“Theo being here for me would imply he knew me enough to care I was gone. The man barely batted an eyelash when I quit.” Julia sighed. “He told me he would have no trouble replacing me.”

“Okay, so he’s an asshole, but it does seem like there’s some unfinished business between the two of you.”

Julia’s words hit me a lot harder than I wished they had. Not because they surprised me, but because of how bad I wanted them to be true.

It was so foolish. So reckless. And it was pointless, because no matter what, I would never risk my business over a relationship. I was bad at romance. No, I was terrible at it. But I was a fucking Jedi Master at shutting everything else out when it came to getting the job done.

Chapter Six

Theo

It turned out reality TV was real in all the wrong ways. We were only halfway through our first morning of filming and things were already going south.

“Sorry, you want us to do what?” Alba asked Chase Cooper, our showrunner and enormous pain in my ass. Her voice was panicky enough to make me push off from the portion of wall I’d commandeered by the kitchen of the penthouse the show was providing for me and went to see what he’d said to upset her. Today we were supposed to do on-camera interviews. We’d been told those would be separate—which, given Alba’s extra iciness toward me, I assumed she preferred—but so far they’d only dragged in lighting and set up one camera and microphone in front of the love seat in the living room.

Chase, whose claim to fame was running a successful franchise of reality TV shows about B-list celebrities who seemed to despise each other, was, in one word, an asshole. On that first phone call with Streamflix a few weeks ago I’d been told the showrunner would be a Latina with a great reputation in the business, not that I wouldn’t have signed on anyway. But right as I was set to come to Dallas they’d informed me she’d just taken extended medical leave. Which left us with Chase, who at the moment was standing over Alba, his pointer finger only inches from her face. I could see her almost trying to shrink before my eyes while he glared at her. Alba, who just two days ago had risen to her full height of five feet and five inches and threatened me with bodily harm if I ruined her plans, was cowering under this greasy dweeb who couldn’t even grow a goatee.

“Is there a problem here, Chase?” I managed to keep my voice neutral, but I knew there was no helping how my face looked.

Alba looked nervous. Her face flushed with red and Chase was about a foot too far into her personal space than I was comfortable with.