Checked Out

by Hazel James

  Blaine was the first to break the awkward silence. “Do you want to knock out our interview now before it gets busy?”

  “What happened to Ginger Scott? I thought she was coming,” Jack said.

  “Her son took his Superman costume a little too seriously and landed himself in the ER with a possible broken arm.”

  That was news to me, but then again so was Channel 3 covering the event in the first place. When I parked in the lot next door, Blaine was getting his equipment out of the back of a sedan with the station’s logo on the side. He asked what I was doing there and my answer was mostly truthful—I was meeting my aunt and niece for trunk-or-treating. I didn’t want to get into the specifics of my relationship with a new co-worker, which would make Aunt Alma proud. For as much as she loved to tease and flirt, she held fast to one rule in Hollywood: Don’t discuss your personal life with members of the media. I firmly believed that’s why she and Uncle Alan made it when so many other couples didn’t. Instead, I talked about my goal of one day being a reporter like him. Putting a bug in the ear of your professional idol couldn’t hurt, right?

  Jack blew out a long breath and glanced around the parking lot. “Can you give me a few minutes? I need to check on a couple of things.”

  “Sure. I’ll look around for a spot to set up.” As I watched Blaine walk away, video camera in one hand and tripod strap slung over his shoulder, I made a promise to myself: Next year, that will be you. But for now, there were more important matters to attend to, like Count Dracula’s date with the spotlight… an interview with a vampire, if you will.

  Without speaking, he led me inside the library and straight into his office. He dropped my hand and rummaged through his desk drawer, pulling out a bottle of Pepto Bismol. “I hate this shit,” he grumbled, ripping the plastic safety packaging off the top.

  “Then why are you drinking it?”

  He smiled, albeit a small one, and shook his head. “Not this,” he said, holding up the bottle. “That.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the general direction of the parking lot. “The media. Being on camera.” He muttered something else that I couldn’t make out.

  I grabbed the bottle and set it on top of his desk calendar, then made him sit in his chair. “Take some deep breaths.”

  “You really think that’s going to help?”

  I lifted a brow. “Just because I’ve grown up wanting to be a reporter doesn’t mean I didn’t freak out the first dozen times I got in front of the camera. So yes, you’re going to skip the Pepto, take some calming breaths, and come outside to tell southwestern Idaho about this amazing event you and Cara have put together.”

  “Just like that, huh?”

  “Yep.”

  Jack slid his fingers between mine and said, “Okay, but I think you forgot a step.”

  “Which one?”

  He sat me side-saddle on his lap and slid his hands on either side of my face. I felt small and dainty, which wasn’t always easy given the fact that I was taller than most of the women in my family. We stayed that way for a moment, each knowing what step came next but neither of us rushing it.

  “Have I mentioned how gorgeous your eyes are?” I whispered. “They remind me of a glacier in Iceland in the winter.”

  “That’s supposed to be my line. Except the Iceland part. Yours are more like kryptonite in Ireland in the spring.”

  A low chuckle hummed in my throat. “That sounds a little… dangerous.”

  “You are a little dangerous.”

  “Am not,” I said, gaping at him in mock offense. “I’m literally the sweet and innocent Belle of the ball.”

  Jack arched a brow as his eyes darkened from Icelandic glacier to Icelandic ocean. “You’ve hijacked my thoughts for the last three weeks and gotten me to agree to things that no one else could. If this is any indication of the power you’ll have over me in this relationship, I’m pretty much screwed.”

  Laughter erupted from my chest. His confession had taken me from small and dainty to sexy and dominant, and that was a new feeling. One I liked very much and wanted to explore a little more. With my laughter fading and heat coursing through me, I leaned in and brought my lips to his. It wasn’t a deep kiss—he was wearing too much makeup for that—but it still set off fireworks behind my eyelids.

  I didn’t mean to moan when his tongue tangled against mine. Or shift on his lap, where I swore I could feel that flying fox he was talking about the other night. Or fist my hands in his hair… almost. The collar of his cape got in the way, which was probably just as well. We needed to get back outside instead of making out in Jack’s office like a couple of hormone-filled teenagers. “I promise my plan was to calm you down, not get both of us riled up.”

