Changing His Game (11 page)

Chapter Six

My head's going to combust. It's the only explanation for why it's throbbing the way it is. I groan and roll over, lifting my hands to apply pressure to my throbbing temples.

"Oh," I groan.

I can feel the sunlight warming my skin. I know when I open my eyes my head will feel ten times worse, but I need to do it. I slowly pry open my eyelids, squinting continuously from the brightness of the sun. I look around the room and notice right away that I'm in Jared's bedroom.

Just perfect. It's night three of being in his bed.

His bed.

All of a sudden the night rushes back to me. He took me out to celebrate... dinner... the club... the alcohol... all of the alcohol... dancing... grinding... kissing and touching... the cab ride... his bedroom.

I lift up the covers and look down my body. Yep, I'm completely naked in his bed. In Jared's bed.

I'm in a porn star's bed.

His lips on my skin... His hands caressing me... His tongue on my...

Yes, that's right. He went down on me after I told him I wouldn't like it, and he gave me the best orgasm of my life.

I have to figure this out. What should I do? Should I play it off like it was no big deal? Should I ignore it all together and hope he doesn't bring it up? Should I thank him for pleasuring me?

I'm such a loser. No, I shouldn't thank him, that makes me sound so... so... juvenile. I really liked last night and although I hate to admit it, I have feelings for Jared. I’m not sure how intense those feelings are, but I know it's more than friendship. He’s been a great friend to me this past week, he's protected me, and somewhere our friendship turned into me liking him. Really liking him.

He said he doesn't date unless the girl is okay with his profession. Do I want to date Jared and deal with him screwing other women on a daily basis? Could I ask him not to screw other women? I know the answer already. I can’t ask him that. He'd laugh in my face. We just started getting to know each other, and I'm going to tell him I'm ready for him to date me and stop working? He'd think I'm crazy.

"Jesus," Jared says groggily as he stirs awake in bed next to me. His eyes blink open and he stares at me. I see the moment recognition of last night hits him. His eyes go wide and he drags his eyes up and down my body. The sheet is pulled up to my underarms, but he can tell by my exposed shoulders and collarbone that I'm naked under the sheets. His eyes become soft, almost lovingly, for a brief second before returning to normal.

Jared turns over, his back facing me, and lifts himself out of bed. He searches the floor for his boxers and pulls them on once he's found them.

"I need coffee," he says, speaking harshly before walking out of the bedroom.

I find my eyes peeled to the entryway. Was that it? No discussion about what happened last night? No kiss good morning? No sweet acknowledgment of me at all?

This isn't happening. Oh no, I will not let him make me feel like the poor pathetic girl who doesn't know when she should leave after a one-night stand. Jeez, I'm not even the one-night stand kind of girl. What am I saying, it wasn't a one-night stand. Sure he made me come, but he didn't come and we didn't have sex. I can still walk away with my head held high.

I pull the sheets off my naked body and search the floor for my clothing. Once I have it all bundled up in my grasp, I tip toe to the doorway and look down the hallway, making sure it's deserted.

The hallway is clear so I dash to Tawny's bedroom door, or I guess my bedroom door, and shut it behind me. I lean my back against the closed door and take a couple deep breaths, trying to calm my nerves.

I can do this. I can act normal as long as Jared acts normal. I'm a professional. What happened last night was a mistake and I will make sure that it doesn't happen again. The only problem is, it doesn't feel like a mistake.

I shower and quickly get dressed for the day. Today is my first real day working for Brandon so I have no idea how my day will go. I decide to let my long blonde locks air dry as I apply light make-up to my pale complexion. When I'm ready to finally face Jared, I make my way downstairs and into the kitchen where I spot a freshly showered Jared, drinking his coffee and speaking to Kelly at the kitchen table.

Their conversation is light as Jared laughs at something Kelly says. I decide now is not the right time to pull Jared off to the side and ask him about what happened last night. I'll talk to him later on today.

I walk over to the coffee machine to make myself a cup of liquid heaven so I'm prepared for the long day ahead of me.

"Hey, Autumn," Kelly says brightly to me, spotting me on the other side of the eat-in kitchen.

"Hi," I reply back, trying to sound cheerful.

Jared doesn’t turn around to see me, but he doesn’t completely ignore me either.

"I made you a cup of coffee," he says, pointing to a cup in front of one of the empty seats. "It might be cold now though. I didn’t know it would take you so long to come down this morning."

"Oh," I mumble, walking to the empty seat.

Did I mess up? Should I have followed him out of the room so we could talk this morning? He gave me no indication he wanted to see me, let alone speak to me.

"Thanks. I wanted to shower first so I was ready for whatever tasks you had for me today."

Jared nods his head and I sit down in the chair next to him. I sip my coffee, silently listening to the conversation between him and Kelly.

Jared has a shoot with an online-based company today that isn’t his own. He'll be working with a fresh faced eighteen-year-old trying to get her foot in the business. This will be her first ever porn shoot.

The thought disgusts me. I know I'm only a few years older, but eighteen is so young. She's still a baby. She couldn't possibly know that going into the adult industry is what she wants.

"Earth to Autumn," Jared says, snapping his fingers in front of my face. "Where did you go?"

I turn my head to look at him, "I'm sorry, I spaced out for a second."

Hearing him call me Autumn is a lot more depressing than I ever thought it could be. Apparently I'm not Billy or babe anymore

"Did you hear anything I said?"

"Bits and pieces."

"Dammit, Autumn. You work for me and I don't have time to continually repeat myself. You need to start paying attention."

I blush in embarrassment at his harsh tone of voice and look over to Kelly who has a slight smirk on her face from Jared's outburst. I'm a little shocked that he is talking to me like this.

