Filthy Beast Read online

  I could see the outline. I mean, holy shit… he was huge, and pretty hard. He said he was thinking about me, but come on. There’s no way he got hard just thinking about me like that. Then again, he wasn’t really trying to hide it, and he wasn’t really getting soft, either….

  Jesus. I need to stop thinking about Jackson’s enormous cock.

  “Are they butchering my story yet?”

  I look up from my daydream and catch Laney grinning at me.

  “Hey you!” I stand up and walk over to her, pulling her in for a hug. The whole thing with Jackson’s ah, uh, towel happened yesterday, though I can’t stop seeing it like it was just ten minutes ago. We’re on a short break while the actors get changed and prepped for their next scene.

  “Place looks good,” she says, looking around the set. We’re shooting on a soundstage that was built to look like the inside of a giant abandoned factory.

  “Yeah, it’s actually going really well so far. Sticking to script.”

  She arches an eyebrow. “Really?”

  “Really,” I say. “Though Lionel made some changes.”

  She sighs. “They always fucking do.”

  “Look, it’s not bad. He just cut some minor characters.”

  Laney groans. “Let me see the script.”

  “I can’t, you know that.”

  She makes a face but doesn’t push the point. I’m not supposed to let the master copy out of my sight, not even to show the writer.

  At this point, Laney doesn’t have much to do with the film. She sold her script and that’s pretty much it. She’s allowed on set because it’s customary to let the writer watch, but they’re not allowed to get involved with the filming at all. If the director makes changes, the writer is expected to basically shut up and deal with it.

  Laney hates that. I can already tell that she’s itching to yell at Lionel, but I won’t let that happen. I don’t want her to ruin her good reputation just on some minor script points, and besides, Lionel is doing a good job. Although he’s a little odd, he’s a good director.

  “How’s that hunk of a lead actor, by the way?” she asks, looking around.

  “He’s not bad,” I admit. “Doing a good job actually. He can kind of act.”

  “Kind of?” She snorts. “I saw his movie. He’s actually talented.”

  “Yeah, well, he’s just okay.” I look away from her. I can feel her studying me right now, trying to figure out what I meant by that, but I’m not going to give her the satisfaction.

  “Well, you be careful around him, at any rate.”

  I hesitate. “Why?” I ask, not sure I want to know the answer.

  “He has a bad reputation,” she says slowly. “You haven’t heard?”

  I shake my head, a knot in my stomach. “I try not to read that stuff before filming. I have to work with these people, you know?”

  “Well, I don’t have any problem combing through the rags,” she says, grinning at me. We start walking slowly through the scenery as we walk. “Word is, Jackson Hendricks is quite the ladies’ man.”

  I frown but stare down at the ground. It doesn’t surprise me at all, considering the way he looks now. He’s so big, so charming, and so handsome. I’m sure he can have anyone on this set right now if he wanted.

  Anyone except me.

  “He’s been good here,” I say, trying to keep it casual. I don’t want her to know how much I care about this.

  “Maybe he is, and hey, this is all just rumor. So you know how it can be. But word is, he slept with literally every woman that worked on his last movie.” She elbows me softly. “Maybe you’ll get lucky and he’ll go through this one, too.”

  I stumble over a piece of rubble and kick it away. The rock smashes up against a fallen steel beam, or a piece of cardboard painted to look like one at least. Everything around here is fake, everything is phony, including, apparently, the people.

  “I don’t think so,” I say.

  “Yeah, you’re probably right. He’s working with Holly Hart. Could you look at anyone else if you had to work with her?” Laney grins at me. “Hell, I think I’d give her a try.”

  I roll my eyes at her. “Okay, enough. I have to work with these people, remember?”

  “Sure, sure,” she says and laughs. “Come on, kiddo. Why the long face? This movie is going to kick ass and make a billion dollars. We’re going places.”

  “Yeah,” I agree softly. “We’re definitely going places.

  Before she can say more, Lionel calls through the megaphone. “Back to places, people!”

