by Leslie North
But then there was the "romance."
She tapped the papers one more time and then gave up and gnawed on her index finger. She wondered if Arthur had received the same timeline she had. Their romance had specific marks to hit: flirtation, first kiss, first fight, first…other things…that were timed to give a little "bump," as Adele had explained it, to the planning scenes. "Nothing serious," Adele had warned in her email introducing it all. "But enough to give good tension. Yes?"
"Yes?" Cassandra repeated faintly to the empty room, then put her hand on her still-flat belly. Yeah. Nothing serious. At all.
The clock jumped forward another minute. Cassandra sighed. He was officially late now. Why was she not surprised? She could just imagine the smirk on his face as he waltzed in here, completely unbothered by the fact that he'd kept her waiting. He'd be all rumpled hair and dangerous tattoos, looking at her with that look that said he knew what she looked like naked.
Even before he knew what she looked like naked.
Cassandra sat up straighter and squirmed, trying to push away the thoughts of Arthur's eyes, Arthur's abs, Arthur's…cooking. "Dammit," she whispered.
Right as the door swung open.
She blinked and recovered quickly, trying for a smile and then realizing just how fake it must look and giving up halfway. "Hi," she said.
Arthur strode into the conference room with no trace of a smirk on his face. And no trace of sex in his eyes, either. Cassandra wasn't sure if she was relieved or sad to see that his expression was all business as he yanked a chair out and folded his long body into it. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table and fixed her with a look that should have made her dissolve into a squeaking puddle of lust.
But there was no time for that. "I said, ‘hi,’" she told him.
"Yeah. Hey." He was still looking at her as if she was a book written in a language he didn't understand. "Where you been?"
She waved her hand to take in the Taste Network offices. "Here, mainly." She narrowed her eyes. "Just like you, apparently."
"You sound surprised."
Cassandra swallowed. In all honesty, she was surprised. She'd been surprised from the very start that Arthur McClellan had been pursuing a deal with Taste, too. The bad boy chef who'd spoon fed her fruits and stolen her champagne hadn't exactly struck her as business minded. He'd struck her as pretty dirty minded, though.
To her horror, she felt heat rising to her cheeks and tossed her head to buy time. "I was surprised the network decided to pair us," she covered.
"That wasn't what you had in mind?"
"Doubt it was what you had in mind either," she shot back.
Arthur leaned back and laced his fingers on top of his head. Cassandra deliberately avoided looking at the way the position made his biceps pop. "It wasn't," he said flatly, but in a way that somehow didn’t sound insulting. "But we’re both using this as a jumping off point to bigger and better things, right?" Cassandra blinked and tried to hide yet another surprised reaction, but the quirk of Arthur's mouth told her she hadn't hidden it well enough. "Yeah. I want my own show. I don't see why you should be surprised. You want the same thing I do. So, the way I figure it, the way we both get what we want is by giving them what they want. Really sell the hell out of this relationship angle they're pushing."
"Sell it how?" She felt a clutching deep in her core.
He shook his head and chuckled. "You can stop blushing like a schoolgirl now."
"I'm not."
"Fine. You're not. I'm not going to make it awkward, Cassandra. And I'm also not going to push you to do anything you're not comfortable with." His voice dropped lower. "I hope you already knew that about me."
She swallowed and nodded her silent agreement. He hadn't pushed her to do anything she didn't want. It was true.
"So, tell me your limits. Right now."
"My limits?"
He tilted his head knowingly. "I mean, you seem to enjoy it when I…" he gestured below the waist, and she flushed hot. "But I don't think that's on the table again." He grinned wider. "Heh. On the table…"
"Arthur! Sssh!" Cassandra looked around wildly.
"No one is listening, doll." His grin fell. "Look, we have a past. We can't change that. But I don't want to cross the line with you."
Cassandra clenched her fists and then deliberately unballed them and spread her hands flat on the table. It was now or never. "We have a past, yes. But I think the line has already been crossed." She looked him in the eye. "Because there were two of them on the pregnancy test, I took yesterday."
