Untamed: (Heath & Violet) (Beg For It) (25 page)

“Oh!” A moan of
desire escaped her lips as I pinched down on her nipples, covered
through the cotton T-shirt, yet still so sensitive. This woman got me
going like no other.

But then, loud as a
tiger’s roar, her stomach rumbled with hunger. Quick, embarrassed,
she brought her arms to cover her stomach. “Whoops!” She laughed.
“I don’t think I’ve eaten since breakfast!”

“I need to feed you!”
I stood and helped her up, re-adjusting myself to ease the pressure
in my crotch. Hammertime would have to wait until after dinner. Then
I could get out my gold pants. Metaphorically speaking, of course.

She polished off her
BLT like it was on fire sale.

“You all right
there?” I asked, as she burped a little into her napkin.

She dissolved into
giggles, a tear forming at the corner of her eye. “I don’t want
to go back to juicing!” she declared, cracking herself up even
more. “I want scones and bacon!”

“Just because you’re
flying back to L.A. doesn’t mean you have to go back to juicing.”

“You don’t know
what it’s like!” she declared in melodramatic angst, laughing
again, then melting into a sigh. “Seriously, though, I’ve gained
at least five pounds here in Vermont.”

“Don’t lose any of
it. You look amazing.” Her breasts pushed plump and juicy against
the soft cotton of my T-shirt. I could still feel her arousal on my
fingertips. I itched to get in there again.

“Oh, I almost
forgot!” she declared, grabbing a couple pieces of paper from the
table that I hadn’t noticed before. “I need you to sign these. We
want to use footage from the shop downtown. Just the artwork, not
you. But we can’t use it without your permission.”

“Sounds good.” I
grabbed a pen and signed. You know what was better than good? Violet
coming on my tongue. I hadn’t had any dessert yet, but I knew
exactly what I wanted.

Pushing the papers to
the side, I stood up, looking down at her wolfishly.

“What?” she asked,
fluttery and flushed.

“Time for dessert.”
I smiled at her. Scooping her up in my arms, I carried her toward the
bedroom where I could take my time. It wasn’t a cave, but it would
have to do for tonight. The rest we’d figure out as it came along.

Violet

Out the window of the
15th floor of the Fame! Network’s headquarters, you’d never know
it was February. The sun shown down from the bright blue sky just
like it did every single day of the year in L.A. On the street below,
palm trees stood stock still in the completely windless mid-afternoon
sunshine.

“You ready?” A
co-worker poked her head into my cubicle. I hadn’t exactly worked
my way into the corner office yet. But at least my cube had a view.

“Yes!” I stood up,
a hand at my stomach to still the frantically flapping butterflies.
Honestly, I felt super close to vomiting. I’d barely slept the
night before, arriving into LAX at midnight west coast time. And the
night before that, with Heath in his cabin? Not so much sleeping
then, either.

My stomach flipped for
a whole other reason. What that man did to me. I missed him so much
already and we’d only been apart for 24 hours. Or was it less than
that? I couldn’t do the time zone math, not on that little sleep.

However long it had
been, it was too long. I so wanted to be back in his arms, fly right
back there and film this show. We’d get to capture Vermont in the
springtime. I bet it would be teeming with life after the winter,
thawing and warming right up with flowers and birds and bees. Heath
and I would join right in.

But I needed to focus.
It would take every last ounce of brain cell power to make my pitch.
I walked down the carpeted hallway, my Louboutin heels strutting
their stuff. Shoulders back, chin up, I needed to own this. I needed
to pitch the shit out of these executives.

“Hello everyone!” I
entered the room, bright and enthusiastic.

“There she is!” My
boss turned and smiled at me, or at least as much of a smile as he
ever managed which really looked more like a cold survey. Sam sat by
his side, looking slightly smug.

“You survived!”
another co-worker congratulated me, rising to give me air-kisses on
each cheek.

“Good to see you,”
another greeted me, giving me a once-over. “I’d heard you’d
gone native.”

“Oh, right.” I
laughed it off, getting a vivid mental picture of the reindeer hat
I’d taken to wearing around town. It got cold there, people!
Reindeer hat cold!

