Page 75 of On Set
I remember like it was yesterday. The way his hands rested possessively on my hips. The hitch in my breath when I realized what was about to happen. The flutter of excitement in my stomach. The pounding of my heart.
All those same things are happening right now as I stare at my screen.
Someone captured our first kiss. The moment it all started.
The headline:Playboy Eli Simms has found love on the set ofChasing Fate.
Clicking the link to the article, I skim the contents. There’s speculation that I’m part of the production team. That we met on set. That we secretly were married while in Nassau. There are more pictures of us scattered throughout the article.
Me leaving his trailer the morning after I spent the night. The first time. When he slept on the couch. I’m wearing the shirt he borrowed from wardrobe. My hair looks a mess, barely tamed. This time, my face is partially visible, the photographer capturing my profile. It’s dark enough outside that unless you know who I am, you can barely tell it’s me.
Still, it looks like I’m doing the walk of shame. It felt that way at the time, so I’m not surprised.
There’s one of the two of us holding hands as we navigated our way through the Seattle airport. The picture is taken from the back. My face is hidden, but Eli is looking over at me, his profile in full view. There’s adoration in his eyes. I remember that day. We were talking about him meeting the girls. I was hesitant but he wasn’t. And the way he’s looking at me confirms how confident he was in us even then.
The last picture is what gives it all away though. The source. There’s only one person who could have snapped this picture.
It’s me standing on Eli’s porch at the vineyard six days ago. I’m staring at the swing, lost in thought. Eli’s standing in the doorway, without his shirt on. What I see in his stare startles me. Love. Happiness. Desire.
Closing my eyes, I take a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“Celia,” I state, the single word barely above a whisper.
“That was my inclination, too.”
Before we can discuss the situation further, people begin rushing in and out of my office. Slamming my computer shut to keep anyone else from seeing the article, I do my best to focus on the task at hand. I need to collect the rest of the forms and head to the corporate offices so we can start working on finding replacement items for tomorrow.
My phone starts going off as I’m packing up my things for the day. Eli hasn’t said a word about the article since we were first interrupted. He’s sat in the corner of my office in silence, staring at his phone. Either he doesn’t know what to say or he’s formulating a plan.
“I have to drop these off and then we can leave.”
As excited as I was to ride together this morning, right now I’m wishing I had my own car. I could run away and escape having the rest of this conversation. Because I have no idea how it’s going to go and I’m the one in control. He knows my stance on being in the spotlight.
The last thing I want is to have my name dragged through the mud. For people to talk about me and how I’m not good enough for Eli. Or for people to speculate about me or my mother. More than anything, I don’t want to live through what they might say about my father’s death. I’m still processing the few facts I have.
As soon as we’re through security and on our way back to Eli’s house, he breaks the silence.
“Are you breaking up with me? If so, just tell me now. Please don’t drag it out.”
“No, I’m not. I just don’t know where to go from here or what to do,” I say, my words sounding more confident than I feel. “You know this is something I was trying extremely hard to avoid. I don’t like the spotlight and try to stay as far away from it as possible.”
“What if we give them an exclusive? That’s what they always want. Factual information straight from the source.”
Sit down with a reporter and tell them who I am, details about my life, about our relationship? I don’t know if I can do that.
On the other hand, I’m not sure I want to read the fabricated ideas they may come up with either.
And maybe if we give them the story, they’ll stop talking about it. Which means the spotlight will fade. All I have to do is reveal my identity.
“I’ll think about it. For right now, I think we need to lay low. If Celia is the one who sold them the pictures and the story, I don’t want to give her any more ammo.”
“I don’t get why she did it. I think that’s what irritates me the most,” he confesses, hitting the brakes too hard as the light turns red. I fly forward in my seat, brace myself against the dash, and let out a little screech. “Sorry. I’m just so frustrated. I wasn’t paying attention to the road.”
“You really don’t know why she did it?” I ask. When Eli shakes his head, his focus on the road again as the light changes, I continue, “She’s jealous, Eli. She wants you. She made that perfectly clear. And because I have you, she’s out to destroy us both. Maybe she thinks you’ll come running to her or maybe she just wants everyone around her to be miserable. Whatever her motives are, whatever she thinks the outcome will be, she won’t be happy until she has you. Bottom line.
“The shitty part is I really thought we were making ground. She finally got her shit together. I guess I was wrong. She won’t rest until she has everything she wants, including you.”
“Well, that’s not going to happen.”