Sugar and Spice_ An L.A. Candy Novel - Lauren Conrad [7]
“Oh, Gaby!” Scarlett said, rolling her eyes. (Cue: more crowd laughter.)
God, who writes this stuff? Madison wondered drily. It’s soooo cheesy.
“We have lots of surprises lined up for you tonight,” Jane said.
Madison started to read her next line, then did a double-take at the teleprompter. Were they seriously asking her to say that? “Yeah, lots of surprises,” she recited. “Like what’s going to happen this season with me and my best friend Jane.” The teleprompter then instructed her to “bump lightly into Jane,” so she did. She could feel Jane’s body stiffen.
“You mean me and my best friend Jane,” Scar read, bumping into Jane from the other side.
“They sprung this on me,” my ass, Madison thought irritably.
“We have Aja here with us tonight to sing her brand-new hit single, ‘I Need You Now,’” Jane said, pretending to ignore both girls. Cheers, applause.
Gaby raised her hand. “I’m gonna sing, too!”
Madison, Jane, and Scarlett turned to Gaby. “You’re gonna sing?” Scarlett asked, pretending to be shocked.
“Yeah, I’m gonna channel my inner Aja,” Gaby said. But she misread the teleprompter, pronouncing the word “channel” like “Chanel,” the fashion designer. The crowd laughed, not on cue.
“Uh, Gaby . . . you mean channel?” Scarlett corrected her, improvising.
Jane fake-smiled again. “Stay tuned, because after the commercial break, we’ll be back to talk about—”
“Who hooks up with who in Season Two,” Madison finished, stage-winking.
“Really? Who do I hook up with?” Gaby said eagerly. Cheers, laughter, applause.
“And . . . cut.” Matt, the director, made a motion with his hands. “Great job, girls. Stand by for the next segment, okay? We’re moving over to the statue garden. You can touch up now if you’d like.”
The four girls dispersed into small clusters of stylists and clouds of hair spray. Madison scanned the crowd as one of the stylists applied powder to her face. She still felt uneasy thinking that someone might be watching her and having no idea who it was.
She noticed Trevor standing nearby, talking to Dana and pointing to something on a computer monitor. Madison caught his eye, and he sauntered over to her.
“Good work,” he complimented her.
Madison waved the stylist away and tucked her arm through Trevor’s. “Can we talk about my big story line now?” she said in a low, eager voice.
Trevor nodded and signaled for her to click off her microphone. “Walk with me, and I’ll fill you in. We’re looking to start shooting these new scenes the day after tomorrow. . . .”
Madison put the blackmailer out of her mind—for now—and listened intently to Trevor’s pitch.
Chapter 3
Second Chances . . . Second Thoughts
Scarlett kicked off her very uncomfortable, very expensive—not that she had to pay for them—strappy gold sandals and leaned back on the couch. The series premiere, which she’d TiVo’d because she’d missed the private PopTV screening earlier, flashed across her TV screen: the opening credits, with Jane at her event-planning job . . . then Madison shopping . . . Scarlett walking through the USC campus . . . Gaby at the gym . . . then all four girls dancing at a club, goofing around, and laughing. The producers had been forced to dig up some unused footage from early last season, when they could all stand to be in the same room together.
“I hate these shoes,” she complained to Liam Ferguson, her boyfriend (although she was still getting used to thinking of him that way, since she’d never really had a boyfriend before).
“Really? You look hot in them.” Liam leaned over to kiss her neck, nearly spilling a bowl of popcorn in the process.
Scarlett blushed. Liam was just about the only person in the world who could make her blush. “Thanks. Soooo. I missed you at the party tonight.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there,” Liam said sincerely. “Was it fun?”
“I guess? They rented some insane house on Mulholland Drive for it. Mostly, it was a lot of talking to fans and posing for cameras and telling reporters the same things over and over again.