Chapter 30
MICAH
The knock came just as I was contemplating whether to order room service or drag myself down to the restaurant for a quick breakfast. I’d been up most of the night working with Toby on the video, catching maybe two hours of sleep before my phone started blowing up with notifications.
Totally worth it.
I looked down. I just got out of the shower. Whoever was at the door could deal with me in my briefs. I was too tired to care about modesty.
I opened the door expecting Toby with another crisis or maybe room service he sent up.
It was Grace.
She stood there in the hallway, her hair thrown up in a messy bun, her face bare of makeup, wearing shorts and the ugliest t-shirt I’d ever seen.
“Grace, what’s wrong?”
She pushed past me into the suite, grabbed the door from my hand, and slammed it shut behind her.
Then she kissed me.
Her hands fisted in my hair, pulling me down to her level.
Her mouth was warm and desperate against mine.
I forgot every reason we were supposed to be keeping our distance.
My arms wrapped around her automatically, pulling her against my chest, feeling her heart hammering through the thin fabric of her shirt.
When she finally pulled back, we were both breathing hard.
“What was that for?” I managed.
“For being amazing.” Her voice was thick with emotion. “For doing what you did. The video. Chantilly told me everything.”
“Ah.” I rubbed the back of my neck, suddenly self-conscious. “You saw it.”
“The whole world saw it, Micah.” She laughed and shook her head. “I woke up to about a million notifications. Everyone’s talking about it. And for once, they’re not calling me a homewrecker.”
“That was kind of the point.”
She shook her head, her eyes never leaving mine. “You didn’t have to do that. The studio wanted to ride the buzz. Chantilly was loving the attention. You could have just let it play out.”
“I couldn’t. I hated it, Grace. Every single day, watching you carry that weight. Seeing those headlines, knowing what people were saying about you online. It was killing me.”
“Micah, I’m a big girl. If this movie is a success, those will not be the last headlines. There will be plenty more. I imagine a lot worse.”
“You don’t deserve that reputation,” I said. “I shouldn’t have let it go on as long as it did.”
“You didn’t do it,” she said. “I know it was the studio making that call. My agent loved it.”
“I didn’t.”
She smiled. “I know.”
“We had to hide whatever this is between us because of some bullshit rumor the studio loved.” I stepped closer, cupping her face in my hands. “I couldn’t stand it anymore. You didn’t deserve any of it. You’re not some scandal. You’re not a story. I’m sorry I didn’t push back harder.”
“I don’t need you to rescue me,” she said. “I could have pushed back as well.”
“You were manipulated by people in power,” I said. “It was wrong. They know how desperate newcomers are. They took advantage.”
She nodded. “You’re not wrong. But I’m not a shrinking violet. I had no doubt I could recover.”
“Liar,” I said with a soft smirk.
“I’ll survive.”
“I got a lot of angry phone calls after that video went up,” I admitted. “Carol at the studio was furious. Said I torpedoed weeks of free publicity. My father called to yell at me for going rogue on a major PR decision.”
“What did you tell them?”
“That I didn’t give a shit.” I shrugged. “It was the right thing to do. I’d do it again.”
Grace laughed softly, leaning into my touch. “Loretta was furious too. She called me three times before I even got out of bed. Said I should have at least been the one to break the story. Something about controlling my own narrative.”
“What did you tell her?”
“That I didn’t know it was happening.” She paused, her eyes searching mine. “And that I was grateful someone cared enough to fix it for me.”
I pulled her closer, pressing my forehead against hers. We stood there for a moment, just breathing each other in. Damn, I missed having her in my arms.
“We still can’t tell people we’re together,” she said quietly. “Can we?”
“No.” The word tasted bitter in my mouth. “Not yet. We’ve still got a week of shooting left. If it comes out now, it’ll overshadow everything. The movie. Your performance. People will say I cast you because we were sleeping together.”
“Which isn’t true.”
“We know that. But perception is everything in this industry.” I pulled back just enough to look at her properly. “Once we’re back home, though. Once the movie’s wrapped and there’s some distance between us and the production, I want to talk.”
“Think we can figure out what this is?”
“We can be whatever we want to be.” I kissed her forehead, her cheek, the corner of her mouth. “No more hiding. No more pretending. Just us.”
She smiled, and it was like watching the sun come out. “I can wait a few weeks.”
“And then I’m taking you on a real date. Somewhere nice. Somewhere public. Where everyone can see us together.”
“Sounds perfect.”
She kissed me again, slower this time. Sweeter. Like we had all the time in the world instead of stolen moments in hotel rooms.
“We have an hour before we need to get to set,” I said.
She looked into my very soul and then rose up on her tiptoes.
The kiss started slow. Just her lips moving against mine.
I loved that she never rushed anything. She kissed the way she moved through a scene.
All intention, like every beat mattered.
Her hands came up to my chest, brushing across my pecs and then up to my shoulders.
I walked her backward toward the bed.
