“What’s wrong?” he asks, pulling me inside with his free hand and leading me to the couch.
“Everything. Nothing. I just wanted to see you.” I drop down on the couch, and when he sets the script aside, I curl into his chest and inhale him. He smells of a recent shower and spices, a scent I now associate with Ian Ford. “My mom just signed the divorce papers. It’s over.” Don’t cry again, Sara! You’re stronger than this.
“I’m sorry.” Ian strokes his hand along the back of my head, his tone low and sad.
“I don’t know why… I can’t wrap my head around…” I shake my head, wondering why it hurts so much when I knew it was coming. Did I think Dad would change his mind? That things would right themselves somehow?
I think of Ian and his own marriage disappointment, and wonder how hard it has been for him. I lift my eyes to his and feel them blur again. “Why would someone do this to the person they love? My dad loved my mother. And your wife? I would never want anyone else but you. I would never even look at another guy the way I know I look at you. You didn’t deserve what she did to you!” I’m emotional and I try to get a grip.
Ian takes me by the wrists and pulls me to my feet.
“What are you doing?”
His arms come around me, and he starts moving. “I’m dancing with you.”
He’s holding me to his hard chest, moving side to side.
Realizing what he’s doing, I press my cheek to his chest and move with him. It’s the most perfect thing anyone has ever done for me. “Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it. Only way I know to cheer you up.”
I laugh and let him twirl me out and pull me back to him, my spirits lifting as my body releases all the stress and burden it’s been carrying. How can he know me so well already?
“See, you know this about me.” I narrow my gaze and stare up at him. His hair is disheveled after his recent bath, and I slide my fingers into it. “And I don’t know this about you. How would I cheer you up?”
He seems surprised, as if I’m a dope not to know better. “You cheer me up all the time.”
“How?” I demand.
“Hell, I don’t know. You just do.” He shakes his head, a smile teasing the corner of his mouth. His eyes shift and fill with a curious deep longing.
“I’ll film you!” I decide, having a light-bulb moment. “Or film myself doing something for you. To cheer you up.”
“Just stand here. It’s enough.” His voice roughens as he twirls me out, then back to nearly slam against his chest. “Or dance. Just like this.”
A chuckle runs up his chest and his arms envelop me again. We sway to and fro, slowly and without music, only to the rustle of our clothes, and it feels as if nothing can touch me but my Suit.
Sara
I woke up nervous as hell because today is that audition I found out about the same day my mom got the papers. I’ve been gnawing my nails to stubs at work, and Bryn scolded me when I was shuffling around the office like a nervous wreck.
“Sara. My advice is, go easy on the coffee. And go walk. Get prepared. You won’t be able to nail it when you’re this nervous!”
“Fine,” I tell her saucily and tilt my chin up. “I’ll see if my dirty Suit wants to help me figure out a good, effective method of relaxation.”
I haven’t seen him since I bawled my eyes out, and then danced in his arms, but I know he planned to stay home and read for the rest of the day and finish that script.
He knows how to cheer me up and ease my nerves. He won’t mind the distraction if I make a surprise visit. But I text him to be sure.
Me: Are you interested in a quickie break while you read? Are you still home?
Him: Almost done. Still home.
I’m reading his reply when a new one comes in:
And interested.
Turning to mush with just those two words, I take a cab ride to the Upper East Side, pull out the key from its hiding place (which he showed me before I left), and walk inside.
He’s barking into the phone at the far end of the living area. His living area looks kick-ass with all his brand-new furniture. He’s tieless, the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up to his elbows, his top two buttons unbuttoned, his hair a little rumpled, a drink in his hand.
He turns and spots me. “Right. As soon as possible,” he barks into the phone and hangs up.
My stomach tumbles as I wonder if he was talking to his lawyer. About his divorce. I want to ask him, but at the same time, I don’t want to get in a funk before my audition.
