Here All Along

by Crista McHugh

  “I know. And you’ve been more than patient with me while I got my shit together, but I need to let go of this business and carve out a new niche for myself. Maybe then, I could finally afford to move out of your garage apartment.” Frustration laced her words. She exhaled with a loud sigh and shrugged her shoulders. “But enough about this. I scored us nosebleed tickets for the Blue Man Group at the half-price ticket booth, so we’d better get moving if we want to get there before the curtain goes up.”

  It was her way of changing the subject, and he questioned the timing of his gift once again. She wanted to leave Hollywood behind, and he carried a memento of her greatness in his hand.

  Sarah pointed to the box. “What’s that? Another autographed football?”

  He had a split second to choose. Give her the box now, or wait until a more appropriate time?

  He chickened out. “Um, yeah.”

  “You and your sports collection.” She rolled her eyes and brushed past him. “Let’s go, Kid.”

  He placed the box on her desk, put on his hat, and followed her out of the room.

  ***

  Four hours later, the elevator doors dinged, and Sarah took him by the hand. “Come on, Kid.”

  Gideon expected the Eiffel Tower replica at the Paris Casino to be packed at this time of night, but there was only one other couple on the observation deck. He stumbled out of the elevator and joined Sarah at the railing. The Strip stretched out below them in all its gaudy glory, and yet, it seemed strangely romantic from this height.

  When Sarah had mentioned doing some touristy things tonight, he didn’t know what to expect. Or worse, what would happen if someone recognized him wandering the streets. But no one did. It was as though the universe had aligned in just the right way to allow him to be an ordinary person and to enjoy a “date night” with Sarah. They managed to sneak into the show at the last minute, followed by a quick bite on the run from a food vendor, and finally, a trip up the fake Eiffel Tower. Throughout the night, they laughed, teased each other, and fell back into the easygoing relationship they’d had nine months ago when they’d been best friends.

  Before he’d suggested they become something more.

  But the moment he stood beside her at the railing, things shifted. Best friends would maybe catch a show or a meal on the town, but this location was more appropriate for lovers. Why did Red bring him here?

  She stared out into the night, her face unreadable. The only acknowledgment he got was the stiffening of her posture.

  He mirrored her as the wind ruffled his clothes. “Talk to me, Red.”

  The silence stretched between them until he thought he’d encountered one of her stubborn walls that he’d never been able to climb over. But after a few minutes, she said, “You don’t like the idea of me doing the fashion thing, do you?”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “I saw it on your face earlier tonight.”

  He leaned forward on the railing and shifted his weight. He might be a damn good actor, but Sarah knew him too well. “I’m worried.”

  “About what? That I’d fail?”

  “No, no, no.” He straightened and pressed his palm against his temple. “I’m more worried you’ll succeed.”

  Her lips parted, and she tilted her head. “Gideon, I—”

  “No, please, hear me out.” He took her hands in his own and faced her. “You’re an amazingly talented woman, Sarah, and I know you’ll make this next venture a success, and that scares the shit out of me.”

  “Why?”

  Because you’ll leave me.

  That’s what he wanted to say. But his pride spun a different excuse. “Because once you open up your house of haute couture in Paris, you won’t have time for me anymore.” He brushed a stray strand of hair that had been blown free from her bun. “Call me selfish, but I’d miss my best friend.”

  There. He’d risked exposing his feelings without blurting out that he loved her. This was the safe zone, a place where he could test things out and see how she responded. If she withdrew, he’d know he’d crossed the line. But if she didn’t…

  Instead of looking away, she stayed focused on him. “I’ll always be there for you, just like you’ve always been there for me. But I need to do this. I need to see what I can do on my own. I can’t depend on you for everything. I’ve taken your charity for too long as it is.”

  “It’s not charity.”

  She arched one brow at him, and he added, “Well, maybe at the beginning, it was. But once you recovered from the accident, you worked hard, and I couldn’t have asked for a better assistant.”

