Twisted Arrangement 4 (5 page)

Emotion swirled through his veins like radiation at Chernobyl – guilt, frustration, anger. This might take more than a few rounds to work out of his system.

It should be illegal for a man to smell this good when you were mad at him. Josh smelled liked a primeval forest. Not piney, but dark, mossy, earthy. Dangerous. Emma kept trying to hold her breath, but that just drew odd looks from the crew.

There was nothing she could do about it. She’d made her bed, now she had to lie in it. Or rather, avoid lying in it. With Josh. Emma gritted her teeth against the flood of images that thought conjured.

“Cut!” Morse Goodweather’s voice was a nasal bark. It suited the almost cadaverous man. In his plaid suit jacket and scarf, with a flop of pale, almost white blond hair and square, black glasses, he looked like a hipster Andy Warhol, a concept which made Emma’s head hurt. But, according to Josh, he was an incredibly talented director and the only one who could handle a film of this depth and complexity while still keeping it entertaining.

As soon as his voice faded, the set exploded into activity. The actors reset their marks, the boom operator checked sound, grips adjusted equipment. Conversations restarted as if no interruption had taken place.

With all the lights and bodies, the room felt close and hot. The building they stood in was on the back lot of the studio, a period authentic meeting hall, austere and simply decorated. They couldn’t run any sort of air conditioning, because the hum would get picked up on the mikes. The room smelled of damp wood and sweat, and Emma was afraid to move for fear of making a sound and ruining the take.

All of her glamorous impressions of the movie business were evaporating in the stultifying heat.

Beside her, Josh shifted in his chair, wafting another wave of his warm, delicious aroma in her direction. Couldn’t the man just smell sweaty, like normal people? Emma was glad she’d worn a cotton blouse and a lightweight linen skirt or she’d have melted into a puddle by now.

His arm brushed hers and Emma braced herself against the urge to pull back. They were in public. Public attention meant public displays of affection. That was the whole point of her presence here.

“You alright? I can have Jorge bring you a water.” Josh raised his hand to beckon the slender PA forward, but Emma shook her head.

She lifted one hand and gently touched his jaw. “I’m fine, darling. Thank you.” Beneath her fingertips, Josh’s muscles tensed. She withdrew. She didn’t want to push their tentative peace too far.

Ever since their fight the other night, he’d maintained his distance. In private, they were back to behaving civilly. He’d even apologized for making her feel used.

A heat that had nothing to do with the close confines of the set prickled through Emma. Josh knew just how to touch her to drive her from zero to crazy in no seconds flat. She had no idea how he did it. She’d lost her virginity as a teenager when she succumbed to Lance Frederick’s incessant pleading in the back of his father’s SUV after a football game (go, Wildcats, indeed.)

All her encounters before now – not that there had been all that many, she had to admit – had been... nice. Things had felt good. One college boyfriend had even managed to get her off on a semi-regular basis. The orgasms she’d experienced with the few guys she’d slept with before Josh had been short and sharp. Satisfying, and yet... not entirely.

But as soon as Josh kissed her, touched her even a little, her body went up in flames and burned like a charcoal briquette. Long and hot until there was nothing left but ashes.

It wasn’t fair.

“Is it everything you hoped it would be?”

Emma jerked out of her reverie, eyes wide as she met Josh’s questioning gaze. Was he asking about the sex? She swallowed, her throat dry as Aunt Margaret’s porkchops (the woman never could master cooking pork – thank god she hadn’t passed that trait on to Emma). “I’m sorry, what?”

“Your first day on set. Is it how you pictured it?” Josh’s thick brows furrowed as he studied her face. “Are you sure you don’t want a water? Or maybe some air? You look flushed.”

“I’m fine.” She waved him off with a twitch of her fingers. “And no, it’s nothing like I pictured. There’s a lot more involved. All the setup and breakdown, the pauses between takes. I never realized how many they do of each scene.”

He nodded, eyes scanning the set as they prepared for yet another take. There was some sort of commotion going on near the sound equipment that made him frown. “Everyone’s a little surprised, their first time on set. There’s a lot more waiting around and fiddling with equipment than people anticipate. All this work to get just a few seconds of film.”

She knew he was using ‘film’ in the abstract sense. Their cameras were the newest digital equipment the studio could buy.

One of the crew hurried over to William Ransler and began reaffixing his thick beard, which was apparently coming unstuck in the heat. When Josh had introduced her to Cleo in the makeup trailer earlier, Emma had stared at the other woman for an embarrassingly long minute before shaking her outstretched hand.

Cleo could be a model. A supermodel. She was almost six feet tall, her skin was a creamy tan color, and her cheekbones were so sharp they could cut crystal. Pair that with her exotically tilted grey eyes, bee stung lips and a spiked mop of silky black hair cut asymmetrically over her smooth forehead and she could walk down any runway in the world wearing haute couture.

Instead, she was wearing a worn pair of paint-stained overalls, a tool belt stuffed with various brushes, and a beat-up pair of army boots. Her nose, lip, and eyebrow were pierced, and she wore two sets of dog tags around her neck.

“I think you’re my hero,” Emma blurted as she shook Cleo’s hand. Her eyes had been so wide she worried they fall out onto the scuffed toes of Cleo’s boots.

The other woman burst out laughing, clapping Emma on the shoulder with one long-fingered hand. “Oh wow, Josh, mind if I borrow her? She’s adorable.”