  “Better hurry,” I say to Laney. “Wouldn’t want him to start screaming in German.”

  “I wouldn’t? I bet that’d be awesome.”

  We laugh and hustle back to the front of the set. Laney heads off to sit in the chairs reserved for observers, and I take my place next to Lionel. He briefs me on the scene as Holly and Jackson take their places. The crew assembles, the lighting director makes sure everything is set up, and we get moving.

  The scene’s pretty straightforward. The main characters Helga and Brock just finished fighting off an Illuminati-controlled army using their advanced weaponry that they stole from the CIA. It briefly occurs to me that this movie makes no sense, and has nothing to do with the sequel that Laney is supposedly writing, but it doesn’t matter. She’ll probably rewrite it ten times, and anyway, it’s all crazy stuff. If you buy them, you’ll buy anything.

  I watch Holly and Jackson closely, but it seems totally normal. Nothing special is happening between them, and they deliver their lines and hit their marks professionally. I can’t help but keep thinking about what Laney said about them, though. Jackson and Holly make a lot of sense, they’re both rich movie stars rising up through the ranks, and they’re both stupidly attractive.

  I don’t know why that makes me jealous or why I even care. Jackson is nothing to me anymore. We’re just friends, well, we’re on a friendly truce at least. We’re not even real friends. If he wants to sleep with Holly, he can.

  The scene finishes and the crew breaks again to get ready for the last bit of shooting before the end of the day. I go to review the film and cross-reference it to the script like I’m supposed to when something catches my eyes.

  It’s Jackson and Holly. They’re both leaning against a prop support beam, and Holly is laughing about something. She tosses her hair and touches Jackson’s arm, which makes him smile. She leans closer and whispers something in his ear, and he laughs loudly.

  I’m staring at them and I don’t even realize it until Lionel barks at me. “Script girl, get to work.”

  “Sorry,” I stumble, and look back at the monitor, but I can’t help but keep seeing that moment.

  Holly’s gorgeous lips next to Jackson’s ear. The way she whispers. The way he laughs. It seemed so… intimate.

  I have to get myself together. I’m not some jealous little girl. They’re professionals acting in a film. They’re trying to be friendly together, because it’s easier to be friends with your coworkers than it is to be awkward or whatever else. I’ve seen it a hundred times. Stars become best friends during a film and then they drift apart and never speak again.

  That’s what’ll happen with Jackson and Holly. I’m sure of it. I don’t care if they have a friendship.

  And yet I keep seeing him in a towel. And I keep seeing her laughing, tossing her hair. Clearly flirting with him.

  I need to get it together. This is my job and nothing more. Jackson can do whatever he wants.

  We have a truce and nothing more.

  7

  Jackson

  I’m sweating slightly, my breath coming faster as my body works to normalize itself. We just spent the last hour shooting the same ten-second fight sequence over and over again, and although I’m worn out, I’m still exhilarated.

  There’s nothing like a real fight to get your blood jumping, though this is pretty decent. I’ll never feel like I did back with the SEALs when I was doing real dead
ly work. Back then, the fights weren’t scripted, and my life was genuinely in danger.

  A film set is fun and it’s a nice workout, but I’m not in any real danger. And I’m not taking real lives. Out there on the battlefield, I killed America’s enemies, because that was my job.

  Here though, I don’t have to worry about that. It feels good and it feels strange to be free of the constant nagging fear that my next mission might be my last.

  “How was that last flip?” I ask her as we watch the playback on the monitor. Lionel is already off talking with the lighting guys, and so it’s just me and Tara watching the footage.

  “It looks good,” she says without turning around. “I think it’ll fit right.”

  I nod and lean in closer. “They really sell it, don’t they?” I ask her.

  She glances back at me. “Huh?” she asks.

  “The stunt guys,” I say, nodding at the extras that I was fighting with. “They’re really impressive.”

  “Oh. Yeah, definitely.”

