‘Yeah, that’ll help you get better. Will bagels and lox do?’
‘Depends.’ Cassidy lifted her chin, stifled a wry smile and arched a brow. ‘What is lox, exactly?’
His eyes sparkled. ‘It’s smoked salmon. Bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon.’
‘Ahh.’
‘Is that “Yes, Will”?’
A more genuine smile broke free as she inclined her head. ‘Yes, Will. Thank you. Bagels and lox sounds lovely.’
As if to emphasise her approval her stomach growled softly, making Will’s mouth twitch as he left the room. ‘Come down when you’re ready. Feed a cold and all that…’
She wished he would stop being nice. Annoying Will her heart could cope with. But if he started adding Nice Will to the house she’d fallen in love with at first sight she would be in even bigger trouble than she had been twenty-four hours ago.
Lying back on the bed, she turned her head and closed her eyes, breathing as deep as her aching chest would allow while she compared Will’s life to the one she had. It wasn’t hard to see who had fared better. If her self-confidence had been low before she’d stepped on the plane in Dublin, it was pretty much sitting at the bottom of a dark pit of despair now. She really needed to do something that would make her feel like herself again. But that was just it. Since Will, she’d never really discovered who Cassidy Malone was without him. Maybe it was time to find out?
After all, she was in the house of her dreams in California, a stone’s throw away from the industry she still found completely absorbing—even from the periphery, as a viewer of the art form. It was a step in the right direction, wasn’t it? Nothing ventured, nothing gained?
She slapped her palms against the cool covers and sat upright, reaching into her bag for her tablets and taking them with her as she left the room. Coffee, bagels and lox, tablets—and then she was going to start work and see if she still remembered how to write. That was somewhere to start…
‘THAT’S the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.’
‘How is it?’
‘How is it not?’ She blinked incredulously at him, then continued looking around the large glass desk for the pen she knew she’d had five minutes ago. ‘You want them to find a hidden nuclear warhead in the middle of an archaeological dig?’
Will allowed a pen to twirl between his thumb and forefinger, as if teasing her with it because she couldn’t find her own. ‘We need explosions.’
‘A nuclear warhead is a little more than a simple explosion. And how on earth did the terrorist group get the thing down there, when we’ve already said that no one has discovered the site after centuries of searching?’ Cassidy shook her head, lifting discarded scene cards in her search.
‘We can change that. It’s one line.’ His pen stilled and his deep voice informed her, ‘Behind your ear.’
‘What?’ She scowled at him, her pulse hitching when she realised how intensely he was staring at her as he lounged in his chair and swung it from side to side. That chair had been driving her crazy. It had a squeak. She’d have thought a man of Will’s means could afford a can of oil to fix something that irritating, but no. He just kept swinging and squeaking, and swinging and squeaking, until she thought she might have to kill him.
He jerked his chin at her. ‘Your pen. It’s behind your ear.’
When she reached up her hand she sighed; of course it was.
Retrieving the pen from behind her ear, she reached for the last card he’d scrawled notes on and scribbled through half of it forcefully. ‘Rachel wouldn’t be seen dead wearing that either. You’re turning her into a sex object.’
The chair squeaked back and forth. ‘Bad boy hero, sexy heroine, explosions, treasure hunt, hint of romance—all the ingredients of a blockbuster, trust me…’
‘The box office is all that matters to you, is it?’ Cassidy began rhythmically tapping the end of her pen on the glass tabletop. ‘Forget telling a story, or little things such as character arc and continuity.’
‘We’re still at the brainstorming stage. We’re miles away from character arc and continuity. This is the fun part.’
Really? Because Cassidy hadn’t noticed the ‘fun part’ so much. It was almost as if Will was determined to get her to argue with him. Surely a man with his experience in the business knew better than to fall into the usual traps of cliché and plot device? If she didn’t know better she might say he was playing with her on purpose…
While she considered the possibility of that with narrowed eyes, she tapped her pen harder and faster against the glass. Will continued to add to the ambient noise with the squeaking of his chair.
Then his mouth twitched and he nodded at her pen. ‘That could get irritating after a while…’
‘You think?’ She lifted her brows and tapped the pen harder. ‘Like the squeaking of your chair, perhaps?’
When she pouted there was a split second of silence as the tapping and the squeaking stopped. Then, out of nowhere, they both laughed at the same time. Cassidy tossed the pen down, running her palms over her face as she groaned loudly. The man was making her insane!
Residual laughter sounded in the deep rumble of Will’s voice. ‘Time for a break.’
It only occurred to her that his voice sounded closer when warm hands closed over hers to lift them from her face, and she found herself tilting her chin up to look into the green of his gaze. He was gorgeous. Take-a-girl’s-breath-away gorgeous. Her heart thundered against her breastbone loud enough for her to hear it in her ears as he smiled a small smile that darkened his eyes a shade, then lowered her hands before stepping back and gently tugging her upright.
‘I need food.’
‘Again? We ate less than an hour ago.’ There had been sandwiches. Cassidy definitely remembered there being sandwiches.
‘Five hours ago.’
It was? She looked out of the windows as Will turned, keeping hold of one of her wrists to draw her towards the door. Sure enough, outside the light was changing, the tide was turning and people were beginning to—
Hang on a minute. Why did Will still have hold of her wrist?
Turning her head, she dropped her chin and frowned down at the human handcuff. Long fingers were lightly hooked over her pulse-point, but they were hooked nevertheless, and he was walking them through the living area towards the kitchen. She couldn’t take a chance on him realising what he did to her pulse. So she gently twisted her wrist and reclaimed it, frowning all the harder at the fact her skin still tingled where he had touched.
Will glanced briefly over his shoulder, then walked to the giant refrigerator and looked inside.
