Starlight Nights

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  One of the hardest lessons in life is learning that just because someone loves you (or says they do) doesn’t mean they know what’s best for you. Standing up for yourself and taking the risk of finding your own path is sometimes as terrifying as it is exhilarating. Stay strong. This book is for you.

  PROLOGUE

  CALISTA

  SEVEN YEARS AGO

  I’m losing the room.

  There’s a distinct sensation that accompanies blowing an audition. It feels like something from one of those game shows where the floor starts to drop out from beneath you and you’re scrambling to stay on your feet and in the room.

  My eyes are firmly shut, but it doesn’t matter. After more than ten years in this industry, I can practically feel the linoleum tipping beneath me. In reality, the signs are more subtle: the slight throat clearing, the rustle of fabric as people shift in their seats, the loud clicking as someone texts or responds to an email on their phone. But I can feel their gazes sliding away from me like I’m a particularly gruesome accident on the 405. I’m slowly becoming invisible to them even as I stand at the front of the room.

  Breathe. Find the moment. I can easily imagine my mother’s exasperated voice in my head, but it’s tinged with panic—hers and mine.

  It doesn’t help that I have a big blond guy attached to my mouth, and I’m as stiff as a wind-dried towel. He was a stranger as of five minutes ago, and he’s ten years older than me, twenty-six to my sixteen.

  The guy—Tyler, I think—seems to sense the imminent failure, too, because he grips me harder, his fingers digging into my waist, his wet mouth pressing tighter against mine.

  I go rigid, and my eyes snap open, giving me a close-up view of his sharply angled cheekbone and one perfectly groomed sideburn.

  Beyond that, Eric Stone is watching, smirking.

  The son of one of the most famous television producers of all time will be playing my—Skye’s—brother, Byron. He’s sprawled in a chair, waiting to read with me—assuming I even get that far. And judging by his expression, it’s pretty clear he doesn’t think that’s going to happen.

  “Okay, that’s great,” Drea, the casting director, says with a forced smile in her voice.

  Tyler releases me and steps back. It takes every ounce of my willpower not to reach up and wipe my mouth off with the back of my sleeve.

  Willpower and the presence of my mom, Lori, near the door, glaring at me in that way she has. It’s like target-focused laser beams from the eyes. Her forehead is completely smooth, her mouth curved upward in a slight smile. No one would know how pissed she is—no one except me. Which is exactly the point.

  “Okay,” Drea says. “That was great, Tyler. Thank you. And Calista—”

  “Oh, can we just have a minute?” Lori asks, stepping forward and beaming a smile at Alex, the showrunner. My mom is young and pretty—even for a Hollywood mom—and she knows how to use it. “I think Calista’s just a little nervous. She’ll do better the next time.”

  Alex sighs. “Eric. You want to read with her?” he asks, sounding bored and tired, scrubbing his hands over his face as Tyler leaves the room.

  My heart sinks.

  Lori slips quickly to the front of the room to stand before me, under the pretense of fixing my hair while Drea and Alex whisper with the two unnamed studio execs at the back of the room.

  “Look at me, Calista,” she says through her perfect white teeth. Caps, all of them. “We need this. You know we need this.”

  The rent is due.

  We need to eat next month.

  THIS is your chance at stardom. Sometimes you only get one.

  I’ve heard it all from her over the years.

  It’s too late, I want to shout. But I just nod, my throat tight.

  Then she continues in a louder voice. “I just think you’re maybe tensing up too much during the kiss.”

  Right.

  “Remember, passion! And you need to watch his angles and yours, make sure you’re not blocking him, but try to make it look natural,” she says, as if this is the easiest thing in the world.

  She demonstrates then, draping her arm around the neck of an invisible man, tilting her head at an angle, and thrusting her chest in his direction.

  “Now you try it.” She grabs my hand and lifts it up, curving my hand into place on his “neck.”

  I feel queasy. I can’t do this.

  “No,” Eric says.

  I jolt, jerking my hand away from my mother’s.

  Behind her, Eric unfolds himself from his chair and strolls toward us, hands shoved in his pockets.

  Oh, God. In person, he’s more handsome, if that’s possible, in a black T-shirt and expensive jeans that are deliberately worn and faded. Tall, with tousled dark curls, tan skin with a smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose and the tops of his cheeks. I don’t know how old he is. He looks closer to my age than Tyler, but still older than me. Adult. Male.

  “Excuse me?” Lori says, her smile tightening into more of a snarl.

  “That’s bad advice,” he says. “For her.” He nods at me.

  “Thank you for your concern,” she says. “But I’m not sure your expertise is needed here. She needs more than the right last name to land this.”

  “Mom,” I say sharply.

  Eric stiffens, ever so slightly, but shrugs and steps back, his mouth twisting wryly. “Whatever.”

  Lori rolls her eyes, not discreetly, and then returns her attention to me. “Now, as I was saying—”

  “Am I shiny?” I whisper at her. “I feel shiny.”

  Her eyes focus immediately on my face. “One minute, baby. I’ll be right back with the powder.”

