How was she going to get out of there? The thought of walking outside into all of that made her anxious. People knew she was in San Francisco; the photographers might be watching out for her. And she was wearing the same thing she’d worn to the set yesterday. She’d avoided situations like this—where she wasn’t in control of how and when people took photos of her—for exactly this reason. Shit. She dropped her head into her hands.

Ben pulled his phone out of his pocket.

“I have an idea. Hold on.”

 

* * *

 

—

Theo answered the phone after only two rings.

“Why are you calling me this early? Is someone in the hospital? Are you in jail?”

His brother had so much faith in him.

“Neither of those, but I need your help. Wait, actually, Maddie’s, too, if she’s with you.”

Theo snorted.

“Oh, are you going to be the one to wake her up before six a.m. and deal with the consequences? Because I sure as hell do not want to do that.”

Ben heard mumbling in the background.

“She says fine, she’s up, what is it?”

Wait. Damn it. He hadn’t checked with Anna to see if he could let Theo and Maddie in on this. Which, obviously, they were already in on it, but Anna didn’t know that.

“Hold on. Give me a second.”

He ignored the squawking from Theo and hit the mute button.

“Anna.” She looked up from her phone and at him. “Can I tell my brother that . . . you’re here? And his girlfriend? They’re both trustworthy, I swear, they won’t tell anyone, and just as important, they’ll know how to solve this. My brother might irritate the hell out of me sometimes, but he’s great in a crisis.”

She looked at him for a minute and shrugged.

“Sure.”

“Okay. Great.” He unmuted the phone. “Here’s the situation. Anna is here, at my apartment.” Theo whistled, but Ben kept talking. “There’s a film crew outside, on my street, with a bunch of photographers, which we discovered when we tried to leave to go to my car so I could drive her back to her hotel. How do we get her out of here without being photographed?”

He heard a gasp from Maddie.

“I know! I know how to do this!” Maddie said. Theo had obviously put him on speaker. “This is the moment I’ve been dreaming of for years! Okay, wait—what time does she have to be back at her hotel? Like, by absolutely what time?”

He repeated that question to Anna, who looked down at her phone.

“Well, my manager just postponed our meeting from six to eight, thank God. Luckily, Gene told me yesterday I don’t have to be on set until ten today, because you guys are doing all of that crowd stuff first.”

“Eight,” Ben said into the phone. “Why, what are you—”

“Okay!” Maddie said. “We’ll be there as soon as we can. Stay where you are!”

“Where would we go? That’s the whole . . .” She’d hung up the phone. Well, if he trusted anyone in this world, he trusted his brother and Maddie, so hopefully their solution was real.

And hopefully, they’d make it to San Francisco from the East Bay in time.

Ben turned to look at Anna.

“Maddie says stay here, they’re on their way.”

She looked back at him and narrowed her eyes.

“Who . . . is Maddie again?”

He shook his head. Right. Even though it felt like they knew each other well by this point, they barely knew anything about each other’s lives.

“Maddie is my brother’s girlfriend. Between the two of them, I knew they’d have some sort of idea for how to deal with this, but I didn’t expect them to come flying across the bay before six a.m.” Anna still looked doubtful. “Maddie’s a stylist; she’s used to this sort of thing. She worked for that princess, the American one.”

“Oh!” Anna’s brow cleared. “Duchess, but okay. So she does know what she’s talking about.” She looked past him into the kitchen. “Is there any coffee in there, by chance?”

They were deep into their third cup of coffee by the time Theo and Maddie buzzed from downstairs. Thank God, because Ben had spent the past thirty minutes freaking out that maybe there’d been an accident on the bridge and his promise to Anna that he’d find a way to get her out of there unscathed would be a lie and he’d have to dress her up in four layers of his clothes to walk to his car.

Ben opened his apartment door and let in Theo, Maddie, and the enormous suitcase Maddie was carrying. That must contain her disguise options for Anna. His brother looked sleepy; Maddie looked excited.

“Anna, meet my brother, Theo, and his girlfriend, Maddie. Theo, Maddie, this is Anna.”

It was, yes, slightly awkward to be introducing his brother and Maddie to Anna at his apartment at 6:15 a.m., but everyone involved pretended it was totally normal.

“Nice to meet you, Anna.” Theo nodded at her, as uptight and formal at this hour of the morning as he always was.

“Nice to meet you, too,” Anna said. “Your brother has told me a lot about you.”

Theo turned to Ben, and the formal mask slipped from his face a little. If Theo said Likewise Ben might have to murder him on the spot.

“Mmm. Well. Only believe the good stories he told you. The bad ones are all lies.”

Ben relaxed. He should have trusted his brother. In his defense, it had been a . . . while since he’d introduced him to a woman he was dating.

Not that he was dating Anna.

But still.

Maddie broke into his musings.

“Hi, Anna. Do you want to hear my plan?”

She held up the suitcase, and Ben couldn’t resist interrupting her.

“What is in that thing, anyway? That’s the biggest suitcase I’ve ever seen.”

Maddie grinned at him. She looked more excited than he’d ever seen her.

“It’s huge. I usually use it for big-deal shoots, or when I’m trying to transport a ton of clothes for a client. And I brought an assortment of random clothes and a few wigs over this morning, in case Anna wants to wear them on the way to the hotel, but also . . .” She paused and looked right at Anna. “It’s big enough for you to fit inside.”

Maddie must have lost her mind. Ben looked at Anna, expecting her to say that, but instead, Anna let out a peal of laughter.

“Like when . . . Oh my God, this is ridiculous and hilarious and borderline certifiable.” She grinned. “And also, I love it. Why the fuck not?”