She took a deep breath, pulling her hands away, not wanting to incite herself further. But the images kept coming. She saw Eric stunning her with that sexy, crooked grin of his before his mouth began streaking down her body, an intoxicating prelude to his tongue greedily lapping between her thighs until she was unable to control her quaking body. She imagined him thrusting hard inside her, her cries of pleasure matching his own strangulated groans as they climaxed together. She saw herself curled in his arms in the afterglow, both of them sweaty but not caring, his still-fevered mouth tenderly pressing itself to her brow before he nuzzled her neck and told her how much he—
Her hands curled into fists. Enough. That was enough. What she was doing was insanity. It was desperate and masochistic. She knew that if she ever seduced Eric, he would jump at the chance to sleep with her. But Monica could never screw just for the sake of screwing. The act would have significance for her but not for him. She could never risk that, even though he was the reason she was now lying here, roused and tense at the same time. Feeling like her own worst enemy, she turned on her side away from him, waiting for the tension to leave her body so she could sleep.
Every morning for as long as Eric could remember, he woke at 4:30 a.m., the exact time he and Jason always had to be up to make the 5:30 a.m. hockey practice before school. Usually when he woke, he’d take a few seconds to get his bearings, then fall quickly back to sleep. But not this morning. This morning there was the soft rise and fall of breath coming from the other side of the bed: Monica, defending her virtue by erecting a goose-down pillow barrier between them. As if that could stop him if he really wanted to initiate something.
He propped himself up on his left elbow and looked at her. She was on her back, her lips parted slightly, her blonde hair tousled, her deliciously long neck cocked to one side. The stupidest cliché imaginable came to mind: Sleeping Beauty. But it was true. She was sleeping, and she was beautiful.
Watching her, he felt himself begin to harden. God, how many times over the years as a fan had he fantasized about making love to her in a hundred different ways? And now, here she was lying beside him, sleeping, at his parents’ house, no less. He had kissed her deeply once already, and he wanted to kiss her now. Kiss her and hold her and eventually feel her bucking in his arms while she screamed his name. Simple, straightforward sex. Except it wasn’t.
He lay back down, waiting for the intense feeling churning within him to abate. The more time he spent with Monica, the more clouded his mind became. They were supposed to be pretending to be a couple; but more and more—at least in his opinion—the lines were blurring, acting bleeding into real life. Monica could protest her gorgeous head off, but she was physically attracted to him, and he knew it. He wondered: Couldn’t they just run with that, the way he did with every woman he’d ever dated? I pleasure you, you pleasure me, no promises, and when it gets boring, we split and each look for another someone else to give us that heady rush that comes with initial seduction.
Maybe he was in over his head with this pretending thing. He’d assumed Monica was as shallow as he was; she wasn’t. And somehow that was changing his feelings. He worried about that; it could wreck his rep in the long run. He was the inveterate bachelor, for chrissakes. He wanted to maintain that image.
God, what bullshit. Right now, he didn’t know what he wanted, apart from ravishing Monica Geary.
He heard a door open in the hallway, light footsteps walking to the bathroom. Delilah. His brother seemed blissfully happy with her, and she with him. But relationships seemed incredibly complicated to Eric. The compromises. Having sex with only one person for the rest of your life. Having to remember birthdays and anniversaries. Being dragged to spend time with her relatives. Endless negotiation on everything from what to have for dinner to when to have kids.
Then again, there did seem to be perks, too. Someone to come home to. Someone to laugh with. Someone to listen to you bitch and be there when you had a shitty day. Someone who loved you despite your flaws, maybe even because of them.
Mind somersaulting, he turned on his side to face the window. He wanted his old life back, the simple one where he was a player on and off the ice. They needed to talk about when to end this thing.
