by Maggie Marr
“Did you have a dog?” he asked. “Growing up?”
I nodded. “Petunia.”
“Good name,” he said. “I got my first dog when I was eight. Dallas, a beagle puppy.” His gaze jerked from Kong to me. “My dad shot it.”
My eyes widened with his words. My heart thudded against my chest and a hollowness lodged just beneath my ribs. “W…why would—”
“He caught him in the neighbor’s chicken coop, so he killed the dog.”
An ache pulsed through my body for the little boy that Dillon had been when his father killed his dog. I couldn’t begin to understand what kind of father would shoot his son’s pet.
“According to my dad, everything is disposable, even things that are alive.”
I clenched my jaw and bit back the words I wanted to say about Dillon’s father. “Do you… do you still see your dad?”
The muscle in his jaw flinched and he stared beyond me into the distance and didn’t meet my gaze. “Not anymore,” he said. “Sometimes I hear from our mom.”
He didn’t offer more about his parents. I remembered Choo’s words from last night. Dillon didn’t mention how their parents had tried to deprogram Choo and finally tossed him out into the street. Dillon also didn’t mention that he’d saved his brother and was now putting Choo through school. Instead, Dillon kept walking. I chewed my bottom lip. He was all of a sudden a whole lot less of a jerk than I’d originally thought.
We rounded the corner to the top of Runyon and approached the highest spot on the path. “You close with your family?” Dillon asked.
My inside crumpled with the word family. I’d only ever had one person in my family. Hot tears plucked at my eyes. The benefit of feeling numb was that when someone said an innocuous word like family—a word that for most people brought feelings of happiness and joy—if you were numb, you could just shrug and you felt nothing. But I was less and less numb every day, and the feelings that swirled through me weren’t always easy to control.
I turned to Dillon. “My mom died last year,” I said. “And I’ve never met my dad.”
He nodded. His gaze remained on mine. I liked how he reacted. He didn’t apologize; he didn’t act like he didn’t know what to say or was afraid of what I’d told him. Instead, he looked at me in silence and waited. He seemed to be watching me and waiting for me fill the silent space, to see if I had something I needed to say.
“I miss her,” I whispered. I turned out toward the overlook. All of Los Angeles lay at my feet. A breeze whispered across my face. My heart hurt with the thought of my mom. Her blue eyes, her blond hair, that laugh that I would forever hear in my mind that made me think of wind chimes and warm breezes, her smile. The fact that even as she lay in a hospital bed with tubes sticking out of her, she made me promise to chase my dreams no matter how long or how far.
“She lived out here for a while,” I said. “In L.A.” I looked to my left where the L.A. skyline cut upward into the blue sky. The ache in my heart lodged hard and deep. I wanted to imagine my mom my age, standing here, on top of Runyon Canyon, looking out at the view. My gaze traveled across the horizon toward the blue of the ocean. “She loved the beach.” My throat thickened around my words. We’d meant to go to the beach, together, someday, but the time to someday had run out for us. “She used to tell me stories about all the time she spent there.” My voice quivered and Bernie walked to me and nuzzled my hand.
I took a giant breath and closed my eyes. The hard lump in my throat was there and was at this moment the only thing that prevented me from screaming. Screaming out “why?” There wasn’t an answer, not a good one. All that remained of my mom was me and my memories of her.
I turned my face from the view of L.A. and looked at Dillon. He watched me. He was really listening. There was an earnest intensity on his face, as though what I was saying was important to him.
I hitched the corner of my mouth upward into a false smile. “Probably not what you expected to hear on your walk this morning.” I rolled my gaze toward the sky. Suddenly I felt stupid and exposed. Vulnerable and embarrassed. Why had I just totally laid out my life for Dillon?
He nodded. “Unexpected, yes.” He turned away from the view and started down the long canyon hill.
Great. I’d just convinced Dillon that his brother had hired an unprofessional, emotional nutjob.
