Jack_A Cryptocurrency Billionaire Romance

by Sara Forbes

  “I don’t have amnesia.”

  “Sorry, I just thought with everything—never mind. Let’s try it without the camera first.”

  “Where have they gone?” I read. “Why would they leave without me? I thought he wanted to go to the Cardano system with me. I knew this would happen! She always gets the prize!”

  “All right.” Jack rises from the tree stump. “Try this. When you’re reading, don’t put your finger on the line you’re reading, but at the end of the phrase so that when you look down again, you’re ready to move forward.” He comes behind me, leans over my shoulder, and moves my finger along the script to the next sentence. “Trust that you can process the entre phrase up to that point. Your brain can assimilate entire sentences in fractions of seconds if you force it.”

  I nod, resisting the urge to sink back against his body. I repeat the speech with only a single glance down at the script. I try the trick for a few more lines. It takes more concentration this way, but even to my own ears, it’s flowing better and I’m not glancing down at the page so much.

  “How was that?” I ask when we reach the end of the scene a second time.

  “Much better. If you master this, you can even get away with still reading and not learning by heart.”

  “I’ve no problems learning by heart.”

  “I’ve noticed that. But I’m just giving you general tips for any situation, one actor to another.”

  “OK, got it.”

  I smooth my hair back and reassume my position. I guess I need to get used to Jack being my director now. He has a natural authority, more acting coach than director, which, given his background, isn’t surprising. It’s amazing how many directors don’t have any acting experience at all. Aunt Rita, for one.

  When I’ve read the last line of Sola’s soliloquy, he comes closer, nodding.

  “You have a good, clear voice. Not all actors do. Use it. Don’t worry that Scarlett talks huskily all the time. That’s her trademark. But do yourself a favor and get yourself a reputation as the actress everyone can hear, all the time. If it helps, think of yourself as the better educated of the two princesses who had extra lessons in elocution.”

  I nod. “That does help. Actually.”

  I go back to the beginning and channel my inner hoity-toity princess. I’m thinking I’m doing a pretty good job, too, but Jack’s stomping around in a little circle, almost talking to himself like Woody Allen. I break off my speech.

  “I’m not feeling her pain, her frustration. Her sensitive side,” he says. “Can you dig deeper inside?”

  “Sure.”

  “I mean it, Mia.”

  I swipe beads of sweat off my forehead. “It’s just that I’m focusing so much on the reading technique and the upper-class accent.”

  “OK, take a quick break and then let’s try the next scene with Carter.”

  “The kissing scene?”

  He hilts his head toward the sky. “No, Mia. The one that comes before that, when he’s moaning about fixing his spaceship.”

  “Oh.”

  We take the scene from the top, and I do my best with my new reading technique, the diction, the passion. Between the heat, the hunger, and the concentration needed, I’m getting dizzy. The periphery of my eyesight is blurry.

  “Wait,” Jack says instead of reading Carter’s next line.

  I groan inwardly. “Yes?”

  “You’re speaking your lines and applying what I’ve said, and that’s great, but you’re not listening.”

  “Uh, OK.”

  We do it again. I know my lines well enough that I don’t need the script and can focus all my effort into listening. I listen to every syllable that comes through his parched lips.

  He shakes his head. “You’re not listening.”

  I put my hands on my hips. “I am listening.”

  I’m also boiling, and my throat is sore and raw. One more time and I might throw up, though at this stage nothing can possibly come out of my stomach.

  Still, we do it one more time. I cock my head to show him how damn hard I’m listening. But by the end, he’s still got that hard line to his forehead and is shaking his head.

  I slap the script. “If it weren’t so fucking pathetic, I might be able to say it right.”

  “A good actor can make any dialogue work,” he says. “If they listen to their co-actors.”

  I shake my hair out. “Yeah, well, I’m going for a swim. See ya.”

