Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
CASS
Good morning, beautiful
I had an excellent sleep last night
Lmao me too
But I slept on wet hair and I look ridiculous this morning
Send pic
Absolutely not
Ping! A photo landed in her messages. Steam poured out of the open shower door to fog the mirror, obscuring his reflection. The towel, which must have roughed his damp hair, hung loosely in his other hand to just cover his interesting parts. Water beaded his chest and the lickable stretch of hip she’d run her tongue over. A second photo followed, the fog wiped from the mirror, the towel a little lower, showing the dark hair at his base but still covering himself.
Please?
She caught her lower lip between her teeth and stretched her phone out to capture her hair, wild on her pillow, covers pulled up to her nose and eyes crinkled in laughter.
There. He asked for it.
You look divine
I need to see your bedhead in person. Come back to Van
How’s my beautiful girl this morning?
This morning’s photo was cropped purposefully off centre; she was sure. He half hid behind the mug he sipped from, eyes narrowed over the rim.
Need extra caffeine today
Was up all night thinking about you again
Sure you were . Cass snorted as she walked down the sidewalk, iced coffee in hand with shades and a floppy sun hat, snapping her own photo to send back.
That so? What’s for breakfast
Don’t usually eat breakfast
But I’d make an exception to eat it with you
Or eat you
I’m not picky
You would, would you?
I don’t believe you
You didn’t when you had me in front of you
Ouch
I’m not kidding when I say I will fly your fine ass down here and correct the error of my ways
Say the word
“What are you smiling at?” Libby half shouted.
The bar looked more like a middle-aged meat market than a hot spot for a production wrap party, but Terry, the film’s production coordinator, had hired a killer DJ, and the restaurant had won awards for their sliders.
Cass looked over Libby’s cocktail, some bizarre Caesar with a whole host of bar snacks precariously skewered into it, and turned her phone face down beside her rosé spritzer with a nervous grin. “So, ah, I’ve been texting with Sexy Dimples for a few weeks.”
Libby perked up. “That dude from Vancouver? What happened to keeping that as a onetime thing, no contact, et cetera, et cetera?”
Right. She might have said that.
“He texted me, then all of a sudden I was telling him how good he felt that night and I’m sending him nudes.”
Lots of guys had asked her for nudes. She’d never sent one. But her nipples had tightened when his message popped up on her screen, and at the memories of his hungry look when he’d uncovered her body that night, peeling off all her layers. The thought of that expression on his face again—that she could put that expression on his face again—was too much to resist. It hadn’t even crossed her mind not to let the towel drop and send him photos.
One of her getting out of the shower. Another with her fingers splayed around her breasts. Last night, she’d sent one with the waistband of her sleep shorts tugged down to the side. Then another one with her shorts pooled around her feet.
And not just nudes. Of her eating a bagel on the river pathway. Her eyes crossed at an art exhibit downtown. His appreciative replies to every text had warmed her to her toes.
“And now there are naked photos of you floating around. I thought you looked extra slutty today.”
Cass slapped a hand over the grin that hadn’t faded since the exchange that morning. “He doesn’t seem like the type to share them, does he?”
“He might be. You don’t know him.”
A doubt clouded her stomach, and her smile dimmed. “What was I thinking?”
“You were thinking your kitty needed a little fun.” Libby plucked a pickled asparagus out of her drink and snapped off the tip. “At least I know you’re heading into vacation with a head start on being relaxed. But if you have FaceTime sex with this guy on the beach, I’m tossing you in the ocean.”
“My data plan isn’t good enough to support orgasms via international video calls.”
But sex on the beach with Sexy Dimples? With her knees and elbows cushioned in the warm sand, and his hips slapping against her butt. Heck, it didn’t need to be on the beach. She’d happily jump on a plane back to Vancouver for a weekend. Take him up on his offer to eat with her. Or her. A fresh shiver rolled over her collarbones, and she clamped down on the feeling working its way under her skin.
“To Cancun,” Libby cheered, clicking her glass against Cass’s, shedding a few flakes of batter from the deep-fried crab leg into her rosé, “and good riddance to this clusterfuck.”
“To Cancun,” agreed Cass with a grin, focussing on her friend and fishing out the batter sprinkles from her drink, “Although I’ll miss everyone.”
“Not like we won’t see them on the next project.”
But before the next project, she and Libby—no Jill for this getaway, too busy with a new promotion—would be on a plane for her first real vacation in years. Not a weekend away, not an unplanned break in filming because of bad weather, and not their usual hop-on-a-plane to bum around some new city until they crashed. The last time they’d slept in a hostel, Cass had woken up with a rash and all of Libby’s underwear had been stolen.