  “I mean, I’m the star or whatever, but I’d be nothing without guys that could do that. I mean seriously, watch him take this punch. It looks so…” I trail off as on screen, I punch a guy in the face and he collapses in a realistic way.

  “It looks real,” she finishes for me. “Yeah, I can’t argue with that.” As the footage ends, she turns and looks at me, a strange curiosity on her face.

  “What?” I ask her.

  “It’s just, I’ve worked on more than a few big budget movies like this, and I’ve never had a lead talk about the crew like you do.”

  I blink at her, surprised. “What should I talk about?”

  “Well, normally it’s about how you look.”

  I grin at her. “I’m not that kind of guy. Besides, I know I look good.”

  She rolls her eyes and starts walking. I fall in beside her as we head across the set.

  “Fact is, I’m new to all this,” I say to her. “I don’t really know what I’m doing.”

  “You seem pretty confident to me,” she says.

  “It’s easy to fake. I mean, two years ago, I was fighting on a battlefield in Syria, risking my damn life. And now I’m here, in front of cameras all day long.”

  She hesitates for a second. “That must be weird for you.”

  “Very weird,” I say. “Bizarre, actually. I was hoping…” I trail off a little bit as we walk though a group of stunt guys coordinating the next scene.

  “You were hoping what?” she asks, stopping and facing me.

  “I was hoping you could help me. You know this business better than I do.”

  “You don’t need my help,” she says, not even thinking about it.

  “I think I do,” I answer. “I’ve gotten lucky so far, but if I’m going to do this job for real, I need to learn how to be an actual actor.”

  “And how can I help with that?” she asks, not batting an eye.

  “You know how to act on these sets. I have no clue, I’m just faking it.”

  She watches me for a second, and I can’t help but look into her gorgeous deep eyes. I keep seeing that strong, serious girl that I knew so long ago. She’s still there, just buried under the years and so many experiences that I don’t know a damn thing about. I barely know Tara anymore, and yet I feel like I know her so well. She’s barely changed.

  “Sorry,” she says. “I can’t.”

  “Just have dinner with me tonight. We’ll talk about it, let me pick your brain.”

  “No,” she says, shaking her head. “Sorry.”

  Before I can say a word, she turns and walks off. I think about going after her, but I can’t see the point in that.

  The conversation bugs me for the rest of the day. I figured we had reached some kind of truce and maybe we could start being friends. But she was a little distant, maybe even a little cold.

  Maybe I’m stupid, but I can’t see where this resentment is still coming from. I know she’s still angry about what I did to her all those years ago, but this feels like it’s fresh or something like that. I don’t know what I’m doing to push her away, but it’s not like she’s going to open up and tell me.

  I spend the rest of the day slightly distracted, but I get through shooting. We have a bunch of action sequences to get through, which is actually good for me. I like to get physical when I have a problem, and I find that doing these scenes over and over is pretty cathartic. By the end of the day, I’m tired, but I feel productive and my stress is gone.

  At the end of a shooting day, the crew cleans up the set and starts to prep for tomorrow’s scenes. I take a shower while that’s happening, and by the time I’m done, people are usually heading home. Sometimes I go back to my apartment, have some scotch, and get some sleep. Sometimes I meet the crew guys out for a few drinks.

  Today, I go looking for Tara. I’m not happy about how that conversation earlier went, and I want to know what the deal is. I asked her for help and she just outright turned me down. I want to get through that shell she has, and I can’t keep waiting for her to come to me.

  I find her chatting with some extras near the catering tent. I walk up to the group with a smile on my face.

  “Hey guys, mind if I steal her for a second?” I say to them.

  She looks at me with narrowed eyes but doesn’t say anything as I steer her away. We walk over to a more private part of the set. Above us, an enormous clock is ticking away, part of the scenery for tomorrow’s shoot. The face is glowing yellow, casting an eerie hue down on top of us.

  “What’s up, Jackson?” she says to me.

  I watch her for a second, measuring her. “Why did you turn me down earlier?”

