Nina reached across the table and patted his hand. “Eat the pickles, baby. I need you to nail the rest of the day. My grandkids are in town.”
Drew crunched into a pickle. They always tasted better when he was filming.Grandkids. The last time they worked together, Nina’s daughter was in her late teens. “How old are they now?”
“Eight and six. Allison has her hands full.”
“You’re not going to see them much if we don’t finish at a good time, huh?”
“That’s the way the cookie crumbles.” She gave a tight smile. “Grandma’s place is nice for a base of operations for Disney and Legoland and aquariums and all the other things kids love.”
“Like their grandmother?” Drew suggested. Allison and her wife lived in Maine, he thought. Somewhere coastal and liberal but with shittier weather than LA. “Why don’t you bring them by?” They were supposed to shoot a crowd scene at a food court in a couple of days. “They can be extras—if Allison says it’s okay.”
“You don’t think Hilary will mind?”
He scoffed. “What, because she gets to cast two less child extras? I think she’ll be okay. This whole production is practically a family affair for her—you know she knows Steve from when they were kids? Might as well keep it in the family, so to speak.”
This time her smile was a little more genuine. “That’s a good idea. I’ll talk to Allison. The oldest, Marley, he reminds me of you. Young and vain.”
“Hey, when you got it, flaunt it. Maybe I can give him some pointers.”
“On second thought—”
Drew stuck out his tongue.
“Anyway.” Nina picked up her napkin and carefully wiped each of her fingers before depositing it on her plate. “Do you think you can pull your head out of your butt and be a professional now, or do I need to ask Steve to show you how it’s done?”
Drew opened his mouth, ready to retort that Steve was a professional head-from-anus remover, then thought better of it. He didn’t need to think about Steve and anyone’s butt more than he was already. As filming wore on, Will was tailoring Steve’s pants more and more too, to reflect that Scotty and Morgan were rubbing off on each other.
Ugh, Drew didn’t need to think about rubbing off either.
“I asked him to go to a fundraiser dinner with me. Badly.” Honestly he couldn’t remember beinglesssmooth. “He said yes anyway and now I don’t know if it’s a date.”
Now Nina leaned back in her seat and gazed at him assessingly. “It’s not a date unless you both want it to be a date. So the question you have to ask before anything else is: Do you want it to be a date?”
Yeah, it would be helpful if Drew knew the answer to that. It definitely wasn’t no. He just wasn’t sure it was yes. “I don’t know.”
“That’s just a yes with an asterisk.”
He wrinkled his nose. Did he want to have sex with Steve? Yes. Did he want more than sex?
He hadn’t dated in years. He’d been focused on his career and on not letting someone use him. He had friends; he had a fulfilling life. He didn’t feel like anything was missing from it.
But that didn’t mean it wouldn’t be nice to share it with someone more than a friend, and getting action from someone other than his right hand or a onetime hookup would be a nice bonus.
“If you think any harder your brain’s gonna melt.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.” He picked up his tray to deposit it on the service cart.
“You don’t need any more confidence. You need clarity and maybe a kick in the pants to get you moving.”
The thing was, he wasn’t sure she was wrong.
He pushed the thoughts from his mind, ditched his tray, and draped his arm around her shoulders. “Maybe so,” he said. “But for now let’s concentrate on me nailing the rest of the day’s shoot so you can go home to your family.”
A little extra motivation never hurt. They finished the day’s shooting schedule before six. Drew still didn’t have all the answers he needed… but at least now he knew the question.
Chapter Eight
“WHATdo you think?” Steve asked, holding his phone at arm’s length and swapping the camera so his mom could see his full reflection. “Too much?”
