Sasha graced him with a genuine smile. “Thank you so much. I’m sorry to bring chaos to your restaurant,” she said.
He shook his head and waved a hand, dismissing her concern. “You can’t buy this kind of publicity,” he said, walking away and leaving them alone.
“Well. That wasn’t how I planned for things to go.” She picked up the napkin on the table, shook it out, and placed it on her lap. “Let’s talk about something other than … that.” That meaning her being swarmed by fans.
The server came over and Xander asked her to give them more time.
He would willingly change the subject except for a lingering question he couldn’t ignore. “I have to ask. The fans, the autographs, the starring roles. It’s everything you wanted and, let’s face it, everything you were willing to risk us for. You have that now, yet you seem … sad? Stressed?”
She drew a deep breath and, with one finger, circled the top of her water glass that was already on the table. “In order to explain, I need to go back. Are you sure you’re ready for the conversation?” she asked, putting him on the spot.
Though he hadn’t meant to bring up the discussion of their past, he understood they had no choice but to talk so he could put it behind him and work with her on the movie. It wasn’t easy.
For almost a year, he’d thought he’d found the woman who would define his future. They’d broken up without real closure, and now he had to wrap things up in a public restaurant, of all places. But that was his fault for refusing to talk at his house, a decision he now attributed to the shock of seeing her again.
“I can handle it,” he finally said, his shoulders stiff, his hands in fists in his lap.
She nodded. “Okay then.” Drawing a deep breath, she started to speak. “When we got together, I was trying to make a name for myself in the industry, and the night we met exposed me to big names for the first time. I’d already had a supporting role in a movie that was due out, and I was poised, as my agent likes to say. Does that make sense?”
“It does. And I understood that.” And he really had.
He’d been in town for everything that having a say in his first movie entailed. He’d rented a house for a year, testing whether or not he liked LA, and he’d tried to be open-minded. To put his time in Afghanistan and the occasional bouts of anxiety behind him. He was home in one piece, so were his buddies, and he wasn’t going back. He’d been looking toward the future and thought that would include Sasha.
She tipped her head to the side. “I know you tried to be accepting of my running around on auditions, taking meetings, having to cancel plans we’d made.” She swallowed hard and twisted a long strand of hair around her finger. A nervous gesture he remembered well.
“Yes. But what I didn’t understand or accept was how you ended up in a relationship with another man for show”—he paused to emphasize the words with finger quotes—“or taking a limo and walking the red carpet with him because it looked good for the movie.”
From the living room sofa, watching on his laptop, the entire situation hadn’t looked fake to him. Not with her co-star Marcus Collins’s hands all over her on the red carpet that Xander had offered to walk her down. Despite knowing the lights and crowds and yelling photographers would possibly trigger him, he’d volunteered. For her. She knew it would have been hard for him, but he’d been willing to try.
She leaned forward in her seat. “I explained that to you,” she said, her soft gaze meeting his. “My agent wanted us to arrive together and give the audience what they wanted. What they assumed to be true.”
And that truth had included Marcus’s mouth on hers for every photographer to capture for posterity. Xander had watched and waited for her to react, to stiffen in shock or discreetly move the dick’s hand off her ass. Anything to prove to Xander she might suck up the situation for appearances but she was his and she’d take care of the bastard when the cameras weren’t focused on her.
But when a reporter stopped the couple and asked about their status, Marcus had pulled Sasha closer and kissed her on the lips a second time, with his tongue. Then he’d turned to the camera with a grin and asked, “Does that answer your question?”
Sasha hadn’t batted an eyelash at his actions or response.
Xander raised his eyebrows. “And the kisses?” He made sure to use the plural.
She briefly closed her eyes before meeting his gaze. “At the time, I thought I was doing what was best, but I was also acting. Doing my job in front of the cameras.”
And she was damned good at it. Then and now. So what if he’d caught a movie or two of hers in the privacy of his home? Nobody had to know.
He braced his arms on the table. “We didn’t break up over Marcus Collins. It was the culmination of many things, but the final straw was–”
“Paris,” she said.
“Paris.” He inclined his head. “You took that role without giving me a heads-up first. We’d been living together almost a year. Don’t you think I deserved at least a discussion before you decided you were going to be gone for months overseas?” He wouldn’t have stopped her, but she should have offered reassurances about them.
“I–” she began.
He cut her off. “You weren’t the least bit upset about it because you were so excited that your dreams were coming true.” And though everything inside him had been ready to end things because he’d grown tired of barely being an afterthought, he knew he loved her. So he’d talked to his siblings, the people closest to him, and he’d decided to try one last time. “And I accepted Paris, too.”
He’d gone on with his life in LA. Was available for the post-production process of his film and worked on an upcoming book in his free time. He’d tried to make things work with Sasha, but video calls, texting, and phone conversations were hard with the different time zones. She’d often been called away mid-sentence and he had been frustrated.
“It was a hard time,” she admitted. “And it was complicated for me. I had a lot of pressure from my agent and my mother.”
Her mother had never liked Xander, whether it was their age difference or the fact that he might derail Sasha’s career, it hadn’t mattered. She’d always been a negative voice in her daughter’s ear. It made sense that she’d both wanted and needed the approval of the parent who’d raised her and also encouraged her to pursue her dreams. Even if Annika had been trying to live vicariously through her daughter.
And yet, he’d understood. “I loved you, so I supported you.”
She winced at his use of the past tense, but it was the truth. Those feelings were in the past.
She nodded, tears in her eyes. “I know you did. And I appreciated it.”
Did she? He didn’t want to be a dick and ask.
“But when those photos of you and yet another co-star surfaced…” He shook his head. Sasha and Corey Murphy had been spotted cozying up in a small café, sharing a booth, heads bent together in what looked like an intimate conversation. The photos went viral. And Xander had had enough.
He wasn’t a jealous man but she’d pushed him to the brink. “At that point, I didn’t care if the rumors and the photos showed the truth or not.”