Chapter 11
Penn
I ’m destroyed.
The last two weeks have been a pitch-black hole and I’ve been operating blindly, trying to be a father, trying to do my job, trying to remember how to get up, function and breathe without the possibility of Jenna walking back through my door.
She’s gone.
She blew in here, rearranged the geography of my heart, my soul, and left me bleeding out on the floor.
Nothing looks the same. Nothing feels the same, now that I’ve felt her breath on my skin.
Now that I’ve been the object of her trust. She let me into her world and now, I’m locked out in the fucking cold.
I was a fool to think our relationship would end any other way.
She’s a nineteen-year-old bombshell on her way to meteoric fame.
Did I really think she’d saddle herself with a scarred vet on a humble salary?
That was never going to happen. Not in reality.
I need to be grateful for the small amount of time I was allowed to exist in her orbit.
I need to count my blessings that I’ve had a woman like that look up at me in the dark and whimper for me to kiss her, to stop her world from spinning too fast. To anchor her, even if it was just for a little while. Even if it was only temporary.
I don’t realize I’m staring into space until Erin shrieks my name from the living room.
“Dad! Jenna is on television!”
My feet carry me in the direction of the living room before I make a conscious decision, heart slamming into my jugular. Seeing her face might be the absolute last thing I need right now, but I also need the sight of her like goddamn oxygen.
And there she is.
Walking down a street in Los Angeles, carrying a brown paper bag on her hip.
Loose, low-hanging jeans and a white tank top. A ponytail.
I don’t expect the dark circles under her eyes. I don’t expect the haunted expression. Don’t expect her to look so lost and confused when the reporter sprints up to her with a camera on his shoulder, firing off questions like bullets, making Jenna jolt.
“Jenna Fairchild! Deadline just announced your new starring role in the Muse trilogy. Congratulations.”
“Thank you,” she murmurs, looking a little dazed. Pale.
Has she been sleeping? Eating?
Where has the color gone from her face?
“This is going to be quite a departure from Hey Betty . You’re going to be playing a sexy assassin. How far are you going to take this new foray into more adult roles? Are there any love scenes in your future? What about nudity?”
“Um. I’m just out trying to buy some groceries.” After a beat of silence, she sets her shoulders and looks the reporter in the eye. “And you shouldn’t be asking me those types of questions. They make me uncomfortable.”
“Right.” He laughs off the admonishment.
But me? I’m so proud of Jenna, my chest could burst. Moreover, I’m so proud that Erin got the witness the moment Jenna stood up for herself.
“You’ve been silent about your recent trip to the mountains, but the picture of you and a mystery man are still circulating. Could you shed some light on his identity?”
“Are they talking about you, Dad?” Erin wants to know.
“Yeah, honey. They’re talking about me,” I mutter distractedly, because I’m too busy witnessing Jenna’s reaction. The bag of groceries slips down her hip a little and it seems to cost all her strength to drag it back up.
“It looked like you were getting pretty cozy with the man in flannel,” urges the reporter in a voice dripping with innuendo. “Was he a fling or something more serious? People are dying to know.”
Just when I think Jenna isn’t going to answer, she whispers, “It was serious. He was everything to me.” A hard swallow. “He still is.”
And then her bottom lip wobbles and she looks directly into the camera, ever so briefly, one flash of those green eyes ripping me wide open.
Crumbling my world around me.
“How do you feel about moving to LA, kid?” I rasp.
Jenna
One month later
“Cut!”
There’s a round of applause from the crew, and I let the tension of the scene melt away, drooping my shoulders.
“That’s a wrap for today, Jenna. Well done. Can’t wait to review these dailies.”
Forcing a smile, I say, “Great. See you tomorrow.”
I did it.
I landed the role of a lifetime.
I’m surrounded by a cast of people my own age that invite me out every night to the Chateau Marmont or whatever club they’ve decided to frequent. I’ve gone a couple of times, but I can’t do anything but sit in the corner, numb, my drink untouched in front of me.
I don’t want to be there.
I don’t want to be anywhere.
I need to be cuddling with Penn.
My body is bereft without his heat. Somehow sleeping one night in his bed has ruined my ability to sleep in my own.
My cold sheets are no match for his hairy barrel chest and his open grip on my hip.
The way he adjusts his position to accommodate my preferred sprawl or snuggle. How he’d kiss my head and rub my back.
I yearn for his voice.
I feel sick without his solid dependability in my life. His belief in me.
Have I matured in the wake of our whirlwind affair and learned how to stand on my own two feet, in a new, positive way?
Yes. I fired my manager, found a new one.
I’m in the process of buying a permanent home.
I’m showing up to set on time every day, my lines have been learned and I’m focused on being a professional.
On building my career the way I want it to look. Not the industry.
But even a marvel, especially my marvel, needs to come home and let her man do the soothing. Are you going to give me that responsibility, Jenna?
Why didn’t I just say yes?
I turn away from the set, my intention to change in my trailer and go home, but there’s a man blocking my path. It’s the director. He’s still here.
A quick glance to my right and left tells me no one else is around.
But he’s been professional with me thus far, so I check my discomfort for now.
“Jenna, we’ve got your seduction scene tomorrow…” He rubs his hands together, his eyes taking a quick tour of my body, which is clad in a leather mini skirt, heels and a crop top, in keeping with the provocative nature of my character. “I hope it’s not inappropriate to say I can’t wait to film it.”
He’s talking about the scene where I seduce my target, only to stab him in the heart as soon as we’re alone in a hotel room in Tokyo. Or a set that looks like a hotel room in Tokyo, at least. “Oh. Um...”
“I know we already met with the intimacy coordinator to discuss your comfort level for the scene, but I’m really looking to give this part of the story…
pop . Fire. ” He takes a sauntering step in my direction.
