Behind the Film Star's Smile. Kate Hardy

you’ll be the perfect person to look after Baloo,’ Ayesha said brightly.

      No, she wasn’t. She was the last person to look after the dog. Why hadn’t she lied and said that she was scared of dogs, or allergic to them? And she was furious at the way the actor had behaved. This was as bad as the socialites who carried a little dog around with them as an accessory. ‘If you haven’t got time to look after a dog properly, you shouldn’t have one,’ Jess said. ‘I don’t care if he’s the star of the film. This isn’t how you treat dogs.’ She frowned. ‘My sister and my best friend think he’s wonderful. I didn’t think he’d be like—well, like that, in real life.’ Grouchy. Demanding. Whatever the male equivalent of a diva was.

      ‘He never used to be,’ Ayesha said. ‘I worked on a film with him a couple of years ago, and he was a total sweetheart—he remembered everyone’s name, thanked anyone who ran an errand for him, and I think every female member of the crew and cast fell in love with him. Including me, and I’m used to actors being charming. With him, it wasn’t acting. He meant it.’ She shrugged. ‘But he’s had a pretty hard time the last year. I think it’s changed him.’

      Jess remembered seeing the stories about the break-up of Luke McKenzie’s marriage in the press. A divorce must be hard enough to deal with, but having the press zooming in on every detail must make it so much worse. And even Carly and Shannon—her sister and her best friend—had admitted that Luke’s last film hadn’t been quite as good as the previous ones. Not surprising, really: when your life imploded, it was pretty hard to concentrate on your job and do your best. Which was why Jess was focusing on doing something completely different from her old life. ‘Even so, you don’t just dump your dog on the nearest stranger.’

      The dog licked her hand, as if glad that someone was batting her corner, and Jess felt something crack in the region of her heart.

      No.

      She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t make herself that vulnerable and open again.

      ‘Wouldn’t it be better if she went to the animal handling department?’ Jess asked, hoping she didn’t sound quite as desperate as she felt.

      ‘They work part-time and they’re only on set when we actually need them.’ Ayesha looked at her schedule. ‘Which isn’t today.’

      So she had no choice?

      ‘Jess, if you could look after the dog, I’d be really grateful,’ Ayesha said. ‘I need to keep everything running as smoothly as possible. And if we say we can’t do it and give the dog back to him, it’s going to affect rehearsals. We start filming this week, so we can’t afford any setbacks. The dog chewed Mimi’s shoes. I’ve already had a message from the director to get another pair delivered here by lunchtime. I get the impression that if we refuse to look after her and the dog goes back with Luke, then Mimi’s going to walk off set. And it’ll take an awful lot to unruffle her feathers and persuade her to come back.’

      ‘Artistic temperament?’ Jess asked.

      ‘Let’s just say she lives up to her name.’

      Mimi—me, me, me, me. Jess got it instantly.

      Ayesha blew out a breath. ‘Though I’d appreciate it if you didn’t repeat any of that.’

      Jess remembered what the production manager had told her right from the start: set rules were non-negotiable. What happened on set, stayed on set. No photographs, no social media, no mobile phones, no leaks. Everything within the bounds of the set was to remain a completely separate world. ‘Of course not.’

      ‘And if you can get those call sheets for tomorrow sorted while you’re looking after the dog, that’d be good.’ Ayesha smiled at her.

      Dismissed, but nicely so. It looked as if she didn’t have a choice in the matter, then. ‘OK,’ Jess said, and took the dog over to her own desk.

      Luke McKenzie hadn’t bothered to bring a water bowl with him, or give any information about the dog’s feeding schedule. And she had no idea when the movie star planned to come and collect the dog. He hadn’t bothered to tell them that, either.

      Jess wasn’t sure what made her angriest: the fact that Luke had dumped his dog, or the fact that he’d put her in an impossible position. She didn’t want to look after his dog, but she had no way to refuse. Not without explanations she didn’t want to make, because she’d had enough of people pitying her.

      ‘He needs a lesson in manners,’ she said to the dog. ‘And a lot of lessons in how to look after you. You haven’t even got any toys to keep you busy.’

      The dog shifted closer to Jess and put her head on Jess’s knee.

      Jess had to fight back the tears. It’d been so long since she’d worked at a desk with a dog cuddled up close to her. And the spaniel-shaped hole in her life felt as if it had just opened up again.

      She dragged in a breath. ‘Let’s see what we can sort out for you, sweetie.’ A word with the catering department netted her a plastic bowl for water, and a word with the props department gained her a tennis ball. ‘It’s a bit sketchy, but it’s better than nothing,’ she said. ‘We’ll work round this.’

      And she wouldn’t bond with the dog in just one day.

      Would she?

      * * *

      That, Luke thought as he headed for the temporary building of the production office, was possibly one of the worst days he’d ever spent in his entire career as a film actor. A co-star who wanted to be treated as if she were the empress of the entire universe, a ridiculous bill for replacing a pair of shoes that said co-star could barely walk in, and now he had to go back and collect the dog that had been dumped on him. The dog he didn’t want. The dog who’d wrecked both his house and his sleep over the last two days.

      The icing on the misery cake now would be another of those snide little articles asking if Luke McKenzie was in the process of making another box office flop. He was pretty sure that the last couple had been written by one of his ex-wife’s cronies, but calling them both on it would just result in yet more bad publicity for him. Say nothing, and he was a wimp. Protest, and he was a spiteful bastard who was trying to get revenge on his ex. Whatever he did, he lost.

      ‘Just grin and bear it,’ he told himself. Fleur would get over the guilt eventually, and she’d stop trying to paint him as the bad guy in an attempt to make herself feel better about what she’d done.

      He hoped.

      There was one way Luke could turn the tables on her and get all the sympathy, but he wasn’t prepared to do that. Particularly as he knew how quickly the press could put the opposite spin on a story to get more mileage from it. That part of his life was private, and it was staying that way.

      OK. He only had to put up with the dog until Thursday. Just another three days. Then his aunt would be back in London to find the dog a permanent home; and he could get back to concentrating on his career. And on making damn sure that this movie was a huge success so Fleur and her cronies wouldn’t be able to say another word.

      Luke walked into the office, expecting to see Ayesha Milan, but the only person he saw was the new assistant. He hadn’t actually caught her name this morning. He really regretted that; he’d always sworn that he wouldn’t be one of the stuck-up stars who forgot what it was like to be at the bottom of the heap. He usually made a point of making sure that anyone who worked with him knew that he appreciated what they did and he didn’t take them for granted. Today, he’d slipped up. Badly.

      ‘Mr McKenzie,’ she said, her mouth thinning. ‘Come to collect your dog?’

      ‘Yes.’

      He was about to apologise for the way he’d dumped the dog on her that morning, but she didn’t give him the chance. ‘I don’t care if you’re Mr Big Shot Actor, and I don’t care if you complain to Ayesha and get me fired for this, but what you did this morning is most definitely not the way