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PopTV’s newest hit series is all about good friends living the good life in L.A.—right? Last we checked, friends don’t lie to each other—or stab each other in the well-dressed back. On famed reality TV producer Trevor Lord’s sugarcoated confection, it’s hard to tell who’s really friends and who’s just making nice for more airtime. But one thing’s for sure: This candy isn’t as sweet as it appears to be. In fact, it just might be toxic.
1 YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN THERE MIGHT BE A PHOTOGRAPHER AROUND
Jane Roberts sat up on her white chaise longue and gazed at the horizon between the vast blue ocean and the vast blue sky. She could hear the distant cries of seagulls and the roar of the surf as it curled in, approaching high tide. The breeze, dry and warm for December, stirred her long, wavy blond hair. She reached for the cactus-pear margarita on top of the small hand-painted table next to her and took a long sip.
It was a perfect day on a perfect beach in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. But not for Jane, who felt perfectly awful.
“Another margarita, sweetie?”
Jane glanced over her shoulder and saw her friend Madison Parker walking toward her. Despite her mood, Jane had to smile. Madison was wearing a bronze bikini that barely covered her size-zero figure, along with five-inch wedges and full makeup, including bright coral lipstick. But that was Madison. She never went anywhere, not even to the beach, without spending an hour and a half getting ready.
“I’m good, thanks. Where’s your Gucci purse? And your gold jewelry?” Jane teased.
Madison slid onto the chaise longue next to Jane’s. “Hey, a girl’s gotta look her best, right? You never know when there might be a photographer around. Or a hot guy.” She lowered her massive Dolce & Gabbana sunglasses to stare at a nearby lifeguard with an impressive six-pack. “Like him. Hmm, I call dibs!”
“He’s all yours,” Jane said. After the boy drama she’d been through lately, she really wasn’t interested. She was in Mexico to get away from her disastrous love life and the media circus, not to scope out guys. “Anyway, I thought you said this was a private resort and that photographers couldn’t get in.”
“Yeah, I meant like other guests with cameras,” Madison replied, still staring at the lifeguard. “I’ll see if he has a friend for you. Back in a sec.” She rose to her feet, fluffed her long platinum-blond hair, and struggled through the sand in her heels.
Jane had to laugh. Poor guy has no idea what’s coming.
Jane and Madison had been at Madison’s parents’ condo for the last five days, doing not much besides swimming, tanning, drinking, and checking out guys. Well, Madison had been checking out guys. Jane couldn’t stop thinking about what she had done to her boyfriend (now ex-boyfriend), Jesse, back in L.A., and how she had run away when everything had gone so wrong. A guy was the last thing she needed right now. Unless he had a PhD in psychology, he was of little use.
Jane leaned back and tried to relax. The sun felt so nice, and the sound of the waves in the background should have been calming. But her mind still raced with worries. Her life used to be so normal. A little boring, but wonderfully normal. When she and her best friend, Scarlett Harp, had moved to L.A. from Santa Barbara after high school, it was so Jane could pursue an internship with Fiona Chen, one of the top event planners in the business, and Scarlett could attend USC. They’d hoped to add a little excitement to their lives by meeting new people and experiencing L.A. nightlife. But they’d never planned on meeting Trevor Lord at Les Deux.
Jane still couldn’t believe that out of a roomful of pretty girls Trevor had asked her and Scar to audition for L.A. Candy, the new reality show he was producing for PopTV. And that he’d actually cast them.
As Jane sat there on that beach so far away from everything, she wished she could go back in time to that night in August and say, Thanks, but no, thanks. Although it’s not like she could’ve predicted what was about to happen to her. She and Scar had figured the show would flop but they’d get some fun nights from it. Of course, the show ended up being a hit, and soon after the series premiere in October, Jane found herself unable to walk into a restaurant or down the street without someone recognizing her. Magazines called her “America’s sweetheart.” Blogs called her…well, other things. Her face was everywhere.
At first, her sudden fame was exciting and flattering. Now she was one of the beautiful, glamorous people. She got all the best tables at all the best clubs. Designers sent her clothes to wear, for free. She was invited to a different Hollywood party almost every night, rubbing shoulders with A-list insiders she used to only read about or see on TV.
But all the attention was also confusing. What had she done to deserve it? The L.A. Candy cameras merely filmed her living her life: cooking dinner, doing the laundry, going out with her friends, working as Fiona’s slave-slash-assistant. Everyday stuff. How, exactly, did that make her worthy of celebrity status?
More important, why had it turned her into a tabloid target? That was the reason she was here, attempting to relax on this beach with Madison. Five days ago—was it only five days ago?—Gossip magazine published a story about Jane hooking up with her boyfriend Jesse’s best friend and housemate, Braden. The story didn’t mention that Jane and Jesse had been fighting. No one who read it knew how trashed he’d gotten at Goa or knew about the girl he’d been all over that night. They didn’t know how vulnerable Jane was when Braden, who had been her friend before she met Jesse, came over, and they definitely didn’t know about her long-standing, unspoken crush on him. All they knew was that there were photos of Jane and Braden in little more than their underwear, in her bedroom. A photographer had somehow gotten those shots of them through her window—why, why had she left the curtains open? And what kind of sick person shoots into a girl’s bedroom? Talk about invasion of privacy…and that was coming from someone on a reality show. The photos ended up all over the internet for everyone in the world to see, including Jane’s parents…her little sisters, Lacie and Nora…Trevor…Fiona…and, of course, Jesse.
Jane couldn’t bring herself to face Jesse when the story broke. Actually, she didn’t have the guts to face anyone. So she didn’t. That same day, she let Madison whisk her away to the Parkers’ gorgeous, exclusive condo in Cabo to escape the photographers (who were camped out at Jane’s apartment building) and her phone (which was ringing nonstop). Jane made only one call before departing: to her parents, leaving them a message that she was okay and that she was going away for a few days. Luckily there was no cell reception at the Parkers’ condo. Jane knew there must be hundreds of messages waiting for her: from her parents, Scar, Trevor, Fiona, random reporters, and who knew who else. She also knew there was a very real chance that she would never check her voice mail again.
She squeezed her eyes shut, but it wasn’t to block out the sun.