Downhill was much easier than uphill. While embarrassment still coursed through me, my breath was more even. Women walking by ogled Dillon and kept checking him out. I noticed they would actually turn around after they passed him so they could check out his ass.
“Does that get old?” I finally asked.
“I don’t even notice it,” Dillon said. “Anymore.” He turned his face toward me. “Until you point it out.”
“Sorry.”
He called for the dogs and put leashes on all four. He handed me Kong and Bernie’s leashes. He’d been silent since the top of the canyon. I hoped I still had a job.
When we got to the flat area at the bottom, he turned his head to me. “You got those four scripts?”
I nodded. Bernie and Kong jerked hard to the right and I stumbled.
“Gotcha.” Dillon’s hands caught my shoulders and a jolt of electricity whizzed through me.
I looked into those intense blue eyes. He was right in front of me. He still held my shoulders. My gaze roamed down over his chest. I could smell the salty sweat on him. He smelled like outdoors, and wind, and grass, and God that sweat would taste salty on my tongue.
Salty on my tongue?
I jerked my head back from staring at Dillon’s chest. I was considering licking the sweat off my boss’s chest. Thank God he couldn’t read minds. I peered into his eyes, and his wicked smirk decorated his face. Or could he? I stepped backward and turned toward the pups. They slobbered and slurped from a bucket of water. Once they finished, Dillon walked us toward the canyon gates.
“Where’s your Jeep?” he asked and scanned down the street.
I bit my top lip and twisted Kong’s leash around my wrist. “I don’t know.”
Dillon scrunched up his face and looked at me as though I had half a brain.
“I parked it on Whitley and when I came out of my motel, it was gone,” I said. “I haven’t had time to track it down.”
Dillon’s brow furrowed. “How did you get here this morning?”
“We walked,” I said.
Dillon jerked his head back and then shook it. “That’s farther than the loop at Runyon.”
“But not nearly as steep,” I said. I twisted the ends of all four leashes around my hand.
Dillon dug into his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. “Black Range Rover.” He pointed and I spied it three cars down. He held out the keys and dropped them in my hand.
“How will you get back?” I asked.
“Same way you got here.” He put his hands on his hips. They were beautiful hips with little round muscles just at the edge. “So, listen,” he said and turned first back toward Runyon and then looked at me, “would you read that script, The Legend Returns, as soon as you get back to the house? It’s on the top of the pile.”
“Sure, of course,” I said and chewed my bottom lip. So maybe I wasn’t getting fired just yet. Maybe Choo had convinced Dillon to let me stay on as his script reader slash dog-walker for a little while, or at least until I could gather enough money to find my own place. Kong pranced around under Bernie’s legs, and I knelt down and scooped him up into my arms.
Dillon took two steps back from me. “Once you’re finished reading the script, come by the set.”
I whipped my head toward Dillon. “The set?”
Panic clutched my belly and a feeling of dread flooded my body.
“Yeah, the set.” Dillon stopped walking and stared at me. “Where I’ll be the rest of the day and most of the night. I need to know what you think of that script. The director on this film is doing it next.”
“Can’t I just e-mail you what I t
hink?”
Dillon shook his head. “Naw, I don’t want to read about it, I want to talk about it.”
“I’ll call,” I yelled out toward Dillon as he turned to run back up the hill. He was running up Runyon Canyon again? What was he, a masochist?
“I need to see you when we talk about it. I do better in person. I can’t understand you the same way over the phone.”
“What… wait…”
“Just read the script, Dorothy, and come to the set,” he yelled and then trotted up the dusty path.
A queasy feeling snaked through my belly. Easy for Dillon to say, he hadn’t been the laughingstock of the entire cast and crew the last time he was on set.
Chapter 7
Dillon
I sat at the table in my trailer and went over my lines.
Ryan grabbed another beer from the fridge in my trailer. “Want one?”
“No, man, thanks.” I glanced at the clock above the windshield. It wasn’t even noon and Ryan was already suckin’ ’em down and playing Halo in my trailer. There was no way I could get through the scenes for today if I was drinking, but Ryan played his character half in the bag most days.
