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ADRIANNE
This could not be happening. I could feel the ground beneath my knees, Callan’s thighs beneath my hands, but this had to be a dream . . . or a nightmare. “Cal?”
He put a finger to his lips. “Shh.” He quickly reached down and tucked himself back into his jeans. “Sit tight, okay? I’ll sort it out.”
Callan stood, stepped around me, and headed for the seam of the tent. I slid into the chair that he vacated and hid my face in my hands.
What was I thinking?
Doing something like that in a damn tent?
It wasn’t like the trailer back in California. There wasn’t a lock, and any sounds we made would clearly be heard by anyone near enough outside. My hands trembled at the possibility. We’d gotten so used to being able to do what we wanted that I’d just . . . stopped being careful.
I was suddenly aware that I was shirtless. I nearly toppled off the chair picking it up and shoving it back over my head. By the time Callan came back, carrying a camera with a high-powered lens, I was dressed but still trembling. “I bought the man’s camera,” he said, holding it up. “He didn’t have any pictures of us in the files, but I may have told him that if he didn’t leave, I’d find a place to ‘lose’ him all the way out here. I’m pretty sure he left a cloud of dust behind him, he took off so fast.”
He was smiling like he expected me to find this funny, and I might have if I wasn’t so afraid. “What if he saw us?” I asked. “Even if he didn’t get a picture. It only takes one person running their mouth on social media, and then . . . ” I buried my face in my hands. “It’s all over.”
Callan dropped to his knees in front of me. “He wasn’t anywhere close enough to hear us,” he promised. “He was looking for you and Ryan here, to get pictures that confirmed your relationship, but he was outside the wrong tent.”
I shook my head. “I should have never let the studio talk me into letting the world think that Ryan and I were together. It was stupid.”
“They didn’t give you much of a choice.”
Disgust welled up in my gut. “There’s always a choice, Cal. I just made the selfish one to protect my career.”
He reached out to touch my chin, but I moved as far as I could back in the chair, and he dropped his hand, not willing to touch me if I didn’t want him to. “Adrianne, your career is important to you. None of us would want you to give it up for us.”
“I know, but . . . ” I sighed. “Look, I’m going to head to hair and makeup, okay? I just . . . need a minute.”
He nodded, obviously concerned, but we left the tent and crossed the lot to where hair and makeup were set up. Ryan wasn’t quite done yet, but I threw myself into the chair beside him. Callan took to standing nearby, but not too near me. “Tall, Dark, and Threatening looks even more menacing than usual. What’s wrong?” Ryan asked.
I sighed. “There was a photog skulking around the tents. Callan had to buy the guy’s camera and threaten him off.”
Ryan whistled. “What’d they want?”
“Confirmation that we’re a couple . . . pretty sure it’d be worth a few million.”
“Damn. Couple of million bucks just for a picture of us? Why the hell are we making this movie again?”
I giggled, and it helped relieve some of the tension in my chest. “Pretty sure if we weren’t making this movie, no one would care.”
Ryan shrugged. “True.” He looked over at our wardrobe for today. “Are we doing the big fight scene?”
I nodded. “Either that or your death scene, for sure.”
He swore. “I am not ready for a death scene today. I’m going to need more coffee first.”
The thought of coffee normally brought me joy. I could drink coffee all day long and never tire of it. But now, it made my stomach turn into a
heavy knot. “How can you drink coffee right now? It’s a million degrees out here.”
Ryan scoffed. “Don’t be such a wuss.”
A headache bloomed behind my eye, and I lay back as much as I could in the chair. “I feel like I’m hungover,” I told him. “But I haven’t touched alcohol in weeks.”
Ryan didn’t look up from his phone as the hairstylist put the finishing touches on the wig that he wore. It was an artfully disheveled mess, so my assumption that Lee would want to start with the emotionally charged death scene appeared to be right on the money. The hairdresser took the wig off his head and returned it to the dummy head. there was something not quite right in the fit. She wandered away, murmuring to herself.
Ryan kept scrolling, eyes on his phone’s screen. “If I thought you were getting laid at all, I would suggest that you sound pregnant, but since I’m pretty sure you’re a virgin-”
But I wasn’t a virgin. In fact, I was having more sex now than I ever had before. Ryan’s words hit me like he’d taken a bat to my head. Pregnant? There wasn’t any way. I had an implant. It was good for three years, and I’d only had it for one.
“Ryan, I’m having sex,” I said. “I’m having a lot of sex.”
That piqued his interest. “Do tell!” The man was positively foaming at the mouth. Could I trust him with this? Or would he go running to the media with a hot tip to sell?
“If I tell you, and you tell anyone else,” I said, “I will be forced to murder you and throw you down a mineshaft. Do you understand?”
Ryan looked sufficiently terrified. “I understand, you psycho. How bad could it possibly be?”
I looked around, making sure that there weren’t any prying eyes or ears standing around. “Do you remember asking me if I was sleeping with any of my security guards?”
