Causing a Commotion (24 page)

“Where do you get off speaking to me this way?” Maxwell demanded. “You’re nothing but a has-been producer who got lucky when Rob Lancaster included you on what ended up being a surprising success.”

Despite his shock of white hair, his arthritic bones, and his stiff joints, J.P. didn’t take kindly to being called a has-been. Not by this arrogant SOB who’d already pushed his luck too far once today. J.P. found himself wishing Maxwell’s family jewels weren’t hidden beneath his monstrosity of a desk. He might knee the man, too.

Maxwell shrugged. “I’m told we’re booked through the end of the month with guests and sponsors. We’ll make good on our contracts, then the show’s gone.”

J.P. would be out of a job again. He should have known Wolf would never live up to their end of the deal.

“Fine.” J.P. grabbed hold of the chair arms and used them to hoist himself from the chair. Amazing how something so simple could take so much effort. “I’ll tell the rest of the crew.”

* * *

“Mrs. Arnold, are you sure you want to see this?” the nervous assistant asked for the third time.

Marian knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that, yes, she did want to see. From the moment Maxwell mentioned hiring the young actress, she’d known this day was coming. The day when he’d make his move on the buxomy blonde.

Only she hadn’t predicted that the woman would turn Maxwell down as Beverly reported. Marian patted the assistant’s hand. “I need to see this. Start the tape.”

Although, it probably broke all kinds of privacy acts, Marian installed security cameras into Jessie Davidson’s private room. If anything inappropriate happened between the woman and her husband, she’d wanted proof to nail Maxwell’s nuts to the wall.

She’d had similar cameras installed in Maxwell’s office. Not that he knew or even had the slightest suspicion. The fool. He thought he could do as he pleased, and she’d never be the wiser, that she was no more than a means to an end.

For too many years she had been. Before she met Maxwell she’d planned to eventually run Wolf television. Look at her now. A thirty-five-year-old woman who spent her days working out and getting facials to keep her skin young in vain efforts to hold onto a man who didn’t deserve her. Only she wasn’t young. Not as young as she had been. Nor would she ever be again. And she didn’t want to spend the rest of her life in Maxwell’s shadow, constantly getting injected and peeled and lipo-suctioned in an effort to compete with the young starlets coming in and out of his life.

She refused to do it. Not anymore.

She’d earned every line on her face, every gray hair on her head. Most at her husband’s infliction.

Marian’s eyes narrowed as the tape played, as she watched her husband grab the young woman, attempt to bribe her, watched as the woman gave him what he deserved.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Arnold.,” Beverly apologized yet again. “I hate that you had to see this.”

Marian hated having to see it to, but not to the point that she wanted to remain in ignorance to her husband’s carrying-on. She imagined she’d see it several times over in court if she could convince Jessie Davidson to sign a release.

Hopefully, she’d do a better job with that than she had of convincing Colin to get her off
Causing A Commotion
and out of Wolf. It had been her last ditch effort at saving her marriage.

“Leo said you’d want to see it, too.” Leo was one of the security guards Marian had on her private payroll. He’d installed the cameras in Maxwell’s office. A total professional who’d come highly recommended and been worth every penny.

“Put it in.”

Beverly did so, gasping when she heard Maxwell’s proclamation to can
Causing A Commotion
. “Oh no!”

Marian finished watching the segment, trying to sort out how she wanted to handle this latest development. Beverly sat beside her, looking pale. Of course, the woman just found out she was going to lose her job. Marian would never allow her to go on unemployment though. Like Leo and the other security guard on her payroll, Beverly had proven how helpful, how intelligent she was. Her skills went far beyond a production assistant. Marian had known that before she’d arranged for Beverly to be hired on Colin’s show. A show she’d insured Colin would have.

Who knew an overheard conversation between her husband and an acquaintance of theirs at a dinner party would change her life so much? A conversation that made her curious enough about what was going on at Wolf to hire Beverly to be her eyes and ears?

She’d never regretted that decision and knew Beverly needed the extra money for her mother’s care. Their relationship, strange and secretive as it was, benefited them both.

Maxwell planned to cancel a show that was doing well. Not only doing well, but growing in success. It made little sense except to assuage his wounded pride, and Marian didn’t buy that for a minute. Maxwell would have let word of her positive drug screen leak out and let others do his dirty work for him. The network would have found a replacement. Perhaps one who wouldn’t be so quick to say no and so thrusting of the knee.

“She’s kind to everyone, funny, gorgeous yet will be the first to poke fun of her self.” Beverly smiled softly, as if recalling a particular memory. “She thinks her nose is too big and is constantly telling Elaine to make her up to make it look smaller. As if. She’s a total knock-out.” Beverly’s gaze lifted, and she winced. “Sorry.”

