All Over You (4 page)

And failed spectacularly.

Hollywood had swallowed him in one easy gulp, with barely a ripple to mark his passing. He’d been on the soap for too long, his agent had told him, he was tainted by the association.

On a good day, he didn’t hate
Boulevard
. It had bought his house, his car, fed him, clothed him, got him laid for many of the past fifteen years. It was a fun, entertaining, sometimes even moving show. It just didn’t feed his soul. And how pretentious was that, anyway, wanting a career that made you proud, made you want to jump out of bed in the morning? Most people settled for three square meals and a roof over their heads, smiles on their kids’ faces and backyard barbecues. He was a spoiled bastard. He knew it, but it didn’t stop him from feeling as though a giant hand was slowly grinding him into the ground.

The reality was, he should have had the courage to walk away altogether, to pursue something completely outside of the industry. Instead, he’d succumbed to the lure of money and security. And it was slowly killing him.

“Boo-goddamn-hoo,” he sneered at himself, launching himself to his feet.

The only thing worse than a worn-out has-been was a self-pitying worn-out has-been. Prowling around the house, he picked up books and put them down again, shuffled through his CD collection looking for something — anything — he could bear to listen to, and generally behaved like a lost soul.

Inevitably, he wound up in his study, staring at the calendar on his wall. Tomorrow’s date was circled in red, and he shook his head as he acknowledged his own desperation. Tomorrow he found out if the
Boulevard
’s new producer was willing to continue what her predecessor had started and hand over a block of the show for him to direct.

Originally, he’d floated the idea of directing some blocks of the show to his agent half as a joke — he’d figured the producers would say no, or that if they said yes it would be an entertaining diversion from the usual. To his surprise, they’d given him the nod. Twice now he’d been allowed to step behind the camera and direct the show. It had been challenging work both times, but it had also been the most alive he’d felt in a long time.

Then there had been a regime change, a fairly regular occurrence in television. Heads had rolled and new heads had taken their places. He’d been waiting for nearly two months since then to find out if the new producer, Claudia Dostis, was willing to continue what her predecessor had started. There was a high chance she wouldn’t — many producers would have said no simply because he’d been a pet project of the guy whose seat they were now warming. But tomorrow was the day of truth, the day she was handing out the new directors’ roster.

And he wanted his name to be on it, bad. He needed his name to be on it, if he was being honest with himself.

There had to be something more out there. Didn’t there?

I
T WAS MID-MORNING
when Claudia called Grace into her office the next day.

“I wanted to talk to you about Mac Harrison,” Claudia said by way of kicking off the conversation.

Grace started in her seat and tried to will away the blush that she could feel rising into her cheeks. There was no way that Claudia was about to tell her to stop using him as her convenient virtual stud. No one could know what she’d been doing in the privacy of her apartment last night. No one.

It didn’t stop her from blushing, however. Ducking her head, she pretended to have an itchy nose.

“Right, Mac Harrison. The actor who plays Kirk on the show,” she said, fumbling for time.

Claudia gave her an odd look and Grace winced mentally. Probably pretending to not be familiar with one of the show’s biggest stars was not the smartest way to appear natural.

“Yes. That Mac Harrison,” Claudia said dryly. “What did you think of the blocks he directed recently?”

Grace blinked a few times, trying to work out where this conversation was going. Mac had directed two five-episode blocks since he’d put up his hand to step behind the camera. Both had been good — inventive, interesting, tight.

“Does he want to do more?” she hedged.

“His agent has approached me. You still haven’t answered my question.”

Grace fiddled with the hem of her 1950s-era sundress. “They were good, strong. He brought a lot of energy to it,” she said honestly.

Claudia smiled. “I’m glad you liked his work. He’s a big fan of your scripts, too. It’ll make the whole process much smoother.”

Grace frowned, feeling as though she’d just missed something very important.

“Um, what process?” she asked hesitantly.

“Well, you’re writing the script for our feature-length wedding episode,” Claudia explained.

“Yessss,”
Grace said slowly, beginning to see the yawning chasm that loomed before her.

“And he’s going to direct it.”

