22. Reese
Chapter 22
Reese
“Any update?” I ask Heather, pacing my trailer. The anxiety coils in my chest like a living thing.
The production-wide email arrived like a death sentence: shooting cancelled for today.
I spent years climbing Hollywood’s ladder, and I’ve never had a director cancel shooting out of the blue, unless they came down with the flu. Even that’s a rarity.
What if this isn’t just for the day? What if this is a permanent termination of the project?
This is all my fault.
I messed up. I got a little too confident.
My mind races through the milestones, from that lucky break on Clubhouse to becoming America’s sweetheart, churning out hit rom-coms like clockwork.
My career could be over. Who knows what Felix will tell the media. I thought I was okay with this, but with the possibility of messing up my image so close, I want to run.
“His team says he’s ‘regrouping,’” Heather says. My stomach lurches, knowing the studio’s gamble on me might have gone up in flames.
“Regrouping?” I grip the phone tighter, my other hand unconsciously touching where Dante’s fingers gripped my thighs yesterday. “I know I shouldn’t have lost it, but if you’d heard how he spoke to me—”
“Darling, that man’s ego needed deflating. You don’t snap without cause.” Heather’s tone softens. “Let me handle the suits. Meanwhile, those scripts I sent over…give them a look just in case.”
“This has to work,” I whisper, pressing cool fingers to my temples. All those hours of training, pushing my body to its limits, learning to be someone new—I can’t let it slip away.
“The jet’s fueled if you need an escape to LA.”
“No. He might return. I need to be here.”
After hanging up, I stare at my phone’s dark screen. The weight of responsibility crushes my chest—my career and hundreds of jobs hanging by a thread because I couldn’t swallow my pride.
Three sharp knocks break my spiral. Dante. My pulse jumps. My fingers absently trace my lips, which are still sore after yesterday’s adrenaline-filled angry kiss. One reckless moment. I can’t do it again. I got distracted, and that’s exactly what I said would happen.
My moral compass has completely lost its true north.
Felix will be back tomorrow. My racing pulse betrays my doubt.
Yet when I see Dante, it’s like coming up for air.
“Come with me?” He leans against the doorframe, all leonine grace.
“No. I should stay here, just in case—”
“Reese.” My name comes out of his mouth like a verdict. “You’re sitting here letting that prick’s ego trip eat you alive. The agents can handle this shit.” He looks at me then, and there’s this raw honesty in his face that makes my stomach clench. “Back in elementary school, I broke some kid’s nose. He’d been harassing my sister. I got suspended for it. Sometimes you do the right thing, and it costs you. That’s how it works.”
One month of working together, and he reads me like a well-worn script. Following him now feels like striking matches in a room full of dynamite.
“But what if he calls—”
“Phones stay on. But I’m not letting you spiral alone in here.” He extends his hand. Rationality wages war with want. This is such a terrible idea.
“Come on, what would Rob—”
“Don’t finish your sentence,” I scold. As if he knows the thing that would get me out of this cabin better than I do. But, against my better judgment, I take his hand anyway.
The early autumn air hits my face as we step outside. The set thrums with nervous energy, crew members trading worried glances. They greet Dante with easy familiarity, inside jokes, and casual touches, while giving me a wide berth. Untouchable.
“Miss Sinclair.” Marcus and two other stunt team members approach, their presence a welcome distraction.
“Marcus,” I smile.
He turns to Dante, eyes lighting up mischievously. “Regardless of whether or not we have a job tomorrow, our offer for today’s session still stands.”
The weight of their livelihoods sits heavy on my shoulders.
“Not a chance in hell,” Dante laughs.
“Come on! It’s a day off, and your character sheet’s getting dusty.” I’m grateful for their playful banter. It pulls me from my guilt spiral. “We’ll let you bore us with your historically accurate weapons rants…” Marcus grins.
Dante blows them a kiss. “Don’t miss me too much.”
As we walk away, I study his profile. “What’s their mysterious offer about?”
“They run this whole D I’m just consumed by his touch.
He reaches for my waistband, his fingers brushing my bare skin. I nod, lifting my hips. He takes his time, sliding the fabric down inch by torturous inch. The air feels cool against my exposed skin. My sweatshirt follows, and I shiver—from the cold or anticipation, I’m not sure.
His eyes rake over me, drinking in every detail. “Fuck,” he says through gritted teeth.
Through my thin cotton bra, his thumb traces slow circles.
I love the way he’s staring at me. It makes me feel strong seeing him so consumed in me like this.
I buck toward him, inhaling his smoky skin, my new favorite scent. His chest is firm against mine, all solid muscle beneath his shirt. I ache for him to touch me. I want to scream at him too, but my voice is lost at the moment.
I reach for him, my palm pressing against his hard length through his sweats. Heat pools low in my belly at how thick he feels.
He grips my wrists hard, pinning them to the table.
A warning. A promise.
“What did I tell you about touching things you aren’t supposed to?” He exhales, his arousal apparent. He’s holding himself back, and I don’t want him to.