  He breathed out a laugh and swept his thumb across my chin. “And I meant to keep my face paint on me, not get it on you.”

  “How do you feel about a raincheck?” It was part question, part plea because I’d just learned that Jack Price could do fabulous things with his mouth and I really wanted to see what else he excelled at.

  “As long as you’re okay with cashing it in later tonight, I don’t think that would be a problem.”

  His wicked grin had me nodding like a bobblehead on a road full of potholes. “Lucky for you, I have no plans after trick-or-treating.”

  “Trunk-or-treating,” he said, lifting me up so he could stand. “And as much as it kills me to say this, we should get back out there.”

  “Hang on.” I grabbed the face paint kit off his desk and touched up the area around his mouth. “There. They’ll never know you were attacked by a beast in a Belle costume.”

  Jack reached for my hand on the way out of his office. “I thought you said your aunt and niece were coming.”

  “She’ll text me when they get here. My sister-in-law wanted to take Olivia to a few of their neighbors’ houses, and I wanted to get here early in case you needed help, so Aunt Alma said she’d pick Livvy up.”

  “Well I, for one, am grateful for your help.” He smirked on the last word, but his smile gave way to a frown as he pushed open the door and led us outside. “I just wish you could do this interview for me. I’m so fucking nervous, which means I’ll probably end up looking pissed off or constipated.”

  I gave his hand another reassuring squeeze. “I can’t be on camera for you, but I do have a trick that should make it easier.”

  “What is it?”

  “Just trust me.”

  Blaine tested the microphone he’d just pinned on Jack’s vest and said, “You ready, Count Jackula?”

  Jack’s eyes sought mine over Blaine’s shoulder. I mouthed You’ve got this and gave him an encouraging smile.

  Before we found Blaine, I reminded Jack of a few key points. One, this wouldn’t be a live interview. If he needed to stop and start over, he could. Two, I was letting him off the hook with our interview for my video blog. And three, he didn’t have to look in the camera—that was Blaine’s job. Jack’s job (and my magic trick) was to look at me and pretend Blaine and the camera didn’t exist, and my job was to be Jack’s anchor and remind him to breathe.

  Jack’s Adam’s apple bobbed once and then he nodded. “Yeah, let’s do it.”

  Blaine wasted no time, asking Jack about his role in creating the event, how he found volunteers to participate, and some other things I couldn’t hear because I was happily drowning in his ocean eyes and had no interest coming up for air.

  In fact, I was taking my role as anchor so seriously that I didn’t see Aunt Alma until she flanked my side. “You ignored my text. Trying to ditch me already?”

  I shook my head while keeping my gaze trained on the man in front of me. “Of course not. Just offering some moral support while Jack’s in the crosshairs. He should be done soon.”

  “And who is this handsome young man we’re staring at?” she asked, her tone playful. She was probably waggling her brows at him, but he didn’t seem to notice her either.

  I was powerless against th
e grin overtaking my face. “That’s my boyfriend.” Maybe conversing with Diego for half of his life had taught Jack how to read lips because now he was smiling and my insides had just become a jumbled mess of horny butterflies.

  Thank God for rainchecks with short expiration dates.

  “He must be important if he’s being interviewed.”

  “He’s the director of the library and this event was his idea.” And right now he’s doing the one thing he dreads most, but you’d never know it because he looks so poised and confident. Who knew that watching a man confront his fear could be so sexy?

  “Damn girl, you done good.” I saw Aunt Alma fan herself out of the corner of my eye. I slipped my hands into the pockets of my dress (It had pockets!!!) to keep myself from mimicking her, or worse, tackling Jack and planting a kiss on those perfectly delicious lips of his. I could hear Blaine’s report now:

  “What was supposed to be a family friendly trunk-or-treating event quickly turned X-rated when Channel 3’s newest employee attacked the director of the library and proceeded to dry hump him in front of horrified on-lookers. One eyewitness claimed she’d never unsee the images of Belle and Dracula creating their own fan-fiction erotica plot. The library is now offering free counseling services to bystanders.”