Grace’s whole body went hot, then cold.

“You’ll have to work closely with each other — he’ll be on light duties on-set and we’ll get in an extra body to take over some of your usual workload so you can do reconnaissance with him for location shoots and anything else that’s necessary. I want this to be the best wedding the
Boulevard
has ever done,” Claudia said with determination.

“Right. The best,” Grace repeated numbly.

She felt blindsided. For twelve months, she’d used Mac Harrison as the personification of all her sexual desires. She’d had sex with him in her mind a hundred different ways, cried his name out as she climaxed, gone to sleep with his image in her mind. All despite never having met the man.

And now they were about to become each other’s shadows.

Why did she feel as though she’d set herself up for the fall of a lifetime?

M
AC PULLED INTO
the visitors parking slot at the
Boulevard
’s Santa Monica office and switched his ignition off. Instead of getting out of his car, however, he sat for a moment listening to the tick-tick-tick of his engine cooling.

He was nervous. He felt like an idiot as soon as he admitted it to himself. It had been a long time since he’d felt the peculiar mix of adrenaline and expectation that was pumping its way around his body right now. He’d stopped being nervous about auditions roughly three years after he’d left his cushy, high-paying role on the show — that was about how long it had taken Hollywood to suck his hopes and dreams out of him. It was hard to feel nervous about something when you knew you didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of achieving it.

He forced himself to acknowledge his feelings. Claudia Dostis was entrusting him with the most important episode of the year — a feature-length, stand-alone wedding episode that was supposed to knock everyone’s socks off. And she’d chosen him, a still-wet-behind-the-ears novice to direct it. When she’d called to tell him her decision a week ago, he’d thanked her, written down the appropriate details and discussed his studio schedule with the production manager to ensure they could work his shooting schedule around these new directing commitments.

He’d read through the story line they sent him, made notes, come up with some ideas of his own. But it was only now that he was sitting here, about to commit himself wholly to the project, that he could admit to himself there was a very real chance he wasn’t up to the challenge she’d offered him.

He was a novice. He’d directed ten episodes, and now they wanted him to make their big special shine. Frankly, he thought they were crazy handing their baby to him.

Of course, he could always say no. He could tell Claudia that he didn’t want or need the hassle. This whole directing thing had only ever been a diversion, after all, something to stop him from banging his head against the wall in frustration.

He could start the car up and drive away from it all. If that was what he wanted.

The door of his ’57 Corvette complained with a metallic squeal as he stepped out. If he sat around contemplating his navel much longer, he was going to be late. Grabbing his notebook, he headed toward the building entrance.

With the decision made, some of his nervousness dropped away and he realized that underneath his uncharacteristic adolescent self-doubt there was a buzz of anticipation, the yin to the yang of his nervousness. He didn’t have to look far for the source — he was about to meet Grace Wellington.

He’d been reading Grace’s work for the past year and every time he picked up a script with her name on it his curiosity and his respect for her had grown. She was the best writer on the show, hands down. She only penned one every now and then — she was obviously absorbed with her duties as script editor — but when she did, it was like a beacon in the night. The dialogue sparkled, emotions ran deep, laughs were sincere. She could write.

He’d whiled away a lot of long, boring hours in his dressing room wondering what she was like, the woman who put down words with so much energy and life and power. It was hard to get a bead on her, since there were so many different facets to her writing.

For starters, there was the sexy, sizzling, witty banter that delighted an actor. That Grace Wellington struck him as savvy and confident, a man-eater in red silk garters and stilettos.

Then there was the wry humor that she managed to inject into every episode. When he dwelt on that aspect of her writing, he thought of messy hair, big smiles, hot cocoa and woolly sweaters.

Then there was the wrenching emotional content of her scenes. She always managed to strike a chord, helping him dig deep to find the humanity in any story, no matter how soapy or silly. That woman he imagined as razor sharp, dressed in minimalist black with a bent for double-shot espressos and books by dead Russian authors.

He was looking forward to meeting her, to satisfying his curiosity about the mystery woman behind the scripts. He also figured that if he was going to have to jump headfirst into the unknown on this project, it would help to have the show’s best writer by his side.

