Wild at Heart (Walk on the Wild Side #1) (16 page)

It wasn’t working.

A gust of wind ruffled the pages of his book and made the pine branches whisper accusingly. He shifted in the chair, struggling to get comfortable on the hard wood.

Damn it. He didn’t want to think. He didn’t want to look inside himself.

What was in there just wasn’t good. He’d seen this pattern with his parents too many times—they’d go
high, high, high
with someone, so blissful, so connected, and then it would all crash and burn, the glowing ecstasy turning to something noxious, something vicious. The more intense the passion, the uglier the damage.

Sex just
confused
everything.

He tried stretching out his legs, but that increased the strain on the overused muscles in his back, and thinking of how they got that way in bed last night only made things worse. He tried bending his knees and jamming his heels onto the edge of the seat, but he was too damned big to fit. Getting up, he turned the chair to a different angle where he could prop his feet up on a mossy old tree stump, but then the sun was in his eyes and made his head ache. How was he supposed to get through a whole day out here with nothing to do but let the pressure of dangerous thoughts build inside his brain?

And, dear God, the thoughts were overwhelming. He could almost feel the heat of Amber’s mouth on his cock, smell the musk that came off of her, hear her little gasps and moans and cries, taste her slickness on his tongue.

The feeling he’d had when he finally came inside her last night—he’d never experienced anything so overwhelming in his life. It felt like the top of his skull had blown off, like every nerve in his spinal column had exploded, like his internal organs had spontaneously burst into flame and his balls erupted into new universes. It was so completely insane he’d almost been surprised to return to normal consciousness just a few minutes afterwards, and to find his body still in one piece on the bed.

Even the memory of the sensation was so strong, it took him a while to notice that someone was shouting his name right now.

Onyx, he realized.

“Nick! Hey, Nick! Where’d you go?” she was yelling. “I need you!” She came running towards him from the direction of the Rangers’ Station, her black boots kicking up gravel, one hand waving frantically in the air and the other pointing back toward the entry road. “The rangers at the entry gate just radioed to say we’ve got company driving in.”

He stood, strategically covering the front of his jeans—and the evidence of his recent thoughts—with his forearm and the novel he still held in his fist. “Company?”

“A dozen four-wheelers with rental plates,” said Onyx, panting for breath. “Rangers had to let them in—day passes, not overnight. Wanna guess who’s coming?”

Nick had lived in Hollywood too long to have any doubts. “Paparazzi,” he said, and spat. “Goddamn paparazzi.”

He shook his head to clear away the last tendrils of sensual memory that still clung to him. Well, he’d wanted a distraction—a ravenous horde of paparazzi to fight off from the film set would certainly provide one.

Within minutes, a heavy line of SUVs came bumping and rumbling down the gravel road, moving faster than was safe for either any passing campers or their own rear axles. Even with sunshine gleaming on the windshields, he recognized a couple of the drivers on sight—Donny Lempert from the
Hollywood Hot Sheet
and Vilma Wilson from
Celebrity Secrets
. The tabloid press descended quite literally like vultures, parking in a ring and emerging from their cars looking hooded and hungry and eager for carrion.

Donny Lempert was the lowest of the low—a short, wiry little man in a Hawaiian shirt, with a shaved head and gray eyes that darted constantly. His stock in trade was paying the neighbors of movie and rock stars to let him crouch at whatever window gave him the best view into the celeb’s bedroom next door, or bathroom for that matter, and let him snap away. That was how he’d gotten pictures of Nick kissing that
Sports Illustrated
cover model whose impending divorce hadn’t been announced to the press yet—a nice little payday for Lempert, no doubt, and a whole lot of pain for the human beings involved. The model had two little kids, for God’s sake, and one of them saw the photo in a drugstore checkout line.

Nick tried to remember the model’s name.

How had they even gotten together? He couldn’t recall a single conversation he’d had with her. He could remember what her ass looked like in a bikini, but he had trouble remembering her face.

A sick feeling swirled in his stomach.