  Jeez. How pathetic does that sound?

  One look at her face confirmed it. “I’m going about this the wrong way, aren’t I?” he asked.

  “Depends on what you’re trying to achieve.”

  Time to take another risk. He tilted her chin up, her lips so close to him that he was tempted to trace them first with his thumb and then with his lips. “You’ve been with me since the beginning, and I’d be lost without you.”

  Her face softened, and a spark of realization glimmered in her eyes. It was exactly what he’d hoped for. He could see her walls crumbling, her defenses weakening, her heart melting. She came closer, so close that he held his breath in case she kissed him.

  But just when her lips were a mere breath away from his, she pulled away.

  “Gideon.” She said his name like a whimper of resignation.

  If he’d been like any of the alpha males he played in the movies, this would be the moment where he’d take matters into his own hands and kiss her. But knowing Red, all it would do was earn him a slap in the face, especially since there was a vulnerability to her that he’d never seen before. He’d broken down a few walls, and the woman he’d found behind them appeared to be more precious and fragile than he first assumed.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

  “There’s no need to apologize.” She sniffled and rubbed her bare arms.

  He whisked off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders. A second later, she pressed against him, and he wrapped his arms around her. He couldn’t remember the last time she’d let him hold her like this, but he didn’t dare ruin the moment by asking more questions. He just savored the closeness, the warmth, the weight of her head on his shoulder as she allowed him to comfort her.

  “I’m not trying to leave you. I’m just trying to be my own person.”

  “You always have been, Red.” He rested his cheek against the top of her head and breathed in the scent of her shampoo.

  “Ah, young love,” a woman said behind them.

  Sarah jumped, and he turned around to find an elderly couple strolling arm in arm behind them.

  The old man grinned at his wife and patted her hand. “Reminds me a little of us, eh?”

  “Still does,” the woman replied as they strolled by, oblivious to anything around her but the man beside her.

  When Gideon turned back to Sarah, her cheeks were almost as red as her hair. She met his gaze with an unexpected shyness, and once again, he grew hopeful that she would see him as something more than a friend. She threaded her fingers through his. “We’d better go before they get the wrong idea about us.”

  She started for the elevator, but he held her back. “Scared they might be right?”

  Fear flickered across her face, followed by something else that kept him from losing all hope. A mix of wonder and confusion furrowed her forehead as though she was seeing him for the first time and trying to sort out her reaction. At last, her features settled into the calm, composed mask he knew all too well. “More like scared that they’ll recognize you, and we’ll end up all over the tabloids.”

  No-Nonsense Red was back.

  As they rode down the elevator, he looked down and realized she was still holding his hand.

  He may not have given her the recovered Golden Globe. He may not have kissed her. But for all purposes, he considered tonight to be a win. />
  Chapter Nine

  Sarah squeezed past the crowd of onlookers on the casino floor and flashed the badge the production company had given her. The security guards parted, and she dashed into the VIP lounge where they were shooting today’s scene. Because they had to close off a section of the casino, they’d started filming at the ungodly hour of two in the morning. The sun had just risen over the Strip an hour ago, and she was bringing Gideon his “lunch” when most people would be sitting down for breakfast.

  She’d expected to find the cameras rolling or the crew hustling to prep for the next scene, but the set appeared dead. Her scalp tingled from the oddity. She found Gideon sitting in a chair next to Gabe and hurried over to them. “What happened?”

  “We’re still waiting on Mackinzie.” Gideon took his salad from her, but didn’t dive into it like he normally did. “She never showed up.”

  “Did she know about the odd shooting time?”

  “Yep.” Gabe crossed his arms and stretched out in the chair. “I personally reminded her several times last night.”

  There was something in his grin that said Gabe knew more about the missing actress than he was willing to share, but frankly, it wasn’t something Sarah cared to pursue. The few times she’d witnessed Mackinzie’s attempts at acting had affected her the same way fingernails scraping along a blackboard did. And although Gideon was too much of a professional to complain, he’d come home more frustrated than usual since shooting had begun.

