The A-List: Hollywood Royalty #1 Read online

  grossed some ungodly amount. It had been just Myla, until four years ago, when they'd

  brought home four-year-old Mahalo from Bangladesh on her twelfth birthday. They'd just

  returned from a Babel-meets-- Independence Day shoot and decided to bring back a souvenir.

  At least that's how it seemed to Myla.

  Then one day in the eighth grade, she and Ash were waiting for his dad, Gordon Gilmour--a

  record producer who spent more time coddling whiny rock stars than taking care of his only

  son--to pick them up from the ArcLight after they'd gone to see the new Harry Potter movie

  together. They hadn't told their friends, who said the movie was dorky. That was okay though;

  it was their secret. Myla was in the middle of a rant about how she sometimes hated the

  ArcLight's assigned seats--the Hogwarts-uniformed senior citizen in the seat next to her and

  Ash had reeked of asparagus and Old Spice. That was when Ash leaned over and kissed her,

  right in front of the Cinerama Dome. They'd been Hollywood's youngest golden couple ever

  since.

  And they were inseparable.

  But Myla's parents--Barbar, as they were called by the press--had insisted on a family vacation

  this summer. "Vacation" meant a whirlwind tour of the third world, doing United Nations aid

  work at their older children's adopted countries: Thailand for Myla, Bangladesh for Mahalo,

  and Madagascar for Bobby, now six. Myla had to share a room with her two brothers--next to

  her parents and the three recently adopted toddlers--often in villages so small and remote she

  couldn't get a cell phone signal or Internet. She couldn't indulge in online retail therapy, take a

  real shower, update her Facebook status, or, more important, communicate with Ash. It was

  torture.

  Granted, she could have called Ash every second while she was in Paris last week, visiting her

  old friend Isabelle, who'd moved there in fourth grade. But she'd been in the city of love

  without the love of her life--thinking about him too much would have depressed her. In a way,

  she also thought the waiting was romantic. Being someone who never had to wait long for

  anything she wanted, Myla enjoyed the way her heart beat when she thought about her and

  Ash finally being together again.

  She punched a string of numbers into her phone, twirling a lock of her long ebony hair around

  her index finger. She smiled, catching a glimpse of the shiny, emerald green streak that fell

  along the left side of her neck. It had been Ash's idea, and Myla had initially been revolted, but

  now she loved the secret burst of color.

  Isabelle picked up on the third ring. " Ma chère amie, I missed you too."

  Myla could hear the clinking of silverware and wineglasses in the background. Even though it

  was after eleven there, Isabelle was probably just eating dinner now, before hitting Paris's

  nightclubs.

  "Stop that, Guillaume!" Isabelle squealed delightedly to her boyfriend. "Sorry, he's being a total

  perv. Shouldn't you be with Ash?"

  "He's late." Myla fiddled nervously with the plastic Green Lantern bubble gum machine ring

  she wore on a Tiffany gold chain. She and Ash had traded rings from a bubble gum machine in

  ninth grade, and she had worn it on her neck ever since. Myla fully planned to hire Mindy

  Weiss, the best wedding planner in L.A., to work the cheap rings into the ceremony when they

  got married.

  "Better he's late than you are, if you know what I mean," Isabelle said bawdily, before cracking

  up. "Oh, that's right! You haven't done it yet. Quel dommage."

  Myla rolled her eyes. "We can't all be French sluts like you," she teased her friend.

  A woman in a Jesus Saves (Ask Me How) T-shirt rumbled by, scowling at the dirty talk.

  "I know, you're waiting for the right time." Isabelle yawned. "Just make sure to take advantage

  of being young and hot. Now go moisturize before he gets there."

  Isabelle hung up with a giggle, probably to stop Guillaume's wandering hands again, and Myla

  hung up too. Two girls walked by arm in arm, wearing matching Fairy Princess T-shirts and

  glittery purple leggings.

  Myla sighed. Even if they were only ten, you had to start learning the basic rules of fashion

  sometime. She yanked the pile of dog-eared Vogue s from her bag and thrust the magazines into

  the taller girl's arms.