But now wasn’t the
time to get defensive, now was the time to sell. Our boss, the head
production manager for our team, convened the meeting with me, him,
Sam and five other people seated around a conference table. So much
rode on the next half hour. My hands shook, but I drank a Pellegrino
and reminded myself I was one tough cookie. I didn’t back down. I
knew how to rise to a challenge.

And rose I did, after I
got the nod. I stood and started telling them about Watson. Our
little film crew had done an amazing job putting together footage,
using the sights and scenes of rural Vermont to tell the story. I let
the images play out behind me as I spoke to them from the heart.

“Imagine a place
where you can fall in love. A place where you can completely be
yourself. Where everywhere you look there’s something
breathtakingly beautiful. I give you Watson, Vermont.”

I told them about the
organic farm and crazy local Mad Mountain ski resort. I passed around
hard ciders, shipped from Vermont the week before, now chilled and
ready for them to enjoy as I told them about the local brewery. I
showed them footage of ice skating and sledding, of covered bridges
and mountains.

“And best of all are
the people.” I could see them as I spoke, Helga winking to me as
she danced to Bruno Mars, Dave talking passionately about the beauty
of youth hockey. And Heath, of course, building his own cabin and
making furniture so unique yet classic at the same time.

“We’ve found the
real Stars Hollow,” I began my wrap up. “We’ve found the set of
the
Gilmore Girls
,
the town everyone wishes they were from. The kind of place where
everyone knows your name. We’ve got a hit show on our hands here. I
can’t wait to make it with you.”

I sat down, adrenaline
still pumping through me. But even with the rush, I could tell the
reaction in the room was…tepid. Polite clapping. I got a couple of
nods and smiles. A few people tapped at their phones, already moving
on to the next business of the day.

Didn’t they feel it?
The potential? The magic? I noticed my boss hadn’t even touched his
hard cider. Uh-oh.

I turned to Sam, clammy
nervousness making its way up into my throat.

“Or…” He brought
his hands to the table and rose up to standing. “We could go in
another direction.” With a point and a click he opened a different
file on the laptop connected to the screen. “You’ve heard from
Violet. Now let me show you something different. Something a little
more exciting. More juicy.” One by one, the faces around the table
grew more attentive, focusing up and on what Sam had to offer.

What was he talking
about?

“Get ready to feast
your eyes on a secret. A scandal.” Sam stood in his element,
dishing dirt, loving every second of it. I had no fucking clue what
he meant, but he was a master at it and he had everyone’s complete
attention. “Wealth, privilege, celebrity status, all hidden away.
Under wraps. Until now.”

And there, in all his
shirtless glory, appeared Heath on the screen. Massive and ripped, he
stood with a blowtorch in his hands looking giant and sexy as hell.

“He can blow my
torch,” the woman sitting next to me murmured.

That feeling I’d had
earlier like I might throw up? It came back. Big time.

But Sam was just
getting started. “What would you say if I told you I had an exposé
on my hands? An epic one?”

“You want hot?” He
splashed another image of Heath up on the screen, looking giant and
muscled. When had he gotten all that footage of him? And always
without his shirt?

“You want wealth and
privilege?” Sam asked. An image of the quintessential older
businessman flashed on the screen, hair slicked back as he lounged in
an opulent office. “Meet Richard Kavanaugh, CEO of Kavanaugh
Industries and one of the wealthiest men in the world. He passed away
a year ago, leaving a cool billion to his children.”

“Including this
mountain man.” Up went another yummier than yummy photo of Heath,
in plaid, his profile silhouetted against a snow-capped mountain
range. “Whose name happens to be Heathcliff.”

Now I was having
trouble breathing, literally. I tried to take a sip of my water but
all I did was choke and gasp. No one even noticed, they were so rapt
with attention on Sam’s pitch.

“Not enough, you
say?” Sam was loving every second of this. He had everyone right
where he wanted them, eating out of the palm of his hand. “How
about some royalty?”

An elegant elderly
woman flashed onto the screen, looking like the queen of England.
“Meet the Baroness of Warwick. She’s Heath’s paternal
grandmother.”

Another image arose
that caused a collective gasp from the room. It was the equivalent of
TV gold: Dutchess Kate and Prince William. With the Baroness. At a
polo match. All of them wearing hats.

