by Keary Taylor
I want Kale.
It’s time. And I have a plan.
The car pulls into a warehouse district that looks abandoned. Sheet metal is peeling off of walls. The car has to dart between barrels and piles of junk. It looks like the perfect scene for a horror movie.
But it’s the latest location for the newest Your Fantasy shoot.
When we get there, there’s already a trailer set up.
“You’ve been watching me do my thing for the past month, I can’t wait to see you in action,” I say as we pull to a stop. “This is exciting.”
“Just promise you won’t get jealous when they bring Janessa into the shoot, okay?” he says as he meets my eyes. “Cause it’s just modeling. It isn’t real. ‘K?”
I push down the deadly viper that rises in my stomach at the other model’s name. I’ve seen her before. She’s beautiful and severe looking. She and Kale have done shoots together before. And they’re magic in front of the camera.
“Promise,” I say as I force a smile on and follow him out of the car.
I get to sit in a chair and watch in the trailer while they prep the two models. Kale changes into a pair of black jeans and a blue and white striped button up shirt. They put the makeup apron around his shoulders and a woman with the biggest hair I’ve ever seen starts in on his makeup.
“I’ve been talking to Calvin,” he says as the woman dabs foundation all over his face. “And November is going to get kind of crazy for me. I’m supposed to be in Dubai for two weeks and then off to London for a while, but we’ll be in London at the same time for about thirty-six hours, so I figure we’ll at least get a few hours together then.”
“Close your mouth for a sec,” the makeup artist says as she pops her bubble gum. Kale does as she says for a few seconds.
“But I figure I can go with you for the first week of the tour. I can hit the Seattle show, and the Salt Lake City one,” he continues as he looks over at me.
And I glow. Cause Kale has my entire schedule memorized, and I can barely remember where I am when.
“That sound okay?” he asks.
Like that was ever a concern.
“That sounds perfect,” I smile.
“’K,” he says, his voice ecstatic. And then it falls. “There’s still four weeks where we won’t see each other. I’m going to miss you like hell.”
“I know,” I say, my expression falling, too. “I kind of just want to cancel the whole stupid thing.”
And ta-da! She’s done with him. He stands from his chair and crosses to me, taking my hands in his.
“No kissing!” the girl yells.
“Yeah, yeah,” he barely acknowledges her. “And no you don’t. This tour is going to be one of the most amazing experiences of your life.”
“I know,” I say, lacing my fingers through is, bringing our hands up and together. “I’m just going to miss you.”
“I’ll be right here when you get back,” he says quietly. “That’s a promise.”
“Let’s get rolling,” the director says as he opens the door to the trailer.
Kale bends in to give me a kiss when the makeup lady shouts, “no kissing!” So instead, he gives an air kiss, lets go of my hands, and walks out of the trailer.
I watch from a distance. There’s an entire crew here. Working lights. Moving junk. The literal junk, to different places, posing it. Two camera people. Kale goes to one location, Janessa to another.
I feel awkward and out of place, just hanging back here by myself. But it doesn’t last long, cause once Kale gets doing his thing, I am transfixed.
He knows exactly how to look and how not to look at the camera. His intense eyes. His downturned mouth. His entire body works the camera. It’s there in his shoulders, his hips, the way his toes are positioned. This is Kale’s element.
And slowly but surely, the buttons of his shirt come undone. His sleeves get rolled up. The cameras click away as more and more of Kale’s skin is exposed.
And finally, the shirt just comes off.
Cue the heavenly choir.
“I’m a little afraid that grin’s going to split your beautiful face, Whit,” Kale says when he catches my eyes between clicks of the camera.
“I can’t help it!” I mock defend, holding my arms around my middle as I laugh at myself. “I mean, hello! This is the man of my fantasies in action. Half naked. And he’s going to be in my bed tonight!”
“You bet your ass I will be,” he says with a wink as he moves into his next pose. Which is him flexing.
