Within This Frame

by Zart, Lindy

  “Hey. Hi. Hello.” She chewed on her lower lip and tried to smile. “Who are you?”

  “Who are you?” he shot back. Lance’s character was angry at the world, but especially at his father for relocating them. He decided to be angry at the unknown girl too, just because she was near him and seemed easy to intimidate.

  “Cecilia Monroe. I live here.”

  “I gathered that. Derek Ryan. My dad and I are moving in next door.” He jerked his head in the direction of their pretend house. “He says you have the key.”

  Her mouth pursed. “No. I don’t have a key.”

  Lance rubbed the back of his neck. “Are your parents home?”

  Looking confused, she answered, “Yes. But I won’t have the key whether they’re home or not.”

  A few chuckles rang out at how well Maggie played the clueless girl.

  Exasperation interlaced his words as he said, “Look, we have a U-Haul out back full of stuff and my dad’s waiting for me to bring him the key. The landlord said someone at this house is supposed to know where it is. Can you see if either of your parents have it?”

  “Sure.” Maggie turned and walked up to the door.

  Once there, she whirled around to face him, the bottom of her dress slowly following the motion of her hips. The look on her face grabbed Lance’s throat and squeezed. Hope was etched into her raised eyebrows, shyness reddened her cheeks, and the way her eyes sparkled with friendliness made it hard for him to swallow.

  It’s not real. It’s just an act. This girl is a character. Cecilia Monroe does not exist.

  “Would you like to come in? I made cookies and lemonade this morning. There’s nothing better than cookies and lemonade on a day like today.”

  Lance’s eyes dropped. In his interpretation of Derek, his mom used to make cookies every Sunday and he’d have a tall glass of milk with the treat. His dad would steal a few and go back to work on his novel in the den. It was also a frequent scene Lance imagined in his version of a perfect world. The unnecessary kindness a stranger showed a jaded boy unraveled something tight inside Derek.

  He looked up and offered a small smile. “I’d like that.”

  “Acceptable!” was the immediate shout from Herman. He hurried to Lance and clapped his shoulder, bringing the scent of onions and garlic with him. “Not bad, Denton. Maggie, you were brilliant.” He divided his gaze between the teenagers. “Think you can do it again, but better, and with the camera rolling? Of course you can! Let’s go!”

  Maggie caught his eye roll and smiled. “He’s ferocious, isn’t he?”

  “Like a pit bull,” Lance agreed.

  MAGGIE—2010

  THE DOORBELL RANG in three quick successions.

  Maggie sprang into a sitting position and wildly eyed her surroundings before she realized what was going on: she had been asleep, in her bed, until some jerk decided to wake her up. She put a hand to her matted hair, brushing wayward strands from her eyes, and heaved herself from the bed. Grabbing the robe from the settee, she slid her arms through the sleeves and knotted the tie at her waist.

  A glance at the clock on the wall told her it was seven in the morning. With a groan, she clomped down the stairs to the foyer. A normal day got her out of bed around eight, sometimes nine. Seven in the morning was a number she rarely saw on the clock.

  “This better be important,” Maggie mumbled to herself as she swung open the door.

  She met dark blue eyes and a taunting smile, felt her heart explode in her chest, and immediately slammed the door shut. Maggie then spun around to rest her back against it so she didn’t crumple to the floor. She knew those eyes, that mouth. She’d been intimately acquainted with the man to whom they belonged. It had been years since she’d seen him in person, but he hadn’t changed that much. If anything, he looked better, which was unfair.

  Maggie splayed her palms against the cool wood of the door and counted to thirty as she told herself to not freak out. She hallucinated him. He wasn’t really there. Too much late night sugar was getting to not only her body, but her head as well.

  It was time to stop that shit.

  The doorbell rang again. Maggie covered her face and groaned. He was really there. Her chest was tight and each lungful of air she sucked in was painful. Lifting a hand, Maggie stared at the way it trembled. She had on no makeup, her hair was a nest. She weighed a lot more than the last time she’d seen him and she had on a pink and yellow cat-print robe.

