Mr. 365 (15 page)

Despite all of my initial good intentions, I slip further as the morning goes on, taking Lindsey’s playful permission too much to heart. I’m an out of control octopus with swirling arms and grabby tentacles. If I could, I’d just latch myself onto Will and ride him around the house all day.

I roll my eyes at myself as that vivid picture pops into my mind.

Paul continues to tease, but Will now responds by giving it back. The whole atmosphere is charged and unpredictable. My stomach churns hoping we can make it through the day in one piece. By lunchtime I halfheartedly pick up a sandwich just as Lindsey grabs Will to be her lunch buddy.

Okay, so that’s how this is going to go,
I think.

When I sit down next to Stu, he starts in. “So you and Will the stud, huh?” He wiggles his eyebrows suggestively.

I look down and take a deep breath.

“You’ve gotta move faster, girl. Lindsey ain’t goin’ down without a fight.”

I silently get up and push in my chair. As I turn to move away, Stu makes a face.

“Ah, come on, Sophia. Where’s your sense of humor?”

“I don’t know, Stu. I’ll let you know when I find it,” I snap before heading into the house.

“Oooo,” Terry adds as I storm off.

From two tables over Will watches me leave, but Lindsey distracts him by asking him a question.

Ten minutes later Will finds me sitting on the steps of the deck and Romeo curled up at my feet. I feel completely deflated.

“I’ve been looking for you. I noticed you left lunch without eating.”

“I’ve lost my appetite. Paul and Lindsey are intent on riling me up and now the others are joining in. They’re all so pleased that you come off like a stud muffin.” I make air quotes with my fingers as I say it. “And along with that they’re saying all of us females are acting like your rabid followers. It’s infuriating me.”

“What exactly is
your
definition of a stud muffin?” asks Will, teasing.

H
ow to explain
stud
muffin
.
“Well, a stud is a really good-looking guy who plays the field, right? And we like to eat tasty muffins. So I’ve always assumed it’s a guy so hot you want to gain his attention and then consume him.”

“Do you think I’m one of those? ’Cause I could be
your
stud muffin,” he says jokingly with a smile.

I’ve got one eye closed and my face scrunched up. “Do you really think that’s helping?”

“What? You’ve got me amped-up with how touchy feely you’ve been this morning. Don’t get me wrong, I love it, but I suspect it only supports Paul’s theory. Besides I’ve vowed not to be bothered by Paul’s shenanigans,” he says.

“Do you think I objectify you?”

“No, I think you just like to touch me. A lot.”

“Oh God. I’m out of control.” I moan.

“Why are you feeling bad? Do you have any idea how much I want to touch you? But I made you a promise and I’m trying to stick to it.”

I lean forward, my face in my hands. “And I’m not making it easy for you, am I?”

“No, you aren’t,” he says, laughing. “The irony is part of me is thrilled that you want to be close to me, and the other part of me wants to drag you somewhere private and touch you
everywhere
.” His eyes are closed as he says the last word, as if he’s picturing it all in his mind.

“Everywhere?” I whisper, pressing my thighs together.

“Oh, yeah,” he says, his eyes still closed.

“I’m curious. If we did make that choice—to be unprofessional—”

“So unprofessional.”

“And sneak off to fool around. Where would this private place be?”

He opens his eyes, his face full of excitement as his mind scans the blueprints of his house with supersonic speed. “There’s a storeroom just past the pantry that’s not being used.”

I pull back my sleeve and check my watch. “They still have twenty-three minutes for their lunch break.”

“Really?” he asks, his voice almost breathless. “Are you sure?”

“About the time left, yes. But the rest, no, I’m not,” I say with fire coursing through me. “I’ve clearly lost my mind. Last night I made the very sane determination to protect myself and slow our relationship.”

Will nods, the ends of his mouth turn down. “You did, even though I wanted to veto the idea.”

“But today I’m fairly certain I’ll internally combust and leave behind a pile of sparkly ashes if I don’t kiss you soon.”

“Kiss?” he asks.

I nod. Although on second thought I’m pretty sure a kiss won’t be enough for either of us. I give him a sexy smile and decide to elaborate.