She went willingly, her mouth still on mine, her breath warm against my lips when she exhaled. The backs of her knees hit the mattress and she sat down, looking up at me with those eyes that had been wrecking me for weeks.
I reached up and pulled her mass of hair from that tie she’d twisted it up in. I ran my fingers through the silky strands.
“I’ve been dying to do that,” I said. “Watching you through the monitor is great, but I like it like this. Me and you. No screens.”
Her eyes moved across my chest, unhurried. The way she looked at me did something to me I wasn’t prepared for. I’d been looked at before. This was different. This felt like being seen.
She reached for the hem of her own shirt and I stopped her.
“Let me.”
She dropped her hands into her lap and let me do it.
I crouched in front of her, gathered the fabric, and drew it up slowly over her stomach, her ribs, the soft curve of her waist. She lifted her arms and I pulled it the rest of the way off and tossed it aside.
She was wearing a plain nude-colored bra, nothing fancy, and somehow that made it worse.
I reached around and unclasped it.
She let it fall.
I stayed where I was for a moment, just looking. She didn’t cover herself or look away. She held my gaze. I brought both hands up to her face, tilting her chin up, and kissed her again. Deeper this time. She made a small sound against my mouth. Her hands found my shoulders and pulled.
I laid her back onto the bed.
“Do you always answer the door in your underwear?” she asked.
I chuckled. “I just got out of the shower. I figured if room service didn’t mind, I sure as hell didn’t.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t flaunt the goods,” she said. “You have to know you’re a tease.”
I settled my weight on my forearms so I wasn’t crushing her. Her bare skin was warm against mine. I kissed her throat, sucking the flesh between my teeth. I nipped and licked and moved over to the soft skin just below her ear. My tongue ran over her pulse.
Her fingers slid into my hair. “Micah.”
Just my name. Nothing else. But the way she said it nearly turned me inside out.
I worked my way down, pressing my mouth to her sternum and then to the swell of her breast. I drew her nipple between my lips.
Her back arched off the mattress, a sharp breath escaping her.
I stayed there, learning what made her gasp and what made her fingers tighten in my hair.
She was responsive in a way that was making it very difficult to take my time, but I wanted to. I wanted to know all of it.
I worked my way lower.
Her shorts came off, then my briefs. I hooked my fingers into the waistband of her panties and drew them down her legs slowly, watching her face the whole time. She was watching me back. The steady eye contact made the whole thing feel almost unbearably intimate.
I pressed a kiss to the inside of her knee.
Her breath hitched.
I kissed higher. The inside of her thigh.
Higher still. When I finally put my mouth on her she groaned and lifted her hips off the bed.
I held her steady, one hand flat across her hip, and felt her whole body shudder as I worked.
Her fingers found my hair again, not guiding, just holding on.
I could hear her breathing change, feel the tension building in her thighs on either side of my face.
“Micah,” she moaned. “Come here. I need you. Please. Now.”
I kissed my way back up her stomach, her ribs, and then between her breasts. She was flushed and breathing hard. She grabbed my face in both hands and kissed me with the kind of urgency I came to expect from her.
“Nightstand,” I managed.
She reached over while I was still kissing her neck and pulled the drawer open, pressing the condom into my hand without looking. I pulled back long enough to roll it on. When I looked back at her, she literally took my breath away. Her hair spread across the pillow. Her lips swollen from kissing.
I didn’t know what to do with how she looked right then.
I settled between her thighs. She drew her knees up, and when I pushed inside her we both went completely still.
“Damn,” I hissed. “You feel so good.”
Her eyes were on mine. Her hands were on my back, a gentle caress. I felt her body adjust around me. I settled in impossibly deeper.
I started to move.
Slow, at first. Long strokes that I savored while I watched her face.
Her lips parted and her hands pressed flat against my back.
Her nails dragged across my back and then down.
I dropped my forehead against hers. We stayed like that.
Foreheads pressed together, breathing the same air.
Her hips rose to meet mine in a rhythm that neither of us had to think about.
“You okay?” I asked.
“More than okay.” Her voice was low and a little rough. “Don’t stop.”
I didn’t stop.
I buried my face in her neck. She turned her head to give me more room. I felt her legs wrap tighter around me, pulling me in. I responded without thinking, pushing deeper and moving faster.
“There,” she breathed. “Right there.”
I found the angle she needed and held it. Her whole body responded with her back arching up into me. I tried to go slow, but I couldn’t. I needed her release. Fuck, I needed my own.
“Micah,” she cried out.
“I’ve got you,” I said against her neck. “I’ve got you.”
She came apart slowly in a long, shuddering wave that moved through her whole body and left her gasping quietly against my ear. I held her through it, stayed deep, felt every second of it.
Then she pulled my face back to hers and kissed me again. That kiss was what finally undid me. The intimacy of it. The fact that she wanted to be looking at me while I spilled inside her.
“We’re terrible at keeping our distance,” she said.
“Terrible,” I agreed.
She laughed quietly.
I pulled her closer and pressed my lips to the top of her head. I was so fucking gone for this woman.