Chapter 12 Cynthie #2
“Good.” Jasmine nods. “Don’t be afraid to ask questions or to make suggestions.” For a moment the stern facade drops away, for just a second her mouth curves, and I see a glimmer in her eye that makes her look like Logan. “Let them underestimate us. We’ll have the last laugh.”
“You’ve got it, boss,” I agree. I think I would lie down in traffic for her if she asked.
She only nods once more, the cool expression falling back into place as she lets herself out the door, passing Hannah on her way.
“There you are,” Hannah says, bouncing up the steps into the trailer. “Are you ready to get into costume?”
I stand, grin at her. For the first time I’m not faking it when I pull my shoulders back, lift my chin and say, “Absolutely.”
BY THE TIME I AM laced into my corset and buttoned into a gown of creamy silk trimmed with green ribbon and delicately embroidered with trailing green vines, I feel ready.
Of course there are still nerves there, but they simmer, a low, gentle heat underneath the roiling thrill of excitement.
I look in the mirror and all I see is Emilia.
Hannah must sense my mood because she doesn’t try to talk to me as we pick our way over toward the cameras.
“Okay!” Logan says, clapping his hands together when he sees us approaching. “Here we go!” His smile is wide, but there’s a tightness around his eyes. His sister might believe in me, but Logan’s definitely not sure I can do this.
Jasmine lurks behind him, swathed in black and looking grimly like she’s about to attend a funeral. It is strangely reassuring.
The gray clouds have drifted away, and the sky is mostly clear now, though Marion is staring up at it, deep in conversation with Mark, the head of cinematography.
Logan’s sheep have been dotted artistically around in the background, and between them and the rolling green landscape intersected by low dry-stone walls, the scene is bucolic.
Waiting up at the top of the gentle slope, under a handsome oak tree, is Jack.
Dressed in breeches, dark riding boots, and a navy jacket that appears to have been molded to the muscular lines of his upper body, he looks every inch the romantic Regency fantasy.
As I walk toward him, I notice he has his eyes closed, just as he did that first day at the read-through, and when he opens them, they catch on me and flash, full of an electric blue heat.
In that moment I’m not sure if the zing I experience is between Cynthie and Jack or Emilia and Edward, but I know that it will help with the scene, and instead of tamping the feeling down, I let heat unfurl inside me.
I allow my mouth to curve: a smile and an invitation, and Jack’s whole body goes utterly still, wariness creeping into his gaze.
“Last looks,” Logan yells, and Liam rushes forward from behind the huddle of the cameras, pulling brushes from his belt as he dabs first at Jack’s face and then at mine.
The people around us fall back. Logan and Jasmine are positioned behind their monitor.
The camera operators close in, a boom mic hovers in my peripheral vision, and I take a breath, narrowing my focus so that I don’t see them, don’t hear them.
All I see is Jack, and I’m so focused on him, I’m convinced that I can hear his heartbeat, thrumming in time with my own.
“First positions,” Marion calls, and I move to the agreed-upon spot.
“Roll sound,” Logan’s voice comes, and then there is the quick patter that I know signals the start of filming.
“Sound speed!”
“Roll camera.”
“Camera rolling.”
A young woman steps forward with a slate. “Scene seventeen, take one.” She claps the slate shut, and I feel the thrill you get when the roller coaster is climbing, climbing, climbing.
“Set,” one of the camera operators says.
The moment teeters on a knife’s edge—the split second before free fall. My eyes close.
“Action,” Logan shouts, and if I were Cynthie, I might wonder why Jasmine hasn’t said anything at all yet, but I’m not Cynthie anymore. My eyes snap open, and I say my first line.
“It has been quite the social season.”
“And you and my brother have made a stir.”
I tilt my head, considering the man beside me. He holds himself stiffly, emotions in check.
“Do you think so?” I ask, lightly. “I wonder how such information reached you, when it seems you’ve been avoiding society altogether.”
Edward’s jaw tightens, and my heart leaps. He thinks he’s hiding his feelings, but they’re easy enough to find if you choose to look for them.
“I have been busy,” he says, stiffly.
I stop walking, and his good manners force him to stop beside me. I take a step closer.
“Busy avoiding me, I think,” I say, the words gentle, a little sad. “When I was under the impression that you and I were friends.”
Our eyes meet for a long moment, and there’s such heat in his gaze I almost falter.
“Friends,” he bites out finally with a hard laugh.
I lift my eyebrows in challenge, take another step closer, playing with fire.
“What would you call it?” I ask the question softly, reach out, my hand hovering for an instant of indecision before I place my fingertips on his arm.
It’s a light touch, but I can feel the heat of his body, even through the sleeve of his coat, through my gloves.
He hesitates and looks down with a frown.
Then, just as I’m about to pull away, embarrassed, he covers my fingers with his for a second of desperate contact, before he moves away.
My own hand drops to my side, and I continue walking, my heartbeat erratic.
“ Friends ,” he says again with an ironic curl of his lips, while struggling to hide how affected he is. “I suppose so.”
“In that case,” I reply with an easiness I don’t feel, as we continue to walk, “you won’t mind when I beat you at cards later.”
This time his laugh is real, drawn out of him by surprise. “You mean I won’t mind when you try to cheat me at cards later.”
His smile transforms his face. I blink—dazzled.
“I have no idea what you are talking about,” I manage finally, schooling my expression into one of innocence.
The two of us continue to walk and to tease one another, and I try to pretend that the pleasure I take in this simple exchange is ordinary, that it doesn’t feel like snatching something precious.
When a voice finally shouts, “Cut!” I flinch.
The world rushes in, and I find to my surprise that I’m shaking.
Jack looks at me like I’ve just sprouted an extra head.
“That was—” he starts, but he’s cut off by Jasmine and Logan bustling over.
“Great, Jack. Great !” Logan enthuses, clapping Jack on the arm.
My eyes go to Jasmine, whose face gives nothing away. “A good start,” she purses her lips. “I think we need to pick up the pace on those last few lines. We might need to tweak something there… The end of the scene felt flat.”
I nod. “I think…” I hesitate, but Jasmine inclines her head, and I remember her saying I should speak up. “I think maybe we need to keep walking a bit farther. It felt like the momentum in the movement was off.” I sound tentative.
“Mmmm,” Jasmine murmurs thoughtfully.
I’m on the brink of telling her to ignore me, that I don’t know what I’m talking about, when Logan turns to Jack. “What do you think about that, Jack?”
Jack glances over at me and frowns. “I was going to say the same thing,” he says finally, and it sounds like he’s confessing to a crime.
“Okay, good.” Logan nods. “Let me just have a chat with Mark.” He looks up at the sky. “I think the cloud cover is steady for now, so we’ll go again asap.”
“Oh, and Cynthie,” Jasmine says, “I know it wasn’t scripted, but the arm touch was good. Keep that in.”
She walks away to talk to Marion and I laugh, delighted. Adrenaline is thrashing so wildly through my body, I feel like there are fireworks going off inside me.
Jack looks like he’s just found half a worm in his apple.
“Right, everyone,” Marion shouts, clapping her hands together. “Back to firsts.”
“Did you have anything you wanted to say to me?” I ask Jack sweetly, as we climb back up the hill.
“I have to admit I’m impressed,” he replies, his tone matching mine. “I had no idea you could say your lines and walk in a straight line at the same time. Better get ready for that Oscar nomination.”
I only have time to growl before Liam is there, powdering my face again.
Never mind.
First I’ll prove Jack Turner-Jones wrong about me, and then I’ll enact some vigilante justice. He won’t know what’s hit him.