  If thoughts of "stranger danger" occurred to either girl, they didn't show it. They studied Myla's

  round cheeks, smooth skin, and almond-shaped, shamrock-colored eyes. Recognition flashed

  across their surprised faces. They must have seen her photo in People, helping Barbar hand out

  care packages in the Philippines. And here she was again, doing charity work of her own.

  Ash Gilmour was late for everything, a habit he'd never wanted to develop but had learned

  from his record impresario father. "Early means eager. Eager is weak," he'd always said.

  But when it came to Myla Everhart, Ash was weak. And he'd wanted to be waiting at LAX

  when she'd landed. He wanted to watch her come down the escalator to the baggage claim, to

  see whatever impossible shoes she was wearing, followed by her long legs with the little

  birthmark below her right knee. Then her slim little body, and her tumble of hair with the green

  streak just for him. And then that face--lips that reminded him of the cherries on top of a

  sundae and eyes that always looked a little sleepy but saw every little thing.

  Ash parked his vintage black 1969 Camaro and stumbled out, half-running across the wide

  one-way street reserved for shuttle buses and taxis. He dashed past planters of daisies lining

  the median and skidded to a stop in his beat-up Vans. On the drive over, he'd called House of

  Petals to get Myla's favorite hot pink peony bouquet, but they'd been crazed with some

  Endeavor agent's wedding. He reached down and picked six daisies, then sprinted across the

  rest of the street, nearly getting hit by a limo driver.

  Safely on the sidewalk, Ash composed himself, shoving his shaggy dark blond hair off his

  forehead and smoothing his vintage Zeppelin tee. He stepped through the automatic doors. The

  air-conditioning swallowed him, but he saw no sign of Myla on the benches or near the

  baggage carousel. He checked the arrivals board. Her flight had made it. Oh, shit. How late

  was he? Had she left without him?

  Myla was in the LAX ladies room, applying a final coat of Urban Decay XXX gloss in Baked.

  Satisfied, she tossed her hair and headed for the door. Surely Ash would be here by now.

  Swinging her bag back to her shoulder, she pushed through the doors to be greeted not by her

  boyfriend, but by four paparazzi.

  "Myla, where's Barbar?"

  Now that Myla was sixteen, and with her parents less, she got photographed more and more on

  her own. Some days she didn't mind it, but after a fourteen-hour flight? Come on.

  She gave the photogs a sarcastic smile, knowing an unflattering scowl would certainly make

  the tabloids. "Take your pick: Adopting a baby from a wartorn region. Building houses in a

  hurricane-ravaged stretch of the South. Having wild, passionate affairs with their costars."

  A photographer sporting a jet-black goatee asked, "Are they here, Myla? You can tell us." His

  eyes were focused on Myla's toned thighs.

  Myla raised her eyebrows. "First, take a picture, it lasts longer. Which you should already

  know. Sec
ond, no, my parents are not here. Now please get out of my way." They fired a few

  more shots and were gone. Myla blinked post-flashbulb into the crowd of new arrivals.

  And then she saw him.

  There, clutching a sad bouquet of crumpled daisies, was Ash. His sun-lightened hair hung

  shaggily over his ears, and his chestnut-colored eyes looked like a heartbroken puppy's. She

  stopped where she stood, waiting for him to come to her.

  Ash, meanwhile, felt like he'd been kicked in the stomach. Where was Myla? He began to look

  carefully around the crowded terminal. A British tour group ambled slowly to the baggage

  claim on his right. To his left, he saw nothing but a cluster of Japanese businessmen. Straight

  ahead, he studied girls at the newsstand, flipping through copies of W. A girl with long, shiny

  black hair had her face buried in Vogue. She looked up, and Ash saw she was probably thirty.

  Where was Myla? He felt like he might cry, something he hadn't done since his grade-school

  friend Jacob Porter-Goldsmith spilled Sunny D on Ash's favorite Pokémon card.