Bless me and all the glory that is my life.
“Okay, I think that’s good for the single shoot,” the director guy says. “Let’s do the couple set now. Janessa!”
She saunters over, lanky, crazy skinny, and utterly beautiful.
But her sharply angled face also makes her look kind of terrifying.
As she walks up to Kale’s side, him pulling on a different shirt now, he gives me this nervous look. And I just try to smile back. I don’t think I pull it off very well.
At first, they don’t even touch each other. They’re just in proximity of one another, looking stern and sexy, showing off their expensive clothes. They work the camera. Looking at it. Not looking at it.
But then they’re together.
Touching each other.
Her hand on the back of his neck. His hands low on her hips. Looking crazily intense into each other’s eyes. Looking like they want to rip each other’s clothes off.
And then Kale’s shirt is unbuttoned, and she’s posing like she’s pulling it off. His lips go to her neck, and he pulls at her shirt, dropping the neckline, and exposing her bra.
My breathing picks up, and angry scorpions start a war in my chest.
Then the shirts come all the way off. His and hers.
I feel only a small comfort that my boobs are bigger than hers. I’m a comfortable C and she’s barely a B with all that padding.
But still. Those are my boyfriend’s lips hovering over her chest. Those are my boyfriend’s hands on her ass. Those are my boyfriend’s jeans she’s unbuttoning. Those are my boyfriend’s lips she’s half a breath from kissing.
This. Sucks.
And it can’t get over soon enough.
This isn’t uncommon for Kale. He works for a company that makes clothing for men and women. And they certainly go for sex appeal. Many of their shoots get pretty scandalous, and I’ve seen sets where the woman has been topless with Kale. The only reason you don’t see the female model’s breasts is because they were covered with Kale’s hands.
The realization hits me. As long as the rest of the world drools over Kale McCain, I’m always going to have to share him.
And sharing sucks.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
There was no way I was going to try and seduce my boyfriend after seeing his hands all over another woman that day. Yes, I got that it didn’t mean anything to him, that it was just work. But still, my ego needed a day to recover.
By Wednesday, though, I’ve had enough. I get to come home for a few minutes after an interview before having to head out for another. When I walk through the door, Kale isn’t home, and for twenty seconds I get to be disappointed.
Then he walks through the door. He wears a work out shirt that exposes his currently muscle ripped arms. He’s sweaty and shiny.
But his eyes meet mine, and every hormone in me explodes.
He doesn’t even get to say a word. I rush across the living room, launching myself at him. My legs wrap around his hips. My fingers knot in his hair, pulling his head back so I could take his mouth however I want.
My heartbeat roars in my ears, and I have no doubt Kale could feel it pulse through every part of my body.
Kale pushes the door closed behind him and turns to pin my body against the wall. Which is amazing cause it’s all the harder he can press his hard body into me.
His hips grind into my center and all the nerve endings in me go into nuclear countdown.
My han
ds go for the hem of his shirt and I literally rip it in my haste to get it off him.
Kale breathes a curse into my neck. “I want you, Whitney,” he says as his muscles flex and twitch with desire.
And just as I’m about to tell him to take me, the front door opens and there’s Tony. Always interrupting Tony.
He swears and turns away from us. “Sorry, Miss Ford, but we have to leave now. We’re already running late.”
“Shit, Tony!” Kale yells as he lets me off the wall. “Don’t you know how to knock?”
“I will work on that, Mr. McCain.” He sounds chastised, but he’s also trying to suppress a laugh.
“We’re not finished,” I say to Kale, pointing at him as I follow Tony out the door.
As it closes behind us, I hear Kale yell behind it, “Hell yes!”
I probably sound like more of an idiot than I normally do. All I can think about is Kale and me and that amazing wall. I am on the edge of a sexual cliff, and I will blissfully let Kale push me off of it tonight.
This interview is taking forever. This dinner meeting is excruciating. This traffic driving home will kill me.