Well, he really had no business judging the paparazzi. They were his people, his tribe, the very essence of L.A.’s vapid, heartless,
look at anything that glitters
culture.

Maybe if he’d been born somewhere else—a farm in Vermont, maybe, or some crunchy neighborhood in Portland—he might have become a different sort of man. Then again, his mom was from small-town Kansas, and she’d hopped a bus first chance she got and took a role as a teenage temptress on an afternoon soap, and it was all plastic surgeries and drunken pool parties from there.

Hollywood trash was in his blood.

And the mob of reporters could apparently smell it on him—within seconds of emerging from their vehicles, most of them were hurrying his way.

“Hey, Nick!” called Vilma Wilson. She was a pretty redhead with a guileless face and a Midwestern sweetness in her manner, but he knew from experience her beak was as sharp as that of any of the rest of the vultures, and she carried the same general stench of death. “How’s it going? This is some beautiful spot here, huh?”

“Beautiful,” he said, watching her warily. None of these people spent any time in nature voluntarily, except to hide under bushes waiting for Kate Hudson or Jennifer Lawrence to come out of a restaurant or walk down their driveway to take out the trash. There was probably some dank cave somewhere where they all gathered when they’d finished stripping the latest carcass of the day.

Cameras were already flashing in his face. For a short, shamed moment, he thought that somehow they knew about him and Amber, that pictures of them in bed together were going to show up with strategic pixilation on
Entertainment TV
, with some moronic headline: “Making Whoopie, Not Movies” or “Naked Cameraman Caught on Camera!” But of course the press didn’t know about that. They couldn’t. There hadn’t been any Nick and Amber before this trip to the wilderness started.

No, this had to be about Ruby Torres or Jake Hultensaalt, who were pure Hollywood tabloid gold. Especially the two of them together, especially if something scandalous might possibly happen. Only star power like theirs could lure the vultures into the middle of nowhere, where they had no chance of catching Britney Spears having a meltdown, or Miley Cyrus flashing an excess of side-boob. Someone must have learned something really juicy to draw this mob out here.

Luckily, Ruby and Jake were nowhere in sight at the moment.

“Hey, Nick!” called an unfamiliar young guy in a fedora and a short hipster goatee. His buddy-buddy tone made Nick’s hackles rise. “How’s the shoot going? Pretty intimate set, huh? What’s it like working so closely with Ruby Torres?”

Ah, that last bit had an insinuating edge, but clearly the guy was just fishing.

“She’s very talented,” said Nick. “Amber’s thrilled with what’s she’s doing in the role.” As if anyone of them gave a shit about the artistic integrity of the film.

“How’s Amber?” called another woman. Jane Kersey. She was from England, with a lovely accent and a reputation for never taking pictures of celebrities with their kids—a major sacrifice, given what those kinds of shots were worth. She was also known for catching unflattering “No Makeup” pictures of models and actresses going about their normal lives, but she was maybe a little closer to human than the rest.

“Amber’s great,” he said, flashing a smile. “Everything’s going smoothly here. Nothing more dramatic than a few mosquito bites. Don’t even have any poison ivy to report.”

Amber’s cabin door creaked open. She must have heard the commotion, and she came out looking furious. She wasn’t used to having her sets invaded—but then again, she’d never had big name stars before.

Her fists were clenched and her jaw was tight in a way Nick knew was bad news for anyone who stepped into her path right now, but the paparazzi were fearless—most of them surged forward to surround her before she could even get fully down the steps from her cabin.

Taking advantage of that distraction, Nick waved Jane Kersey a few feet away from the crowd, and she was savvy enough to come with him. Nobody waved over a tabloid reporter unless they had something useful to share. None of these people were trustworthy, but Jane was maybe a little more decent than the rest. “What brings you all out here?” he asked her. “Needing a little fresh air?”