  Then Ash noticed a small group of scuzzy-looking paparazzi walking away from the ladies'

  room corridor. As they parted, he finally saw her. There was Myla, wearing the world's

  shortest dress, her slim legs tanned and sexy above a pair of crazy-high shoes. She tilted her

  head at a "come and get me" angle. Her dark hair tumbled over the straps of her big plumcolored bag. She grinned and took a few steps closer.

  He nearly tripped over his navy blue Vans trying to reach her faster. When he did, he lifted her

  into the air, dropping the daisies to the polished airport floor. And with hundreds of travelers

  and tourists surrounding them, he kissed her like it was the only thing he ever needed to be

  good at in his whole life.

  Myla was only vaguely conscious that the paparazzi were shooting photos of them. Their

  reunion wouldn't make a cover, but because of her parents, they'd get an inset box. She could

  see the caption now: Hollywood's Princess finds her Prince Charming.

  A WHOLE NEW WORLD

  Josephine Milford--Jojo to anyone who wanted to stay on her good side--tossed another Roxy

  hoodie atop the mountainous pile of clothing in the center of her sustainable-bamboo bed. She

  heaved a sigh, then gathered her thick brown hair into a ponytail at the top of her head. Her

  room was stuffy, since her parents refused to set the AC below eighty-four degrees. She was

  already sweating in her JFK High soccer shorts and tank top.

  Jojo was packing for Greenland, of all places, and she wasn't having an easy go of it. Her

  wardrobe go-to's--American Eagle miniskirts, Aéropostale tank tops, lightweight cotton Tshirts, and her most flattering Gap V-neck--didn't exactly scream "ice-bound continent!" Sure,

  her parents were on their sabbatical from UC Sacramento, but who took a sixteen-year-old girl

  to Greenland for her pivotal junior year?

  She turned to her mirrored closet door, wondering how she would look after a semester in the

  snow. Her olive skin, a deep brown thanks to a summer of soccer practice, would probably

  fade to pale and pasty. Her pink lips would become chapped and wintry. Hopefully, her violet

  blue eyes wouldn't freeze shut as she cried away her school year in Greenland's frigid tundra.

  They would be living in Nuuk, the country's capital, but it wasn't exactly cosmopolitan.

  Jojo stuck out her tongue at her reflection as she waited for best friend, Willa Barnes, to come

  back to the phone. They were discussing the tragic way Jojo would be spending the next nine

  months.

  "Sorry about that," Willa finally breathed into the phone. "Damian put his turtle in the toilet

  bowl."

  Jojo would babysit Willa's five-year-old brother Damian until she turned fifty if it meant she

  could stay in Sacramento. Not that it was the capital of cool or anything, but it was better than

  Nuuk. At least she had friends here. Plus, she'd just made forward on the soccer team.

  "You know that cute miniskirt I bought at Bebe?" Jojo looked longingly at her short, red A-line

  skirt with oversize front pockets. She pulled it on over her soccer shorts and admired her

  tanned calves in the mirror. "Do you want to adopt it?" She sighed, yanking the skirt off and

  throwing it into a separate pile on her bed. "I don't think Greenland is miniskirt territory."

  Willa laughed. "There might be cute Greenlandian guys desperate to see a girl wearing

  something totally inappropriate in the snow."

  Jojo flopped onto her bed, picking up the latest Us Weekly. Barbar and their kids were on the

  cover with three Bangladesh villagers. Their oldest daughter--a gorgeous Thai sixteen-yearold--wore a green Versace halter and a pair of True Religion cutoffs. Jojo figured the cost of

  the girl's skimpy outfit alone could probably feed all the starving kids on those late-night "this

  child needs your help" commercials. She tossed the magazine on her desk with the stack of

  books she'd probably read within the first week of boring Greenlandian life.

  "Maybe it will have globally warmed by the time you get there," Willa reasoned.

  "I've never wanted the Earth to die more." Jojo sighed. She looked out her window, imagining

  Justin Klatch, the captain of the boys' soccer team, pulling his blue Scion up in front of the

  house to appeal to her parents for mercy. She'd only had the guts to make eye contact with him

  once in her whole life. But maybe by some miracle he was in love with Jojo too, and needed

  her to stay in Sacramento. If they took her away now, he'd become a recluse, not even leaving

  his house for soccer games. Maybe hearing his desperate pleas, her parents would relent. . . .

