"Well, while you work on your tea, I figured we could watch something," he said, turning away, not pressing. Which I was thankful for because I was pretty sure if he pressed, it would all come tumbling out.
Not just about my parents, my brother, my debts. But about it all. About him. About my growing feelings. About my increasing inability to handle them.
And that would just be a disaster, wouldn't it?
If he knew I was catching feelings, he would probably pull away, stick me with a new actor. It wasn't healthy to get attached.
Because to all these people, this was work.
"What are we watching?" I asked as he produced a laptop from beside the couch, powering it up, typing in his passcode, then clicking around.
"This," he told me as the video screen popped up. His finger went to the bar, scrolling it forward just the right amount, then hitting play, and sitting back on the couch with me.
This was actually us.
It was our second scene. The one in the black room for the first time.
"Preston, I don't want to watch this," I told him, feeling my belly roll as we moved into the frame. "I mean... does anyone actually want to watch themselves?" I went on, babbling because I was nervous. "It seems like a great way to develop new and crippling insecurities, you know? Seeing yourself from a bunch of new angles and moving all around and..."
"Baby, relax," Preston cut me off, moving a little closer, placing his hand on my knee, reassuring. "Just watch for a minute, okay? If you want to turn it off, we can then. Fair?"
It was.
But there was no denying that my chest felt like a thousand-pound weight had suddenly settled on it as our hands started to remove clothing.
The minute passed.
But I couldn't seem to look away from us.
Soon, it wasn't even like we were watching at all. It was like we were there. Or, at least, that was what it was like for me.
I sipped my tea and felt like Preston's hands were all over me, like his lips were on me, like he was moving inside me.
I didn't stop to analyze myself, to pick myself apart.
Because, and this was a revelation of sorts for me, there was nothing to pick apart.
Together, we were perfect.
Maybe I was partial, maybe my feelings for Preston were rose tinting everything.
But something within me said otherwise.
We moved as one.
We emanated something raw, something pure.
On that screen, we weren't two actors doing a scene. No. We were two lovers enjoying each other's bodies.
And nothing could convince me otherwise.
"See?" Preston asked after everything was over, cutting the image before we got up to dress because we both knew what we would find there. The uncertainty, the awkwardness. Two strangers about to get on with their lives.
"Yeah," I agreed, watching as his hand - a hand I swear I knew as well as my own at this point - removed my mug from my hands, placed it back down on the table.
"You're wet, aren't you?" he asked, arm reaching to plant on the armrest behind me, his upper body curling over me in a possessive way that made my belly flip-flop. "Remembering my hands on you," he went on, his lips near my ear, but his hands stubbornly refusing to touch me.
"Yes," I admitted, knowing he would see for himself if he reached between us, if he pressed his hand between my thighs.
"Tell me how you want it," he demanded, his hand finally moving between us, reaching up under my skirt, grabbing my panties, ripping it off in what was becoming his signature caveman move. And despite it happening over and over - enough that he had a box of panties waiting for me one day to replace the ones he had been ruining - it never failed to send a spark through my body. "Or better yet, show me," he demanded as my hand reached to free him of his belt, undid his button and zip, reached inside his boxer briefs to free his cock.
No one had ever accused me of being overly confident in bed, of taking charge, of taking exactly what I wanted from my partner.
But I somehow felt myself moving upward, pressing him back onto the couch. Spurred on by the barely contained need in his eyes, I took a breath, moving to throw my legs over his, but with my back to his front, leaning back into his strong chest as I rose up to reach between us, guiding his cock to slide up my cleft before moving down, pressing, sliding him ever so slightly inside.
Preston's hands slid up my chest, working my nipples into hardened peaks before gliding down, sinking into my hipbones, lowering me down until I took him fully. A throaty moan escaped me at the new, unexpectedly intense position.
"Anyway you want me, Rosie," he said, lips grazing my ear, "you can have me. You just have to tell me."
The weak, needy, emotional part of me wanted to read into that, wanted to find some deeper meaning, some shred of shared feelings.
Feeling a familiar tearing sensation in my chest, I took a deep breath, pushing thoughts away.
This wasn't time for thinking anyway.
My hips started moving, slow and unsure of the right rhythm at first, then faster, harder as I gained confidence, as the need overtook me, guided me in a primal way that needed no instruction.
As the orgasm rushed closer, my legs shook, not wanting to hold me, making me collapse back onto him.
His hand slid between my thighs, pressing into my clit as he started thrusting upward into me, sending the orgasm cresting through my body with an intensity that stole my breath, that made it impossible even to cry out his name.
"Fuck," Preston hissed some time later, letting out a ragged breath.
"Yeah," I agreed.
"Any more fantasies up in that head?" he asked, brushing my hair off my shoulder so his lips could press there.
"I'm sure I could come up with a few," I told him, smiling at the idea of exploring more of them. Even if I knew it was stupid. Even though I was painfully aware that giving him more of me that way was only going to complicate this issue further for me.
"By this weekend," he demanded, arm anchoring around my belly, giving me a squeeze.
Three days.
It wasn't long.
