We step outside the restaurant and I hold out my hand, wanting to end this on a professional note. As if a handshake will give me the kind of closure I was hoping for.

“Wait,” Gabe says.

I don’t want to. I’ve been looking at the door for the past hour, imagining myself bolting from the restaurant. Getting away from it. Getting away from him.

I put my hand away.

“Chani,” he says.

He still says it perfectly. It still gives me a chill.

I hate it. I’m a grown-ass divorcee who lived in New York for fuck’s sake, not a twenty-six-year-old fangirl with a boner for the future James Bond.

“Did you get what you needed?” Gabe asks.

“I got enough,” I say.

He runs his hand across the back of his neck. His baseball cap is tucked into his back pocket, his sunglasses folded and hanging from the front of his shirt. It pulls the fabric low enough that I can see his chest hair.

I look away.

“I’d like to show you something,” he says.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I say.

“Probably not,” he agrees. “But what do you have to lose?”

THE RUMOR MILL

PACKING ON THOSE POST-BOND POUNDS

IT’S OUR FIRST SPOTTING OF the former Bond actor since his fall from grace. Even in these grainy photos, it’s clear to see that Parker has gained a significant amount of weight since he was officially fired from the Bond franchise.

Rumors of his drinking problem have plagued the actor for years, but he’s been spotted out at clubs and bars on multiple nights, and there were several instances where paparazzi caught him puking out of the side of his car before being driven away.

The drinking has also put a strain on Parker’s relationship with Jacinda Lockwood. Rumors of a potential split were fueled by her decision to remain in London when Parker made his Broadway debut in A Raisin in the Sun, and the two haven’t been photographed together in months. Sources close to the couple insist they’ll be divorced before the end of the year.

There had been whispers of Parker’s bad behavior dating all the way back to The Hildebrand Rarity. While Murder on Wheels, his second Bond film, was in production, Dan Mitchell claimed that Parker had him fired. The up-and-coming star—who later landed the lead in the hilarious Ivan the Not Too Terrible—told Entertainment Weekly that Parker was jealous of him being younger and more fit, and personally ordered him removed from the project.