Chapter Five
Dominic
That kiss had, without a doubt, been the best and the worst kiss of my entire life.
That was the only way I could think to describe it. It was, at once, the hottest thing I could imagine – the two of us making out in that trailer with the entire crew just beyond the door. The way her tongue tasted, the way her body felt – it was so familiar and yet brand-new at the same time, and the combination was crazy-hot. I loved the feel of her against me, and it wasn’t until that moment that I’d realized just how damn much I’d missed it. How much I’d missed her. I had fucked plenty of women since the last time we had kissed, but none of them had come close to switching me on with the electric fire that Tennessee did. There was just something about her, something indescribable, that kept me coming back for more. And now that we had kissed again, the floodgates were opened, and avoiding each other was going to be that much harder.
Because if I had my way then I would have just started up with her again. I knew we couldn’t pick up where we left off, or not quite, but we could sure as hell give it a shot for as long as we were on set together again. It seemed stupid to deny ourselves that, when the universe had been so intent on shoving us back together once more. It wouldn’t last for long, but then, it hadn’t last time, but it had been by far the best relationship of my life.
Maybe that’s just what I was trying to get back? And maybe that’s what she was trying to avoid. Because I had left her, I had forfeited any right to want her or to flirt with her or to feel that hot, burning need for her that felt as though it was carried in my blood. I had left things too badly to pick up where we left off, but I was young and so was she - surely she could cut me some slack on fucking up?
I wished I could have asked her all this outright, but every time I got near her she would find some excuse to put some distance between the two of us. I couldn’t say I was surprised. That kiss had been so hot and so promising that it felt like if we got within a ten-foot radius of each other we might both go up like gunpowder.
I had been watching her work, as usual, but keeping my distance so she didn’t have any other reason to get mad at me for distracting her or getting in her way. And it really seemed like she was pushing herself a little too far, too fast. I knew she was good and that if anyone had complete control over themselves, it was her, but I couldn’t help but worry as she seemed intent on throwing herself into more and more dangerous stunts with less and less safety gear. And, of course, if she suggested it, the director was going to let her go ahead with it, because it made his job easier even if it made hers more dangerous. I wondered if I should intervene and say something, because some of the shit she was pulling off should have been off the table for any stunt performer no matter how experienced, but I knew she would bite my head off if I dared interfere with any of her work. In fact, some of the shit she was doing felt designed to get me to sit up and take notice and to worry about her. To remind me that she was more than capable of looking after herself. As if I needed reminding.
I was hanging out on set, knowing I should have long-since headed back to the apartment I was renting in town, but not able to drag my eyes away from Tennessee. It was a blazing hot day, the sun high in the sky and beating down on the sweltering crew, when Julia approached me again.
She was a sweet girl, there was no arguing with that, but I just didn’t see her in that way. Not after the kiss I shared with Tennessee. Hell, it was hard to acknowledge that any other woman in the world existed when she was right there, hot as hell and completely and pointedly paying no attention to me. Still, Julia was destined for big things, so I figured keeping her on my good side would only work in my favor in the future.
“Hey,” she greeted me coyly.
“Hi,” I replied, smiling at her, and she nodded in the direction of… well, of away from here.
“We’re all going for a drink in a little bit.” She caught a strand of hair and twirled it around her finger. “You want to come with us?”
“Yeah, I don’t see why not,” I shrugged. “Where are you going?”
“You’ll see.” She flashed me a grin, and I had this odd sinking feeling in my stomach that I wasn’t going to like what she had to reveal to me yet.
We finished up and headed over to this mysterious bar that Julia was being so reticent about – it was a regular old dive, the kind that I had darkened the doorstep of dozens of times over the years, but I guessed for someone with her kind of status a place like this actually was kind of deviant and crazy. I headed over to the bar and ordered myself a drink – and, of course, that’s when I laid eyes on her.
Of course she was here. Where else would she be? Because it seemed like however hard she tried to escape my presence, we just couldn’t get out from under each other’s feet. She was wearing the clothes she’d been working in, her hair still pulled back, and her face scrubbed clean of the stage make-up she’d had to wear for the shoot. She wasn’t here to impress anyone or play bimbo to some guy’s ego – she was here to drink. And, as she raised her eyes to meet mine, I could see that me turning up to disrupt that hadn’t exactly been part of the plan. She was drinking a scotch on the rocks – she had usually stuck to light beers or cheap wine when I’d known her, but since then it was clear that her tastes had moved towards the stronger stuff. She rolled her eyes as soon as she saw me, and shifted so that her back was aimed in my direction. I stared at her for a moment, wondering how in the hell we could have gotten this far from each other – especially after the kiss we’d shared only a few days before.
