California Girl Chronicles - Brea's Big Scandal

This the third book in the California Girl Chronicles series. Brea's Big Scandal is coming soon.

Chapter 1

Book 3 Leaves off From Book 2

            My name is Brea Harper, and if you read my last two books then you know I am chronically challenged when it comes to men and relationships. Yes, I came to Hollywood to break in as a screenwriter only to be distracted by hot men. Sigh, it’s hard being single in La La Land – home of the beautiful yet often crazy people. Am I crazy? Some might think misguided and creatively wacky, but not certifiable. Although on any given day my sanity might actually be debatable among my many past lovers and even a few friends. I’m okay with it, though. You have to really know me to love me. Just as a reminder if you’re coming into this book first, I am tall, blonde, blue-eyed and a very tasteful dresser. I arrived in Hollywood when I was fresh out of college, having followed my college boyfriend Lance. Just a side note for all women: if you’re going to follow your dream don’t follow boyfriends around … just saying. Lance later on got sick, if you’ll remember from book two, but he eventually recovered and went back north to Sacramento to join the California Department of Transporation (CalTrans) as an engineer. We still talk once in a while and last I heard he got engaged to a dog trainer named Lydia. He often complains their house smells like dog. Poor Lance, dog odor isn’t the most pleasant.

            Now you’re probably wondering, what happened to me and Kale and the whole screenwriting scandal? Well, I decided they were all assholes and quit all of the projects. I know, I know. How many producers are going to get behind a virtually unknown screenwriter? Well, I was so hurt and frustrated with Kale for selling me out. I kind of lost my brain cells in the whole mess. I went on what they call in Australia “walk-about” and left Los Angeles to spend a year working on a newspaper in Monterey. I found this cute, little apartment a block away from the ocean. I decorated it with the sweetest wicker furniture and (get this) I started painting in watercolors. Yes, me a painter. I swore off men, too … well, sort of … well, not really. Are you laughing? Who me? Swear off men completely – that’s just completely impossible for little, ole me. I like men too much.

            What happened I met this graphic artist named Frederic Stanton. He was the designer on the Saturday magazine Monterey by the Sea. Frederic had the most beautiful dark hair and chocolate brown eyes. He was perfectly built and wore wire-rimmed, silver glasses. He used to look up from the computer with those soulful, doe-like eyes and just melt my panties right off. One day when we had to stay late on a deadline we ended up doing it under his desk. Problem is, Frederic got all obsessed with me and then I got promoted to publisher of the magazine, and affairs with employees could be construed as sexual harassment. I had to give up my doe-eyed underling in favor of prestigious position and a huge pay raise.

Frederic didn’t take it well. He kept making salacious comments about my skirts being too short and my tops too low cut. Then one day, he sent me an email with his lurid comments about my breasts. Well, he couldn’t have been anymore stupid. He put his thoughts into writing. One “forward” to human resources and Frederic found himself kindly asked to leave. I remember reading the e-mail and thinking how crazy and stupid it was to sexually harass your “boss” – and put it in writing no less. It made it super easy, though. No “he said, she said” involved. It was straight up “he said” and “he got fired” for it. Although I kind of missed those doe eyes … oh well…

So while I was becoming a publishing “goddess” I also wrote a new screenplay. I called Body in the Trunk, and it was a murder-mystery-thriller. I wrote it as a spec script, which means I would sell it to the highest bidder. It’s always better to be hired to write an actual script and get paid, but my once flourishing screenwriting careered tanked right along with my love affair with Kale. Are you wondering do I miss Kale? You know, my blonde, green-eyed, very tall Adonis to whom I was engaged to marry for all of two minutes? Well, more like two seconds… Oh, I miss him all right. I thought for months I wouldn’t be able to shake my thoughts about him. I woke up every day for months and months with my first thoughts being of Kale. At one point I felt desperate to rid my memories of him much like that movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I would have happily paid my savings to banish thoughts of Kale into the abyss. So, yes I miss him without question. Time though is the great equalizer. The longer I lived in Monterey and didn’t speak to him anymore, the easier it got.

