Wild at Heart (Walk on the Wild Side #1) (8 page)

Do. Not. Think. About. That.

Find your Zen.

Ruby seemed to be getting into the mood of it now. Which, given how unbelievably sexy Jake was, shouldn’t have been very hard. Parting her full lips, Ruby arched her back sensuously and pressed her breasts into Jake’s sculpted chest. She gave her thick mane of hair a shake, and ran her tongue slowly over her bottom lip and—

“
Cut
!”

Ruby flinched visibly.

“Sorry,” said Amber. “Really, that was better. More lively, at least. But it felt a little...um, self-conscious. Like you knew the camera was on you.”

Ruby blinked at her. “Yeah, well, I do know the camera’s on me.”

“But your character’s not supposed to know. She’s just living her life, not making a music video.”

Oh, and that got another flinch.

Amber tried again. “It’s just that...what you’re doing—it looks a little too...posed. You know, calculated.
Fake
.”

Okay, maybe that wasn’t the gentlest way to have put it. But it was true—Ruby was
acting
sexy, creating a facsimile of desire with the shell of her body. Her fans might be thrilled to see it, no matter what. But Amber needed her to show desire from
within
.

“Look,” said Amber. “Just let it flow. Don’t try to make it pretty. Don’t try to force it to be sexy. Be
authentic
.”

Ruby nodded, but her face looked stiffer than ever.

Jake stepped forward then. “Hey,” he said. “Amber, can you maybe give us a couple minutes here? Without the cameras? So Ruby and I can talk?”

“Sure,” said Amber, motioning to Nick and Onyx to shut everything off.

Jake led Ruby out of sight behind a boulder, but the murmur of their voices made it clear they were talking intently.

Onyx punched Eli on the shoulder. “C’mon,” she said. “I need you to…uh, identify some species of toadstools for me.”

Eli looked alarmed at being addressed by a female. Especially a scary female like Onyx. “I don’t know anything about toadstools,” he said.

Onyx rolled her kohl-lined eyes meaningfully in Nick’s direction. “So guess.” She grabbed Eli by the elbow and dragged him off down the hill. “Move.”

Which left Amber alone with Nick.

Great, so even Onyx could tell there was something off between them, and thought it needed to be fixed. Immediately.

As if it could be fixed.

Nick, not surprisingly, was suddenly very absorbed in checking his light meter again. And, oh good God, this was awful. Any other day, she could have talked to Nick about what was happening with Ruby, have him reassure her, or give her a reality check, bounce ideas back and forth. But in the past twenty-four hours he’d gone from being her unfailing rock to being a big pit of quicksand.

She actually hoped Eli and Onyx would hurry back so there’d be more people there to not talk to, so it wouldn’t be so conspicuous that she wasn’t talking to Nick.

Nick fiddled with his meter for a few more seconds, but then he looked up at her abruptly. “Hey, kiddo,” he said softly, his eyes kind of hooded like he knew she wouldn’t want him looking at her. “Can I offer some advice?”

Her stomach jumped. And then twisted.

Advice. Oh, yes, she definitely wanted
advice
from Nick Turner right about now.

But, actually, given how badly things were going with her actors, she couldn’t exactly afford to turn it down. “Sure,” she said tightly. “Shoot.”

Hesitantly, Nick looked her in the eye. “Don’t take this wrong, but...ease up a little, okay? Ruby’s feeling a lot of pressure right now, I think, and you being hard on her’s not helping her relax.”

“Ruby?” she said. He thought she was being hard on
Ruby
? And just like that, the hot seething ball of jealousy she’d managed to tamp down thus far burst into flame. “Ruby needs help to relax? Well, I really think that’s more your department than mine, cowboy. What do you say we all go back down to the cabins for a couple hours and you help her get the
tension
out?”

And Nick’s face went hard and dark, and now Amber’s stomach turned into a lump of lava rock. A big, hard, horrible, guilty, stupid lump of lava rock.

“Oh, God,” she blurted out. “I’m sorry. That was a totally middle school thing to say.”

And no,
no no no no
—the inside of her nose started to have that hot, achy, prickly feeling, and tears were suddenly pushing their way up in her eyes.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she said, and the tears flowed right over. “I’m just fucking everything up right now. I mean
screwing
it up.” Her hands flailed. “I mean—oh, bad choice of words. Forget I said that. I mean—I’m just a mess.”

“Amber.” Nick started to reach towards her, but clearly thought better of it, and let his arm fall back to his side. “Look, I’m really sorry. About the way things have gone the last couple of days. When you walked in on me and Ruby—”

She put up a hand to block his words. “No, it’s fine, Nick,” she said, keeping her voice low so the sound wouldn’t carry to any of the others. “You can be with whoever you want.
Ruby Torres
…I mean, come on, what man wouldn't want to be with her? You’d have to have a testosterone deficiency to turn her down.” She swiped at her eyes with her wrists. “And I know for a fact you don’t have a testosterone deficiency.”

A rueful look crossed Nick’s face. “Maybe an excess.”

And for just a second his brow knit like he was wrestling with a decision, like he was about to tell her something more.

But then he just shrugged. “Definitely an excess.” He shook his head. “If anybody’s a mess, it’s me, kiddo. I’m—I’m not exactly loyal boyfriend material. You know how I am. I’m just...I’m sorry you had to experience that side of me.”

Amber blew out a hard breath.
A testosterone excess
. Yeah, maybe that was it.

Poor Nick—he looked as miserable as she did.

And, to be fair, he’d never made her any promises. She’d been the one to jump him up in the meadow. So, he wasn’t
pond scum
. Or at least not
lying
pond scum. Just a really, really physical guy. Who didn’t do relationships. None of this was personally directed at her.

She wasn’t sure that knowledge made it hurt any less.

