12. Heidi
HEIDI
Back at the mansion, I go to my room and wait. Part of me wonders if he’s going to show up tonight. He took off so fast after the wrap, I’m not sure if he’s mad at me. But I don’t get to stew for long. The door clicks, and Max slides inside, locking it behind him.
“No one saw you?” I ask.
“Not a soul,” he says, his voice sounding thicker than usual as he sits on the bed beside me. “I’m becoming quite the expert at sneaking into your room.”
I relax a little at the confirmation, but the effort is wasted. The air in the room is charged with a new kind of weight, a tension that makes the skin on my arms prickle.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
“Nothing,” I lie, turning to face him.
We look at each other in the dim light for a long, silent beat before he threads his fingers through mine. Somehow, it feels more intimate than anything else we’ve done.
He’s waiting for the real answer. When I don’t give it, he sighs.
“You know, I couldn’t watch you with some other guy,” he says. “I’d kill him.”
“You would not,” I say, glancing away.
“Would too.”
“We hardly know each other.”
“I’ve spent more time with you in the last few weeks than I have with my entire family in years.”
He has a point. I’m the one always calling this place a pressure cooker. When you’re trapped together twenty-four hours a day, the normal rules of time don’t apply. You get to know a person better in a week than you would in a year of Sunday brunches and casual texts.
But there is still a part of Max I haven’t seen. Under the charm and the persona, there’s a motive I can’t quite pin down.
“Why did you sign up for this?” I ask. “Really?”
“For liking you? It wasn’t a choice. Just happened.”
“For the show,” I clarify.
He pauses. His easy, flirtatious energy shifts, cooling into something more serious. I can tell it’s not a conversation he wants to have, but I need to know the answer.
“Alright. My brothers, my friends—even the guys I thought would be bachelors until they were eighty—they’re all settled. They’ve got houses, wives…actual lives. And I’m just…it’s just me. And I started to feel like it would be nice to have someone. Someone to go through my life with.”
He’s not looking at me anymore. He’s looking at our joined hands, and for a second, the million-dollar smile and the leading-man ego are nowhere to be found. He just sounds like a man who is tired of being alone.
I know how he feels. It’s a slow-motion magic trick: one minute you’re the center of the party, and the next, you return from a three-month shoot to find your last single friend has moved to the suburbs with their new boyfriend. Then the party is over, and you’re the only one left in the room.
“I tried to meet someone organically, but…” He shakes his head, a dry, self-deprecating sound escaping his throat. “When Vanessa promised she’d find my perfect match—someone who actually made sense for me—I bought it. I was desperate. And stupid.”
He tries to shrug it off, but the admission doesn’t just disappear. It lingers between us. He believed the pitch. He really thought he’d find a wife in this circus.
Max exhales a long breath and leans back, his head hitting the pillow. He pulls me with him until I’m hovering over him. I end up draped across his chest. He wraps his arms around me.
“It’s a bit poetic, don’t you think?” he says. “I came here looking for a connection, and you’re here to facilitate that. But you’re the only person I actually feel a connection with.”
“It’s attraction,” I correct him quickly. My brain is scrambling for the right label, anything that feels less permanent. “That’s different.”
“I think when you can relax around someone and just be yourself, that’s a connection.”
“I think connection is when you have things in common and—”
“We have things in common,” he interrupts. “We both got scammed. You by that fraud lady and me by Vanessa.”
I laugh. It isn’t a perfect parallel, but I don’t care. I settle against him, letting the warmth of his body and the solid weight of his arms take over. For a second, the pressure to be the one in control finally stops.
I bite my lip.
“Okay,” I say, my voice trembling slightly. “So, here’s what’s going to happen. We’re going to have sex, and we’re going to be adults about it. It’s a one-time thing. We’ll be efficient, we’ll get it out of our systems, and tomorrow we go back to the script. We don’t let it get messy, we don’t—”
Max doesn’t let me finish. He catches my waist and rolls me onto my back, pinning me with the heavy, solid heat of his body. His eyes are no longer playful. They are dark, fixed entirely on mine.
“Stop producing me.”
