Riptide (Renegades 6)

Zach shook his head and planted his hands at his hips. “I can’t believe you’re going to bitch about getting paid to drink, eat, and get mauled by bikini queens. Only you could make something like that—”

“I’m meeting with Dougherty from Tinsel Town Films to talk about the lead in a movie.”

So the rumors were true. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Tomorrow morning is the only time he could see me in person before he leaves for Greece to film Pitt’s new movie. I have to leave tonight if I’m going to make an early meeting tomorrow.”

Zach wanted to do this about as much as he wanted to surf on an ocean of broken glass. He hated Ian’s groupies. “Look, that’s not my scene—”

“There’s fifty grand in it for you.”

“Bullshit.”

“The sponsors are paying fifty grand. You can have the money,” he said with a negligent slant to his tone. “I don’t need it. What I need is to get out of the event so I can catch a plane to LA.”

The whole thing felt dicey, but a little voice whispered in the back of his head, You’ll need that money if this role bottoms out and you bomb at Mavericks.

“Even if I wanted to, it would never work,” he told Ian. “We don’t look that much alike.”

“Oh no? Turn and wave at the women lining the barricades. See whose name they call out.”

Zach didn’t need to. He already knew it would be Ian’s. Which reminded him of the women Ian took to bed every night and how long it had been since Zach had hooked up with one of his mellow island girls, women chased away by all those psycho groupies.

“At a hundred yards away,” he told Ian, “Keith and I probably look alike.”

The comparison between Zach and the fifty-something director who never showed more skin than forearms and calves—no matter what the weather dished out—made Ian laugh. “Look, you don’t have to MC from the tabletops or anything. Just hang at the VIP table with your friends and sign my name on a few racks. The bar will be dark, and everyone will be drunk. You’ll have a bodyguard if you want to get rid of someone. And if you find a chick or two you like, get a piece. Hell, I don’t care if you’re banging her and she’s screaming my name.”

“Dude,” Zach said, affronted. “I don’t want your groupies, and I sure as shit don’t have to pretend to be someone else to get laid.”

He sounded so confident, he almost had himself convinced. His body, on the other hand, was telling him something different. His long days and lack of extracurricular activities had him wound tighter than a clock.

“Then brush them all off,” Ian said. “Whatever. If you do this for me, I’ll hype you to Keith. I know you want my role.” But between the lines, he meant, I know you want to be me. “You can even have my suite at the Kapalua. The studio has it rented until the end of the month. It’ll be empty. And I’ll have that ditzy makeup girl put a scar on my forehead and have the crew tell everyone the board hit you on your last run. When you show at the club without a cut—”

“Stop the bullshit, man,” Zach said, sick of the way Ian put everyone down. “Just—”

Tucker called from down the beach, and Josh started that direction. Ten minutes ago, Zach had been dreading the waves. Now he couldn’t wait to get away from this ass and grab some adrenaline in the surf.

“Fine, whatever.” He jerked his board from the sand and swung it under his arm, angry and disgusted with himself for agreeing to do it. But not enough to bail. Fifty grand was fifty grand. A leading role in a hit series was a leading role in a hit series. Right now, Zach had to take what he could get when he could get it. “Just have someone give Tucker the information, and make sure you follow through with Keith.”

Josh joined Zach in the walk toward the new filming area. “That guy is one of the biggest pricks I’ve ever met.”

“Agreed.”

“Sure you want to do that for him?”

“It’s not for him,” Zach told Josh. “It’s for me. Why don’t you bring Grace tonight, keep me company in my misery.”

“I’ll talk to her. What’s going on with your shoulder?”

God dammit. The guy had the sharpest eyes on the planet.

“Don’t do this last run if you’re tired or hurting,” Josh told him.

“I’m fine, dude. I was just stretching it out.” He gave Josh a smile and a slap on the shoulder before he headed toward the water, determined to enjoy his last ride of the night. “See you tonight.”

Tessa Drake could remember every name of every congressman and senator on Capitol Hill, distinguish their moods with a glance at their expression, and identify them from a distance by their walk. But here, now, standing on the sidelines of a movie set in Maui, she felt like she was in a constant shell game trying to tell Zach Ellis and Ian Bellamy apart.

She’d been watching them for three days, searching for a way to distinguish the pair and find a pattern of behavior. She thought she’d be devising an approach plan by now, but she still had no idea where Zach was staying or how to get ahold of him after the shoot. She’d also discovered early on that her DC negotiation skills had no influence on this television crew. No one would let her near any of the actors or tell her anything about them. In fact, her best source of information had become the groupies lining the barricades where she stood now.