  She reached into her bag and pulled out a bottle of chilled kombucha tea for Gideon. “So what have you been doing in the meantime?”

  “Running lines, working out what we might do in some other scenes, talking about baseball.” Gideon took the bottle of tea, but didn’t open it, much like his lunch. “Just chillin’.”

  “Good to see you two aren’t at each other’s throats anymore.” Over the last week, the rivalry between the two actors had visibly disappeared, along with Gabe’s flirtations, much to her relief.

  Gabe gave Gideon a side glance, and his grin widened. “You can say we came to an understanding.”

  Gideon rolled his eyes. “Yeah, especially after you spiked my beer with hot sauce.”

  “Consider it your initiation, Kid.” Gabe turned his attention to her. “What are your plans for the day, Sarah?”

  “Nothing much,” she replied with a nonchalant shrug. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. She had emails and phone calls to follow up on for Gideon, especially concerning the article with Pomp and Celebrity. Then after that, she had a few design ideas she wanted to flesh out, but she doubted Gabe wanted to hear about any of those things.

  “If you have a moment, why don’t you help Gideon out with this scene?” He leaned forward, his elbows resting on the arms of the chair and his hands clasped together. “That way, once Mackinzie finally decides to grace us with her presence, he’ll have everything blocked and ready to go.”

  She stared at the set with a mixture of fear and anticipation. It would be fun to slip into character for a little bit, just long enough to get the acting bug out of her system. “What’s the scene?”

  “When Colton kisses Rae for the first time.” Gideon handed her a few pages from his binder. “It literally should only be a three-minute scene, but since Mackinzie isn’t here…”

  Sarah muffled her snicker. The actress was probably passed out drunk somewhere. Not that she had any room to criticize, though. She’d been that way once herself. Instead, she took the pages of the screenplay and read through them a few times to commit the lines to memory. “Okay, tell me what Karl has in mind for this scene.”

  Gideon took her by the hand and led her onto the set. “I think he wanted Mackinzie to start here by the blackjack table. According to the directions, she sees Colt watching her and approaches him.”

  “I can take it from there.” She closed her eyes and shook out the tension in her body as she let herself fall into character.

  She’d read through the script enough to get a good sense of Rae. The drug lord’s mistress was a complex character, one she would’ve loved to have taken on if she’d still been acting. On the surface, she appeared to be little more than a gold-digging slut, which would probably be the extent of where Mackinzie would take her. But underneath it all was a woman who felt trapped by her situation, a woman who’d come from nothing and had risen to a life of comfort. And yet, a woman who would be willing to risk losing it all, both due to her underlying sense of morality and her growing relationship with Colt. She was a wild card, a double agent, a ruthless and yet tragic character who took a gamble and loses it all.

  When Sarah opened her eyes again, she saw the world through Rae’s eyes. Her posture changed to emphasize her feminine curves. Her head tilted to a coquettish angle that matched the sideways glances she was giving Gideon’s character.

  She met his gaze, and just like that, the set faded. They were no longer Sarah and Gideon. In her mind, they were Rae and Colt. She approached him slowly, swaying her hips with each step, and spoke the first line from the script. “ ‘See something you like?’ ”

  “ ‘Perhaps,’ ” he replied, his voice raw and strained.

  She twirled his tie around her finger, drawing closer to him. “ ‘You should be careful. If you keep staring at me like that, we could get into trouble.’ ”

  “ ‘Depends on your definition of trouble.’ ” His body stiffened until he was almost like a soldier standing at attention, but his eyes burned with desire.

  Somewhere in the back of her mind, she wanted to applaud him for his performance. Colt was an undercover agent charged with infiltrating the cartel. His plan was to seduce Rae for information, never thinking he’d fall in love with the drug lord’s mistress along the way. The struggle to stay in control played out in the tense lines of his face.

