Outside the dressing room, the studio has exploded into a whirlwind of activity. Camera crews, set design, and assistants hurry back and forth in every direction, heels and steel-toed boots alike clacking across the wooden flooring. Someone set up a buffet table near the main stage, laden with pastries and fruit, along with several carafes of coffee. Just the sight of food makes my stomach do an unpleasant backflip.
But then I catch sight of who’s standing beside it, and that backflip turns into something more like a washing machine tumble cycle. My whole body switches to high gear, churning.
Marcel doesn’t wait for me to recover. He leads me by the elbow to the corner of the snack table where Lark is waiting, and then he announces, “I’ve got to go talk to the stage manager,” and vanishes.
Lark looks good. Better than I remember, even, which is saying something. Because I’ve had a lot of very detailed fantasies about him in the days since we parted.
He’s dressed in a suit, his tie done up, and his hair freshly swept to one side, beard shaved close. But when I look closely, I catch signs of distress. Faint reddish lines in the whites of his eyes, and a hint of a shadow beneath them, like he hasn’t been sleeping well.
I blink, realizing I’m staring, but that’s okay. Because he’s doing the same thing. Gazing at me like I’m some kind of apparition, or a puzzle he can’t quite work out.
“Hey,” I say, after an awkwardly long pause.
“Cassidy…” But whatever he’s about to say is cut off when a woman appears at his shoulder.
“We’re about ready for her, if you’re done prepping,” she says. Then she’s gone, as quickly as she appeared, and I notice her drifting toward Marcel. Stage manager, I guess.
I expect Lark to just listen to her and lead me up on stage to the chair where I’m about to give a live television interview—and damn him, that should be the most exciting thing for me right now, I should be thrilled about it, excited about it, losing my mind with nerves about it.
Instead, all I can think about is that he smells the same. A deep, almost smoky scent, cologne mingled with a salty note that’s all him.
He steps closer, raises a hand as if to brush my shoulder, and sparks ignite throughout my body, before he even so much as touches me. He lets his hand fall again, and disappointment dampens that rush of sparks. “Can we talk?” Lark asks quietly. “After the interview. Please?”
Maybe it’s the quiet desperation in his eyes. Maybe it’s just the fact that I’ve been wanting the same thing. At the very least, a chance to hear the truth. To say my piece, too, and to let him know that I’m not the kind of girl who plays second fiddle to anybody.
Or the kind of person who breaks up marriages, either.
“Okay,” I murmur. Just one word, but it brightens his whole countenance. His eyes light up, and the corners of his mouth lift in the first thing approaching a smile that I’ve seen from him yet.
It almost makes me feel guilty. Almost.
Then a few more stagehands appear to wave me toward my chair, and I lift my hand in a weak little farewell, and let them sweep me off to the interview.
All the while, as I go, I can feel Lark’s gaze burning into my back. And somehow, I get the feeling that whenever I turn my head during this interview, I’ll catch sight of him watching me the entire time.
I would have thought that would make me even more nervous, but as I settle myself in a little pouf on stage and wait for one of the world’s most famous models to join me… it actually feels reassuring. At least I know there’s one person in this studio watching who’s here for me, and not the other famous people I’m sharing the stage with. And regardless of whatever happened between us outside of this room, I know that in here, at least, when it comes to my business?
Lark has my back. Always.
On stage, I settle into the middle big pouf of a chair. Supermodel Jackie Shell will be on one side of me, and the host will be on my other side. The lights are brighter than I expected, and they feel warm on my cheeks—or maybe that’s just my own blood rushing to my face in anticipation.
Because this is real. I’m really doing this. With a deep breath, I put on a broad smile, and prepare to face the cameras.
13
Cassidy
My interview might have started out nerve-wracking, but by the end, I’m vibrating with a whole different emotion: excitement. Because by the end, I know I’m nailing it. Jackie and the host are both ridiculously fun to chat with, and they even insist on having me do (or rather, re-do) some of their makeup live on camera while I explain what ingredients I use (all-natural and free from preservatives that often irritate sensitive skin), and why (cruelty-free products that haven’t been tested on animals because I feel like that’s a practice that we need to retire in the beauty industry).