“With tongue. And touching of the fondling variety.”

“Probably more like groping.”

“Perhaps some biting. I’m in a biting mood,” I add.

“Hot damn!” He stands quickly and grabs my hand. “What are we waiting for?”

W
hen Will pulls open the storage room door, I hesitate.

“What?” he asks.

I take a peek. A row of almost full size reindeer are suspended from the ceiling.

“This is weird.”

“It’s the only room downstairs with a door lock,” he explains.

“Gotcha.” I step inside and take in my surroundings. This must be one of his storage spaces for his Christmas stuff. It’s like a prop warehouse in January after the holiday decorations come down. To my right are the huge pieces of a child-size gingerbread house and a pile of oversized lighted candy canes. I spy a large group of full-sized elves. God only knows where he keeps Santa’s sleigh.

When he closes the door and turns the antique lock, the light fades to a dusty dimness. The one small window opposite the door renders all the stored figures and decorations like focal points in a Vermeer painting—if Vermeer had lived in the twenty-first century and had a highly exaggerated love of holiday decorating. I watch the motes dance in the beam of light around the piles of Christmas stuff.

“This is overwhelming,” I say softly.

“You’re overwhelming. And it’s my turn to touch you.” His voice is low and sexy.

A moment later his lips are working their way up the soft skin of my neck while he pulls me tightly against him. His hands move over my curves as he kisses me slow and deep.

“Ohhh.” I moan, hoping everyone is still outside on break.

I slide my hands under his shirt and up his chest as I kiss him back. Everything about him feels perfect—the planes of his chest leading up to his powerful shoulders, the hard and soft of his kisses, the way he pulls me so close. I feel his want all the way through me.

I pull back and grin. “Can I?”

He smiles. “Please.”

My wandering hands go down over his fly. I sigh happily that he’s completely aroused. He groans when I elevate my touch from stroking to groping and his eyes roll back with pleasure. A minute later his hands are all over me and my moans get louder between each mind-bending kiss. He starts sliding his hands from over to under my clothes, when someone suddenly starts pounding on the door.

“Sophia, I know you’ve got him in there, and we’re behind schedule! We have four more setups to shoot today.”

We freeze in horror. I recognize Stu’s voice and my mind goes numb as I realize the full extent of how incredibly awkward this is. There’s no way to get out of this gracefully.

Will’s body tenses up and he gets a wild look in his eyes. As he pulls away from me, he starts mumbling insults to himself in a hushed voice about making bad choices.

When he finally finishes his rambling thoughts, I feel as if he’s going to float away and it terrifies me. I have no idea why this man has brought out my wild side, but I’m getting turned inside out too, and I can’t stop myself. I don’t want to lose him.

I grip his shoulders hard as my fingers dig into his flesh.

When I was young I thought that love was finding the perfect Ken for my Barbie, a mix-and-match guy you could walk hand in hand with over the rainbow. It took a lot of years and disappointments to learn that’s a load of crap.

Love is an explosive crash on a collision course of desire and expectation. Even in its quietest moments, when your lives easily braid together like the plaits in a girls hair, there’s still darkness lingering. My experience with my ex, Marcos, taught me to always search for the darkness so you’re not broadsided like I was when it comes.

He also taught me that love is a madness. You let go of logic and move to crazy town. Today it’s the desperation of an unsteady mind that’s willing to abandon all reason to hide in a dusty storage room to be with
the
o
ne
. With Will there’s no going back now.

We frantically try to figure out what to do, exchanging whispered words.

“Why did I agree to this?”

Will’s question takes my breath away, and with it, I sense his spirit float even further away, lingering in the storage room rafters and likely to head out the window within moments. In my mind I reach for him, grab his ankle, and hold on.

We may have met because of a reality show, but the real reality is sometimes it’s worth going down the rough road to get to love. And as I pull him back toward me, our eyes meet. He knows it too.

There’s no going back for him either.