  When she didn’t budge, the knocks began. Firm, consistent thumps that sounded every ten seconds.

  Why is he here? He has no reason to be here. Ever.

  Just get it over with. Let him laugh and say whatever it is he has to say, and then he’ll go away.

  Fear bunched her stomach in knots, told her she was deluding herself. Well, why not? She was good at it.

  Maggie took the doorknob within her hand and carefully turned it, hoping he would magically be gone once the door was fully opened. She could deal with insanity, but Lance Denton, not so much. She looked up and deflated against the doorframe. He was still there, still smiling, still too good-looking. His gaze was piercing, locked on her in a way that made her insides twist.

  “Why are you here?” Maggie considered herself a nice person, normally, but if anyone could change that with their presence, it was the guy who stood on her doorstep.

  “You asked for me.”

  She snorted. “Pretty sure you’re the last person I would ask for.”

  “Wasn’t I?” His tone went quietly seductive, laser eyes zapping her with their heat.

  Maggie tried to swallow and found that function no longer available to her. His eyes traveled up and down her frame, mockery clear in them as they stopped on hers. Lance’s facial features were sharper than she recalled, and the stubble along his jaw was new as well. She knew he was judging her appearance, him with his super fit body and her with her unfit one. Well, she was judging too. Sadly, she couldn’t come up with any needed improvements on his end.

  “Why are you here? Remember that time, long, long ago, when we decided we wouldn’t see each other again?”

  He cocked his dark head and looked deep in thought. “Was that what we decided? I thought it was you deciding you despised the very air I breathed, and couldn’t stand the thought of sharing such a thing with me anymore.”

  “Well, I couldn’t maim you, so the logical alternative was to never see you again,” she said sweetly. Fire scorched her veins and heated her skin. The last time Maggie had seen Lance, she’d told him she hated him and never wanted to speak to him again.

  “Oh, but you did,” Lance whispered, seeming closer and yet not moving an inch.

  “Did . . . what?” she choked, reeling from the fact that Lance Denton stood before her, looking at her, talking to her. Being.

  “Maim me—right here, right where it counts the most.” He patted his chest, expression mocking even as his eyes were indecipherable.

  Maggie’s eyes narrowed. “I doubt it.”

  The somberness cleared from his face and amusement simultaneously put stars in his eyes and lightened them. “You would.”

  “Fun time is over. You came, you saw, you laughed. Now go.” She pointed a finger over his shoulder and hoped he’d move in the direction it faced.

  “Don’t you want to know why I’m here?”

  “Not really.”

  Instead of leaving, he straightened and posed in a way that showed off his toned upper half through the yellow shirt he wore. “You probably already know this, but along with being superbly talented as an actor and model, I’m a trained fitness expert, personal trainer, and nutritionist.”

  He flexed a bicep and looked from it to her face. He rotated his shoulders, showed her his profile, and winked. “Your sister’s gym called me yesterday and told me you were in need of someone of my expertise.”

  Maggie’s throat went dry, and then her mouth, and then her eyes.

  “Obviously I can’t refuse a cry for he
lp from Cecilia Monroe. What would fans think of Derek Ryan if I did?” He stopped preening long enough to look at her in a way that meant she should understand what he was saying.

  “The same thing they thought before—that you’re a selfish, egotistical, narcissistic ass.”

  “Ouch.” With a sigh, Lance dropped his arms. “You do know I’m a fitness expert, right?”At her dubious look, he said, “Oh, come on, you had to have seen some of my promotional stuff on TV.”

  “Whenever I have the misfortune to catch a glimpse of your face on TV, I change the channel.”

  “Must do a lot of channel surfing then.”

  “I’m closing the door now. There is no way I’m working with you. I’d rather work with my sister.” Maggie shuddered and moved to push the door shut, but Lance quickly put up his hand to stop it. She met his eyes. “Let go.”

  “No,” he said cheerfully.