He looked positively gleeful. “I knew that’s why Tall, Dark, and Threatening didn’t like me! You’re fucking him.”
I winced and wished that he would keep his voice down even a little bit, but he was an actor with one of the biggest, and most obnoxious, personalities I’d ever met. He wouldn’t begin to understand what being quiet meant. “Yes, Cal and I are in a relationship.”
His shoulders drooped. “Explain how that’s so terrible? A lot of actors date their bodyguards at one point or another.”
I took a breath. “Because it’s not just Callan,” I said. “It’s Foster and Ethan too.”
Ryan stared at me for a long time, mouth open in a really unattractive way. “You’re . . . with all of them?”
“Yeah. I’m dating all of them.”
“Are they . . . ? Are they also dating each other?”
I shook my head. “Nope. They just . . . share me with each other.” I held up a hand to stop whatever was about to come out of his mouth. “It’s just them. That’s their dynamic. I’m not free to date whoever else I want.”
He considered this for a moment. “You’re a polyandrist,” he said and then smirked. “They’re your brother-husbands.”
We laughed. I wanted to point out that polyandry wasn’t quite the right word for what we were, but it did make a sort of sense since my men only had eyes for me. The laughter died, and with it went some of the air in my lungs.
“We almost got caught in the tents. The photographer was looking for you and me, but he almost caught me with Callan instead.”
Ryan shrugged. “So?”
“We discussed the idea of my taking one of them as my ‘public’ boyfriend, but I said no. I don’t want that kind of pressure on any of them.”
“Well, if you’re pregnant,” he said, gesturing at me, “that’s going to cause even more pressure than a public boyfriend ever could.”
Dread pooled in my belly. “There’s no way,” I said, mostly to myself. “I have an implant. it basically has stopped my period, so there’s no way that I’ve actually been fertile.”
“My mother had me after getting her tubes tied,” Ryan said. “Life finds a way, my friend.”
Well, that’s less than comforting, I thought. The hairdresser was coming back with a different brand of glue, and she also had my wig. “Let’s just . . . drop this, okay?” I said. “Please, don’t say anything to anyone.”
“I swear,” he said. “I don’t fancy ending up in a mine.” I smiled at him. “Thanks, Ryan.”
He winked. “Anytime, babe.”
Somehow, against all odds, this man and I became friends, and it felt good to have one outside of Foster, Callan, and Ethan. My men were great,
to be sure, but still . . . it was nice to be able to sit and talk like this.
I took the next forty minutes to get ready, and then Lee called us to set for the big death scene. Ryan struggled for a take or two-it was kind of nice to see someone else draw Lee’s ire for a bit-but when nothing changed, I whispered to him, “Keep your eyes open when you die.”
“What?”
“When you die, keep looking at me. Go blank in your expression, but don’t close your eyes. Dead people don’t really close their eyes unless they’re already closed.”
Ryan took my advice, and the next take was perfection. Lee patted me on the shoulder. “This turns out well, and I’ll give you an assistant director credit for the film,” he said.
Ryan, who was still sprawled across my lap, glared at me. “Lucky bitch.”
I shrugged. “Throw me some useful advice in a scene and get your own credit.” He looked thoughtful for a moment, but I reminded him, “It has to be a good direction that helps the movie.”
“Damn.”
We ran the scene one more time so that Lee could watch my side of the scene, and it was deemed a success. Lee wanted to start blocking out the fight scene as well, but our stunt coordinators were held up in Sydney. “So I suppose we can save it for tomorrow,” he said.
We wrapped, and I dragged Ryan off before Callan could come near me. “Can you do me a favor?
Ryan smirked. “A sexy favor?”
I wanted to smack him. “No, dumbass,” I said. “I need you to distract Callan while I run to the drugstore for a pregnancy test.”
He paled-actually paled-at the thought. “Are you out of your mind?
That man will kill me.”
I would say that he was exaggerating, but I had no way of being 100 percent sure of that. “Okay . . . could you get me one?”
Ryan’s face twisted uncomfortably, but he nodded. “That seems like the safer choice for me, honestly. Keep him here a little longer, and I’ll have someone drive me to go get one.”
“Thanks, Ryan.”
He shrugged. “This makes us friends now, right? There’s not a chance in hell of anything romantic happening between us?”
“I’m fairly certain that’s a safe assumption,” I said. Not that there was a chance before, I added in my head.
He let out a breath that was almost . . . relieved. I must have had a look on my face because he put his hands up in an “I’m harmless” gesture.
“I don’t have many friends,” he said, and then he looked a little ashamed. “I’ve slept with a lot of co-stars, and that tends to ruin any friendship that I might have with them.”
Well, duh, I thought and rolled my eyes. “Sex tends to do that.”
“But I don’t have to worry about that with you,” he said as if to clarify again.
I shook my head. “Not at all,” I said. “You’re a handsome guy, Ryan, but I’ve got a plateful.”
He laughed. “That you do.” He looked around as the set was slowly clearing of people. “Okay, go distract your guy.”
I nodded. “Thanks again.”