He plopped down on the couch, cracked open the beer, and took a long gulp. He pulled the earphones back onto his head and continued blowing away everything that came at him on the flat screen.
I tried to refocus on my lines, but when I tried to read, all I saw was a pair of blue eyes and long caramel-colored hair. What the hell was I thinking? I shook my head and tugged at my hair. I’d actually been interested in what Dorothy had told me this morning. I’d wanted to listen. I’d wanted to hear about her, about her life, about her past. This was bad. Very, very bad. My focus was on my career. My career and getting Choo through college without seeing our parents again. Never seeing our parents again. I didn’t have time to listen to a girl or tell her about my childhood heartaches.
A girl like Lane Channing didn’t fit into my life right now, except for reading. I needed her reading and reviewing scripts. I sighed and flipped a page. Dorothy was here to read, and I wouldn’t be banging that reader for sure, because she’d already proven in one day that she had an uncanny ability to climb inside my head.
I focused on the script that was open on the table in front of me. Hunter had mentioned this was the pivotal scene for my character. I didn’t want to blow it, especially after the offer he’d just given me for his next film, The Legend Returns. I already felt like I was kind of in the shitter with Hunter since I hadn’t given him an answer on the Steve Legend film.
“Hot damn,” Ryan said. He bent forward and peered out the window. “Who is that?”
I didn’t have time to reach over and pull up the shade to check out whatever hot body had Ryan salivating before Dorothy burst through the trailer door.
“Read it!” she called. She bounded up the trailer steps with that brilliant smile plastered to her face. The same brilliant smile I’d seen at Runyon Canyon earlier that day, the smile that made me run a second circuit, give her my car, and hit a cold shower once I got home.
Ryan turned to me and behind Lane mouthed, “Wow!” I squirmed out of my seat. I couldn’t blame him. She wore this hot little sundress—a pale color with tiny little flowers all over it. The dress showed off the golden skin of her shoulders and neck. Her hair was piled on her head, but some curls dangled loose and danced around her neck. That dress was short, mid-thigh, and showed off her legs. She wore cowboy boots. In L.A. Brown with blue insets. That dress was obscene, and a part of me wanted to order Ryan to get out, then walk to the top of the steps, grab her, and bend her over the table in my trailer. Slide my hand up that golden thigh to a place I didn’t suspect she’d been touched before.
She turned toward Ryan and then back to me. Those damn blue eyes ripped through me. Every time she looked at me, her gaze hit me hard in the chest.
“Hey,” Ryan said in that throaty voice. He shot her that hot actor smile. The same type of smile I dropped at every club, every scene, on every girl I wanted to get into bed.
My pulse sped up. I didn’t want Lane to want Ryan. I shoved my hands into my back pockets. I shot Ryan my best keep-your-hands-off glare.
“Hi,” she said.
A small, cautious smile shimmered across her lips. Her eyes darted to me, then to the floor, then back to Ryan as she pulled a strand of that damn long hair, which was dancing along her collarbone, behind her ear.
“I’m Lane.” She took two steps forward and reached out her hand. I didn’t even want him to touch her hand.
“Ryan.” He moved in close to her. Too close. I didn’t like it.
“Nice to meet you.” Her tongue traced over her lips, chasing her words. Those pouty sex-pot lips.
“You read it?” I barked out louder than I intended. Harsher than I wanted, but I need to bust up this little lovefest that had started. I knew who Ryan was, what type of guy, and Dorothy wasn’t ready for his kind. She was straight-up just in town and wouldn’t stand a chance when Ryan put on the heat.
She turned her face to me and her smile dropped from her lips. Her brows furrowed with an unasked question. She looked more tentative, more cautious—if I admitted it, I loved it. I didn’t want that smile to be for anyone but me.
