues start whispering. Jolene’s smile begins to drip from her face like a Salvador Dali.
“Rebel Maddox,” I repeat much louder as I jump to my feet. My heart is racing a thousand miles an hour. I’m either crazy or this is the best idea ever. With the way everyone is looking at me, I’m going with the former.
“Do you really think you can tame the beast?” Jolene asks, pure disbelief oozing off every word.
“I heard he once sacrificed a goat to the devil,” Brian says.
“Jeez, thanks, Brian,” I whisper as I hold Bernadette’s gaze with my own. I cannot back down on this. Not now. This is my dream job, and I am not giving it up without a fight. So okay, the last time I saw the hunky movie star he was screaming at me to get out of his house, but no one here knows that. And I doubt the man himself remembers, right? He’d just cracked open his second bottle of whisky.
The idea of taking on Rebel Maddox seems a little like hugging a crocodile and hoping I don’t get my head chewed off, but I have six brothers, and I do not back down. Never. No matter what the consequences. I once had a chili pepper shoved down the back of my underwear and no, we’re not talking about a chili that was in one perfect piece. This thing had been sliced for maximum torture. I didn’t sit right for a week, but did I cry? No. Not one single tear. That’s how stubborn I am.
Another voice pipes up. “Didn’t he urinate on Selena Page?”
“I thought that was a rumor.” I blanche. Please let it be a rumor.
“That never happened,” someone else says. “I’m pretty sure it was a dog, wasn’t it?”
“Not sure,” another of my coworkers responds. “Isn’t he the one who masturbated on that statue? You know the one? With the horse?”
“That’s right,” Anthony, who handles Knightly PR’s sports team clients, jumps in. “He’s a real piece of work. There’s no way she can make him look good.”
Bernadette steeples her fingers beneath her chin. “Are you sure about this, Summer?”
I swallow as they all focus their attention on me for a second time since this meeting started. Am I sure? Nope, not at all. Not one iota. I’d go so far as to say this is a terrible idea. My mouth does not get the message. “Yes.”
“And he’s interested?” There’s a dare in her tone, and I wish I’d asked her why she’d never signed him herself. I assumed it was because he’s such a nightmare, but I get the sense she might have tried to land this devil fish at some point and was knocked back.
“Interested,” I scoff. “He’s on board.”
“Oh no, she didn’t,” Brian whispers. “You signed the Hollywood Rebel?”
Oh fuck no, I didn’t. But apparently that’s exactly what I’ve told the entire room that I’ve done.
“Congratulations.” Bernadette beams. “Have his contract on my desk by Friday afternoon.”
“Easy.” My fingers do this weird thing where they tap my forehead, like I’m trying to salute my boss before I manage to get them under control. Now, I need to track down Rebel Maddox, who hasn’t been seen in public since before he went to prison, and convince the worst man in Hollywood that he needs my help. Piece of cake, right?
I am so going to lose my job.
“Meeting adjourned.” Bernadette stands and packs up her files.
The others follow and start to exit the conference room.
“Congratulations,” Jolene says as she passes me to get to the door. “You’re far braver than I, tackling Rebel Maddox as your first client. I couldn’t put my whole career on the line like that.”
A bubble of nervous laughter makes its way up my throat and gets stuck as she walks away. If I don’t sign Rebel Maddox I might as well go home with my tail between my legs.
That’s not an alternative.
Rebel Maddox is going to sign with me. He’s going to let me turn his career around. Because, damnit, I won’t give him any other option.
I’m the last one to leave the conference room. I drop my notes at my desk and grab my bag. I find his agent’s address online. I have a week to make Rebel Maddox say yes to me. There’s no time to waste. I’m going straight to his agent’s office.
—*—
“What was I thinking?” I mutter under my breath as I climb the stairs to Rebel Maddox’s house. Well, house might be a bit of an understatement. Two floors of glass and white concrete set high up in the hills with a view looking down on the city. Tall trees surround the property, affording a good amount of privacy and the guard at the gate probably does a decent job of keeping unwelcome people away. Lucky for me, I have a meeting with Rebel Maddox.
And how did I manage that? I cornered his agent in his office, plunked my butt in the chair opposite him and convinced him that I could fix his biggest star. At which point he laughed and called Rebel Maddox’s manager to share the joke. Between them they decided it would be worth giving me a chance to shoot my shot, basically because it would be a great prank to play on the star.
That said, I am now standing here, at his door… and I’m not leaving until I get what I came for. “Or I can die trying.”
According to the eight hours of research I did over donuts and caffeine last night, before I fell asleep on the old sofa in the two-bedroom apartment I share with my bestie, Rebel is unredeemable. A drama llama on set, he once threatened to beat a producer with the man’s own leg. I’m not entirely sure how one would go about that, but it sounds like it would hurt a lot.
I take a deep breath as I depress the doorbell. Moment of truth. Have I got what it takes to handle Rebel Maddox? Can I bluff hard enough to convince him that I do?
It takes a few minutes before the door opens.
I blink as my gaze roves past the bottle of beer in his hand and up the shirtless torso that has flitted into my mind every night for the past two months while I’m trying to sleep. Up over those beefy, muscular shoulders with their ink. I take in the dark scruff on his jaw and those firm, yet plush lips.
“How the fuck did you get past security?” Those gray-blues glare at me.
I steel my spine and force my nerves back down from my throat. He’s an imposing figure. I don’t know how I forgot how much so. Blame it on the champagne. I thrust out a hand. “I’m Summer Heart, with Knightly PR. We have an app—”
“Hell fucking no.” The door slams in my face.
Does that mean he remembers me? Well, I guess it’s on to plan B.