The Private Rehearsal (Caught Up In Love: The Swoony New Reboot of the Contemporary Romance Series Book 4)

by Lauren Blakely

  The kind that leaves me with a buzz when I break the kiss and step back. I blink in the harsh light, trying to reorient myself. St. James Theater? Yes. Done with my audition? Yes. Desperate to get where I can unpack some of this? Hell, yes.

  I blurt the compulsory, “Thank you for your time,” and dash offstage, where I slam into Alexis Carbone—all bleached blonde hair, bosoms, and pipes like nobody’s business.

  She’s a certifiable star, so I guess the next thing I can kiss is this role goodbye.

  “Watch where you’re going!” Alexis has a sweet soprano voice, so pure and lovely I almost think she means “Take care you don’t hurt yourself,” instead of “Walk where you want as long as it’s nowhere near me.” Still dazed from the kiss to end all kisses, I mutter a quick, “I’m sorry,” and edge past her in the wings. Or try.

  “I’m sure you are,” she says as she tugs down her jacket and makes sure her breasts look good. They do. “Too bad, your being scheduled just before A-List arrives. Must be so disappointing.”

  That stings. “I’m sorry—Yes, you are,” is grade-school level burn, but I am one raw nerve after laying it all out there on the stage. And what have I ever done to her? I know not to take the bait, but in a breathy, ingenue voice, heavy on the Southern Belle, I gush, “But it’s such a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Carbone. I’ve been a fan of yours since I was in high school.” I twinkle at her, chirrup, “Break a leg!” then split backstage before she can completely ruin my Patrick Carlson buzz.

  I head past the dressing rooms, exchanging friendly goodbyes with a stagehand wheeling a dolly in the cramped hallway. At the stage door, I push it open and step into the alleyway behind the theater.

  A snap of cold air greets me, and I lean against the brick wall, drop my bag, and run a finger across my lips as if I can reactivate that kiss like a loop of a hologram. Closing my eyes, I replay everything—Patrick’s breath, so soft. The slightest bit of stubble on his jawline. The way he tasted faintly of cinnamon.

  Even staged, kissing the real man is so much more potent than anything I imagined as a seventeen-year-old, when he was Fiyero. How is that for a theater geek, dreaming of kisses from a stage actor?

  Now I’ve sampled the real thing, and I want to hold on to the details. Not many men could outclass an idealized version of themselves.

  Sharing the stage with the actual Patrick Carlson couldn’t make me want this part any more than I already do. It’s a terrific role. A dramatic, marvelous, career-making role. Acting with someone I admired—mostly just professionally—would be a bonus, though.

  Now I need to get on with my day before anyone calls the NYPD about the crazy stalker actress outside the theater.

  I’m meeting my friend Reeve nearby, at Bryant Park. He’s an actor too, and when I get there, he’s lounging at one of the metal tables, reading the script for the movie he’s working on. He has his girlfriend’s dog with him. The little brown and tan Chihuahua/Min Pin curls up in his lap. It’s adorable how when Reeve fell hard for Sutton, he fell for her dog too.

  He puts the dog on the ground and the pages on the table, then stands and holds out his arms with a wide, expectant grin. “So, do we have a reason to celebrate? Are you the new ingénue of old Broadway?”

  When I start to tell him, reality comes crashing down. Alexis was right—there was no point in hoping after she showed up, and yes, it was damned disappointing after I’d nailed that audition scene. “I highly doubt it,” I tell Reeve. “Alexis Carbone showed up right after me.”

  He makes a face as if I just breathed last night’s onions on him. “Can I hope that Ava has an evil sister and they want Alexis for that role?”

  “Ha. I wish.” I lean my hip against the table, shoulders slumping. The high of performing—not to mention the stage kiss—is dropping off fast. “But you know it’s going to be her. She has an insane following. Her fans love her and would line up for blocks to see her.”

  “Yeah, but you never know.” Reeve nudges me with his elbow. “Every star was the new kid once. Even Alexis Carbone.”

