by Elise Faber
Pierce snorted.
“I know, I know,” I said. “My control freak tendencies are strong. But it backfired, because the one week I was home that month, I didn’t even get to sleep in my own bed.”
Kate laughed then bent to stroke her fingers across the wide, hand-scraped, gray plank. “Well, hotel or not, it was well worth it.”
“True,” I said, then swept a hand toward my kitchen. “Can I get you guys something to drink? A popsicle for Thomas?”
Thomas’s eyes perked up, and he nodded jerkily from his position at his mom’s side. “I think that’s a yes,” Kate said, smiling. “I’d love a water, too, if you don’t mind, Artie. Corralling these boys is hard work.”
Thomas nodded again. “I’m a terror,” he announced proudly.
“Well,” I said, smothering a laugh at his child honesty, “Mr. Terror, do you want to walk with me so you can pick out your popsicle?” I asked. “I also don’t think you finished telling me about T-rexes.”
He considered that. “Okay,” he said, and he walked over to take my hand, his shyness of being in a new place fading in the face of popsicles and dinosaur talk.
“Did you know that T-rexes had really bad breath?”
I shook my head solemnly. “No, I did not know that,” I said, leading us into the kitchen and opening up the freezer.
Thomas’s eyes widened.
Pierce whistled.
“I have an unhealthy obsession with popsicles,” I said, feeling suddenly self-conscious. It was the truth, though. I love them. The sugarier and more dye-filled, the better.
“I wish I could eat those and have an ass like yours,” Kate said enviously.
“The key is not caring what your ass looks like,” I said, then made a face, adding in a teasing tone. “Well, that and not having kids.”
She laughed, went along with my joke. “That’s true. They do ruin everything.”
I held up a box of popsicles. “So what’s your poison? Strawberry? Cherry? Grape? Or will you live on the edge and go for green apple?”
Kate hesitated then shrugged. “Why not? I’ll take strawberry.”
I handed her strawberry. “Thomas?”
“Cherry!”
I handed him cherry.
“Pierce?”
Silence.
I glanced up at him, saw that the smolder from almost six years before had made a reappearance. My mouth went dry, my thighs trembled, and—
“Here, honey, come over to the sink so I can help you with the wrapper,” Kate murmured, and my gaze flew to her and Thomas walking away from the freezer.
“Strawberry.”
I gulped.
How in the hell had the man made that sound sexy?
Oh, probably because he was burning me to cinders with his gaze.
I reached into the box, pulling out a strawberry popsicle and holding it out. Pierce took it, but slowly, his fingers drifting down the inside of my wrist and making me shiver.
“Thanks, sweetheart.”
Another shiver, barely able to nod at Kate when she asked if it was okay to take Thomas onto the back porch, so he didn’t drip on the floor.
Pierce was close.
Near enough that I could scent him, and that paired with him being in my house, just inches from me, so close that all my senses—touch, smell, taste, sight, hearing—were all on high alert, made my brain haze over.
My fingertips ached to run over his chest, to explore the abs I’d spent an evening kissing my way across.
My nose was filled with the spicy maleness of his scent.
My ears were filled with the pounding of my heartbeat.
My eyes traced up and down his body, reminding my mind how good it had been to be in his arms, to cuddle close and be held like I was important.
My mouth watered to taste his.
I licked my lips. Pierce’s head dropped so I could feel his hot breath puffing against them.
His vulnerability at the awards ceremony the previous year had lifted the bandage covering my need for him, had made me yearn to see him happy and fulfilled, even if it wasn’t with me.
The past nine months of planning the film had nudged that Band-Aid further, had made me wish when he found his happy and content it could be me, even while knowing that was impossible.
Scotland had prodded the bandage even more, overwhelming me with yearning, all while knowing it could not be.
And last night . . .
Well, last night, the bandage had disappeared.
I was flayed open and vulnerable. I wanted him, wanted more of how he made me feel special and included, more of his wonderful, teasing family.
It could not be.
Sighing and wondering why the mental statement gave me all sorts of Gandalf the Gray vibes from Lord of the Rings (“You shall not pass!”), I pushed the memory of my night with Pierce from my mind.
He was here for pictures. That was it.
But then he cupped my cheek, murmured, “Artie.”
I reached into the box, grabbed a popsicle at random, and whipped around to shove the remaining ice pops back in the freezer. It took me several tries to shove the box back in and close the door, probably crumpling it to hell and breaking them into tiny unsatisfying pieces, but in the end, I did manage to stow everything safely in the freezer.
Too bad I couldn’t fit.
If so, I could avoid what was coming next.
“She’s right.”
My forehead was resting against the cool metal when I asked, “Who’s right?”
“Kate.”
I tilted my head to the side, peered back at him over my shoulder. He’d returned to leaning back against the island, one ankle crossed over the other. I turned so my forehead was against the cool metal of the fridge again and asked, “About what?”
“Your ass is fantastic.”
Heat. One minute I was feeling totally fine—okay, lie, because I was definitely off-kilter. But one second, I was pulling the strands of my self-control together, shoring up my spine to do the right thing, and the next I was in flames. Desire pooled in my stomach, spreading out to my limbs, making my fingers tremble and almost dropping the popsicle, right along with my restraint.
