Muscle

by Lexi Whitlow

  “Are you always this persistent?” she asks me.

  “Yes,” I admit. “When I know the thing I want is worth the effort.”

  Winter bites her lip, clenching her jaw. Her wheels are turning. I’m wearing down her resolve.

  “Take a risk, Winter,” I say. “Being forbidden makes it even better.”

  She swallows hard, looking around to check to see who’s watching. Satisfying herself that most of the attention in the room is focused on my date, Dylan, and that insufferable diva, Keira, she says, “Give me your phone.”

  Thirty seconds later I have her digits saved, and a promise secured for a real date.

  “You pick the place,” I say. “Somewhere you like.”

  “Your place,” she says. “We’re going stealth. You offered to make me dinner before. Show me your new apartment. Make me quesadillas.”

  “I can do that,” I tell her. “Tomorrow?”

  She nods.

  Just then I see the Conan O’Brian lookalike moving in our direction. He steps up beside Winter, a little too close for my comfort, giving me a look like I’m trespassing on his property.

  “Dylan, we should probably get back to your dad and the crew. I’m sure Mr. Vaughn has some mingling he needs to do.”

  I shake my head, smiling at him. “Nope, I’m all mingled out. Just fine, right here. But you’re welcome to mingle elsewhere.”

  Winter shoots me a deer-in-the-headlights look. She’s adorable when she’s freaked out.

  The guy glares at me. I put out my hand. “Gates,” I say. “We haven’t met.”

  He reluctantly shakes my hand. His grip is like holding a damp dishrag.

  “Blair Thomas,” he says. “Assistant Producer at Addison. I work for Bill.”

  He states this with a tone of implication, as if his employment situation should matter to me.

  “I’m reasonably sure nearly everyone in this room works for Bill in one capacity or another,” I observe, sipping my whiskey. Some are just shoved further up his ass than others.

  “That’s true,” Blair says, narrowing his eyes on me even more disapprovingly. “And the smart ones who plan to stay in his employ quickly learn where their place is, and to stay in it.”

  “Blair, please—” Winter says, trying to rein him in.

  “I’d like to see anyone attempt to show me my place, and try to make me stay in it,” I respond, fixing my gaze harshly on this smug punk. “Might be fun to watch, ringside. For about fifteen seconds.”

  Blair Thomas blanches white, the color draining fast from his already pasty face. He puts his hand on Winter’s arm, urging her to come with him. It’s all I can do not to rip that errant hand out of its socket.

  Winter shakes her head, urging me not to respond. Her eyes are imploring, begging me.

  “It was good seeing you again, Miss Addison,” I say, giving in. “I look forward to meeting you soon.”

  A few moments later, Dylan finds me. She circles her arm inside mine, leaning into me.

  “Can you please get me the fuck out of this room and away from all these plastic, fake people?” she asks, smiling broadly like she’s telling me a happy story. “My feet are killing me, and if I have to smile at one more creep, I’m going to pull these stilettos off and put someone’s eyes out with the heels.”

  “Gladly,” I respond, entertained with her accurate assessment of the room. “Let’s bolt.”

  We pass Blair Thomas and Winter on our way out. Winter nods, then gives Dylan the stink eye behind her back. I laugh, knowing that she knows it’s all for show.

  Tomorrow I get to prove that, finally.

  Chapter 9

  Winter

  Managing Gates Vaughn without blowing both our worlds apart is going to be about as challenging as donning a red cape and leading a bull through a China shop without breaking anything expensive. He is singularly focused and doesn’t seem to grasp the fact that my father takes his rules seriously.

  Gates hasn’t even started shooting yet, and he’s already bucking the system. Which is damned attractive. He’s the only person I know who isn’t intimidated by my father. There’s something to be said for that.

  This time I’m going to take it slow and measured. We’ll have dinner, a glass of wine, and a nice conversation. Margot has been trying for months to get me to put up a web site and sell my photography online. I finally bit the bullet and started working on that, so that’s one thing we can talk about.

  Gates’ new apartment is all the way across the city from where I live. It’s a block south of Hollywood Boulevard, at the corner of North Fairfax and Selma Avenues, in the heart of hipster West Hollywood, where all the beautiful people live.

  It takes me more than an hour to make the drive across the flat grid of the Los Angeles basin, and I’m running late when I finally arrive, buzzing the security box at the gate so he can let me in.

  “I thought you changed your mind,” Gates voice says over the small speaker on the box. “I’m glad you didn’t, because I made enough quesadillas to feed the entire third fleet.”

  The apartment building is new, and a post-modernists wet dream of faux adobe, paying homage to the native hacienda-style architecture of a long distant era, brought into the twenty-first century with towering glass walls, skylights, solar panels, and brushed-steel framing and decoration.

  Gates meets me at his door wearing faded jeans, a comfortably rumpled Navy t-shirt, and bare feet, along with a boyish smile that reveals he’s nervous.

