by Lark O'Neal
I straighten. “I get it!” I grin up at him. “Thank you.”
He bows a little. “Of course.”
As I’m about to leave, he says, “You’re really quite talented, Jess. It’s all raw right now, but you can do this.”
This is the second time today someone has said that to me, and I feel it as a little whisper of possibility in my lungs, a faint flutter of maybe.
* * *
In the morning there’s a mist and very low light, and I wonder if we’ll actually film after all. Mika gets me dressed in the Elvin dress, the blue green number with very little back, and creates a messy braided look woven through with fake greenery. A makeup tech elongates my eyes with eyeliner, making me look much more exotic that usual, and I like it. Looking in the mirror at myself, I swish the skirt. “This is so gorgeous.”
“Jess, you’re gorgeous,” Mika says from behind me.
“Thanks.”
I’m feeling confident about the kissing after Colin’s lessons, and as they set up the shots I give Kaleb a wink. He looks uncomfortable, the way I was yesterday, so I go over to talk to him. “Just follow my lead,” I say. “It’s easy.”
He looks down at my body. “Quite the dress. Although it’s not really that much of a dress, is it?”
“Now you know how I felt yesterday.”
“Yeah?” That wicked eyebrow lifts.
I roll my eyes. “No fishing for compliments.”
“Never.” His teeth flash. “So tell me what to do. What’d Colin tell you?”
“We have to pay attention to the position of the camera, and it should be kind of…” I look at his mouth, lush and delicious-looking, and there’s a hitch in my throat. “Er…sweet.”
He looks at me, at my mouth, then lower, skimming over my torso. My braless torso. “This is how you felt yesterday?”
“How?”
His nostrils flare slightly. He raises his gaze, meets mine head on, and I can see the heat there. Light and dark lights flicker through his irises. “Like this.”
My heart squeezes. I’m caught in the amber world of his eyes. “Yes,” I whisper softly.
I’m grateful when Ian calls, “Places, everybody. Kaleb, you’re on the path. Jess, you’re in the trees. We’ll shoot from the left.”
Kaleb starts walking up the hill, and I walk through the trees. The air is damp, and tree ferns are dripping, birds whistling in the canopy. The air is fragrant with some humus-y earthy scent. Kaleb is turning his face up to the sounds, his hair so sexy and untamed, and I glide through the trees, winding toward him in the long gown until our paths intersect. He sees me, and I see him, and I reach out a hand, which he takes with one of his own. And then we’re moving toward each other. Just as Colin showed me, I lift one hand to Kaleb’s face and lean in, rising on my tiptoes the slightest bit to meet his lips.
But where it had been completely clinical with Colin, it’s exactly the opposite with Kaleb. His skin beneath my fingers is hot, almost burning, and my fingertips buzz with the contact, sending an electrical sensation right through my body. Kaleb’s hand falls on my lower back, which is bare, and the entire span of his palm opens on my skin, singeing me.
Our eyes lock, and that’s the instant that everything changes, because all at once the rest of the world disappears and it’s just the two of us swimming together in that wild sea, with dolphins all around us. And when our lips meet, we don’t look away. We’re locked into our own tight, private world. His lips are a shock, literally, moist and full and tasting of something magical, the hint of tongue just beyond his teeth. A bolt of heat and yearning shoots straight through my body to light my breasts and thighs on fire.
The entire thing happens in the space of a breath, a second or three, not much, but I’m practically shaking by the time he pulls back, his expression as alight with sex as mine must be. I look away.
“Cut!”
We do it again. And again. And again. My hand on his face, once on his neck, where I can feel the pulse of his blood pouring thought the arteries, once just braced against his chest, where I think about the way he touched the center of his naked chest with that open palm.
He touches me now, too, his hand on my shoulder or my lower back, once sliding down my hip.
“Cut!”
