Love Everlasting

by Tracey Alvarez

  “I won’t let either of us fall.”

  Chapter 10

  Act two. Scene two. Darby, Simone, and Pamela, who played their stepmother, took their positions center stage for their Saturday night rehearsal. Hugh and Eddie, Prince Charming’s no pressure but pick a woman to marry already dad, were stage right. Today Prince Charming had opted to wear black jeans and a white tee shirt that clung to every contour of his chest. He’d chosen to accessorize with a rakishly draped checked scarf and a black beanie.

  “Love the hat,” Darby had teased him when she’d arrived for rehearsal.

  He’d taken off the knitted hat and fluffed perfect hair that didn’t need fluffing. “Just a bad-hair day, babe. Trust me, I’m not going bald.” Then he’d winked and sauntered off.

  See—anyone else who’d just found out she had cancer probably wouldn’t have cracked a joke like that for fear of offending her. Not Hugh. His lack of tact was a sign her illness didn’t faze him.

  Simone nudged her in the rib cage, bringing Darby’s attention back to center stage. They were meant to be fluttering a silk fan and trying to upstage each other for Hugh’s attention. While Darby had the fan fluttering down pat, her improv skills were markedly absent. They’d disappeared around the same time she’d caught sight of Reid sliding into a seat in the first row a few minutes ago.

  “You must choose a bride by the end of the ball, my son.” Eddie gave a dramatic sweep of his hand around the stage to where the ball scene extras clustered in small groups.

  The prince scanned the stage; Darby scanned Reid. He, too, wore black and white, only Reid’s pants were finely cut dress pants, and his white shirt was in a crisp Oxford style that skimmed over his wide shoulders and loosened just a fraction around his flat stomach. Talk about your who wears it better?—Darby wasn’t going to weigh in on that one. He was close enough to the edge of the stage that the lighting above picked out the warm strands of sun-kissed blond in his hair and made them shine.

  As she watched from the corner of her eye, Reid unbuttoned his shirt cuff and rolled the cotton over twice to expose a length of tanned and corded forearm.

  “Oh, my prince—won’t you dance with me?” Simone said from beside her.

  That was Darby’s cue, but Reid glanced up at her and suddenly she was back in his workroom, clutching at his rolled-up shirtsleeves while he kissed her to a silky puddle of mush. Just friends, remember?

  A muscle to the side of Reid’s jaw twitched as they continued to burn up the space between them. Then his eyes hooded lazily as he continued to roll up his sleeve in some sort of slow-mo strip show.

  Friends who maybe swap spit and other bodily fluids on occasion?

  Prince Charming clearing his throat and Simone lightly hip-checking her brought Darby back to real time.

  Oh, right! Her line.

  Her gaze shot to a frowning Hugh, whose gaze slid from left to right, watching her watch Reid.

  Darby opened her mouth and nothing at all came out. Zip, zilch, zero words could be found spinning around the cavernous space her brain had vacated only moments ago. She froze, but her hand moved on its own accord with a sharp flick of the wrist to open the silk fan. Practice obviously didn’t make perfect in this case, as the fan flew out of her hand, bounced off Prince Charming’s chest, and clattered to his feet.

  Say something, Darby!

  Darby dropped into a low—and praise the baby Jesus, graceful—curtsy. “Prince Charming,” she said, projecting her voice the way she’d been taught. “I’m such a fan.”

  Improv at its best, ladies and gentlemen.

  Whistles and hoots of laughter erupted around her, and even Sally cracked a smile. Darby didn’t dare glance at Reid, not that she could have since Hugh stood directly in front of her, blocking her line of sight.

  “That’s a hell of a sense of comedic timing you’ve got there, Darbs,” he said with a grin and extended his hand.

  Darby slid her fingers into his—no sweaty palms this time—and straightened. Hugh squeezed her fingers and her stomach gave a little twinge. Not quite a cartwheel, granted, but it was only a quick squeeze before he released her and turned to their director.

  “We’re keeping that in, too, right?”

  Sally nodded vigorously. “Of course, Hugh.” She switched her simpering smile to the rest of the cast where it transformed into a cat’s-butt pucker. “Let’s call it a night so we don’t keep Mr. Hudson waiting for the main cast fitting.”

