Laurelin Paige - Take Two

Her phone buzzed Bree’s incoming text before Maddie could return the slider. And make you cry.

Maddie’s scowl deepened. Was she really so fragile that she couldn’t sleep with a guy and not have it mean anything? She didn’t have to be. She could sleep with him and not become a weeping willow. Sleep with him and not be affected.

Rephrase that, sleep with him and only be physically affected. An important distinction as she liked the delicious effect he had on her body.

“We’re ready to shoot,” Joe said, interrupting Maddie’s thoughts of her and Micah rolling around in the grassy meadow in front of them, sans clothes. “Places!”

Maddie cleared her head of the ridiculous fantasy she shouldn’t be having in the first place and started toward the camera, toward Micah. She squatted on the dolly at the side of the Adam. “Sound rolling,” Chloe, the sound technician, called from her cart.

Sam stepped in front of the camera and read the clapboard. “Scene twenty-two, take one.”

Adam shifted as he adjusted the camera. Maddie rolled with the dolly as the second assistant moved them along the track, circling into the scene.

Micah began his lines, the very lines Maddie had read with him. As she watched him surrender to his performance, her body tingled. Not just in the usual physically turned-on way, but in the artistically turned-on way. He was really a good actor. She hadn’t paid attention before, trying her best not to notice him on the days since she’d arrived in Colorado. But now she saw it, saw how his whole body took on his character, his voice and movement changing into a persona very different from the man she had swapped spit with less than thirty minutes before. Yet at the same time, he was Micah Preston, more exposed and unveiled than she’d ever seen him.

Holy crap, she was gaga over him.

She let the realization settle as she followed the camera, adjusting the focus at the appropriate times.

Until Micah began walking toward Heather, and Maddie’s chest began throbbing.

Painfully throbbing.

She knew what came next—the kiss—and she didn’t want to see any more, didn’t want to watch Micah’s mouth possess another woman’s. But she had to watch, it was her job. So she did, the ache increasing with each passing second. By the time Micah wrapped his arms around Heather and leaned in for the kiss, the stab of jealousy was so tight Maddie wondered if she was having a heart attack.

Impulsively, Maddie closed her eyes, blocking out the action before her.

“Cut,” Joe called out and Maddie’s eyes flew open, realizing he’d ended before the scene was finished.

Shit. She’d missed her final focus. Shit, shit, shit. She peered up at Adam who was listening to Beaumont on his own headset. He looked down at Maddie questioningly.

“I missed it,” Maddie said softly. This wasn’t like her. She never missed.

“Adam, Maddie?” Joe asked. “What was with that last focus?”

“Miscalculation,” Adam said, not pointing out Maddie’s error in front of everyone. “We got it now. Sorry.”

“Let’s take it again.” Joe’s irritation sounded in his voice. “Reset.”

Dammit, Maddie thought as she helped the second assistant roll the camera dolly back to its starting position on the track. This, this was why she couldn’t get mixed up with Micah Preston. She couldn’t even watch him act a scene with a fellow cast member without being overcome with jealousy. Without screwing up her job—a job that she was usually perfect at. Surely if anything more happened with him, this feeling would only get worse. Right now it was already horrible. Achingly, maddeningly, horrible.

Maddie avoided Micah’s eyes as his makeup artist came in to retouch his lips. She took the free moment to pull out her phone and type a final text to Bree. I’m not gonna jump him.

4 the best. Luvs!

Was it for the best? She thought she’d feel better but her decision seemed hollow. She swallowed hard, stealing herself for the second take of the scene.

“Wait,” Joe said, his right hand lifted in a halting gesture. With his other hand, he pressed his headset tighter against his ear, listening to an order from Beaumont. After a minute, he pointed to Micah. “Micah, Beaumont wants to move your initial mark to here.” Joe tapped a spot on the ground with his toe. “Bruce, the light isn’t hitting the new mark. Can you arm it in, please?”

A lighting adjustment and a change in blocking. She’d have to refocus too.

She took a deep breath as crossed to the mega-fine actor, blushing as she remembered the last time she’d calculated a focus for him.

“Hey,” Micah said.

“Hey.” She didn’t meet his eyes, didn’t ask him to hold her measure, but instead put it on the ground at his feet. She felt rather than saw him pick up the end. “Thanks,” she muttered. She walked the steps back to the camera and wrote down the new measurements, then pushed the button to pull the length in, but it didn’t budge. She glanced back at Micah who still held tightly to the end. Seriously?

She trudged back to him. “Can I have it back, please?”

He crossed his arms, burying the edge against his chest. “Will you talk to me?”

Heather broke into a laugh a few feet away, pulling Maddie’s attention. Her eyes narrowed as she glared at the actress flirting with Joe, still bristling from having just watched Heather make out with her man. Whoops. Not her man. Definitely not her man.

Micah studied Maddie. “What’s with you and Heather? That look could shoot daggers.”

She bent her head, hoping to hide her irrational envy. “Nothing. Can I have my measure?”

“No, that wasn’t a nothing look. That was most certainly something.” He pursed his lips. “Hmm. Anger? No. Jealousy.”

Her cheeks went warm. “My measure, please.”

“Maddie, you’re blushing. You are jealous.” He peered over at Heather and the crew. “You can’t be into any of those guys. At least, I hope not, because you’re way out of their league. Is it…” His face broke into an electric smile. “Are you jealous of her and me?”

She burned with irritation. “Oh my God, you’re so full of yourself.” It was true, but that he thought it was true was downright narcissistic.