Over and over and over and over our lips touch. Part. Touch. Part. Over and over I want to sink into the kiss with all I have, open my mouth to the taste of him, to that tongue that’s lurking just beyond his teeth. I want to pull him into me, close, press my thighs and belly and breasts into him, hard. Over and over, his teeth graze my lips, his chest presses for a split second again my breasts, which feel electrified, on fire, buzzing and too hot. My hand reaches for his hair.
Over and over. How long are we kissing? Forever and never quite long enough, take after take, all of them raw, and by the end I’m so overwhelmed and aroused that I can barely stand up straight.
“For Christ’s sake,” somebody says. “Just shag each other and get on with it.”
I blush to the very roots of my hair.
Kaleb says, “Hey, a little respect here.”
Ian says, “Cut. Let’s break for lunch and I’ll look at the clips.”
He stalks away, and I’m left standing there with people staring at me with what looks like disappointment.
Or maybe that’s my own feeling toward myself.
I look up at Kaleb, and even looking at him makes me weak. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “They aren’t happy with me.”
He grabs my hand, hard, as everyone starts to leave. “Don’t move.”
I glance at the stylist waiting for me and say, “I’ll be there in a second.” I’m shaking, Kaleb’s hand the only thing keeping me from flying off into the stratosphere.
People peel away. We stand there beneath the coil of a tree fern, the forest going quieter and quieter. Finally we’re alone, and he turns, pulling me up hill, into a thicket, where he turns and wraps a hand around my neck, his arm around my back, hauls me into him, and kisses me.
Kisses me. Mouths open, his tongue plunging hard into the depths of my mouth and mine driving back into his, my hands on his face, his sides. He backs me into a tree and the impact jolts us, but neither one of us cares. I can’t even catch my breath, I’m so lost in the smell of him, the taste of him. Our legs tangle, and my hands are on his hips, pulling him closer to me, feeling the aggressive thrust of his erection. And still we kiss, sucking tongues and lips. I feel the impact of my tooth against his lips and taste blood, and still his hands are in my hair, on my shoulders, sliding all over my back, naked and overheated.
I’m digging my hands into his ass, and I feel his hands sliding down over my mine, cupping the shape, and it weakens my knees. So much heat is dripping from the center of me that I’d do anything to have him inside me right now. As if he senses the heat, his fingers slip beneath my panties, grasping my bottom, yanking me hard into him.
And still we’re locked in that violent kissing, kissing so hard, so deep, gasping for breath, diving back in. I can feel the tree against my back and his aggressive cock trying to free itself, his fingers digging into my butt and—
“Jess!” It’s Darcy, from a distance. “Where are you?”
We break apart, breathing hard. His lip is bleeding, and his face shows the same stunned, aroused, shaken expression that must be on my own.
I cover my mouth. “I don’t…this was…”
He backs away, crossing his arms across his chest, bowing his head. He licks his lip. “Go. I get it.”
I bolt, running down the path in the opposite direction from Darcy, my heart racing.
* * *
After lunch Darcy finds me in our room. “You didn’t eat!”
“I know. Too embarrassed to face everybody.”
She pulls out some pastries and puts them on the bed. “That was hot, Jess. And I can say that even if it’s my brother. You guys could make movies, like Beyonce and Jay Z.”
I close my eye
s. “It’s not supposed to be hot, I don’t think.”
“Well, it was.” She bites into an apple. “Do you like him?” Her dark eyes are bright and round.
I don’t know what to say, so I give the same old answer. “I have a boyfriend.” I remember, but don’t say, we agreed before I left that we didn’t have a claim on each other.
“Yeah, I get that. But what about Kaleb?”
What about Kaleb? My mouth burns with the taste of him. It lingers in my throat, and my entire body can feel the imprint of his. “I don’t know.” I sit up and grab a pastry. “But I really can’t talk about it.”
She bites into a scone, eyes still on my face. “No harm, no foul, right?”
I scowl at her. “That’s ridiculous. There’s no such thing as no harm. People always get hurt.”
“Kaleb used to—”
“No.” I raise my hand. “Don’t tell me anything about him. It’s too weird.” I stand. “I’m going to take a walk.”
