See?
I could evaluate myself realistically.
And I was fine with making movies that made people happy, that entertained and provided some escapism . . . even if that meant I didn’t get to take home a gilded trophy.
I just needed to find my—fuck, but I was going to think it—because I just needed to find my happy again.
I—
Was spinning.
Sighing, I forced the thoughts out of my mind, finished my club soda, then went to make my rounds. I did my job. I schmoozed and shook hands and networked and laughed. Then I sat and looked dutifully on, clapping for a winner that wasn’t me. Which was fine. I was alone, but I was where I had always dreamed I would be. I’d find what was missing, or I’d realize I wasn’t actually missing anything at all.
There. Done. Get over it.
But as I went about my night, I couldn’t help but watch Artie as she went about hers, smiling and laughing and generally charming everyone she spoke to.
She made it look absolutely effortless.
Still, I wondered if she felt the same emptiness inside her that I did.
And if she did, then did the careful distance she kept between herself and the rest of the world make the emptiness easier to bear?
Much later that evening, I was chowing down on my pizza when there was a knock at my door. Slice in hand, I got up from the couch and made my way over, glancing through the peephole to see a harried-looking girl standing outside, clutching a bag to her chest.
I unlocked it, tugged it open. “Can I help you?”
“My boss told me to deliver this to you.”
I didn’t take the bag she extended. “Who’s your boss?”
“Artie Mil—”
My fingers found the handle before she finished the name, peeking inside to see an envelope with Artie’s handwriting on it. Heart skipping a beat, I turned my attention back to the girl in front of me. “You have a ride home?”
She nodded. “I drove.”
“Okay.”
Her feet stayed firmly planted on my porch.
“Did you need something else?”
She blinked. “Oh. Um. Nope.” Spinning, she hustled down the steps and out to the street. I waited until she was in her car and driving away before I went back inside.
The envelope smelled like Artie.
Or maybe I was just hallucinating.
Either way, I opened it up and read. It didn’t take long because there were only two words.
For inspiration.
-A
Curved, hurried strokes, exactly like the note I’d kept from five years before. And yes, I was critically aware of how pathetic that made me, not that it was going to stop me from keeping this one as well.
Gently, I folded and pocketed the paper then looked into the bag.
A book.
I sucked in a breath—in disappointment, in anticipation? In that moment, I couldn’t be sure. The only thing I was sure about was sitting back down on the couch, grabbing another slice, and cracking open the book and beginning to read.
I was hooked before finishing the first page.
Five
Artie
My cell rang just as I stepped out of my car.
I’d taken a red-eye to Iceland right after the awards ceremony in order to approve a few shooting locations my field producer had scouted out.
Already, I was in love, even while understanding that filming here was going to be difficult with our schedule. The project was slotted to begin shooting in October, which meant we had a narrow window in which to get the necessary shots in the right light and weather conditions.
Still, the pictures I’d received from the field producer and director had almost convinced me, despite the risks to schedule.
The drive from the airport and my current stopover had done the rest.
We’d film here and figure the rest out later.
Sighing in satisfaction, I lifted my cell to my ear and said, “Hello?” Besides, the weather in October was supposed to be some of the best and—
“Does this mean you’ll finally work with me?”
My lips pulled into a smile. “Pierce.”
“I didn’t get any sleep last night, thanks to you,” he murmured, and I tried, quite desperately, though I would take that admission to my grave, to hold back a shiver at his voice. I’d heard it with alarming frequency over the last years, the slight bedroom rasp that he never used in public.
Just to me.
Just in my bed.
“Does that mean you like it?” I asked, trying to focus.
“It’s fucking everything.”
I laughed. “I never understand why people say that. It’s just a book. Yes, it’s a story I thought you might like, and”—I smiled at the driver and walked a few feet further from the car, lifting my DSLR to snap a few shots of the landscape—“it can’t put food on the table or cure cancer or whatever everything encompasses.”
“It’s everything when it makes my heart sing with joy,” he murmured. “Or my fingers itch for my camera or for my laptop to frantically type up ideas. It’s everything when I close my eyes and see nothing but the shots I’ll use to tell this story.”
My breath caught, words failing me for several heartbeats. “I’m glad you like it.”
His voice slid down my spine. “I more than like it, I love it.”
He loved it. I smiled, repositioning the camera and taking a few shots that weren’t the pretty landscape, but instead encompassed the logistics area. Where we’d house the crew, where the actors might stay between takes. Places to park and store equipment—
All of it needed to be planned for in advance.
“I’m glad,” I murmured, finger working furiously on the button.
“What’s that clicking?” Pierce said into the silence.
I froze. “I’m in Iceland.”
A beat then, “And that involves clicking, how?”
“I’m scouting,” I said. “Or rather, I’m scouting my scouted locations so that I can make sure they’re up to snuff.”
Pierce chuckled. “You know, most executive producers of your stature sit at home and just lend their names to projects. They don’t take fourteen-hour plane rides halfway around the globe to scout locations.”
“I’m not most producers,” I said, striding back over to the car and telling my driver to proceed to the next location. “It’s my money,” I told Pierce, “which means that if I want to keep it, then I’d better know where it’s going.”
“No,” he said as I buckled in, “it’s because you love it.”
A tingle shot down to my stomach.
In the five years since we’d slept together, I’d gotten to know Pierce quite well. You couldn’t move in the same circles for extended periods of time and not get to know someone. Well, I couldn’t, especially when that someone was a person I liked.
“Don’t try to deny it,” he said lightly. “You’re an excellent producer because you love what you do . . . and also because you’re crazy enough to fly halfway around the world on no sleep just to scout out locations that have already been scouted.”
“I slept on the plane.”