“Comes with the job,” Drew said gently. “I’m the one who should be sorry. You didn’t ask for any of this. And they’re going to find out who you are, and then….”
And thenwas the rub. Steve’s face twisted into an unpleasant expression. “Well, it’s bound to happen eventually, you know? I mean….” He gestured around. “I’m not exactly incognito here. The neighbors know who my mother is, obviously. And they know I’m her kid. It’s just a matter of someone seeing my face in a magazine or a blog and putting two and two together.”
Drew’s heart sank a little, and he covered Steve’s hand with his. He was the one who insisted Steve costar with him in this movie. Without him Steve could continue living his life quietly, out of the spotlight. “This is my fault. If I hadn’t dragged you in front of the cameras….”
Snorting, Steve turned his hand over and laced his fingers with Drew’s. “Yeah, look at me in that picture.” He set his phone, already open to the article Drew had been reading, on the table. “I sure look like I’m there against my will.” The picture didn’t show Steve’s face, but it did show his hand, fingers laced easily with Drew’s.
Still. “I didn’t mean to make your life this complicated,” Drew mumbled to the tabletop.
“Hey.” Steve squeezed his hand until he looked up. “Relationships are complicated. I wouldn’t do anything differently. Would you?”
Drew let out a long breath, relief and affection seeping through him. “No.”
“Then let’s let it go and decide what we’re going to do now.”
He made it sound so logical and reasonable. “I should call my publicist.” Drew wasn’t looking forward to that. “I’ll draft a generic statement. ‘It’s true, we’re happy, respect his privacy, blah blah.’”
Steve snorted. “Maybe I’ll help you with the wording. We can do better than ‘blah blah.’”
“Sure.” Drew ran a hand through his hair and shook his head. “Okay. You shower, I’ll do breakfast. And then we can deal with this mess.”
“Hmm.” Steve shot him a sly look. “Better idea. I’ll shower, and you come join me in a few minutes. Everything else can wait.”
Maybe the day wouldn’t be a total wash after all.
LASTnight we published a picture of Drew Beaumont and an unknown man in an intimate embrace. When we reached out to Beaumont’s representation for comment, we received this response:
Last month Drew and a date attended a charity benefit at the Aquarium of the Pacific. Drew was assured the event would be professional photography only and is disappointed to have such a personal moment released in the media. At this time we would like to ask that members of the press respect Drew’s privacy and that of his boyfriend.
“I’m going to have to give an interview too,” Drew said, twisting his face in distaste as he set his phone on the bedside table. “Answering a few basic questions will get the press to back off a little. The less they think there is for them to discover, the less important it is to run a story.”
Steve nodded and slung his arm over Drew’s waist. “We could just tell them everything and get it over with.”
Drew hummed noncommittally. “Yeah. But you don’t want to.” Steve hadn’t even really toldDrewabout his family. He doubted Steve wanted it to be public knowledge.
“I always wanted to prove to my dad I could do it, you know? Not that he wasn’t supportive.” Steve shifted his weight until he was positioned so he didn’t have to look Drew in the eye. Drew let him; talking about this couldn’t be easy. “He was so proud. But I wanted to write my own stuff, and I wanted people to judge it on its own merit instead of comparing it to his.”
“Tall order,” Drew murmured.
Steve’s huff warmed the skin on Drew’s chest. “Right? But I’m one of the lucky ones. I was a high-risk pregnancy. Mom and Dad left Hollywood before I was even born. I went to school under an assumed name. I know some of my friends and their parents recognized my mom from movies, but by the time I was ten or so, Mom had been out of the spotlight for so long that it wasn’t a big thing.”
“She went back to work when your dad passed?” Drew guessed.
“Needed a diversion,” Steve confirmed. “And I think she’d forgotten how much she loved it. Don’t get me wrong, she loved playing mom too. But she couldn’t stay here all the time—too many memories of when they were young. So she had the place renovated and got an apartment in the city and an army of boyfriends.”
Drew chuckled at Steve’s wry tone. “She sounds awesome. You’re close?”
“She’s the best. And I am a mama’s boy,” Steve confirmed. “I’ve made my peace with it.”
“Hmm.” Absently Drew toyed with the fine hairs at the base of Steve’s neck. “I have to admit, there have been times in my life when I wondered if Marla Stone approved of me.” He dropped a kiss on the top of Steve’s head. “Never thought it’d be in the context of dating her only child, though.”
“She keeps threatening to ask for your autograph,” Steve told him, and Drew laughed. “The two of you are going to be two peas in a pod.”
“I can’t wait to meet her,” Drew said, surprising himself with how much he meant that. It was too late for him to meet Steve’s dad, but Marla was still around. He wanted to meet her, talk to her, figure out if she was as like Steve as he suspected.
Steve shifted again, but this time he looked up at Drew for a moment. “Austin said that too.”
Realization dawned slowly. “That’swhat you meant by ‘being used’? He wanted to meet yourmother?” That was twisted.
