Laurelin Paige - Take Two

“Oh, a late night?” Ariahn abandoned whatever question she’d just asked and redirected. “That’s right, we were originally scheduled to meet yesterday, but my assistant said you had something come up. Sightseeing, wasn’t it?”

Micah stiffened. He hadn’t mentioned his adventure with Maddie to anyone. He answered cautiously. “Yeah, I did some sightseeing. Figured it was my last chance since the shoot’s almost over.”

“A hot air balloon is certainly the way to see Colorado.”

Shit. Thank God he was wearing sunglasses—hopefully they hid his panic. Who let it leak? It had to be a member of the balloon’s crew. How much had the source said? Had they mentioned Maddie? How could they not mention Maddie? What should he say now?

He took a swallow of his coffee and looked over at the set nearby, hoping it was time for filming to resume. Bruce was still adjusting lights, though. Damn, he wasn’t getting out of this interview yet.

He moved his attention back to Ariahn who was peering at him intently. He cocked his head, deciding to play dumb. “Oh, are you waiting for me to answer? I didn’t realize it was a question.”

“I guess it wasn’t.” Ariahn picked up her bag and rifled through it. “Here’s a question though.” She pulled out several sheets of paper and laid them on the table between them. “Who’s this attractive young woman that Hollywood’s most eligible bachelor has been hanging out with recently?”

Micah felt the blood drain from his face as he examined the papers in front of him. They were low-quality photos, obviously printed off the internet, four of them in total. Three pictures were of him and Maddie getting into the basket of the hot air balloon. One of the crew must have taken them with his phone. How had he not noticed? The fourth was from the Breckenridge Film Festival. That one didn’t surprise him. In fact, none of it surprised him. He knew the press would find out about her eventually. They always did.

Fuck.

He wasn’t ready for this.

Several possible responses whirled through his mind, each with a different set of consequences. A big part of him said he should just claim her as his. Tell Ariahn that Maddie was his girlfriend and deal with the aftermath later.

But he hadn’t talked to Maddie about it and that wouldn’t be fair to her. He needed to have this conversation with her first. Tell her how he felt. Work out with her how they would move forward.

Besides, there would be an inevitable media circus. Once it was out that they were a couple, every decision they made would be under the microscopic eye of his fans and the paparazzi. It would add an incredible amount of strain to their relationship. Maddie’s private life would be destroyed. They’d pounce on her, follow her wherever she went, dig up all of her past, lie about her. Hurt her.

They’d find out about her history with Joss Beaumont. That could harm her chances at a directing career. Hell, it could harm his own career.

Did she even realize that’s what dating him meant? Why hadn’t he talked to her about the press? Prepared her? He was such an idiot, trying to keep their romance in a bubble.

And when her movie came out—and it would eventually, he’d see to it—her brilliance would be overlooked because she was Micah Preston’s girlfriend. People would say that was the only reason she’d gotten her movie picked up before they even saw it.

At that moment, he hated the press more than he ever had. Because they forced him to keep Maddie a secret, whether he wanted to or not.

He processed all of this in a matter of seconds. “Ah, Maddie Bauers. Yeah, she’s on the crew of this show.” He removed his sunglasses and met the reporter’s eyes, hoping to come across sincere. “She’s also a writer/director and we’ve been talking about working on a project together.”

Ariahn looked skeptical. “In a hot air balloon?”

“Only place I’m not followed by paparazzi.” Yeah, it was vague, but it was also charming.

“Yes, the paparazzi.” Ariahn smirked. “Oh, I forgot—I have one more.” She uncovered another sheet of paper she had tucked under the others. This one was taken in the lobby of the Buell. He and Maddie were lip-locked in one of the most heart-searing kisses of his lifetime. The usher. It had to be.

Goddammit. Why did everyone have to have camera phones nowadays?

Though he liked the look of them together like that.

This one was the hardest to deny. This one almost made him ignore all the reasonable arguments and claim Maddie as his right then and there.

Almost.

“This looks like more than a meeting about a project,” Ariahn prodded.

He swallowed his surprise, his frustration, his desire to come clean about the woman he adored and improvised. “All right, Ariahn, you caught me. I made a pass. Hot girl at a hot party? I’ve been known to do that.”

Ariahn raised an eyebrow. “Let me put it this way: Micah, are you off the market?”

“Come on, am I ever off the market?” He added a wink. Time to bring out flirtatious Micah.

It worked. She smiled coyly in return. “So you’re still Hollywood’s most eligible bachelor?”

“Definitely.” He leaned back in his seat, putting on a relaxed air contrary to the uneasiness he felt at dismissing his relationship with Maddie. “Without a doubt. Free and single as ever. In fact, I’d ask you if you were busy later, but I see you’re wearing an engagement ring.”

“Hey, you got that hard drive for Beaumont?” Joe’s voice drew Micah to peer behind him to see who he was addressing.

His heart stopped.

Maddie.

She was standing right behind him, clearly in earshot, hard drive in hand as Joe approached her from the set. Micah didn’t have to wonder if she had overheard his interview. Her face said that she had heard every word.

And that every word hurt.

Fuck.

But this shouldn’t matter, he told himself. They’d agreed no media. A shift had occurred between them, he couldn’t deny that, but they hadn’t said they were ready for this. He would remind her of that. He’d tell her how he felt about her and that would make up for this. It had to.

Except the pain in her eyes said that nothing could make up for this.