  Sarah stayed in character and pressed her body against his, her hand still clutching his tie like a leash. Rae knew she had Colt under her spell, and she was out to break him. Her lips were mere inches from his, teasing him, taunting him, testing him. “ ‘You know what they say about playing with fire. You’re bound to get burned.’ ”

  “ ‘But oh, what a way to burn.’ ” He wrapped his arm around her waist and pressed his lips to hers.

  She knew that according to the script, they were supposed to kiss, but Gideon had always stopped short of those directions when they’d run lines in the past, which was why the kiss startled her at first. Once the initial shock wore off, however, a warm glow of pleasure radiated from where he touched her.

  A faint warning to stop sounded in the back of her mind, but she was too busy enjoying the sensation of kissing Gideon to listen to it. For months, she’d fought to be responsible, to stay in control, to ignore the secret longings of her heart for fear she’d fall into chaos again. She’d almost given in the other night at the top of the Eiffel Tower. Maybe she would’ve if the elderly couple hadn’t interrupted them. But she’d been good for too long. Now she wanted nothing more than to be reckless.

  She released his tie and wound her arm around his neck, threading her fingers through his hair. Gideon took her response as his cue to deepen the kiss, and her pulse quickened. Desire flowed through her veins at the same languid tempo of his lips and tongue, and before she could stop herself, she was following his lead and kissing him back.

  She’d kissed him before as part of a role. After all, his big break was playing her boyfriend on TV. Back then, she’d had to fight off the giggles when shooting a kissing scene because it had been so awkward. But this was different. This kiss was pure indulgence. It awakened her senses like no other kiss had before. She tasted the faint sweetness of an apple on his tongue. She inhaled his familiar scent with each breath she drew. She savored the pressure of his hand against the small of her back and the steady throb of his heart vibrating through his chest. She grew more aware of him with every flick of her tongue, every movement of her lips, until she could no longer deny her attraction t
o him.

  She wanted Gideon Kelly. Preferably, in her bed.

  Which, of course, would ruin everything.

  But that didn’t stop her from enjoying the moment. She made no effort to end the kiss until someone let out a shrill whistle and started applauding.

  Reality crashed into her with the force of a city bus, and she broke away with a gasp. Her vision was hazy, but that didn’t stop her from pushing away and stumbling back a few steps. Her breaths came quick and sharp as though she’d just finished doing speed drills on the treadmill. More applause filled the set, and as her vision came into focus, she realized Gabe and several members of the crew were clapping.

  Embarrassment quickly morphed into panic. This couldn’t be happening. Her pulse pounded in her ears, and her cheeks burned as she looked around the room. Everyone was watching her. Everyone had seen her kiss Gideon.

  She came back to the one person who’d started this all. Gideon held out his hand to her. “Red?”

  She tried to speak, but her throat tightened. Dear God, she just wanted to breathe, but the closer he came to her, the harder it was to draw in that life-sustaining air. She had to get away from him. Her eyes stung with tears. She kept backpedaling until she collided with one of the grips. That was enough to jolt her out of her panic attack. She spun around and bolted for the door.

  ***

  “Red!” Gideon started to chase after Sarah, but Karl blocked his path and grabbed his arm.

  “Who was that?” the director asked.

  He tried to shake free, but by the time he managed to get around Karl, Sarah was long gone.

  Shit!

  “Answer me, Kelly.”

  Defeat wilted his spirit. He’d kissed her. He’d gone out on a limb and taken the risk and kissed her. And damn it, she was kissing him back until someone’s catcall ruined everything. But for those few precious moments…

  It was the closest to heaven he’d ever been.

  He sucked down a few breaths and waited for his heart to stop hammering. “She’s my assistant.”

  “Bullshit.” Karl got in his face and poked his finger into Gideon’s chest. “If I’m going to have another actress disrupt my set—”