Eric was pleased when Monica agreed to take a walk with him after dinner, even though she’d already had a tour of the farm that morning with Delilah. He was feeling restless ever since not being able to get back to sleep that morning. It had been an odd day: him and Jason helping with chores, interspersed with long bouts of the two of them discussing the farm situation with each other, as well as with their folks. Surprisingly, their mother was just as tight-lipped as their father on the issue of Eric and Jason continuing to help out financially. He and Jason decided to leave it alone for now. They knew their parents; they shut down if you nagged them. Better to just let it go for now, gingerly picking up the thread of conversation when he and his brother were back in New York.
Monica had told him about her stroll with Delilah that morning; how thrilled Delilah and Jason were that Eric seemed so happy. The fantasy versus reality debate kept nudging itself back into his thoughts. Was he happy hanging out with Monica? Or was he just good at pretending to be happy hanging out with Monica? He was overthinking this whole stupid charade. It was time to turn off his brain and enjoy the endless black ocean of the sky above them, the twinkling silver stars luminous as pearls. He’d never lost his sense of wonder when it came to the sky out here on the farm. He hoped he never did.
Monica was looking skyward, too. “This is unreal. It just seems to go on and on forever.”
“I know. Jason and I used to sleep outside sometimes in the summer. It was awesome.”
“I’ll bet.” There was a long pause. “How come you didn’t tell me your parents were in danger of losing the farm?”
His mother must have filled her in. Eric tensed, unsure how to answer. “I guess I thought it wasn’t something you needed to know, since this isn’t real.”
Monica nodded. “I like your parents a lot. Your sister-in-law, too.”
Eric chuckled. “Not Jace, though, huh?”
“No, I like him, too, now that he’s given up the third degree. You two love each other,” Monica observed.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Eric muttered, embarrassed. “Whatever.”
Monica turned to look at him. “Are you upset they might lose the farm?”
“They’re not going to lose it,” Eric shot back fiercely. “Jason and I are going to help keep them afloat, even expand, if that’s what they need to do. It’s been in the family for three generations.”
Talking about it was beginning to upset him, perhaps because that’s all he’d talked about all day. Right now, he just wanted to walk around and enjoy it as much as he could.
“I’m sorry,” Monica murmured, slipping a warm hand into his. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“It’s okay.”
Her hand in his—was it a gesture of sympathy or comfort? They continued ambling through the grass. Would it insult her if he gently broke the contact between them? The thing was, he didn’t want to. And he didn’t think she wanted him to, either.
He could feel sexual tension pressing down on them, solid and real as a weight. Eager to override it, he began talking. “Winters here can be really brutal. Jace and I used to freeze our asses off waiting for the bus in the morning. Summer is great, though. Sometimes thunderstorms kick up in a flash. The sky is amazing then, too, a really eerie gunmetal gray that’s sometimes streaked with red, if you can believe that. It was a really great place to be a kid, but once you were a teenager, it sucked. At least Jace and I had hockey. We were pretty bad students; we knew sports would be our way out. Neither one of us wanted to stay on the farm.” He realized he was babbling, most likely boring the hell out of her by talking about himself. “Did you always know you wanted to be an actress?”
“Yup. I played Cinderella in my first grade play, and it was all downhill from ther
e.”
Anther thing they shared: knowing their calling at an early age. Eric stole a sideways glance at her. She seemed calm, despite the tension still hanging over them like a cloud. This was the way real couples talked, he realized. This was how they got to know each other. The realization had his mind twisting in agony.
He cleared his throat. “So, when we get back to New York? How are we supposed to proceed?”
“Just carry on,” Monica said briskly. “Theresa said I should go to one of your games. Maybe accompany you to a charity event. Do you do any of those?”
“Yeah, I’ve been doing stuff with the Ronald McDonald House in north Jersey ever since I moved to the city. It’s a place where families can stay free when their kids are undergoing cancer treatment.”
“I know what it is,” said Monica, sounding impressed. “That’s wonderful.”
“What can I say?” Eric replied jauntily. “I’m a great guy.” He needed to drag Eric the egomaniac out of storage, and fast. The night sky, her beauty, opening up to her . . . all were conspiring to make him want to gather her up in his arms and kiss her.