  Darby couldn’t resist a slight sideways lean to spy around Hugh’s shoulder to where Reid sat with both his shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbow, looking as if he’d nothing better to do than to sit there and distract women with his sexy GQ vibes.

  Simone leaned in to whisper in Darby’s ear. “I’m kicking myself that I didn’t learn to sew. I’d play thread the needle with him any day.”

  As if Reid’s package could be comparable to thread. Darby turned and grinned at her fellow ugly stepsister. “That has to be the worst metaphor for—”

  Someone tapped Darby’s shoulder and she nearly peed a little thinking it was Reid. Luckily, it was Kaitlyn that had sneaked up behind her.

  “What are we whispering about?” Kaitlyn whispered.

  “How hot Reid Hudson is,” Simone whispered back.

  “Really?” Kaitlyn managed to turn the two-syllable word into three long ones. She lifted an eyebrow in Darby’s direction, and somehow Darby managed to keep her face from detonating into a guilty blush.

  “What are we, twelve?” Darby muttered. “Come on, I’ve got to go backstage and help with the fitting.”

  She made a beeline for backstage and didn’t look back.

  Not that she was much help when it came to the fitting part, but Darby still tried to be of some usefulness to Reid as he worked. Cucumber cool, he instructed her to jot down new measurements and notes on each garment, or to pin up a dress hem once he’d finished with the tricky bodice shaping. Basically, though, she passed him a fresh load of pins once he’d run out, and helped Claudia and Simone extricate themselves from the mock-up garments without pulling any of the marker pins out. While he worked with Hugh, however, Darby made herself scarce.

  Finally it was her turn to have her costume fitted. She hadn’t sewn her mock-up as they’d run out of time on Saturday, and Reid had insisted he’d complete it before rehearsal today. Darby fingered the plain white cotton shell of the bodice as she drew it up over her bra, a simple black bra with a little hint of lace but not in a showy look at my lingerie way that she’d spent thirty minutes selecting before she’d left for rehearsal.

  Kaitlyn knocked quietly on the door and slipped inside. “There’s only a few of us left out back,” she said.

  Darby glanced at her reflection in the mirror, her mouth giving a little lopsided twist. Reid’s original sketch had shown a dress with a nearly risqué neckline, but the garment he’d made had been moderated. The bodice was now more a pseudo-military style featuring a crossover front with buttons to the throat. Effectively hiding her port scar.

  A lump bobbed up and down in her throat. She was both touched by his thoughtfulness and ashamed that she still clung to the need to carve out her identity separate to the one cancer had claimed for her.

  Kaitlyn’s reflection came up behind her and she rested her hands lightly on the gaping edges of the dress. “Want me to pin you in?”

  Darby swallowed the lump and arched her chin. “Well, I’m not going out there with my ass on display.” Her gaze slipped to the side. “I guess Hugh’s gone home for the night?”

  “Nope.” Kaitlyn deftly pinned the center back seam together. “He’s hanging around and pissing off Reid.”

  Hugh was still there with Reid? Darby’s pulse gave a little high kick, though she chose not to analyze whether it was Hugh’s name or Reid’s that caused the disturbance in her Force.

  “How is he pissing off Reid?” she asked with as much nonchalance as she could muster.

  Kaitlyn snickered. “
Other than by his presence?” She crinkled her nose and stepped away, examining Darby critically. “Reid’s outdone himself with this dress. Come on, it fits almost perfectly but he’s got work to do around the waistline. It’s a little baggy.”

  Wait—she wasn’t ready for the topic change. Darby was dying to pry out more information on why Reid apparently didn’t like Hugh, but she didn’t want to risk triggering Kaitlyn’s suspicions.

  Darby spotted both men beside the rack of returned costumes, eyeing each other up like prize fighters about to climb into the ring. If she was honest, Hugh was the only male suggesting aggression with his squared shoulders and thumbs hooked in his belt pose, because Reid didn’t need physicality. By the simple fact of his height advantage and muscle carved out of inflexible flesh, combined with the kind of confidence only men who were fully aware of their strength but chose not to abuse it had, Reid remained leaning against the theater wall.