  She heads for her bag near the door.

  As soon as she moves away, I edge in Eric’s direction.

  His gaze flicks toward me.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know why she…” I shake my head. She worships the ground Rawley Stone, Eric’s father, walks on, but for some reason, Eric is not in that same category. He’s the mud beneath said holy ground and therefore beneath her attention.

  “I saw you in Seven Sins,” I add. “It was good.” Demons representing the seven deadly sins possess teens with the intent of corrupting the last pure soul in town. Eric played Lust. And, uh, yeah, if I’d been the last pure soul, the hope for all mankind would have been lost.

  He snorts. “No, it wasn’t.”

  “Okay, it wasn’t, but you were,” I say, flushing. Then I glance back over my shoulder to see Lori still digging in her huge bag. “What’s your advice? I … need this.”

  “Do you?” he asks.

  I open my mouth to answer.

  “Or do
es your mom?” he asks, his voice hardening.

  “Is there a difference?” I ask helplessly. It’s gotten better since my mom married Wade, my stepdad, but my career is still the primary source of income for all of us.

  “Calista, I have your powder,” Lori says, glaring at Eric as she returns, stepping between us as if he isn’t even there.

  He raises an eyebrow at her, his jaw tight, and I’m expecting him to turn and walk away. Instead, he steps around her and takes my wrist. “Excuse us,” he says with a smirk that dares her to protest, as he tugs me away.

  “Calista!”

  “One second, Mo … Lori.” She doesn’t like it when I call her Mom in front of industry people.

  He leads me to the opposite corner of the room. When I glance over my shoulder, my mother is staring, her mouth agape.

  His dark-eyed gaze fixes on me as if I’m the only person in the room, and the attention makes my knees go wobbly. “This your first time?” he asks.

  I blink at him. “Auditioning? Uh, no, I mean, I’ve been—”

  “With a kissing scene,” he clarifies. Then he cocks his head to the side. “Or your first kiss, in general?”

  Whatever he sees in my expression—mute horror, perhaps at being discovered as the only sixteen-year-old who hasn’t been kissed other than a peck on the mouth for a scene when I was twelve—must confirm his suspicion because then he nods. “Thought so.”

  Betrayal and humiliation wash over me in a fiery wave, and I pull my hand free of his. “I don’t need you to make fun—”

  “I’m not,” he says. “I’m trying to understand. It makes sense.” His tone goes flat with distaste, his focus shifting to someone behind me. My mom, most likely.

  I face Eric. “Is it … it’s that obvious? I mean, the haven’t-been-kissed … thing,” I stutter out.

  He ignores me. “Forget her bullshit. It’s not about the camera angles. You can tweak that stuff later. You have to make them,” he jerks his head in the direction of Drea, Alex and the execs, “feel something. That’s the most important part.”

  I nod. I know this already; the problem is, I don’t know how to do that.

  “You’re trying to show them passion, but that’s not it,” he says.

  “It says ‘passionately’ right on the page in the—”

  “Fear. You should try fear.”

  I narrow my eyes at him. I’ve heard of actors sabotaging one another with deliberately shitty suggestions, but that’s usually when they’re competing for the same part.

  He makes an impatient noise. “Not like ‘there’s a shark in the water and it’s coming this way.’ Fear of losing, fear of being hurt. Anytime you feel that much, it’s a risk. And Skye knows it can’t work between her and Brody. He’s immortal and her guardian angel. There’s no happily-ever-after for these two.”

  I want to protest—love conquers all (or ratings do, and if viewers want Skye and Brody together, the writers will find a way)—but Eric’s right. From Skye’s perspective, any kind of future together would seem impossible. Forbidden, even.

  “But then there’s also the risk that you won’t feel that way again, with anyone else, for the rest of your life. Is it better to take the chance and know there will be pain, or to miss out on something life-changing? To live a small, safe life so you don’t get hurt? It’s a choice, but there’s fear on both sides. Make them see that, make them feel it,” he says fiercely.

  I blink up at him.

  “Got it?” he asks, straightening up slightly, seeming to recover himself.

  I don’t have words, or I can’t speak them over the lump in my throat, so I bob my head at him.

  “We’re ready,” Eric calls to the others. Then he leads me back in front of the chairs, waiting with barely disguised impatience for my mother to step out of the way.

  “We’re going to run the Brody/Skye scene instead,” he says to Alex, calmly and with such confidence you’d think he was the one in charge.

  I freeze, waiting for the protest. Eric is already cast as Skye’s brother. What Eric’s proposing makes no sense … except to help me redeem myself.

  But Alex just waves his hand in a gesture of acceptance. Clearly he’s already made up his mind about me, so it doesn’t matter what scene we do. “All right, let’s go,” Alex says as soon as we’re in position.

  “It’s too dangerous, Skye. I won’t let you,” Eric-as-Brody says quietly, but his fear and anger are simmering just beneath the surface. It’s a more subtle performance, unlike Tyler’s—he insisted on yelling the lines because he was ANGRY.