For the first time in a long time, he was looking forward to something. He wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. In his experience, wanting something only made failure more painful.

He smiled grimly as he stepped over the threshold. Ready or not, he was already free-falling.

G
RACE WIPED
her sweaty palms on the sides of her dress, angry with herself for being nervous. Mac Harrison was just a person.

No, he was less than that — he was an actor. A man who traded on his good looks and sex appeal to live in the lap of luxury. All his life, doors had opened for him, women had thrown themselves at his feet and he’d sat back and lapped it all up because he’d been lucky enough to be born with a body and face that the world worshipped.

He was like her sisters. Just as he was the epitome of male good looks, her sisters were stunning, each in her own way a different version of perfection. Felicity, Serena and Hope had also parlayed their looks into careers — Felicity as a weather girl, Serena as an actress and Hope as a model. Growing up as the ugly sister among three beauties had given Grace a front-row appreciation of how the other half lived. She loved her sisters, but she wouldn’t have been human if she hadn’t resented the number of boyfriends she’d had over the years who’d looked distinctly ripped off when they walked into her family home and saw Felicity, Serena and Hope lounging around. Their expressions said it all:
How come I got the dud sister?
It was no fun being the booby prize, so she’d opted to fight on her own terms. She dressed differently, lived her life differently, had separate dreams from her sisters. And it had worked for her, it really had. She had a great career. And until Owen had betrayed her, she’d thought she’d found the one man who valued her heart and soul more than he valued long legs, perfect features and shampoo-commercial hair.

Ha.

He’d sure shown her. But in doing so he’d shattered her last illusion. She lived in L.A., possibly the most appearance-obsessed city in the world, and she worked in the television industry. Perhaps that distorted her perception, but she knew that for many, many people, what was outside a person was more important than what was inside them.

Her lust-crush on Mac Harrison was a perfect example. All those times she’d pleasured herself and imagined it was him touching her, licking her, tasting her, had she once thought about what kind of man he was? Had she fantasized that he cared for animals, was nice to old people, that he stopped to give money to the homeless? No. She’d fixated on his amazing eyes and his hot body and how hard and ready he’d be.

She was as bad as everyone else. Absolutely guilty as charged.

And when she had more time to chastise herself for her superficial values and blatant hypocrisy, she’d do it.

But right now, she was concentrating on surviving the next hour or so. Very foolishly, she had eroticized Mac to the point where the mere sound of his voice turned her on. She’d practically made him her fetish — and she was about to step into an intimate meeting with him that would lead to an intimate working relationship for the next few months.

She’d set herself up to be vulnerable. And she didn’t do vulnerable, not any more.

Put simply, she would rather shave her head than let him know in any way, shape or form that she was attracted to him. He had women falling all over him all the time, she knew that. Probably he expected her to do the same. But he was so wrong. She would never, ever let him laugh at her or give him the opportunity to reject her. She’d had enough of that, thank you very much.

She checked her watch. He was late for their first meeting — a brilliant start and typical actor behavior. Brick by brick she built a wall of disdain around herself.

He’d probably had a Pilates session or a pedicure that he simply couldn’t miss, and had neglected to pass on this vital information to Claudia or herself. She pictured him swaggering in a couple of hours late, all shiny teeth and bronzed skin. Claudia would lose it, and that would be the end of Mr. Harrison’s short-lived dalliance with directing.

She basked in the surge of relief this vision inspired, but her hope died a quick death when she heard a hush fall over the outer office, closely followed by the excited murmur of feminine speculation.

Mac Harrison had entered the building. There was no other explanation for it.

She gathered her notes together, shaking her head over the secretarial staff’s behavior. It wasn’t as though they were all greenhorns — they should be beyond gushing over one of their own actors by now. The man played dress-up for a living — it wasn’t as if he was a Nobel Prize winner or anything.

You screaming hypocrite,
she chastised herself.

If Mac Harrison was so contemptuous, why was sweat prickling her underarms, and why was she flicking her hair over her shoulder and rubbing a finger over her teeth to ensure none of her crimson-warrior lipstick had transferred itself?