“Jess, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“I know. This is just—” I yank open the door. “—not what I expected.”
But I don’t get very far. Ian sees me as I’m coming down the stairs and gestures to me. With a rock in my gut, I follow him into the little study. In the dining room, the rest of the crew are still finishing lunch, and the meat smell makes me slightly dizzy. I need to eat. All this thinking is making me insanely hungry.
Ian sits in one wing back chair and gestures for me to sit in the other. It’s impossible to read his expression. I hate getting yelled at, and I pull my braid over my shoulder so that I can weave the end through my fingers.
“You’re not in trouble, Jess. I just want to talk to you.”
I suck my lips into my mouth. Wait.
“This is new for you, right, and I understand that you’re nervous. Are you naturally shy?”
It almost makes me want to cry. “Yes.”
“Is that making it harder to do the romantic scenes?”
I lower my eyes. Shake my head no. “That’s not really it. I just didn’t realize that…” Oh, how can I say it? “That I would… … like Kaleb like that,” I whisper.
“It happens on set all the time,” he says. “I wouldn’t worry too much.”
That’s not at all comforting.
“I want to show you something.” He reaches for a laptop and flips it open to a film clip on pause. It’s Kaleb coming out of the ocean, all brown and wet and even hotter than I thought at the time. He plays the clip, and it shows us meeting, Kaleb offering a shell to me, me looking up at him in wonder.
“It’s good,” he says.
I nod. It is.
“And this is even better.”
He brings up another one, from this morning, and I feel my ears start to burn as Kaleb walks up the path between the ferns and the trees. The exact minute of our meeting, his face softens with wonder and delight, and then the camera is on me, and my offering of a flower, and then the kiss. Our eyes meeting, our lips, and I’m both watching in amazement at how well it works on screen and feeling the pulse of my desire for him all over again. “Wow, it’s so good!”
Ian nods. “It might have seemed like torture while it was happening, but this is how it turned out.”
“Do you have the dolphins?”
“Yes.” He closes that window, clicks on another one, and there we are in the kayak, both of us laughing in delight as the dolphins stir up the water around us, leaping in excitement, and then there’s the moment of collusion when we look at each other and make the choice to dive into the water. It’s amazing, and I feel tears in my eyes as we swim with the animals. There’s a great shot of us soaked and beaming at each other as we reach the overturned kayak. Ian freezes it there. “That’s the money shot right there.”
“Can I have a copy?”
“Sure.” He closes the laptop. “The reason I brought you in here is to try to make you relax, Jess. When you get nervous, it slows things down and the crew gets restless. Just relax and trust yourself. Trust Kaleb.” He folds his hands over his knee and looks at me through his glasses. “The screen chemistry you share is remarkable and rare.”
I nod. Maybe that’s all this is, just screen chemistry, on-set romance or something. “I’ll try.”
Chapter TWELVE
The afternoon is just as full as the rest of the schedule has been. More shots of hiking, more at the water’s edge, until finally the weather turns wet and we’re saved. I can’t get on the internet because everybody else is doing it, and, anyway, I feel weird talking to anybody right now.
Kaleb avoids me, and Darcy is partying with some of the crew. I can hear her laugh booming out over the others, musical and powerful.
I retreat into a corner of the living room, populated with books people have left behind. Just seeing the spines sends longing through me, and I grab a couple and go upstairs. It’s such a relief to dive into the tale of a girl trying to make her way through the countryside of England that even when it’s time for dinner, I make a sandwich at the table, then carry that and a glass of tea back upstairs with me, where I can be alone.
I’ve been there a couple of hours when Kaleb comes in wearing his coat. “You have to come outside right now.”
“What is it?”
“You’ll see.” He grabs my coat from the foot of my bed and tosses it to me. “Come on.”
I tug on my shoes and coat, and follow him down the back stairs, avoiding a party going on in the common room. Outside, the air is damp and very cold, but the skies have cleared. I can see my breath puff out in cold clouds, and I stick my hands in my pockets.
