by Jaci Burton
“Why would I want to do that?”
She quirked a smile. “I don’t know. I thought maybe you’d find it interesting.”
“Are you working on the film crew, Des?”
Her lips curled into a smirk. “You could say that.”
One of the big guys stepped forward. “Miss Jenkins?”
“It’s okay, Carl. You and Duke can take off.”
Carl shook his head. “Not a good idea.”
She shot him a look. “And I said I’m fine.”
With another serious death glare, the guy named Carl and the other guy got into the SUV and drove back down the hill.
“Are those your bodyguards?”
She laughed. “No. Well, sometimes.”
“So you must be the star of the show.”
She shrugged. “Well, I’m the lead. I don’t know about star.”
“What are you doing out here?”
“Taking a break. And getting some exercise.”
“Not really a gym on site for you to work out in, is there?”
“No. This is better. You must love it here.”
“It’s home.”
She leaned against the front of his truck, grabbed his beer from his hand, took a long swallow, and handed it back to him. “Thanks.”
“I don’t recall offering it to you.”
She turned to her side. “You’re not very friendly, are you, Logan?”
“I try not to be.”
“Yeah? And why’s that?”
“It keeps people away.”
“Oh, so you don’t like people.”
“I didn’t say that.”
She laughed, and he liked the gravely, raspy, sexy sound of it. Which he shouldn’t.
“Do you have any more of those?” she asked, eyeing his beer.
“I might.”
When she cocked a brow, he added. “Front passenger floor of the truck. Help yourself.”
She went around and grabbed a beer, bringing him another one, too. “Yours looked about empty.” She popped the top and took a long swallow.
“You sure you’re old enough to be drinking those?”
There went that laugh again. “I’m sure.” She gave him a sideways glance. “Are you old enough to be drinking them?”
“Funny.” He took a long swallow.
She leaned next to him, against the truck, and looked out over the valley.
“Just how big is this ranch, Logan?”
“It’s pretty big.”
She shot him a look. “Pretend I’m smart and just tell me.”
“It’s a little over a hundred thousand acres.”
“Holy shit. That’s a lot. No wonder you could afford to lend us a small piece of the pie.”
“I didn’t lend it. I’m renting it to your movie-making company. Which means I make money. Working a ranch is costly business.”
“I’m sure it is. Though honestly, I wouldn’t know.”
He took another swallow of beer as he studied her. “City girl?”
“A little of that, and a little country. I’ve been around. Never lived on a ranch, though.”
“Where are you from?”
“Just about everywhere.”
“Military?”
She tilted her head and looked up at him. “What makes you think that?”
“I don’t think anything at all. Just guessing.”
“Good guess. Yeah, my dad was army. We moved around a lot.”
“So you’ve seen the world.”
She didn’t smile this time. “You could say that.”
“You probably still see a lot of it, being an actress.”
“Sometimes a lot more than I want to.” She took a couple sips of her beer and kept her gaze focused below, where the movie was being filmed. And she stopped talking.
Logan didn’t know what to make of Desiree Jenkins. She couldn’t be more than mid-twenties at best, which put her firmly in the close-to-ten-years-younger-than-him category. Scrubbed of makeup, she looked like a teenager, but there was a worldliness in her eyes that made her seem a lot older.
She sure was pretty with her long dark hair and wide eyes that he couldn’t quite get a handle on, color-wise. Every time she shifted position, so did the color. At first they seemed blue, but now they were more like a brownish green, with little flecks of gold in them.
“You’re staring.”
He frowned. “Huh?”
“You’re staring at me. Do I have dirt on my face?”
“No. I’m looking at your eyes. The color of them.”
“Oh yeah. My dad told me I had chameleon eyes. I figure they’re just hazel, with a little of every color in them. Pretty cool, huh?”
“Huh. I guess so.”
She leaned back against his truck again. “Not much impresses you, does it, Logan?”
“Nope.” But her eyes did.
“So tell me about your ranch. What do you do here?”
“Work.”
“Wow, so descriptive. I’ll bet you’re a great conversationalist at parties.”
