Fame Game 03: Infamous by Lauren Conrad Page B

a stalker, the security team was costing the production a pretty penny.
    He sighed. It was also inconvenient. The camera crew was used to shooting around Kate’s absurd mess, but how were they also going to avoid the burly guys hired to hang around her apartment to protect her?
    If Trevor hadn’t sent Kate back to Ohio mere months ago, he would have certainly done it again. He drummed his fingers on the desk, imagining it. Maybe he’d send Carmen with her, so the two of them could play out their best-frenemy drama on a different stage. He laughed, imagining Carmen’s reaction to a flat landscape of soybean fields and strip malls, where the best restaurant around was a tie between Chili’s and the Olive Garden. . . .
    It was unfortunate he couldn’t make everything he wanted happen. But all in all, Trevor Lord knew he wasn’t doing too badly, and he had the fat year-end bonus and a new Lamborghini to prove it.
    And every week, as reliable as his delivery of Variety , Trevor was sure to open a tabloid and see an item on one or more of his girls. If that wasn’t winning the Fame Game, then he didn’t know what was.

13
    A REGULAR CUPID
    Carmen was supposed to meet Laurel at her favorite nail salon on Beverly Boulevard, but at the last minute Laurel changed her mind; apparently she’d seen something about flesh-eating bacteria and manicures and was feeling very anti-salon.
    So they rendezvoused at a new boutique on 3rd Street instead, and as Carmen flipped through a rack of fluttery tunics and skinny jeans, Laurel slipped her feet in and out of various pairs of pumps, mules, and ankle boots.
    “Do you remember Anna Baker from high school?” Laurel asked as she admired a pair of Proenza Schouler booties. “She got a DUI last night after sideswiping a cop car in an In-N-Out Burger parking lot.”
    “Ouch,” Carmen said. Anna Baker had been a senior when Carmen was a freshman. She was one of the popular girls: By seventeen she’d already starred in two dumb but profitable teen rom-coms. “Was that on TMZ?”
    “Actually her mom ran into mine at yoga in Brentwood,” Laurel said. “TMZ’s got nothing on the maternal grapevine.”
    “Too bad my mom’s not part of that. She actually gets her gossip from blogs, so she’s wrong half the time. But that sucks for Anna—though it seems like everyone has a DUI these days,” Carmen noted.
    “Yeah—if you weren’t already in the tabloids so much, I’d suggest you get one for the sake of the publicity.”
    “My dad would kill me,” Carmen said, holding up a butter-yellow smocklike garment. “He’s still not over Tanktopgate.” The color was lovely, she thought—it reminded her of spring sunshine. “What do you think of this?”
    Laurel shook her head firmly. “Uh-uh. Looks like an apron a kindergarten teacher would wear so she doesn’t get finger paint on her clothes.”
    Carmen put it back on the rack. Okay, so the yellow smock was a miss. She selected another shirt, held it up, and got another no from Laurel. Her third shirt pick prompted Laurel to make a gagging face.
    “Girl, do you need eyeglasses?” Laurel asked.
    Carmen felt herself blushing. This was bad . She hadn’t shopped in ages, ever since her parents cut her ties to the family bank account. (She’d even returned those beautiful boots she’d bought with Fawn and Lily.) Was shopping like spinning class—you had to keep doing it or else you lost your edge? Or was it possible she’d lost her sense of taste? No. Not possible. She must be overtired.
    “Here,” Laurel said, handing Carmen a sleek dress of copper-colored silk. “Try this one on. It’ll bring out your eyes.”
    Carmen did as she was told. She could see Laurel’s feet under the dressing-room door, pacing back and forth. She wondered if she should hire a stylist to go with her new publicist. (She’d shared Sam at Beckwith Associates with her mother for years—but when she and Cassandra had their fight, Carmen hired