It was childish of me to feel sad at not seeing him. Like some lovestruck teenager who can't go half a day without spending time with her boyfriend.
Hell, I was worse than that technically. Seeing as Preston was most definitely not my boyfriend.
His laptop dinged a few feet in front of me, making the sleep screen disappear.
"It's just an email," he told me, nipping my shoulder.
But the moment was gone.
Seeming to sense it too, he released me, let me climb awkwardly forward , making my way to the couch until a muscle cramp shot sparks of pain up my calf, making me fall back, clutching it.
"Ow ow ow ow."
"What's the matter?" Preston asked, eyes small, confused.
"Cramp," I explained, watching as he pushed my hand away, grabbing my calf in both of his, gently massaging, finding the ache and slowly taking it away.
"Better?" he asked, a sexy little smirk pulling at his lips.
"I guess I should stretch first before trying new positions," I said, shaking my head at myself. "Or take up yoga."
"Wouldn't mind watching a little warm-up yoga. Naked," he specified, that smile going even more devilish.
"Keep dreaming," I told him, poking him in the chest with my toes.
"Come on. You get warmed up muscles. I get a warmed up... muscle," he told me, body curving over mine. "It's a win-win," he added before sealing his lips over mine.
My body tensed at the contact, unprepared.
We kissed.
A lot, really, compared to other porn scenes I had watched in the past.
But always before. Always during.
To get in the mood, to keep the intimacy.
Never after.
When the orgasms were done, when our bodies had already come back down. When there was no need for it.
But as his lips press
ed harder, demanded a reaction, it was pointless to even pretend I was going to resist, that I was going to give up any opportunity to be close with him, to get what my body, my mind, my freaking soul was demanding.
My legs parted and he moved in, bracing some of his weight, but giving me almost as much, the pressure something I sometimes found myself craving at night alone in my bed.
His tongue moved inside to claim mine, stoking a desire in me, but one that didn't really have much to do with needing him inside of me, needing an orgasm from him. It was something else entirely. It was a deep, aching need to be close to him, to have as much of him as I could, to feel his body, hear his breath, feel his heartbeat against my breast.
It was sexual, yet wholly not at the same time.
And if it weren't for my stomach letting out a loud, angry grumble, objecting to its emptiness, it seemed like it could go on forever, that neither of us were anywhere near getting our fill.
But Preston pulled away with dancing eyes and a little chuckle. "Hungry for more than me, huh?" he asked, lips quirking up.
"I didn't get a chance to have a full meal today," I admitted, annoyed at my body for betraying me when I was giving it something it wanted by being with him.
"Alright, come on, get dressed," he demanded, pulling away, and it took every bit of self-control I contained not to reach out to him, pull him close again. "We'll get you something to eat," he added, finding his clothes, getting into them as I seemed to move at half-speed getting into my own.
"Really, that's not necc..."
"There is a full kitchen here," he cut me off. "And a fridge and pantry that Cooper keeps stocked all the time. You need to get something into your system," he added, picking up my ripped panties with a small, masculine, satisfied smirk.
I grabbed my purse and followed him to the door, finding the halls outside at only half light, all the doors closed, the rooms behind them dark.
"What time is it?" I asked, finding the space oddly creepy dark and abandoned.
"Um..." he started, reaching for his phone. "Nine-thirty," he supplied, surprising me.
But, then again, we had watched a full scene, then created another one. Then there had been the making out that must have gone on for a while because my lips felt swollen and overly sensitive.
"Is everyone gone?" I asked as we moved into the main entrance area and found even the office was darkened.
"Looks like it. Tuesdays don't usually run late," he explained, hand pressing into my lower back, leading me down the hall where the dark room was situated, guiding me into the cafeteria, then back into the kitchens where he had me hop up on a table while he gathered various times - eggs, milk, butter, spinach, mushrooms, swiss cheese.
Shrugging out of his jacket, he draped it over my bare legs, seeming to sense the coldness in the space as he cracked eggs, chopped vegetables, got a pan hot.
"You didn't ask if I like eggs," I accused him, making him turn back, looking almost stricken for a moment, the look so foreign on his usually confident face that a laugh escaped me. "I do," I told him, taking him out of his misery. "And I really like omelets," I added. "Can I do anything?"
"No," he told me, turning away to whisk the eggs as the pan sizzled with butter.
"Preston?" I called a couple minutes later, the silence starting to make me shift uncomfortably around.
"Yeah?"
"How did you get into this?" I asked, it being a burning question since almost the beginning.
"Into the acting part, or the production part?" he asked after a short pause before pouring half the eggs into the pan, dropping in the vegetables and cheese as he waited for it to cook through enough to flip.
"Both," I told him, deciding that if he was willing to talk about either, then I was going to be greedy and ask for it all. The whole story. Because, it seemed, no one else knew it. Aside from him growing up in France. Then coming to the States when he was a teenager. No one had his details. If he was willing to safeguard them to me, I was going to let him.
"I grew up in France, obviously," he said, waving his spatula around even though it wasn't overly obvious, his accent only slipping in on certain words and, well, during sex when it got thick. Especially when he slipped into French. "So I was raised with a more... liberal view of sex in general. My mom died when I was thirteen. And my father was, well, an asshole. By the time I was sixteen, I knew I wanted to get as far away from him as possible. So as soon as I graduated school, I hopped on a plane heading for the States."