“What?” I said and turned my palm upward. “Dude she’s my reader.” I looked at Ryan like he was nuts to consider her. I turned to Lane. “You’re here to see me, right? Not flirt with him.” I jerked my head toward Ryan.
She flushed red, and a hard look entered her eyes.
“Guy,” Ryan said. “Chill. We were just introducing ourselves.”
“She isn’t here to make friends or find a date. She’s here to read my scripts and walk my dogs.”
Both Ryan and Lane stared at me. “Even you know how big of an ass you’re being, right?” Ryan asked.
A sharp feeling sliced through me. I couldn’t stop my need to make certain that Ryan understood that Lane was a no-touch proposition. Lane’s eyes raked over me.
“I gotta bounce,” Ryan said. “Lane, it was nice to meet you. Maybe I’ll see you again if this asshole doesn’t scare you off.”
Lane’s mouth turned to a shallow smile of thanks. I guessed for Ryan acknowledging me acting like a giant prick. The trailer door slammed shut. When Lane turned to me, I got the cold stare. She walked to me and slapped the script on the table.
“It’s a shitty action script with franchise potential all over it.” Her frigid, clipped tone matched her eyes. “You’ll make a gazillion dollars. Enjoy.” She hiked her purse over her shoulder and walked back toward the trailer door. The door slammed shut behind her—hard.
She was pissed and actually, I couldn’t blame her. What the hell was wrong with me? I lifted the script from the table. Why the hell did I care who Lane dated? I didn’t. Did I?
I bounded down the steps and burst through the door. “Lane!” I called. “Lane, stop!”
Her tight little ass stopped moving beneath her flirty skirt and she turned toward me. She crossed her arms over her chest—what a way to ruin a good view. I walked up to her, picking my way over the gravel under my trailer as I’d run out without shoes. I hated wearing shoes.
“Look,” I said and slid my eyes from side to side. “I know Ryan. I know who he is and I know what he does and I know how he treats women and—”
“You mean he’s just like you?” She pulled her head back and a smug, pursed-lip look settled onto her face. Great, she was going to bust my balls for being a dick. Just what I didn’t want to deal with.
“Not exactly,” I said. “He’s not your type.”
“Like you would know?” She turned to walk away.
I grasped her arm and stopped her. Her skin was soft and warm. Lane’s eyes landed on my hand. Did she feel it too? The electricity that pulsed between us with even the slightest touch, the electricity that was hot and dangerous and made me want to do some seriously bad things to this little girl from Kansas, no matter her untouc
hability.
I pulled in close to her. She smelled fresh, like flowers and mint. I got close enough to see the tremble of her pulse in her neck, to know that I was causing her heart rate to jump. I liked being the cause of her fluttering heart.
“Maybe, I don’t know,” I whispered. I didn’t have to work hard to make my voice low. Lane, this close to me, the heat coming off her body, those pretty little nipples pressed tight to the fabric of her dress, that short skirt that was an inch from my fingertips—all of it worked me, worked me in a way that made me want to work her. “You’re not the right girl for Ryan.”
She was turned on, but she kept her gaze locked on mine. Her pulse hammered, but she played it cool. Cooler than I would have expected.
“You don’t get to decide who or what I do. I’m just your reader, remember?” She slipped her arm from my grasp and my hand felt cold with its absence. She turned and her boots crunched gravel.
I barely knew this girl, but my belly clenched with the idea that I might have to watch her be with someone else. The idea made me want to slam my hand into the metal side of the trailer.
“What about the other scripts!” I yelled at her retreating ass. I didn’t want her to leave, but I wouldn’t tell her that.
She stopped walking and turned back toward me. “I finished reading two of the scripts and am working on the third.” Her tone was still cool.
“You bring them with you?” I asked.
She took a step back toward the trailer. “They’re in my bag,” she said and pointed to her purse, which was slung over her shoulder.
“Finish them here,” I said. I pulled open my trailer door. “I’m headed to makeup, but we can discuss them when I finish filming my next scene.” My words were a command. A command that Lane wouldn’t refuse.
Lane