by Judy Corry
"I guess… Hey, what are you doing?" he asked when she pulled his shirt tight from the back and stuck a chip clip to hold the fabric snugly.
She attached another clip. "You said you work better while in costume, so…since Treven would want to show off his toned physique, that's what you get to do." And boy was it toned. She could wash her laundry on those washboard abs of his.
"I feel so violated." Drew sighed.
She paused, her stomach sinking. She didn't want him to feel uncomfortable. "Do you really?"
He cracked a smile. "No. Not yet. They did much worse to me when we filmed the promos for the show. At least you're letting me keep my shirt on."
"For now." Kate winked. She rolled up his sleeves until they were just above the dip between his bicep and deltoid. What was it like to see him without his shirt in person? She'd probably faint.
"You really think Treven would wear sleeves this short?" Drew's cheeks were rosier than usual as he inspected his newly fitted shirt.
"Yep. Just like that." Kate stepped back, hoping to appear calm and unaffected by his good looks as her eyes moved up to his face. "I also think his hair might be slightly different. Come with me." She grabbed his hand, feeling warmth spike up her arm as she pulled him into the bathroom just down the hall.
"And what are we going to do in here?" Drew asked, looking around the small room at her curling iron, brushes, and makeup that she'd stacked haphazardly in a cart next to the vanity. "You're not going to put eyeliner on me, are you?"
"No, but if it would help, I'm not opposed to it. I just got a new glittery eyeliner that would really stand out against your dark lashes."
"As tempting as that is…I'll pass."
"Good choice." She instructed him to sit down so she could work on his hair. "Are you okay if I change your hair?"
"You don't like it?" He peered up at her through his lashes, and she couldn't help but think how unfair it was for a guy to have such full and long lashes.
"Your hair is great. Quite an improvement from the surfer-dude style you sported a few years ago."
"Hey, I'll have you know I had lots of women asking to touch my silky locks." His jaw jutted out.
"Whatever you say."
Then, as if realizing something, he said, "Wait. How did you know I had my hair longer? That was four years ago."
She bit her lip. "I, uh, ran across a photo of you online one day."
He raised his eyebrows and gave her a teasing look. "Did you stalk me online?"
Her face heated. Why did he have to be so good at picking up on everything? "I didn't stalk you." That much.
He kept staring at her, like he could get her to confess anything if he just met her with that smoldering gaze for a few seconds.
And of course, it worked. She wondered if he used that look in his business meetings very often.
"Fine. I looked you up once or twice."
"Why?"
Was there an exit from this conversation that didn't end with her looking like a fool?
"I was curious about what you were up to." She grabbed a comb from a drawer and started moving it through his dark hair. She hadn't realized how thick and silky his hair was until she touched it.
"To be fair, I looked you up, too."
Her hand stilled. "I hope it wasn't during my pixie-cut stage. I didn’t have the right shape of face for it."
"I thought it looked good."
So he had seen it. How many times had he looked her up?
She wanted to ask but knew if she did, she'd have to tell him how many times she'd gone to his page. Which was probably in the hundreds. So instead of revealing how much of a stalker she actually was, she grabbed some hair wax and began styling his hair.
She wasn't used to doing a guy’s hair, but she eventually found a style that would best embody Treven's character. When she'd dreamt Treven up a few months ago, he'd somehow ended up looking a lot like Drew. Maybe her subconscious had been trying to remind her of something.
As she worked the wax into his hair, they were quiet, though she felt his eyes on her, studying her. Her neck prickled with heat under his scrutiny. What did Drew Burrows see in her? Did he still see her as the annoying ten-year-old who bugged him and Aiden as they played their video games? Or as the domineering twelve-year-old who acted like a dictator when she was putting on a backyard production? Or as the hormonal teenager who had the hots for her brother's best friend?
She hoped it was none of those, hoped he noticed that she wasn't the same as she'd been back then. Maybe she wasn't exactly how she thought she'd be at twenty-five—not nearly as successful as the woman she'd daydreamed about becoming, that was for sure. But she hoped he saw her as a peer, an equal, now that they were finally in the same stage of life.
But could she really hope to be on the same level as Drew Burrows: America's Favorite Billionaire Bachelor?
Probably not. She certainly hadn't been enough for Nolan Prosser.
She swallowed the lump in her throat and swiped the thoughts away.
"Is everything okay?" Drew asked, his voice quiet with concern.
She nodded and pushed back the heartache threatening to spill out of her eyes. "My mind decided to ramble back through bad memories." She stepped back and gestured for him to take a look in the mirror.
"Thinking about Aiden?" Drew asked, still looking at her instead of at his hair.
She shook her head. "Nolan."
His eyes became wary. "Do you miss him?"
She groaned. No. Definitely not. "I was just wondering why he went through with the wedding. Why go through with it when he wasn't even interested in being my husband?" She swiveled to face the mirror. Drew did the same, so they were looking at each other's reflections.
Drew gazed at her with a soft sympathetic expression. "I wish I had an answer for that. But all that comes to my mind is that he was a class-A jerk. And really, really stupid."