By the end of our interview, both Jackie and our host are swearing up and down that they’ll be customers of mine for life— “and I swear, she’s not paying me to say that,” Jackie adds at the end, laughing along with me.
The thrill of being on television and not just holding my own but actually having fun while doing it, is a high I don’t know that I’ll be able to top anytime soon.
But almost as soon as I step off the stage, I start to spiral all over again. Because one glance to the side of the stage, and there he is. Lark. Waiting to talk to me as promised.
My soaring spirits do a quick dip toward crashing and burning. Then they hoist up again as Lark gives me a sheepish grin and a half-wave with one hand, because damn it, he’s still as drop-dead sexy as ever, and all I want to do is run straight into his arms and forget about the past week.
I especially want to forget about what I overheard in the hallway of my new therapist’s office last weekend. The event that triggered this whole separation.
Unfortunately, I can’t. Always a pleasure, Mr. and Mrs. Anderson. Their marriage counselor. And then Sheryl’s reply. That went well, I thought.
If she’s right, if it did go well… if they have a shot at reuniting… I won’t be the person who comes between them. I refuse. No matter how devastating Lark looks in his well-pressed suit right now.
No more avoiding this, I guess. At least I still have the buzz of adrenaline from the interview coursing through me. Not to mention Marcel’s voice whispering in the back of my mind, telling me that Lark seemed devastated all week too. That he’s as stuck on me as I am on him.
It doesn’t make this situation any less of a complicated mess. But it makes me feel a bit better, at least, for how cut up I’ve been over it.
At least I’m not the only one. Not overreacting. Not making up this emotion all in my head.
As I approach Lark, I try to remember what my therapist suggested to me in our second session last week, as the self-doubting voices rear up in the back of my mind all over again. She told me not to identify with those voices, with the anxieties that tell me I’m not good enough for anyone. Those are just things I’ve been conditioned to think, as a sort of self-defense mechanism, after all that I’ve been through in past relationships.
But while it’s easy to tell myself that, it’s a lot harder to believe it as I’m approaching the one guy who I thought was different. The guy who somehow managed to wound me even more than the rest.
When I reach his side, I notice that none of the stagehands are fluttering around anymore, or even the catering people I’d noticed carefully removing the buffet earlier. He positioned himself in a far corner, out of sight of almost anyone but me. Like he doesn’t want to be interrupted.
It only worsens my nerves because I don’t know if I trust myself alone with him, if I trust that I can say what I need to say.
But when I reach his side, he doesn’t let me say a thing at all. He cuts in first.
“You look incredible today,” he says. “Not that you don’t always, but… wow.”
My cheeks flush, and I’m grateful for the camera-level of foundation Marcel gave me because it hides the blush. “Thanks
. You look all right yourself.” All right? Mentally I kick myself.
But Lark just grins, the same devilish grin that I fell for hard. “I was starting to worry you’d been avoiding me,” he says. It’s meant to be a joke, but I can see the flash of hurt in his eyes.
“Lark…” I start, but he cuts me off.
“Look, Cassidy, I don’t know what’s upsetting you, but I want to help. There has to be some way I can help.” His brows contract. “Tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it.”
But I can’t. Because what I want is to tell him to leave his wife once and for all. But that’s selfish of me, terrible. And a part of me is still angry with him. He told me they’d split up, and now I know they’re still married, trying to work things out.
“There’s nothing you can do,” I tell him, crossing my arms. “It’s not about us.” Not exactly. “It’s just… this whole situation. I can’t.”
“Why not?” He takes a step toward me, and it’s almost more than I can bear. The look in his eyes, the heat radiating from him. He’s so close I can practically taste him again. I know exactly what those lips would taste like if I let myself sink into a kiss. I know how that body would feel, rock hard and solid as he pulled me against him.