  “Come on in,” he says, showing me forward. “A little bit nicer than the last place.”

  His new apartment is a substantial upgrade from the grubby closet I visited in Long Beach. It’s got great light, high ceilings, and a wide-open, flowing floorplan with golden hardwood floors and walls of glass, offering a nice view of the rising Hollywood Hills to the north and the sprawling city falling gently down to the west. It’s minimal, with almost no furniture or interior decoration. There are a few boxes stacked in a corner of the dining room. It’s clear he’s just moved and hasn’t even started unpacking.

  “Sorry it’s a little spare,” Gates says apologetically. “I’m still working on furnishing the place. I don’t really know what I’m doing in that arena.”

  At least he has a couch—a different one than the crusty, worn out number from Long Beach—and a breakfast table and chairs in the kitchen.

  “You look beautiful,” he says. “As always.”

  I’m just casual in jeans and a simple blouse. I didn’t want to dress for a date, as I don’t want to lead Gates on. The goal of this evening is to take everything slow, convince him to manage his expectations, and reinforce the idea that my father is a force that should be taken seriously.

  With that in mind, I ignore the compliment and change the subject.

  “Dinner smells good,” I offer, conscious of how thin my voice sounds. I wish I could understand why being in Gates presence makes me feel anxious and comfortable, all at the same time. It’s a contradiction I can’t reconcile.

  “Come to the kitchen with me,” he says. “It’s almost done. I’m putting together the salad. You can help.”

  Gates Vaughn is insane if he thinks I can help in the kitchen. Slicing and dicing isn’t in my wheelhouse. I was raised with a full-time, private chef who has his own staff.

  The kitchen is small but well-organized, with plenty of counterspace in polished black granite. Gates tosses me a tangerine.

  “Peel that,” he instructs, giving me a small paper bowl for the pieces, while he slices a couple avocados into wedges.

  “Where’d you learn to cook?” I ask, genuinely curious.

  He shrugs his broad shoulders nonchalantly. “I dunno. At home, from my mom. From the guys I worked with. Just paying attention to what I like and what works.” He looks up from his cutting board, smiling as I struggle to peel the leathery skin away from the fruit. “It helps that I like to eat. Cooking is sort of a necessity. How about you?”


  I bite my lip. Gates has no real sense of the class or economic divide between us. I was fifteen years old before I ever ventured inside an actual grocery store, and only then because Margot and I got fake IDs and were attempting to buy beer.

  “I can’t cook,” I admit. “I eat out a lot, and we have a cook at home who does all that.”

  Gates’ eyebrows raise. He nods. “You live in Beverly Hills, I bet.”

  I shake my head, smiling awkwardly. “Beverly Hills is for Chinese real estate investors, and the retirement set, or the occasional upstart pop-star with more money than sense. I live at Palos Verdes, on the peninsula west of the city. A lot of film industry executives live there, along with a few upstart pop-stars with more money than sense.”

  “Never heard of it,” Gates says. “Probably because they wouldn’t let me in the gate.”

  “Something like that,” I admit reluctantly.

  He lays out place settings at the table, then gathers my tangerine slices, breaking them up, combining them with black beans, corn, and diced tomatoes, tossing them into a salsa. He’s also made spicy brown rice with roasted red peppers to go with our main course.

  “I hope you like shrimp,” Gates says, pulling the baked quesadillas from the oven. They’re steaming and smell fantastic. “Shrimp, with just a little apple smoked bacon, hot pepper jack cheese, and spinach.”

  He really can cook.

  Over our meal, which is delicious, we talk about my new web site I’m building, and my hope that people will buy my photographs for stock work and maybe even to hang on their walls. I admit the idea was Margot’s, and without her encouragement I probably would have given up on doing my own stuff long ago. Gates listens intently, his eyes darkening when he hears the tenor of defeat in my tone.

  “I think your father’s really done a number on you,” he observes with a touch of anger in his voice. “Three years ago, you were brimming, almost cocky. And now you’re talking about quitting your dreams.”

  I shrug, lifting my wine glass. “Maybe my dreams were a too ambitious.”

  “Or maybe your father just couldn’t bear the idea of you spreading your wings, making your own way, not needing him.”

  “Maybe,” I say.

  “He seems like the kind of guy who insists on taking credit for everyone else’s success. He likes to choreograph people, make them dance to his tune. What do you suppose made him that way?” Gates asks.

  I could speculate, but honestly, I don’t know much about my father. I only know what he chooses to reveal, which is precious little, except his general disapproval.

  After dinner, it’s my turn to ask Gates questions about his life. We settle on the couch with a second bottle of wine, while a deep orange glow from the setting sun in the west fills the room, coloring everything warm and cozy.

  He tells me about his childhood growing up in Chesapeake, Virginia. His father and mother divorced when he was very young, and his mom worked at the Navy shipyard, as an accountant at the base commissary. He got exposed to a lot of soldiers and sailors from an early age. Before he was halfway through high school, he knew he was going to be a SEAL.