"Well, since you didn't indicate my start time, and it seemed like you had a late night, I thought coming down at eight-thirty was an acceptable time to start the day. Let me know what time I should start in the future, and I'll change my schedule accordingly."

I'm cold with my words and Kelly's smirk has disappeared from her face. Without any acknowledgment of my attitude, Jared continues to speak.

"I have a ten a.m. call time and I need you to come with me today. Kelly is flying out to New York for a meeting so you will play her roll today. Whatever I need, you are there to service me. Understand?" He looks my way and it's clear he chose his words deliberately.

"Yes, Jared."

He purses his lips before turning back to Kelly and continuing his conversation with her, as if it never ended.

I finish my coffee and decide to wait for him outside on the long, curved driveway. It's warm today so I'm in a pair of white khaki shorts and a loose, sleeveless purple blouse. The pale purple does wonders for my green eyes and the blouse is slightly see-through, allowing anyone to see the outline of my breasts in my tight tank underneath.

Jared comes outside a few minutes later, just as his driver is pulling up the driveway. When the town car stops, Jared opens the door for me and I get in the vehicle. As I enter, I decide to bend over more than necessary and sway my ass slightly in his view. I know it's childish, but he's pissed me off this morning.

I hear a soft, deep groan come from behind me and I know my teasing has worked. I sit as close to the door on the opposite end of the seat as I can, as Jared's driver pulls out onto the road.

The car ride is silent. I'm afraid to breathe too loud and piss Jared off, but the longer we are in the car, the more pissed off I'm getting. I decide to address everything before I explode and do something on set I'll regret. Like chop his balls off.

"So, are we going to talk about last night, or continue to ignore it?" I ask him, turning in the seat so my body is facing his.

Jared keeps his eyes fixed on the window as he speaks. "What's there to talk about? We both got wasted and things got out of hand. It was poor judgment on our part. Honestly, I don't really remember much else."

What a fucking asshole.

"You don't remember it, really?"

"I don’t know what to tell you, Autumn."

"And what's with this Autumn bullshit? You never call me Autumn. It's always Billy, and last night it was babe!" I yell at him, my temper getting the best of me.

I watch Jared flinch at my words. He almost looks like he feels bad for what he said, but he quickly pulls it together. The confident Jared I’ve seen so many times before is back and he finally turns to look at me.

"Autumn is your name, isn't it? And you've asked me several times to call you it. I'm just doing what you asked."

"And last night? You claim to barely remember it, but I remember everything. I remember you singing to me. I remember you telling me how much you wanted me. How you weren’t used to wanting something so bad." I look at his face and study his expression. He looks like he's replaying the night over in his head. "And I remember you telling me you were going to fuck me silly."

Jared drags a hand through the hair on the top of his head. I watch him glance over at the driver before looking back at me.

"Okay, you got me. I do remember last night. I remember everything, but it won't happen again. We were drunk and made a bad decision."

I feel the tears start to form in my eyes. I know I'm acting unreasonable, but I can’t help it.

"You regret it," I whisper, looking down at my hands.

"No. No, babe. I didn't mean to make you feel that way." He moves over in the seat until we're next to each other. Our thighs are touching and Jared wraps an arm around my shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Billy. I just didn’t know how to handle this morning and I made you feel like crap because of it." He lightly grabs my chin between his thumb and pointer finger and lifts my head so I can see him.

"I don't regret last night. It was fun and I should apologize," he says as he quickly glances at my lap. "It seems you are a natural blonde."

He smiles humorously back up at me and I start to melt, but his face suddenly becomes serious again.

"I meant what I said to you."

"But..."

"We're friends and I don't want to ruin this friendship. I don’t have a lot of genuine friends and I wouldn't know the first thing about how to treat you. You deserve better than me. You deserve a man who is going to worship you, bow down at your feet. You deserve a man who doesn't fuck other women for a living."

I smile up at him and bring my hands to my face to wipe away any tears that fell.

"So... I'm back to Billy?"

Jared smiles softly at me and pulls me in to kiss my forehead briefly. "You're back to Billy."

We stay this way for the rest of the car ride, with our legs touching and Jared's arm wrapped around my shoulder. I can smell the mint and lingering cigarette smell coming off his breath. A smell that should disgust me, but actually soothes me. I know Jared said he rarely smokes, but I'm starting to think that's not the case. I smell it on him all the time.

When we pull up to the small studio in the middle of the desert, Jared's body language changes. He lets go of me and stiffens his back. Once the town car is completely stopped, Jared opens his door and gets out of the car.

"Follow me," he calls over his shoulder.

I don't know what I possibly did to make him so cold towards me this quickly. I follow him into the building where he talks briefly to some of the crew. I stand silently next to him, trying to follow his conversations. There is an older gentleman with a ZZ Top style beard and thick-framed glasses talking to one of the cameramen. Jared walks over in his direction and shakes his hand.

"Troy, it's been a long time man. How've you been?"

"I'm good, Brandon. I'm glad you decided to work with us today. We've missed you ever since you started your own online production company."

"Anything for a friend." Jared glances my way and tilts his head in my direction. "This is Autumn. She's my new assistant, but she's filling in for Kelly today because Kelly's working on a deal for me out of town."

Troy sticks out his callused hand for me to shake. I shake his hand hesitantly and greet him with a soft smile.

"She's a beauty, Brandon, and I bet she's a whole lot nicer than Kelly. That one is such a bitch."

"Hey now, you don't like Kelly because she's ruthless and always has my best interest at heart. Don't be pissed because she constantly tells you no on your shitty projects," Jared says laughing.