all mussed and cheeks flushed like a woman after a night of pleasure, that he suddenly remembered her. Maddie from the party. Oh, yeah. That chick.
If he remembered correctly, that party was before he’d even signed with Stu. He had to be careful or she’d want to hook up again. Women from his past didn’t ever want anything except his fame and fortune. Hell, women in his present only wanted that. He decided it best to pretend he didn’t remember her at all.
She remembered him, though. It was obvious. Recognition spread over her face the minute he said her name. Her eyes glimmered with hopefulness.
Then the spark left and letdown settled on her features. He could have thrown her a bone then, given her a hint that he knew her, but he didn’t.
Yeah, he was an asshole.
Then he was stuffed in the SUV with her, drowning in her unique smell and memories of their evening together crashed over him like a giant wave—her tentative flirting, his smooth moves, that apple-pear body spray she used, the one she still wore now. He hadn’t done anything big yet. She hadn’t even known he was an actor. And still, she’d let him kiss her and touch her. Very intimately.
Was she the last woman he’d kissed before he’d become known? Too many years and women had passed for him to be sure. Maybe she wasn’t, but she reminded him of that time. Before he doubted the sincerity of every compliment. When his pick-up lines were meant to start relationships, not just get some for the night.
Now no pick-up lines were necessary at all. He could bag a girl with a flash of his famous smile. And though having models and costars and willing fans lined up at his bedroom door was out-of-this-world awesome, it got boring. Hot sex wasn’t the same as just talking and flirting and connecting with a woman. How long had it been since he’d done that?
What if he could recapture those days? With her. With Maddie. They still had chemistry. He could cut the sexual tension in the backseat with a knife. He felt her lean into his leg. He got it. He wanted to touch her too. And he did—a brush of her cheek, a hand on her knee. It wouldn’t take much to get her alone and underneath him.
But then she flirted with that overly chipper, butt-kisser Sam and he remembered—he wasn’t that guy. He wasn’t the guy who was in it for the long haul. Micah was a movie star. He was into girls for a minute. He couldn’t recapture the days before his fame and that was the price he’d paid. Even if he tried to get involved with a woman, he could never trust their intentions with him. He’d chosen this life, made a very deliberate decision of career over love.
And getting tangled up with a girl like Maddie Bauers, a girl from the days when he was that guy, wasn’t what he needed.
What he needed was to get to his room and take a cold shower. He crossed his hands low in his lap to hide his stiff bulge and shut his eyes, attempting sleep. Or, at least the pretense.
“Hey, Micah.” Fudge paused. “Dude?”
His bodyguard’s insistent tone pulled Micah out of his pretend sleep. “What?”
“Look out your window. The mountains are dope. Why do we only come out here in the winter?”
“Because you think sliding down a mountain on a surfboard is fun.” But he leaned forward to look at the scenery through the front window. Fudge was right, it was gorgeous. “We’ll do some sightseeing while we’re here, okay?”
“You should invite Lulu.”
He swallowed a sigh. “Maybe.” Lulu was his mother. Lucille, actually, but he and his friends had always referred to her as Lulu.
“Come on, she’d love it out here.”
“I’ll think about it.” She would love it. His mother had a thing for nature and Micah flew her out to many of his more picturesque locations.
It was just that, though he adored his mom, she also brought him down. She’d remained single since she’d flown off to California when he was twelve and Micah worried about her being by