“And you’re so beautiful, Jenna. Shouldn’t we give the people what they want? A little more…”
“Nudity?”
“ Yes .”
I’m instantly exhausted. I can fight this battle. And I will. I’m not the only actress fighting it. But there are some days, like today, that I don’t have the bandwidth. I suspect that’s why he’s approaching me now, after a strenuous day of filming. My energy level is low. There’s no one around.
“We could have given this part to so many girls…” he laughs, running fingers through his dyed black hair. “But we went with you. You know what I’m saying?”
There it is. The demand for a show of gratitude. A reminder to kiss the ring.
Not today. Not ever.
Feeling an urgency to put space between me and the direction before I knock him down a peg and inform him I’ll be calling my agent, lawyer and manager on a conference post haste, I reverse a step—
And my back hits something hard.
“Leave it with me,” a familiar deep voice says into my hair.
Shock hits me in the solar plexus and I quite simply collapse.
Carrying the world on my shoulders is rewarding, but as soon as I hear Penn’s voice, the weight rolls off and my legs turn to nothing in the wake of the whiplash relief.
In a matter of seconds, I go from defending myself with a sword against a five-headed fire monster to sleeping in a meadow, in the arms of my king—and he’s always, always keeping watch.
Penn catches me, turns me around. Elevates me with a brawny arm beneath my butt, so I can bury myself in his neck, my arms squeezing his neck with a force that would kill any other man besides this one. My man only grunts, rubbing my back encouragingly.
“You’re here. You’re really here,” I whimper, soaking the shoulder of his T-shirt with happy tears. “I should have asked you to come, Penn. I need you. I love you. What was I thinking? That I could live without you? I can’t.”
“Shh. I’m here now.” His voice hardens, his hand tugging down the hem of my leather skirt, which has ridden up.
Next, he addresses my director with a murderous tone.
“And if you ever approach her again without me present, especially about something that involves her body, I’ll put your fucking head through a wall. Is that understood?”
“Who…” Based on the sound of his footsteps, the director is backing away. “Who the hell are you?”
“Someone you should be very worried about.” Even when Penn projects violence at the director, he kisses my cheek gently. “Someone who makes it so she doesn’t have to.”
My heart topples over, spilling sappy heat into my chest, happiness waking up my limbs and nerve endings and parts of me that have been sleeping since I walked away from the glorious giant of a man.
Before the director can respond, Penn turns on a heel and carries me off the set, not stopping until we’re outside the building and climbing the stairs to my trailer. In a replay of six weeks ago, the door is locked, but this time Penn kicks it wide open, carrying me inside.
“How are you here? Are you…did you just come for a visit, or—”
“Nope. Here to stay, Jenna.”
I squeal, planting kisses all over his face, the life reentering my body like an acceleration of spring. Flowers blooming, birds chirping, the ground thawing.
“How?” I ask. “How? Where is Erin?”
“With her mom, for now. She’s back from her tour and they’re spending some much-needed time together, but she’ll be coming to see us a lot.”
“Oh good,” I whisper, relief and hope swelling in my throat. “Your job?”
“I’m still contracted with the forestry department, but they’re only going to bring me in as foreman on large-scale projects, maybe two or three trips north per year.
The rest of the time, I’ll be consulting and doing remote planning.
” He settles my bottom down on my dressing table, dropping his mouth to mine and giving me his tongue so deep, my thighs start to tremble, rattling the dressing table.
Oh God, oh God. How did I live without him for a whole six weeks?
“But baby,” he says, tipping my chin up with a crooked knuckle. “What’s my most important job?”
“Being my Daddy,” I whisper, my whole body shaking now.
“That’s right.”
He holds intense eye contact with me while I unfasten his belt blindly, clumsily, practically hyperventilating with need.
Still looking at him. Not daring to look anywhere but his eyes while I unzip his jeans, fist his cock and stroke it firmly with two hands, letting him hear my worship for him in every gulping inhale, feel it in every luxurious pump of my hands.
“Will you come live with me?” I ask, in between lusty kisses, his hand reaching up beneath my skirt to rip the crotch of my panties in half, making me writhe frantically on the table, arching my back to show him my breasts, my head falling back in an involuntary gesture of the bliss that’s coursing through me.
“Please. Live with me. I can’t sleep without you in my bed. I need to be near you. Always.”
“I’m going to live with you. And for you.
My life is dedicated to you, Jenna Fairchild.
” He presses his sex to mine, and we moan into each other’s mouths as he drives in slowly, slowly, then slams the final few inches, making me scream with the force of my sudden, rippling peak.
A peak that has been sitting there for weeks, waiting for Penn to come give it to me.
It’s an endless spasm of muscle, an outpouring of pleasure, that twists me in its grip and doesn’t let go, my sex squeezing and squeezing, exuding wetness everywhere.
“Oh fuck,” he groans, rocking into my clenching flesh. “This little girl missed her Daddy real bad, didn’t she?”
“Uh-huh. Especially his come,” I pout, bringing my heels up onto the edge of the desk and watching that visual blow his mind.
Enough to have him falling on me in a frenzied rut, the table bashing into the wall of the trailer in time with his drives, his roar of release nearly deafening me, but my lips are curled in a dazed smile the whole time, my eyes rolling back in my head with euphoric glee when he floods me with his hot spurts, his older and bigger body wracked with shudders against mine, his sweat smearing on my breasts, his breath heavy on the crown of my head.
“This is where you belong,” I whisper, licking perspiration off his jaw. “Stay forever, plus one extra day.”
He pulls back and looks me in the eye, drowning me with affection. “Forever and a day, baby.”