Exposing Alix (32 page)

But she still hadn’t opened her eyes.

“Quiet on the set!”

Lena took a deep breath. It wasn’t like they were really
going to have sex. They were acting. Only acting. There wasn’t much dialogue;
they’d already shot the scene just before and just after. It was only sex. Jake
would climb into bed with her. At first, he’d be reluctant, still fighting
their attraction. She would have to seduce him until his resistance was broken,
and then he’d take control. They would film him kissing her breasts and belly,
licking her inner thigh and caressing her bottom. When he was supposed to be
entering her, they would film a close-up of her face. She would gasp, realizing
that she loved him.

That part came from Alix. It was her bright idea to have
Salva’s moment of truth come while she was having sex. Alix couldn’t make
anything easy for Lena. Even their sex scene had to be more than a sex scene.

“Action!”

The first few takes were horrible. Lena’s body was stiff
and unresponsive. Jake looked more worried than he did aroused. Alix pulled him
aside for a few murmured instructions. He threw on a robe and wandered away
from the set. Alix approached Lena next.

Lena hid her body under the white bedsheets. “What?” she
muttered.

“It’s time to step it up,” Alix said briskly. “No more
coddling. No more Ms. Nice Girl.”

“Are you kidding?” Lena poked her head out of the covers.
“You’re picking now to go mean on me? You’ve been hanging out too long with
Ryker.”

“I gave you my ChapStick spiel. That was the best I had.
Now it’s time to go to work. Commit yourself. This is it. This is your moment.
Miss it here, and it will never come again.”

“But—”

Alix held up a hand. “I’m not interested.”

Lena noticed for the first time the lines of tension
etched around Alix’s eyes and the way she kept darting little looks at Ryker
while they talked.

“Have a good night, did you?” Lena drawled.

Alix flushed beet red. “I don’t know what you’re talking
about.”

Lena chuckled. Oh, her expression was priceless! Like a
teenager caught red-handed by her mother. “Did you commit yourself? Grab your
own moment? Your one chance?”

Alix glared at her. “We’re here to film a movie, not talk
about my personal life.”

“The professional
is
personal. Isn’t that what
you’re always telling me?”

“Can we get back to
Salva’s Revenge
, please?”

“No.” Lena pouted. “I’m not doing anything until I hear
details. It’s obvious you’re in love with him. So what happened last night? Did
you finally do the deed?”

“Please. Let it go, Lena.”

Lena knew she was being a jerk but couldn’t seem to stop.
“I bet he’s good in the sack. At least, that’s what all the other gals say. Did
he tell you he loved you back? They’re such good liars, these men of ours. You
didn’t believe him, did you?”

Alix’s eyes were haunted. Her shoulders collapsed inward.
“Of course not,” she whispered. “I would have to be crazy to believe something
like that.”

Whatever nasty thing Lena had been about to say died in
her throat at Alix’s painful reply. “Oh, hon, I’m sorry,” she said with genuine
sympathy. Whatever hell Alix had put her through, she didn’t deserve that
feeling. No one did. “I’m so sorry.”

Alix gave her a weak smile. “Let’s just say I know exactly
how difficult it is to do what I’m asking. You’re good, damn good. Don’t let
fear get in the way of that.”

Lena nodded, threw the sheet back over her head, and took
several long, slow breaths. “Okay,” she said through the cloth. “I’m ready.”

“We’re ready,” Alix called.

Lena folded the sheet around her breasts and centered her
head on the pillow. She focused on her character. She was Salva, not Lena. He
was Hank McAdams, not Jake. She could do this.

“Places, please.”

Jake appeared next to the bed, naked, except for a tiny
scrap of silk. Alix had wanted them naked. Ryker allowed a few pieces of
modesty cloth.

“Quiet on the set!”

Jake stared down at her, eyes dark and hungry. Lena
blocked out the lights, forgot the cameras, let the set fade to black.

“And…action!”

She held up her arms, and he reluctantly climbed into bed.
She kissed him, and for a while, he remained stiff and cold. Gradually, his
body loosened, and he circled her with his arms. They fell into each other,
limbs tangled, bodies intertwined. Slowly, the locus of control shifted.
Instead of responding to her kisses, he initiated them. When he trailed a line
of fire down her throat to her breasts, she relaxed and let him take over.