Pierce recognized that and took the former from me, setting both of them on the counter before coming back and standing very close. His front was a hairsbreadth away from my spine, the heat radiating off him and seeping through the cotton of my shirt, warming my skin.
I spun to face him.
My willpower at resisting him was shredded simply by that proximity, by the way he stared down at me.
Need reflected back.
And softness.
That was the most dangerous. The softness.
I shook my head, attempting to clear it. “We can’t—”
“Tell me you don’t feel it,” he murmured, running his fingers lightly down my cheek, along my jaw. “Tell me you haven’t spent the last six years fighting whatever draw there is between us.”
“Pierce—” I shook my head again. “We shouldn’t—”
“Shouldn’t keep ignoring it,” he said, head dropping, lips trailing along the same path. “In that, I am in complete agreement.”
Gooseflesh erupted on my arms, my nape.
My hand lifted, to push him away, to tug him nearer. I wasn’t sure. “T-that’s not what I meant. Things are too complicated—”
“Because of the movie?” he asked, and I nodded, panic curling in my insides, desperation building, and out-pacing desire for the moment. I took a step forward, forcing Pierce to take a step back or our bodies would collide.
I wasn’t sure which option I wanted.
Fuck, who was I kidding? My body wanted to be pressed to his. It was my brain that was having a hard time keeping up.
The organ took the opportunity to grab on to any excuse to stop this before it went too far. “We can’t jeopardize the movie. It’s too important to both of us, and if we act on this and it goes wrong . . .”
We hadn’t crossed that point of no return.
If we did—
“You told me you wouldn’t be around much for actual filming,” he said, and my gut sank, remembering the conversation we’d had a few nights after I’d fled Scotland. It wasn’t like I planned to just drop everything to do with the project, but a lot of my initial legwork was done. I could review the dailies from anywhere, and God knew I had plenty of other work to fill the rest of my time. I’d used that excuse to create distance and . . .
Well, it was backfiring now, since he was using my reasoning against me.
Smart man. Infuriating man.
He settled his hands on my shoulders, massaging lightly. “This seems like as good a time as any to see what we could be, sweetheart,” he murmured. “We’ll have some time together, but it’ll be limited because we’re both going to our separate locations, because our work hours will be long and intense. So that time will be tempered, by the distance and the hours. It’ll force us to take things slow, to get to know each other.”
I shook my head.
Not because I necessarily thought he was wrong. Mostly, I shook it because I was trying to knock the argument from my mind. He was making sense, being reasonable . . .
And, fuck, I liked him.
I’d never liked a man this much before.
Never felt this connection or yearning or—he shifted so his hips brushed lightly against mine, making my nerves explode with sensation—temptation.
Yes. That was the word.
I lived my life in temporaries because I’d lived through my permanence being torn to shreds. I knew that stability could be a false façade, that everything could be ripped away in a moment’s notice.
Temporary was safe.
I didn’t get attached, and I could leave when things got dicey.
I wouldn’t get hurt.
Pierce could hurt me. He could absolutely devastate me. Just the thought of giving in and then losing him in the end was absolutely terrifying.
I couldn’t—I couldn’t do this, risk everything . . . I just couldn’t.
Twelve
Pierce
She was going to say no.
Of course, she was.
This was too much too soon.
The plan was to have Kate and Thomas come with me to deliver the pictures I could have easily emailed, to use Thomas’s utter adorableness to convince Artie to come to Disneyland with us. To sugar her up, coax her on a few rides, get her out on a date that she didn’t realize was a date.
But then I’d gotten close.
And I’d not played it cool.
Marie was going to smack me around.
My internal dialogue wasn’t serious, of course, but the words still clued me in, as though a hand had struck my brain. Smack. Me. Around.
Fuck.
I got it.
I knew the story. Everyone in this town did. Artie’s mom and dad, Ben and Tawny Miller, had been B-list celebrities, stars of several failed sitcoms, one successful soap, and had raised Artie in the film world. That wasn’t particularly uncommon in L.A. Neither was the fact that Ben had been abusive to Tawny—and apparently to Artie as well, though that wasn’t common knowledge in any narrative I’d ever heard. The salacious and gossip-inducing part came when Artie’s dad had been caught by the paparazzi, punching and kicking her mom, leaving Tawny bruised and bloodied and surrounded by camera flashes before fleeing in their car.
He’d somehow avoided arrest and made it over the border to Canada.
That was just one shitty piece of the whole horrible scenario, because life had gotten worse for Artie. First, her mom had begun mailing cash to her husband, supplying Ben with enough money to live comfortably north of the border, even at the expense of Artie’s and her own well-being.
Then Tawny had packed up their house, sold their belongings, and followed Artie’s dad to Canada.
Story had it that Ben would have continued to avoid detection if he hadn’t gotten cocky and attempted to attend a fan event for the soap, needing or wanting the attention, and drawing altogether too much of the wrong sort from the Washington State Patrol when he’d been joyriding on his way home.
He’d been picked up, booked, and shipped back to California to face prosecution by the District Attorney.