Before she had to figure out something else sensible to say, Jake and Ruby walked back out into the open, holding hands of all things, very tight. It didn’t look romantic, more like fairy-tale children holding hands while lost in the woods.

Which made Amber the Big Bad Wolf, apparently.

“Okay,” said Jake. “We’re ready to try that again.”

Ruby had a deer caught in the headlights look, but she nodded.

Amber bit her lip. Nick was right—Ruby needed reassurance now, not criticism.

“Great,” said Amber. “And, look, I’m really sorry if I jumped down your throat before. I’m just gonna hang back this time, and let you play with the scene, okay? Any way you want to. We’ll let the cameras roll, and you try out whatever you feel like trying, and we’ll see where it takes us. Deal?”

“Deal,” Jake and Ruby said together.

So Amber waved Eli and Onyx back up into their positions, and Nick did some adjusting of the lenses and the reflective screens to account for the movement of the sun, and then Jake and Ruby took it from the top.

Whatever Jake had said to Ruby during the break, it definitely seemed to have helped. Before they started, he looked into her eyes hard and long, and she nodded. This time the dialogue sounded much more like actual conversation, and something more interesting than before was happening on Ruby’s face.

It still wasn’t really right—it was still a little tentative, a little muted, but it was progress.

And then Jake kissed her. And that was
definitely
different. Ruby seemed to melt in against him this time, and she didn’t seem to worrying about whether or not her booty was posed in exactly the right position. She was just kissing him...and making little sighing noises. And tangling her fingers in his hair.

Well. It was certainly
authentic
.

Maybe Ruby Torres wasn’t much of a monogamous type herself.

Though Jake Hultensaalt was about Nick’s height, and had very similar dark hair, and similar broad shoulders, so maybe Ruby’s sudden burst of motivation had nothing to do with Jake at all. Had she maybe told Jake about Nick during their little heart-to-heart behind the boulder? Had Jake advised her to pretend he was Nick?

Suddenly, this was all too much like watching Ruby Torres naked in Nick’s arms.

Nick’s mouth on her mouth. Nick’s hands stroking down over that fabulous, famous ass.

The seething ball of jealousy was turning into a freaking volcano. And was being joined by a regular tsunami of humiliation.

Wouldn’t this scene make much more sense if the characters were, say, wearing four or five layers of clothing? With parkas on top?

Or were standing at least three feet away from each other?

Oh, this is not working. This is not working at all.

Amber’s heart was about to split open. It took every bit of restraint she had not to yell, “Cut!” just to make it all stop.

But she didn’t have to yell “Cut.”

Without warning, Ruby Torres suddenly pushed Jake away from her, backing up several feet, and waving her hands in front of her like she was trying to ward him off. “I’m sorry...I’m sorry,” she said in a choked voice. As soon as she glanced over at Amber, it was perfectly obvious that she was about to burst into tears. “I thought I could pull it off. But I can’t. I just can’t do this today.”

She dove for her bathrobe and went charging back down the trail towards the cabins, pulling it on over her nakedness as she went.

“Shit,” said Jake, grabbing his robe and taking off after her at a run.

Eli watched them go, blinking in confusion, his boom mike swinging over nothing but grass and flowers.

“Shit on a
cracker
,” said Onyx.

Nick didn’t even say anything. He just blew out a long, low breath, then started dismantling the ARRI Alexa set-up with a look that said he didn’t think Ruby Torres was likely to be able to pull this off anytime in the near future either.

The sky was still blue above them; the mountains in the distance were pristine and majestic. An eagle screeched somewhere overhead. The day could not be more beautiful.

But everything was a disaster.

Amber pressed the heels of her hands against her eyeballs, and rubbed them back and forth, trying to ease the ache that was starting to pound through her temples.

Ah, well, what was the point of screwing up just one part of your life at a time?

Might as well go in for the complete catastrophe.

She scooped up Jake’s and Ruby’s abandoned street clothes, and turned and headed back down the path herself. She couldn’t seem to help seeking out every rock in the trail and kicking it downhill as hard and mercilessly as she could.

Chapter Four

At least Amber knocked this time before barging into his cabin. Pounded actually. And then, with the door just barely cracked, yelled, “All clear in there? I know Ruby’s taking a walk with Jake, but I didn’t want to assume you were alone.”

Nick couldn’t help smiling a little at that, ruefully—Amber’s sarcasm was back.

And Sarcastic Amber was a damn sight preferable to the Apologetic Weepy Amber he’d seen up at the shoot today. That Amber had about shredded his heart.

“It’s safe,” he called back. Though it didn’t feel safe. Not for him.

But they had to talk. They had to figure out how to work together again.

Amber peeked in around the door, scanning the room like he might actually have a couple catering girls naked in here with him.

Finally she stepped inside, but kept one hand on the door latch. “So,” she said, eyeballing him suspiciously. “What exactly did you do to Ruby?”

His eyebrows rose, and she broke off, grimacing.

“Wait, no!” she said. “I don’t want any of
those
lurid details. Let me rephrase the question: what did you do to
upset
her? Because it occurred to me on the way back down the mountain that she probably didn’t burst into tears up in the meadow just because I was a little brusque with her.” She crossed her arms over her chest, looking fierce. “If you broke my star, Nick Turner, I’m skinning you alive.”

He had to stop and think before answering. Whether it made her weepy or not, it really was best for Amber to go on thinking he’d actually slept with Ruby.

“You know she’s coming off that nasty breakup with Vinnie La Russa,” he said. “I’d bet that’s got a lot more to do with her mood than anything that happened with me.” There. Just ambiguous enough—he wasn’t lying, but he wasn’t clarifying the truth, either. “Maybe kissing a new co-star reminded her of the whole fiasco with him.”