  As I wade into the water, my body feels like it’s drinking in the cool, green seawater through every pore. I dive into a frothy wave and swim a few strokes underwater. Clear-headed, blinking the salt out of my eyes, I gaze back at Jack still on the beach. I can’t believe he didn’t follow me in. His head is down, reading the script. What a perfectionist.

  I have no idea where this can go, and, realistically, I don’t have high hopes for us, but I’m far too addicted to give him up already, slave driver though he is.

  As I saunter back to him, dripping wet, he flashes me an appraising look, but I’m all ready to work now, so there.

  He taps the camera, which we still haven’t used because apparently my performance isn’t worth the memory space.

  “This is your chance to grab viewers’ attention. Who knows what’ll happen after that. An opportunity like this doesn’t come around often.”

  “No kidding,” I say, wringing the water out of my pony tail and assuming the same position as before to redo the scene.

  “But how do you fix things that get broken? Machinery.” Jack-aka-Captain Carter says, stomping around in exasperation.

  I have to say, Jack’s version is far more believable than Chase’s.

  “Fix?” I say coolly. “Revain crafts are built to withstand forces.”

  “What about rust? Atmospheric degradation?”

  “That is not a problem we have on this planet.”

  “I think you just don’t want to help. Let me talk to somebody else.”

  At this point, I’m supposed to walk forward and prevent Captain Carter from stomping off toward the compound, but Jack’s holding up his hand again in the dreaded “cut” sign.

  “What?” I groan. “I did that bit pretty well.”

  “You’d do it better if you listened to Carter. To what he’s saying.”

  I scratch my head. “I did listen. I listened very well actually.”

  He gives a brisk shake of his head, like my protest is an annoying mosquito. It makes me want to slap him.

  On the next attempt, to show him how hard I’m listening and how present I am in the scene, I add words of my own.

  “That is not a problem we have on our planet. I am sorry to learn you Earthlings have such shortcomings.”

  “I think you just don’t want to help,” Carter’s response comes, same as before.

  And so, we continue. To prevent him from moving farther away, I place my hand on his chest, fingers splayed, enjoying the hardness of his muscles, wondering just how much improvisation Jack is going to allow in this scene. With a barely suppressed grin, he peels my fingers away. “Take your scaly, red claws off me, ma’am. This here shirt was dry-cleaned only yesterday.”

  I giggle at his phony accent. “I like it. Can we add it to the script?”

  “Oh yeah. Let me just write it in.”

  Soon we’re laughing at the silliness of our made-up lines that will never see production. The story’s grown on me and I care about these silly red aliens and the fate of the hapless John Carter and his beat up old spacecraft.

  The soft look on Jack’s face as he laughs makes my heart feel lighter. He could choose to spend his time in so many other ways, but he’s doing this for me. He’s all in. I’ve never had anyone care about my craft. It makes me want to do everything in my power to deserve his attention.

  The next scene involves us looking at Carter’s wreck of a spaceship. We’re using the shack as a focal point. I commit my first three lines to memory as he shuffles about trying to find th
e best position to stand in.

  Then we’re off again. He gives a forlorn shake of his head. “We’ve traveled the outer rim, the Brin system, never thought she’d look like this. It can’t be the end.”

  “You cannot leave it here,” I say primly. “Cardano rebels will detect it and destroy it. Then they will come looking for you.”

  “Mia,” he says heavily. “You’re not listening.”

  “How do I listen then?” I push his chest. “Tell me! Show me.”

  He says nothing, just holds my gaze calmly.

  The silence grows as I wait.

  Finally, he says, “now you’re listening.”

  “What?”

  He doesn’t answer. But I get his point. I think.

  “We take the scene again,” he says softly.

  And this time, I get it. I’m listening because I want to know what he’s going to say next, which could be anything, not something that I know is pre-defined on a script. I must create the illusion of reality happening now.

  No longer concerned with the script in my hands or my clever delivery, I have an all-consuming desire to know what Captain John Carter has to say about his goddamn spaceship that’s sitting on my goddamn planet because it has stakes.

  Lesson learned.

