Say It Sexy (13 page)

That night, after an early dinner and a jog on the treadmill, I decided to make use of the hotel’s indoor water facilities. They had a pool, hot tub, and sauna. To my knowledge, Garrick and the guys were running lines again. Erica had locked herself away to write, so it looked like I was flying solo, which was nothing new. Leaving my towel on the peg outside, as I didn’t want it to get damp from the humidity, I slipped into the sauna and shut the door.

My bathing suit top had gotten a little small lately, and it made my breasts look larger than normal, but due to the season, I didn’t think I’d need to run out and buy another. Victoria’s Secret wasn’t cheap and even though I was here in New Mexico, I still had to cover my rent in California.

Using the ladle that had been hanging from the hook on the wall, I scooped out a helping of water from the basin that had been provided and drizzled it onto the coals. With a sigh, I closed my eyes. I immediately pictured Garrick and once again felt the same burn of curiosity in my chest that had made me want to interrogate rocker Liam Collier about his friend. Strange, but even after that horrible incident at dinner the other night, my obsession with Garrick just seemed to be growing bigger and bigger. I knew that had to do with his innate attractiveness, what had turned out to be an undeniable talent on set, and yes, the way my body still trembled whenever I thought of him visiting my room two nights ago.

You know, if you didn’t hate me, I could like you. I may already like you.

You are really drunk right now.

I’m not drunk enough to forget you in that lingerie.

My “sexy shorts,” he had called them. What had Garrick meant about potentially already liking me? Had that been the liquor talking, or had the liquor simply freed him of his inhibitions enough to speak the truth?

I snorted. More likely, it had freed him of his inhibitions enough to want to get laid, even if it would be with the uptight priss who’d yammered on about love at dinner.

My eyes snapped open when I heard the hinges of the sauna door creak. Garrick, dressed in white and blue swim trunks that made his natural tan sinfully apparent, stopped short, steam pouring out into the colder air behind him.

“Oh. Hey, girl,” he said stiffly with a hint of apology.

“Hi,” I whispered back. Stunned by his appearance when I’d just been thinking of him and suddenly feeling very self-conscious, I hugged myself and scooted to the corner of my slippery wooden bench.

“I can come back,” he offered, eyes darting from me to the coals and back again.

“It’s fine,” I stated awkwardly, tucking a strand of damp hair behind my ear.

“Great minds, huh?” he tried, stepping inside as I swallowed thickly. There were two other benches, smaller ones, framing the walls. Surely, he wouldn’t think to sit with me. But I was wrong again. He planted himself in the middle of my bench, not the opposite end, and I felt my pulse rev up. “I just had a lift session at the gym. Can you tell?” he teased. He flexed, sporting an arrogant gin.

After a glance, never quite able to fully fuse my eyes with his, I stared at the door. “Quite the specimen,” I muttered. Of course, Hollywood’s new playboy would have an incredible physique, but I didn’t need him naked in front me, flexing his muscles to know that. I, along with thousands of other girls, had probably fantasized about his body while watching him in action on the big screen. And given I’d actually been on set with him for hours and hours, and had spent time with my lips pressed against his… Well, fantasizing about Garrick Maze’s body had become a habit.

“I was joking,” he insisted, leaning toward me and giving me a gentle bump with his shoulder. “Loosen up, doll.”

With a subtle roll of my eyes, I uncrossed my arms and settled by hands on the bench.

“Killer suit,” he said and I had to fight to keep my arms down.

Suddenly, I felt feverish. “Thank you. Yours is nice too.” I swallowed thickly and hoped the wall would inspire me to say more. “It was nice meeting Liam today.”

“Yeah. He’s cool. We fell out of touch after high school. He went his way in the music industry after he got signed and I went mine. We party together occasionally.”

“Sounds fun.” I smiled.

“Yeah.”

One could have cut the awkward tension with a knife. “I—I—” I stammered, “I thought you were running lines with Shane tonight.”

Garrick huffed dramatically and slumped back against the wall, somehow accentuating his shoulder and chest muscles all the more. I blushed. “Ty took him from me, the traitor. Said Shane has more potential than I did at his age, so he wants to be his mentor now.”

Surprised, I blinked. “How brutal.”

He shrugged, settling back into his causal, lackadaisical coolness. “Eh, brutal honesty helps you get places in this business.” His dark hair, moistened and weighed down by the humidity, hung in his eyes in wavy pieces. He was so, so handsome.

“That’s true.” I reached up and nervously twisted my hair over my shoulder, wishing I brought something to tie it up with. “Speaking of brutal honesty…” I said softly, worrying at my lip. “Do you remember our conversation the other night?”

“What other night?”

“The night you got back from downtown and came to invite me to party with you guys in Tyler’s room,” I clarified, hoping it would jog his memory.

He frowned and turned his head to give me a queer look. “I did that?”

My spirits sank. Adjusting my posture, I sat straighter and stared at the door, firmly resolved not to be hypnotized by his rippling pectorals. “Never mind.”

It figured that he wouldn’t remember something that had been plaguing and nagging at me at all hours of the day. And the night,
especially
the night. He probably said similar things to all the girls, his hundreds of pictures on the web a testament to that. I had to stop focusing on this and get my mind back on track again. Where was the cool, confident woman I had been when I started this job? Deciding that it was entirely Garrick’s fault, like most recently recurring atrocities were, I stood to collect my things.

Garrick

The truth was… I remembered. I remembered everything.

I’d been just drunk enough to lose my filter, but not quite so much that chunks of time fell out of my memory. I could still picture Gwen exactly as she looked that night—long glossy black-brown hair hanging loose and attractively disheveled, as though she had been running her fingers through it for hours at a time. I wanted to do the same. I saw it as clearly then as I did now. I pictured it often. Her pale green silk lingerie, which I could only assume came from my favorite lady store of all time, enhanced the jade in her eyes and the shape of her body. I knew her breasts were impressive from the beginning, and they were the kind I wanted to squeeze, feel against me, lick (the whole shebang) as often as possible.

