Just Physical (17 page)

Her head falling back, Jill groaned.

“Too much?” Crash asked, stilling her fingers.

“No. God, no. Perfect.”

Crash started moving again and, within moments, sent her spiraling a second time.

Crash collapsed onto the damp sheets and stared at the ceiling, nearly cross-eyed with pleasure.
Jesus.
Maybe she would miss out if she gave up on one-night stands.
Hmm, but then again, maybe not.
Because if this were a relationship and not a one-night stand, she wouldn't have hesitated to wrap her arms around Jill and cradle her against her body while they enjoyed the afterglow. She turned onto her side and regarded Jill.

Cuddling hadn't been mentioned in Jill's collection of rules one way or another, but Crash didn't want this incredible experience to end on an unpleasant note by touching Jill in a way that wouldn't be welcome.

They lay facing each other, sharing the same pillow but not touching.

Jill's normally creamy-pale skin was flushed and her breathing was still a little uneven.

During their lovemaking—
sex,
she mentally corrected herself—she hadn't thought of Jill's illness. Well, truth be told, there hadn't been much thinking going on at all. But now she worried that Jill would have a price to pay for exerting herself like that.

Crash cleared her throat. “Jill?”

“Hmm?” Jill's eyelids had drooped to half-mast, but now she forced them open and glanced over at her.

“Are you all right?”

“Never been better,” Jill said. As if to prove it, she reached for Crash again.

“Oh, God.” Crash grabbed her wrist and stilled her hand against her lower abdomen. “I never thought I'd say this, but you're wearing me out.”

“I have a lot to make up for. Two years is a long time.” Jill smiled and her tone was light as if it were just a funny quip, but there was something in her eyes that looked strangely like grief.

Crash studied her. “Two years… Is that how long you've known about the MS?”

“That's when the first symptoms started, but it took a while until the doctors came up with the diagnosis.”

“And you haven't been with anyone since?” Crash couldn't help asking.

“Nope,” Jill said. Her tone was still casual, but Crash sensed the emotions lurking beneath.

“I'm glad you didn't keep denying yourself this.” Crash gestured at their naked bodies.

“Me too,” Jill whispered. But instead of wrapping her arms around Crash and kissing her, she pulled her hand out from under Crash's and moved to her side of the bed. Something in her face closed off.

Crash stared over at her; then her gaze flicked to the door. “Do you want me to go?”

This whole situation had heartbreak written all over it. Maybe she should leave before she got even more involved than she already was. There were a dozen good reasons why she should get up, gather her clothes, and leave, yet part of her still hoped that Jill would want her to stay.

“No,” Jill said and then added, “I mean, it's the middle of the night. We wouldn't want any of our colleagues to see you sneak out of my room.”

“Right.” Crash peeked over at her. Was that really the only reason Jill wanted her to stay? The way Jill looked at her said something else.

Jill turned around, away from her, interrupting their eye contact. “The bed is big enough for us both,” she said over her shoulder. “Let's just go to sleep.”

Crash turned off the light but lay there without closing her eyes, staring at the contours of Jill's naked back in the near darkness. Her body was still humming with pleasure, but the rest of her was much less satisfied.

What would happen now? Would this really stay a one-time thing? She couldn't imagine never touching Jill again. But what were the alternatives?

The darkness didn't hold any answers.

She listened to Jill's breathing as it evened out into the soft rhythm of sleep. It took a long time before Crash nodded off too.

CHAPTER 10

A familiar jabbing pain in
her toes woke Jill from an unusually sound sleep. She stayed still and listened. No distant hum of city traffic filtered into the room, so it was probably early. Without opening her eyes or sitting up, she took stock of her body, as she did every morning. Waves of tingling shot up and down her left leg. She gritted her teeth against the feeling as if ants were crawling all over her calf. The rest of her body felt heavy, but there was no other pain, no scary new symptom.

Something else was new, though. Her right leg and arm were draped over a warm body and her head rested on a chest that lifted and fell in the soft pattern of sleep.

Crash.
Memories of last night shot through her mind in vivid images. God, no wonder she felt exhausted. She hadn't known she still possessed the energy to have sex for hours on end. Being with Crash had been like a drug, making her crave more.

Not just more sex, but more of everything. She wanted to snuggle closer, trying to shut out the world for a little longer and let Crash's calm breathing lull her back to sleep. As long as she hadn't gotten up, the day hadn't officially started, so she hadn't broken their just-one-night agreement.

She allowed herself to soak up the feeling of Crash's naked body against hers for another minute, then called herself to order.

Enough. You have to face reality sooner or later, so cut out the rosy afterglow.

The pressure in her bladder told her that staying in bed was not an option anyway. If she didn't want to wake Crash with a wetness of a different kind, she had to get up—now.