Arthur waited for Cassandra to finish her sentence. Because clearly there was more to say. Like, "Ha ha! Just kidding," or, "And the father of this baby will want to come to the Bahamas, too," or anything, really. But she just looked him dead on with those big blue eyes. There was no lie, no bullshit, nothing but quietly, patiently waiting for his brain to register the bomb she'd just dropped in his lap.
"We…" A thousand emotions warred in his chest. The first to rise was anger. An irrational, table-throwing rage that blazed up hotter than wildfire in his veins. He slammed his fist down on the table, making Cassandra stiffen, then narrow her eyes.
Shit.
"Sorry." He looked away from her rather than see the look in her eyes. He knew that look. It was one that wondered what the hell else she'd expect from a piece of shit like Arthur McClellan. He clenched his fist, desperately trying to stuff his anger back down again. It wasn't her fault. It was his for not being more damn careful.
Hot on the heels of the anger came the shame at being angry. He turned back to Cassandra and attempted a smile.
She abruptly jumped to her feet. With eyes blazing, she glared at him until Arthur felt something inside of him collapse under the weight of her contempt. "Look, Cassandra, that was a shitty way for me to react." He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand and wished—not for the first time—that time travel existed so he could go back and punch himself in the face before doing the wrong thing. "Can we start again?"
She folded her arms over her chest and tilted her head in a go-ahead gesture.
He drew in a deep breath. He'd never had to worry about the way his words landed before. Because they'd never landed anywhere as serious as this. "I…want to make this right." He lifted his hand, wanting to touch her, to soothe some of the brittle hurt out of her. He'd thought about her every single night since they'd been together, and all that thinking had deluded him into believing he knew her. That she was this soft, delicate princess who'd decided to slum it with the bad boy for a night.
But there was nothing soft or delicate about the steel in her gaze. "I don't need anything from you, Arthur. And I will bow out of the show, tell the producers that I…that I…" The steel in her voice shattered.
"Don't you dare," he snapped. "This is as much for your career as it is mine. I'm not letting you lose this opportunity just because we made a mistake."
"It was a mistake, huh?"
"I didn't say that." Arthur waved his hands. "Look, it's fine. Okay, starting again. I'm sorry, Jesus, stop looking at me like that."
But her eyes had already hardened.
"Okay, what do you need?" he asked, cursing himself for not asking this first.
"Nothing from you," she said stiffly.
"Of course, you need something. I'm the damn father."
She tossed her head. "Look, I don't want anything. I can do this alone; I've already figured it all out."
"In your planner?" he couldn't help snapping. The fact that she'd tell him, only to shut him out like this hurt more than he cared to admit. "Did you vision board a whole storybook life where your kid has no idea who his father is?"
"No." She looked away, pressing her pretty lips together. "Well, yes. Yes, I did vision board what parenthood would look like. And don't you dare make fun of me for it." She turned back to him and searched his eyes. "Are you going to going to change diapers? Stay up all night with a sick kid? Are you going to put i
n the time, and effort and—"
"What makes you think I won't?" he thundered.
She blinked at him. Arthur felt like she was peering at him through a microscope, noting all his faults right down to the cellular level. Disgust and self-loathing stuck in his throat like a bone lodged in his airway. "What the hell makes you think I can't be a good father?" he choked defensively.
She took a deep breath. "Everything."
5
Five pieces of luggage didn't seem like too much, Cassandra sulked. But her pink-plaid matched set had been getting an awful lot of attention today. First from the bellhop at the airport, who'd made a great show of grunting and heaving before holding his hand out for a tip. Then from the driver sent to pick her up from the tiny airport in the Bahamas.
"I like to be prepared," she'd said, with what she hoped was a charming smile.
But it wasn't charming enough, apparently. Cassandra sighed as she watched him deposit her duffel bag on the ground next to the rest of her luggage and then speed away without helping her carry everything to the door.
"Well. Okay, then," she said. Then turned around to take in her home for the next month.