“It’s too complicated.”
His brow furrows. “Because of Sheryl?” he asks, totally thrown, as if he hadn’t already guessed my concern.
Which only makes my anger flare back anew. “Yes, because of Sheryl. Because I work with you, and I work with your—” I catch myself barely in time. Manage to insert the extra word. “Your ex-wife. It’s too messy.”
“I told you, she’s my past,” Lark says, echoing what Marcel told me earlier. Yet I can’t shake the image of him hand-in-hand with Sheryl at the therapist’s office, seeing a counselor. Trying to work on his marriage.
She didn’t look like your past last week, I think, but I don’t say it, because we’re in public, and we just finished filming a live TV segment, and who knows how many eyes are already on us right now, curiously watching the new up and coming makeup creator arguing with her business investor.
Lark takes my wrist, and I freeze in place, trying my best to ignore the spark in my veins at his touch. “Cassidy.” His eyes bore into mine. “I can’t get you out of my head. I can’t stop thinking about you, dreaming about you.”
My pulse skips a beat at that. Unbidden, an image rises to mind. Lark, naked in his big king size bed. One hand fisted around his thick, veined cock, as he strokes himself, thinking about me.
Fuck. I’m starting to get wet just imagining it, and feeling his hand wrapped around my wrist. Gentle, now. But there was a time he used that hand to pin my wrist over my head while he fucked me senseless, and god damn, I cannot get him out of my head, ever, can I?
“I know you’ve been feeling the same way,” he says, lower, taking another step closer to me, until we’re mere inches apart. Close enough our chests would touch if I so much as inched forward. “We don’t have to suffer like this. We can figure it out together, if you’ll let me.”
It would be so easy. So easy to sink into him now. Melt and forget everything else. Forget my anger, my upset. To just ignore the whole messy situation and let myself have the one man I’ve ever craved this badly.
But I still have my principles. Whatever else I’ve become; however far and hard I’ve fallen for him… it can’t trump my beliefs. And my beliefs tell me that whatever I’m doing now is wrong.
“I’m sorry,” I breathe. And then, gently as possible, I twist my arm free from his grasp, striding away across the studio floor.
“Cassidy, wait.” His footsteps chase after me. “It’s late. At least let me walk you to your car.”
One glance through the studio’s lone window—I assume they limit them because they need to control all the lighting sources inside the building—tells me he’s right. It is a lot later than I thought. The sky is already darkening toward a fiery orange sunset overhead.
“This neighborhood isn’t the safest at night,” he continues, drawing closer the longer I stand there eying the skylight.
I hadn’t realize how much time passed while we were filming and between all the prep work and the interview itself, the multiple takes we had to do, and then all the tear down work.
Doesn’t matter. “I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. Good night, Lark.” With that, I push through the studio doors out into the lobby.
This time, he lets me go.
There’s a security guard on duty still, which makes me feel just a little bit better about shooting down Lark’s offer. I sign out, and then tap on my phone, calling a ride share car. The pickup point is on the far side of the parking lot. I glance outside. There are only two streetlamps in this lot, one right next to the building, and another on the far side of the lot. That’s got to be where the ride shares pick up.
With an annoyed sigh, I push through the doors and out onto the street. The air smells faintly damp, as if there might be a storm brewing somewhere in the distance. I shrug on my sweater and pray the rain holds off until my car arrives, at the very least.
Three minutes until arrival.
I half-walk, half-jog across the lot, all too aware of the way the light behind me flickers when I cross beneath its orange glow. Overhead, the fiery sunset colors have faded from the sky, leaving behind a dark cobalt blue that darkens, the longer time stretches on.
By the time I reach the far lamppost, the car is still sitting right where it was on the map when I ordered it, and the time stamp still says three minutes. So irritating when they do that.
