Chapter 6

Margot

Today was the first day of filming, and I’d never been as nervous in my entire life.

It wasn’t enough that there was a cameraman floating around, a producer on site, and that Guy Simmons had decided to hang out to see how things ran the first day. No, that was nothing compared to the fact that Cain had shown up to work in a sleeveless shirt.

His arms were fucking… they were… oh my god. They were strong and tatted-up, and he smelled of man and cologne.

I leaned on the counter in reception and looked through our appointments book, checking who had booked what and when. Natalie was next to me, her focus solely on Cain as he spoke with the cameraman in the opposite corner.

“That man,” Nat whispered, and twirled a strand of purple hair around her index finger. “He’ll be the death of me. I mean, that shirt is enough to give any woman a heart attack, am I right?”

“I hadn’t noticed,” I said through gritted teeth.

Nat snorted to show me what she thought of that.

That being a total lie.

I swept my gaze from the list of names and times and skipped it over to Cain.

All the humiliation I’d felt the other night when he’d nearly stripped in front of me, when he’d talked to me in ways I’d only dreamed of, came rushing back.

He caught sight of me looking and directed another of his shit-eating grins my way.

I dismissed him by shifting back to my task.

“OK, so we’ve got quite a few clients today,” I said, clearing my throat in the process. Don’t think about his jeans. About his dick. About the fact you’ve never had an orgasm with a man, and he almost gave you a goddamn spontaneous one in the hotel room a couple nights ago. Just from words.

Oh god, oh god. “This might be a challenge.” I tapped one of Cain’s appointments. It was the first part of a sleeve for a regular customer, and he’d indicated he wanted a pretty intricate sketch of the yin-yang symbol entwined with a Tree of Life. I was all for a challenge, but Cain? The last time he’d attempted something like this had to have been right out of high school, before he’d left the shop.

“Cain, can I speak to you for a—” I looked up and swallowed. He was already right in front of me, across the desk. Nat had practically gone cross-eyed. “There you are.”

“Here I am,” he said and winked.

“I—I was looking at this appointment with Gary,” I said, and tapped it. “Are you sure you’re OK doing this? I mean, it’s a big deal.” The cameraman appeared behind Cain, already filming. God, this would take some getting used to. “I can take it if you want.”

“Purple girl,” Cain said, and nodded to Nat. “Pass me my sketchbook.”

Nat almost fell over getting to Cain’s wooden cubby against the crimson wall. She returned with his book, and he took it from her, nodded thanks. He opened it and flipped through until he reached the correct page, then tapped twice on the image.

“That good enough for you, Ms. Reed?” Cain asked.

I bent and studied the drawing, and lost my breath.

It was so intricate, the pencil strokes so fine and sharp, each line or curve filled with self-expression. The Tree of Life punctuated both sides of the symbol, dark on one side, light on the other, and the branches and roots met the sides of the circle, twined around them.

“Wow,” I whispered.

Cain snapped the book shut, and I jumped. “I think we’ll be fine,” he said.

“Yes, thank you.” I was stiff all over.

Cain spun on his heel and walked off, trailing a sense of what? Anger? I couldn’t place it, and I couldn’t fathom how that drawing had come from the man walking off, all broad-backed and strong.

The cameraman followed him.

I shook my head.

Cain was good, but I’d never thought of him as imaginative or artistic, at least not after he’d changed. He was cocky and impulsive, and out to get his. He wasn’t supposed to be the guy who could express himself, not even in this way.

But I was wrong.

Maybe I’d boxed him where he shouldn’t be.

“Good morning, Margot.” The smooth voice broke my reverie.

For the second time, I cleared my throat and looked up.

Guy Simmons walked across the wooden boards toward me, smiling big. “I hear good things about filming this morning. No trouble,” he said.

“None,” I replied. But the day had only just started.

“But the day just started,” Guy said, echoing me out loud. “Listen, this is going to be a great pilot, but we need to make it worthwhile.”

“How do you mean?” I asked, and stepped around the reception desk. I didn’t take him through to the office, but it totally wasn’t because Cain had been frustrated the last time I’d taken Guy into a private room.

Guy glanced past me at Nat, who sat on her stool, paging through a magazine.

“Nat, could you go get me a cup of coffee or something? And one for Guy too, please.”

“Yeah, sure. Do you want me to do your laundry while I’m at it?” Nat heaved herself up regardless and gave Guy a special Nat smile. Good god, the woman had to be hard up. She flirted with everyone. She trundled off and left us in relative peace.

“I like her,” Guy said, and nodded after my receptionist. “She’ll add some sass to the program. So, this is what I wanted to talk to you about. We want this show to be addictive. It’s going to mingle pain, art, pleasure, the works. Obviously, we want some tension, but not too much. People like a little conflict, but they like it when it’s all neatly boxed and not out of control.”

Cain was the definition of “out of control.”

“What are you saying?” I asked, and braced myself for it.