She gave herself a stern talking to as she marched toward the conference room. She had been thinking about this moment ever since Claudia had handed down her sentence last week. A whole seven days of dwelling on this scenario, shooting it from every angle with her mental camera, playing both leads, considering all possibilities.

She was not going to gush or simper or blush or ogle or flirt. She was simply going to walk into that meeting room and greet him coolly and professionally. Not by the flicker of an eyelid was she going to reveal that just a week ago she had imagined him pressed against her, his body buried deep inside hers. Hell no. They were going to discuss the upcoming project intelligently, then they would go their separate ways. All very business-like and orderly. All very dignified.

Then she entered the room and lost the power to think.

Claudia was sitting to one side, a smile on her face as she talked to Mac. But all Grace could register was
him:
his scent, his presence, his height, his breadth, his charisma. She felt as though someone had just driven over her with a silk and velvet steamroller, then punched her in the stomach for good measure.

Then he actually looked at her and it was like standing under a million-watt klieg light. Her knees literally gave out on her — fortunately she was close enough to grab the back of one of the chairs and she held on with a white-knuckled grip as her body went up in flames.

He was, quite simply, too good-looking to be fully human.

Everything was perfect — the small screen didn’t do him justice. He was taller. His eyes were clearer, bluer. His jaw was stronger, his nose prouder. He was more graceful, as well as more powerful-looking. He was simply…
more
.

“Mac, you and Grace have met before, right?” Claudia said.

He extended his hand, his smile broadening. “Actually, believe it not, we haven’t,” he said.

Grace stared stupidly at his outstretched hand for a full, agonizing ten seconds. He wanted her to actually
touch
him? To lay her skin against his and not expire on the spot?

Swallowing, she slowly extended her own hand. There was no choice, right? Claudia was already staring at her as though she was an escapee from planet loopy and the smile on his face had lost most of its spontaneity. Gritting her teeth, she clasped his hand in hers.

Sensation skittered up her nerve endings and danced around her body. His hand was large and warm, strong. His skin was smooth but firm. She stared at his well-tended nails and perfectly shaped fingers, remembering how many times she’d imagined him cupping her breasts, thumbing her nipples, sliding her underwear down….

She snatched her hand away and took a jerky step backward.

“S-static electricity,” she blurted when Claudia and Mac stared at her.

He frowned and she busied herself with settling into a chair and arranging her notes and pencils in front of her on the glass-topped table.

Where had her game plan gone? What about dignity and coolness and professionalism? She’d never felt less dignified or professional in her life. She felt exactly like a star-struck teenager, complete with a mouth full of braces, bad acne and baby fat.

“Might as well get started, I guess,” Claudia said, shooting Grace a questioning glance. Grace got the distinct feeling she’d be having an intense interrogation session with her friend later. Her toes curled in her shoes at the very thought.

“Grace, you’re still working on the first draft of the script, I know, but I really want this wedding feature to rate off the graph. I’m kicking in extra money for location shoots, whatever it takes. As far as venues go, Mac, the scouts have narrowed it down to two locations — a vineyard in the Santa Clarita valley, just north of L.A., and the Malibu West Beach Club. I want you to take a look at both of them with Grace and see what kind of ideas they suggest. Once we’ve decided on a location, we’ll swing the team into action.”

Grace concentrated on scribbling down Claudia’s words verbatim — it gave her something to do and it meant that she didn’t have to try to comprehend what her friend was saying until afterward. As much as it galled her, while Mac was in the room, she was hard pressed to simply master the whole inhale-exhale thing.

“Any questions, guys?” Claudia asked, looking from Grace to Mac and back again.

“Yeah. It’s for Grace, actually. I’ve gone over the story line for the episode, but is there any chance of getting a look at your script while it’s a work-in-progress? Just so we can start thinking on the same page?” Mac asked.

Grace just managed to stifle the instinctive scoff of rejection that rose in her throat. The thought of him looking at her half-assed, half-finished work was enough to make her break into a sweat again. Writing was her thing, the thing she did better than anything else in her life. There was no way she was letting this man see her at anything less than her best.