“Can we stop walking a minute?” Monica asked. “I just want to look up at the sky for a while.”
“Sure.”
Eric dropped her hand, ostensibly to button up his well-worn denim jacket. But when he was done, he didn’t know what to do with his hands. He wanted to put an arm around her waist but opted to put it around her shoulder instead, the way a friend might.
Monica seemed comfortable in the crook of his arm. They stood there, silent, both stargazing. The dark tension was increasing, distracting them. Making him want. Usually his damn brother was the one with impulse control issues. But this time, it was him.
“Monica,” he said softly.
She turned to look at him. Eric tilted her chin up gently, her face luminous in the glow of the crescent moon, which had slowly arced over the plains while they walked. She was so heart-stoppingly beautiful, he feared he’d lose his nerve. But the ache inside him, confusing as it was, needed to be sated. Eric slowly lowered his mouth to hers, teasing as his lips played over hers.
Monica jerked her head away. “Tell me,” she said sharply. “Is this another one of your kisses designed to make sure you haven’t lost your touch?”
“No.” His mind was aswirl with confusion.
“What, then?”
“I just want to kiss you,” he admitted, feeling sheepish. “I’ve dreamed of it since before we met, and as you can see, I dream of it now. If you don’t want me to, I understand.”
His heart was hammering as he waited for her to answer. “You can kiss me,” Monica said with a hint of warning in her voice, “but don’t think it really means anything. I just feel badly for you because of the situation with your family.”
A mercy kiss. She was lying. She knew it. And he knew it, too. But it was a lie that worked for both of them. He lowered his mouth to hers again, the feel of her lips against his a particularly addictive form of torment. There was something in her response—the urgency, perhaps the neediness—that sent pins and needles shooting through his body. He matched her hunger, intent on pleasing not only himself but also her. All those years dreaming of kissing Monica Geary . . . But those dreams were of Monica Geary the fantasy. This was Monica Geary the woman, lovely and soft in his arms. Real.
It was more than his desire could take. He’d made love to lots of girls under these stars; he knew how drugging it could be. The longer he and Monica remained pressed together like this, exploring, probing, becoming familiar, the more he’d want and the more he’d try to take. Garnering every ounce of his self-control, he tore his mouth from hers.
They both blinked as they looked at one another, seeming to need to recover. Sexual tension still hovered, but now it was tempered with awkwardness.
“We should probably get back to the house,” Monica suggested quietly. “And just for the record,” she added, flipping her hair over her shoulder, “that wasn’t half bad.”
“I agree: you weren’t half as inexperienced as I thought you’d be,” he replied, suppressing a smile as they turned back in the direction of the house. Maybe he’d wait on talking to her about ending things.
TWELVE
A wave of delight swept through Monica as the crowd of more than three hundred women erupted into applause as she entered the ballroom at the Grand Hyatt New York. She was there for a special meeting of the tristate chapter of the Monica Geary Fan Club. They still loved her. They still wanted her. Take that, Chesty!
Monica was escorted to the dais in the front of the room by Debbie Glazer, the woman who had founded the fan club ten years before within months of Monica joining W and F. Debbie, a slightly overweight stay-at-home mom of three from Long Island was, without a doubt, Monica’s most ardent fan. Sometimes it scared Monica how much Debbie knew about her, but Monica knew this came with putting yourself in the public eye. She hated celebrities who whined about having no privacy. They chose to put themselves out there; they wanted to be famous. Monica believed celebrities owed something to these people, since they did help put you where you were. However, there were limits—like fans crawling under the bathroom stall when you were trying to pee.
“Debbie, I can’t thank you enough for putting this together on such short notice,” Monica said gratefully.
Debbie’s face lit up. “My pleasure. It’s so great to see you again, Monica! You might end up being here all afternoon; there are so many questions people want to ask!”
“That’s great.”