  Whatever Hugh had been saying to Reid, she missed it as Reid chose that moment to glance over Hugh’s head. His mouth dimpled in the corners in not quite a smile, but his gaze was warm on her bare shoulders. Warm, bordering on hot.

  Stop it, Darby!

  She refocused on Hugh, who turned, spotted her, and let out a wolf whistle. “You look smoking hot in that dress, Darbs.” He walked toward her and made a circular gesture with his finger. “Give us a spin so we can appreciate the view from the rear.”

  It wasn’t Hugh’s words that brought a flare of heat to her cheekbones so much as the sudden memory of wearing a skirt that’d split to just above her panty line—and the man who’d turned a mortifying experience into a not-so-bad one. The man who continued to watch her from behind Hugh with folded arms and an unreadable expression on his face.

  Darby twirled in a tight, embarrassed circle. When she’d made the full three-sixty, Hugh was right in front of her. “Grab a bite at Essential Thai after you’re done?” he asked.

  Her stomach fluttered. “Oh. Is everyone going?”

  She couldn’t help notice Hugh’s quick glance over his shoulder at Reid. “No. Just us.”

  Darby’s gaze also flicked to Reid, but he wasn’t giving anything away with his slightly crooked eyebrow and his neutrally aligned lips. Not that she was silently asking for his permission or searching for some sign that he didn’t want her to go. This was what she’d been wanting for months, right?

  “Great. I’m in.”

  Hugh’s smile said he’d never had a doubt she would be, but he winked at her anyway then sauntered past Kaitlyn to the stairs leading into the theater. “I’ll see you out front in a few.”

  Darby kept her gaze away from Reid as she smoothed her palms down the dress’s bodice. “I think it just needs taking in a little at each seam or maybe a couple of darts.” As if she knew what the hell she was talking about.

  Reid gave a noncommittal grunt as steadily paced footsteps approached her. Darby continued to study the theater’s backstage scaffolding until she could tell he was directly beside her by the way every hair follicle on her body stood to attention.

  “I can pass you the pins,” Kaitlyn said. “I’ve got fifteen minutes before the babysitter’s expecting me home, and I’m not leaving a minute early.”

  Darby wanted to lean over and kiss her. Now she wouldn’t have to make awkward chitchat with Reid, who’d just pinched together a small section of fabric above her waist. She tried, and failed abysmally, not to react to the light touch of his fingers as he slid a pin in place. A shiver, worthy of a midwinter sea dip, trembled down her body from head to toe.

  “Did I prick you?” His fingers moved to the next section of loose fabric, which happened to be around her second rib.

  “No.” It came out more of a squeak than a word. She blew out a wobbly sigh and straightened her spine. “I’m just ticklish.”

  “Oh, me, too.” Kaitlyn pulled three more pins out of the pincushion and passed them to Reid, who was hovering somewhere behind her.

  She couldn’t see him, but she didn’t need to. He was everywhere but unobtrusively—unless you were her. How could she concentrate on keeping her guard up with the smell of his cologne wrapping around her? How could she pretend that the touch of his fingers through the thin cotton didn’t make her blood simmer, that the accidental brush of his forearm against the soft skin of her inner wrist brought her blood nearly to the boil? That the easy chitchat he made with Kaitlyn as he worked filled her with inexplicable jealousy—not because there was anything sexual in the way he related to her, but because he spoke to Kaitlyn with the weight of years of friendship between them. It was time that Darby wouldn’t have to develop the same rapport, because if she and Reid actually had created the first fragile strands of friendship, it wouldn’t last once his job was done.

  “Finished,” Reid said. “Kaitlyn, can you help Darby get changed?”

  “Sure,” Kaitlyn said.

  “Thanks,” Darby said to Reid, but she was talking to his back as he walked away from them.

  Reid took the theater steps two at a time and blew through the main auditorium into the foyer. Once in the foyer he spotted a playbill with Hugh’s smug face on it and decided that rather than tear the man’s head off either in paper or real form, he’d step outside for a minute to cool down.

  Darby had agreed to go out with the douchebag. Not completely unexpected, but still.

