SLEAZE: A Hollywood Comeback Story (Book #1)

Chapter 25

Perched on the corner of my desk, Melanie sat stirring soy creamer and organic sugar into her coffee while she listened to me tell her about my weekend. Empty wrappers littered the area around her makeshift seat and she watched me over the rim of her mug with amusement twinkling in her eyes.

“This is so cute,” she said, placing a hand over her heart and sighing. “Four months ago you were a wide-eyed intern and now you’re sneaking around and dating our clients like one of the big guys down the hall.”

“Shut up,” I mumbled, getting up to close my office’s door. Nearly all of the full-time staff had gone out for lunch to celebrate the company president’s birthday but there was no point in risking a rumor being spread in case someone overheard us talking. “And I’m not dating anyone.”

“In that case, pick me up at seven. Tulips are my favorite flower and I hate garlic.”

“Sometimes it’s really hard for me to tell if you’re joking or not,” I said and Melanie tilted her head so that neatly styled curls tumbled across her shoulder.

“Well, then you should probably just assume the worst.” She batted her eyelashes before bursting into a fit of giggles. “Oh, God, you look terrified. I’m just kidding, Parker, what’s wrong with you?”

I sat down in my chair again and swiveled back and forth, staring up at the ceiling. “Sorry. I told you I haven’t been sleeping. My brain is…” I lifted my index finger next to my temple and twirled it in fast circles. “Completely out the window.”

“Well, hurry up and get it together; you’re throwing off our dynamic.”

“Believe me, I’m trying,” I said and rubbed my eyes with the heel of my palm. “Help me out, Mel.”

“With what?”

“Everything.” I motioned to the stacks of headshots that Michael had handed me to file and toss, accordingly. The project itself wouldn’t have been so bad if the intern before me had known what ‘alphabetical order’ meant when creating the physical filing system. “I don’t want to do any of this anymore.”

“Then you should hurry up and finish your film school application so that maybe when you graduate, you won’t have to. Or did you change your mind and decide to stick with engineering?”

I groaned. I couldn’t decide what was worse--the fact that Sophie was the leading cause of my procrastination or that Melanie had appointed herself as my drill sergeant. “I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe.”

“Maybe what?”

“Maybe I should just become an engineer. I have two years to get my grades up and then I can move back to Boston and start a firm with my dad.” I paused, considering the idea for a moment. “It wouldn’t be terrible.”

Melanie shook her head furiously until full curls became looser waves. “You’d be miserable.”

“How do you know?” I asked, studying her through one eye and closing the other. “Maybe solving Axiomatic design matrices is my true calling.”

“Oh my God, get over yourself.”

“Thanks for caring about my future.”

“I do care and that’s why you obviously need some tough love right now.” She leaned forward and clapped her hands on my shoulders. I raised an eyebrow but didn’t protest, noting the distinct difference in how her touch made me feel compared to Sophie’s.

Melanie continued, “I totally get that you’re stressed right now and I can’t blame you—just listening to everything you’ve told me makes me feel like I need a drink.”