Looking out over the crowd, Monica saw many familiar faces from the past. Maybe it came from years of memorizing lines, but she remembered many of their names and made a point of greeting them personally. It was such a simple thing, and yet they looked so happy. It helped assuage her guilt for being out of touch with her audience for so long.
Of course, there was some soap press there, too: Carolyn Shields from Soap World (who, surprisingly, had written positively about her and Eric in her “A Day on the Set of W and F” piece), and another woman named Delores Clarkson from Soap World’s rival, Daytime Today, who was a longtime Monica fan.
Sitting up on the dais, Monica took the mike. “Ask away!” she urged her fans with a smile.
Hands shot up in the air like weeds. Monica selected a petite, nervous-looking woman down front who’d been jiggling her left leg madly ever since Monica’s entrance. Being an actress had made Monica a keen observer of people. She knew it would drive this woman nuts if she had to wait too long to have her question answered.
The woman stood, accepting the mike Debbie would be passing around the room. “Yes, um, Rox—I mean Monica—” the woman momentarily cast down her eyes, mortified by her mistake—“um, are Grayson and Roxie going to get married?”
Monica smiled slyly. “Good question. I’m not at liberty to answer that, but I can tell you, there will be a wedding on the show in the not-too-distant future.”
“Oooh,” the fans said collectively.
Unfortunately, Chessy’s character, Paige, was slated to seduce Royce’s character, Grayson, after a drunken one-night tryst, resulting in a pregnancy. Wanting to “do the right thing,” Grayson was going to dump Roxie and marry Paige, breaking Roxie’s heart. This would spur Monica’s character on to wanting revenge on Chesty’s character, which would be a joy to play.
“Thank you,” the woman said meekly, handing the mike back to Debbie so she could pass it on to the next fan.
Monica answered as many questions about the show and her character as she could. But she knew that eventually, the topic of Eric would come up.
“Monica,” boomed a woman with all the stentorian warmth of a high court judge. “How serious is your relationship with Eric Mitchell?”
The room sucked in its breath, every eager eye glued to Monica. She smiled warmly. “We’re taking it one day at a time.”
Shoulders slumped. These people wanted dirt. They were her fans. They wanted to be
on the inside track.
“Of course, who knows where it might go?” Monica added coyly. The room erupted in cheers and whistles. Monica knew she was deliberately tantalizing them, but that was the point, wasn’t it? At the back of the room, Carolyn Shields and Delores Clarkson were scribbling furiously on their reporter’s pads. Monica could already recite the headlines: “Wedding Bells for W and F’s Monica?” She wondered if her answer would get back to Eric. Probably. Hadn’t he said he and his teammates read soap mags in addition to being addicted to the show? She’d cross that bridge when and if she came to it.
Though only a week had passed, the whole weekend in North Dakota was beginning to feel like a figment of Monica’s imagination. After their passionate kiss beneath the stars, they resumed playing their parts as if it had never happened. All Monica could think was: we’re both cowards. But now, her impromptu addendum to her fan’s question—“Who knows where it might go?”—made her wonder. Where did she want it to go? She was willing to admit to herself that she was physically attracted to him. But emotionally? Could it go to that level? And if it did?
She put these thoughts aside, concentrating on pleasing her fans. Which was easy—until the door at the back of the ballroom opened and Chesty stepped inside.
“Hi, everyone!” she chirped loudly, waving as if she were the queen of England greeting her beloved subjects. “Since I’m one of Monica’s biggest fans myself,” she declared as she made her way to the dais, “this was one event I couldn’t miss!”
Monica dug her nails into her thighs to keep herself from jumping up and coldcocking her. Oh you bitch. Oh you bitchedy witchedy little bitch on wheels.
Monica’s fans looked unsure of how to react. Some looked delighted: two soap stars for the price of one! Others looked confused: Was this a planned surprise? But most of them looked resentful. This was their event for Monica, their private audience with their idol. Monica wanted to circle the room and give every one of them a big kiss.
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