Chapter 4: Rising Action
The hotel sheets were cool, a stark contrast to the heat of her own panic. She closed her eyes, chasing a blackness that wouldn’t come. Instead, a different warmth bloomed behind her lids, vivid and complete.
In the dream, the light was golden, filtering through the large windows of a sunlit kitchen that smelled of butter and sugar. Cameron was on the floor, his serious face soft with laughter as Arthur, now three, used him as a climbing frame. “Again, Daddy! Again!” Beatrice shrieked, collapsing into giggles as he tickled her. He looked at London over their heads, his grey eyes clear, unburdened by the plot she’d written for him. “They’re perfect,” he said, his voice rough with a wonder that felt real. He read them a story, doing all the voices, his large hands turning the pages carefully.
After they were asleep, he found her on the sofa, pulling her into his arms without a word. The movie played, unseen. His mouth found hers in a slow, deep kiss that tasted of domestic peace and something hungrier. “I need you,” he murmured against her throat, his hands already pushing her shirt up. There was no hesitation, just a consuming hunger as he stripped her, his mouth hot and demanding on her breasts. He fucked her right there on the couch, pushing into her with a guttural groan, his pace relentless and perfect. "So fucking tight for me," he growled, his fingers digging into her hips. The feeling was overwhelming, a raw, grinding pleasure that built until she cried out, shuddering around him as he followed, pulsing deep inside her. He held her afterward, his breath slowing against her hair. The dream held her in that safe, spent warmth until dawn’s grey light breached the curtains. She woke up aching, the phantom sensation of his body etched into her skin, the emptiness in the actual hotel room a physical blow.
She woke up aching, the phantom sensation of his body etched into her skin, the emptiness in the actual hotel room a physical blow. London sat up, the sheet pooling at her waist, and pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes until colors burst. “It’ll never happen,” she whispered to the silent, anonymous walls, her voice scraping raw. “He’s the male lead. It could never.”
The mantra was a cold shower, bracing and necessary. She showered, the water scalding away the dream’s clinging heat, and chose her armor: a severe black blazer, trousers, glasses she didn’t need. Each piece was a barrier laid over the memory of his hands. In the taxi, she clenched her fists, her short nails leaving half-moons in her palms as the city’s glittering towers loomed. The sleek MLS headquarters swallowed her whole, its atrium a cathedral of cold ambition. “London Devine for the ten o’clock with Mr. Blackwood’s office,” she stated, the name tasting of ash and destiny.
The receptionist, a polished blonde with an unfaltering smile, tapped her screen without looking up. “London Devine,” she repeated, her smile tightening for a fraction of a second before returning to its professional gleam. “Your early, you can wait in the waiting room till they call for you” She gestured with a manicured hand toward a stark alcove furnished with two modern chairs and a low glass table.
London’s pulse, already erratic, skipped into a faster, harder rhythm. She sat, the leather sighing beneath her, and clutched the portfolio.