But then there’s our building. Here’s the elevator.
Tony and I walk down our hall. Finally, my hand closes on my doorknob. Tony always watches me until I go inside.
I give him one look, stern and serious. “You are not to under any circumstances disturb us until at least ten tomorrow morning. Got it? Unless someone is dead or dying, don’t you dare come in. Or let anyone else in.”
Tony’s smile is a small thing on his narrow lips. But he’s got mischief in his eyes and a bit of an eye roll.
Dumb, horny kids, that’s probably what he’s thinking. But what. Freaking. Ever.
“You got it,” he says in that low, rumbly voice. And he turns back for his own apartment.
And finally, finally, I open the door to our apartment.
Kale is sitting at the dining table, a jug of orange juice and some take out in front of him that is unopened. He was scrolling through his phone, but the second I shut the door, he looks over at me, his eyes uncertain but wide.
“You and me,” I say as I strip my jacket off and kick my shoes into a corner. “That bed. Right now.”
“You and me, angel,” he says as he leaps up from the chair, knocking it right over. We meet somewhere in the middle of the living room, and I don’t even remember my feet leaving the floor. My legs are suddenly just around his hips, my lips devouring his. As he walks us to the bedroom, he finds the hem of my shirt and yanks it up and over my head.
Our bedroom door slams open, pounding the wall and bouncing back at us to smack me on the rear end. Kale stumbles us forward, and tips the both of us right over onto the bed.
I kneel on it and start working with his belt. My fingers are shaking with excitement and it takes me far longer than I’d like.
“Oh my hell,” I say, still struggling with it. “Get this damn thing off!”
Kale chuckles and gets it undone in one second flat. And his pants hit the floor. He pushes my shoulders, sending me flat on my back.
Hooking his fingers into my vintage skirt, he slides it down over my thighs, over my ankles, and flings it into a corner.
“Damn, you drive me crazy, angel,” he whispers as he bends down and kisses my thigh. My fingers knot in his hair as he kisses his way up my leg. My back arches as he kisses across the front of my pink lace underwear and starts his way up my stomach. His tongue flicks into my bellybutton and a firework explodes in my lower belly.
Somewhere, off in the distance, one of our phones starts ringing.
My fingers move from his hair and to his shirt. Why he’s still wearing one is the world’s biggest mystery. But half a second later, it’s gone.
“I want you to take it tonight, Kale,” I breathe as his lips finally make their way up to my neck. Here I am, wearing only a bra and panties, quivering and ready to rip apart into explosions.
“This means everything, that you’re giving this to me,” Kale says. And the way he says it, there’s almost reverence in his voice. “I swear, you’re going to be my last first anything, ever.”
“Kale,” I breathe into his mouth.
With only two thin layers of fabric between us, Kale grinds his hips into mine, and I swear I’m going to lose my ever loving mind with the things that he does to me.
Kale kneels on the bed between my legs and pulls me up so we’re chest to chest. And with hands that are gentle, but shake in a way that surprises me, he unclasps my bra.
Nearly two months now. That’s how long we’ve been together. That’s how long I’ve needed to take things slow.
Kale doesn’t rush it. My bra falls between us, landing somewhere on the bed. But he holds me close, his kisses deep and searching. These kisses of his crush my soul into a million pieces and rearrange them into something that could never ever exist without him.
One of his hands slides down from the back of my neck, over my bare back, and slips into my underwear. A soft moan escapes my throat as one of our phones starts ringing again off in the distance.
“I love you, Whitney,” he says softly. “For the rest of forever, I’m going to love you.”
And as every hormone in me pushes me toward something fiery and grand, I feel the words build up inside of me.
I do love this man. I want to be with him for forever. I want to run away together and make love and never breathe without him. Me and Kale, for the rest of now, today, tomorrow.
“I lov—”
But as the words leave my mouth, there’s our door, once again, bursting open. And there’s Calvin.