Jane gave him a friendly smile, though no doubt she was calculating just how much she might be able to squeeze out of him in exchange for anything she revealed. “Truth is,” she whispered, “I haven’t the foggiest notion. There was lots of chatter yesterday—Donny Lempert got drunk at the Venom Lounge the night before last and let something slip about having an amazing lead on a Ruby Torres scandal. Big, nasty, even-the-mainstream-press-will-run-it kind of thing. You have anything you can tell me?”

Shit.
Of course it was about Ruby. And of course it was Donny Lempert who’d picked up the trail. Snakes like him dragged their bellies through the filthiest muck and invariably hit paydirt. And, whatever it was, it had to be bad.
Something
had been under Ruby’s skin the day she arrived, and that skin had been toughened up by some pretty nasty scandal with Vin La Russa. She wouldn’t have burst into tears over nothing.

Sure enough, Donny Lempert stood a little distance away from the crowd, ignoring Amber, with a cocksure, malicious look about him. He was waiting for someone else. For Ruby.

Damn
.

Amber was making a little speech to the vultures around her, saying earnest things about making art and respecting the privacy of her actors so they could do their best, most honest work.

Appealing to the innate decency of tabloid reporters
—nothing could more clearly reveal the difference between her life experience and his. She still believed in the basic goodness of the human heart. And he didn’t want to break that part of her. He didn’t want her to be disillusioned. Which was exactly the reason he couldn’t keep falling into bed with her—because disillusionment was sure to follow, sooner or later, if she got any more involved with him.

His gut cramped thinking about it.

He wanted to get a club and go swimming through that pack of vultures and send them all sailing a mile away from her. She needed protection. From them, and from himself.

Ranger Donnell came storming out from the Ranger Station now, Onyx pulling him by the arm, with Ruby’s security guards and Jake Hultensaalt close behind them. Clearly, Onyx was rallying the troops.

The ranger stepped up beside Amber, his back ramrod straight and his expression all business. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, in a loud, clear tour-guiding voice. “I’d like to remind all of you that you’re on federally protected land, and our rules are very strict here about not harassing other visitors. If necessary, I will ask you to leave the park.”

The vultures blinked at him. They were accustomed to being told to beat it. Hearing it from a Park Ranger who didn’t even carry a weapon had little effect on them. Collectively, they shrugged or turned their attention away from the man in uniform. And, Nick noted with a growing sense of anger, not a one of them moved away from where they’d landed.

With a frustrated frown, Ranger Donnell pointed at the clouds gathering above their heads. “In fact,” he said, “it might be best if you all get back in your cars and head out right now, before this storm hits. I’ve got nowhere to lodge you, and once the lightning starts, it’s going to be bad news for anyone out in the open. If we get hail, it could easily crack your windshields.”

At that very moment, a stiff breeze pressed against Nick’s back and set his hair whipping about his ears. The wind felt colder than before, wilder, making the trees show the white undersides of their leaves. Little spits of moisture began to flick his face, soft at first, but quickly picking up tempo and strength. Jake Hultensaalt noticed it, too, and pivoted to get a good look at the sky, which was definitely growing more ominous. The big cloud that hadn’t looked too bad fifteen minutes ago was looming nearer and rising higher and darker, suddenly seeming worthy of the word “thunderhead.”

Jake’s interest in the atmosphere made the assembled paparazzi look upwards, too, and a few of them actually seemed rather alarmed at the sight of that huge dark mass bearing down on them. For a few seconds, it seemed as if they might scatter and fly back to their vulture-mobiles.

But then, Ruby Torres’s cabin door opened. The diva herself stepped out into the open.

The flock instantly scented their prey. In a body, they turned and pushed towards her, forming a ring outside her porch railing. “Ms. Torres!” they started calling out, and cameras began to flash. “Can we have a moment? Ms. Torres!”

Ruby’s face blanched, and she let out a string of expletives in Spanish. But, like the diva she was, she gathered herself quickly and struck a serene and queenly pose, presenting her best angle to the cameras. “No comment,” she said, plastering a tight smile on her face. “I’m here working. No interviews during this shoot, sorry.”