  A scowl took over her mouth and she shoved harder, but Lance was an unmovable wall, and the door merely inched forward. His expression said it all: See? You’re a pudgy wimp. You need me to make you strong, and hopefully get you slimmed down as well, if we can keep the doughnuts out of your hands. With an angry exhalation of air, Maggie stepped back quickly and Lance stumbled into the entryway. He shot upright and gave her a look, smoothing black locks that didn’t need it.

  He looked around the space. “You go for the old look, huh?”

  “It’s not old. It’s antiquated,” she corrected, crossing her arms when she remembered she didn’t have on a bra and his eyes liked to wander.

  “Whatever you say.” He paused. “Show me around.”

  “No!” The word was loud and violently executed, and the look he aimed her way hinted that he wondered at her mental stability.

  Maggie sucked in a sharp breath that was meant to be calming, and blew it out with excessive force. It didn’t calm her down. “I’m not showing you my house. I’m not hiring you. I’ll find someone else.”

  “There is no one else. That’s why I was called. I’m sort of all you got.”

  “Now, wouldn’t that be a horrible, horrible predicament in which to find oneself, having to rely on you for anything of importance.”

  Lance rubbed his jaw. “I don’t remember you being this feisty when we were younger.”

  “That’s because I didn’t know enough to stay away from you.”

  He didn’t move, but the way he looked at her took all the space between them and crushed it. “You knew.”

  Maggie swallowed. She couldn’t refute that. She had known what Lance Denton was like, from the very first day of their acquaintance, but it hadn’t mattered enough to keep her away. She couldn’t stay away—he was ablaze with life and danger and rawness and she was pulled to him, wanting to dance along the shadows of his presence.

  “And if you didn’t, I warned you.”

  Another truth. It was time to move on.

  “What do you get out of this, other than my humiliation?”

  “Money?”

  She snorted. “You have to have loads of that lying around. I’m sure you wash your body and brush your teeth with it. Wipe your butt . . .”

  Lance didn’t answer, giving her a look.

  Maggie glanced down at his bare ring finger. “Aren’t you supposed to be in England or Australia or whatever foreign country you inhabit with your wife and daughter during the winter and spring months?”

  His smile evaporated. It was interesting how dark his face went. “Recently divorced.”

  She’d known that. “Oh. Is that why you’re here? I thought you lived in Florida part of the time.”

  “I did.”

  Lance’s abrupt tone let Maggie know she’d hit a nerve. She decided to torture it a little bit. “Why are you in Iowa then?”

  “Don’t you know, Maggie?” he whispered, voice and eyes beseeching. He lifted a finger and trailed it along her jaw, tingles following his touch. “You.”

  She swallowed, struck speechless. Shaking her head, she got her wits back in order and glared at him. “You’re good,” she said grudgingly.

  Lance flashed a sinister smile. “I’m better than good, and you know it.” His eyes dared her to say otherwise.

  “You didn’t answer me—why are you in Iowa?”

  “I did answer you.” He glanced at her as he walked farther into the room. “You.”

  As she tried to steady a pulse that was presently erratic, Lance moved for the alabaster and wood staircase. He took one step and something snapped inside her. It didn’t even make sense—she just knew he could not go upstairs. That was her home, her life, and he was not allowed to enter it as he pleased and make it a mess by putting his Lance Denton figurative lips all over it.

  Maggie lunged for him, tackling him around the waist and swinging him around with her weight. They both landed on the hard floor, but he was gentlemanly enough to spin them so he took the brunt of it. He hit the wood with his back. Maggie was draped over him, still as stone as air forcefully left him in a painful rush.

  They lay like that for some time, neither feeling the need to move. Maggie, because she was appalled by her behavior and their current physicality, and Lance, she assumed, because he was having a hard time breathing. As the seconds turned into minutes, it started to get awkward—or more awkward.

  Lance’s tone was conversational as he asked, “You’re not wearing a bra, are you?”