  I fold my arms across my chest, cocking an eyebrow at him. “Funny, I thought your boss was kind of big on the whole ‘free will’ thing.” But it’s a front, bravado. I want him to stop me—because it means he cares—as much as I need him to let me go. I squeeze my arms tight around myself, indicating that vulnerability and that desire—oh, God, that desire—for him to touch me, to pull me close. To keep me with him.

  “You’re too important to the world,” Brody says, but he can’t meet my eyes, his gaze focused on the ground.

  “Maybe I don’t care about the world,” I say, a tremor in my voice.

  The muscles in the back of his jaw jump. He knows exactly what Skye is doing.

  “You’re too important to me,” he says finally. “Is that what you want to hear?”

  I edge closer. “Only if it’s true,” I whisper, my chest aching with longing. I want him. But I want him to want me, too. Not as Skye Danvers, future savior of the world, but as Skye Danvers, a girl in love with someone she can’t have. Someone she’ll never have.

  He looks up at me then, and all that pain and frustration is mixed with love and desire, a roiling sea of torment in his gaze.

  I close the distance between us, rising on my tiptoes to wrap my arms around his neck.

  He shakes his head, those soft curls brushing my cheek. “I can’t.” His struggle within himself, between right and wrong, duty and destiny, love and honor, is plain on his face, but his arms slide around me, steadying me.

  The scene calls for him to lean down and kiss me anyway. But following the emotion of the scene, the current of energy that is making this moment hum, I make a change.

  I am Skye, deciding which kind of fear I can live with.

  “I can,” I say. I tip my head to the side and lean in.

  Eric’s breath flutters against my cheek, and I feel the jolt of surprise run through him the second our lips touch. After a second, his hands tighten on my waist, then his mouth moves over mine, taking the lead, and it feels good to surrender control.

  My eyes automatically shut, and my hands slide up past the warm skin at the back of his neck to tangle in his hair. When his tongue touches mine, so briefly I might have imagined it, it sets off a spark of heat low in my belly.

  I press myself against him until there’s no room between us. This. This is what it’s supposed to feel like.

  “Wow.”

  “Holy shit.”

  Those two muttered exclamations are enough to break the moment.

  My head spinning, I lower myself from my tiptoes. Eric pulls away slightly, not enough that it feels like a rejection exactly. But a definite ending.

  “Good enough?” he asks the room, as if nothing has happened.

  Blushing, I remove myself from him, taking a step back. I feel the loss of his closeness immediately, and it strikes with unexpected fierceness. What is wrong with me? He was acting. It was just a scene.

  “Drea, we need to see some more Brodys,” Alex says, sounding stunned. “Do a fresh call. Because I think we’ve found our Skye.”

  His words electrify me. I’m hired? I got the job? As in, potentially steady work that could last months or even years without the stress of auditioning?

  The thought makes me dizzy.

  As if in answer to my silent questions, the room bursts into spontaneous applause, none louder or more enthusiastic than that from my mother. But she stays back in h
er corner. I’m pretty sure Eric’s responsible for that, too.

  “Thank you,” I say to Eric, hearing the wonder in my voice. It’s hard not to reach out, to touch his arm or squeeze his hand.

  He shakes his head. “Don’t thank me. That was all you.”

  “No, I—”

  “Welcome to Starlight, kid,” he says with a smile. Then, with his hands stuffed in his pockets again, he ambles back toward his chair. The only sign of our interaction is a faint flush in his cheeks.

  I’d never understood why people called it “falling” in love. You either love someone or you don’t, like an on/off switch. End of story.

  But in that second, I get it. Because suddenly it’s not the floor tilting anymore, it’s my whole world. And I’m sliding helplessly toward feelings that are way bigger than I am.

  1

  CALISTA BECKETT

  “Come on, Tamara, it’s supposed to be the biggest party on campus this semester,” Ginny says, her voice muffled through the twisted layers of scarf.

  A step behind Ginny and Tamara, I brace myself, my stomach clenching in anticipation. It’s coming. I can feel it, the impending awkwardness rising like a monster out of the ocean in one of those old cheesy horror movies.

  Not that there’s anything resembling an ocean anywhere near here.

  Tamara shakes her head. “This is the one with all the black lights, right? Where they hand out T-shirts and highlighters?” she asks, sounding skeptical.

  Good, maybe she’ll be able to redirect the conversation.

  I tuck my freezing hands deeper into my coat pockets. I can never seem to get warm here. Then again, that might be because the temperature has actually fallen below zero—what is that? How can it be a temperature that doesn’t even exist on a thermometer?—and we’re shuffling to our dorms on a small cleared path between three-foot-tall drifts of snow. The Midwest in winter. Forget flames and perpetual sweatiness and thirst—hell is your nose being so cold you can’t tell if it’s leaking a river of snot again. So sexy.

  I sniffle, just in case.

  Plus, the cold makes the perpetual dull ache in my arm sharpen to a knifepoint, which scares me, even now. You can make it go away, the perpetual refrain in my head whispers. It won’t be like last time.