She took a deep breath, as always a little tense before first getting up in the morning. How she missed those carefree days of the past when she had just opened her eyes and jumped out of bed without being afraid to discover that she had gone blind or couldn't move.

So far, it hadn't happened, but that didn't stop that nagging fear from always lurking in the back of her mind. Another deep breath and she lifted her arm and withdrew her leg from around Crash.

So far, so good.

Her limbs seemed relatively okay. Now on to her eyesight. She opened her eyes. The gray light of dawn filtered through the curtains of the hotel room. Her gaze traced Crash's chiseled features, which were relaxed in sleep and looked even more appealing in the shadowy half-light. Her hair was disheveled from the way Jill had run her fingers through it and clutched Crash's head last night. A black lock of hair had tumbled onto her brow, and Jill had to fight the urge to push back that smooth strand and press a kiss to the sensual curve of Crash's mouth.

Annoyed with herself, she directed her gaze elsewhere. The glowing red numbers of the alarm clock told her it was nearly five. Okay, so her eyesight worked too. With that encouraging inventory of her body done, she quietly slipped out of bed.

Her legs felt weak, as if she'd run a marathon. Her body would definitely hate her later today, when she had to shoot that dancing scene in the ballroom of San Francisco's only intact Victorian building.
Yeah, but it sure as hell didn't hate me last night.

Her bladder reminded her that there was no time to indulge in pleasant memories, so she grabbed a change of clothes and rushed toward the bathroom as fast as her wobbly legs would carry her.

At the door, she turned back around and watched Crash, who lay fast asleep, only half covered by the rumpled sheets. Her gaze traced the curve of the one breast that was visible and then over one strong shoulder and up to Crash's face, which looked completely peaceful.

For a moment, she let herself wonder whether Crash would think back to last night every now and then too. She resolutely told herself it didn't matter and entered the bathroom.

Once she had taken care of business, she stepped into the shower and thoroughly spread soap over her body, forcing herself to wash off all traces of Crash.

When she dried off and got dressed, her gaze fell on the box of syringes that she had placed on the marble counter next to the soaps and little shampoo bottles with the hotel's logo. The daily injections were supposed to reduce the frequency and severity of her relapses. Good thing she hadn't put her medication in the fridge, as she did at home. While the prefilled syringes could be kept at room temperature for up to a month, the manufacturer recommended refrigerating them. Usually, she took one out the evening before so it could warm up a little, but last night, she definitely would have forgotten. She liked to get her injection over with first thing in the morning so she didn't have to worry about it for the rest of the day, but she couldn't do that if it wasn't the right temperature.

She glanced at the bathroom door. Everything was quiet on the other side, but she still went to the door and locked it before returning to the sink. This was a ritual that she needed to perform in privacy. She laid out one of the syringes, a cotton pad, and an alcohol wipe. The gel pads she normally used to warm up the injection site beforehand and then cool it afterward were in the other room, but she didn't want to risk waking Crash by getting them.

She'd lost track of time as she often did when shooting on location, so she had to think a moment to remember that it was Tuesday. Right thigh day. Much better than Saturday and Sunday, when she had to inject herself into the back of her arms, which were hard to reach, especially since she had no hand free to pinch the skin before putting the needle in.

After pulling her jeans down and sitting on the closed toilet, she swiped the alcohol pad over her skin and removed the syringe from its blister pack while she waited for it to dry. She removed the needle cap and carefully shook a drop of the medication from the tip of the needle, knowing it would irritate the skin if it came into direct contact with it. Without hesitation, she pinched a bit of skin between thumb and index finger of her left hand and was just about to insert the needle into her thigh when a knock came at the door.

Jesus F. Christ!
She barely stopped herself from flinching and stabbing herself with the needle.

“Jill?” Crash called through the door. “Are you in there?”

“Uh, yeah. Do you need the bathroom?” Jill asked, trying to sound normal, as if Crash hadn't startled her.

“No, I can wait. It's just that you've been in there for a while, so I wanted to make sure you're okay.”

Crash's concern felt good, but at the same time, it reminded her that she wasn't healthy; she was someone whose well-being couldn't be taken for granted. “I'm fine,” she called through the door. “I'm just…getting dressed.”

She bit her lip as soon as she'd said it.
Great.
Now she was acting like a junkie who locked herself into a bathroom to shoot herself up with heroin and then lied about what she'd been doing.

“Okay,” Crash answered.

Then everything was silent. Was she waiting for Jill to say something? That was exactly why Jill didn't do one-night stands. Mornings after were just too awkward.

Pressing her lips together, she again pinched up a bit of skin and inserted the needle into the side of her leg. The sting made her wince, but she ignored it and pushed the plunger all the way down. It burned more than usual. She sucked in a sharp breath as she pulled the needle out, released the skin, and pressed the cotton ball to her thigh.
Damn.
She'd injected the medication too fast. Now she'd end up with an itching red lump on her thigh. That hadn't happened since she'd gotten used to injecting herself.