A smile cracked Kate's lips. "Yes, he was really stupid."
"I'd use a stronger adjective, but I know how you feel about profanity. So we'll leave it at stupid jerk."
"You could have called him a nincompoop."
Drew put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her toward his side. She melted against him. "Yes, a really stupid nincompoop jerk with a big helping of twerp on top." He sighed and squeezed her tighter. Then he inspected his hair for the first time. "So, this is my bad-boy hairstyle then?"
"Yep, though I'm pretty sure you pull it off even better than Treven could."
"Since Treven is imaginary and all."
Yep, no part of Treven was based on Drew at all.
25
Drew
Drew felt ridiculous, but if Kate liked this look, he'd try to channel his inner bad boy. The bad boy that was locked away under so many layers, he didn't know if he'd be able to pull him out without seeming pathetic.
But he had noticed that Kate's eyes seemed to linger on his arms more than they had in the past…so maybe this getup would help him in the long run.
Feeling encouraged, he drew in a deep breath and stood with as much confidence as he could muster. Bad guys were usually über confident.
He ran through the scene in his mind, trying to embrace Treven's character. He really wanted this to be helpful to Kate, so he would do his best.
"He's gone." Drew pretended to open a door and walked through it before walking up to Kate and pretending to unlock imaginary chains from her wrists. "I'm sorry we have to keep you locked up like that."
Kate's face turned to stone. Wow, she was really good at this.
"Are you really?" Her voice was full of hatred. "If you were sorry you wouldn't keep locking me up."
Drew slumped his shoulders, hoping he was putting off a defeated vibe. "I’m sorry." He reached for one of her wrists and pretended like he was feeling along her chains. And when he looked into her eyes, something took over him. He felt light and confident, like for the first time in his life he could actually move through a
scene without overthinking it.
Kate was a girl he'd kidnapped. She was scared. She'd been ripped away from her family and friends, held hostage by him. He had no right to think she could forgive him for this. But when he was with her, he wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and make her feel safe again.
"I'm trying to keep you safe. You need to just trust me," Drew said.
Kate ripped her hands away and clenched them in fists at her side. "How can I trust you when you're the reason I'm here in the first place?"
Drew scrubbed his hands over his face the way he thought Treven would. "I know it started out wrong, but you don't know what he's holding over me. Maybe if you did, you'd understand that I want what's best for you. I just don't know how to stop."
"What are you talking about?" Kate asked. "If you wanted to get away from him, you could just leave."
Drew took her hands in his again and ran his thumb along her knuckles—such soft, delicate fingers. "It's not that simple. Give me time and I'll get you out of here. I promise."
Kate's eyes shifted their focus from side to side, reading his eyes. He pushed as much warmth into them as he could.
"So what made you change your mind?" she finally said.
Drew slid his hands up her arms to rest on her shoulders. "You changed me. You changed everything." His gaze dipped down to her lips then back to her eyes.
This would probably be the time for Treven and Misty to kiss.
Drew slid a hand from her shoulders to rest behind her neck while the other traced the line of her cheekbone.
He swallowed. Just follow through. Just go for it, he told himself.
"Do you want me to finish the scene?" Drew asked, his heart pounding so hard in his chest.
Her lips parted, and she nodded before whispering, "You probably should…for research."
His stomach tightened. But he nodded too, and said, "For research." Then he closed the distance between them and kissed her slowly and tentatively. At least, he tried to go slow, but the moment their lips touched, Drew was breathless and hungry for more. He'd feared she'd shy away from his kiss, but she didn't. Her lips parted, and she deepened the kiss.
Every inch of his skin tingled as he pulled her closer to him. He smoothed his hands across her back, resisting the urge to press her firmly against him.
How many times had he dreamed of that stolen moment on the couch in her parents’ basement? So many times. But even though he'd relived it over and over again, trying to forget while trying to remember at the same time, he was surprised at how much he had forgotten. The sensation he remembered was just a ghost of what it was like to kiss Kate now.
She slipped her hands slowly up the contours of his chest, before resting them behind his neck and pulling herself closer. He didn't know if she was still just doing research for the scene, but he didn't care. Even if this wasn't coming from a real place with real feelings, he'd take it. He'd kiss her as long as she'd let him.
"What would Treven and Misty do next?" Drew asked, breaking the kiss for a moment, his chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath.
She looked up into his eyes, and the blue reflected a desire he'd hadn't seen in them since he was in college. Could he dare hope that she wanted this to be real as much as he did?
"You did say Treven would probably trap Misty in a corner and make-out with her, right?" Her breathing was as shallow as his. "It might be a good idea to test that theory and see how it goes."
Drew's insides surged at her suggestion. Before he could talk himself out of it, or break character, he walked Kate backwards until her back was against the wall and they were kissing again.
26
Kate
Kate couldn't stop kissing Drew. It was like she had turned into some hormonal teenager the moment their lips touched, and all she could do was run her fingers through his hair and beg him to never stop kissing her.