  Maggie began to take note of things. The hardness of his chest, the boniness of his hip as it dug into her abdomen, how close her face was to his neck—how well her breasts molded to his shoulder and arm, and the fact that she was feeling a draft in a place she rather would not be feeling one.

  “Shit!” She scrambled back and spun away as she tucked a boob back within the confines of the tank top she wore under the robe. Then, brave person that she was, she sprinted up the stairs, dove into her room, and flipped the lock on the door.

  Chest heaving, blood burned through her veins as her heart thundered out a fast beat. Maggie took quick, shallow breaths, but all that did was make her need more air. She would stay in her room, wait him out. They had too much history, too much pain between the two of them, to be anything but strangers. He would leave eventually. He’d get bored, or hungry, or realize it was futile to think she’d ever hire him on as her personal trainer.

  Maggie nodded to herself. Right. That was exactly how things would go.

  That settled, she sat on the bed and listened for the front door to shut, a clear signal that he had left the premises. Instead she cocked her head as a faint, scratching sound met her ears. Not owning a pet of any kind, that puzzled her. She moved for the door, reaching for the doorknob just as it powerfully swung open and smacked against her forehead.

  “Ow!” Maggie stumbled back and careened to the left, hand held to her stinging flesh.

  “Oh. Whoops.” Lance stood with his hand raised, bobby pin within it. He tossed it over his shoulder and stepped inside. “Nice room.”

  Maggie’s voice sounded like gravel as she said, “First of all, why are you carrying around a bobby pin?”

  Lance blinked at her. “How else was I going to open the door you so rudely locked?”

  “It’s my bedroom,” she shouted, a slice of sanity sliding away. “I could have been naked!”

  His eyes went up and down the length of her, lingering on her breasts as a smile skipped along his lips. “Don’t tease. It’s unkind.”

  Palm to her head, she seethed at the man standing in her bedroom. “Get . . . out . . . of . . . my . . . house.”

  He moved to sit on the bed, bouncing up and down a few times before looking at her. “You need me.”

  “I need you like I need—”

  “Watch it. You might regret what you say and then you can’t take it back.” He reclined on the bed with his hands behind his head.

  “I doubt I’d want to take it back.”

  “I like your bed. It’s comfy.” Lance jumped to his feet like a spr
ing and clapped his hands together once. “So . . . where’s my room?”

  Maggie gaped at him, hand falling limply to her side.

  “Downstairs, down the hall? Guest house? I see my physical perfection has you speechless.” Shrugging, he said, “That’s okay, I’ll find it.”

  When Lance reached her, her hand shot out and slammed against his chest.

  He looked down. “If you want excuses to fondle me, I could think of better ways to go about it.”

  She snatched her hand back. “You’re not staying here, you’re not working for me. And if you don’t leave now, I’m calling the police.”

  His eyes narrowed. “You would do that?”

  Maggie’s resolution wavered. “Yes.”

  “What about the scandal it would cause?”

  “No one would have to find out.” They could find out, easily.

  “Well, they would, with me telling them and all.”

  “Are you . . . are you . . . blackmailing me?” Anger had her sputtering.

  “Of course not. Not unless I have to,” he added.

  “Why are you so adamant about this?”

  “You need a trainer, I need a job. I don’t see the problem.”

  “Except we used to date and I would rather scratch out my own eyes than have you as a personal trainer.”

  “Such harsh words, Maggie.” Lance’s expression turned serious. “Okay, look at it this way—do you want me to help you or do you want your sister? Because there isn’t anyone else. I’m it. She was ready to call you and tell you when I got back to her and said I’d take the job. I know you two don’t get along,” he continued. “I remember.”

  “That was years ago,” she hissed. “She’s changed. I’ve changed.” Lies. All of it.

  “Sure.” Lance didn’t sound convinced.

  Maggie thought of her food and exercise obsessed, self-absorbed, judgmental sister, and then she turned her gaze to Lance Denton. The man who had once been the boy who had her heart and didn’t want it enough. Neither was ideal. He was slightly better—very slightly.