He saluted me and then ran to find a PA to help him, and I made my way over to Callan. “Are you ready to head to the hotel?” he asked.
“I think I left something in the tent earlier, actually. Walk me there?” He nodded. “Adrianne, about before . . .”
His words felt like a blow. We were careless. The words echoed inside my head. “I don’t really want to talk about it, Cal,” I said. “I shouldn’t have put us in that situation. We’d seen how bad the paparazzi were here, and I just . . . didn’t think about it.”
Callan made a soft, sad sound. “You shouldn’t have to think about things like that. I should.”
I looked at him. “But you didn’t,” I said, and it came out way harsher than I really wanted. “We both got distracted, and it could have been disastrous.”
Callan didn’t seem to know what to say to that. “I’m . . . I’m so sorry, Adrianne.”
I sniffled. When did I get so close to crying? “So am I.”
“Wait.” He grabbed my arm, and I had to wrench away. “Are we okay?” “You’re doing it again!” I said. “We’re out in the open, and you’ve just grabbed me. What would that look like on camera? We can’t be us right now, okay? You have to be just my bodyguard right now, and if you can’t
handle that then you can’t come to set anymore.”
Callan’s jaw clenched. His eyes went a little cold, and for a moment, I could see the SEAL that he used to be. Tough and cold. “If that’s what you want.”
I dropped my gaze as one tear slipped down my cheek. “That’s not what I want, Cal,” I said.
“Then why would you say it?” He was getting frustrated, and my ire rose with his.
“Callan, I love you, but-” “What?”
I was about to tear my hair out. “You interrupted what I was about to say.”
But he was smiling now, and it wasn’t one that I’d seen before. “Can you tell me what you just said again?” he asked, voice low and eager.
I had to think about it, and then . . . oh. “I was trying to yell at you,” I pointed out.
He shrugged. “But you started with just about the best thing I’ve ever heard. Say it again, please.”
I shouldn’t-it would fly in the face of everything I’d just said-but I couldn’t turn down that ‘please.’ “I love you,” I said, and a kaleidoscope of butterflies fluttered in my belly. When he reached for me, however, I put my hands out to stop him. “Not here, okay? On set, we have to be professional.”
Heat burned in his eyes, but he nodded. “You’re mine tonight.” I could feel myself blush, but I nodded. “Yes,” I murmured.
“I love you too,” he said. “In case you were wondering.” The butterflies’ wings grew ten times, and I felt like there might be no more room in my belly for these new feelings.
“Hey, Adrianne!” I looked up, spell broken, and Ryan was coming toward me with my purse. “I found your purse in one of the tents.” I could have kissed him for his cleverness. “Can’t find where I put my sunglasses, but I figured you’d at least want your wallet and phone.”
He handed it to me, and I nearly hugged him, but that would have put Callan off. “Thanks,” I said, and Ryan nodded. “See you in the morning for our big fight scene?”
He groaned. “Bright and friggin’ early.”
The three of us walked to where the cars were parked together. Callan hung back a step so that Ryan and I could stand side-by-side, and I knew
that photos of this moment would end up online. I could only hope that my talk with Callan wasn’t. I hadn’t seen or heard anyone near-Callan had scared that guy good earlier-but I didn’t feel like I could relax here.
My purse hit against my thigh, as if reminding me that there was the equivalent of a bomb inside. Something else for me to worry about. What if I was pregnant? How would I deal with it? How would they? Would they simply throw their hands up and walk away?
No, I couldn’t imagine any of them doing that. Besides, it wasn’t likely that I was pregnant, anyway. I had a few tiny symptoms that could be just about anything, and I had my implant. Even if I hadn’t had a period, it didn’t mean anything. That’s how the implant worked, after all.
Callan helped me into the car but positioned himself in the front seat beside the driver. It felt wrong for him to not be beside me, but it was more professional for him to take the front. The drive back through the mines seemed to take longer, but when they stopped outside what looked like a giant mound of red clay, I was confused. “This is the hotel?”
“One of the charming things about Coober Pedy, love,” the driver said. “Lots of our buildings are underground. Keeps things cooler.”
It was absolutely gorgeous. “That’s so cool!”
We got out of the car and found the room numbers that matched the numbers that Ethan had texted Callan before. We stopped outside what was to be my room. There was a door code to get in, and he read them out to me. “Can I come inside?” he asked.
I bit my lip. I’d promised him that it would be just him and me, but the pregnancy test was like a screeching alarm that only I could hear. “Can I get a few moments? Please?”
Callan didn’t look thrilled, but he kissed my forehead and punched in the code for the next door. “Go inside,” he said. “Text me when you want me.”
I nodded. “Thanks, Cal.”
I shut the door, and for the first time in a long time, I was glad to be totally alone. The room was all carved rock that was cool to the touch, and there was a bathroom in the very back, tucked into the rock like it had sprung there naturally. I took the pink test box out of my bag and headed to the bathroom, heart pounding in my chest. Please, I thought. Just please.
I wasn’t sure what I was asking for.