A Monster and a Gentleman (17 page)

After a quick flash of anger, quickly controlled, Lance had submitted easily. He’d been surprised when Maeve asked him to hold out his hand, but he hadn’t resisted. When it was done, a shaking Lance had dropped into a chair. He hadn’t said anything for a long time.
 

Worried, Oren had jumped in to fill the silence and explained that Maeve could see his past and his future, and from that she’d be able to tell them if he’d been the one to leak the photos.

Lance had been more interested in Maeve than his future. “So there are female monsters?”

“Of course, but we are outnumbered by males.”

“So if there are women monsters, why are the hotties outside dating them?” He jerked his finger at Margo.

“They are novel,” Maeve said bluntly while Margo gave her a death stare.
 

Lena had come in then. “Everything okay?”

“Oh fine, Lance is just asking why our fiancées are dating crappy humans when they could be dating cool female monsters.”

“That’s is not what I said. Well, not exactly…”

“I told them it’s because you’re a novelty.” Maeve said matter of factly to Lena.

“Excuse me?” Lena’s right eyebrow rose half an inch.

Maeve shrugged. “And because the few females are so protected by their families that it’s dangerous to even approach them.”

“Did you just call us easy?” Margo looked ready to kill.

“Easier, yes.” Maeve was unimpressed with Margo’s anger.

“Could we get back to the point of this?” Oren resisted the urge to whack them upside the head so they’d pay attention. “Is Lance the one who leaked the pictures?”

“Of course not,” Maeve said. They all looked at her. “He’d already be dead if he had.”

They all took a moment to absorb that.

Jane stuck her head in. “I’m still looking for Nell.” Her gaze darted to Lance and then she looked at Lena.
 

“He’s clean,” Margo said. “And Maeve is one scary motherfucker. Also, she says the guys are only with us because we’re a novelty and because monster girls are hard to get, whereas we’re easy.”

“Will you let it go?” Lena asked, exasperated.

Oren leaned back and took it all in. They were blocking the door, so he couldn’t go anywhere anyway. Cali picked up her script, flipping through it, apparently uninterested in the conversation. Oren had to admire her focus.

To his surprise, Maeve came and sat by him, resting her hand on his knee even as she replied to Margo.

“Well, if they were with their own kind, they would be able to have sex in their true forms.”

“What are you talking about?” Margo tossed her hair. “We have sex with them when they are monsters.”

All eyes turned to Margo.

Lance whistled. Actors had no privacy anyway, and because they’d been constantly changing not just clothes but their oversized bodies, everyone on set had gotten a good view of them naked.

It had certainly been enough to give Oren an inferiority complex.

Margo looked at Lena, then at Jane. “But…but…you have sex with them in that body too, right?”

Jane bit her lip. Lena shook her head, then choked out, “Of course not, it would be like fucking a baseball bat!”

Margo hissed out a breath. “I’m going to
fucking kill
Runako.”
 

Margo stormed out, followed by Jane, Lena and Cali.

Lance laughed. “I love this job.” He got up to leave, nodding at Maeve. “Thank you for clearing my name.”

“Lance,” she said.

He turned back.

“No one’s future is set. All I see are possibilities.”

Oren wondered what she was doing, and Lance stiffened.

“In the ones where you’re happiest, I see the man. The one who looks like Runako’s human form.”

Lance let out a choked laugh, then pressed his fingers to his chest, over his heart. “Is he happy?”

“Yes, and so are your children.”

Lance let out another laugh. “I knew I’d lose that argument if we stayed together. Thank you, really. I was going to end it, I thought…” Lance shook his head again. “I thought he was too good for me, that being with me would hold him back.”

Maeve smiled gently as Lance opened the trailer door. He paused, then looked over his shoulder. “I wasn’t going to say anything, because, honestly, I didn’t want to be responsible if something happened, but Nell has been acting weird. I thought I saw her sneaking into Henry and Seling’s trailers.”

Oren’s stomach sank. They hadn’t been able to find Nell, and Oren had a bad feeling that it wasn’t a coincidence.

“Thanks for telling us,” Maeve said.

“Thank you,” Lance said, “for making sure I didn’t make a terrible mistake.”

The door closed behind him.

Oren put his hand on Maeve’s, where it rested on his knee. “That was kind of you.”

“I should not.” Maeve sighed and leaned back. “But in all the futures without the man, he dies in less than ten years.”

“Jesus.” Oren shook his head.

“In some from the human disease AIDS, in many he kills himself. The man he loves will save him, and I’m not sure, as it was so far in the future it was hard to see, but one of the children they adopt and raise will cure that same human disease.”

Oren blinked as the magnitude of what she said sunk in. If Lance had broken up with his boyfriend, he’d be dead in five years, and if that happened they’d never adopt the kid who’d find the cure to AIDS.

“I was thinking about you last night,” Oren said.
 

Maeve turned to face him. “What were you thinking?”

“I thought that it must be very depressing, doing what you do. You see all the sadness and hurt in people’s lives, know what bad things will happen to them, but…”

Maeve said nothing, but the way her eyes searched his face made him think she was taking what he was about to say very seriously.
 

“But what you see is really hope, isn’t it? For all the bad, you see the hope too.”

She smiled. It lit up her face, made her eyes sparkle. Oren wanted to grab her and kiss her. He didn’t care that she was so different, so Other. He wanted her.

“Both my people and yours are on the brink of disaster or annihilation, every day. And yet I see futures full of joy. That does give me hope.”

