Someone I Used to Know - By Blakney Francis Page 0,91

looks of these cozy pics, Declan is getting more into character than anyone could have imagined…”

That wasn’t even the worst of it either. The journalist went on to question the effect his relationship with me would have on his career. After all, what would someone like him, be doing with someone like me?

Cam was right. No matter what I felt, Declan was wrong for me. I was bad for him, and Cam saw that he was bad for me. I had to trust that.

The only silver lining to the whole day was that it marked the beginning of the very last week of filming. All I had to do was get through the next few days, and then production would be over. Nothing had changed on the surface. Declan and I would do what we were always supposed to. Filming would wrap and we’d go our separate ways. The way I felt about him didn’t really change anything at all…

Just a few more days and my normal life could resume like none of this ever happened. I curled up in a ball on the smooth leather seats that smelled faintly of him, squeezing my eyes shut and fighting the festering emptiness that threatened to consume me.

Nope, everything was exactly the same.

Chapter Sixteen

Declan

It was getting worse. In the four days following the original article’s release, the story of the real Adley Adair and our supposed relationship had been picked up by numerous other gossip magazines and websites. Paparazzi stalked us like ravenous buzzards.

I was safe inside the confines of my gated community. No one had managed to scale a fence…yet. Going anywhere else had become a disaster, and yet there I was, in the limo, tapping my fingers nervously, as we headed into the belly of the beast, or as some people liked to call it, Beverly Hills. Rodeo Drive to be exact.

The cloudy sky didn’t warrant the sunglasses or baseball cap I wore, and they looked terribly out of place with the rest of my polished attire. Nevertheless, I was thankful for the small shields as Lazarus pulled the car to a stop in front of the restaurant.

My hope for a quiet entrance was instantly dashed as I stared at the dozen or so camera-faced men and women. How did they even know someone worth taking a picture of would be there? All the American intelligence agencies were really missing out on some potential with these guys. They could find anybody.

My hand lingered above the handle, procrastinating the inevitable, and for the one-hundredth time that morning, I had to remind myself why I was putting myself through the hassle. If it had been anyone else that called requesting a meeting, I would’ve blown them off, no problem. But this was one man you didn’t turn down.

I steeled myself, and then finally took the plunge. Flashes ignited as soon as my foot hit the ground.

“Declan! Declan!”

“Over here!”

They crammed along both sides of the stairway leading up to Urasawa, and I shuffled past them as gracefully as my tense body allowed. When shouting my name didn’t rattle my downward concentration, they resorted to new tactics.

“How does it feel, knowing your girlfriend has a child she abandoned?”

My foot paused for just an instant as my hands clenched at my sides before I powered on with even more determination to get it over with than before.

“Are you in love, Mr. Davies?”

“What’s Adley’s current involvement with C.A. Peterson?”

All they wanted was a reaction. Me, walking into a restaurant for lunch by myself wasn’t going to sell many papers or earn them any more hits on their websites.

“Mr. Davies, over here!”

And then it was over. The door clicked closed behind me, and the noise muffled into nothing behind the shaded glass.

My hands shook, pulling off my baseball hat and sunglasses. I tried to smooth out the unruly locks that had actually looked presentable before I’d been forced to ruin it with hat hair. When it was as good as it was going to get, I got into the elevator, and was only joined by a serious faced man in a business suit with a pretty young girl at his side. The age difference was impressive, but in that town you never knew. If their hair hadn’t been the exact same shade of light brown, and without their unusual, slightly too-large noses, I might have mistaken them for a couple instead of father and daughter.

We rode in silence up to the second floor, but as soon as