by A. B. Wilson
She looked down at her drink and swirled the last of the melting ice cubes around. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
My voice came out strained and unnatural. “Nothing! There’s nothing I want you to say, except maybe that you understand.”
Alina finally looked up at me, her eyes suddenly shadowed and weary. “I get it. You’re a little broken. For some reason, I make things better, and you’ll use me in whatever way I’m willing to be used in order to knit yourself back together. But I shouldn’t have any hope that you’d actually want to be with me. That about it?”
“No!” I reeled back. I’m fucking this up. “More like you’ll run for the hills once you actually spend time with me. I can be a selfish asshole.”
Her half-smile gave me hope. “You’re not a selfish asshole. You’re an overprotective, moody, codependent asshole. Who isn’t always honest with himself or others,” she corrected.
She’d called me out brutally there. I gritted my teeth and looked around. Candace, Rory and Ethan were belting out an ABBA song and everyone was focused on them. “I’m sorry. Really, I sent a lot of mixed messages between the kisses, the touching then pulling back. Acting like it didn’t matter.”
She snorted. “You sure did.”
“Look, all I do know—literally the only facts that I know for sure in my life right now are these. One—somehow you’ve become my closest friend. Two—I have never been as attracted to someone as I am to you. And three—I’m not ready for anything serious right now, but there’s something here between us that I want to explore. I don’t know what to call it, dating, casual, whatever. It’s more than friends and it’s definitely exclusive, but—”
I came to a stop and dropped my head into my palms. I had no idea if I’d made sense or if what I could offer was something she’d be remotely interested in. Her face had gone completely still, and only the motion of her throat as she swallowed hard gave the smallest hint that my words had affected her.
She brushed her fingers through my hair and tugged a little so I would look up and meet her eyes. “Markus, I feel pretty much the same about you. This whole thing with us is confusing and scary. I don’t fuck around with actors—especially ones on my set. I’m worried that you could ruin me completely.”
I was more than a little relieved to hear her say that she felt somewhat the same, but her reservations were legitimate and I had no guarantees for how things would play out. Her hands were lying folded in her lap and I reached out and clasped one of them, my thumb brushing slowly over her knuckles. We watched one of the lighting guys ham it up to Bon Jovi for a while, and all the thoughts of what to do next were whirring through my brain. Finally they settled like a slot machine on a hopefully winning combination.
“Alina, can we try something?”
She looked at me like I was a potentially venomous snake. “What?”
“Can I kiss you?”
She was momentarily stunned, but then she shocked the hell out of me as she pulled me up and led me out into the empty hallway outside the private lounge. Her determined strides squelched on the sticky floor. She came to a halt and turned me around by the shoulders so I was pressed up against the wall with only a few inches between us, and pulled me down to her for a soft kiss. The barely there press of her lips rocked me to my core.
“And now?” she asked softly as she settled back to her heels.
I caught my breath slowly and let it back out. “Now I ask if you felt something there too. Because I did—even though that was the kind of bullshit kiss you give your grandma. I felt that kiss lighting up parts of me that I thought were completely dead. I don’t know what to do with it all, but I want more with you. More than being your friend. Can we try this dating thing? See where it goes?”
Her eyes darted back and forth. “‘See where things go’? Yeah, I don’t know—casual isn’t my usual mode.”
We kept up our staring contest until she clapped a hand over her eyes and groaned. “Ugh, fine, yes, I felt that same thing too. I do every time we’re near each other.”
I reached out for her hand and twined her fingers in mine. We both looked down at our joined hands.
“It’s a lot, yeah? Can we, though? Try?” I tugged her closer and she leaned into me, sighing as I kissed the top of her head.
She stepped back abruptly and poked me in the chest. “I want one more apology. You’re such a fucking tease.”
“Me? Yeah, probably, I’m sorry.” Her glare was accusatory, but I swear there was a slight twinkle in her eyes as I grinned at her. “But you know you still want me, and besides, it takes one to know one.”
“So, what does more even mean? Are we dating? Like, we hang out a bunch, go out in public maybe, hook up?” she asked a little sarcastically as she flattened her hands on my chest.
“You make it sounds so sterile,” I complained. “I want to take you out, to the Premier for last season, which is coming up in a few days, for one thing. Spend time at each other’s houses, talk about childhood nonsense, I don’t know. And, yeah, of course I want to do other, very grown-up things with you. I’ve never been this drawn to someone. You’re burned into me.”
Something—I had no idea what—passed between us in that moment. A very tiny part of me seemed to wake up and flare to life, eager to be handed over to her without reservation. It was surreal and I wondered if she felt the same—as if we needed to trade these little fragments of ourselves to remain whole.
She pulled back and looked up at me as she cupped my jaw in her hands. I wasn’t quite sure what she saw in my eyes as she stared at me, searching for the truth behind my words. Finally she nodded to herself and stepped back so only my fingertips dragged across her forearms. “All right, Markus. You’re on. We can ‘try’.”
My breath gusted out in a relieved sigh and I smiled at her. “Trust me, you won’t regret this.”
She wasn’t smiling, though, as she said, “Oh, trust me, I’m going to hold you to that. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to run to the restroom.”
