children with you. Eventually. But we didn’t get there.”
When she didn’t yell at him for using the diminutive of her name, he took it as a sign of progress.
“We didn’t get to a lot of places,” she said softly, then checked her watch. “They’re about to open the doors. Are you ready?”
Victor steeled himself, ignoring the barks and meows coming from behind him. “As I’ll ever be.”
The doors opened and a crowd rushed into the gymnasium, shoes squeaking on the waxed floors and murmurs echoing around the space.
From his spot in front of the photo backdrop emblazoned with the animal shelter’s logo, Victor smiled and signed autographs and posed for pictures as Carmen handed him one puppy or kitten after another.
His fingers were nipped by needle-pointed puppy teeth, his jacket was scratched by razor-sharp kitten claws, and he was nearly peed on—twice. But he suffered through it, charming the people who were there to help him improve his public image.
Even as his allergies started to kick in.
He tried not to sniffle too loudly as Carmen gave him three kittens to hold up near his face, but he was fighting a losing battle, despite the meds he’d downed that morning.
And then they brought out Luther.
Luther was a five-foot-long female ball python whose name was actually Lucy.
The script didn’t say that Victor was afraid of snakes. And if you asked him, he wouldn’t have said he was.
But he wasn’t overly fond of them either. And he had never in his life wanted to hold one.
“Here comes Luther,” Carmen called in a singsong voice. The children assembled around Victor cheered. The parents oohed and ahhed.
And Victor was very nearly about to break character.
Cálmate, cabrón, he told himself. You’re an international superstar. You’ve played sold-out shows all over the world, in the biggest venues. This is just one harmless snake!
The snake, still in its handler’s arms, eyed him impassively.
Victor’s armpits began to sweat.
The snake came closer.
Swallowing hard, Victor raised his arms, tensed all his muscles, and let them hand him the python.
The kids crowded around him. He smiled for the camera.
The snake shifted its weight. Victor’s arms trembled from the stress. And then . . .
On “one,” Victor sneezed, nearly dropping Luther. Reflexively, his arms clenched, gathering the snake close to his chest. Luther—Lucy—whatever—slithered its head over his shoulder and around the back of his neck.
Victor froze. Fuck. This.
“Somebody take this snake!” he shouted.
“Cut!”
Chapter 21
Ashton’s eyes itched, his nose ran, and if he never heard “Somebody take this snake!” again in his life, it would be too soon. Worse, the director had loved it and decided to keep it for the final cut.
Between the children and the animals, Ashton’s sneezing, and everyone breaking character left and right, the animal charity event required the most takes of any scene they’d filmed yet. By the end, people were already talking about the blooper reel, and Ashton’s allergies were in full swing, but he had to admit, he was having fun. So when Jasmine told him the cast was going out for karaoke that night, he surprised them all by saying yes.
“I’m not sure how good my singing will be,” he warned, sniffling. “You might have noticed I’m having an allergy attack.”
Jasmine handed him a pack of tissues. “Was it the cats or the dogs?”
“The kittens,” he admitted. “Cute little things, but I’m severely allergic to them. Ya—you know what I mean?”
She simply nodded, not catching his slip, but his insides turned to ice. He’d almost said Yadiel’s name—his son was always begging for a pet. Ashton’s cat allergies and Abuelita Bibi’s aversion to dogs made that impossible, but didn’t stop Yadiel from making pointed comments about the cuteness of every dog and cat he encountered.
Ashton was the last to arrive at the karaoke place in Midtown where Jasmine had booked a private room. Three bottles of wine and two pitchers of beer sat on the low table in the center of the room, and Miriam was in the middle of belting out a Selena song.
Jasmine sidled up and nudged him with her shoulder. “I didn’t think you were going to show.”
“I said I would.” It sounded curt, but he hadn’t meant it to. It was just that his mouth had gone bone-dry at the sight of her. She wore some lacy scrap of a shirt that left her shoulders and midriff bare and revealed an enticing curve of cleavage. He’d seen