She turned to her boyfriend, who sat a mere foot away from her. His knees were turned towards the door, while his delicate fingers were wrapped around the door handle, as if he were ready to escape at any moment. His plump, pink lips bobbed up and down, colliding with each other as he mumbled things to himself…
“Scene 27…. Line three…. Shot five….”
Blythe cocked her head to the side. She hadn’t seen this in him in a while. Behind him, they drove past the empire state building. She smirked to herself. It was so unremarkable.
“… what about the hairbrushes? Shit the hairbrushes. Connaire. It was sitting right there…. It’s a flaw…” He started biting his nails.
Blythe reached over to him, grabbing his hand and placing it in her lap. “What about the hairbrushes?”
Caius’s hazel eyes flashed wide, his head giving a little shake because he had not realized he was saying those things out loud. His broad chest inflated with his breath, but stayed there as his lips stretched into an eye-twinkling smile and he placed his hand on her cheek. “I’m sorry, love.”
Blythe put her hand over his. Even though he’d been in the United States for about three-fourths of his life, it was nice to hear that his Irish accent hadn’t gone anywhere. “You’re nervous. It’s understandable.”
He nodded, a lock of his hair shivering with the movement, and let out his breath.
That’s when Blythe leaned over, planting a kiss on his cheek. “But you shouldn’t be. This film is brilliant.”
“Only because you starred in it.” Caius pulled away to look Blythe in the eye.
Blythe’s face flushed red. “No,” She mumbled. “Because you directed it.”
Caius chuckled. “I love it when you lie to me.” And with that, he kissed her.
One touch of his lips and Blythe wanted to mount him right inside of that limo. She didn’t care if Chris, the driver, would hear them rolling around in the back seat. She needed him to be inside of her, needed to be as close to him as possible right then and there.
But then the limo screeched to a stop.
Even through the tinted windows, Blythe could hear the ruckus of hundreds of people crowded around a small red carpet. The small explosions of camera clicks punctuated the noise in the air. Blythe squinted at the bright lights, her heart fluttering a little at all the sound and excitement. She watched as Chris stepped out of the driver’s seat and rounded the front of the car. Caius came out first and the crowd’s cheers grew at this exposure. The door hung open as he extended a hand out to Blythe.
She looked up at him, taking in his inviting smile, his twinkling eyes, his long ponytail of hair hanging just off of his shoulder. She felt a flutter of excitement as he grabbed her hand and guided her out of the limo. As soon as her loubitons hit the fuzz of that carpet, a light flashed so bright she couldn’t see a thing for a good couple of seconds. The noise rushed in soon after and her veins coursed hot with adrenalin. She was more than ready to show her work to the world.
The line of fans came first.
“Blythe!”
“Oh my God!”
“I love you!”
“I’m gonna cry!”
It was a strange thing feeling this kind of emotion from people who would probably never meet her. It was strange being told that she was an inspiring performer when half the time she had no idea what she was doing. Half of the time, she was leaning on Caius for support: like right at that moment.
He wrapped his arm around her like a small cage, claiming ownership and yet protecting her from everything else. She felt as tall as a goddess with those heals and that dress and yet, somehow, he was always bigger than her. Her lips stretched into a smile as she let her excitement swamp her nerves.
She was so lucky.
“See. This isn’t so bad.” She whispered into his ear. At her height, she hardly had to stretch to reach it.
He nodded. “Only because you’re here.”
That intoxicating voice made her swoon still…. Four years into their relationship. “Oh I love you, Caius.” She hissed.
He nodded. “I’m gonna do something. Just go along with it.”
Before Blythe had a chance to question any of this, Caius dropped to one knee right in front of her. For a split second, in the beginnings of things, she felt exposed and a flash of agitation crossed her face. But then she looked down at him, and it all started to make sense. He pulled out a small velvet box and opened it. A strange hush descended on the crowd of people closest to them.
Blythe realized what was happening. Behind those hazel eyes, there was a man deeply uncomfortable with this; an undeniable authority that cringed at the thought of getting on one knee in front of anyone.
As Blythe looked down at him, she felt like the only one around. The only one that mattered. So, she said, “Yes,” a girlish giggle coming out of her mouth.
He shot up from the carpet, wrapping his arms around her and lifting her off of the ground. More cameras. More cheers. Blythe felt like a princess in his arms. She couldn’t believe she had actually made it. She was so happy about the massive rock on her ring finger that she didn’t even realize that the intimate crowd in the movie theater didn’t even get the joke in the first scene of the film. Nevertheless, they got through the premier with enough laughter, applause and tears for a lifetime. They went home feeling more than accomplished.
The next thing Blythe knew, they were getting calls from all of the major TV networks. Months later, when their wedding planning had already reached full swing and she had landed another job, she somehow managed to fit time in both of their schedules for a Good Morning America interview.
She sat in the high chair in her semi-casual attire, staring at Robin Roberts with a smile plastered onto her face. She could sense Caius’s disapproval: they had been up since a little after five that morning and he was more than exhausted.
“So, tell me about that ring!”
Blythe blinked twice. She couldn’t understand how a person could be so freaking excited that early. “Oh…” she lifted her ring finger.
