Paradise Read Online Free Page B

with a twenty-seven-year-old beauty can have sex three times in one day.’
    ‘Hah, I doubt it!’ Angel teased, but when Ethan kissed her and she pressed her body against his, she thought he was probably on to something.

Chapter 2
    ‘ SO WHAT SHALL we do today?’ Jez asked after he’d finally emerged from his bedroom the following morning, his highlighted blond hair carefully teased into spikes. Ethan had already left for training and Gemma and Angel were sitting by the pool, while Honey, ever the water baby, splashed in the water.
    ‘Your favourite thing Jez – retail! We can get a car to Rodeo Drive, have lunch at The Ivy, and in the evening Ethan is going to take us to Hyde – that really cool club.’
    Angel was expecting Jez to be thrilled by the prospect of shopping and clubbing; instead he looked torn. ‘I promised Rufus I wouldn’t buy any clothes – like I said last night, things are a bit tight at the moment. He’s got me on a budget and I had to cut up my credit cards.’ Jez said the word ‘budget’ as if it was the dirtiest, nastiest thing in the world.
    ‘You don’t have to spend any money . . . I want to give you this.’ And Angel handed an envelope bulging with cash to each of her friends. She beamed, waiting for their reaction.
    ‘But there’s a thousand dollars here!’ Gemma exclaimed as she opened the envelope and flipped through the notes, ‘That is way too much.’
    ‘Too too much,’ Jez agreed. ‘We can’t take your money, Angel.’
    ‘I want you to have it,’ she urged them. ‘Buy yourselves something gorgeous.’ She wasn’t trying to be flash – she genuinely wanted to treat her friends. Money meant nothing if you couldn’t share it with the people you loved.
    Jez and Gemma hesitated some more before finally giving in when Angel told them to think of it as an early Christmas present. And then they were ready to hit the stores. Lucy, the nanny, took Honey off to a toddlers’ art club and so it was just the three friends in the back of the chauffeur-driven Chrysler, laughing and gossiping.
    They went into Prada and Jez bought a shirt for himself and one for Rufus. They browsed in Armani, Gucci and Valentino. In Dior Gemma bought herself some stylish black-framed sunglasses, taking nearly forty minutes to make her selection which almost drove Angel and Jez crazy, and Angel ended up buying two bikinis that she didn’t need, just for something to do. But that was Gemma: always wanting to make sure she spent the money well, and that she’d bought an ‘investment piece’, as she called it. Then it was off to The Ivy for lunch and celeb-spotting.
    One of the things Angel loved about LA was that she didn’t get noticed much, or if she did people were so used to seeing stars they weren’t fazed. It wasn’t like the UK where the paps followed her every move. The press attention had been intense when she’d first moved over because her leaving Cal had been such a big story, but lately it had become more relaxed and she much preferred it that way. She was not the kind of celebrity who needed to see a story about herself in the paper to feel important, that her life had meaning.
    Jez was in his element at the up market restaurant as they sat at a table on the patio with the white picket fence that he had seen in many a celeb mag. ‘Thatpicket fence is so iconic! It’s like the Hollywood sign,’ he exclaimed, then added, ‘Paris Hilton, two o’clock,’ out of the corner of his mouth. ‘Christina Aguilera, three o’clock.’ He was so excited he could barely eat the lobster ravioli he’d ordered. It was sweet seeing her friend so thrilled.
    Gemma, of course, was more cool and restrained, but even she looked excited when she thought she spotted Zac Efron. ‘He’s so cute!’ she enthused. ‘Do you think it would count as being unfaithful if I offered him a no-strings-attached shag?’ she said cheekily. ‘Tony wouldn’t mind, would he?’
    ‘Well, there’s just