  We zip through three flips of the pages, our longest run yet.

  I’m exhausted but happy. I was in the zone.

  “Good. That’s the scene done. You’re ready for the camera.”

  I blink in amazement.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “For what?”

  “For teaching me something.”

  He grins. “Any time.” He looks like he’s transported to a happier place, all the worry gone, replaced with a new light in his gorgeous blue eyes. He’s made that script come alive. He’s transformed the movie into something I want to star in for its own sake.

  “You must have been a good actor,” I say.

  He rubs his jaw. “Average, I assure you. I was too impatient to allow my craft to develop to a real skill.”

  “Well, you’re a good teacher.”

  He smiles. “There are better ones. Guess you just haven’t come across them.” He gives me a meaningful look. “Yet.”

  “I like to learn by experience.”

  “I know. But you can take shortcuts by stocking up on theory and technique. That’s what drama school’s for.”

  “Mmm. Yeah. Maybe. God, I’m starving.”

  “Me too.”

  We head back to our makeshift base under the tree.

  While I simply loll there, stacking little shells inside each other, dreaming of the French fries we serve in Al’s, Jack is writing something, his face tight with concentration, from time to time pushing his glasses up his nose. He’s sporting a beard, and I like it.

  “What are you writing?” I snake my arms around his neck, tracing the beard with my fingertips.

  “Edits.” He kisses my fingers then holds the page up so I can see the screenplay he’s filled with crossed out words, new lines, arrows, like he’s doing an extensive edit of a rough first draft.

  “A man of many talents,” I remark. “Producer, acting coach, screenwriter…”

  He grasps my head and kisses me like he’s the only one who truly knows me, knows my mouth, and how to turn me into a quivering mass of hormones with just tongue on tongue, lips on lips.

  Actually, he is the only one.

  “Another talent,” I say.

  He averts his gaze, almost shyly, but there’s no way he can be shy with the millions of expert kissers he must have encountered in his star-studded career. I’ve read the tabloids. I should simply appreciate this time for what it is—a weird loophole in reality. Something that shouldn’t have happened.

  I peer down and read what he’s written. “Scarlett won’t like that.”

  “It’s not for her.”

  “No?”

  “It’s for you. You need more lines to segue into the soliloquy. We need to flesh out your character.”

  He’s scribbling now like he’s losing his mind in this heat.

  “OK, this is some seriously alternative producer’s cut,” I say after a while.

  “And you’re going to act it out in a minute. With me.”

  I groan. “Anything to take my mind off the hunger. But speaking makes me hungry, just so you know.”

  “Believe me, I know.”

  As the afternoon burns on, we do these lines, and Jack teaches me about breathing and voice projection and how to stand so that my face captures the sun advantageously. I’ve never learned these tricks in all of my drama classes.

  Now he’s sitting, holding the lens to the sun, watching the spot between the movie title and the author name in the script. It should start burning any time. In theory.

  “Do we even need a fire?” I ask in the wild hope he’s got a secret stash of fish he caught earlier. They’d go so well with my imaginary French fries.

  “Yeah. For the fish I’m going to catch.” He gazes out to sea, like he’s a Hemingway character.

  “You keep talking about fish. Do you know anything about fishing?”

  “Nope.”

  I let out a sigh. To take my mind off hunger, I flick over a page of the script. Even a brief read tells me what he’s written is engaging, funny. I can spot which bits are his—they’re the lines I find myself wanting to say aloud.

  “Next time I’m handed a screenplay where someone starts a fire easily without matches or a lighter, I’m going to cut that bullshit right out of the script,” he growls. “Better still, pass on the script entirely.”

  “Good call. Most things are easier in the movies. Miraculous escapes from exploding bombs? Hanging from cliffs and being able to scramble up again?” I sigh heavily. “Love.”

  He stops moving. “Is that hard in real life?”

  “I don’t have much experience,” I say, avoiding his eyes. “Don’t you miss it? I mean acting?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Why’d you give it up?”