Robert’s almond eyes went wide at this as she sucked in her cheeks. “This is absolutely exquisite. Can we get a camera on this?”
Some guy zoomed in on the camera he was holding.
Blythe could see Caius smiling out of the corner of her eye.
“Tell us about it?”
Blythe sucked in a deep breath. It seemed odd talking about her wedding ring with another woman when her fiancé was mere feet away from her, almost blasphemous. But that was the job, so, “It’s a vintage white diamond.”
Roberts raised an eyebrow and turned to the audience, the whole thing horribly staged. “We actually did some research and found…”
Oh God. Blythe never wanted to know what Caius had determined was an appropriate amount of money to spend on her.
“… It is valued at a staggering, 2.4 million dollars.”
Blythe’s heart skipped a beat.
Wow.
“So tell me what led to this whole romance? How did you two meet?”
Blythe looked at Caius. It was time for him to do some of the work.
He glanced at her before saying, “I met her when I lived in Portland. I did mostly independent films at that point in my life and she did mostly modeling.”
That eyebrow on Roberts’s forehead went up yet again. “A model?”
Blythe nodded. “I was the epitome of the pageant girl.” Then she stopped talking. She hated that part of her life.
So Caius picked up. “Anyway, she auditioned for one of my films and I fell in love with her.”
Roberts leaned into him, her eyes wide with infatuation.
It was something Blythe had become accustomed to: watching other women swoon at him right in front of her with such openness.
“Just like that?”
Caius lied, “Of course.”
It wasn’t, “just like that.” They had hated each other at first. They hated each other for y
ears. But then they needed each other…and then they loved each other.
***
Blythe pretended to yawn. Their private jet had started its descent into Portland and her ears were popping again. The low murmur of voices from the camera crew in the back of the plane drifted towards her over the roar of the aircraft rushing through the sky. Across from her sat Caius, his eyes buried in the rough manuscript of a new script. Working. Always working.
She let out a sigh to herself, pressing her back against the designer leather and pursing her lips. Her stomach flopped about nervously in her gut. She was terrified of staying with her mother after three years of ignoring her calls. They had agreed on a small reality special shaped around their love story. $3 million to start, then royalties on top of that. It was like getting payed for good publicity. Yet, as the plane took a nose dive and she got much closer to home than she had been in a long time, she couldn’t help but to regret her decision.
She felt a firm hand on her knee and looked up to find Caius staring down at her, his manuscript cast aside and his eyes wide and focused on only her.
“I’m excited to meet your mother,” He said.
It was simple. Elegant. And perfect. Blythe smiled. Suddenly, she wasn’t nervous anymore.
The pilot eased their plane onto the runway of the small private airport just outside of Portland. Before the aircraft had even reached a full stop, the camera men were preparing their equipment. Blythe unbuckled her belt and stood up, stretching her hands over her head. The last, sorry conversation she had had with her mother was more than depressing: her mother crying over the phone, asking for more money and more money and more money; guilting Blythe into writing her check after check.
As she descended the steps of the jet, she couldn’t help but feel a little nostalgic. There was her mother, looking tiny on the giant runway just twenty feet away from her. She slipped the hood off of her yellow parka, revealing a full head of black hair streaked with gray. It rustled in the wind.
“Mom.” Blythe murmured to the sound of cameras clicking over and over again. Her eyes stung with tears in spite of it all.
“Oh B.” she said, as if they were long lost lovers.
Blythe could feel the warm salty liquid of her mother’s tears seeping into her cardigan. She resented her mother for it, hated the fact that she would even deign to cry after all that she had done and said to her.
“Blythe?” Caius’s voice slithered into her ear. She could feel his hand on the small of her back.
Blythe stepped back, her hand clasping his. They were like two magnets, coming together as if the rules of nature had already necessitated it. “This is Caius O’Neal…”
Her mother nodded eagerly. “Right. I know.”
And there they were, those big, glossy eyes.
Blythe vomited a little in her mouth. “I think it might rain.” She said in a short voice as she watched the two of them shake hands.
Her mother cleared her throat. “I’ll take you home, then.”
Blythe resented that. Home? Nevertheless, she nodded at the camera men behind her. They gathered their things and followed the three of them to the rows of cars awaiting them. The oldest one; the biggest one; a forest green jeep with faded paint, was the one Blythe went straight to. It was her mother’s car, where she had practically lived while her mother drove her around, forcing her into this pageant and that in the hopes that she would become successful. Her mother betted on Blythe as the only justification of her failures as a wife and career woman.
Soon enough, they had driven through the narrow back roads, the dirt paths and through a small community of houses. The cars piled into the col-de-sac at the end of the street. Her mother cut the engine as Blythe jumped out. She couldn’t tell whether it was the anticipation of being inside of her childhood home, or the utter inability to spend another moment with her mother that propelled her forward. Either way, she needed to get inside.
Her mother’s hands shook as she unlocked the door.
Soon enough all seven of them had poured into the small front hall. Blythe glanced around. Everything looked exactly the same, albeit a little faded and a little smaller.