Emma flushed in remembrance, still unsure if the exotic beauty had been making fun of her or not. “Was Cleo ever a model?”

Josh glanced up at her words, his gaze sliding to where the makeup woman finished touching William up. “Yeah, in her late teens. She hated it, to hear her tell it. But she got talking with some of the people who did her hair and makeup for shoots and that’s how she ended up in Tinseltown.”

“Tinseltown? You did not just seriously call it that.” Emma tried to swallow the giggle that bubbled up, but couldn’t. Josh smiled.

She had to remind herself that she was still angry at him. Apology or not, he’d agreed to her no sex rule and then tried to seduce her.

That’s not really why you’re so upset.

Emma wondered if it was possible to use a mental ball-gag on your inner voice. Hers had grown increasingly mouthy the longer she spent in Josh’s company. Yet another thing she could lay at his door.

So, fine, she wasn’t really angry because he’d tried to seduce her. She’d enjoyed that part, actually. What bothered her was the idea that she was just some convenient hole for him. She’d been naive when she’d told Todd their marriage would be in name only. Naive, or in denial. She’d known there was an attraction between her and Josh that was difficult to ignore.

And intellectually, she understood why Josh didn’t trust her. She
had
lied to him, tricked him, and stolen from him. But he acted as if not only everything she’d ever done or said in the past was a lie, but everything she did and said now, too.

Okay, granted, she was still lying. But not to him! And only because he was making her do it. So how could he blame her for that?

“Places, people!” Morse Goodweather’s voice rang out over the set and Emma jerked, startled to see everyone back in their places already.

She slid her gaze to Josh and then stilled, heat staining her cheeks as she realized he was already looking at her. The expression in his blue-green eyes burned intensely, but other than that she couldn’t quite read it. His brow remained smooth, and the corner of his mouth turned the tiniest bit upward.

Emma bit her lip, tilting her head a little in question. She’d lost interest in the scene being filmed before her, much more intrigued by what might be going on in Josh’s head.

Slowly, Josh raised his hand. Emma’s heart did a soft shoe worthy of Fred Astaire as he touched her cheek.
Just an act!

But everyone’s attention was on the actors right now. So why bother?

Her breath caught in her throat at the feel of his hand on her skin. She wished it wasn’t Josh who had this affect on her. Their relationship was much too complicated as it was. Giving in to the desire that plagued her would be a terrible idea. She wished...

You wish this was for real.

Emma snapped her eyes closed, unable to look at Josh’s face, afraid he’d read that traitorous – and completely untrue! – thought in her eyes. There was nothing real about her and Josh. They were colleagues and temporary roommates. Nothing more.

She was handling this. And despite what Todd had thought, pretending to be married to Josh actually wasn’t torture. Not most of the time. Most of the time it was surprisingly easy between them. As long as they didn’t talk about the their arrangement. Or have sex.

Which was going to make tonight especially difficult. She’d been sleeping in a bedroom upstairs and across the house from Josh. Keeping distance, physical distance, between them, helped somewhat. She’d always managed to be up and about early enough so that none of the staff was the wiser, but this morning the housekeeper had caught her coming out of the spare bedroom with her bags.

It had been clear from the look on her face that she was startled to find the supposed lady of the house sleeping in a guest room. Emma knew the woman might not say anything. Josh said all of his staff signed NDAs when he hired them. But still, this was a precarious situation. One slip of the tongue to the wrong person and it would be all over the tabloids.

Josh’s hand withdrew from her cheek and she risked a peek at his face. One blond brow curved upward. He held up his hand. Emma blinked at it for a full ten seconds before comprehending the smudge of dirt on his thumb.

Oh. Now she felt like a complete idiot. He wasn’t being affectionate, either out of sham necessity or genuine feeling. He was just cleaning her face off. It wasn’t as if he could call out ‘Hey Emma, you’ve got some dirt on you’ and ruin the take.

She forced her lips into a smile and mouthed ‘Thanks’. He nodded, glancing down at his phone with a frown. Morse clapped his hands briskly.

“Cut! Great, I think we’ve got it. Let’s move on.” The level of activity around her ramped up to eleven. Emma blinked in astonishment as the whole set began to unfold quickly, the crew clearing everything away and packing up so they could move on to the next location.

One of the PAs, a coolly professional blonde with a bright smile, glided up to Josh’s chair. “Excuse me, Mr. Owens? I’m sorry to interrupt but Ian asked if you could come to the studio office. It seemed rather urgent.” She spoke with a soft British accent.

Josh hopped from his chair, scowling at her. The woman’s green eyes were a brighter shade than Emma’s, their expression unruffled as Josh towered over her. “Damn it, why didn’t he call my cell?”

Ian. Emma wracked her brain for the name. Someone tied to the studio. It clicked. Ian had something to do with the budget. Or maybe it was payroll? Either way, if he wanted to see Josh, it probably wasn’t a good thing.

The blonde smiled benignly at Josh. “I’m sure I don’t know, sir. I can ride you over, if you like.”

“Not necessary.” He ran his hand through his hair and glanced at Emma. “Can you go on with the crew? I like to be on set as much as possible the first day. I’ll meet back up with you.”

Emma blinked in surprise at the small tingle of disappointment she felt at the thought of Josh leaving, but she forced herself to smile. “No problem. Go do what you have to do. I’ll be here. Or, you know,” she swept her hand in the direction of the packing crew. “There.”