“Thank you! Actually while I have the main cast here and we have about 15 minutes until we begin the table read. I'd love to have a word with the five of you about the press junket we have slated for the end of next week.”
“I’m sorry young lady,” barked Lee, coming up behind me. “I wasn’t aware that you were running today’s meeting. I’ll have to review my contract since last I checked I was the only director listed on this project. Clearly you think your ridiculous hiring gives you the right to dictate how my table reads are held.”
There was an audible gasp in the room. I looked around at the shocked expressions on the actors’ faces around me. I knew from some of the background research that I’d done on Lee Wynn that he used this kind of bullying on his crew. However, it was known around town that he had been trying to keep this kind of behaviour under wraps since a caterer had threatened to sue the studio and they had settled out of court.
I turned to face him head on, a trick I’d learned from one of my PR professors. He’d told me to always be willing to stare down the bull as most outbursts can be tamed by your willingness to make strong eye contact.
“Mr. Wynn,” I said with a stern but polite tone, being sure to use the formal mister since he had commented earlier in the day that he didn’t appreciate it. “I’m sure you are aware that my firm has been hired to boost public image thanks to some unfortunate press that was turned up earlier this year.”
“Your job is to not stand in my way. If you’ll excuse me, I am using the limited down time before today’s table read that you have left us thanks to your early morning reschedule to go over important details about next week’s press junket. If you have any further questions about my role, I’m happy to have my assistant Alex send you my job description as outlined by your studio head.”
“Fucking bitch,” Lee hissed and then promptly turned heel and left the room. The air suddenly returned to the room and after a moment or two of shock the group started cheering. Several actors I hadn’t met before even came up and patted me on the back or gave me a thumbs up.
“That was something else,” congratulated Kai. “I’ve never seen him back down to a woman before. Ryan maybe, but never a woman.”
“Incredible,” came a voice from behind me. “But then you’ve always been incredible to me.” I turned and stared into Ryan’s ice blue eyes, our son’s eyes.Yup, I’m in major trouble.
2
MICHAEL
I strolled off the elevator making my way toward the studio’s conference room that had been assigned to Tinsley to use while working the movie.
Tinsley, man, what a woman.
I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about that gorgeous red hair and her supple lips since she’d walked into that table read and all but grabbed Lee by the balls when he tried to harass her.
I found myself daydreaming about her constantly wondering what those lips might feel against my own or ever better around my hard cock. It was becoming a big distraction at work, and I knew it was annoying the shit out of my castmates.
As I walked into the conference room, I saw her typing feverishly on her computer.
Tinsley was an absolute stunner. Her fiery red, curly hair reminded me of some sort of sensual mermaid. I’d had a thing for redheads ever since the early days of Julia Roberts when I would sneak out of my room at night to eavesdrop on my Grandma Frannie watching her favourite movie Steel Magnolias.
I allowed my eyes to pursue her perfect body. She was petite but shapely. Small enough to toss around the bed a bit during a night of passion if she were up for it. I imagined kissing my way down her neck, peppering each inch of her with soft, gentle kisses, and using my teeth once I reached her nipples. I would allow us to teeter along the lines of pleasure and pain as I teased my way down to her core.
Michael, don't go getting a hard on before you even walk through the door. You’re a professional, act like it.
But it wasn’t simply sexual with Tinsley. She had blown me away with her incredible confidence and composure. I’d never known my mother, she had died before I was old enough to have even a memory of her, but my grandmother had spoken often of her kind, subtle confidence.
“That’s the kind of woman you want in your life Michael,” my grandmother would say. “You want a woman that commands not demands a room. A lady that can stop a man in his tracks with a single look and that will protect you to the ends of the earth. You want a true partner.”
That’s what I saw in Tinsley. That was the woman that had been haunting my dreams and waking me up each morning with a boner the size of Texas.
I thought women like Tinsley only existed in my wildest fantasies until two days ago when she walked into that table read and swept me off my feet despite having barely said two words to her.
I couldn’t wait to see her again and I was so grateful that I had been one of the first wraps of the day so that I could come to the studio to meet her early, sign my non-disclosure agreement, and spend time getting to know if my fantasy of Tinsley matched her reality.
I gently rapped on the partially opened door and felt my heart catch in my chest when she looked up at me with those gorgeous, green eyes of hers.
“Well, well, well if it isn’t my favourite boy next door,” she said with a sexy smile. “Please don’t leave me waiting, come on in.”
“Miss Tinsley, I have to tell you once again just how much you impressed me the other day with the way you handled Lee. He’s a grade A asshole. If he wasn’t such a damned good director, I’m sure he’d be out on his rear for how he treated you, but the studio is worried about how the franchise will move forward without him.”.
“Well thank you, but I was only doing what years of experience taught me to do, putting dicks like Lee in their proper place,” she said. I felt myself harden when she mentioned putting dicks in places but quickly got it under control. Had she meant to throw me by saying that? I couldn’t be sure.
“Mind, if I sit?”
“Please, at the table,” she replied. “Let me come to you.” Tinsley walked around to my side of the table, hips swishing back and forth as she moved, and placed a thick document before me.