So generic beach destination it was. The new cover-up and two-piece bathing suit she’d sewn especially for the trip were already packed in her bags at the door. Though packing had taken longer than she’d planned, thanks to last night’s texting and sweetly spicy exchange that morning. His black hair mussed around his face, partly hidden behind another coffee, eyes narrowed in a flirty stare. The flutter in her chest picked up.
Crap. Here she was, obsessing over another unobtainable man, this one all the way in another province. She could barely afford rent, let alone regular plane tickets. And on the off-chance he was serious about flying her out, fantasizing about Josh would lead to pining at best and plane-hopping booty calls at worst.
This was how it always started. She’d fall hard while he was having fun, and she’d have to pretend she didn’t care. Which never worked.
Before she could change her mind, she swiped the thread clear and blocked his number.
There. Temptation gone. No more thinking about Sexy Dimples or the way he made her pulse beat against her ribs and between her thighs. Time to focus on the future. A future that included a vacation with her best friend. Spa treatments. Sleeping in. Unlimited margaritas, seashell-dotted sand, and a bathtub-warm ocean. That was all that mattered.
But visions of sand between her pedicured toes and a margarita in her hand were shattered when Terry, whom she adored like a sibling and was the person who roped her into ninety percent of the projects she’d worked on in the last decade, had her in their sights from across the bar. And was coming her way.
“No,” Cass said pre-emptively as Terry hopped onto the bar stool beside Libby, who scowled at them.
“Hello, my lovelies,” they said with a broad smile. “Having fun tonight?”
“I’m not doing it.”
“Me, either.”
“Come on, now. You haven’t even heard what it’s about.”
“Oops, sorry the guys are calling me over byeeee!” Libby jumped up, calling over her retreating shoulder as she disappeared into a crowd that had not been waving her over.
Traitor.
“So, as I was saying?—”
“I’m busy.”
“You don’t even know when it is.”
Cass tried to glower, and Terry cackled at her attempt.
“You’ll want to hear about this,” they said. “Trust me.”
“I love you, but find someone else.”
“You’ve been asked for by name.”
That didn’t mean anything. Everyone in the tight-knit Calgary film and television industry knew her name. Cass remained stoic and silent, but pleasure tiptoed over her ego.
“You’d be head of costume,” Terry nudged in a sing-song voice. “And I know you like the hands-on stuff, so you could probably still get your mitts on wardrobe …”
Head of costume? It was likely some little indie thing that would be wrapped up in a month. Cass squinched her eyes shut. “No.”
“It has a budget,” they continued, “and pre-production meetings are starting next week.”
“I’m literally out of the country next week,” she hedged.
“So take a virtual meeting. You can be the asshole on the beach drinking mai tais, or whatever, while everyone else sweats in a boardroom. Not that you’re an asshole, darling. You are my favourite person ever. And Libby, too.”
The reason there was no rest for the wicked was because they kept getting more work. When will I learn to say no? Cass grimaced into her half-finished drink and sighed. Apparently, not today. “What’s it about?”
“Ever heard of Sirius Darker ?”
She shook her head, nonplussed.
Terry grinned. “Ever hear of Melanie Westwood?”
“I’m in Cancun for a week,” Cass whined into her mochaccino. “And I wanted to do theatre this year.”
But Melanie freaking Westwood had personally picked Cass for head of costume. No idea which tv show or film would have caught her eye, but it didn’t matter. Terry said the director, whom she hadn’t looked up yet, had pushed to bring in their own talent for the costume department, but had been overruled. Terry had stopped badgering her after she promised to think about it, so now she dealt with the indecision of a steady paycheque or something new. Leading costume on a show that wasn’t either another Western, blood-stained tatters, or sourced exclusively from thrift stores would be completely new.
“She told the director my work was understated but forward thinking.” Cass could hardly believe it. Not only did Melanie Westwood know who she was, but she asked for her by name. “But theatre!”
“This does sound like a great opportunity,” Jill said. “But you’ve been talking about working with your friend in theatre all year. What’s the movie?”
She could always count on Jill to enable her decisions, especially in work-life balance. Cass pulled out her phone and scrolled her inbox. “They said it was something serious. Serious armour, serious ardour … it was really loud last night. ”
Jill’s entire posture changed, eyes widening. “You don’t mean Sirius Darker , do you?” she whispered.
“Yeah! That’s it!”
“ Sirius Darker is going to be a movie?” She seized Cass’s forearm and shook her. “That’s one of my favourite books! It’s a dystopian love letter to humanity! It’s a new modern classic!”
So, she’d heard of it? Funny. Terry said it was niche. “Nothing’s confirmed yet, and you can’t say anything to anyone.”
“I won’t, I swear,” Jill said breathlessly. “I can’t let you not do this. You have to do this.”
Cass’s face dropped. “What about work-life balance? Theatre?”