“And there’s more,”
Sam gloated, bringing up a photo of the baroness holding Princess
Charlotte, the royal baby. THE ROYAL BABY!

“Not enough for you?”
Sam practically roared over the twitters and yelps of excitement.
“How about we add a celebrity into the story?”

Up popped a photo of
rockstar Ash Black onto the screen, standing there smiling with his
fiancé. Everyone knew that story, how the notorious bad boy rocker
had had his heart tamed by the children’s librarian. But now Sam
had gone too far. How would he tie that to Heath?

“Look in the back,”
Sam instructed us, zooming in as if on a crime scene. He drew a
circle on the touch screen—and voila. Heath was standing behind
them at what looked like a black tie event.

“It’s the mountain
man! Heath! He’s Ash’s brother!”

“What?” Now I
exclaimed with the rest of the room.

“That’s right.”
Sam nodded his head, drinking in the attention, adding more photos
into the mix. A picture of them from when they were younger, standing
with their father at some sort of a charity event. Another picture
from another year, again at a black tie gala.

“Remember last year
when Ash went off the grid? Everyone thought he was in rehab? He was
in Vermont with his brother Heath!
Hot
Off the Grid
!”

Oohs and aahs arose
from the room.

“There are so many
layers here!” Sam exclaimed in rapture. “At the very least, this
is a Fame! Insider Exclusive.” He referred to the hour-long exposés
our network ran, focusing in on intrigue and scandal. The last one
had re-opened the Natalie Wood debacle, airing supposedly new
evidence regarding her death.

Sam turned to the
audience as images continued to play out behind him, an estate that
looked straight out of
Downton
Abbey
, a college campus that screamed Ivy League, and
then, the man at the center of it all, Heath, in his shirtless glory.

“He’s tucked away
in this nothing town in the middle of nowhere. And we’re the ones
who can expose all of it. He’s our in. We can scoop Ash Black, find
out what really went on behind the scenes last year when he dropped
out of the public eye. We can lift the lid on the Kavanaugh fortune.
Was Richard Kavanaugh’s death due to natural causes? We want to
know!” The headline news of the magnate’s passing flashed up on
screen: “Investor, Pioneer, Billionaire, Dead at 67.”

“When we first went
to Siberia…I mean Watson, Vermont—” The room laughed at his
joke. “I was bored out of my mind. But then I started getting
curious. And I found us a goldmine in Heath. I think we can even get
a series out of this. We can grow it as big as we want.”

Sam pointed at me,
giving me a wink, like we were in on this together. I sat there pale
faced and so shocked I couldn’t manage a single word. “And this
one here. You know what Violet went and did? She got him to sign off
on it.”

He held up paperwork,
the sheets of paper I’d handed Heath a couple of days ago. To get
camera crew access to the shop. “We’ve got it here in writing.
His permission to film. We’re in!”

The room erupted in
raucous applause.

“Amazing!” The
woman sitting next to me grasped my wrist and exclaimed with
excitement. “Great work!”

“I love it!” our
boss declared, his hands coming together in big, hearty claps. “Let’s
get the ball rolling!”

“You won’t be
sorry! We’re going to hit a bullseye with this one!” Sam gave him
the double gun salute with his index fingers, firing away with a
wink.

“Pull in Nance and
Claire. I want a full team on this.” He rose, having officially
given us the green light. “Good idea, going with the one-two like
that,” he added, straightening out his already iron-pressed shirt,
tucked into his perfectly neat and tidy pants. “Violet bores us to
tears so Sam can come in and knock us right out of our seats. Clever
way to pitch. That’s what I like to see around here.”

The people around me
filtered out of the room, buzzing and talking amongst themselves. I
sat stone still, practically gasping for air like someone had punched
me hard in the stomach.

Sam lingered. He
fiddled with a pen. “Well, they sure loved the pitch, didn’t
they?”

“Is that all true?”
Many, many questions fought for space in my brain, questions about
what he’d been hiding from me for how many weeks and how and when
he’d decided to throw me under the bus and what the fuck was in the
paperwork I had Heath sign? But I asked the question that struck me
right at the heart.