"Did you have family here?"
"No," he said, snorting as he flipped the omelet. "I barely had enough money to get a seedy hotel room for a week," he added. "But anything was better than living under his roof, so I was willing to scrimp and save. I got a couple odd jobs. Then one night, I was working security at a club and I hit it off with this woman there. Went home with her. Fucked, obviously. Turns out she was a porn star. She, ah, told me that with how I fuck, I should be getting paid for it," he admitted in a small voice, almost seeming bashful as he slid the omelet onto a plate, getting to work on the next one.
"Were you immediately into the idea?"
"Fuck no," he said, shooting me a smile. "I mean, liberal or not, it seemed like there was no future in it, y'know? Once the world saw you eating pussy and fucking someone's ass, they kind of have a hard time paying attention to you listing all your qualifications for an office job. I told her thanks but no thanks. I kept in touch with her here and there. Casually," he added as though I didn't know his meaning. "And one night she let it slip how much I could make for just an hour of work. And I figured, fuck it. My mom was gone. I didn't give a damn what my father thought. I would figure out the after, well, after."
"Did you like the work?"
"I was nineteen and I was getting more pussy than I knew what to do with," he told me, slipping the omelet onto another plate, cutting the flame, and moving toward me, nudging me as he passed, wanting me to follow him to the small break table in the corner, dropping our plates, grabbing bottles of orange juice and plastic utensils, then coming back to sit with me.
"So, yeah, you liked it," I said with a smile as I cut into my omelet.
Maybe I would have normally felt jealousy. In past relationships with men, I had. I didn't like ever hearing about exes. I wasn't sure why it didn't bother me hearing it from Preston. Maybe simply because I had known coming into this that he'd been with more women than I cared to count. Or possibly it was because if it weren't for all of them, he wouldn't be who he was now. A man I liked way more than I had any right to.
"Yeah. I mean... it's work. After a while, the shine gets a little dull. And it's just another job. But it paid well. I was lucky to get in when I got in. Back when you were like a minor celebrity. With the income to go with it. And I was smart enough to save most of it, having seen so many people spending cash like water, then having their careers end, leaving them packing groceries at food stores."
"What made you decide to start all this?" I asked, waving my fork around before moving the first mouthful to my lips. "Oh, my God," I groaned, closing my eyes as I chewed.
"Maybe I will need to have you in a kitchen if you are going to moan like that when you eat," he told me, making my eyes pop open, a little embarrassed.
"This is really good. I mean, I'm starving. And food is always better when you don't have to cook it, but this is amazing."
"It's nothing," he said, brushing it off, something that didn't seem characteristic. But, then again, I didn't know enough about him to even think that. "Anyway, free porn sites are why I did this. All a sudden, anyone with a cellphone could shoot a makeshift porn and upload it, which all but decimated the industry, putting most of us all out of work. And, well, the porn they were producing was awful. Heavily misogynistic, focusing more on male pleasure than female when, obviously, it is meant to be mutual. Save for some particular fetishes. No one was getting paid for something they absolutely should have been getting paid for. It was a clusterfuck o
f a situation. And I just... I don't know. The industry had been good to me. And I guess I wanted to see it restored to what it used to be. Or adapted to something new altogether."
"So you came up with the streaming platform."
"Hey, if it works for Netflix and Hulu and endless others, I figured it could work for us. If we had enough content with good enough quality, catering to all the different fetishes with care and knowledge and actors who actually enjoyed what they were doing, I figured we could get people to part with five or six bucks a month for endless access to it."
"And they did?" I asked, even though it was clear Golden Age Productions was doing just fine. "Even though it was available for free somewhere else?"
"Well, none of our footage was free anywhere. We ruthlessly handed out cease and desist letters at the beginning before we had the money to pay someone to tell us how we could prevent our movies from being pirated. But, I don't know. I guess it is like anything else. Plenty of people pay to use advanced features with more access on dating sites even though they could go to other sites for free. People will pay for something if they think the quality is worth it. We've worked hard to make sure everything we do is quality."
"Does it bother you that your old movies are up for free everywhere?" I asked even though it was clear I was speaking from experience. We were beyond being coy about things like that, I guessed. Once you incorporated butt plugs and vibrators into your sex, there wasn't a whole lot left to feel embarrassed about.
"No. I mean... I was paid my fair cut for those movies. It's kind of like buying a book. You pay for it once even if you re-read it a thousand times. I got paid. They can watch as much as they want. What?" he asked, catching me watching his profile for just a second too long.
"Nothing," I told him, shaking my head, pretending cutting up the rest of my food took my utmost attention.
"No, tell me."
"Nothing... you're just. You're interesting is all."
"So are you."
There was no stopping the snort that escaped me. And it was really sexy, let me tell you.
"What?" he asked, eyes getting small.
"Nothing. I'm just... not," I said, shaking my head. "You're just being nice. I mean... you barely know me," I added. "Believe me. I'm... boring."
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