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

by Lauren Blakely

  “A theory about men and coffee?” I raise an eyebrow. “Enlighten me.”

  She briefly looks at her shoes, then back at me. “Well, it’s just, she has this theory that the man who orders just coffee is, you know . . .” Her voice trails off, and crimson starts to flood her cheeks.

  “Is just what?”

  “Just . . .” She can’t seem to finish the thought.

  “You want me to guess?”

  She shakes her head, her hair falling in a curtain around her face in the most distracting way. But she seems embarrassed, and the last thing I want to do is push her past her point of comfort.

  “Well, whatever the theory is, I will choose to take it as a compliment.”

  She raises her face and meets my eyes. “Thank you.”

  “Do you want a tour of all the secret doors and backstage passages before we start? Or did you check everything out already?” I hope she’ll say yes. I want to be able to do something for her that no one else can do. To show her more of the things she loves—like theater.

  Her eyes sparkle. “Secret backstage stuff? Like ghosts?”

  “This theater has many, many ghosts. They say the ghost of Hammerstein sometimes watches from over there.”

  I point past the stage to the balcony on the right-hand side.

  “Do you think he’s there right now?” she whispers.

  “Oh no. He’s far too busy. He only shows up on opening night.”

  She laughs and places her coffee on the floor and unbuttons her coat. She walks to the edge of the stage, leans slightly, then tosses the coat perfectly so it lands on a chair in the second row—right next to my coat. Then she retrieves her cup.

  I tip my head toward the wings and crook my finger for her to follow me. I take another sip of the coffee then show her the trapdoor in the stage, the steps down to the orchestra pit that also do double duty for quick costume changes in some shows, and the catwalk above with the spotlights.

  “But here’s the best part. Did you know there’s a dressing room above the stage?”

  She grins widely, as if I’ve just revealed the location to buried treasure. “How did I not notice it today?”

  “It’s kind of hidden behind some of the crates with the set pieces we haven’t unpacked yet. The star usually claims it; it’s actually in Alexis’s contract. But it’s still worth a look.” I show her back to the wings and open a black door that’s painted to match the walls. “Right there. Stairs lead up to it. Like a fire escape.”

  “Can we go up?”

  “We can’t go inside. But you can go up.”

  She walks up the steps to the top where a small metal balcony looks out over the quiet stage, with the door to the dressing room behind.

  “It’s quite a view,” she says drinking in the majesty of the St. James from this hideout spot that few people ever see. I love watching her reaction because I feel the same. She turns to me, and we’re so close in this tiniest of balconies that I could easily grab her and kiss her and do so many other things to her, with her, for her up above the floorboards, with only the stage below to know our secrets. “Davis,” she says in a low and sexy voice that nearly obliterates my self-control. “Would you go down to the stage? I want to see what it looks like from up here with a person on the stage.”

  “Okay,” I say warily. “But I’m not going to perform.”

  “I won’t ask you to tap dance or twirl in circles.”

  “Good.” I oblige by heading down the metal stairs to the middle of the stage. I’m still holding my coffee, so I look up at her, and hell if she doesn’t look like the most romantic woman ever written leaning on the railing in the balcony, her long hair framing her face and a wistful sigh fluttering from her lips.

  It’s a moment that shouldn’t be ruined by words. Besides, she wanted to see how the stage looks, not how it sounds, so I say nothing. I take a drink of my coffee. I wait for her to go next.

  Even from this distance, I can see her swallow and exhale as if she’s about to say something that’s hard for her. “Your coffee?”

  “Yeah?”

  “All the hot guys take their coffee black. So that’s how I knew.”

  For the first time I can recall, I am speechless. I am reduced to nothing but this buzzing in my bones, as if every cell inside me has been dialed all the way up. My skin is hot all over, and I might be shaking as she turns down the stairs, crosses the stage, and stands in front of me.

  I want to crush her against me. I want to smother her in kisses. I want to taste her, touch her, feel her.