Oren couldn’t help himself. He touched a lock of her hair, then her cheek. She gasped and he pulled his hand back.

“Don’t,” she said. “Don’t stop.”

Oren carefully cupped her cheek.

“I’m too old for you.”

“How old are you?”
 

“Forty-three.”

Maeve rolled her eyes. “I’m far older than that.”

“No, you’re not.” She couldn’t be more than twenty-five.

“My breed have long, long lives. I am almost three times as old as you.”

Oren let that sink in. She was over one hundred years old.
 

“I’m too old for you,” she said, with a flash of uncertainty in her voice.

Oren shrugged. “I’ve dated women older.”

She threw back her head and laughed, and Oren joined her.

There was a clatter outside, followed by cursing, and someone dropped something. This wasn’t the time or the place for this discussion, or anything that might come from it.

“Maeve?”

“Yes?”

“Would you like to go to dinner tonight?”

Her eyes sparkled. “Yes, I would.”

Oren wandered through the set, checking out restaurants on his phone.
 

He was going on a date.

He hadn’t been in a date in a while and was short on ideas for restaurants. He checked places in Hollywood, which wouldn’t be too far from the condo where she was staying, and then, just for fun, checked places further north, closer to him.

He’d be lying if he said he didn’t hope tonight ended up in sex.
 

He heard Cali and headed towards her, planning to ask for some advice. As he rounded the corner, he saw that she was working with Akta and Henry.

“Henry, I’m not really getting anything from you. This is an emotional moment. You’ve just flown halfway across L.A., hoping to find the woman you love, not sure if she’s still alive. You almost expect her to be dead, and when you realize she’s not, when you see her alive and unhurt…”

Cali motioned and Henry bowed his head and folded his wings, getting into character.

Akta was sitting on the ground a few feet away, in a pantomime of the scene, where she’d be tied to one of the steel supports in the construction site.
 

Henry took a few steps back. His fingers curled, talons glistening in the light. As a monster, he had blue skin and wings, which made him damned near impossible to spot when he was flying.

But when he was angry…

His skin started to change color. Like ink spreading in a bowl of water, his skin turned black, his wings red. It was terrifying.

He snarled, white fangs seeming to glow against his black skin.

With a jerk, he ran for Akta. He threw himself to the ground in front of her, curling his wings around her as he looked over his shoulder, scanning for her kidnapper.

“Pull one wing back,” Cali said, eyes darting over the scene to assess what the camera would need.

Henry folded it back, giving Oren, Cali and later the camera a glimpse of Akta protected by his body.
 

Akta tipped her face up to him. Tears glittered on her lashes. “You found me.”

“I will always—” Henry raised his hand to touch her face.

He froze, his hand inches from her. As Oren watched, his skin faded from black back to blue.

“Henry…” Cali’s voice was low, urgent. “Stay in the moment, you’ve found her, but there’s still a threat, the people who did this will pay.”

“I can’t.” He pushed to his feet and walked away, leaving Akta sitting on the ground.

Oren backed up. Cali had her hands full. He’d have to find restaurant tips somewhere else.
 

But as he walked away, he was worried. Henry and Akta’s relationship was the core of the story. He’d seen a few of their scenes come through already, but the dialogue-heavy emotional ones weren’t scheduled until the end. They were front-loading location and action shots in an effort to get the movie made before they caught the attention of the industry. Once the action scenes were done, they could use sound stages and green screen to do emotional scenes with whatever blurry background was closest.
 

Based on what he just saw, they may be in trouble.
 

Chapter Twelve

Cali and Seling

It was just after sunset, and they were finally done filming for the day. Cali headed for her trailer, where script pages for tomorrow waited. There was also a bottle of champagne, chocolate and strawberries. Margo had gone out for the items, as well as to Cali’s condo for a set of lingerie. The preparation was wasted. Cali had planned to seduce Seling tonight, but filming had, of course, run long, and she’d missed him.

“Cali?”

She turned to see the transportation coordinator rushing over.

“Everything okay, Cecy?”

“I wanted to let you know that Seling is still on set.”

“What? Why?”

“He didn’t show up at his pickup time. We were backed up, and I figured he’d show up, but he hasn’t yet.”

“We need to find him.” Cali’s heart clenched. What if something happened to him?

“No, no.” Cecy shook her head. “I’m sorry, I’m telling this all wrong. I know where he is—he’s asleep in his trailer. I just wanted to let you know that he’s on set.”

“Where’s his wrangler?” Movie sets had strict rules about who could interact with talent. Transportation crew wasn’t on that list, but wranglers were. It was the wrangler’s job to make sure talent was where they needed to be, but they only had a few wranglers covering all the actors.

“I think she’s off already.”

“Okay.” Cali bit her lip, thinking.

“If you have someone wake him up, I have a car still waiting for him.”

“No, it’s okay, I’ll make sure he gets home. Take off.”

“Okay, thanks, Cali.”

“Thank you, Cecy.”

When the other woman had walked away, Cali let the grin she’d been holding back spread across her face.
 

Ten minutes later, Cali slunk across the set to Seling’s trailer. Almost everyone was gone, though a set was never really deserted. She saw a few people, including security guards, and rather than have to talk to them, she stuck to the shadows.
 

When she reached Seling’s trailer, she eased the squeaky door open.
 

He was facedown on the bed in the back. He was human—which made sense, as he didn’t fit in the trailer otherwise. Shirtless and with his jeans riding low, he looked good enough to eat. The flames on his back begged to be touched.