Acting Brave (Fenbrook Academy #3) Read Online Free PDF Page A

just trying to establish what happened.”
    I gave two little disbelieving huffs of air and then my voice went so high with anger that it was almost ultrasonic. “I AM NOT A HOOKER!” I screeched. “Why would you think—” I looked down and saw my tiny dress and long fur coat. “I’m an actress!”
    Ryan just looked at me. “Uh-huh.”
    Karen butted in. “Um, she actually is an actress,” she said, stepping forward.
    Ryan looked at her, then looked at Nat and Clarissa. “And I suppose they’re actresses, too?”
    “Oh, no,” Karen told him. “They’re ballerinas.”
    The anger flared up hot and bright inside me…but, as it reached my brain, it started to sink back down again. Now that I replayed my words in my head, coupled with being in the alley and the ridiculous outfit I was wearing, I couldn’t really blame the guy. And he was so insanely hot that even him mistaking me for a hooker was sort of hot, in a twisted way. So I wasn’t actually mad, once the initial outrage had died away.
    But the anger had done something important. It had snapped me out of my daydreaming about him. It had reminded me that he was a cop and I flushed with shame at how stupid I’d been. What the hell had I been thinking?! That I’d give him my phone number? That we’d somehow wind up dating? A cop?!
    So I glared at him and let him think I was furious. I could see he was sorry for his mistake. He even tried to apologize, as I got into the ambulance with Dan and Karen, but I didn’t let him. I spent the next week telling Karen and Nat and Clarissa over and over how annoyed I was.
    But at night, Ryan haunted my dreams.
     
    ***
     
    I saw him again when Connor had gotten into a fight to protect Karen from some creep who’d groped her. Ryan and Hux showed up to break it up and managed to keep Connor out of jail. I stayed back as much as possible, avoiding looking at him. Trying to will my heart to slow down every time I felt him looking at me.
    And then, when I’d watched Connor kiss Karen for the first time and aww- ed along with Nat and Clarissa, I went home, I slammed the door behind me and, without even taking off my clothes, I leaned my back against the door, shoved my hand up under dress and brought myself to a breathless, shuddering orgasm thinking of him. The guy I wanted. The guy I could never have.
    Part of the attraction was that he was just so... physical. Yes, there was the muscle and the fact I wanted to run my hands over every damn part of him, but it went beyond that. He was big and solid. Real. The opposite of being an actress who spends most of her time in her own head. And he wasn’t all talk, talk, talk. In fact, he didn’t say much at all—he was kind of silent and gruff. When he did say something, it was in that gorgeous, heart-stopping deep voice, but mainly he seemed like the sort of guy who’d forget the platitudes and just wrap his arms around you. After dealing with over-thinking, chattering actors all day, that sounded like heaven.
    He was like a rock I wanted to cling to but, instead, I had to push him away.
     
    ***
     
    And then he started to drive past Fenbrook every Thursday lunchtime.
    Sometimes I’d dare to glance around and see him, and sometimes I’d let him drive past and then try to glimpse his face in the driver-side mirror. Always distant. Because that’s how it had to be.
    Except this time, as I heard the car speed toward me, the siren wailed, and immediately every muscle tensed because for years, that noise meant run.

 
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 4
    Jasmine
    Now
     
    I spun around and saw him staring at me through the windshield.
    “Ryan?!” I asked.
    “Yeah.” I felt that warning flicker in my chest. He’d gone tense, and I knew what that meant. I wasn’t Karen, sitting in a practice room with a guy who was clearly crazy about her for months on end, flatly denying it. I knew he liked me. But he didn’t like the real me. He liked the fantasy woman I’d