  She sighs. “We don’t have to get into this.”

  “No, we do. You said we had a truce.”

  “I did say that.” She turns away from me, but I grab her arm and turn her back. Her eyes are wide as I look down into hers, and goddamn, do I want to take her right here, right now. She’s so fucking sexy, and there’s a little anger in her gaze, which only makes me want her that much more.

  “I don’t trust you,” she whispers.

  “You don’t trust me?” I cock my head and slowly let her arm go. She crosses them over her chest.

  “No,” she says. “I’ve heard rumors about you, Jackson. And you know what? We don’t know each other anymore.”

  I stare at her for a second, surprised that she listens to that sort of shit. “You’re still that girl I knew,” I say to her softly.

  “I doubt it,” she says. “You’re not the guy I knew.”

  “Yes, I am. I’ve just been through some shit, like you have. But we haven’t changed, not fundamentally.”

  “I don’t know if I agree with that. And anyway, just because we have a truce, doesn’t mean I want to get close to you.”

  “I don’t believe that,” I say, smirking at her. “I see the way you look at me, Tara. You still remember what it was like back then, and you still wonder…”

  She glares at me. “Wonder what?”

  “What it would feel like to have me do exactly what you want me to do to you.”

  She’s quiet for a second, but she doesn’t argue. My heart is beating fast and she’s not running away, not turning away from me. She tips her chin up and stares into my eyes.

  “Do you have any idea what it was like when you left?” she asks me suddenly.

  I frown at her and sigh. “No, I don’t,” I admit.

  “You just disappeared. One day we were as close as I’ve ever been with someone, and then you joined the military without even telling me. You never wrote, you never called.”

  “I got your letters,” I say softly. “I still have them.”

  She hesitates but shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter now. You decided to leave me, Jackson. That wasn’t my choice. And now you’re back and what, you think it can go back to the way it was?”

  “No,” I say to her. “I don’t think that. The man I was when I was out there… y
ou didn’t want to know that man, Tara.”

  “Maybe but you didn’t give me that choice, did you?”

  I watch her quietly for a second and sigh. “Remember that guy, Silas Lerain?”

  She hesitates, a little thrown off balance. “Yeah, I remember Silas. Never shut up.”

  “Yeah, that was Silas. Always talking shit.” I grin at her. “One day, we were walking to school and he goes, ‘Hey man, why the fuck do you hang around that Tara chick all the time? You could have any girl in the school. So why her?’ And you know what I said?”

  She shakes her head. “I have no clue.”

  “I said that she’s the only girl worth my time. He fucking made fun of me for saying that for weeks, but it was the truth. Still is the truth.”

  She smiles a little bit. “I think I remember that. He used to call you a bitch boy.”

  “He was an asshole,” I say, smiling a bit.

  “Didn’t you end up punching him?”

  “Yeah, well, that was because he called my little brother a faggot and tried to steal his iPod.”

  “Oh yeah, I forgot that. Silas really was a piece of shit.”

  “Not as bad as Marty, remember that kid?”

  “Oh god,” she groans. “I haven’t thought about Stinky Marty in years.”

  “That asshole never showered after gym class. Not even once.”

  “We all paid for his mistakes.”

  We laugh together and for a second, it feels normal between us. The feelings we both have, complicated by time and distance and anger and resentment, seem a little less sharp. The more we talk about them, the more it feels like we’re getting it all out. And maybe that’s what she needs, to get it all out.

  She glances down at her phone and sighs. “Look, I have to go. I’ll think about dinner.”

  “I appreciate that,” I say. “I promise I’ll be on my best behavior.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure you will be.” She smiles up at me as I grin at her. I want to kiss her so badly, but I know I can’t. Not yet at least. She’s still angry and still holding on to something, but she’ll let it all go eventually. She just needs to understand that I wasn’t leaving her. I never meant to leave her. I thought it would be better if I cut it off, but god, I was so stupid back then.