Tangled Up Read online

  But it wasn’t Caite’s job to keep them together. Or break them up, for that matter. Her job was to spin the exploits of these three into something the public would eagerly consume, no matter how stupid they acted. Or how boring. Using her social media management skills, her task would be to keep them in the public eye without oversaturating the market, as well as make sure that everything they did met the corporate sponsors’ approval.

  She loved it already.

  “So. Guys,” she said, pinpointing her gaze on Nellie and Pax, who were ignoring her totally for a whispered conversation full of sibilance. Tommy, however, looked at her with the same deadpan stare he’d become famous for. “Let’s talk about this week’s schedule. You’re off from the house this weekend, right?”

  The team got weekends free to leave the treasure house and live in the real world while the crew reset the booby traps and clues they’d have to fight and find in the next week’s filming. Pax bore a distinct set of fading bruises on his dark cheek that Caite had already seen covered in a blast of comments on the show’s Connex fan page, though Pax himself had been smart enough not to breach his contract by mentioning what had caused them in anything he’d said. That had only fueled the fire of commentary as fans tried to figure out what had happened, how close to dying he’d come, the extent of injuries they couldn’t see. It had been ratings genius, though Caite suspected it was mostly unplanned on his part. She was having a hard time believing Pax was smart enough to have planned that strategy.

  “Yeah.” The answer finally came from Tommy, who gave his teammates a small roll of his eyes. “We got the weekend off. Gotta go back in Sunday night.”

  “So tonight it’s parrrrty!” Nellie bounced in her seat and clapped her hands like a toddler promised a pony ride. Her long black hair, dyed beneath with blue and green stripes, flipped over her shoulders. “I’m’a get shit hammered!”

  “There’s a shocker,” Tommy muttered.

  From his seat, the formerly silent Jamison said, “Contractually, the three of you have to stay together at all times, right? During filming and not.”

  “Yeah.” Pax nodded and sidled a tiny bit closer to Nellie, though it was obvious he was trying to make it look accidental. “All three of us. All the time. The Three Musketeers.”

  “More like a PayDay,” Tommy said.

  Caite grinned at his clever twist on the names of two candy bars. “I guess it’s a good thing you like each other, then.”

  Another one of those sly glances from Pax to Nellie. Caite didn’t miss it. Jamison didn’t, either. He and Caite shared a look of their own across the table.

  “So,” Jamison said suddenly. “Where are we going tonight?”

  * * *

  “Your face is gonna stay that way.” Caite had sidled up next to Jamison, who stood along the railing overlooking the dance floor where Nellie, Paxton and Tommy were currently taking pictures and signing autographs for their admirers. She’d arranged for the club to advertise their appearance. She didn’t look at Jamison but kept her gaze carefully on their three clients. She nudged him gently with an elbow.

  He half turned to look at her. “Don’t they ever quit?”

  “If you had to stay locked in a house full of booby traps, your every move being filmed, for five days out of seven…wouldn’t you want to go a little wild when you had a chance for some time off?”

  He shook his head. “Hell, no. I’d want to get a good night’s sleep.”

  “You,” Caite said, turning to him finally, “could stand to loosen up a little.”

  Jamison stared her down, but she didn’t look away. “You think so, huh.”

  “I do.”

  For an instant, just the barest, briefest second, a hint of a smile ghosted along his mouth. It was gone before she could return it. But she’d seen it. There was that.

  “You don’t have to be here, you know. It’s not required. I can handle it.” Caite bounced a little on her toes to the beat of the music as she gave a discreet gesture toward their clients. She pulled out her phone to tap in an updated Connex status for the three, sending out another media blip. “We’re not babysitters.”

  Jamison made no move to leave. “When you get them trending in the local radius, then I’ll leave.”

  Caite’s brows rose, but she held up her phone to show him the screen of her tracking app. It logged the trending topics in several of the social media apps Wolfe and Baron preferred to utilize and was updated every fifteen minutes. “We’re in the top ten on most of them, except for the video ones. We had a brief surge on Buffvid, but that was it.”

  “Guess you’d better get them posting some video, then, huh?” He gave her a sharklike grin.

  It didn’t intimidate her.

  “You got it,” Caite said, then paused to give him a slowly quirking smile designed to get under his skin just a little. “Boss.”

  She ducked through the crowd to get close to Tommy, who looked happy to see her. At least, he put his arm around her and drew her close as though they were longtime besties instead of just-met acquaintances. Caite didn’t mind. Tommy was delicious, long and lean and tattooed. He smelled good, too. He leaned close to talk into her ear.

  “Hey, you.”

  “Can you Buzzvid a couple clips?” She looked past him to where Nellie and Paxton were holding court, happily taking pictures with fans who were hopefully using the right hashtags.

  Tommy frowned for a second. “Yeah. Sure. Get in here with me.”

  He took a shot of the crowd, then of the two of them, with Caite woo-wooing appropriately. She waited for him to send the clip out into the world, then rebuzzed it once it had uploaded.

  “You need anything? A drink or something?” Caite asked.

  “Nah. I’m good. Getting tired, though. Think you can convince my compatriots over there that it’s time to head home?”

  She laughed ruefully, watching Nellie and Pax posing for picture after picture. Neither of them seemed tired. “Not sure about that. But you’re done with this promo stuff in…five minutes. You can all do whatever you want.”

  He hadn’t let go of her shoulders and now half turned toward her. “Yeah? Whatever I want?”

  “Are you flirting with me?” she teased, getting ready to step out of the way so that a girl with white-blond ponytails could get him to sign her half-bared breasts.

  “Only if you’re interested,” he said, holding up his pen with a flourish that made the blonde girl squeal.

  Caite had to think on that for a second or so as she looked out over the jostling crowd. There were at least a hundred girls in here tonight who’d give their right arm for a wink and smile from Tommy Sanders, much less something a little more personal. Before she could answer, he backed up a step to put an arm around her again, this time to nuzzle against her ear.

  “Only if the wolf over there wouldn’t bite my head off,” Tommy said.

  Caite followed his gaze. “Jamison? He’s my boss.”

  “He’s looking at you like he wants to gobble you up. Hey there, what’s your name?” And that was it—Tommy was back to being famous, signing boobs and posing for pictures in the last five minutes before their gig ended.

  And Caite had managed to get them trending in the top five social media sites, at least for half an hour.

  “Not bad,” Jamison said. “Are they ready to leave yet?”

  “Tommy is. Nellie and Paxton aren’t. Let me guess. You are.” Caite waved for a glass of ice water. The press of the crowd had left her sweating. Or maybe it had been the hint from Tommy that her boss might be interested in her. That was good for a spike in her heart rate.

  “You think they’re going to keep their shit together?”

  Caite looked out to the dance floor, where Nellie was grinding with Pax, both of them bathed in the glare of a dozen flashes going off. Tommy joined them in a moment, bumping her ass while she shimmied. “Um…do we care?”

  “We’re being paid to care.”

  She gave