  There was a knock at Jojo's door.

  "Gotta go." Jojo quickly dropped the phone on her nightstand and picked up a pair of jeans.

  She was supposed to be packing, not chatting. Pretending to fold them, she yelled, "Come in!"

  to her dads.

  Yes, dads. Plural.

  Frederick and Bradley Milford shuffled into her room, looking like cover models for the

  Nonthreatening Gay Men Catalog. Even in balmy August, they wore itchy wool sweater vests.

  Fred's was a little snug around his potato-sack upper body. Bradley, rail-thin and a head taller

  than Fred, carried a cup of his favorite free-trade coffee in a National Public Radio pledge drive

  mug.

  "Hi," Jojo said innocently, gesturing to the pile of to-pack items. "Look at all my progress."

  Fred looked at her over the top of his horn-rimmed glasses. "Jojo, can we have a chat?"

  She shoved the pile of clothing from her bed, revealing the organic cotton bedspread. "Go for

  it."

  Fred and Bradley sat and Jojo pulled out her IKEA desk chair. She plopped onto it backwards,

  resting her chin on the seat back. "What's up? Greenland called and canceled? We're ruining my

  social life and potential for teenage normalcy in Costa Rica instead?"

  "No, this is serious," Fred said, tugging a loose thread on his sweater and admiring his new

  wedding ring. "Why don't you come sit over here?" He patted the bed between him and

  Bradley. Fred was short and bald, with chocolate skin and a soft, cuddly look to him. He

  always wanted to drop ten pounds, though he'd need to lose fifteen to make any difference.

  Bradley, on the other hand, was pale and reedy, with pointy features and a wild tuft of blond

  hair that couldn't be controlled by even hair gel. Jojo knew this because she had trie
d.

  She rolled her desk chair to the bed and, playing along, smushed herself between her dads.

  "Really, guys, is this going to be another 'you're a woman now' talk? 'Cause I'm totally cool on

  the tampon thing."

  "We'll just say it, Josephine," Bradley began, running his long fingers along his corduroy

  shorts. She sat up a little straighter at the use of her full name. Had she gone over her cell

  phone minutes again?

  Bradley took a deep breath, like he was about to run a marathon. "Remember your tenth

  birthday?" he tentatively questioned.

  "Yeah, my disastrous boy-girl party? With the two boys and thirteen girls?" Jojo rolled her

  eyes, remembering. "Oh, but the decorate-your-own-cupcake thing was cool."

  "This is more about what we discussed on your birthday," Bradley continued, a serious edge in

  his voice. "How you'd be open to meeting your birth parents, if the opportunity arose."

  Jojo gulped. She remembered the conversation vividly. She'd spent the week after that birthday

  wondering what her biological parents were like. She and Willa had even planned to take a road

  trip when they turned seventeen so that Jojo could meet them.

  "We got a call from them yesterday." Fred placed his pudgy hand on Jojo's knee. "They've

  been looking for you for years."

  Her birth parents? Looking for her for years?

  "They found us through the adoption agency. We spoke with them this morning," Fred went

  on.

  The air around Jojo felt heavy. She stared at Bradley, then turned to face Fred.

  Then she narrowed her eyes. "Wait a second. . . . Is this some weird surprise going-away-party

  thing? You'll tell me we're going to meet them and then we'll get over to Sadie's Pizza and all

  my friends will be there? Because that's a horrible prank."

  Fred gave Bradley an uneasy look.

  Jojo took it to mean this was real. She felt as though there were a strange hole somewhere

  between her chest and her stomach.

  Her dads were studying her more closely than they did their pet avocado tree after a storm. "So

  what do they want from me?" she asked hesitantly, breaking the silence.

  "Well, they'd like to meet you," Bradley said, playing with the corners of Jojo's Us Weekly.

  "And they were extremely nice on the phone, and seem to be, um, great with kids."