Chapter 3 #3
I’m terrified to ask, just in case his thoughts are going in the same direction as mine.
It’s one thing to find myself unexpectedly and completely hot for someone I’m meant to be writing a piece on, but it’s one hundred per cent another if he returns those feelings.
My own I can ignore. His? That would make it a heck of a lot harder.
‘Is it relevant?’
He laughs, but it’s not carefree. There’s a note to it that speaks of disbelief. ‘Yeah, Bailey, I’d say so, or I wouldn’t have brought it up.’
I feel like something’s happened between us.
My experience suddenly seems to count for nothing.
I’m like an awkward child, fumbling in the dark.
Once upon a time, I had a place at the most prestigious ballet school in the States, with an offer to attend a summer program in Paris.
I was confident and outgoing, with the world at my feet.
That girl feels like a million miles away right now.
‘Okay, fine. What is it?’
He lifts his beer and takes a sip, gaze latched to mine.
I try not to look, but I can’t help it. There’s something magnetic about his movements and motion, so I stare at the capable fingers that grip the bottle, at the way his lips shape as he takes a drink, at the shift of his Adam’s apple as he swallows, the hair-roughened movement of his throat somehow so animalistic and masculine that muscles deep inside of me clench with a long-forgotten need.
‘I don’t much care for one-way streets. Never have done.’
It’s a statement that doesn’t seem to make any sense. ‘What does that mean?’
‘I’m not interested in sittin’ here letting you pull threads out of me all night.’
‘It’s just a drink,’ I say, focusing on the last part of his statement.
‘You know what I mean. I’m not gonna sit here like some lab experiment you’re running.’
I expel a long, slow breath. ‘That’s sort of how this works.’
‘Yeah, well, it doesn’t have to, right?’
‘I need to interview you.’
‘But who says that can’t go both ways?’
My heart ticks up a beat. I cover my reaction with an instant response, ‘Are you writing an article about me?’
His lips flick in that sexy smile of his. ‘Could be. For a readership of one is all.’
My heart speeds up another notch; I hate that. ‘There’s really no need. This is my job.’
‘I don’t like it.’
I frown. ‘My job?’
‘I don’t give a shit about your job,’ he says with a shake of his head, and another slow, deliberate sip of his drink. ‘I just don’t wanna talk about myself non-stop.’
That’s interesting. In my experience, most people love to talk about themselves. ‘You can talk about the things you like, your home, your family. That’s all a part of it.’
He bristles a little. He tries to hide it, but not quickly enough.
I’m trained to look and observe—or maybe I’ve just always been this way.
No. I was right the first time. It is training, but a training that began when I was a girl.
Even when all I could think of was dancing, my father was coaching me to be a reporter, giving me the powers that helped make him such a success.
‘On one condition: you talk right back.’
I clamp down on my first, fierce reaction to that. No. He says he doesn’t like one-way streets, but I feel the same way about two-ways. It doesn’t work. It gets messy. I don’t share my personal life, not with anyone, not anymore. And especially not with interview subjects.
‘That’s not how this works.’
‘Says who?’
‘Everyone I’ve ever interviewed. I’m a journalist. I ask, you answer.’
He shrugs those broad shoulders in a way that makes my fingertips tingle.
‘Then I’m sorry, Bailey. You’ve wasted your time comin’ out here.’
My lips part on a rush of air. ‘Wait, what?’
He takes another long drink of his beer and places it on the table. ‘I’m not interested in spending three weeks giving you all the dirt on my life and knowing nothing about you. That’s not for me.’
I shake my head, staring at him with bewilderment. ‘This is all arranged.’ Even as I say it, I know it won’t cut the mustard with a guy like Beau. Our team and the circuit management had a deal, but Beau’s his own man. That’s as clear as the day is long.
‘You can go ahead and write what you want, I guess. But if you expect my cooperation, this is the deal.’
In the truck, he’d been the epitome of the easygoing Beau Donovan I’d sort of got to know through his interview clips. Laughing, free-spirited, casual. But this version of him has a toughness that speaks to something deep inside of me—because it’s a toughness I can’t fail to recognise.
He sits back in his chair and crosses his arms over his chest. It’s both the exact right and wrong thing to do.
Right, because it shows how serious he is.
He’s digging in, and I know I won’t be able to change his mind.
Wrong, because it’s an immediate reminder of the dangers here.
I can’t look at his crossed arms without noticing all the things I really shouldn’t.
Their size, the hairs on his tanned skin, the muscles, his hands.
I can’t look without imagining things that distract and overheat me all at once.
I know I should get the hell out of here, go home and tell my editor that Beau Donovan was impossible to work with, but I refuse to lose this opportunity.
I tell myself it’s professional dedication alone that has me narrowing my eyes and nodding once.
‘Fine, Beau. You’ve got yourself a deal—but don’t you go thinking I’m happy about this. ’