And gasped.
A rambling villa of warm stucco and dark tiles rose in front of her. It blended so seamlessly into the landscape, hidden behind the tall palms that rustled in the gentle, salt-tinged breeze, that at first, she couldn't take in its immense size. It rolled on and on, tumbling down to the very edge of the water, the different angles and roof peaks giving it the look of a small, perfectly contained town. It was massive, but the small gables and private porches gave it a feeling of cozy privacy.
Now, if she could only get to it. She looked down at her luggage and then back up the to the house. Was someone going to greet her? Sign her in, show her around, anything?
"I'm here!" she called. But the big front door remained shut. Cassandra pressed her lips together. This wasn't a problem. Help would have been nice, but she was perfectly capable of carrying her own luggage. Using the strap of her messenger bag, she tied her carry-on to her largest suitcase, then grabbed the handles of them both. With her head held as high as her load would allow, she strode for the door.
She'd just set foot on the wide front porch when the door opened. "Miss Kelly?" the woman asked, checking her clipboard.
Cassandra let her bags drop and wiped a sweat-soaked strand of hair from her face. "Yes. Hi!"
"Have you been here long? We were setting up the mics, sorry."
"Mics?"
The crew member gestured to the ceiling. "This whole place is getting wired up. Cameras, audio, night vision, the works." She pointed to the corner above the front door. "Say hi to Sam, he's our A/V guy," she said, waving at a tiny little glinting disk. "And he needs to pull his head out of his ass before I shove it up there even further." She smiled winningly.
Cassandra swallowed and waggled her fingers at the disk, hoping Sam was hidden somewhere safe. The camera was so tiny she wouldn't have noticed it unless the crew member pointed it out. "There are cameras everywhere?" she asked, trying to keep the nerves out of her voice. She tossed her head as she tried to keep her composure. "I mean, even in the bathrooms?"
"Just outside of them," she said cheerfully. "So be sure you wash your hands, baby!" Her hand flew to her headset, then she shook her head vehemently. "No way. No fucking way. You tell that inbred son of a bitch to go fuck himself sideways with a cactus."
"What?" Cassandra took several steps back.
The woman dropped her hand with a cheerful smile. "Just talking to my crew," she chirped, as if she hadn't just made Cassandra blush to the roots of her hair. She held out her hand. "I'm Amy, by the way. I'm your director, cheerleader, ass-kicker, and general point person for the duration of this shoot. I'll show you to your room." She looked down, finally taking in all of Cassandra's luggage with wide eyes. "Do you want some help carrying that?"
Relief washed through Cassandra, and she nodded gratefully.
Amy cheerfully accepted Cassandra's messenger bag and disappeared down a long winding hallway. Cassandra debated between leaving the rest of her belongings unattended in this deeply strange place or possibly losing Amy forever in a house this size.
She chose to trust her fellow cast members and hurried down the hall.
It dead ended at an arched doorway with a heavy oaken door that swung open on silent hinges. Cassandra peered inside with trepidation, scanning the corners of the room for the telltale glinting disks.
Amy caught her gaze and laughed. "Actually, you're in luck. These stones," she thunked her knuckles on the wall, "are like a black hole for our wireless signals. We can't set up cameras in here." Amy looked like she was on the verge of tears over the idea of not capturing every waking moment. "But there are a few night vision cameras in the trees, and of course the hallway is nicely rigged up so…" She winked. "Be sure to brush your hair before coming out to breakfast, baby."
Cassandra touched her head. Her usual sleek topknot was coming loose after a full day of travel. She cringed and nodded. "So, I'll go freshen up then?"
Amy swore into her headset, told someone to go do something Cassandra was sure was physically impossible, and definitely illegal in some states, then smiled at Cassandra again. "Good idea. I'll let you get to it. And maybe Jim can grab your bags for you. If I can get him down out of the trees out there." She touched her earpiece, and before Cassandra could say a word, she bolted down the hallway, bellowing curses involving the listener's ancestors and all his future descendants.