  He clips the protective cover back on the camera lens and brushes sand off his shorts. “I wanted to be successful. Faster.”

  “Well, you managed that.”

  “I mean faster…than Felix.”

  “Oh. What’s he like then?”

  “He’s blond and happy-go-lucky. You’d like him.”

  “Is he in the movie business too?”

  Jack’s hands curl into fists and then straighten. “Felix is a professional gambler, Mia. Just like my father. His lifestyle is precarious. He got lucky before Dad died. A massive win in a poker tournament. So at least Dad left this earth knowing that Felix was on top.”

  I reach out and touch his arm. “Sorry about your dad.”

  He nods. “Yeah, you know what that’s like, I guess. He was old. He was ready to go. Then, of course, Felix lost it all in the very next game. And I’ve been bailing him out on occasion ever since. Something our mother doesn’t know and doesn’t need to know. She worries enough about us as it is. But there’s no reason for her to worry. I mean, it’s OK as long as business is good. And it is.”

  “Of course it is,” I say gently. “And thank you for telling me all this.”

  He tugs me to his chest. His heart is thrumming fast. “I want to tell you everything, Mia.” His embrace is tight and urgent and I squeeze him back.

  “But I also want to feed you.” He draws away, rises, and in a fluid move, traipses off in the direction of the bushes and sand dunes. I let him go. If I follow, he’ll only feel extra pressure to find something edible, which I doubt is going to happen. My empty stomach is spasming. They say the first twenty-four hours of fasting is the worst. I hope they’re right.

  One thing’s for sure—I’m not going to be at the mercy of Jack’s fishing skills. I’m going to search under every palm tree on this island until I find one that wasn’t pilfered for Scarlett’s pina colada frenzy. Failing that, I’m going to try scaling a tree to knock
one down.

  I amble over the sand in the direction of north point, retracing the journey that caused this mess to begin with. If I hadn’t gone to bathe in that little rock pool, none of this would have happened. I’d be in LA now, gearing up for another day playing Sola in the studio. I’d be stuffing my face and not thinking twice about where food came from.

  But while my stomach is empty, my soul is full. I’m buzzing, lightheaded with possibility. I believe in this movie, and Jack believes in me. I laugh out loud into the breeze. Being around him makes me feel like some bigger, brighter, better version of myself that I never knew existed.

  I want to tell you everything, Mia. He actually said that. He thinks of me as a person he wants to confide in. Jack Palmer! I’ve only scratched the surface of the man and I’m greedy for more, for anything he’ll give me. What makes him truly happy? What is his twin like? How close are they? And why was beating a poker player more important to him than following his own dream?

  He’s happier here, rehearsing and rewriting a script, than I’ve ever seen him in the studio. Can it be that I’ve caused that? Or is this just a weird effect of being stuck on an island together with nobody else around to grab his attention?

  Then I spot it—a large coconut lying snug beside a rock. I dive onto the sand and clasp it between my hands, like a footballer going for a touchdown. The coconut’s skin is tough and green and warm. I kiss it. It’s mature, so it’ll have a good lining of meat as well as juice. We just need sharp stones to cut into it.

  Seconds later, I find another one, roughly the same size. I let out a whoop. This is all I’ll manage to carry, so I begin the trek back to the tent.

  Jack’s back already, putting sticks on the unlit fire. When he sees me, he halts mid-stride. I calmly walk up, a coconut under each arm, a smile of triumph all over my face.

  “Any luck fishing?” I ask him. “Or fancy some locally harvested coconut? Totally organic and vegan?”

  His gaze drops. “You are a genius and I worship you.”

  “Hey, buddy, my eyes are up here.”

  He smirks and smooths back my hair. “Don’t worry, I know exactly where your eyes are. And everything else too.” His gaze roves over me, slowly, sensuously. He draws me closer and kisses my eyelids, nose checks, chin. Then his lips graze over my chin and down my neck, and whisper along my collarbone. It’s all I can do not to drop the coconuts on his bare feet.