“Well, that we might need to script some of this.”

I quirked the corner of my mouth upward.

Guy laughed and patted the air, as if that would calm me down or change my mind. “Now, I know what you’re thinking, but it’s not as bad as it sounds.”

“It’s exactly as bad as it sounds.” Cain’s voice always shocked me. It was gruff and warm, and it sent a shiver right down my spine, even though I didn’t want a shiver down my damn spine.

His boots scraped across the floorboards, and he halted beside me, those biceps straining as he crossed his arms. “Scripted,” he said, as if he’d pronounced a death sentence upon Guy.

“That’s right.” Guy forced a smile, but the tension between these two dudes was unmistakable. They were totally opposite. Guy with his suit and his perfectly combed hair, his cheesy exec smile and clean-cut handsomeness.

He was the type of guy to bring home to Mom. The type you found out had a secret foot fetish or something else nasty later on down the line. He reminded me of Steven, my ex.

And then there was Cain, who was all grit and muscle and that bad-boy “I’ll steal your girl” vibe. He didn’t take shit. He didn’t take kindly to pretenders, either, and he probably saw Guy in that light.

“I thought you were interested in Get Ink’d as is,” I said.

“We are,” Guy replied, and pressed the cheesiness in my direction. “But we’re looking for a solution that will make everyone happy. The viewers at home and the folks at SBC.”

“Folks like you.” Cain ran his thumb along his jaw and the rough beard there.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Guy continued, without so much as looking in Cain’s direction. “We don’t want to script everything, only certain parts. If we don’t, it’s more likely that the viewers won’t like the pilot, and that could lead to the network pulling the plug on the show altogether. And we wouldn’t want that.”

“No,” I said, and shook my head. “But—this type of thing is, I don’t know—”

“Sleazy.” Cain’s biceps twitched.

Don’t look. Don’t look. If I did I’d wind up staring at him open-mouthed like my drool-slathered receptionist.

“It doesn’t feel genuine,” I said. “And I don’t like feeling disingenuous.”

“Same.”

Cain and I agree on something for once. Go figure.

Guy let out a sigh. “A lot of people feel that way at first, of course, but you’ve got to understand that TV is different from the real world.”

“No shit.”

Guy ignored Cain again. “And you don’t want those two worlds to mesh. If they do, things can get unnecessarily complicated for all parties involved.”

“I need to think about this before I make a decision,” I said.

“We make a decision.” Cain let his arms fall at his sides, and the backs of his knuckles grazed mine.

“Right.” It still grated at me that it was a “we” now. Cain’s father had never taken a personal interest in the shop. He’d only cared that he received money back on his investment, and in recent years, that hadn’t been happening all that regularly.

“That’s fine,” Guy said. “I would tell you to take as long as you need, but this is kind of a rush. We already have a writer working on a script for you guys. Something that you’ll really enjoy. Call me after work today, Ms. Reed. We’ll talk about it in more detail later.” He shook my hand, holding it a little too long, and a little too gently, then made for the exit.

The door slapped shut behind him, and Cain let out a low growl. “That guy’s a total fuckhead.”

“And here I was thinking you were judgmental,” I said, and walked back to the reception desk. We’d open in approximately twenty minutes with our first appointment, a standard wrist tattoo—lettering.

Cain walked up behind me and placed his hands on my shoulders. “You’re not really thinking about it, are you? Scripted? It’s fucking fake.”

“I know,” I said. “But if that’s what they need to do, then what choice do we have? I mean, it’s probably safer for everyone, like Simmons said. It will keep you out of trouble.”

Cain spun me around on the spot and held me against the counter. “I don’t need a script to stay out of trouble.” His breath chased down the right side of my face.

I slipped out from under his arm. Don’t focus on the throbbing in your core. Ignore it. No big deal. “You’re right. You don’t need a script. You need a miracle.”

“Let’s talk about this tonight,” Cain said. “A business meeting.”

“I’ve had enough business meetings with you to last me a lifetime.” Thankfully, my cheeks didn’t heat at the mention of this one.

“On neutral ground. I’m serious, Margot. I told you, I came to this shop to change my life.”

God, I wasn’t really going to do this, was I? Cain was selfish, sure, but that could mean a number of things. Not necessarily that he wanted to get me into bed. Or embarrass me. Or ruin things. “Fine,” I said.

“Good. I’ll text you the address of the place.”

A cup shattered on the wooden boards, and I gasped, spun around.

Nat stood there, holding a tray. “Whoops, sorry,” she said, and shrugged. The cameraman was behind her, filming a close-up of the shattered remains and our reactions to it. “Wait a second, where’s the other guy? The guy with the suit? Ugh, are you serious? I made two cups of coffee for nothing? I’m so totally underappreciated around here.”

I sighed. This would be a long day and the fact that I had a dinner—not date!—meeting with Cain tonight wouldn’t make it feel any shorter.