The Awakening of Poppy Edwards Read Online Free PDF

myself too much to let her know that. ‘So tell me then, what’s the real story?’ I said.
    She shook her head. She was close enough for her hair to brush my cheek. ‘I don’t kiss and tell.’
    ‘Which is why you’ll never make a blackmailer,’ I said, smiling at her.
    She laughed, not at all put-out at having been caught out in a lie. I liked that she laughed. I reached for her, pulling her towards me, except I’m not sure that I needed to pull. My hand was on her shoulder. The other was still on her thigh, hers covering it. I could feel the rise and fall of her breasts, but my eyes were on hers. We sat like that, just gazing at each other, as if we were waiting for someone to call, “Cut,” and the heat built between us, and it was painful, wanting so much to kiss her. I almost did. I moved my lips towards her, then she jerked back, and I jerked back, and the silence and the breathing became awkward, and I cursed under my breath, cursed myself for my own ineptness, my own stupidity.
    ‘We need to talk,’ I said.
    ‘I don’t want…’
    ‘Business.’ I got to my feet. ‘I have business I want to discuss with you.’
    She chewed on her lip as she eyed me up. For the first time that day, I thought she wasn’t acting. ‘If we do talk, we have to forget last night happened,’ she said finally, ‘because I truly don’t, not ever. Mix the two, I mean. It’s one of my rules.’
    I didn’t doubt she was serious. It was exactly what I wanted. Absolutely what I wanted. ‘It’s one of my rules, too,’ I said, meaning it.
    ‘Fine. Then I’ll listen to what you have to say, though I make no promises. Did you really cancel my meeting with my agent?’
    ‘Only because I wanted to speak to you first.’
    ‘Don’t ever do that again, Mr Cartsdyke. I make my own decisions. It’s one of
my
rules.’
    ‘That makes two of us.’ I’d grown kind of used to having what I said go, I suppose. It’s not false modesty, just the simple truth, that power breeds power, and I had a lot of power in the industry. She had no idea what I was going to put on the table. She’d called my bluff on the state of her contract, but I hadn’t admitted anything. I liked the way she stood up to me. I admired her for having rules. So few people did. But I wasn’t about to let her ride roughshod over me. ‘I’ll book us dinner while you get changed,’ I said.
    ‘No. Come to my house. I’ll cook you dinner.’ She laughed, seeing the surprise on my face. ‘I can cook, you know. And I do want to hear what you have to say. I’m—I need a change. I think it might be time. Come at seven. The address is—but I suppose you know the address. You’re a man who does his research.’
    ‘I do.’
    She nodded, giving me a quizzical look. I wondered if she realised how sexy it was.
She’s an actress
, I reminded myself. Sure she knew. She most likely had a whole portfolio of looks practised in the mirror, one for every occasion.
    ‘Seven, then,’ I said, and left before I surrendered to the impulse to kiss her goodbye.

Chapter Four
    Poppy
    I mentioned I don’t really like Hollywood parties. Honestly, I don’t socialize much at all here. I’m not exactly a recluse, but I like my own company. I like my life here, even if it does feel as though I live in a bubble, away from the real world. Look what the real world did to Daisy and me. And I do like my work. It’s exciting being on-set, and it could even feel more like real acting if the studio would give me better parts and not have me forever tied to being rescued by Randolph. I think he’s tired of it, too, though it’s not something we talk about. I don’t talk, not
really
talk, to anyone any more.
    So you can see that it wasn’t like me to have invited Lewis Cartsdyke out to my house and offered to cook him dinner. At the time I thought it was a neat solution. Back home, as I worked barefoot in my kitchen, I was singing as I jointed the chicken for a chasseur. The tarragon