  Reid’s fists were clenched as he shoved open the theater doors and stepped out into misty rain. He headed down the side alley of the building toward a portcullis by the rear door, but jerked to a halt near a dumpster and a jacked-up SUV at the sound of coarse male laughter and a higher-pitched, snooty-sounding ha-ha-ha-hah coming from the direction of the portcullis.

  Hugh even managed to laugh like a douchebag.

  Interrupt their conversation by announcing his presence? Or silently withdraw inside? Then he heard one of the men mention Darby. That decided it.

  Reid used the darkness and hazy rain to his advantage, easing silently back into the shadows cast by the truck and dumpster. He pressed against the theater’s damp concrete wall while cigarette smoke drifted past him.

  “You reckon it’ll help your case with Claudia, then?” asked one of the men.

  Reid didn’t recognize the gravelly voice, but it sounded like it probably came from the smoker who was leaning against the back door. At the other point of the triangle of three men was one of the theater group who’d been painting a set backstage when he arrived earlier. The man was facing Reid’s direction, while Reid could only see Hugh’s back.

  “It’s a two-pronged win,” Hugh said. “Taking Cancer Girl to dinner adds sensitive-guy points to my reputation. Plus there’s the bonus of making Claudia jealous. Jealous women are desperate women.”

  Painter Guy snickered. “Also doesn’t hurt that Cancer Girl’s pretty hot.”

  “Yeah,” Smoker Guy chipped in. “And she’s been looking at you like you’re lunch for weeks. You’re in, mate.”

  Hugh threw his head back and gave another laugh. “Guess she’s hot enough to bang even if her hair hadn’t grown back already.”

  Each man’s comments slammed into Reid like a gut punch. His shoulders scraped against rough concrete as his spine stiffened into cold, hard steel. Palms clenched so hard that his nails cut into his flesh, Reid pushed away from the wall and stared at the back of Hugh’s head as if his stare alone could act as a nail gun.

  Three on one? He’d faced worse odds in a fight—and had the shit kicked out of him by a group of homophobic morons who’d decided one of Reid’s design school friends was an easy target. He’d defended his friend as best he could, but still ended up at the emergency department with a cracked rib, black eyes, and a concussion. In the years since, Reid had trained hard to pack muscle onto his naturally slender frame. He’d also learned to hold his own in a fight if it came to that, but he preferred it didn’t come to that. Unfortunately, being in the industry he was and a height that was a natural target for bullies, it
sometimes did come to that.

  Before he could cross the parking lot to teach the three stains on humanity a lesson in respect, Smoker Guy stubbed out his cigarette and wrenched open the door behind him.

  “C’mon. Let’s get shit locked up inside so we can get outta here.”

  The three men disappeared through the door and it slammed shut behind them.

  “Reeee-d? Reid!”

  Reid glanced back the way he’d come to where Kaitlyn stood waving. He stalked toward her. “You need to stop Darby from going out with Hugh tonight.”

  Even saying the man’s name burned like acid on his tongue, and swallowing back all the names he wanted to call him was like the worst kind of indigestion.

  Kaitlyn released one hand from the umbrella she held over her head and went hand on hip. “What? Why?”

  He noticed she had on her coat with her handbag hooked over her arm. She was leaving?

  “You can’t go home.” He grabbed her by the elbow and pivoted her back toward the theater entrance. “You’ve got to go back in and convince her.”

  Kaitlyn glared at him and shook her elbow free. “Again I ask, why? She’s been looking forward to spending some alone time with Hugh for ages.”

  Another gut punch, but he manfully sucked it up and tried again. “The guy’s a jerk. She deserves better.”

  “What happened? Oh jeez—don’t tell me you flattened the little prick.” She spun back around and craned her neck past him to see down the alleyway, as if she’d somehow had a vision of Hugh’s dead body being crammed into the overflowing dumpster.

  For the first time since he’d caught sight of Darby looking magnificent on stage doing her thing, Reid grinned.

  “You don’t like him either,” he said.

  “Of course I don’t. The guy’s got asshat written all over his smarmy face.” She poked Reid’s arm. “But Darby’s a grown woman who can figure that out for herself.”