Julia appeared behind me, touching her small hand to my waist to get my attention; I turned around, my gaze still half-on Tennessee.
“Hey, what’s up?” I asked, a little irritated. It wasn’t that I didn’t like Julia, but my head wasn’t in the right place to humor her right then and there.
“Could you get me another drink?” she asked sweetly, smiling at me expectantly. “I spilled my last one…”
I looked over at the group we had come with, giggling as they attempted to mop up the vodka-seltzer that Julia had knocked over, and realized with a heavy heart just how much younger they all were than me. Not that I was especially old, but these were all kids at the start of their careers, goofing off and having a good time, while I was standing at this bar with the weight of the last ten years hanging heavy on me wanting nothing more than a strong drink and an early night so I could heal up for work tomorrow. I sighed and looked back at Julia.
“Sure,” I nodded, and the bartender appeared to serve us as soon as he laid eyes on Julia. She fluttered her lashes at him and he grinned dopily back, and soon enough we were both holding our drinks and Julia was looking up at me expectantly.
“You coming?” she asked, frowning slightly as she seemed to notice me standing stock-still next to the bar. I shrugged.
“I’ll catch up with you,” I replied, waving my free hand. “Give me a minute.”
She nodded, apparently satisfied with my answer, and headed back over to join her friends. The bar was starting to get a little busier now and I was confident that I could slip into the background in no time and pretend that the two of us had just gotten split up by accident. I looked back over at Tennessee, who had been watching the little story unfold. She raised her eyebrows at me, a flash of amusement on her face, and I made my way around the bar to join her.
She eyed me as I approached, looking unimpressed by my presence, but I wasn’t here to spend the night with her. No, I just wanted some company from someone who was actually my own age for a change, instead of kicking back with those kids at the booth at the other end of the room. She greeted me with a cocked eyebrow and shifted her seat a little to the right to give me space to pull in a stool.
“How very accommodating of you,” I remarked, narrowing my eyes at her. “What’s your game, huh?”
“I’m just trying to take the bullet that you had aimed at Julia,” she replied coolly. “She’s a bit young for you, don’t you think?”
“She’s a grown-ass adult who can make her own decisions,” I snapped back, irritated. But then I had to concede the point. “But yeah, she is,” I admitted. “At least, she seems it. When did we get so old, Tennessee?”
“Speak for yourself,” she snorted. “I’m still sprightly. You’re the one heading into your old age.”
“And you’re the one drinking scotch on an evening after work,” I pointed out, gesturing to her drink. She finished it up in one gulp and raised her eyebrows at me, daring me to comment. The bartender hurried over to refresh her drink and she flashed him a grateful smile; he smiled back, obviously completely at her beck and call. I felt a jolt of jealousy at their interaction. We were the ones with a history, and here this guy was sliding in like he had some sort of claim to her? She took another sip of her drink, eyeing the bartender as he walked away, and I realized with a sinking heart that he might not have had a claim to her, but I sure as hell didn’t either. No-one did.
“You’re still drinking beer,” she remarked after the long silence, and I was pulled from my head and back into the conversation at hand.
“What?”
“You’re still drinking beer,” she gestured with her glass to the bottle in my hand. “Thought you might have graduated on to something a little stiffer since I last saw you.”
“Yeah, spirits mess with my recovery time,” I protested. “I need to be in the best physical form -”
“Bullshit,” she cut across me, half-laughing. “I do the same job as you, remember. You can’t pull that shit on me.”
“Fair point,” I replied. “I just hate the taste of hard liquor.”
“See, was it so hard to be honest?” she teased, but there was a sudden edge to her voice that told me that she was taking this seriously, deadly seriously, that she had flashed back to the last time I had misled her – to when we had lived in that tiny little apartment together and I had led her to believe that I was actually going to stick around, right before I walked out of there and left her to fend for herself once more. I wondered if she was ever going to let it go. I wondered if she had a right to hold on to it forever. I could hold a hell of a grudge, and that was without anyone ever pulling something that pointedly shitty on me over the course of my life.
She took another sip on her scotch and glowered at the sticky bar top in front of us. I was caught between a bunch of kids who made me feel geriatric, and an ex who hated my guts. It was going to be a long night.