“I’m not—”
“You are.” He reaches up, his thumb catching my lower lip and tugging it down just enough to expose the heat behind it. “You’re trying to storyboard a moment that doesn’t have a script.”
He leans down, his forehead resting against mine. “And there is no efficient way I’m going to touch you,” he whispers, his breath hot against my skin. “There is no getting you out of my system. So just for once, stop thinking. Just let go.”
I want to argue, but the desire to listen to him is a physical ache. When his palms cup my face, the last of my resolve shatters.
“Okay,” I breathe.
“Good,” he says. And then he kisses me—hard and deep, his tongue sweeping against mine until every logical thought is scorched from my mind.
He reaches into my bedside drawer for the condoms and stops.
“Wait. What is this?”
He pulls out a bag of black licorice, his nose wrinkling in mock horror. “Please tell me this is a prop,” he says, looking from the bag to me. “Because if you actually eat these, we have a serious problem.”
I huff a laugh, the tension breaking just enough for me to breathe. “It’s an acquired taste. One you clearly haven’t acquired.”
“Because I have functioning taste buds.” He tosses the bag aside, his eyes never leaving mine.
“Is it a dealbreaker?” I ask, the challenge clear in my voice.
“Should be,” he says, though he’s already moving closer, the bed dipping under his weight.
“That’s too bad,” I say. I pull my shirt over my head, the cool air hitting my skin. “Guess I’ll have to find someone who appreciates my taste in snacks.”
The smirk vanishes. It’s replaced by a look of such heavy, concentrated hunger that it makes my skin prickle.
“On second thought,” he says, his voice rough and muffled as he leans in, his mouth finding the curve of my neck. “I think I could learn to live with it.”
He doesn’t waste time. His mouth is back on mine. He’s heavy against me, his chest crushing into mine as he moves down my neck. He isn’t being gentle, and I don’t want him to be.
When he moves lower, his stubble burns against my skin. I feel the sudden, wet heat of his mouth as he takes my nipple between his teeth, then sucks, a hard, rhythmic pull that makes my stomach flip.
He moves lower, kissing down my body until he finds the sensitive skin of my thighs. His palms are rough, guiding me open, his head dipping as he prepares to settle between my legs.
Again. Always focused on me.
“Max,” I say, catching him before he can continue. He looks up, dark and intent. “I don’t want to wait anymore.”
That smirk spreads across his face, but I don’t care right now.
“Yes, boss.”
He stands, stripping off with easy confidence. His clothes hit the floor before he grabs a condom. I take him in properly for the first time. I knew he’d be big. This is something else.
“Fuck, Max,” I breathe, my throat suddenly dry.
He shrugs, looking entirely too comfortable with my wide-eyed stare. “Better to have too much of a good thing than not enough, right?”
He doesn’t wait for an answer. He settles back over me and nudges my knees further apart with his own. He locks himself between my thighs, his skin hot against mine, and for a second, the only sound in the room is the frantic, uneven rhythm of our breathing.
He takes me in, his eyes searching mine as if he’s looking for a reason to hesitate. “Don’t be scared, Freckles. You’re ready for me.”
“Stop talking,” I breathe, my voice steadier than I feel. “And just do it.”
He lets out a short breath—the sound of his restraint finally snapping—and grips my thighs. His fingers dig into my skin as he hauls me down, dragging me toward him until there isn’t a shred of space left. He settles his weight, his hands shifting to my hips, and then he sinks into me.
It’s slow at first, a deep, heavy pressure. But he was right. Despite the sheer stretch of him, I’m so ready that there’s none of the usual friction—just a blunt, deep ache that starts to settle the second he’s inside.
He pauses for a heartbeat, his forehead dropping against mine. I can feel the tension vibrating through his arms, the agony of holding back as he waits for me to adjust to the scale of him.
“You okay?” he grunts, the words sounding like they’re being wrenched out of him.
I don’t answer with words. I wrap my legs around his waist and pull, my heels digging into his back to bring him closer. He gets the message.