They were probably out of the camera's view, but she didn't care. She wasn't kissing him because she needed step-by-step footage to study afterward—all she needed to type in her screenplay was that her characters kissed against the wall.
Kate was kissing him because she wanted to. She'd been dying to do this again for seven years! His lips were softer than she remembered, and she may have thought twenty-one-year-old Drew was an expert kisser, but this Drew was on a whole different playing field. It was otherworldly, and the passion between them was off the charts. How had she ever thought she could love anyone else besides Drew? She knew, especially after this kiss, that it would be an impossibility. No other man could ever compete with him and the way his kisses made her tremble.
She just hoped it wasn't all an act for her screenplay.
It couldn't be, though, could it? Drew was a terrible actor. There was no way he could suddenly pull of the performance of a lifetime after years of messing up lines.
Drew's phone rang, a jazzy melody bringing them back to reality.
"Do you need to get that?" she mumbled against his lips.
He gave his head a quick shake. "That's Alexis's ringtone. She can wait. Treven and Misty were just getting started."
Her heart soared at the thought that he didn't want to stop. She kissed him again, and his hands traced their way down her sides until they gripped her hips.
His phone rang again. Kate pulled her head back, separating their lip lock. "Alexis might have last-minute instructions before she gets on the plane."
Drew pinched his eyes shut briefly and sighed. "You're probably right."
While he was on the phone with Alexis, Kate willed her heart to go back to its normal pace. It felt like she'd just sprinted a marathon.
Drew had his back turned to her, so she combed her fingers through her hair, hoping to give herself some semblance of serenity. Her acting skills were a little better than Drew's, so hopefully he'd buy it.
When he was done with his call, he slipped his phone back in his pocket and slowly turned back to her. He ran a hand through his hair, which she'd done a great job of restyling again during their make-out session. "Do you think that version of the scene will work?" he asked, suddenly bashful.
She wanted to say no, just so they could practice different scenarios all night. But since she still wasn't sure if he'd been acting or not, she stopped the video recorder on her laptop and said, "I think we got it."
Hopefully, her computer had captured enough of their kiss that she could re-watch it and decipher if the kiss had a chance of being real.
27
Drew
Drew couldn't stop thinking about that kiss. All through his meetings the next day, his mind wandered off and took him right back to the moment when he and Kate were tangled up against her wall. He hadn't kissed anyone like that before.
It had seemed so honest and real, but he still wasn't sure. And he didn't want to possibly ruin the magic of it by asking Kate about where they stood after it. He'd just wait and watch her for signals, and hope he could have her in his arms again soon.
Friday evening came too fast. Drew dreaded the thought of spending the weekend with Gwen after everything that had happened. But if they got the footage that they needed, this would hopefully be the last time he'd have to see her. And hopefully, Alexis would stop being so uptight about him having feelings for his handler.
Kate dropped him off at the safe house then called him once she was back at her apartment. The drive over had been interesting, the air charged with unspoken questions. But they'd made it through, and he promised himself that once this weekend was over, he'd find the courage to move things forward with Kate. Lawsuit pending or not.
"Just walk around the house saying a few things," Kate's voice came through the earpiece of the burner phone she'd left him with. Since Alexis had flown out to Denver the night before, she had put Kate in charge of watching the video feed from the privacy of her apartment.
Drew strolled around the house, trying to think of something to say. He wanted to keep things light for now, s
o he just picked a random thing off the top of his head. "This dude walked into my house today. I had no idea who he was, and he asked if he could sit on my couch and take a nap."
"What?" Kate sounded alarmed. "You let a stranger into your house? How did he get through the gate?"
Drew laughed. "You told me to start talking, so I did. You never said anything about not making stuff up."
A low growl sounded through the phone. "You are such a tease, do you know that?"
Drew smiled. "Sorry. I couldn't help myself." She was way too gullible to resist.
"Okay. I need you to walk back to the bug we left in the hall."
Drew made his way to the painting of the couple by the pond.
"Now, run back and forth down the hall while saying whatever other weird things come to your mind."
Drew momentarily wondered why he'd need to run around the house before realizing he didn't want to think about it after all.
"My name is Drew Burrows, and I like to run around little houses, so I can catch my ex-girlfriend cheating on me," he said.
He stopped running.
"Did you get it?"
"Yeah, the bug in the hall is working great. Let me make sure everything matches up now. If you could just twirl your way back to the kitchen while singing Mary Had a Little Lamb, I think we'll be good."
Drew was about to do just as she said before he stopped. "Are you serious? Or just trying to get me back?"
Kate laughed. "I actually have everything I need. Though, it was pretty entertaining to see you running down the hall."
"You mean you didn't really need that?"
"The running…no. That was just an added bonus."
Drew shook his head and scowled at the camera hiding in the plant. "And I thought I was bad."
"Sorry, not sorry." He could just imagine the wicked smile that was sure to be planted on her face.
"Ok, well. If that's all, I'm gonna go sit on the couch and try to regain some of my dignity. I'll call you with our dinner requests after Gwen gets here."