Hot Mess - Elise Faber Page 0,19

way down and—

“You make excellent banana bread, Blue Eyes.”

Another hitch in her breathing. “I—”

He waited to see if she’d finish the sentence, and when she didn’t, he stepped closer. “You?” he asked softly.

Her body drifted toward his, her nipples beading against the fabric of the swimsuit, making his mouth ache, his skin prickle with the need to feel them pressed to his chest.

“Finn,” she murmured.

Her mouth was right there.

“Shannon,” he murmured back.

She rose on tiptoe, leaned in, and he bit back a groan when the pebbled buds of her nipples brushed his chest. He lifted his free hand slowly, threading it through the silken ends of her dark brown hair, tilting her head back, dropping his mouth toward hers.

Her lips were a millimeter away.

Hot breath. Sweet, floral scent.

“Oh my God! You’re Finn Stoneman!”

Nine

Penguin Socks and Reality Strikes

Shannon

She jerked back, Finn’s fingers getting tangled in her hair, the sharp but momentary pain the final push she needed to jump back into her own brain.

Physical and emotional.

She needed distance in both. Her eyes flicked to the side and saw a teenager standing a few feet away, her phone in hand, bobbing excitedly on her tiptoes. “Can I have a selfie?”

Finn stiffened, carefully slipped his hand free of Shannon’s hair, then turned, but not before she saw a smile turn up the edges of his mouth.

A familiar smile.

A fucking smile that had graced billboards and magazine covers and . . . movie screens.

He knew Pepper.

He’d told her his real name. Finn. Stoneman.

But he wasn’t referred to by both names. Or, at least, not often. He was just Finn, like Rhianna or Madonna or Beyonce, known by just one name. Four letters, one handsome face, one award-winning, charmingly self-effacing actor.

The actor.

He stepped toward the teenager, held the cell phone in a practiced way that illustrated quite clearly her realization was indeed the correct one.

God, how could she not have seen it before?

This man was quite possibly the most famous actor in the world.

Even Shannon, who didn’t watch T.V., who had a soon-to-be-seven-year-old and so didn’t go to the movies often, if at all, had seen this man.

She’d even felt there was something familiar about him.

But she hadn’t clued in.

Fuck.

How could she have been so stupid?

“Thanks!” the teenager said happily. “I really loved you in River Creek. But my favorite is Fled.”

“Thank you for saying that,” Finn replied. “You’re very kind.”

Shannon wanted to sink down into the sand, for it to swallow her up and bury her. She’d been toe-to-toe with this man, this world-famous celebrity, and as the realization of how different their lives were . . . different? Hell. They were fucking universes away from one another.

The girl drifted away with one more smile, but Shan already knew what she needed to do.

That was to get the fuck out of there.

To focus on her own life.

To stop having moments of insanity, to stop pretending that she lived in a world where a brown girl could fall for a sexy, sweet white guy, who happened to be a huge movie star, and he fell for her right back.

Because that didn’t happen.

That wasn’t real life.

Not her life anyway.

She had to focus on Rylie. She wasn’t even divorced yet. She—

Needed to go.

She spun, spotting Rylie returning from the Hamiltons’, Pepper at her side as they made their way down to the water. Perfect. The ocean. She could dive in and drown herself. She high-tailed it that way.

“Shannon!” Finn called.

Nope. There was no way she was turning around. No way she could face this man whom she should have recognized instantly but was too much of a hot fucking mess to have done so.

The biggest movie star in the world was her neighbor.

And she’d made him peanut butter milk.

She groaned, dropped her eyes to the sand, and walked away like the speedy motherfucker she was.

“Shan.”

Hot breath in her ear. A warm palm on her arm, slowing her, tugging her to a stop. “Wait, honey.”

She shook her head even as she let him stall her feet, pull her to a halt.

“You really didn’t recognize me?”

Shannon sighed. “No.”

Silence then, “I know this is going to make me sound like an asshole,” he said. “But . . . how?”

Her eyes were glued to the surf. “I-I’m busy.”

“Busy?” he repeated.

“Yeah,” she said. “And well, I used to be addicted to gossip shows, but then I met Pepper, and I realized how wrong and invasive they are . . . and things with Brian went to hell and . . . I