“I can’t stay long—I have an audition in less than two hours,” I say as I approach. I take his drink and set it aside.
His brows fly upward in surprise, and a wicked, wicked smile starts curving his lips as I reach out to grab the collar of his shirt. He reaches out to grab me by the hip and pulls me to his body—his hard wall of a body—and the delicious, shockingly big bulge pressing up against the zipper of his slacks. I groan at the feel of him and rub my fingers up his chest, wanting to feel him.
“An audition?” he asks, in interest.
Sinking my teeth into my bottom lip as I smile, I incline my head in a small gesture of confirmation.
He smiles down at me.
A smile that tightens my sex muscles and my tummy.
“I’ve got to head back to work myself. I’ll drive you.”
He looks incredible. My hands are shaking, and I’m biting my lip as I run my hands up his chest. He eyes my little outfit with interest, tugging my blouse loose from the waistband of my khakis and easing his hand beneath it. He runs his fingertips up my skin as I press myself closer to him, doing the same and running my fingertips under his shirt too.
“Why are you smiling like that?” I frown when he keeps smiling down at me.
“I’m happy to see you. Is that wrong?”
“No.” Heat frissons through me over the look in his eyes. “It’s good.”
“You’re good, and this”—he sets a kiss on my lips, slow and thorough—“is better,” he adds as he cups my ass in his hands and boosts me up.
I twine my legs and arms around him, delighted when he sets me up on the bar top, pulls off my shoes, and starts unbuttoning me. “I don’t like it when you keep your clothes on. I like looking at you too much. I don’t want anything between you and me—especially when we fuck.”
“You have a dirty mouth.” I don’t sound chiding, really, because I kind of like it and I’m actually nibbling on it quite happily right now.
“It’s only dirty when it’s not busy doing other, more pleasurable things. Like sucking your gorgeous tits.” He removes my bra and proceeds to suckle my tits, and I clench my legs around him and pull him closer.
“What other things can this wonderful mouth do?” I whisper as I duck my head and cup his jaw, and when he stops twirling his tongue around my nipple—leaving it red, and hard, and sensitive—he kisses me on the mouth in the way that makes all my thoughts scatter. “It can go down on you. I warn you, though, if I like your taste, I’m going to go on for hours.”
I already know he likes my taste. And that he can go on for hours… and hours… and hours.
My breath hitches, my heart drumming in excitement in ways it drums only when I’m near him. He starts sliding down, and I panic when I remember my audition. Fisting my hands in his hair, I pull him back up. “I don’t have hours, you yummy man. I only have minutes to spare for you.”
“Then let’s make the most of them, shall we?” He grabs my slacks and unbuttons them, pulling them off with a yank. My panties follow. And if I thought I was going to miss out from feeling his mouth between my thighs—oh my God! Oh my God.
Groaning, my head arches back. Because Ian just buried. Buried. His fucking mouth. Between my thighs. And oh! Does he know how to work it. Twirl his tongue. Use it to suck. Lick. Taste. Fuck. My sex in ways I’ve never been fucked before.
I start to swivel my hips, back and forth. I’ve always loved when guys went dow
n on me, but some seem to prefer to only fuck. I suppose they want their dick getting all the action. But this man? Oh my goodness. He tastes me as if he’s been waiting to taste me for a lifetime. As if I’m his favorite flavor. His favorite texture. His favorite scent. His favorite pleasure.
“If I don’t get this interview, it’s your fault for loosening me up too much,” I tell him as he drives me to 43rd and 8th for my audition.
“Sex is good for the nerves.”
“Sex is good before a nap, Ian. Not before an audition.”
“Are you forgetting who did all the work?”
“It’s hard work trying not to come too quickly when you’re going down on me.” I flush, and he stares darkly at me. Hungry.
I purse my lips and try to shake off the tugs in my stomach.
“Here, yummy motherfucker.” I pull him across the car to kiss him and thank him for bringing me. “Have fun filming garbage.”