  Her lips are slightly parted, and if I stare at them any longer, I will be claiming her mouth with mine, pushing her up against a wall and owning her body. So I glance down, and that’s a worse decision.

  The red sweater taunts me. Those pearl buttons are beacons calling out to me, and my fingers twitch with the desire to twist one hard and let it rattle to the floor, then another, then another, exposing her breasts to me, so full and creamy.

  I scrub a hand across my jaw, then find the will to turn away. If I start something now, we’ll never rehearse. I force myself to focus on my job.

  “We should probably get to work on that scene,” I say hoarsely.

  She raises an eyebrow. “The show must go on.” She walks to stage left then tosses me a look over her shoulder. “As they say.”

  I love that she can shift back to playful so naturally, and it’s one more thing that is going to ruin me.

  There is only an easel on the stage. It’s a temporary one, a fill-in prop from an art supply store. When the show begins, the real easel will be bigger, larger than life in many ways, befitting a Broadway show. But for now, this does the trick. It gives Ava a focal point for her work. She has been painting all day, working and reworking her newest piece under Paolo’s direction. The young painter, barely into her twenties, and the world-renowned artist who’s taken her under his iron-fisted wing at art school.

  Paolo returns to the studio to check on her progress and finds her a painted mess.

  I enter from stage left. Ava doesn’t notice me at first; she’s so engrossed in the work. I am quiet, walking on cat’s feet to her side.

  She startles. “Oh.”

  “You are . . .” I don’t finish the sentence. Instead, I make a circular motion around her face.

  “I’m what?”

  “You’re covered in paint.”

  She shrugs. “What else should I be covered in but paint?”

  “Your hair is full of paint. It’s getting in the way.”

  With one sweep of her hand, she brushes her hair off her face, leaving behind an imaginary streak from the paintbrush.

  “Oops,” I say, because Paolo feels playful right now.

  “It’s on my forehead now, right?”

  I nod, then trace a quick line across her forehead. “A bright yellow streak. And your hair is the color of the sun too.”

  “I’m a mess,” she says in a sweet, self-deprecating tone.

  “Here.” I hold out my hand. “Give me the brush.”

  She hands it to me, and I lay it on the easel. “Come with me.”

  She follows and we move to the middle of the stage. “Sit,” I tell her.

  She bites her lip then sits cross-legged. I kneel behind her, so the audience will be able to see both of us. “Let’s get your hair out of the way.”

  “Okay,” she says, in the softest, sweetest voice.

  She leans her head back, closes her eyes, and lets me run my fingers through her hair. I gather it at the top of her head, the thick strands sliding across my palms like silk waterfalls. I weave one strand into another, then gather another layer, recreating the French braid I saw her wearing the other day. The one that made me think of a moment of intimacy, when Paolo and Ava come closer together through touch before they kiss in the next scene. A tender moment, where he wants to take care of her, get her painted hair out of her face.

  I reach the point in the braid where I’m at her
neck, and now I’m simply looping one strand over the other. There are no more lines in this scene until hers at the end, and as I finish, I stare at her neck, at the vein that seems to be beating harder, and then I listen, and her breaths sound like tiny little sighs.

  I stop moving for a second, trying to collect myself. Fighting everything in me that’s dying to touch her, I return to character, pulling a rubber band from my pocket and fastening her braid. She twists around and looks at me.

  That’s not in the blocking. That’s not how she did it this afternoon with Patrick. She didn’t look at him. She uttered the last lines while gazing out at the audience, her body language saying how she felt as she leaned into him, showing that she trusted him.

  But now, she’s leaning back against my chest, and turning to look up at me. A tiny whimper escapes her throat, before she says, “It feels so good.”

  I have no idea if she’s acting. If she’s Ava, or Jill, or both. If she’s acting, she’s so fucking convincing because her face says she’s never been more aroused in her life.

  My hands are still on her back, my thumbs tracing the tiny strands at the end of her braid. She doesn’t break our gaze, nor do I. I don’t know what’s happening, but for the first time, I don’t feel like I’m in control anymore.