  But already there’s a hitch in my throat and the sting of tears. I don’t want to cry over a role, but I worked so hard on this audition and it felt like the chance of a lifetime. “I felt so thoroughly Ava, almost as if the character had possessed me. I swear I could read it on the director’s face too, even after my first piece. He stood up and I could have sworn he was going to say, ‘You’re it. You’re my Ava.’ And then she walked in.”

  “Hey . . .” He pulls me in for a quick hug, and I let one more tear fall against his shirt as he pats my hair. “Sometimes you nail an audition and lose out. Sometimes you flub one and still get a role. You never know. The only thing you can do is leave it all on the stage, and I know you did. You’ve never given less than a hundred percent of your heart and soul in any rehearsal, let alone a performance.”

  I grab a deep, steadying breath and nod, then I rummage in my purse for a tissue to swipe the errant tears on my face.

  “C’mon. Let me buy you a coffee,” he says, bumping my shoulder with his.

  “Sure.” I let myself be cajoled. “Since you’re the big-time film actor now.”

  “From your mouth to God’s ears.” He’s just landed his first starring role, and being Reeve, he’s not even obnoxious about it. He leashes the dog, and we wander over to a pretzel vendor who’s hawking espressos, lattes, and coffees too, and order some hot beverages to stay warm on this chilly day. I try to stay upbeat, even though I’m braced for the “Better luck next time” call from my agent.

  Reeve breaks off a piece of the pretzel for the dog, who stands on his tiny back legs to snag the bite.

  “Are you a full-time dog nanny for the Artful Dodger now?”

  Reeve laughs. “What can I say? He’s kind of an awesome dog, so I like hanging out with him. And it makes Sutton happy to know he’s with me.”

  “You’re so in love with her, next thing you know, you’ll be raising a whole pack of min pins together,” I tease. But I think it’s awesome that Reeve and Sutton are in love and official.

  I glance at my watch, thinking I should head home. “We’re still running tomorrow, right?”

  “Of course. I have to kick your ass.”

  “You wish.”

  I set off, thinking of Reeve paired up with Sutton, and my roomie, Kat, now happily engaged to her long-time love, Bryan. Funny, how my singleness has become more, not less, obvious by my friends not mentioning it. It’s been a long time since I’ve been with anyone—much longer than I let on. Long enough that they’ll want to know why, and that’s not part of the story I want to tell.

  Acting isn’t just my job. It’s my whole damn life.

  3

  Davis

  “I agree. She was brilliant, but it’s irrelevant.”

  I press my thumb and forefinger against the bridge of my nose. I cannot believe I am having this debate. I cannot believe this suit is being such a . . . suit.

  “How can her acting be irrelevant?” I demand. “She’s an actress.”

  The suit in question is the show’s executive producer, Don Kraftig, sitting across the aisle from me in a pinstriped, double-breasted number that could have walked out of wardrobe for Guys and Dolls. The auditions are over. The callbacks are done. Patrick Carlson has left for the day, and we are sliding into the early evening. There’s just Don, Stillman, and me in the seats of the St. James. At least until they open the house for the audience of The King and I, in the final week of its run before we take over the theater.

  Their curtain is at eight, and I’d like to be out of here by then, so I try—I really try—for a reasonable tone. “Look, Don. She’s tailor-fucking-made for this part. She is Ava. How can there be any question?”

  The producer shrugs. “She was amazing,” he concedes. He has a voice like gravel in a tin can, and I hated it even before he wanted to run this production like an accountant. “But she’s not Alexis Carbone.”

  “Exactly. I
don’t want Alexis Carbone. Alexis Carbone is a classic, grade-A diva and a half. She misses shows if she has so much as a sniffle.”

  “She should rest her voice if she’s ill.” Now he sounds prissy, and I want to reach over and shake him even more.

  Instead, I switch to Don’s native tongue—dollars. “She missed one-third of her performances in Fate Can Wait. How many ticketholders was it, who called asking for refunds because they’d paid to see Alexis Carbone and not her understudy?”

  “We are not the Logan Theater Company.” He folds his arms, on the defensive, distancing himself from Alexis’s one Broadway flop. “That show was a mess. It had an awful title.”

