“Well...thank you. But you don’t have to bribe me. You have an ironclad lease that keeps me from kicking you out of this place for at least five years. Unless you’re planning to start laundering money through here or something?”
“I’m not,” he said like he was taking my question seriously. “Not unless tourism dries up and people decide not to listen to music anymore. In which case I might have to turn to a life of crime. But I think we’ll be okay.”
“I’ll do an addendum to your lease that requires you to give me thirty days’ advance notice in writing if you decide to make this a crime front.”
“Good plan.”
I smiled at him, then crooked my head to the door behind us. “I’ll get out of your hair. Sorry for barging in. I’ll check with you first before I come down again.” I turned toward the kitchen.
“Wait,” he said, reaching out to grab my wrist in the same light hold he’d used on the dance floor. I stopped and turned back to him. “Last week, Miss Mary’s gumbo party.” He paused and it looked like he was drawing in a slow, steady breath. I tensed, knowing what was coming. “I didn’t imagine that. Right?”
He sounded way more uncertain than I’d expect from a guy who had been photographed with major and minor celebrity girlfriends over the years, much less this month.
“It was nothing,” I reassured him. “Anneke has nothing to worry about.”
“Anneke?” his eyes crinkled in confusion, and it was so adorable it made my stomach dip. “Oh, did you see us on her Instagram?”
“What? No.” The last thing I wanted him to think was that I was stalking him on social media. “Chloe mentioned something the paper ran in the People section, that’s all. You were at a benefit together? Anyway, it’s all good.”
“Anneke is an old friend of mine. We’re not dating. I get credit for more Hollywood hookups than I deserve.”
“No judgment here,” I said. Not judging him, anyway. But I’d judged that I was definitely not his type.
“I promise that of the two women I’ve had real relationships with in the last ten years, one of them has never been seen in a paparazzi photo and the other was identified as a friend I was grocery shopping with when one of the tabloids ran a picture of us coming out of the market in our sweats.”
“Oh. That’s...oh.”
“Does that matter?” he asked softly.
Yes. No. Did it matter to him whether it mattered to me? I needed to say something fast before the silence said something I didn’t mean it to. “No, it doesn’t matter.”
“Did you research me on Instagram?”
“No.” I was thankful for the dim light so he couldn’t see me turning red at telling such a bold-faced lie.
“I looked you up. I wondered what it had been like for you over the last twelve years.”
This made my stomach churn harder. He’d been curious enough to look into me? It made me feel slightly naked, even though I knew exactly what he would have found. I’d kept any mention of Starstruck or that meme or video off my social media accounts. My personal accounts were private, and my public accounts mostly showed properties I’d found for my clients or pictures of places and food in New Orleans to show that I knew the city inside and out. Sometimes I put myself in the pictures to give clients a sense of connection to me. But I made it about the work.
“I didn’t find much,” he said, ducking his head like he was trying to see my face better. “Only proof that if you weren’t already my property agent, I’d want to hire you.”
“Lucky it worked out that way, then.”
“I was hoping for more. Not that you owe it to me. But I was hoping to see more about what your non-work self is like.”
This was veering too much into the personal territory where that dance had almost taken us. “Nothing to tell, really. Anyway, I need to”—escape—“head up and make some dinner. Thanks for the window upgrade. They look good.” I made for the kitchen door.
“Ellie? Stop for a second?”
I did, turning to face him.
“For better or worse, you and I are going to be connected for a long time,” he said. “It could just be as landlord and tenant, but I’d love it to be as friends. Could we