  She is.

  I stay completely still.

  She counters me by shifting closer. “What is happening here?” Her voice is unsteady as she says a line that’s not in the script.

  “You tell me,” I say, and I’m not even sure where my own voice is coming from.

  She turns around, uncrosses her legs, and mirrors me, kneeling. “You wrote that scene for me, didn’t you?”

  I nod. My throat is too dry to speak.

  “That day you saw me with Shelby outside the theater, right?”

  “Yes.” I swallow. I’m an open book now.

  “Did you write it because it makes the show better? Or did you write it for me?”

  I close my eyes briefly. I’ve never had an actress question me like this. Then, I look at her. “I put the scene in the show because the show needed it,” I answer with as much confidence as I can muster, grabbing the reins from her.

  “But you’re also kind of into my hair, aren’t you?”

  Now she’s in control again looking at me with such a challenging stare and so much want in her blue eyes. Her breath is staccato, like mine. She raises her hands behind her head, pulling out the rubber band, shaking out her hair, and letting it fall around her face.

  I am undone by her.

  My hands are twitching to touch her. I am aching to taste her lips.

  “Do it,” she breathes out in a voice so low it’s barely audible, but it’s all I need.

  I place my hands on her face and cup her cheeks, and she closes her eyes and sighs. Then, I pull her to me, pressing my lips to hers again. I am unable to stay away from her.

  Her lips are soft and full and greedy. But I like to lead, so I kiss her deeply, possessively, twining my hands through her glorious hair as I trace the soft underside of her lips with the tip of my tongue, eliciting the sexiest moan from her that I kiss away. I nibble on her bottom lip, and she gasps. “Davis.”

  My name alone sends me into another realm, and before I know it I am tugging on her hair and roaming my mouth down the gorgeous column of her neck, and right before I reach her shoulder blade, I press my teeth to her skin, lightly, but heavy enough to make the smallest of marks.

  “Ouch,” she says, but the word tapers off, and the next thing she says is more, in a breathy whisper that turns into a groan of pleasure as I give her what she wants. “Do you know why I want to have my hands in your hair?” I ask in a hoarse voice.

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to pull on your hair as I fuck you. I want to bend you over and take you against the wall, and I want to gather all your hair in my hands and hear you cry out.”

  “Oh God,” she moans, her mouth in a gorgeous, perfect O that sends me spiraling further into such dark longing for her. “Do you think I’d like it?” she asks, playing along.

  “You’d love it. Because I’d always make sure it was good for you. And I think you’d want me to tell you what to do. To direct you.”

  “Yes,” she says, panting, as I bring a hand down to the little pearl buttons on her sweater. “I want to bite these off,” I whisper in her ear, my breath hot on her skin and making her shiver. “But I think you like this sweater. I think you wore it for me. Did you wear it for me?”

  I nibble my way down her neck to the hollow of her throat. She gasps out a yes, as I tug on the bottom of her sweater, making room for my hand to slide across her belly. Her skin is so soft.

  “Were you thinking I’d like the way your breasts look in it? That I’d like you in red?”

  “Yes.”

  She grabs my shoulders and slams me on top of her, her beautiful body against the floorboards.

  “This works too, though,” I tease.

  She laughs, but then turns serious again. “What else do you want to do to me?”

  “I want to go down on you on the piano. I want to lift you up and put you on the baby grand, and push your skirt to your hips and tell you to spread your legs for me,” I tell her, and she responds by opening her legs and grabbing my ass so we are in perfect missionary except for that little problem of clothes.

  “Do you think I’d do what you say?” she asks breathily, as she thrusts her hips against me.

  “Yes,” I say confidently. “I think you’d spread your legs for me and let me taste you.”

  “Do you think I’ll taste good?”

  “I bet you taste like sin and heaven at the same time. I bet you taste fucking delicious coming on my tongue.” I look straight into her eyes, and they are full of fire and lust. “And I’m going to find out right now, Jill.”

