Given their high profiles, the wedding details would be under wraps. That meant I’d have to dig. I could ask my mom, a makeup artist, if she’d heard anything. Like a hairdresser, she picked up all sorts of little details as her clients gabbed while having their faces done. Another option was my roomie Anaka. I could ask if her dad, Graham Griffin, who greenlit SurfGhost, would be at the nuptials. But if I got in through Anaka, then I’d risk her dad knowing about my job, and the more under-the-radar I flew, the better.
The key to being a good paparrazzo was to be surreptitious. You needed to get in someone’s face when you had to, and then get out just as quickly. Stealthiness was critical to my operations.
Anaka’s cousin Kennedy, in New York was another option, as her mom was a TV show producer, who was often invited to the fetes of the famous. Her mom had cast Bradley Bowman in a guest spot on her popular Sunday night show Lords and Ladies. But that might be too roundabout a way in, though I’d check with Kennedy later just in case.
The smell of the ocean grew stronger, so I shelved the wedding strategy until tonight when I’d have more time to noodle on it. For now, I had another shot to chase. I reached Venice Beach, parked, and began trolling for Riley and Miles.
The boardwalk was teeming with its usual assortment of characters. A man in stilts and a red, white and blue top hat crutched past me, threatening to knock down other passersby, like a hipster kicking a hackey sack and a mustached man in a lime green speedo riding a unicycle.
As I scanned the crowd for Riley, I carefully sidestepped a speed-demoning set of cyclists in matching zebra-striped bike shirts ripping toward me. The ocean waves lazily lapped the shore as street musicians plucked out twangy notes on their acoustic guitars. I kept up my pace, eyes peeled, ears perked, on alert. The usual camera-carrying suspects, such as Soul Patch and Leather Jacket, were nowhere to be seen, nor were the other regulars I’d grown accustomed to running into on red carpets, at coffee shops, outside gyms, and along the clandestine spots in parks, parking lots and nightclubs that the famous thought were secretive.
No one else was scanning so I figured Riley and Miles weren’t a widely known tip yet among the paparazzi.
Which meant it was Criminally Handsome and me going fishing for the hookup shot, and it would be a race for first in. I spotted him hanging out by the ice cream shack on the edge of the boardwalk. He sat at one of the wooden picnic benches, his long legs stretched out in front of him, looking so cool and edible. I needed to look away. But knowing the enemy isn’t a step one should ever skip.
I snapped mental pictures–of his cheekbones, his thick mess of hair, the faint trace of stubble, then on down to the flatness of his abs, though his stomach was hidden behind that blue T-shirt.
Still, as a physician-in-training, I could tell he had fine obliques, as well as solid rectus abdominus muscles. His arms were toned, and his muscles strong. Being pre-med, I needed to familiarize myself as much as possible with musculature. When I had finished tucking away my virtual shots, I surveyed the rest of him, noting that he had a soda in one hand, and his other arm rested on his waist now, probably covering his camera. He took a drink of his soda, and seemed to be enjoying it and the view.
Hmmm…He had the whole act casual routine down, but something didn’t add up.
Sitting was never the best way to land a shot. You needed to be on your feet.
Besides, I happened to know there was a new dog water fountain a few hundred yards down the beach. Since Riley was crazy about her chihuahua-mini-pin, Sparky McDoodle, I was betting that would be a better spot to lie in wait. As I neared the water fountain, artfully avoiding a rollerblader in leg warmers bopping out to oversized headphones as she weaved disco-style down the path, I had the precise feeling of being followed. It was a feeling I knew well, a feeling I was used to in my profession.
I turned around, and there was my competition walking toward me.
“Hey. I didn’t catch your name earlier. I’m William,” he said, his gorgeous gray eyes fixed on me. They shined, they twinkled, they blazed. They did everything a hot guy’s eyes could do.
“You already told me your name,” I said coolly, doing my best to look away, down the beach, at the sky. Anywhere but the fineness of his face in front of me. Because then I’d melt.
“Last name is Harrigan. See? There. I’ve given you both my names. All you have to do is give me one of yours,” he added, his sexy voice threatening to make my stomach flip. I simply couldn’t deny that the words and the way he said them sparkled in that accent of his.
Resistance, Jess.
I kicked myself mentally several times, and the final kick was enough to maintain the stony look on my face, and the straight line of my lips. I would not smile at him. I would not be sucked into his orbit of good-lookingness. Besides, he was probably well-trained to use his kind of extraordinary handsomeness to throw me off the scent of photographic battle. Like he knew his looks were a powerful weapon against the female opposition.
“Did you get the picture already?” I asked, challenging him because I needed to remember he was the competition. Only the competition. “Is that why you’re talking to me? You sent it off to J.P. and now you’re just taunting me?”
He laughed. “No, I didn’t get the picture. No, that’s not why I’m talking to you. And no, I didn’t send it off to J.P. seeing as I didn’t get it, pursuant to answer number one.” He tucked his thumbs into his jeans pockets, his camera slung around his neck, then shot me a captivating smile. Instantly, my stomach practiced its best handspring.