Her body didn’t care if she was Lena or Salva, if he was
Jake or Hank. It responded to the passion in his touch and the way he caressed
her skin as if she was made of the finest porcelain. He stroked her nipples,
traced their outline, took them in his mouth, and she sighed with pleasure.
Something fell into place, and she was transported to a place where nothing
mattered but his hands, the weight of his body, and the pressure of his tongue.

“Yes,” she moaned, “I need you.”

He moved into position on top of her. The sheet had long since
been kicked away, and their bodies pressed together, only a tiny scrap of silk
keeping them apart. Jake stared down at her, and Lena shuddered once but kept
her eyes open.

“Lena,” he whispered. “Look at me.”

In his eyes, she saw everything she had feared. Love.
Commitment. Apology.

A question.

Her lashes fluttered.

Salva
, she reminded herself savagely.
You are
Salva
!

“Lena,” Jake said. “I love you.”

He pushed open her legs and settled between them.

“I love you,” he repeated. “Tell me you love me too.”

Tears filled her eyes. All her attempts at acting
dissolved in an instant. She couldn’t fight it any longer. Maybe she was a
fool. Maybe she was crazy. But it was there, right in front of her, and she
couldn’t deny it any longer.

“Yes.” She sighed, and a smile creased her mouth. “Yes,
Jake. I love you too, you stupid, stubborn man.”

“CUT!” Ryker roared in the background.

Tears streamed out of the corners of her eyes, and Lena
laughed as Jake settled his mouth over hers for a long, deep kiss.

#

“I suppose you’re pleased with yourself,” Ryker grumbled.
They sat together in the viewing room, the projection screen covered with an
enormous shot of Lena, laughing and kissing Jake. It pissed him off every time
he looked at it.

“I’m happy for them,” Alix said. “Aren’t you?”

“I would be happier if they’d been able to focus on their
work today. After that debacle this morning, you’d think they were a couple of
love-struck teenagers.”

“We got great film. You have everything you need here.
Just edit out the parts where they declare their undying love to each other.”

“God save me from actors who can’t remember that they’re
supposed to be acting.” He knew he was spiraling out of control, but the fury
was growing and his body practically shaking with rage.

“You would think they’d done it just to spite you,” she
said. “What on earth do you have to be so pissed about?”

“I expect them to be professionals,” he said, slamming one
fist down on an open palm. “I expect them to act, not use my camera time for a
declaration of love.”

“Let’s be honest here,” she said carefully. “Are you
pissed because they used camera time to declare their love or because they fell
in love in the first place?”

“That wasn’t love,” he said flatly. “That was lust. Pure,
honest lust. Nothing wrong with that, except the delusion that it means
anything more.”

“For God’s sake,” she exploded, jumping off of the couch.
“How can you say that? Were you not there today? Did you not see what happened
on that bed? There was magic there. Everyone felt it.”

“You wanted to feel it,” he argued. “You want to believe
in it.”

“Of course I do!” She threw up her hands and spun around
to face him. “Can we cut to the chase? Let’s talk about last night. Let’s talk
about what happened between us.”

“We had sex,” he said, stomach falling. He had known this
conversation was coming. It had only been a matter of time. “That’s it.”

“No.” She shook her head. “It was more than that. We made
love. I saw it. I saw it in your eyes.”

“I like you, Alix,” he said slowly. “I like you a lot. But
that’s it. Whatever you saw was your own invention.”

She blinked, and her jaw moved forward an inch. “An
invention?”

“It wasn’t real.” He worked to keep his voice firm but
gentle. “Whatever you felt, whatever you think you saw was just lust. Sex.
Animals reacting to each other in the most primitive way possible.”

“Animals,” she repeated. Her voice was beginning to
thicken. The cold feeling in his stomach intensified. “You think we were just
like animals last night. I could have been a complete stranger, and you would
barely have noticed the difference.”

This was going even worse than he’d imagined. “Well, look,
it isn’t as though there wasn’t
any
feeling. I mean, I appreciated you being
there last night. But if I’d had any sense, things would never have gone that
far. I had too much to drink. It was a mistake.”