  “But our show is not a mess. We have a show with a fantastic title, moving script, haunting score, and a sexy-as-hell storyline about love and loss and sex and art.”

  “Alexis can open a show.” Talking to him is as productive as banging my head against the wall and about that painful. “She has her own album, her solo concerts sell out, she was on that TV show, and she’s still regarded as the best damn Velma Kelly in the last five years.”

  On my last nerve, I push out of my chair and pace the aisle until the worst of the temptation to strangle him burns off. Don looks over at Stillman, who still doesn’t speak. He lets his work do his talking. He’s also, I’ve learned, passive-aggressive as fuck.

  When I have a hold of myself, I come back and lay it out there. “Here’s the thing. I don’t want to work with her. I want someone who is fresh and amazing and who is going to blow the audience away. That woman. Jill McCormick. I want to read in Playbills for years to come that she got her first big break as Ava in our show. She is going to be a star. I want to be the one who discovered her.”

  Don digs in his heels. “I want someone who is already a star.”

  “We have one.” I gesture to the bald, bespectacled theatrical genius next to me. “Book and score by Frederick Stillman.”

  The stony look on the composer’s face gives nothing away. I respect Stillman far too much to talk to him as I talk to Don. “Mr. Stillman, you wrote this living, breathing, beautiful show. Who do you picture as your Ava?”

  Stillman crosses then uncrosses his legs. He closes his eyes and taps his fingers on his thigh as if playing the piano—his way of remembering actors and their performances.

  He opens his eyes. “I want the Ava who will move the audience.”

  You’re killing me, Stillman. I respect him, but his avoidance is killing me.

  I try again. I need an ally here. “So, who would that be? Is that Alexis or Jill?”

  Stillman stands up, smoothing his pants legs. “I need to go to the little boys’ room.”

  Then he walks out.

  The composer may have a problem with confrontations, but I don’t, so I turn back to Don. “We need to start rehearsals in four weeks, the day after New Year’s. I would really like them to blow me away.”

  Don rises, reaches inside his jacket pocket, and removes a checkbook. “Does the name Julie Taymor mean anything to you?”

  I don’t answer. He knows I would recognize a fellow director’s name, even if her involuntary departure wasn’t a notorious Broadway debacle. And I know a threat when I hear it.

  “The Spiderman producers were happy to let their director go once upon a time,” Don says, making the expected play. “I have no problem paying your exit clause. How much was it?”

  The man knows about brinksmanship, and he’s got the upper hand. Because he’ll walk and I won’t. I want this job too much. “Fine. Call Alexis’s agent and give her the good news. But I choose the understudy, and my choice will be final. Is that clear?”

  Don nods, and the deal is made. It’s hardly a compromise, but if I’m lucky Alexis will have a whole lot of head colds.

  4

  Jill

  As I head for the subway, I check my phone out of habit. No missed calls from my agent, so I swipe to my to-do list: email the ladies in my running group, new training regimen for their upcoming breast cancer awareness 10K. With Crash the Moon out of the frame, I suppose I’ll devote more time to coaching, maybe find some gals who want to train for marathons and other distance races. And there will be other auditions, other shows.

  I pocket my phone and head down the stairs into the busy Forty-Second Street station, full of rush-hour New Yorkers and tourists with bad timing. At the turnstile, I’m about to swipe my Metro Card when I spot a poster on the sooty wall opposite, advertising a limited run of The King and I right now at the St. James.

  With a pang of longing, I wish this was my exit every night at six-thirty. The one for that theater, where I’d go through that stage door, drop my purse on the floor of a dressing room, and do my makeup in a mirror framed with naked lightbulbs.

  “C’mon,” a man growls from behind me. “Go or get outta the way. We’re trying to get through.”

  I can’t make myself wedge onto a packed train and go home to stew in disappointment. I ditch the turnstiles and head above ground, joining the current of people streaming into the theater district.

  Tomorrow I’ll focus on what’s next. Tonight, I want to walk past the St. James one more time, and say goodbye before moving on to the next project.