The careful part is over. He lets out a low moan and begins to move, his pace shifting into something faster and deep. It’s a relentless rhythm that hits exactly where that ache is strongest. I can’t focus on anything but the way he’s filling me.
I’m making sounds I didn’t know I was capable of. Broken, desperate gasps.
“Too loud,” he says against my ear, his own breathing rough.
He pulls out abruptly, the sudden loss of him making me cry out, but he’s already moving me onto my side, facing away from him. Before I can settle, he wraps one hand firmly over my mouth and slides back inside from behind.
“Shhh,” he whispers.
He’s even deeper this way. I try to stay quiet, but I can’t, not with the way he’s moving now. I reach back blindly, trying to find some leverage, but he just holds me tighter, pinning me against his chest until I stop fighting and let him set the pace.
He keeps whispering “shhh…” against my ear, but he doesn’t slow down. He’s getting more frantic, I bury my face in the pillow to try to muffle my moans. His hand leaves my mouth only to grip my hip, pulling me back against him.
Every thrust is blunt and heavy, hitting that same deep spot until my whole body starts to vibrate. He’s right there with me, his movements getting faster, more desperate.
I can’t breathe or think. I reach back for him as the first wave hits. My muscles clench around him, and I hear him let out a low, choked-off growl into the back of my neck as he follows me over the edge.
He stays buried deep as he finishes. I can feel the heavy, pulsing heat of him.
We stay like that for a long time—pinned together, sweat-slicked and gasping for air in the dark. The only sound is the frantic, muffled thud of my heart against the pillow. Finally, he pulls out and flips me over. I’m still gasping, my skin flushed and hypersensitive to the cool air hitting it.
“God, you’re noisy,” he says. “You want us to be found out?”
I swallow, before I can find a reply, he rolls off the bed. He heads for the ensuite. I stay exactly where I am, staring at the ceiling and trying to force my heart rate back under a hundred. The bed feels huge now that he’s out of it.
I don’t want us being found out, obviously, but I can hardly help it.
I hear the distinct thud of the condom hitting the plastic liner of the bin. Then the tap runs. I pull the duvet up, suddenly chilled as the sweat dries on my skin. I should move. I should find my clothes and my dignity, but my limbs feel too heavy.
“So,” he says, his voice satisfied as he settles back beside me. Pulling me onto his chest. “We canning this production then?”
I frown, the haze of the last few minutes evaporating. “No.”
“I think we should make this official,” he says. “We tell them we’re done. There’s no point in filming the rest.”
“What are you talking about?” I sit up, the sheet clutched to my chest. Reality doesn’t just return; it hits me like blunt object to the head. “We can’t just stop. We’re both stuck in this contract, Max. This isn’t a game.”
“Heidi, calm down—”
“I don’t understand how you could think this changes things,” I say, my voice rising. “We can’t just blow up a multi-million dollar show because—”
He cuts me off, dragging me down until I’m sprawled across his chest. His fingers slide through my hair, like he’s trying to settle me.
I stiffen. His attempts to soothe me only make it worse. He’s looking at a romance; I’m looking at a catastrophe. My chest tightens, the air suddenly too thin to catch. I start to hyperventilate, the sharp, shallow gasps loud in the quiet room.
“Heidi,” he says. He shifts, framing my face with his hands to force me to look at him. “Hey. Look at me. Breathe.”
I can’t. I just shake my head, the walls of the room closing in.
“Alright. We stay on course. No one has to know. For now, nothing changes.”
Only then, does the room stop spinning. I let out a long, shuddering breath and let my head sink into the crook of his neck.
“It’s alright,” he whispers, his grip tightening. “We do it your way.”
“It’s not my way,” I whisper back. “It’s the only way.”
“Sure,” he says, his fingers tangling in my hair. “It’s okay, I’ve got you.”
I close my eyes, finally letting my body go limp against his chest.
I’ve been worried that Max would ruin my career by being a jerk, or a diva, or a liability on set. I’d prepared for that. But I never prepared for this. I never considered that he would ruin me by actually wanting to quit the show for me.
His heart beats steady under my cheek, and for a second, I almost like the idea.
Then I shut it down.