“I will. I get off on it.”
I cackle and step out of the car, walking away, swishing my hips because I want to give him a little wood to remember me by.
A woman who was entering the building pauses and looks directly at me before shifting her gaze to the car, where Ian sits staring back at us.
“Do you know Ian?”
I hear her voice but I’m distracted. It’s a part I’m excited about, a story of a girl finding herself. And there are three leads, which means better odds of landing a part. “Yes,” I say, pulling myself from my thoughts and focusing on the woman in front of me.
“Interesting.”
“How do you know him?” I ask her.
“We’ve crossed paths. What is he to you?”
I feel possessive. I bristle. “My boyfriend.” I walk past her and open the door, thinking I’ve had the last word when I hear, “Really?”
“He seems to think so.” I turn back, give her a smile, and walk forward to get ready.
“Cordelia,” someone calls her. “A call for you. It’s your husband.”
“Oh really. He doesn’t have time to answer my calls? Well, now I don’t have time to answer his.”
The thing about auditions is you’re just not competing with others. You’re competing with yourself. It doesn’t matter what you have for breakfast and if it bloated you, or that you may be catching a bug. You need to be the best version of yourself because these people don’t want to settle, and they see a lot. They know when you’re settling and giving them a half-assed performance. I don’t want to be half-assed or perform scared as if I’m going to break my ankle again. I plan to do it all the way. As if the guy watching me is my Dirty Workaholic and my life depends on him choosing me.
Hmm. Why does that thought make my stomach flip?
Anyway. Back to business. There are forty-eight of us.
And we’re all bloodthirsty for the part.
Dancers can smell fear from a mile away, and so can the directors.
“From the top,” one of the casting directors says.
I took gymnastics when I was a girl. It helped my dancing in numerous ways, but it especially gave me the strength to backflip and do acrobatics that you’d never get from a normal dance class.
It turns out to be an advantage for this casting, which requires some knowledge of gymnastics.
After the auditions, the blonde I met by the door halts me with a curt “You.” She comes over, her regard making me tip my chin up a little higher. I’ve never been stared at by someone who is so blatantly angry during a casting before. “Your name?” She raises one brow.
“Sara.”
“Sara what?” she barks.
“Sara Davies.”
She purses her lips and heads back to converse with the directors.
They seem to be discussing their decisions intensely for ten minutes.
“We’re calling out the list of our final ten,” the blonde, Cordelia, says. The guy next to her begins reading names, and my stomach sinks when we get to number ten. And there’s no Sara Davies on the list.
Crushed, I am about to force myself to move my ass and get off the stage when the guy hesitates. “Eleven,” he says, looking me straight in the eye. “Sara Davies.”
What?
My eyes widen. I made the finalists?
“From the top,” he calls with a clap.
I’m exhausted by the time I’m done; even my bones feel sore. This was an emotional challenge, but I head out and take off my dance shoes and toss them into my dance bag, feeling good about an audition for the first time since I broke my ankle.
I’m supposed to be back here tomorrow.
Please let this be it.
Ian
I’m livid with Cordelia for making this personal. Livid with life for letting Sara end up here, a lamb wandering into a lion’s den.
“You called her back to have her under your thumb. Don’t tell me you don’t know who she is,” I bark at her, knowing full well what Cordelia has planned. But Sara has no fucking clue that the show she’s got her heart set on is none other than my wife’s first full production, under the company founded with my money.
“I know exactly who she is, and I know exactly why you like her. She’s sort of sassy, Ian.”
I grit my teeth and pull my hair in frustration as I pace the living room of “our” house. “What do you want, Cordelia?”
“I’ll keep her in the show. It’s seriously all this girl wants—she’d pee in a bag if I asked her to. But I’ll only give her a part if you forget about her and come home, Ian. Clean slate.”
“I’m not in love with you anymore.”