“Not for me.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m
glad it happened. And I’m not going to let you pretend you didn’t feel it too.”

“It was just sex,” he repeated, feeling his control of the
situation falling away. He wanted her to cry, to rage at him. But all he saw in
her was the deadly calm she’d shown the night of Gunther’s party. “You’re
mixing everything up.”

She shook her head. “No. Not anymore. Now it’s you who’s
got it confused. That thing you felt last night—that emotion you
felt—it wasn’t just sex, Ryker. It was love. There—I’ve said it. I
fell in love with you. That’s why I did what I did. Not because of some
mistake, or because you drank too much, or because I was overcome with lust.
Because I fell in love with you, and I didn’t want to walk away from the way I
felt anymore. So don’t tell me we were just a couple of animals screwing in the
woods, okay?”

“I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely. He thought he was prepared
to hear her say it, but it was still a painful, wrenching blow. He hadn’t meant
to hurt her. He’d meant to stay away. Why couldn’t he have just stayed away? “I
didn’t feel anything. It was just good sex. I’m sorry if your feelings are
hurt, but that’s all it was.”

She studied him silently. “You’re such a hypocrite.”

“A hypocrite?”

“Yes, and I can’t believe it took me this long to figure
out.”

He raised a hand to his forehead. “Alix, you’re not making
any sense. Look, we’re almost done with the movie. Can’t we just forget about
this and move on?”

“Of course you want to forget about it. You’re scared,”
she accused. “You’re even worse than I was, and I was pretty bad.”

“Scared?” His brows contracted in genuine surprise.
“Scared of what?”

“Scared of love.”

He stopped. He would have laughed, but she was so serious
he felt the irritation rise back up in his chest. “Alix, you’re being
ridiculous. I’m not scared of anything. I just don’t believe in the same things
you do. I don’t believe in love.”

“You don’t believe in love.” She tapped her foot and blew
out a breath, eyeing him with disgust. “What a crock. I can’t believe you can
say these things with a straight face.”

That was when he started to get angry. He’d tried to be
patient, tried not to hurt her. But he could stay patient for only so long.
“You’ve got no reason to be like this. I was honest with you at every step of
the way. You knew how I felt.”

“Oh, I know what you told
me
. You lied to yourself,
Ryker, not me. You’ve been lying to yourself this whole time. Maybe all your
life. Because the truth is that you are so damn scared of love, you have to run
around pretending it doesn’t exist. But it does, and you know it. You know it
better than anyone. You saw what happened to your mother, and it terrifies you.
If it didn’t, you wouldn’t fight so hard.”

Ryker swallowed hard. “You don’t know what you’re talking
about.”

“Really? Then explain to me why you go to Rosalia’s family
dinner every month, even though you claim to hate it. Tell me why you care so
much about what Rosalia thinks of you, and why it hurts so badly that Emilio
disapproves of your lifestyle. Tell me why you can hardly live with yourself
when you think your mother died without you telling her you loved her.”

“Enough.” His voice lashed out like a whip. “Clearly, I
made a mistake when I let you get involved in my personal affairs.”

“Am I wrong?” she taunted. “Can you really say I’m wrong?
You drove your mother away. You drove them all away with your tough-guy
attitude. I watched you at dinner, Ryker, and yes, Rosalia is overbearing, and
Emilio complained about your lifestyle. But that’s not what I saw there. I saw
a group of people who wanted desperately to be a part of your life. Hector and
Eduardo worship you—you know that, right? And Emilio, well, he looks at
you with so much pride it’s incredible. You saved Maria’s life, to hear her
tell it. And Rosalia sits there, practically aching for you to show some sign
of approval for all the things she does. And what do you do? You ignore them.
You shut them out. And someday you’re going to push them too far, and they
won’t come back.”

He stood and walked toward the door. “This conversation is
over.”

“I fell in love with you,” she said to his retreating back.
“Your worst nightmare came true. So what are you going to do now? Push me away
too? Tell me I’m crazy, that what I felt last night was all in my head? You
were there. We were
joined
, Ryker. We were one.”

He spun around. “Of course we were joined,” he said,
deliberately making his voice cold and hard. “That’s what happens when you have
sex.”