With Tawny at his side.
Along with Artie being dragged back into the drama.
So, no wonder she was gun shy about possibly pursuing a relationship. She needed to be coaxed, gentled, tugged along.
Not hit over the head with my desire.
Fuck.
She shook her head. “I’m—”
“It’s okay,” I murmured, knowing I needed to employ a tactical retreat, to not push too hard so I could coax on another day. “I understand, sweetheart.” I placed the pretty much useless flash drive on the counter next to the popsicles. “I’ll go—”
Her hand on my arm stopped me.
“No.”
If this had been one of my films, the camera would have focused on her fingers circling my bicep, the slight sheen on her pale pink nails glittering in the overhead lights, the clunky gold ring she wore on her thumb sparkling, then it would have cut to my face, captured my jaw tightening, my eyes widening with hope, the way my breath froze on my lips.
Slowly, it would have panned back to frame us both.
The way my body rotated toward hers, how she drifted closer, that hand sliding up to rest on my shoulder. And I sure as shit would have caught the shudder wracking her frame, the way we subconsciously leaned toward each other.
“You say you know,” she said, chin dropping forward so it rested on her chest. “But how could you possibly?”
I didn’t reply, instinct telling me that my words weren’t needed at that moment.
Hers were the ones that mattered.
She glanced up, and every muscle in my body locked.
“No one—” A shake of her head. “That’s not fair,” she murmured. “Plenty of other people have endured worse abuse than I went through. Perhaps not on such a public scale, but aside from the fact that my pain was tabloid fodder, my story isn’t that unique.”
“It’s yours,” I said. “And your pain isn’t discounted just because someone else might have suffered more. You’re allowed to be hurt. You’re allowed to have whatever feelings about your past that you do, and you don’t have to justify them to me or the world.” I covered her hand with mine. “You answer to yourself, Artie. Not me. Not the press. Not the world.”
She huffed out a breath, dropped her forehead to my shoulder. “Several of my financers would strongly disagree with you.”
I chuckled. “Probably. But you also know that I’m talking emotions, not electronic funds transfers.”
Her lips moved against my shirt. “For some of them, that’s one and the same.”
“True.” My fingers wove into her ponytail, slid gently through the silky strands as we stood there, her barriers not quite down enough for me to feel comfortable yanking her against my chest and slamming my mouth down on hers, caveman style. But the barriers had retracted a hairsbreadth, and so I just stayed in place, stroking her hair, letting her know I was there, I was listening.
“If you know the story,” she murmured, “then you probably know all the gory public versions. The video of the beating circulated widely on news outlets.” Her eyes came up to meet mine. “Did you know someone put it on YouTube right before the premiere of Last Night Out? Lucky me, it got one hundred and sixty million views before YouTube pulled it down.”
Fucking people.
She shook her head. “If one of our trailers had gotten that many, I’d be thrilled.” A sigh. “A video about my painful past? Not ideal.”
“Artie.”
Her fingers squeezed lightly on my shoulder. “Just let me finish, okay?”
I clenched my jaw, shut the fuck up, and nodded.
“I didn’t change my name because my face was out there, because I knew I cou
ldn’t hide from my past, that it would always creep in and find me.” She swallowed. “I had already been in some film and television roles while my parents were working, and after my dad went to jail, I had to keep taking them. Mostly because my mom was all but blacklisted and if I hadn’t taken them, her job at the department store wouldn’t have been enough for us to live on.” She shook her head. “But those producers and directors didn’t want me. They wanted the sad, beautiful little girl to help propel their story or show into the news.”
“That’s fucked up.”
“It’s the business,” she said. “It’s my life. It’s why I can be successful and still have tabloid articles written about my parents. It’s why my mom committing suicide was a top news story, why those clips are constantly put up on YouTube. It’s painful and horrible and . . . it’s my life.”
From my limited experience as a white male director, I understood how vicious this life could be, but I guess what I didn’t understand was why she didn’t just leave it all behind.
Her free hand covered mine at the back of her head, loosening it from the strands as she put some distance between us.
Distance I really fucking hated.
“I’ve seen that look before,” she murmured. “You’re wondering why I didn’t just sell anything of value and get the fuck out of Hollywood when I turned eighteen.” Her thumb brushed across my knuckles. “It’s all I know, Pierce. But more than that, it’s what I love.”
I sucked in a breath, released it slowly. “And you’re really good at it.”
Artie’s smile hit me right in the gut. “Of course, I am.”
“And modest, too,” I teased.
“Yup,” she agreed, before her smile faded. “You need to know that I did leave the life for a few years, right after my mom died. My dad had just gotten out of prison, my mom was gone. I couldn’t take a reality where she wasn’t around, but he was.”
“Doesn’t it make you mad that she—” I cut myself off, realizing that wasn’t a fair question to ask when Artie clearly cared about her mother.
“That she killed herself? Or that she uprooted my life to stay with my abusive father?” Her thumb continued its tracing. “Ask your questions, Pierce. God knows, I’ve been in this city long enough to have been asked everything. Yes, I was furious that she killed herself and left me alone with my father. Yes, I thought she was weak for a long time—both for that and for staying with my dad.”