  “I think we got it,” real Blaine said as he unhooked the microphone from Jack’s vest. On a scale of one to ten, my hormones were dressing in stripper clothes and body glitter as they prepared for another hug from him, so I quickly pulled my yellow elbow-length gloves out of my pockets and donned each one.

  “Cold?” Aunt Alma asked.

  “A little.” More like putting my hands in timeout because they couldn’t be trusted with skin-on-skin contact. See what amped-up hormones could to do to a woman? Without knowing it, Jack had just set a bar that I wasn’t sure another man could meet: Do I feel compelled to wear satin hand-condoms in your presence? No? Thank you, next.

  “Holy shit, I’m glad that’s over,” Jack said when he reached me. He was halfway sagging against me like I was his coach and he’d just endured ten rounds in the ring.

  “I don’t know why you were so worried. You were a natural.”

  He lifted a shoulder, then whispered, “Picturing the audience naked finally worked.”

  “And by audience…” I whispered back, not daring to speak the rest of my question aloud. It didn’t matter. Jack knew what I was getting at. His answer was a slow nod and a wolfish smile.

  Well okay then.

  To the dismay of my hormones—which were now popping Altoids and turning on Pony by Ginuwine—I took a step back and put some much-needed space between us. “I’d like to introduce you to my great aunt, Alma Weiler.”

  With his smile tamed and charm kicked up a few notches, Jack took her hand in his. “Jack Price. It’s so nice to meet you.”

  “I assure you, the pleasure is mine.”

  I busted out laughing when I turned and finally saw the full effect of her costume. As promised, she was metallic from head to toe, thanks to a gold lamé pantsuit, body paint, and hairspray. She looked like she belonged on the set of the third Austin Powers movie.

  “What happened to the bodysuit?”

  She ran a painted hand down the front of her outfit. “I saw this when I was shopping for Vegas clothes and couldn’t pass it up. I’m thinking of wearing it to the Magic Mike show, minus the body paint and crusader’s sword, of course.”

  “Of course,” I echoed, glancing at the plastic prop in her other hand. “Wait, where’s Olivia?”

  “In the bounce house burning off some candy I let her have on the way.”

  Before I suggested we go get her to hit the trunk-or-treating circuit, Jack tilted his head at my aunt. “Alma Weiler… Why do I know that name?”

  Aunt Alma’s flirtatious smile was back in an instant. “Have you seen Bound for Fury or The Blue Light Heist?”

  “Bound for Fury when I was in middle school.” His eyes grew wide as his brain connected the dots. I’d seen the same look hundreds of times over the years and it never got old. That was impossible when it was my aunt we were talking about. Family tree aside, Alma Weiler was a good woman. Even after a successful television and film career that spanned the better part of five decades, her head still fit through every doorway and she was just as down-to-earth as us regular joes.

  She used her fame and money to spoil her friends and family, but not too much. Even in college, I still had a part-time job and a kitchen cabinet full of ramen and macaroni. At the end of every school year, she flew me home first class and took me to the spa, then made me work off the cost of my coach ticket back to campus. If you let your blessings go to your head, they’re not blessings anymore, she always said.

  We had a frank discussion before graduation about her not calling in any favors, not that she knew a lot of people in the TV news world. Still, I wanted to know that whatever job I landed, I did it on my own merits. Her eyes got a little teary when I said that, and then she squeezed my shoulders and said, “That’s my girl.”

  “I can’t believe Stella ‘The Badass’ Caputo is your aunt,” Jack marveled, his eyes still wide. “My parents are gonna freak. Would you mind if I introduced you to them?” He dipped his head, looking a little embarrassed at his request, but really, it was adorable. He was adorable. And sexy. And brave. And I hadn’t felt this way about anyone in eons.