“It’s quite all right. Tell me more.” Marian became thoughtful. “Tell me about her and Colin.”

“She doesn’t talk to me about Colin, but everyone on the set thinks there’s something going on between them. There’s definite chemistry. They fight like cats and dogs, but when they look at each other, there’s attraction. When she passed out last week, Colin was beside himself. I’ve never seen him so perturbed.”

That was another thing. The tampering with the electrical wires. The graffiti on Colin’s wall. The drugs in Jessie’s coffee. All the equipment mishaps on
Causing A Commotion
’s set. Someone was deliberately sabotaging the show. Now Maxwell planned to cancel the show and claimed it was at the board’s bidding. As a board member, and a major one at that, she knew of no such bidding. Which meant Maxwell had lied or was working on an agenda of his own.

Or perhaps particular board members’ agenda.

When she’d insisted on Wolf hiring Colin, there had been those who’d fought her on that decision. Fought and lost, because none was willing to go against her father and he’d sided with her. She smiled. Her daddy always sided with her and she’d lived to make him proud once upon a time. These days she only lived to serve as a doormat for Maxwell. What did her father think about that? He never said anything derogatory, but how long had it been since she’d seen outright pride in his gaze? Too long.

It was time for some changes in her life.

First thing was getting rid of the doormat syndrome.

* * *

What was he doing here? Colin asked himself for the hundredth time. After the childish way he’d behaved this afternoon, Jessie would likely slam the door in his face.

Yet he couldn’t leave. They needed to talk. Ever since Ewing left his office, he’d been able to think of nothing else.

Who was he kidding? He hadn’t been able to think of anything else, but Jessie since he’d made love to her. Before that. Since she’d first climbed into his taxi cab.

Now, his obsession with her was interfering with his work. Which was wrong. And yet another reason why he shouldn’t be here, but hell if he planned to leave before talking with her, getting some answers to his questions.

Colin knocked on the door and waited like a prisoner awaiting sentence.

Dressed in a pair of slinky pink shorts and a white t-shirt she wore
braless
, Jessie opened the door and stared at him. “What do you want?”

Colin’s tongue grew ten sizes and stuck to the roof of his mouth. What did he want?

“You,” he answered without censoring himself. He was tired of censoring his thoughts, his words, his emotions. He felt like he’d been walking on eggshells for years. He was tired of fighting to hold on to a semblance of control. Tired of fighting his feelings for this woman. “I want you.”

Her eyes widened, her lips pursed, then she smiled Cheshire-like. “Then I think you’d better come inside.”

That’s when he realized that’s exactly what he planned to do. Come inside her sweet body. Again and again. As long as she’d let him. As often as she’d let him. Maybe forever.

She plopped on the sofa, eyeing him curiously. He forced his eyes to remain above her chest. Hard to do when she bounced like that with no bra on. Not as hard as other things. Him for instance.

“Colin, darling, there’s nothing slow about you. Especially when the word sex is involved.” With the way she looked at him, he believed her.

He hadn’t killed Karen. He hadn’t been the one to give her the drugs or to even be aware that she was using. He’d drank too much and passed out. Something he’d never done prior to or since. He hadn’t drunk a single drop since that night. One night of losing control and a woman died. It was enough to make him not risk losing control again.

But he’d gone beyond trying to maintain control. He’d quit living. “Yes. I did.”

Her eyebrows rose. “What? You’re admitting that you needed me to shake things up? To shake you up?” Her tone was teasing, but they both knew what she was asking.

Part of him balked at making any kind of admission. Another part warned that it was now or never, because he might never get the nerve up again to lower the walls around him. Jessie wouldn’t accept another run-away lover. She deserved better. He wanted to give her better.

“I needed you.” He walked to stand in front of the sofa, touched her hair, breathed in her spicy cinnamon scent. “I need you.”

* * *

Jessie stared up at Colin and decided this wasn’t real. She’d fallen asleep and was having a delicious dream. One in which Colin whispered words of need and looked at her with hot emotions in his eyes. Well, since she was only dreaming, what would it hurt to tell her dream lover the truth?

“I need you in my life, too.”

He gave a low snort. “You don’t need anyone, Jess. You’re bright, beautiful, and so self-assured. There’s nothing in life you can’t have if it’s what you want.”

Definitely, a dream.

“You’re so wrong. I’m scared of so many things, but fine, I won’t argue. I can have anything I want? I want you.” She reached up and looped her fingers in his belt loops and tugged him to his knees. Putting his eyes slightly below her eyelevel. “Tell me I can have you.”