I tuck my phone into my back pocket and wrap my arms around myself. Then, conscious of how defensive I look, I unfold them again and lean against the lamp post casually, eyes on the road. A few cars trickle past. Some of the drivers or passengers shoot me weird, confused looks. I guess they don’t get a lot of pedestrians in this area of town.
Then a truck slows, and my pulse jumps. It’s not the license plate number I’m looking for, so it can’t be my ride.
Sure enough, the side window rolls down, and a man with tattoos up both arms leers out at me. “Hey babe,” he calls. “Give you a ride somewhere?”
“No thank you,” I reply through as tight a smile as I can manage.
His friendly—if you could call it that—expression immediately melts. “Fucking bitch.” He narrows his eyes. “What, too good for me, is that it?”
The last nerve of my fraying patience snaps. “Yes, that is exactly it. Now fuck off,” I shout, my voice rising.
Not smart. I know it’s not smart. It’ll only provoke him. Sure enough, he puts the truck into park and glares at me furiously now. “What the fuck did you just say to me?”
And then, from over my shoulder, a familiar baritone. “You heard the lady. She told you to fuck off.” Lark’s hand comes to rest on my shoulder, gentle and reassuring at the same time.
I square my shoulders and resist the urge to sink back against him. My heart is still hammering in my chest because I’ve met a million assholes like this truck driver and I don’t know what will happen if he escalates. Will Lark have to fight him?
But the asshole just turns and spits out his window, then slowly drives off, scowling at us in his rearview and muttering curses the entire time.
“I told you not to follow me,” I complain the moment the asshole driver is out of sight.
“And I ignored you, obviously,” Lark replies, stepping around me so we’re face to face, my back still pressed up against the lamp post. “Sometimes you’re too stubborn for your own good, Cass.”
“Coming from you, that really says a lot,” I reply. I can’t help it. The corner of my mouth tugs up into a smirk.
Lark’s does too. Then his hand drifts up, hovers between us. I don’t pull away this time, even though I know I should. His hand cups my cheek, and his fingertip brushes the corner of my smile, lightly. A barely-there touch that does more to ignite the fire in my veins than
any other guy could with a lot more ammunition. “What are we doing?” Lark asks quietly, and I know what he’s asking.
Why are we separate right now? I can feel the tug in the core of me, drawing me toward him, a gravity I’ve been fighting to ignore all week.
One I can’t bring myself to anymore.
“I don’t know,” I admit, my breath so quiet the words are almost a whisper.
He bends toward me. So close I watch his pupils dilate where they’re fixed on mine. I forget all my earlier resolve. There’s only so much willpower I can use up in a day before all my resistance drains from me. Lark is as addictive as a drug, and damn it, I need another hit.
His hand slides from my cheek along my jawline, until he’s cupping the back of my neck. He draws me toward him, and my eyes fall shut.
His lips collide with mine, harder than I expected. I don’t mind because I’m too busy wrapping my arms around his neck, dragging him toward me. His tongue parts my lips, the kiss deepening, until it feels like he’s claiming my mouth for himself, marking his territory.
I want him to.
I raise one leg to wrap around his waist, and in response, he pins me against the lamppost. I gasp at the feeling between my thighs, the hard press of his cock through his jeans, where it grazes my upper thigh. Just bare inches from my clit. I arch my hips up and angle myself toward him, and he laughs a little, his lips still pressed to mine.
“God, I’ve missed you,” he murmurs.
“Shut up and kiss me,” I hiss back, which only makes him laugh more. He turns to obey my command, kissing his way along my jawline until he reaches the edge of my neck. Then he bites down, sharp and unexpected, not enough to hurt, just enough to make me gasp.
Then he keeps kissing, down to my shoulder, across my collarbone to dip his tongue into the hollow at my throat. At the same time, his hands wrap around my waist, tightening, and—
“Shit,” I gasp. The car I called is parked out on the road. It honks, just once. I’m about to peel away, when Lark’s grip tightens.
Kiss Me Now Page 10