“You won’t regret it. The story is incredible.” Jill put her elbows on the café table. “How about this? I’ll lend you my copy while you’re on vacation. Read it, then make up your mind.”
Cass could feel herself being talked into it. Theatre didn’t pay well, anyway, and her friend had a solid backup costumer if Cass backed out. They wouldn’t even miss her.
She sunk her head into her hands. “Fine. I’ll read a hundred pages.”
“And then you’ll read the next four hundred pages. Trust me.”
“I’m not even sure I want to even work on another movie right now,” Cass said, sucking the foam off her drink. Then a thought occurred to her. There could be other benefits of joining the crew. “Plus, if I’m busy again, I won’t have to answer any questions about why I’m still single.”
“Cass,” Jill said, softening, “not everyone is like him.”
The swath of fizzled situationships begged to differ.
“Of course not!” Cass said. “But like you said, this is an amazing opportunity I can’t pass up!”
And if it meant she’d be too busy to date for the foreseeable future, even better.
I’M MEETING MELANIE WESTWOOD TODAY!!!!!
I can’t breathe!!!!
Davie
who
Suzie
isn’t that the chick who flashed her boobs on Secret Celebrity Dancer a few years ago?
How her siblings still didn’t know who Melanie Westwood was after the hours Cass had talked about her made no sense. Or it did make sense. If a topic didn’t involve her sister’s kids or her brother’s dirt biking, they didn’t pay much attention to anything Cass said.
Sure, Melanie had gotten the streaming company a fat fine for her striptease, but she’d also gotten noticed by Hollywood mogul Darrin Westwood, who was responsible for executive producing some of the biggest films every year. Nothing with awards show buzz, but the man knew how to make money. When he met Melanie, Mrs. Westwood Number Four was retired, and Melanie was promoted to Mrs. Westwood Number Five later that year. Overnight, she bank rolled her own passion projects, tiny little films that never would have been noticed.
She’d discovered Brynne Sparo, of all people.
And Melanie had asked for Cass by name. Cass squealed the entire time she scrolled her email.
The studio wanted her on the crew enough that they upgraded her vacation, with the caveat that she read the script on the beach. Staying at a five-star hotel instead of a three-star made for good bribery. Cass tucked the script into the pages of the brick Jill had lent her to read on the beach. Libby, having been hired on as the head electrician, declined the hard copy, instead downloading the audiobook so she didn’t have to lug the thing around .
Packing the tome into her carry-on bags precluded the addition of an extra pair of shoes or another dress. At the last minute, she threw her sketchbook into her carry on, in case inspiration struck over daiquiris.
Sci-fi wasn’t her jam, only ever getting through a few of Octavia E. Butler’s books. But dang. She devoured SD (the small but rabid fanbase online referred to the book by its initials, she’d learned) by the third day of vacation and the screenplay right after. She could already picture the trauma on earth. The otherworldliness of the Travellers. The screenplay adaptation took the major story elements and distilled them into a shockingly tight script. Cass couldn’t believe it worked, but it did.
The film had a real budget for costume, too. The last theatre production she’d worked on had given her six hundred dollars for the entire cast. And while the last tv show she’d costumed on had a budget, it was all tattered jeans and grimy shirts, and she had been a grunt on that crew, anyway. But a few of the smaller projects she had led herself, her design portfolio posted online? Her being handpicked for costume made sense.
Cass scooted her beach chair closer to the umbrella and balanced the laptop on her crossed legs. This was the one spot the glare off the pool wouldn’t reflect off the screen, and there were little side tables with legs buried deep in the sand to hold her rotation of fruity drinks. She wrapped her hair back in a silk scarf, popped her earbuds in, and pulled her beach wrap around her shoulders.
Just because she was taking a meeting on the beach, didn’t mean she wanted to flash a bunch of cleavage to the new creative team.
“The timing on this could not be worse,” Libby grumbled, dragging her chair closer to Cass.
It was short; more of a meet-and-greet than an actual get down to work type meeting. The details had arrived in their inboxes while the plane was still in the air, then dropped to the bottom of their inboxes when they promised each other to ignore their computers for the sea, buffet, and the book, in that order, until the very last second.
The hotel Wi-Fi barely reached where they sat, so not flashing cleavage to the meeting was no longer an issue. She logged into the invite and typed into the meeting chat bar.
Cass and Libby here. Bad reception. Will stay off video and on mute for now!
Not great for a meet-n-greet, but everyone knew they’d be on vacation. They could deal. Plus, the first time Melanie Westwood was seeing her wouldn’t be with sunblock smeared cheeks or humidity hair.
Cass brushed sand from her feet as thumbnails of different crew popped up on the screen. And then nearly dropped her daiquiri.
Any other time, she would have squealed at Melanie Westwood occupying the corner of the screen, with Brynne Sparo beside her. Maybe she’d have spared a second glance for the handsome blond man with dreamy blue eyes she didn’t recognize.