“Here.” Kaleb pulls a knit hat out of his pocket and hands it to me.
“That’s okay. You can have it.”
His mouth turns up on one side. “I have two.” He tugs another cap down over his head and points upward. “Look. Meteor shower.”
I tilt my head back, and not only is it a meteor shower, falling stars tumbling through the black sky, but there are more stars than I have ever seen in my life. “Oh, my God. I didn’t even know there were so many stars.”
“Do they look different here?”
“Um. I don’t know. I’m not sure I’ve ever looked closely enough to know.” There’s a wide white ribbon of stars through the middle of the sky, some bright and some winking, and patterns, but I don’t know the names of any of them. “That must be the Milky Way, right?”
“Yeah. Te Mangaroa, as we say here.”
I repeat it softly. “What else?”
“The Southern Cross.” He draws it in the night, and I follow his fingers, connecting the stars. “In Maori it’s Mahutonga.”
“Do you speak Maori?”
He shrugs. “Well, everybody does, kind of. We learn in school. But I learned some from my dad, and from my aunties.” His voice is light as he says, “Not too much, though. I should know more.”
Meteors shoot across the sky, one tumbling for a long, long way, and it kindles something magical in me. “This place is so amazing. Like, it’s filling up my whole body, making me into somebody else.”
“Or maybe you’re connecting to yourself, to your old self.”
“Maybe.” I sink down on the sand. It’s damp but not too cold, so I fall back and lie down to take it all in. The sky is so huge and black and covered with stars that it almost makes me dizzy.
Kaleb joins me, just close enough that our nylon sleeves brush. I’m acutely aware of him, but the sky is filling my heart and my head and my spirit in a way that leaves no room for anything but wonder. “It’s amazing to think that there’s nothing between us and that open space except air. That you could theoretically just fly off the earth and go to another star, another planet.”
“It is.” He points at a tumbling pair of meteors streaking across the face of a blinking red star. “I always wonder who’s looking up at us, you know? What do they eat? What are they like?”
I laugh softly. The day ripples throu
gh me, stars and kisses and dolphins. “I wonder if they have dolphins anywhere else.”
“Maybe.” He rustles a little, and when he settles, I think he’s closer. “What I wonder is when are we going to be able speak to dolphins in their language? You know they’re talking.”
I think of the buzzes and whistles. “Yeah.”
“I can’t get over it, what it felt like to be in the water with them. They were playing with us.”
“I know.” My sense of wonder grows two more sizes and spills as tears from the corners of my eyes. “I will never, ever, forget that.”
He takes my fingers in his, and I like the strength in them. “Me, either.”
For a long time we’re just lying there, staring up at the sky, speaking very little. Words don’t have much to add to the spectacle, really, except a wow or a look at that.
He makes no move toward me, and I make no move toward him, and the kiss from this afternoon feels like something in a bubble, far away. I don’t have to act on it now, and it’s too intimidating to think of it just yet.
But as we get up to go inside, both of us agreeing that it’s getting too cold, he takes my hand again. “Jess.”
My heart thumps hard, once, as I look up at him.
“This has been one of the best days of my life.”
“Mine, too.”
“Just let it unfold.” He captures a lock of my hair that’s blowing over my cheek and tucks it behind my ear.
His fingertips send sizzles of blue electricity through the soft parts of my body, and I look away, trying to cover the sudden surge of my thoughts toward sex. “I don’t know if I can.”
He carries my hand to his face and presses my palm to his jaw. In this, too, he’s unlike anyone I’ve ever met, the way he touches me, the way he moves.
“Look at me,” he says.
So I do, feeling the heat of his skin against the pads of my fingers, the hard angle of bone beneath the skin, the heat of blood carrying life through him. Curls brush my knuckles. His eyelashes are so long they’re making exaggerated shadows on his cheekbones, and behind him is that vast, star-filled sky, so wild and bright and strange that I almost feel I’m on another planet.