Maddie didn’t speak, but she turned and waved the hard drive at Joe.

“Cool,” Joe said. “I’ll tell him you’re on your way.”

Micah almost rose to follow as she left briskly toward video village. He almost called after her.

But he couldn’t. Not without negating everything he’d just told Ariahn Jessler. Not without inviting chaos into their relationship.

No, he had to sit and watch her walk away, hoping he wasn’t watching her walk out of his life forever.

Maddie’s eyes welled, an infuriating inconvenience since she was only steps away from video village. Dammit. She couldn’t let Beaumont see her cry. She blinked, clearing her tears.

She hadn’t meant to eavesdrop on Micah and his interview, hadn’t even really been interested in it. Beaumont had summoned her to bring him the footage from that morning—a job that should have been relegated to a P.A. or one of Adam’s other assistants. So she shouldn’t have even been walking past Micah in the first place. And then she’d heard her name. How could she not be intrigued?

“So you’re still Hollywood’s most eligible bachelor?”

“Definitely.”

The words stung more than she could have imagined. And then he’d flirted with the journalist…

Dammit all to hell. She was definitely hurt, but more than that she was embarrassed. What had she expected? Did she think that he’d proclaim his love for her in some entertainment magazine when he hadn’t even said the words to her? Stupid, stupid, stupid.

And okay, she shouldn’t care what he said to the press. She knew it was all fake.

The problem was she did care. Fake or not, she couldn’t stand it. Maybe if he’d given her some indication of what he really felt for her she could deal with whatever lies he told others. But since he hadn’t, the words he’d told the reporter were the only ones he had to cling to.

“There’s Maddie,” Sam said as she reached video village. Beaumont had been antsy waiting, she could tell.

“Here I am.” She was surprised at how controlled her voice sounded. Inside she was reeling. Shake it off. “If you scoot over, I’ll load it.”

An assistant sitting in front of the main monitor relinquished his seat. Maddie slid into the chair and connected the hard drive into the USB slot of the computer. Micah’s words rang in her ears as she pulled up the contents of the drive. “Without a doubt. Free and single as ever.”

She shook her head and redirected her focus to her job. She dragged the folder to the computer’s desktop and a warning box came up. The file already exists do you want to replace the existing file? Maddie paused. There shouldn’t be a file with the same name. She squinted at the file’s title. It should have said which scene they had filmed that morning, but it didn’t. The file name still said the date and scene from the previous shoot. The second assistant must have forgotten to change it.

What scene had they shot that morning? She closed her eyes, trying to clear her head. “Free and single as ever.”

“Get outta the way.” Beaumont pushed her out of her chair. “You’re taking too long.”

Numbly, Maddie stepped aside. She watched as Beaumont grabbed for the mouse in front of him. “Wait,” she said. Scene fourteen. That was the scene they’d filmed. Beaumont needed to change the name to say Scene Fourteen. “You need to save as—”

But Beaumont had already clicked.

Panic coursed through her veins. “What did you just do?”

“I saved the file.”

“But it had the wrong name! You just saved it over the last footage!” Hoping she was mistaken, she leaned over the director and grabbed the mouse from his hands. She clicked open the file on the desktop with the previous scene’s date and watched in horror as that morning’s footage played. “No, no, no.” She scrolled through more of the files. All of the footage from the last shoot was lost. “It’s gone. Scene twenty-four is all gone.”

Beaumont furrowed his brow. “What do you mean it’s gone?”

Maddie’s words came soft and measured. “You just clicked ‘yes’ to replace the file and it had the same name as the other day’s shoot.” A lost scene was a disaster. They would have to hold actors over, adjust the shoot schedule. And they were already behind schedule.

“Fuck!” The director stood abruptly, knocking his chair over in the process. “Is this some kind of sick joke?”

“No. I wouldn’t do that.”

Beaumont’s face reddened. He swept his arm across the table in front of him, throwing a stack of papers and clipboards to the ground. “Fuck.” He turned to Maddie. “How the fuck could you make that kind of a mistake?”

Maddie usually kept her cool, no matter what her boss threw at her, but she’d reached the end of her emotional rope. “I was the one who was fixing it when you pushed me out of my chair. If you hadn’t been so goddamned anxious and just let me do my job—”

Beaumont screamed so loud that Maddie wouldn’t have been surprised if they could hear him on set. “It shouldn’t have had the same name in the first place. You are incompetent, unprofessional, and completely out of your league. I should never have agreed to let Adam bring you on.”

“No, I should never have agreed to come on.” Out of the corner of her eye, Maddie saw Sam take a step toward her, trying to stop her. She ignored him. “You’ve been an arrogant bastard since you fucked me over years ago. My coming here saved your ass.”

Beaumont laughed. “Add cocky to the list. Assistants like you are a dime a dozen. Do you even realize how much your mistake is going to cost?”

“I don’t know how much your mistake is going to cost. And frankly, I don’t give a shit. You deserve it.”

His eyes narrowed. “Get your things, Bauer. You’re fired.”

Maddie took her tape measure off her belt loop and threw it at Beaumont’s feet. “Fuck that. I quit.”

She’d never been so angry in her life. Accused of making his mistake? She didn’t have to take that shit. She stormed off, high-tailing it to the trailer where the crew kept their personal items.

“Maddie,” Sam called after her.

Sam was the last person she wanted to deal with. Well, maybe not the last person. She didn’t want to deal with anyone.