After a quiet moment, we pull ourselves together and exit the storage room. We bolster ourselves for a monumental amount of teasing and snide comments, but the crew is surprisingly low key. Other than an eye roll from Stu and some bossiness from Lindsey, everyone stays classy.

It’s a good thing because ten minutes later Helena shows up to join the shoot. After introductions they gather for a discussion in the kitchen. “So my role in this episode is to explore why our culture places such importance on the holiday ritual of decorating in a broad sense, and then what it means specifically to you, Will,” she says with a confident smile.

“Really? Why would anyone care about what it means to me?” Will asks, confused.

“Well, the point of shows like this is to make people examine their own intentions. When they view people on reality shows, they are constantly comparing their own ideals as they watch. The effect is fascinating.”

“I like to watch our hoarding show because I always clean my house afterward,” Lindsey adds.

“Exactly. You’ll either be inspired by the people you see, or do whatever you can to never be like them,” Helena says.

“Can’t you just be entertained?” Will asks.

“Of course, if the personality is entertaining enough, a lot of the other expectations may be lowered.”

“I don’t want to know where I fit into all of that,” Will says, shaking his head.

“You don’t need to. That’s my job,” Helena replies.

Helena and Paul decide the family room would be the best place for an on-camera chat with Will. He follows me in when the guys finish their prep.

“So, Will, I’ve been told this is your favorite room, can you tell me why?” Helena asks once the camera is rolling.

He smiles. “I think because of the trains. I’ve always loved trains. The set in the back belonged to my grandfather and whenever I spent Christmas with my grandparents, he’d let me help him with the setup.”

“So you’re keeping their memory alive in this room,” Helena states.

“If you say so, but I also think the trains are amazingly engineered. Did you see this one in action?” he asks, pointing to the tracks. He flips the switch on the remote control and the train starts chugging along.

“I can understand why you’d enjoy that,” she replies, smiling. “Now let me ask. Many people decorate for Christmas, but only a small handful decorate to the extreme you do. To what do you attribute your desire do this… to set yourself apart?”

“I don’t know, maybe I’m nuts.” He jokes.

“Nuts? Are you worried about your behavior? Perhaps that it’s too extreme?”

“What makes you say it’s extreme?” he says, teasing.

“I know you’re joking, Will, but I’ll answer anyway. You have to spend an extraordinary amount of time and money on your efforts here. By keeping this up, you’re possibly avoiding something in your real life, do you know what it is?”

“Nope. Do you know?” he asks, baiting her.

“Well hearing that you’re single, I would explore the idea that you are avoiding an emotionally intimate relationship.”

“Because I decorate a lot for Christmas? I don’t buy that. Besides, my grandparents started all of this, and they were married for fifty-seven years. You can’t say they were avoiding an emotionally intimate relationship.”

“Actually, I could suggest that as a possibility. They could’ve used their time-consuming hobby to avoid each other. That happens often in long relationships that appear on the surface to be stable.”

“Hardly,” he scoffs before standing and pulling off his mike. “Okay, this has been fun but I’m done.”

“Will?” Lindsey says, “There’s just a few more questions. Can’t you hang in there just a little longer?”

“No. She doesn’t know anything about my grandparents, and I’m not going to sit here and hear her say shit about them.”

“I’m sorry if I upset you, Will,” Helena says.

“Nobody told me this involved me getting my head examined.” He looks at me with an angry stare. “If I’d known I would’ve never agreed to talk to you.”

“Let’s take a break, and then we can explore an approach you’re comfortable with,” Helena suggests.

Will watches me walk out of the room. I pull out my phone and make a call while I head to the backyard. Romeo runs up to me and sticks by my side. A minute later Will comes outside looking for me just as I shut my phone down in frustration.

He scowls as he sees us. “Traitor girl, traitor dog,” he calls out.

My call had gotten heated. Will might not have been able to hear what was said but it’s pretty obvious I’m not happy.

I pace back and forth several times trying to calm down.

When I finally look toward the house, I see he’s still on the deck and I walk over to join him.

“Thanks for standing up for me in there,” he says sarcastically as I get close.

“Will—” I say. I’m just as frustrated as he is.

“So who was that on the phone?”

“George.”