“I know. But you have feelings for this girl—I mean come on, you drove her to the audition and kissed her like you wanted to eat her up!” She laughs, not merrily. “So if you don’t do it for me, then do it for her.” She raises her brows.
“I’ve endorsed your Broadway production company—”
“You did, but it was your gift to me, and it’s in the black now. No longer needing your contributions. I’m in full control.”
“You fucked me over before, you think I’m going to let you fuck me over again? You’re sadly mistaken.”
“Ian.” She rushes to stand before me. “She’s a young little thing. Excited. Think about it. I’ll give her the part—IF you give me another chance.”
I take a long, hard look at my almost ex-wife, wondering what I ever saw in her. There’s greed in her eyes, and very little in her heart to recommend her.
“Work may have destroyed our marriage, but my money destroyed you.” I shake my head in warning, narrowing my eyes. “She has talent. She’ll get her big break, and if she doesn’t, at least she wouldn’t have sold her soul or someone else to get it.”
“Think about it, Ian!” She calls as I storm out of our West End home. “You pretend you don’t care, but let’s see how you feel when she’s devastated she lost the part and you could have done something to help her. You’re broken, Ian. I mean, let’s be realistic. What can you offer her?”
I turn around and face her. Broken? I don’t remember what that feels like. Not now that I have Sara. “I’m not, not anymore,” I say in full honesty.
A shocked, bleak look crosses her features, as if I’ve slapped her. “You can’t care about anything but work, it’s what you know you’re good at.”
I shake my head. “All these years. And you don’t know me at all.” I fling open the front door. “I’ll see you at Wahlberg’s.”
And with that I step out.
Sara
My second day auditioning, this time with the eleven finalists, and the bitch blonde was late to arrive. Now she’s been watching me dance up on stage with a pen in her lips and her eyes narrowed.
“Wonderful job, everyone. We’ll call you,” one of the directors tells us after we finish the piece.
Exhaling as I step off the platform, I grab my duffel and change my dancing shoes for my sneakers.
“Sara.”
I turn to see the blonde bit
ch.
“You’re our top contender for the lead. Just wanted you to know.”
I blink, completely taken aback by the nearly blinding megawatt smile on her face. “I am?”
The blonde continues giving me that winning smile. “You are. I have it on the highest authority that you’re in.”
I’m so mind-blown, I’m pretty sure my brain is about to explode as I head outside. I got the lead. I got the lead in a Broadway show. I step out onto the streets and feel like jumping, screaming, throwing myself to the ground, and kicking in glee. But of course I do none of that. I just pump my fist in the air and then try to compose myself as I head toward the train station. That’s when I spot Becka crossing the street. “Becka, what are you doing here?”
“I’m roaming the streets, getting inspiration.”
“You’re crazy. Where are you even sleeping?” I demand.
“Don’t worry—I’ve got myself the best, most unbelievably hot roommate. Some guy who missed his flight too; turns out we know each other’s families, and he’s helping me get my muse.”
“What guy?” I ask, narrowing my eyes in suspicion over the twinkle in her eye. And that’s when my gaze locks past her shoulder on to a figure behind her. A figure leaning against a black SUV. A figure in a Suit. A figure I have touched, kissed, and licked.
Ian Ford, my Dirty Workaholic Film Mogul Extraordinaire, is standing there next to a dog. Next to Milly. My eyes widen. I head over. “What are you doing here?”
Ian doesn’t even break a sweat. “Mills misses you. You said you’d bring a replacement. Turns out today I was it.”
“Ian.” I laugh and chide him with a shake of my head, unable to keep my heart from backflipping. “It’s so bad of me to have done that to your Gran.”
“That’s all right. I already know how bad you are.” He opens the back passenger door of his SUV. Milly hops onto the seat, and Ian opens the front door for me.
“You’re worse. You look all serious, but I know how dirty you are,” I whisper, going up on tiptoe to plant a kiss on his cheek. He lifts his head to Becka.