I try to form words, but all that comes out is a small, needy sound. “But—”
“I’ll give you what you want.” He cups my waist. “I’ll let you misbehave, since that’s what you’ve been begging for.” The words leave me raw, exposed. No one has ever seen me like this.
“I didn’t beg.”
“No?” A soft laugh, dangerous and low. His hand disappears below, ghosting along the elastic of my panties. My nipples harden, and his gaze skims down the length of me. I’m exposed. “Here in the armory, where anyone with a key could walk in, when we probably shouldn’t do this at all?”
We could be caught, but the thought intensifies my need for him. I’ve been good for too long.
“Or maybe we should see how much you want this,” he says. I nod. The edge of the table digs into my palms as I brace myself, heart thundering. Fear and want tangle in my chest. “You like that, don’t you? Being naughty with me?”
This isn’t a role anymore. The realization hits me like a physical force.
“Maybe I do.”
“Be a good girl and tell me how dirty you want me to make you.” My fingers curl against the wood, knuckles white. Breathing becomes a conscious effort.
“Touch me.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere, Dante. Anywhere you want.”
“Now,” he says, his practiced indifference cracking around the edges, his need bleeding through, “here’s your second lesson. When you’ve got someone exactly where you need them, you take what you want. You make demands.”
He’s so hard. So willing. I love the power coursing through my veins.
“Then get on your knees,” I command. “Show me what you’ve been thinking about doing to me.”
He kneels before me. “You’ve been so bad denying your body what it needs, fighter.” His breath is hot against my inner thigh as he works methodically. First one shoe, then the other. He spreads my legs wider, and I let him. The cold air hits my skin.
“Give it to me.”
“I want to hear you,” he challenges. “No holding back.”
And I couldn’t help it if I wanted to, because when his tongue presses against my clit through cotton, my spine curves involuntarily, and I let out a sound I don’t recognize. The pressure feels so good. I jut my hips against him, seeking more pressure, more friction, more him.
For once, I’m not calculating my next move or worrying about how I look. My body knows what it wants. It wants this.
“Don’t stop, Dante.” My head falls back.
His tongue traces careful patterns that make my thighs shake. He pinches my nipples, and my limbs tighten under him. I tug at his hair, using it to anchor myself as pleasure builds and builds.
With two large fingers, he pulls my panties to the side, and his tongue finally makes contact with me. No barriers.
“You taste better than you did in my dreams,” he says, lapping again. “This pretty cunt of yours is going to be stained with my touch.”
With him below me, something primal fills my chest. He feels it too. Darkness envelops the gold of his irises. The sight should terrify me—we’re surrounded by weapons, cloaked in shadows—but it only feeds the fire burning through my veins.
“I want more,” I say, needing him inside of me.
His fingers press bruises into my thighs. “Fuck, Reese.”
The words slip out before I can stop them, my face burning. “Give me more, Dante.”
I rake my nails across his scalp, drawing out a sound that vibrates through me. His mouth is relentless, precise. Each movement of his tongue sends electricity through my nerves until I’m trembling.
I don’t break eye contact as he slips a finger into me, curving it and pulsing it slowly at first.
Oh my.
He adds another finger, and the fullness is exquisite. My hips move of their own accord, chasing the pressure. His tongue finds my clit again and works in slow, deliberate circles that make my toes curl. I let out a throaty cry.
He understands my body. He’s methodical in this like he is with everything, each stroke calculated, each curl of his fingers intentional. The thought flits through my head—all those hours watching him train, and this is how he applies that focus.
My thighs won’t stop shaking. The table creaks beneath me. When he lifts my legs over his shoulders, the angle shifts and— oh .
“You’re so perfect like this.” His breath is hot against my inner thigh. “My dirty girl, coming apart for me.”
The pressure builds until it shatters. I contract around him. When the pulsing stops, he pulls his fingers out. Without breaking eye contact, he slowly puts his fingers in his mouth, tasting me.
“I fucking love the taste of you undone, fighter.”
It is the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. He kisses me, and I collapse my head against his chest, boneless.
Then, like a cruel joke, reality crashes back like a wave. My face burns. My chest rises and falls rapidly against the cool air. The enormity of what just happened settles over me like a heavy blanket.
Words fail me. “That was—”
His eyes catch mine, dark and knowing. “Careful now. Don’t overthink it.”
But I am overthinking it.
Every possible tabloid headline flashes through my mind: On-Set Scandal. Costars’ Steamy Affair Revealed. Reese Sinclair off the Rails.
I’ve worked too hard to become another cliché. I’ve already crossed every professional boundary here—with Felix, with the movie, with everything I’ve built. Is this my quarter-life crisis catching up to me? Or am I making deliciously bad decisions and pretending not to love every second?
“Hey.” His hand finds my chin, tilting my face up. His thumb traces my lower lip, still sensitive from his kisses. “Stay here with me. You’re just a woman who knows what she wants. Simple.”
Simple. Nothing about this is simple. But when he looks at me like that, everything else falls away. The critics. The cameras. The carefully constructed image.
“Thank you.” I reach for him, my fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt.
“For what?”
“For making me forget myself.”