That vulnerable image of her out of her professional attire and picture perfect poise stuck to my brain like gum on a shoe. I wanted to explore
that
side of her. That frightened me senseless.

And the fear had forced me to admit something I’d fought like hell accepting.

If I had her, it wouldn’t be exclusively about sex for me. I could get that anywhere. I wanted
Gwen
, the Gwen who was a ball-buster, whether it was because someone had caught her talking shit, she was worried about something, or she was defending something she believed in. I also wanted the Gwen who let her hair down and answered the door in her pajamas. Hell, I even wanted the Gwen who’d stared all googly-eyed at Liam when he’d visited the set, the one who for the very first time, had made me so jealous I’d wanted to immediately punch Liam in the face.

Even going out partying the last two nights hadn’t been as great of an idea as I had hoped. I kept seeing her face everywhere, in spite of the fact that she sat in the hotel, tucked far away from downtown. At first, I attributed it to guilt. However, after two hours of the elusive sightings, I knew better. I had even tapped a girl on the shoulder thinking Gwen may have changed her mind and came to meet us.

What the hell was happening to me?

Again, I reminded my head that I couldn’t, I
wouldn’t
, do this to myself. Nothing about me stood ready for intimacy, which always entailed the danger of falling. Hell, forget falling. Intimacy was a crash and burn waiting to happen. And I couldn’t put myself through that. Not a second time.

Not when I knew that I could fall for Gwen in a way I never had with Rachel.

But my body wouldn’t listen.

Before I could fully curb the impulse, my hand shot forward, almost as though it had a mind of its own, and grabbed her wrist. I surged to my feet and yanked her back to me, spinning her around like a dainty top, and kissed her as her hair settled back around her shoulders. The feel of her silky lips, like sinking into solace, hit me like a ton of bricks. I would remember this moment forever. She didn’t feel at all like Rachel, and that was glorious. I had kissed her before, and felt the same rush, magnetized toward her. But this was different.

This wasn’t Payton kissing Lacey.

This was me kissing Gwen.

And it was fucking fantastic.

To my astonishment, she didn’t fight me. It wasn’t until I pulled back and opened my eyes that I understood why. She hovered in front of me with a look of pale, dazed shock on her heart shaped, freckled face. A mix of astonishment and terror colored her features.

I immediately let her go. “I lied,” I blurted out. “I do remember. Everything.”

“What?” she asked, her jewel-like eyes tracking between mine.

Even though I had released her, she hadn’t moved. With so little space between us, I could feel her body heat, her bikini covered breasts against my chest. What I wanted most was to push her up against the wooden wall and kiss her all over again, maybe even go farther. However, something in her eyes told me to make another call.

“I meant it. I don’t think I’ll ever forget. Gwen, I like you. And I don’t expect you to believe me after I’ve been a complete asshole to you. I have. I have my reasons. They suck. And I’m sorry.”

Where were these words coming from? Why was I saying them? Was the heat going to my head? Or, more accurately, my cock? Being this close to her felt utterly intoxicating. Of course, she had another theory not quite in line with my meaning.

“Why are you saying this now? Are you drunk again?” The spark of panic in her eyes had dissipated, replaced by skepticism and worry.

I felt my expression fall as I gazed down into her gorgeous face. “Working out drunk and then sitting in a sauna doesn’t exactly make much sense if one doesn’t want to die of dehydration,” I muttered. The hope that she’d forgive me and give me a second chance, even a first chance at something special with her, bled out of me. Quickly filling the empty space, anger rushed in. “Am I really that repulsive to you? Did you actually mean what you said the first day we—?”

But I didn’t get to finish because in the next second, she hooked her hand behind my neck and pressed her lips against mine. Stunned, I couldn’t respond at first. However, as my senses rushed back to me, I quickly wrapped her up in my arms. Breath catching in my throat, I turned her, walked her the step or two it took to get to the wall, and pressed her against the damp wooden boards. When her back bumped up against them, she graced me with a soft moan. I craved more of those.

The heat of the room, as well as her body, sky rocketed from pleasant to sweltering. I pressed tight against her so she could feel how turned on I was, how crazy she made me. Able to feel every firm curve and crevice, my hands explored her sides and the rounded cheeks of her ass. We fit together like two pieces of a puzzle. She melted against me and I loved the feel of it. My nerves buzzed with anticipation.

Unable to help myself, as my lips remained too occupied with hers to ask for permission, I kept picturing her nude figure, accentuated by the sheen of the moisture in the air, against mine. I wanted her bikini top off…
now
. I slid my hands up her ribs, forgetting all about the glass door, foggy or not, that formed the only barrier between the two of us and potential onlookers.

My hands inched up and around behind her, tangling into the strings keeping me from her plump breasts. She sucked in a sharp breath of air, planted her hands against my chest, and suddenly wriggled away. I jerked around to face her and we stared one another down, chests heaving in an attempt to catch our breath. The attractive flush in her cheeks sent a fresh wave of desire through me. I swallowed thickly.

Opening my mouth to say something, I tried to take a step toward her to ask why she was wearing a
what just came over me
look on her face. She retreated.

“I have to go,” she stammered, voice weighted down with arousal, but buoyed by panic. With that, she whirled away and fled, snatching her towel off the hook and wrapping it tightly around herself the instant she was out the door.

I stood alone in the sauna, watching the muggy shape of her hurry away. The glass eventually fogged over too thickly for me to see anything. It was like standing in a dream and seeing a vision—experiencing a taste of a walking phenomenon—and then . . . waking up.