  I offer her a hand and pull her up, bringing her to the piano at stage right. Then I take off her boots, unzip her jeans, and leave them in a pile on the floor. I lift her up and gently lower her on top of the piano.

  Her eyes widen with the realization that I wasn’t joking.

  “Are you really going to?”

  “Do you want me to stop?”

  “No. The last thing I want is for you to stop.”

  “Good. Now, let me admire you.”

  I step back as if I’m appraising her. All she wears are red lace panties, the red sweater, and the look in her eyes.

  “Take off your sweater,” I tell her.

  “Don’t you want to take it off of me?”

  “Yes. But I want to watch you undress more.”

  She nods, and reaches down to the waistband, crossing her hands, and tugging her sweater over her head. She wears a white strappy tank.

  “Now the tank.”

  She inhales sharply and does as I ask, tossing it into the growing pile of her clothes on the stage. She’s wearing only her matching bra and underwear, and she’s a sight to behold in all that red. My eyes roam her body, memorizing her skin, her curves, the way she’s so sexy in anything and nothing. Then I stalk over to her and place my hands on her thighs. She quivers as I touch her, and arches her back instantly. I run my thumbs along her inner thighs, and she gasps. Then I reach her panties and trace a finger over the thin fabric between her legs that can’t hide how turned on she is. She grabs my hair and tries to pull me closer.

  I meet her gaze, and her eyes are fiery.

  “Please stop teasing me.”

  “I’m not teasing you.”

  “You are.”

  “I would only be teasing if I planned to stop.”

  She presses her hand against her mouth. “I can’t take it anymore. Just touch me. Please.”

  “Take off your bra.”

  She reaches behind her back, and unclasps it instantly, handing it to me. I drop it on the floor then cup her breasts. “So beautiful,” I murmur. I lavish attention first on one breast, tugging on her nipple as she moans, then the other,
and the noises she makes drive me on. Then I pull back. “But that’s not what I promised you tonight.”

  “I know, and I want what you promised,” she says, and her voice is full of reckless desire. There’s something so wild in her, so untamed, as if she’s been waiting to be unleashed like this and wants me to do it.

  I stare at her, then give her the next bit of direction. “Let me see what you look like on my stage with nothing on.”

  20

  Jill

  I shimmy out of my panties and hitch in a breath. My whole body is vibrating, and I am lit up from the inside out. Every part of me is screaming for him. I’m completely naked on top of the piano and he rakes me over with his eyes, making me feel like I’m the only one he’s ever wanted like this. I don’t know how he does this to me, how he makes me feel charged all over, but I’ve never been this turned on. I didn’t know I could be this turned on, but this man makes me feel like my body belongs to him, like he can bring me places I never thought I could be. Like he can take me way past this reckless longing into some sort of altered state of bliss.

  “Jill. Fucking Jill,” he says in a rough voice. He steps closer, curves a hand around my neck, and kisses me gently on the lips, then pulls back to drink me in with his eyes. “You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met. You have to know that. You have to know how beautiful and intoxicating you are to me. Now, spread your legs for me.”

  I am aching for him, throbbing past the point of no return. I want him so badly it’s like my desire has become its own life force here in the theater with him. I scoot back on the top of the piano and part my legs, my knees falling open for him.

  Then his hands are on my thighs and I cry out. He hasn’t even tasted me yet, and I’m already in heaven with him so near me. He bends down and traces his tongue across all the wetness between my legs. Sparks of sheer pleasure shoot through me, from the center of my body all the way to my fingertips. I loop my hands in his hair, holding on to him and pulling him closer. I want him so badly, I want his mouth, and his tongue, and his lips, and I even want the bristly scratch of his stubble against me. I want every single sensation all over me. But mostly, I want him to quench this burning need in my body, because it feels like I might die if I don’t come. I know that’s not true, yet nothing has ever felt more true, because I’ve been reduced to nothing but feelings, to the constant bursts of pleasure that he brings as he licks me, his moans the sexiest sounds I’ve ever heard in my life as he tastes me, savoring me.