“Don’t get to a lot of parties around here.”
“Maybe you don’t get invited to a lot of parties.”
“Can’t say that breaks my heart any.”
She rolled her eyes. “Anyway, about the ranch?”
“We work cattle. We also have horses, but they’re wild mustangs so we don’t mess with them except to feed them in the winter.”
“Okay. Do you raise the cattle for beef?”
“Yeah.”
“You didn’t strike me as a dairy farmer.”
“Really. And what does a typical dairy farmer look like to you?”
She shrugged. “No idea. Not like you. You’re more the rugged, work-the-land type, not the milk-the-cows type.”
He wasn’t sure whether to take that as a compliment, or whether she’d just insulted dairy farmers. Either way, it was obvious she had no idea what she was talking about. Then again, he didn’t know shit about movie making. But he wasn’t spouting off about that, either.
“Well, I gotta go.”
She pushed off the truck and handed him the empty beer can. “Thanks for the drink. You should come down and watch filming.”
“No, thanks. I’m plenty busy with my own work.”
“You might find what we do interesting.”
“I’m interested enough in what I do.”
She cocked her head to the side, revealing the soft column of her neck. He didn’t want to be interested in her neck, but he was. “Afraid you might linger a little too long? Maybe get bitten by the acting bug?”
He laughed at that. “Uh, no.”
“Then come on down and watch us work. I’ll make sure the big burly guys won’t bother you.”
Martha would have a fit if he got an invite and he didn’t say yes. “Martha, my house manager, is a big fan.”
“Bring her down to watch a day of filming. We’re doing a big dramatic scene tomorrow. She’d probably love that.”
“She probably would.”
“I’ll have to warn you there’s a lot of standing around and waiting in between takes, but I promise you the end result is always worthwhile. You and Martha come on out to the set. I promise it’ll be fun.”
There were a million reasons this wasn’t a good idea. But then there was Martha, and he hated the thought of cold sandwiches. “What time?”
“I’m usually in makeup by six a.m., so we should start shooting by eight.”
“You get up that early? I thought all you movie stars slept ’til noon.”
“Now who’s funny? I’ll let the crew know you’re coming.” She lifted her arms over her head, stretched, then kicked off into a run, waving at him. “See you tomorrow, Logan.”
Why the hell he’d agreed to that, he had no idea. He had more than enough to do, and losing a day would put him behind.
But at least Martha would be happy.
DES MADE IT back to the film site and ran straigh
t into Theo, her director.
“Des. Where’d you go?”
“I took a run to get some exercise. Did you need me for something?”
“Yes. We need to do a reshoot of one of this morning’s scenes. I told you not to disappear.”
“Sorry. I’ll head over to makeup and hair.”
“Too late now. I’ve already dismissed the crew for the day and the lighting isn’t right. We’ll pick it up later.” He walked with her as she headed to her trailer. “I wanted to go over tomorrow’s scenes with you, though. How about dinner tonight? My trailer?” He put his arm around her shoulder.
Her skin crawled and she immediately wanted to shrug him off. Theo was a notorious, disgusting, very married womanizer who liked to hit on his leading ladies, especially on location. But he was also a brilliant director, so one had to take the bad with the good. “I need a shower after my run, Theo. And I’ve already made plans to run lines with Colt over dinner. You’re welcome to join us, though. We could knock out discussion about tomorrow’s scenes then.”
Theo paused, then shook his head. “No, that’s all right. We’ll do it in the morning during prep. I’ll see you then.”
“Okay. See you tomorrow, Theo.”
She stepped up her pace before Theo came up with any more pervy ideas.
“Cornered you, did he?”
She smiled as Colt Stevens, her costar, caught up with her. “Why weren’t you here to save me?”
“Sorry, babe. I was on the phone. I saw Theo hook onto you as soon as you got back on set. Did you have a good run?”
“I did. Did you have a good phone call?”
His eyes gleamed. “I did.”
Des looked around to make sure they were alone. “And how is Tony?”
“Pining away for me, as always. I wish he could be here.”