  Aunt Alma aimed a quick wink at me, then slipped her hand around Jack’s elbow and beamed up at him. “Are you kidding? I live for this stuff.”

  I joked about being chopped liver as I trailed behind them, but mostly I was dodging trick-or-treaters and trying to keep my heart inside my chest because Aunt Alma had just given me her seal of approval and that, ladies and gentlemen, wasn’t easily won.

  She’d dealt with more than her fair share of fake people in Hollywood—both in personalities and body parts—so she could spot a bull-you-know-whatter with one eye closed from a mile away. I love that Jack passed muster in the first five minutes of meeting him.

  For now, I took a mental picture of the two of them, arm in arm, and tucked it in my Things-That-Made-My-Ovaries-Explode box.

  Jack

  Preparation is the key to success. I’d taken that mantra as my own about halfway through elementary school, around the time I realized my stutter wasn’t going anywhere. On days when my teacher made the class take turns reading out loud, I’d count ahead to either practice my paragraph or strategically time a trip to the bathroom if I knew there was no point in even trying. Thankfully, I didn’t usually have a problem saying my Bs.

  My Js, on the other hand, were a different (and rather unfortunate) story that resulted in me not being able to say my name properly until I was damn near twenty. Every time I’d try—literally, every single time—my mouth and brain and vocal cords would act like feuding relatives. They’d acknowledge each other’s existence but refuse to help each other, making me look like an idiot who needed a running start to get his own fucking name out. I’d even spent my entire freshman year of high school trying to convince Diego’s parents to adopt me and change my name to Javier.

  Once I finally overcame the pronunciation hurdle, I buried the memories of a decade’s worth of failed introductions and didn’t look back. Well, until tonight, and only because Dicky Dick felt like raising the dead.

  Trunk-or-treating was nearly over, and Mayor Carter had just left with her kids after a successful interview and two full candy buckets. I was more than ready to return to my parents’ truck, where I’d left Tuesday, when I passed Channel 3’s village idiot.

  “Hey, J-J-J-Jack.” He glanced up from his camera bag and tried to make his sneer look like a smile. “So, you and Tuesday, huh?”

  I planned on walking right by him, but his question had me freezing mid-stride. My right hand balled into a fist that desperately wanted to connect with his pretty-boy face. He had no business talking about her in any capacity, but especially not like he was privy to details abou
t my personal life or hers. He shouldn’t even be allowed to say her name. Assholes like him deserved to have two Mondays and then a Wednesday.

  He stood up and slung his camera bag on his shoulder. “How’d you two meet, anyway?”

  I could lie and tell him I rescued her one fateful evening in Goodwood Barbecue when she choked on a bite of food. Or that we shared an Uber pool after a pub crawl. Or that we caught eyes over a display of apples at Fred Meyer.

  Instead I said nothing, because fuck him and the deranged horse he rode in on.

  The bastard just shook his head and laughed to himself. “You realize she’s out of your league, right?”

  Of course she was. His too, and every other man’s within a hundred-mile radius. The difference was, I knew that while Dicky believed he was out of her league. He really was a stupid sonofabitch.

  I forced my fist open and shrugged like I didn’t have a care in the world. “It was nice seeing you, Ricky. If you’ll excuse me, I have a raincheck that needs my attention.”

  When I was fourteen, I scored my first Playboy magazine. One of the guys on the baseball team stole it from his dad and we took turns passing it around during the season. It wasn’t hard to spot who was taking it home after practice—you just had to find the guy with the shit-eating grin on his face. I felt like that tonight, and it’d started with the text Tuesday sent as I slid my key into the deadbolt.

  Tuesday: I’m gonna jump in the shower to get rid of this hairspray. I’ll leave the door unlocked. Just come in when you get here.

  Me: You shouldn’t leave the door unlocked, especially on Halloween.

  Tuesday: You’re cute when you worry about my safety.

  Me: You’re a beautiful woman who lives alone. I’ve watched Dateline. I’ll hurry up so I can protect you from the ghosts and goblins.