Chapter 4: The Dressing Room Straddle
The dressing room smelled like jasmine and something sharper underneath—hairspray, maybe, or the faint chemical tang of setting powder. Tim wheeled through the door and pulled it shut behind him, and the click of the latch sounded louder than it should have in the hush of the room.
Lucy was already moving.
She crossed the space between them in four steps, silk robe billowing behind her, and grabbed the collar of his shirt with both hands. Yanked him forward. Kissed him like she'd been starving for it, like the twelve hours since he'd dropped her off at the studio had been twelve years.
Tim made a sound against her mouth—surprise, mostly, but not protest. His hands found her waist on instinct, fingers spreading over the fabric of the robe, and she pressed into him, all heat and urgency and the soft weight of her body against his.
"Hi," she breathed when she finally pulled back. Her lips were pink and swollen. Her eyes were dark.
"Hi yourself."
She didn't step away. Just stood there, close enough that he could feel the warmth rolling off her skin, her hands still fisted in his collar.
"Do you have any idea," she said, "what you do to me?"
Tim blinked. "I was literally just sitting there."
"Exactly." She let go of his collar and started pacing—three steps one way, three steps back, bare feet silent on the plush carpet. "You were just sitting there. Watching me. Not even doing anything. Just—existing. In that chair. With your face." She gestured vaguely at his face, which made no sense, but he let her continue. "And every time I turned around, you were looking at me like—like—"
"Like what?"
"Like that." She stopped pacing and pointed at him. "That exact expression. Right there."
Tim had no idea what expression he was making. Probably something stupid. Probably something soft and obvious and entirely beyond his control.
"I was watching you work," he said. "You're good at your job."
"I'm wearing a silk gown that costs more than your car. I look like a fertility goddess. My back hurts. My ankles are starting to swell. And all I could think about, the entire time, was climbing into your lap and—"
She cut herself off. Pressed her lips together. Her cheeks flushed pink.
Tim raised an eyebrow. "And?"
"And nothing." She turned away, but he caught her wrist.
"Lucy."
"I'm not going to say it."
"Say what?"
She spun back around. "I've been horny all day, okay? All day. Since six a.m. Since I woke up. Since you kissed my shoulder in the kitchen and told me to have a good shoot. That's it. That's all it took. One kiss. On the shoulder. And I've been walking around this set for eight hours feeling like I'm going to crawl out of my own skin."
Tim stared at her.
The robe she was wearing—pale pink silk, probably worth more than his laptop—had slipped off one shoulder. Her hair was still styled from the earlier shots, loose waves cascading down her back. And beneath the robe, he could see the curve of her belly. Small. Barely there. But unmistakable.
Sixteen weeks.
He'd been watching her all morning, and every time she turned, every time the photographer called for an adjustment and she shifted her hips or tilted her chin, he'd felt something crack open in his chest. Pride. Wonder. Awe. And yeah, okay, maybe something else too. Something hungrier.
"Come here," he said.
Lucy didn't hesitate. She stepped forward, straddled his lap as best she could with the new geography of her body, and settled against him with a sigh that sounded almost relieved. Her knees bracketed his thighs. Her hands found his shoulders. And then she rolled her hips, slow and deliberate, and Tim's vision went briefly white.
"Jesus," he managed.
"Not even close." She did it again. Slower this time. A grind that started somewhere in her spine and traveled all the way down to where their bodies met. "I've been thinking about this for hours. Hours, Tim. Do you know how distracting that is? I almost dropped a five-thousand-dollar earring because I kept imagining you—"
"Imagining me what?"
She leaned in. Her breath was warm against his ear. "Imagining you watching me like you were watching me today. Imagining you thinking about all the things you wanted to do to me. Imagining what your hands would feel like on my—"
His hands tightened on her hips. "Lucy."
"What?" She pulled back just enough to look at him. Her smile was sharp and knowing. "You asked."
She kissed him again before he could respond. Deeper this time. Hungrier. Her tongue slid against his, and her fingers found the buttons of his shirt, working them open with the kind of efficiency that suggested she'd been planning this for longer than eight hours.
"Your belt," she murmured against his mouth.
"What about it?"
"Take it off."
Tim's laugh came out rough and breathless. "Bossy."
"You love it."
He did. God help him, he did.
She shifted off his lap just long enough for him to work the leather through the loops, and then she was back, warmer than before, her robe slipping further off her shoulders. The silk pooled around her elbows, exposing the lacy edge of a bra that matched exactly nothing about the professional, put-together model he'd watched on set all morning.
"You changed," he said.
"I planned ahead." She pressed a kiss to the corner of his jaw. "This is not a spontaneous event. This is a carefully orchestrated seduction."
"On a Wednesday? In a dressing room?"
"I'm a working mother-to-be. I have to multitask."
His hands found the small of her back, skin warm under his palms. She arched into him, and the new weight of her belly pressed against his stomach—a reminder. A promise. Something that made his chest ache even as his blood ran hot.
"You're beautiful," he said.
"I know."
"I mean it."
"I know you mean it." She cupped his face in her hands. "That's why I started dating you."
He kissed her again. Let her set the pace. Let her take what she needed, grinding against him with a rhythm that was both desperate and careful—mindful of the life growing between them, but unwilling to slow down. Her fingers worked the rest of his buttons open. Her mouth moved to his neck, teeth catching on his pulse point.
"I love you," she said against his skin.
"I love you too."
"I'm going to ruin this shirt."
"It's already ruined."
She laughed—bright and sudden—and the sound bounced off the velvet drapes and the gilt mirrors and came back to him like music. And then she was kissing him again, and he was gripping her hips, and the door was still locked, and they had maybe twenty minutes before someone came looking.
"Tim," she breathed.
"Yeah?"
"Stop thinking."
"I'm not thinking."
"You're always thinking." She pulled back to look at him, and her expression was soft now, softer than the hunger that had been there a minute ago. "You get this look. Like you're calculating something. Like you're trying to figure out if you're allowed to want this."
He didn't answer. Because she was right. She was always right.
"You're allowed," she said. "You're always allowed."
And then she kissed him again, and this time he stopped thinking altogether.
The room was warm and close and smelled like jasmine and sex and the faint, familiar trace of his cologne on her skin. Somewhere outside, the muffled sound of a production assistant called out for someone named Marcus. The vanity lights hummed. The silk robe slid to the floor in a whisper of fabric.
And Tim let himself fall into her. Into this. Into the life they were building one impossible, unplanned, beautiful moment at a time.
Later—much later—Lucy would fix her hair in the mirror and dab concealer over the place on her neck where he'd left a mark. She'd kiss him one last time and tell him to wait ten minutes before coming back out. She'd roll her eyes when he asked if that was really necessary.
"Everyone out there has eyes," she'd say. "And you look like you just got the best thirty minutes of your life."
"I did."
She'd flush. Actually flush. And Tim would feel something warm and smug settle in his chest.
But that was later.
For now, there was only this: her body against his, her breath in his ear, and the quiet, certain knowledge that whatever came next—doctor's appointments and swollen ankles and midnight feedings and the terrifying, beautiful unknown of becoming parents—it would be worth it.
It was already worth it.
She shifted against him again, and he groaned, and she laughed, and the sound was the best thing he'd ever heard.
"Again," she whispered.
And he obliged.