“I wish he could, too.” Des wrapped her arm around Colt’s waist. “Why don’t you just come out of the closet and be done with it already?”
They’d reached her trailer. Colt opened the door for her and Des stepped in. Colt followed and shut the door. “Oh, right. Smokin’ hot movie star who gets all the sexy roles comes out as gay.”
Des shrugged. “So? It’s the twenty-first century, Colt. And you kiss better than any leading man I’ve ever worked with. I doubt any of your future leading ladies would be deterred.”
Colt sat on her sofa, stretching out his long legs. “Thanks, babe. Tony thinks so, too.”
She laughed. “Seriously, though. We have chemistry through the roof and it shows on screen. If you can pull that off, who cares who you love off screen?”
“Well, I sure don’t. And you don’t. And probably most of America doesn’t give a shit, either. But my management team does care. And they say no to coming out.”
She plopped onto the sofa next to him. “I’m sorry. You should be able to live your life freely and not have to parade around with a bunch of women you don’t care about while Tony is stuck loving you behind the scenes.”
Colt let out a sigh. “I know, love. But it is what it is, and I guess it’s going to stay that way for a while. Maybe someday we’ll be able to change that.”
She pushed off and stood. “Hopefully sooner rather than later. I want you to be happy.”
“I want you to be happy, too.”
She gave him a smile. “I am happy. I’m living my dream here.”
“Sure you are.”
“Did you get dinner ordered?”
“Should be here in about fifteen.”
“Pop open a bottle of wine for us, then. I’m going to hop in the shower.”
Des stripped and got into the shower, washing away the body makeup from today’s scenes and the sweat from her run. She thought about Colt. They’d known each other since before either of them had gotten their first film role, when they’d bunked together in a one-bedroom apartment in Hollywood. They’d become fast friends and had stayed that way. She’d found out right away that Colt was gay—hard to hide that kind of thing from your best friend and roommate. And when they’d started getting roles together, they’d bonded and supported each others’ careers. Fortunately, they’d also been lucky enough to score roles in films together. Though it was hysterically funny to film love scenes together, they were actors and professionals. And because they were so close, they had a natural chemistry. They were comfortable together, and lit up the screen. They were often linked together in the gossip circles, which Colt found amusing.
So did Des. She didn’t mind bearding for him, and often went out to premieres and to dinner with him to give him a cover when he didn’t feel like playing the role of a straight guy with some other woman.
Until she’d met Jason and had started a relationship with him.
Which had recently gone up in flames. As did most of her Hollywood relationships. Actors were self-absorbed dicks. Except for Colt, of course, who she was now free to hook up with again. At least on the surface.
She got out of the shower and put on a pair of shorts and a tank top. The smell of dinner made her stomach clench. She was hungry, so she hurriedly combed out her hair and went into the main room of the trailer, where Colt was laying out forks and plates.
“Chinese food?”
“Yeah.”
“All that salt. I love looking puffy in front of the camera.”
Colt grinned. “You couldn’t look puffy if you tried. Sit down and eat.”
They ate and chatted about the day, and roughed out tomorrow’s scenes between bites.
“I met Logan McCormack, the owner of the ranch, today,” she said as she grabbed a fortune cookie.
“Yeah? What’s he like?”
“Incredibly sexy, in a brooding, loner cowboy sort of way.”
“Really. Would I like him?”
She laughed. “I think you’d love him. And Tony would kill you.”
“Hey, I’m devoted and madly in love and you know that. Doesn’t mean I can’t ogle.”
“I invited him to the set. He said his house manager is a big fan, so he’s going to bring her tomorrow.”
“Hmm.”
She looked at Colt. “Hmmm what?”
“You’re interested. Now I really can’t wait to meet him.”
“I didn’t say I was interested in him, only that he was interesting.”
“Same thing, isn’t it?”
“Not at all.” She cracked open her fortune cookie and popped a piece into her mouth as she unfolded the fortune and read it.
Your life is about to change in new and exciting ways.
She’d believe that when it happened.
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