"Okay then," Cassandra said for what felt like the millionth time. She sagged against the bed and took stock of both her surroundings and her body.
Her first trimester had flown by in a blur of nausea and preparations. Now at thirteen weeks, some of the nausea was subsiding, but she'd gotten into the habit of checking out the bathroom facilities of every place she went into just in case she ended up losing her lunch or dinner. Or sip of water, as sometimes still happened.
She crossed the vast ocean of tiled floor and opened the bathroom door. She gave a squeak of pleasure. The bathroom was larger than her apartment back home, with trailing vines of greenery nearly obscuring the ceiling, lending the whole place the feel of a jungle tree house. A huge tub sat on a platform before a picture window with views of the private beach, perfect for soaking.
And, she noted with grim relief, the toilet was at the perfect height for throwing up.
She rested a hand on her stomach. Even after all of the turmoil of today, it was still settled and calm, which was a relief. Even if there were no cameras to capture it, she really didn't want to spend her first day on set throwing up. No nausea was a relief. As was the fact that her clothes, while tight, still fit. She'd packed her loosest, flowiest, empire-waisted tunic tops in the hopes that she could continue pulling off real clothes as long as possible. She turned, catching her reflection in the mirror. For travelling while pregnant, she looked pretty good. She smiled at her reflection, and then her smile widened when she heard the door bang open.
"Jim?" she called, relieved that someone had finally brought the rest of her luggage. "Thank you so much for helping me get that to my room and…oh."
She stopped short as she stepped out of the bathroom, her foot hovering in mid-air. "You, uh…Wrong room," she said to Arthur.
Was she getting used to his face, her eye becoming more accustomed to his rugged features and sharp angles, or had he actually grown even more handsome since she last saw him? He set down his suitcase easily—anyone with biceps like that would have no problem carrying five pieces of luggage at once, she noted, half-hysterically—and then narrowed his eyes.
"Nope. This is the room they sent me to. I think you're lost, doll. Big house, that'll happen."
She ignored the little thrill at hearing his pet name for her. Ever since their meeting—their disastrously unproductive "we're having a baby together but I don't want to be with you in any way, shape, or form" meeting—she and
Arthur had been civil. Cool. Polite, even.
Which had honestly surprised her and made her even more mistrustful of his protests that he would help with the baby. Sure, he wasn't overturning tables or going out on wild benders, that she knew of. But this casual gentleman act was even more proof than he was exactly what she'd pegged him as the first time they'd met. Someone who could be so cool and distractedly nonchalant in the face of impending parenthood was not the kind of man she wanted in her life.
She tossed her head. "No, you're the one who is lost. Amy specifically led me to this room."
"Amy? Short dark hair? Headset she keeps swearing into?" He raised his eyebrows. "I thought I was good, but I definitely learned some new words today."
No, you didn't, Cassandra thought, but she nodded. "Yes. She brought me right here herself."
Arthur tilted his head. "You got the royal treatment, then. She just pointed, and then told someone she was going to tear off their head and…" He paused as Cassandra's mouth fell open. "Well, you can probably imagine."
"Unfortunately, yes." She shook her head. "But that makes no sense." She stepped around Arthur, ignoring how his presence made the huge space feel somehow too small, and scurried back down the hallway to the main set. "Hi," she said to the nearest crew member. "I'm looking for Amy?"
"Amy!" the man bellowed into his headset, then visibly cringed when her voice squawked from his earpiece. "Yes," he said, apologetically into the receiver. "But the talent is looking for you."
"Hear that? They think we have talent," Arthur whispered in her ear. She shivered. She hadn't realized he was following her.
A burst of swearing announced Amy's arrival. Arthur stepped in front of Cassandra, a move that she knew should have annoyed her, but actually made her feel a bit more secure. "Hello, babies!" Amy sang out, her incongruously sunny smile in place. "All settled in?"
Arthur turned to Cassandra, who cleared her throat and tossed her hair for good measure. "There seems to be a mix-up about the bedrooms? As in, where's the other one?"