“Okay, I’ll meet you back in there?” I jerked my chin in the direction of the lounge.
“Sure, be right back,” she assured me and hesitated slightly.
Then she rose up on her tiptoes and kissed me, soft and quick as a butterfly landing on a flower, and was gone. I walked back into the lounge in a daze, nodded at the security team, who looked curiously at me, and headed over to the private bar in the corner. I was perusing my options when Rory approached again, this time on his own.
“So,” he said with only the barest slur to indicate his inebriation. “Alina and you, huh?”
“Rory, please don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m not ready to talk about it,” I said distractedly, looking over my shoulder toward the door.
“Hmm. Whyever not?” he asked sarcastically.
“Okay, fine. I like her. A lot, but we’re friends more than anything. I was with Kate for a long time and I don’t think I’m ready for anything more than what we have going on right now.” I sidestepped the fact that we’d literally decided to take things further five seconds ago.
“Be careful with her,” he cautioned, suddenly serious. “From what I understand, she’s been through a lot and plenty of people on set are jealous of her. She climbed the ranks very quickly and even though it’s pretty obviously not the case, there’s always been talk that she slept her way up. Michael, Terrance—”
“That’s ridiculous,” I interrupted. “You’ve seen her, worked with her. She’s fucking great at her job.”
“You and I know it, others do too, but the gossip on the set is high. She deals with it really well, but I worry that this is going to be too much,” he confessed.
“Thanks for letting me know. You’re right. We both need to be careful.”
He nodded solemnly. “Ethan and me have your back and we’ll let you know if we hear anything. Candace too.”
“Thanks, Rory.” I hadn’t been expecting him to take something so
seriously and appreciated that it was on Alina’s behalf.
“You’ve got it. How’s tonight going?”
“Fine, fine,” I said, distracted while continuing to search the crowd for Alina. “Thanks for the talk, but I’m going to head out and look for Alina.”
“Sounds like a plan. Be good to her.” He smirked and strolled off, teetering a little as he navigated the lounge in search of his people.
I gave my security team a signal that I was heading out and that they should clear a path to the car and sent David a text to let them know that I was ready to go and asked him to keep an eye out for Alina. I circled through the main bar area again before worming my way out to the patio. She was there, held hostage up against a towering planter. Her eyes were shiny, darting back and forth as she if she were seeking an escape route while Vanessa stood in her face, bony index finger poking her in the chest.
I moved closer until I could hear her. “I don’t know who the fuck you think you are, but if you think you can waltz around, sleeping with anyone who will give you a bigger piece of this show, you can fuck right off.”
Alina tried to placate her. “I don’t know what you’ve heard, but I would never—”
“I haven’t forgotten how you tried to break up my marriage, and if you thought I didn’t know about that you’re even stupider than I thought. And now you think you’re going to take over my show? I don’t think so, sweetheart.”
I pulled out my phone and sent Alina a text.
I’m right here. Team is making a path to the car. Get to the front and I’ll get you home.
I waited till I saw her glance down at her phone before I started moving toward the entrance to the club. When David pulled up I jumped in and he drove down the block a bit from the club entrance, to where Alina was up on her tiptoes, looking above the crowd for her getaway ride. Security was standing between her and the milling crowd outside. I slid down in the seat as far as I could and switched off the dome lights so they wouldn’t announce my presence to Vanessa, who I could vaguely see had been stopped by security.
She got in, looked at me, dropped her head to her hands and started laughing hysterically. “Thanks for the rescue, my knight in semi-tarnished armor.”
“I’m so fucking sorry. Should I have intervened directly? I was worried you’d be pissed at me for fighting your battles.”
She sighed, hiccupping adorably. “No, that’s okay.”
“Do you want someone to stay with you tonight? I can, or if you want me to run back in and track down Candace—”
“Stop, no, it’s okay. I appreciate it, but I think I need some space. I should have realized, but I didn’t think it all the way through. It’s a lot with the show, you and now this shit with Vanessa. I take it you overheard her?”
“If you need space, take it. And yes, I did hear some of what she said. Do you want to talk about it?”
“No, our disagreement goes way back, and it’s…complicated,” she said, sounding a little uncomfortable.
“Well, if you want to talk, you know I’m here for you.” I squeezed her hand.
She nodded and laid her head on my shoulder. I held her tightly the rest of the way to her house. We arrived, and she gave me a quick kiss on the cheek and crawled out of the car.
“I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Maybe we can hang out.”
“I’d like that. Text me whenever.” I smiled at her as she walked backward up the path for two steps, waving at me before turning around. David stayed where he was until we saw her enter the house and close the door behind her. The lights flickered on and we watched her close the blinds to the big picture window in the front, giving one last wave to the car.
I sighed deeply, and David laughed. “Glad that worked out for you, Markus. She’s one of the good ones.”
Chapter Fifteen
Alina
“Oh, fuck, Markus. Yes!” My fingers clenched in his hair, pulling him tighter against me as he slowly teased me with his tongue and fingers. Waking up to kisses and love bites on my inner thighs as his scruff scratched the thin skin was the most persuasive alarm clock I’d ever owned.