So I wrote this script hoping to reignite my screenwriting career. I worked on it every night after work. No, I didn’t set up shop at the local Starbuck’s like all of those other writer-want-to-be’s. Doesn’t that drive you nuts? These pretentious writers who think a café and a laptop make them look officially published. I laugh at them. They always seem to be the same people. And they always spend more time chitchatting about some other greater writers’ works and not typing much. I’ve seen them mostly surfing the Internet and looking at porn. Do naked girls inspire writers? Oh, sorry I digress… So I wrote in my apartment – alone.

It was hard coming to a strange city without any friends. Once I got hired though I met this great advertising executive named Beach Sands. Yes, I know. A cruel joke from her granola-eating, Vegan parents Tony and Lola Sands. Beach was gorgeous. She had long, curly red hair, sharp, sparkling green eyes, and a curvy figure to be admired. She had an outrageously loud laugh, and she turned heads wherever she went. She had a wicked sense of humor, too. Her name had been the brunt of so many jokes, she just turned it on people.

“What’s your name?”

“Beach Sands.”

“As in ocean and…?” most would ask with a frown.

“Yes. My life really is a beach,” she would smirk.

She handled it that way. I always stood back and smiled. She played it up too and wore all sorts of T-shirts from famous beaches. She would even use a Sharpe and cross out the beach name and add her last name. She said it was the easiest way to get a shirt with her name on it. Since I never thought having a shirt with one’s name on it mattered, I took it as her rebellious need to make fun of her name.

Beach though could talk anybody into anything. I swear that girl was amazing. She sold an ad for snow equipment in a beachside magazine. The nearest snow was like 100 miles away, and most people around Monterey were more interested in beach attire or the best seafood restaurants than snow equipment. The owner of the store though, a Reed Becket had a huge crush on Beach. I mean, who didn’t? She could give a guy a look at a wink and slay them. Reed ended up investing almost $50,000 in advertisements for snowmobiles in a seaside magazine. He was crazy. Let me amend that statement. He was crazy in love with Beach, and Beach shamelessly exploited him.

“Don’t you feel bad?” I asked as I leaned on her office door.

“About what?” she asked with an expressionless innocence.

“You know, come on…”

Beach grinned and leaned back in her black leather chair. She put her purple leather high heels up on her desk. “Like my shoes?” she asked with a sweet smile.

I stepped forward and gazed at the gorgeous purple shoes. “Yeah, those are nice.”

“People like Reed pay for them,” she winked.

“And you’re okay with it?”

“With what?”

“Oh come on!” I laughed.

“I’m okay with it, and you should be too. It pays your salary Miss Publisher.”

“It’s so … opportunist,” I complained.

“Brea, you know what your problem is?”

“I have a problem?” I frowned.

“Yes, you’re much too concerned with conventional ideas.”

“Me,” I laughed. “Really?”

“A man wants to pay to put ads in a magazine because he likes me doesn’t make me the bad person. I didn’t force him; he did it on his own. And yes, I’m reaping the benefits as are you may I remind you, but no harm or foul.”

“I’m not conventional,” I huffed.

Beach started chuckling. “You’re more conventional than you think.”

“Hey, you didn’t know me when I was a star screenwriter dating hot guys.”

Beach rolled her eyes. “So, how’s the screenplay going?”

“It’s going. Hey, do you want to go the club on Friday night?”

“Sure,” she smiled sweetly. “Text me later.”

“Okay,” I replied.

I left the office thinking about the question of being conventional. Was I conventional? I looked down at my low-cut white blouse and black, pencil thin skirt. I suddenly realized I looked like a waitress at a restaurant or even a hostess. What happened to my whip-smart fashion sense? I walked into my office and looked around. It was shaped like a perfect box with a huge floor-to-ceiling picture window that jutted out and had been held up with piers over the crashing ocean below. If I strained I could hear the crashing waves, which I loved. I often open the windows just to hear it. My desk was circular, black and pristine. I had my Apple computer in one corner with the keyboard in front of it. All of my files were put away and only a single calendar sat in the middle. The office was completely wireless. Smart phones replaced landlines, and a wireless intercom system paged anyone when required. My office was bare otherwise with only a single painting of a bouquet or red roses I had painted sometime ago on the far wall. My mind wandered back to the idea of convention.

Ugh! I thought. Me! Conventional? When did that happen?

I sighed and sat down in my cushy leather chair. Beach was right. I couldn’t stand such a thought and decided right there and then to get my wild life back on track.

“Conventional!” I huffed to myself one more time. “We’ll see about that!”