“Jill?” Crash called. Her voice sounded so close as if she was leaning against the door. “Are you really okay?”

Jill bit her lip to hold back a gruff reply. “Just peachy.”

“Are…we okay?” Crash asked more quietly.

“Of course.” Jill stood, pulled up her pants, and dropped the empty syringe into her disposal container. “It was fun, and now that we got it out of our systems, we can move on.”

Crash was quiet for a moment before saying, “I guess so. What happens in San Francisco stays in San Francisco, right?”

“Right.” Even though she was finished injecting herself, Jill didn't leave the bathroom. She wasn't ready to face Crash.

Another moment of silence. “I'll head over to my own room now. I have a stunt later that I need to prepare for.”

“Okay.”

Her receding footsteps indicated that Crash was moving away from the bathroom door.

“Crash?” Jill called.

The footsteps stopped. “Yeah?”

Jill opened her mouth, about to tell Crash to be careful when performing her stunt but then held herself back. She and Crash were colleagues, not loving partners who worried about each other's well-being. “See you later.”

“See you,” Crash answered. A few seconds later, the door clicked shut behind her.

Crash shivered in the heavy, damp fog of the San Francisco morning. Chimes drew her attention up to the ferry building's clock tower. Eight o'clock and they still weren't shooting. The crew bustled around her like an army of busy ants, setting up cameras and other equipment, while the PAs tried to keep a horde of curious onlookers behind the cordons and Ben instructed their new stunt performers.

Instead of flying their entire stunt department to San Francisco, Ben had hired local stunt people for everyone but Shawn, Nikki, and Jill. In addition to doubling for their actresses, Crash and her two colleagues also stepped in as extras whose characters were involved in action-packed scenes.

Today, one of those scenes was on the shooting schedule. Thank God for small favors. At least it meant Crash wouldn't have to work with Jill today, giving them both some time to get over the awkwardness.

She should have known better. Her mentor had warned her never to sleep with a colleague or anyone else she had to work with. Maybe she should have listened to Sabrina, but she just hadn't been able to resist. And why should she? Many of her colleagues indulged in one-night stands whenever they could. It was part of their live-life-to-the-hilt-because-you-could-die-tomorrow attitude. Even Sabrina, the bitch, hadn't followed her own advice when she'd slept with Crash's girlfriend, their assistant location manager.

She shook off thoughts of Jill and the past and focused on work. Their director wanted the greater realism of shooting at the few historic buildings that had survived the earthquake and fires, so they were filming at the ferry building with its arched arcades.

Crash glanced up at the nearly one-hundred-twenty-year-old clock tower again. What the heck was taking the crew so long? They had permission to film for only two hours.

That should have been plenty of time for the one scene they needed to film, but it seemed to take forever to get everything set up the way Ben wanted it—mainly because they still needed to establish a rapport with their new colleagues, not because Crash was distracted or tired. At least that was what she told herself. Considering she'd slept for just two hours, she actually felt pretty good.

Ben did another walk-through with Crash and the San Franciscan stuntwoman, Sarah, and had them run through each of the fight beats in slow motion, almost as if they were dancing.

Dancing?
Crash mentally shook her head at herself.
You're kind of poetic this morning.

“Okay,” Ben finally said. “Here we go. On marks.”

Two dozen extras took their places, surrounding Crash and Sarah. When Ben called, “Action,” they started shoving and jostling, nearly pushing Crash over the edge and into the harbor.

“There it is!” someone shouted.

Crash, Sarah, and the extras all paused and stared out toward the ocean. There was nothing to see, but later, a computer-generated ferry would be added, approaching the dock, where hundreds of people waited.

The jostling and shoving started again as panicked San Franciscans fought each other for a place on the ferry, desperate to get away from their burning city.

An elbow hit Crash a little too hard, making her grunt. She raised her umbrella and threatened to swing it down on Sarah's head.

As they had practiced before, Sarah threw a gloved fist at her.

Crash waited, timing it just right. As Sarah's fist crossed the bridge of her nose, she jerked her head back and pretended to be hit hard. She stumbled back and landed in the water with a loud splash.

Shit, that's cold.
She flailed her arms, pretending to panic as her water-logged dress and petticoats dragged her down.

“Cut!” Ben called from above.

The crew immediately rushed to help Crash climb out.

Ben was massaging his chin—never a good sign, as Crash had learned in the past three weeks.

“We didn't nail it?” She'd thought the fight sequence had gone just fine.

“Yes, you did, but it all looked a bit too great.”

Crash realized her wig had nearly been swept from her head so she tugged it back into position. “Too great?”