“I, uh, fixed up your room for you.” She said, her eyes illuminated by the red light of a camera.
Blythe nodded, grabbing Caius’s hand and leading him up to her bedroom. She pushed the door open, her heart swelling at the sight of it all: a queen sized bed covered in a cozy, but faded looking quilt. A wall covered in medals and another wall covered in shelves, which housed trophies. A Miss Oregon sash hanging on a hook right beside her window. A dresser covered in all of her old favorite drugstore cosmetic brands. A bowl of sponge rollers. An old mug.
“Wow.” Caius said.
Blythe took one look at his raised eyebrow and burst into laughter. It was like the two of them had stepped inside of a time machine. “You have no idea how bizaar this is for me.” She whispered.
He wrapped his arms around her, planting a kiss on her forehead. “No. I think I do.” With that, he shifted his gaze to the lone camera man that had managed to fit himself into the room.
He nodded and backed out of the room.
Blythe smirked at this. It was something she couldn’t have ever accomplished. Caius had a talent for getting people to do what he wanted them to, even if he never verbalized it out loud.
When she turned back to look at Caius, his deep frown and furrowed brow wiped the smile off of her face. She wrapped her arms around his waist. “What’s up with you?”
He looked down at her, his eyes widening as if he was being made aware of her presence for the first time. “What do you mean?”
Blythe nudged him. “You’re being odd.”
He shook his head, shifting his gaze away from her. “It’s nothing… Just—“ He set his jaw.
“Just what?” Blythe ducked her head, resting her chin on the back of his shoulder.
“It’s not all sunshine… coming back here,” He said.
There it was. “We talked about this a hundred times.” She said, stepping in front of him.
He nodded. “You talked about it. It was hardly a conversation.”
Blythe bit her lip. “Why are you telling me this now? I can’t do anything about it now.”
He glanced down at her. “You asked what’s wrong.”
“Yes, but I assumed it wasn’t hindsight.”
Caius gave her an even stare. “It really has nothing to do with you. This place. It’s…”
Blythe could almost see his muscles hardening.
“It’s not good for me.”
Blythe nodded, taking his head in her hands. A wave of guilt washed over her. How could she not have considered what he was too embarrassed, too macho to admit out loud? “I know. I’m sorry.” she said. She lifted her weight onto her tiptoes so that she could plant a kiss on his lips, but he moved his face away.
“You don’t know.”
She furrowed her brow.
“You have to understand, there are things about my life here. Things that happened to me before I met you that I just… I can’t let them see.”
“So why don’t you just tell me?”
“Because I can’t.”
Blythe wanted to squeeze him. “I’m about to marry you and you won’t even tell me your past?”
Caius placed a hand on her cheek. “I love you and you know me now. You know me better than anyone else out there. Isn’t that enough.”
Blythe found it incredibly selfish to say otherwise… so she nodded.
He reached down and kissed her, their lips intertwined, their bodies pressed against each other. There was a small lull; a short moment during which she was processing everything happening to her. Then her body kicked in. Goosebumps rose on every inch of her skin and the warmth in between her legs was impossible to deny. Their heavy breaths matched.
Caius went up for air. “I have to have you.”
Before Blythe could respond, he flipped her over so that
her palms were pressed against the window. A thick curtain separated their steaming lust from the rest of the world. She bit her lips at the sensation of his fingertips tiptoeing up the inside of her blouse. But then her mind caught up with her body. “Wait.” She said, grabbing the hem of her shirt.
He froze, “Blythe…” The word slithered out of his mouth.
“They could be right outside.” She said. “They could be recording.”
She heard his breath catch before he abruptly stepped away from her.
She turned just in time to watch him readjust the bulge in his pants, an agitated frown on his face. “Are we not supposed to touch each other while we’re here?”
Blythe admitted to herself that the prospected of keeping herself away from him for a whole ten days was almost impossible to accomplish, so she came up with an idea. “No. We can go hiking.”
Part two
Blythe dragged Caius behind her up the slippery incline. Their Timberlands were barely catching traction and, with every step, there was an incredibly dramatic misstep and explosion of laughter. Even though Blythe had the best personal trainer in the business, she could feel the strain on her back and the ache in her calves. She was ready to stop.
“Oh? That fast?” Caius said, panting.
They had reached a small, grassy plateau; a meadow thousands of feet above sea level.
Blythe swept her gaze across the expanse of grass and flowers. A little bit of sunlight had finally broken through the clouds. “Oh please, I can hear you panting too, love,” She said.
He shrugged. “But I’m perfectly happy with persevering.”
She raised an eyebrow, taking a step towards him. “Are you?” she asked. “Perfectly happy, you say?”
His eyes scanned her body, going right for her chest, which he could see through her open rain coat. Her V-neck, Gucci sweater hung low. Blythe’s mouth watered at the way his eyes dropped and his jaw hung slightly ajar. She shrugged out of her backpack and let it drop beside her. By the time it hit the ground, he had closed the distance between the two of them.
VAMPIRE:Vampire Guardian Series: Paranormal Mystery Vampire Alpha Male Romance (New Adult Contemporary Paranormal Royalty Fantasy Romance Collection)) Page 49