  “I found a couple guys in town who had been through BUD/S and got them to show me some of the stuff they had to do. I think I was about fourteen years old. Just a skinny little kid,” Gates says, smiling with fond recollection. “I found more stuff on YouTube, and I just started training hard, getting in shape, getting ready to do all the things I knew I’d have to do in BUD/S. By the time I got there, everything except the sleep deprivation part was easy for me.”

  I don’t know a lot about SEAL training, but I know very few have ever described it as easy.

  “My mom wasn’t thrilled when I joined up,” he says. “But I was a solid C+ student in high school. Bored stiff with everything except physed and math. It seemed like a good idea at the time. That is until the bullets and RPGs started flying.”

  Gates offers a wry smile. “In retrospect, I’d say you probably made better decisions. Your kind of shooting makes a lot more sense.”

  He tops off my wine glass, as we talk more about his time in New York and Paris, working as a model. The way he describes it, it’s a lot less glamorous that I envisioned it. Being a fashion photographer was all I ever wanted to do.

  “I know a lot of people,” Gates says. “Not that I want you to go to New York or Paris, but your father’s reach probably doesn’t go that far. I could make some calls if you’re still interested. You could try it out like I did. Just throw caution to the wind, move there and start scrambling for work.”

  The idea of doing that has crossed my mind a thousand times, and a thousand times the fear of failing and the unknown has stopped me. My father would cut me off entirely. I’d be alone in a strange city with no friends, and worse, no money. I don’t know how to do that. I wouldn’t even know how to begin. I try to explain it to Gates, but he just laughs.

  “That’s gotta suck,” he quips. “Gilded cage and all that. You never had to hitch a ride or bum money for lunch? You never had to pay your own rent?”

  I shake my head.

  Gates takes me in with an expression that’s half amused, and half sad. “Hang out with me, I’ll teach you a thing or two about improvisation in time of need.”

  I bet he could teach me that, and plenty more useful things.

  “I’m really glad you came,” he says, reaching forward, laying his hand near mine, then gently touching my fingertips with his. “I’ve thought about you so many times. Wondering how I could find you. Wondering why you walked away from me that morning after—”

  “Gates, you scared the daylights out of me,” I interrupt, withdrawing my hand from his touch. It’s everything I can do not to hurtle myself at him, kiss those lips. I want nothing more than to slide my hands into his short, dark hair—but that’s not why I came here. “You’re too intense. That night was… It was overwhelming. I just knew if I stayed… I’d—”

  “Never leave?”

  I nod anxiously. He makes my belly ache, down low, deep inside.

  “I felt the same way.” His voice drops low, almost to a whisper. “Except it didn’t scare me. It was the best feeling I ever had. I still feel exactly the same way, and I think you do too.”

  He’s right. This isn’t going how I planned it.

  “What’s so scary about being with someone who makes you feel good?” Gates asks, this time reaching forward without restraint, taking both my hands firmly in his. I can’t resist him, because I don’t want to.

  I can’t answer his question either, because I have no sensible answer.

  “Somebody’s convinced you that it’s bad to get too close, that it’s dangerous to care,” he says. “And I’m really sorry about that. But I’m going to do everything I can to show you, you’re wrong.”

  With a swift, deftly powerful motion, he lifts himself close to me. Purposeful, Gates keeps my hands in his. He stops moving when his face is barely mine, so close I can feel his body heat and taste the scent of him in my nose, on my tongue. His scent is intoxicating and spins my head much more dramatically than the wine I shouldn’t be drinking if I’m going to drive home tonight.

  “I’m going to kiss you,” Gates says. “And if you’re still scared in a few minutes, if you want to stop, you can tell me to stop. But if you kiss me back the way you did before, I’m never letting you go.”

  “Gates, please…” I cry, feeling myself melt under his threats. He’s barely touched me yet, and I’m already coming undone.

  His lips taste like fruity wine and hot peppers, with a citrus bite that tickles my tongue. His breath is hot, hungry, breathing mine into his lungs. Our tongues dance together, finding a rhythm as Gates lifts me up and pulls me forward onto his lap. I can’t help myself. My hands fall to his broad chest, then slide higher; my fingers lace through the closely shorn hair at the back of his neck. With curious touches, I trace the stubble of a day-old beard along his jawline. The sensation of falling and fligh
t takes over my mind, but my body is tethered to his, lost in the heat of desperate kisses and trembling legs that straddle Gates’ hips.

  Leaving me breathless and panting, Gates breaks our kiss. He pulls back gently, his fingers rising to frame my face.

  “You see,” he whispers, before teasing a flick of tongue against my lips. “You’re not afraid. You know this feels right, like we’re made for each other. It’s just that simple”

  I know he’s right, but I’m not sure I’m ready to dive into this.

  “It’s so much more complicated than you know,” I say. “You have no idea.”

  Gates shakes his head, pulling me near again. “Let me show you just how simple it is.”