“I’m right.” He uncrossed his arms and stroked her chin, the end of the measure held tightly in his other hand. Goose bumps rose on her arms as his finger moved across her skin. “No need to be jealous, Maddie. That was acting. Not like our kiss.”

She couldn’t help herself. She moved her eyes to his crotch where his hard-on was evident. “Looked like it had the same effect.” She meant to insult him with her words, but after she said them she realized she’d just confirmed his accusation. Man, she was so much better with dialogue when she had a chance to write and rewrite. Spitting it out in real time was incredibly more challenging.

Micah chuckled. “You’re adorable when you’re jealous. And this”—he removed his hand from her face and waved it over his pelvis—“is still from you, baby.”

Her insides twisted at his endearment. “I can’t believe I blue-balled you again,” she muttered, mostly to herself.

“Again? Oh, yeah. That night…” His brow rose. “Now if you’re interested in paying me back…” His eyes glimmered with his tease.

They stared at each other for several heated seconds. Then he let go of the end of the measure. It snapped back into the metal compact Maddie held in her hand, but her eyes never left his.

Softly, he said, “Talk to me?”

She clipped the measure on her belt and chewed on her chapped lip, dry from the Colorado environment and the intense assault it had undergone earlier. She did owe him for leaving him unfulfilled the night they met. Of course she wasn’t expected to pay him back, but that evening with him…she’d had a really good time. She’d let loose in a way she never did, and though she couldn’t get involved with Micah Preston, she did appreciate the bold, sexy girl he elicited from her back then.

Maybe she could relive it just once more and return the favor at the same time. It might prompt him to leave her alone. An idea formed.

“Okay.” She couldn’t believe she was doing this—should she actually be doing this? “A bunch of the crew is going to the bar next to our hotel after wrap tonight. You’re welcome to join. Maybe we can talk there?”

“I’d like that.” He moved his mouth near her ear, his breath on her skin raising all the hairs on her arms. “Don’t be jealous,” he whispered. “If it’s convincing, it’s because I’m thinking of you.”

Her pulse sped up.

“Places!” Joe called.

Maddie started toward the camera, surprised that his words had relaxed her. Not enough to make him and her a possibility, but enough to get through the workday. “Just remember, Micah,” she said over her shoulder. “Paybacks are a bitch.”

She ignored his puzzled look as she rubbed ChapStick over her lips, smacking them deliberately for his benefit. Tonight, he’d understand. Tonight, she was paying back what she owed.

Micah vacillated about what time he should arrive at the bar. He didn’t want to seem too eager, and he knew the crew had at another hour of clean up after he was dismissed from the set at nine.

He decided to shoot for eleven, filling his time with a light dinner in his room while he ran lines, followed by a shower to scrub his makeup and the lingering scent of Heather Wainwright from his body. Not that Heather was unappealing. They had good chemistry, having hooked up a few times over the years. Now Heather almost seemed repulsive after he’d had the sweet taste of Maddie in his mouth.

Ah, Maddie Bauers. Thoughts of her roused his cock. He mentally repeated her name over and over while he took care of his hard-on in the shower, recalling her fingers in his hair and her firm breasts pressed against his chest.

Jesus, this woman had a hold on him. And, if he played his cards right, he hoped to have a hold of her too, preferably naked. Perhaps even later that night.

After he’d finished cleaning up, Micah dressed in tight dark jeans, a white T-shirt and a thin gray mid-sleeved button-down shirt. He met Fudge in the lobby and they hailed a cab to the Golden Well, the bar next to the crew’s hotel.

The Golden Well was brightly lit and crowded. Micah stood with his bodyguard near the door while he scanned the room, hoping not to be spotted by any fans. He preferred dimly lit restaurants and exclusive night clubs, and he felt awkward and exposed, but his resolve to see Maddie was not diminished.

Fudge seemed to share his displaced feelings. “Why are we here again? You never hang with the crew.”

“I should try something different.” He hated the way Fudge’s words made him sound snobby. Really, it was the nature of the business—different call times and jobs on set—that created different social circles for production crew and actors.

Fudge shook his head. “It’s her, isn’t it?”

“No. Not at all. Who?”

“Fuck, Micah. Just bang her and get it over with.”

Micah frowned. “I’m not going to bang her. God, don’t be so crude.” Banging implied hard and fast, and though Micah imagined some of that with Maddie, he was also counting on long and slow.

“You’re pathetic.”

Micah turned his attention back to the crowd. “You don’t have to be here. I gave you the night off.”

“What else am I going to do?”

Micah spotted the back of a brunette head—hair pulled into a neat, high ponytail, and knew it was Maddie. His breath caught as she turned to—what? Look for him?—and their eyes met. She was so beautiful. He could stare at her face for hours.

“Isn’t that the A.D. over there?” Fudge didn’t realize Micah had already seen them .

There were a dozen or so people sitting with Maddie, but Micah didn’t register any of their faces. “Yeah, it’s her. Them.”

He moved toward where she sat in the back of the bar as if pulled by a string. He vaguely sensed the recognition of a couple of people as he passed their table, heard the hushed whispers that often accompanied his outings. “Isn’t that the guy in that superhero movie?” “Isn’t that Micah Preston?” But he ignored them, his full attention on the lovely woman in front of him.

As he got closer, she smiled, and Micah’s dick twitched. He couldn’t remember the last time a girl turned him on so easily.

“Well, look who’s here,” Joe said, not hiding his surprise.