“What the hell are you doing?” Kale bellows as he throws himself in front of me and I scramble for a pillow to cover myself up with. “Calvin? Get the hell out!”
“I’m sorry,” he says, not even effected by the sight of us both basically naked about to get it on. “But shut up and listen.” He’s holding his cell phone in one slightly shaking hand. “It’s Sage on the phone. It’s about your dad.”
“What?” Kale asks, all the fight in him seeping out.
“It’s not good,” Calvin breathes.
“Give me that,” Kale says, scrambling from the bed and yanking the phone from Calvin’s hands. “Sage? Yeah, what’s going on?”
Calvin looks over at me, and that expression in his eyes, I know this can’t be good. Calvin doesn’t display too many emotions, ever, but that haunted look, it makes emotion prick at the back of my eyes, and I don’t even know what’s going on.
Kale presses a hand into his eyes and his entire body tenses us. “How long have they known?” he asks. There’s a truck load of emotion swelling up in his voice. “How long does he have left?”
I can barely hear anything over the sound of my heart beating in my ears. And all I can think, over and over is, please no. Please no.
“Yeah,” Kale says as his voice cracks. “I’m on my way.”
The phone drops from Kale’s hand and clatters onto the floor.
Before it even hits the ground, a sob breaks from Kale’s chest. His arms come up to wrap around his head and his shoulders start shaking.
“I’m so sorry,” Calvin says as he grabs his phone. He pats Kale’s shoulder just once. And looking unsure of what to do, he turns and leaves.
I climb from the bed. My footsteps fall silent next to Kale’s uncontrolled cries as I walk to him. I wrap my arms around him, my bare breasts pressing into him. The second he feels me, he wraps his arms around me, burying his face in my neck, and continues to sob.
Not ten seconds later, Kale’s legs won’t hold him any longer. We sink to the ground, me holding Kale, and him crying in agony.
Robert McCain was diagnosed a week ago with stage four aggressive prostate cancer.
It’s spread everywhere.
He has less than a week to live.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Kale flies out two hours later. It’s late, and he won’t get into
Seattle until one in the morning, but he’ll get there as fast as he possibly can.
I spend an hour on the phone fighting with Hadley and Elysium. Kale needs me. I need to be with him.
But they have me solidly booked and lined up for the next five days. The soonest I can leave is Tuesday.
“I will be there the second I can,” I say through tears as Tony and I drop Kale off at the airport.
Kale gives me a distracted kiss and a “yeah” before he barrels out of the car and into the airport. And as I watch him go, I feel as if there’s a little piece of my soul that is splitting in two.
Damn interviews. Damn publicity shoots. Damn entertainment news.
Damn crowds outside my apartment at all times.
The next five days are agony. And every day, I pray that it won’t be too late before I get there.
Kale doesn’t call, and I doubt he’d be able to say much if he got on the phone. But I get a text or two from him every day. Robert is in the hospital. But he’s fading fast. They’re making arrangements for him to be taken home on Monday.
Which means they’re preparing for him to die. So he can pass away at home, surrounded by his family.
Drake or Kaylee call me occasionally. I ask how everyone is doing. It’s not good. No one is handling this well. It’s all so sudden. No one was prepared for it. And Kale? They say he won’t leave Robert’s side. He’s not eating much of anything. Won’t hardly talk. He’s not doing well.
Those five days kill me. None of this music industry stuff matters. It’s all crap and it has nothing to do with the real world and those you love. I need to be there with him.
Finally.
Finally, Tuesday morning, a private jet flies me to Seattle. Tony drives me to Kale’s hometown, Woodinville. We pull up to the curb. And then I just sit there.
There’s Sage’s BMW outside. Drake and Kaylee’s SUV. The garage is open and inside is a dated minivan. And just behind it is Kale’s Range Rover.
I pull out my phone and text Kaylee. Are you sure it’s okay that I come? I know I’m not part of the family. I don’t want to impose.