SLEAZE: A Hollywood Comeback Story (Book #1)

Chapter 47

My apartment seemed eerily quiet when I got back home so I busied myself with cleaning my room to pass the time. I'd never been as messy as Scott, but I still felt bad for Sophie on the days that she slept over and had to navigate the battlefield of dirty laundry lying on my floor. I even gave my bathroom a thorough scrubbing for good measure and felt satisfied with the results by the time I wandered back into my living room. After the past two days, I was looking forward to having a lazy day at home but as soon as I sat down on the couch, my phone began to buzz. Sophie's face popped up on the screen and I rolled my eyes, wondering what she'd forgotten.

    "Hello?"

    "Hi," Sophie said. "I need you to do me a huge favor."

    "Which is?"

    "I left my purse on your kitchen counter. Would you mind bringing it to the set?"

    I groaned inwardly. The drive into the Valley was always a nightmare and after Michael's warning, I didn't think it was a particularly great idea for me to show up where Sophie was working either. "Can't I bring it by your house later?"

    "I don't know how long the shoot is going to last," Sophie explained, and I got up to look for the abandoned bag.

    Sure enough, the designer wristlet lay beside the sink and I picked it up, turning it over in my hands. "And you really need it now?"

    "Yes," she said impatiently. "My medication is in there--you know, for my headaches."

    "Oh." I fiddled with the latch and the bag popped open. I poked through it while balancing my phone on my shoulder, noting that a thin pill box lay at the bottom beneath several items of make-up and what looked like a plastic compact mirror. "Can't you take an Advil or something?"

    Realizing I wasn't convinced, Sophie continued, "My birth control's in that bag, too."

    "Oh." I opened the lid of the compact and several rows of tiny pink pills stared back at me. I weighed my options for a moment and then relented. Dammit. "Alright, fine."

    "Great. Thanks, Parker," Sophie said. "I'll text you the number of the studio we're in and tell security to give you a guest pass."

    I grunted my dissatisfaction before hanging up but then moved to the hall closet to begin searching for a backpack to stow Sophie's purse in. Ordinarily I wouldn't have minded carrying her bag in my hand but the one she'd worn Friday night was a bit too sparkly to be subtle. I didn't need to look in a mirror to know that I wouldn't be able to pull it off.

The drive into the San Fernando Valley, predictably, ate up an hour of my life and by the time I'd parked in the studio's guest lot, ridden the shuttle to the main entrance, and gone through security to get my pass, it was nearly twelve o'clock. I wandered around the lot while admiring my bustling surroundings until I finally found the studio where Kelly's movie was filming. The massive doors leading onto the set were open so I popped my head in and watched while stagehands moved props and adjusted lighting fixtures. A chair emblazoned with the word "DIRECTOR" on the back sat unoccupied and it looked like everyone was heading out for a break.

Sophie was nowhere to be seen, though as I continued to peer around the emptying set with mounting confusion, a voice behind me asked, "Are you looking for Sophie?"

    I turned around, surprised to find Richard staring up at me. To say that he looked worse for the wear was a generous understatement. Dark shadows rimmed his lower lids and the white spaces around his pupils were bright red where vessels had swelled and burst. The expression on his face was a mixture of disdain and boredom and when he sniffed, his nose rose upwards, pulling his mouth into a sneer. He wiped his nose against the back of his hand.