  Night has fallen and the St. James is lit up, a beacon for young and old, tourists and residents, anyone who wants to suspend disbelief for the length of a show. A marquee like this, bright as day and framed by the night sky, stills my heart every time. I have loved the theater fiercely and deeply for my entire life, both as a spectator and as an actress.

  “Someday,” I whisper.

  I turn to go and notice a man walking toward me, dressed in jeans and a button-down shirt, neat and tucked in, tailored to fit a trim waist and flat abs. I suspect washboard flat. Maybe chiseled.

  He looks familiar—trim clothes, strong jawline, thick brown hair, and eyes as blue and dark as midnight. The pieces click together, and I realize he’s Crash the Moon’s director.

  Davis Milo.

  Oh heck, no. I can’t think about his abs or anything else on his body. No tawdry thoughts at all. Delete, delete, delete.

  I’d barely been able to see him out in the house with the stage lights blaring. I can see him now, looking incredibly intense as he pounds out a number on his cell phone, head down and walking toward me.

  I wonder if I should say hi, if he’d remember me from the audition. I didn’t interact with him much, but he’s a legend. Barely thirty years old, a litany of hit shows on his résumé—he’s got the Midas Touch, they say, and the best eye for talent in New York City. Insiders know, but he rarely takes credit publicly for the careers he’s launched. I’ve seen his awards’ acceptance speeches on TV, and they’re gracious and generous. And, to top it off, he’s heart-stoppingly handsome. In every picture I’ve seen, he has a brooding air, as if he rarely cracks a smile, so when he does you know it must be special.

  Awkward uncertainty sweeps over me. My hands are cold and clammy. I don’t know what to do or say in front of him—if anything. Should I act friendly or pretend I don’t see him? This man decides fates and careers.

  I chicken out and angle to walk by, eyes on the ground, when I hear him say, “I’m looking for M.J. Kim,” and stop in my tracks. That’s my agent’s name.

  Some sound of surprise—a word or a squeak or a bark, I don’t know—comes out of my mouth. Davis looks up and, as if in slow motion, a grin curves his lips. They’re nice lips, particularly when they smile.

  Just an observation. Not tawdry at all.

  “Hi,” he says, and I think it’s both to me and to my agent on the phone. I smile because that’s funny, but I still don’t know what to do. It would be weird to keep walking now—as if I could with him calling my agent at six p.m. That doesn’t seem like the way you deliver a “no.”

  “Kim, it’s Milo.” His voice is commanding, deep and rich, and I wonder if he’s ever been on stage or if he’s always been behind it. “I’m standing on Forty-Fourth Street
where I just bumped into the actress I want to cast in the chorus and, more importantly, as the understudy for my lead.”

  Jet fuel ignites in me, and I take off for the moon.

  I clasp a hand over my mouth to hold in a squeal, and then I grab Davis Milo and hug him hard. His phone clatters to the ground, and I hear my agent say “Hello, hello,” but I don’t care, because Davis Milo has given me my biggest dream ever—and it’s a double whammy of amazing. My first Broadway show and understudy for a role that feels made for me. I have zero ambivalence about learning a part with the risk I’ll never get to perform it, because Alexis Carbone is notorious for flaking, and just rehearsing this amazing role with this gifted director and talented costar is closer to my dream than I’ve ever been.

  There’s something perfectly circular about it, because I don’t know where I would be if I hadn’t fallen in love with the theater and Patrick Carlson.

  5

  Davis

  Her arms wrap all the way around me, gripping me as if she won’t ever let go. For a moment—or two—I let myself notice how fantastic her body feels against mine. Then I peel myself away because that is the last thought I’ll entertain about her that is anything but professional.

  Cardinal rule of directing—do not fall for an actress in your cast.

  Secondary rule of directing—do not fall for an actress, period.

  But her hair smells ridiculously good, a pineapple scent that lingers in the cold December air as she breaks the embrace, and my hand twitches with a sudden impulse to twine my fingers through her dark blonde hair. But I broke rules of directing once before and have the battle-scarred heart to prove it. Scars and iron-clad resistance.

  I pick up my phone from the sidewalk; Ms. Kim is still on the line, sounding worried. “Is everything OK?”