As he knelt between my legs, he looked like a Viking ready to pillage my body. His choppy blond hair was a tangled mess from my fingers, and light scratches from my fingernails marked his shoulders and biceps. Electric-blue eyes shooting sparks, he hovered over me and grinned a dirty smile that told me how much he liked me naked and submissive, begging him for relief.
“Watch, Alina,” he hissed as he slid home. The swollen walls of my core stretched to accommodate him, the slickness of my overstimulated body making it a smooth glide till he bottomed out inside me.
As Markus started to increase his speed, alternating long drives with sharp snaps of his hips, he reached between us to circle my clit. He murmured, keeping his speed steady, “I want to feel you milking my cock, Alina. Come for me. Right. N—”
Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.
Motherfucking alarms. I was right there. So bloody close. Between the emotional highs of joining a show and getting access to Michael’s contacts and the lows of Vanessa’s unexpected attack, I was a mess, and Markus was the common theme through it all. Down to the supreme edge he managed to deliver to me in my dreams.
I rolled out of bed with a heaviness between my legs and skin that was so oversensitive that I almost came from the sensation of the salty breeze blowing through the open window across my naked body. The shower was turned up as hot as it could go and the water scalded me as I scrubbed away the remnants of the dream.
My heart and brain fought it out as I castigated myself for jumping into things without thinking them through. Letting my feelings lead me into a career move that held such a significant amount of risk to my personal life and following my heart into a tentative relationship with Markus, someone whose level of celebrity was sure to turn my world inside out. Not that I didn’t want it to, but it wasn’t a sure thing and uncertainty made me antsy.
While drinking my coffee at the bar in my kitchen, I scanned through the notifications on my phone. Nothing about Southern Gods. I flipped to the non-industry news, nothing good to see there—global crisis after crisis that made me ashamed of my very first-world problems.
The chime of a text notification, followed quickly by a second, interrupted my musing. Markus, then Candace. I glanced at Candace’s text first.
You doing anything today? Want to get brunch or something and catch up?
Hmm. Yes, I did want to hang out, but I’d promised Markus I could get together as well. I swiped over to his message, a long one. He clearly wasn’t a big texter.
Hey, I hope you slept well, I know we said we’d try to do something today, but I’ve got a bunch of Sellers-related P.R. shit. I don’t know when I’ll be free, maybe tonight? PS: I had the most incredible dream last night. You tied me down and sucked my cock for a half hour, stopping every now and then to tickle me. It was weird.
I smiled as I typed my response, somehow feeling both exasperated with his almost-perfect grammar and texting PSs and aroused by the blatant imagery his text inspired. This was coming to be a common theme in my interactions with him.
Hey yourself…that’s cool, let me know if you’re free later. Going to grab brunch with Candace and run a bunch of errands. PS: Slept mostly well except for the fact that you edged me out HARD in my dreams. Didn’t realize we both had such serious oral fixations. ;)
He didn’t reply immediately, and I swiped back to Candace.
Yes, definitely! Need girl time. Hope your night had a happy ending…
Unlike Markus, Candace had an unhealthy and codependent relationship with her phone. She responded immediately.
Girl, YES! Meet at Solid Ground? 10:30?
Perfect
* * * *
Solid Ground was a coffee shop that Candace and I used to frequent when we’d first met and lived in Silver Lake, back when my job with Michael was probationary and I was renting a room in her group house. I hadn’t b
een in a while, but the familiar scent of freshly roasted beans, the whir of the milk steamer and combined chatter of voices as they echoed throughout the space and bounced off the floor-to-ceiling windows felt a little like coming home. I put in an order and snagged a table outside as a very cute hungover couple staggered away, wincing as they threw on their sunglasses.
My iPad was out and humming immediately as I started tallying up the tasks I’d need to accomplish before rehearsals. Since Candace was running late, as usual, I idly started a totally unnecessary, but very special, checklist of things that Markus and I needed to tick off. I was delighted that only eighty-five percent of the items were sexual.
“Alina! Hey!” a rushed voice called out, and a frazzled Candace appeared in my peripheral vision. “So sorry. Parking was a bitch. I put in an order. Did you want anything?” She plopped a numbered table tent down to let the servers know where to bring her food, then laughed as she saw mine. “Should have known you’d have that covered.”
“Yep, don’t mess with my brunch feeding. You know I hate this meal, right? Like, what’s the point? Why not get breakfast? Or lunch? Why split the difference so you’re starving when you arrive and want to pass out at, like, noon when you’re done?” My feelings on brunch were well-known to my exasperated friend.
“I’m not even going to start with that shit right now. We’re on a strict agree-to-disagree about brunch. Don’t fuck with me today. You’ve got some serious dirt to dish!”
“I know. I’m sorry. Things have been happening so fast, you know?”
Candace nodded, her sunglasses hiding what I was pretty sure was an impatient expression as she leaned into me. “Yeah, and last time we talked, you said that nothing was going on with Markus. Last night though, you two told kind of a different story—we saw you canoodling on that couch during karaoke. And this bombshell about joining the show?” She mimed wiping the sweat off her brow and fanned herself aggressively.