But a face with sharp features and glacial green eyes scowling through the screen froze her in place.
“What’s up, babe?” Libby peered at her through her aviators. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Not a ghost. Someone much more physical than that.
Was this a mistake? She grabbed her phone and plugged the name under the thumbnail on screen into IMDb.
No dimples on his impassive headshot, but his intense eyes and high cheekbones were present and accounted for. Hair shorter than what she ran her fingers through, but those were the same lips that had roamed down her body and set her skin on fire.
With her attention half on the video call as people chimed in, she checked his credits .
Confirmed. Director and cinematographer for Sirius Darker , pre-production. She frantically scrolled down to the biography section.
Josh Graham took a circuitous path to film, starting at the University of British Columbia in …
“Holy. Shit.” Libby’s eyes widened, falling back into her own chair.
Cass closed the app like it would make it untrue. Sure, the industry could get small pretty quick, but really?
The laugh started deep in her stomach, shaking her ribs and making her eyes stream until the people sitting beside her glared.
If this wasn’t her luck, nothing was. Her first big gig—leading the department, no less—and she would be working with the man she’d had gloriously fantastic sex with mere weeks ago. The man she’d traded filthy texts with, flirted with, that had watched her beg for his dick on her knees.
The one she had planned never to see again.
Her special, perfect one-night she held like a treasured jewel, close to the warmth of her heart, was about to crash with the harsh light of reality.
Maybe he wouldn’t recognize her. It was possible. Between the theatres and his condo, most of the time they had been together was in the dark.
Oh, who was she kidding? He could be scrolling one of the dozens of photos she’d sent him right now. He had her nudes on his phone, full frontal boobage with her fingers dripping wet after he’d made her come from a thousand kilometres away.
It was a cosmic balancing of the scales. Noticed by Melanie Westwood, but she had to work with the director she’d slept with.
And what was she going to do? Send him a text? What would she say?
Hey there, Sexy Dimples! Small world! Guess we can skip the usual icebreaker questions! Hope that incredible dick of yours is still awesome. Kisses!
“Libby?” she said, turning to her best and longest friend.
“I know.” Libby looked as ashen as she felt.
“This is bananas. What?—”
“I haven’t seen him in years,” Libby whispered. “What am I going to do?”
Who hadn’t she seen in years that was an oh-my-god-I-know agreement? Cass opened and closed her mouth like a fish.
“It’s fine,” Libby continued. “That was a long time ago. He could have a girlfriend. Or be married. He probably doesn’t think about me anymore, anyway. Besides. I’ve moved on. Totally over him. I’m a different person now. It’s not like I didn’t think it would happen one day, anyway.”
A sinking dread pooled in her stomach. Libby’s reaction could only mean one thing. Cass hadn’t looked past a single name after Josh jumped out, and she scrolled through the rest of the agenda.
Stephen. On as first assistant director. Libby’s long-time boyfriend, who left for Vancouver right after university without a second glance. No wonder Libby was freaking out.
Cass shoved her own concerns aside. She could spiral over Josh later. A one-night stand was nothing compared to a broken heart that still hadn’t healed.
“It will be fine,” Cass said, her eyes on the screen, where her perfect one-night stand twiddled a pen between his fingers. The same fingers that had plunged deep in her pussy as he licked his cum off her breasts.
Oh. Dear.
She squeezed her eyes shut. Spiral later. This was about Libby. “It will be better than fine. You are brilliant. You are capable. You are a smoke show. Who knows what could happen?”
“Hey, Libs,” Stephen said to the black square he would have seen on his screen, an affectedly casual tone to his voice Cass hadn’t heard before. “Been a while. ”
Libby pulled her gaze to Cass, eyes pleading. “We’re going to need margs and nachos.”
Cass squeezed her hand. “It’ll be okay.”
A private message landed in her chat. Karl, her old sound buddy.
A few of the guys in lighting said they worked with the director on a shoot in Van where he was first AD, and he’s a mofo. We’re in for a ride on this one.
What if I’ve already ridden that one?
They had clicked instantly. They’d talked each other’s ears off for hours before they dragged each other into bed. He’d texted her after, and almost every day since, just to say good morning. Until she blocked him, anyway.
Maybe he’d want to pick up where they’d left off. Who knew where things could lead?
Texting him now, after hiding behind a turned-off camera for an hour, would be the coward’s way out. The in-person production meeting was scheduled for next month. She’d test the waters then.
Where he could turn her down in front of the entire creative crew if he wasn’t interested.
Honestly, if she didn’t have bad luck, she wouldn’t have any luck at all.
Cass tipped her head to look up at the faded underside of the umbrella. “We are going to need all the margs and nachos.”