Playing With Her Heart (Caught Up In Love #4)(48)
Author: Lauren Blakely

“Can I ask you a question? Why are you so nice to him? I know how you really feel about him. But you’re always so nice to him, like this morning in the hallway.”

“Because that’s what he needs to perform,” I say, as if the answer is obvious. But it’s only obvious to me, because this is the way I work. This is the way I manage actors to get the best from them. “I know Patrick. I’ve worked with him. He’s one of those people who was born skipping, and he’s an amazing talent, and he needs to be happy all the time. That’s what he needs to give the best performances. And that’s what I want.”

“The best performance?” She raises an eyebrow, as if she’s considering this for the first time.

“Yes. Of course I want the best performance. Nothing less.”

“So why did you tell Alexis that day at the studio that she was your Ava?”

“You heard me say that?”

She nods.

“Because that’s what she needs.” I run my index finger along her face. Her skin is so soft, and it’s impossible not to touch her. A soft sigh escapes her lips.

“So you give her what she needs?”

“Look,” I say firmly. “Alexis needs to feel as if she’s the center of the universe. That’s how she gives the best performance that her fans love. But even though I told her she was meant to play Ava, that doesn’t change that you’re the one I wanted more for the part. But that’s what I had to tell her to get her to deliver for me.”

“So you play us all?”

I give her a look as if she can’t be serious. “Is that what you think I’m doing to you?”

Jill

I shake my head. Because I don’t want to think he’d do that. I can’t even contemplate that he’d toy with me. So I won’t believe it.

“Jill, you have to know I’m not playing you,” he says in his cool and controlled voice. He’s the consummate pro now. The man who wins awards, and rains money down on the show’s backers. He’s not talking to me as a lover. He’s talking to me as a director. “But this is how I work, and every actor needs something different.”

“What do I need then? As an actress?” I want to know how he categorizes me. He’s brilliant at his job, and I want to understand how he does it. How he knows what we need. How he makes us give it to him. How he drives us to work harder for him.

“You,” he says, and he stares out at the audience, as if he’s finding the answer there in the vast expanse of empty chairs. In the row after row of red upholstered seats that will creak and groan with theatergoers in two more weeks. With patrons who will never know the blood, sweat and tears that were shed on the path to opening night, but will hopefully fall in love with the artifice that seems real. “You need someone to see you. To know you. To understand you. That’s what makes you so good in this role. Ava needs so many of the same things, and that’s why you connect with her character.”

I am reminded of the day he told me the news. Of the time we had drinks and talked about what he saw in me when I played Eponine. Maybe it sounds vain, maybe it sounds egotistical, but it thrills me deep in my heart and soul to know that he admires my talent. That he thinks I have talent. That he thinks I’m more than good enough. This is what I’ve always wanted, to be able to move people with a performance. I want him to know that. I swivel around so I’m sitting cross-legged and I take his hand in mine. “It means the world to me that you gave me this chance. You know that right?”

“Of course I know that,” he says in a calloused voice that surprises me. Maybe he’d rather not hear how much I admire his work. Maybe what he wants from me right now is something I’m not sure how to give.

“Now let’s get to work because if I spend all night talking to you, we’ll never get this show ready. I want to work on the scene where Paolo finally breaks down Ava. Where he gets her to open up to him and admit all her truths about being alone her whole life and he helps her make the best art.”

Breaks down Ava. Those words reverberate in my head. Paolo breaks down Ava, and there’s a voice inside me, a quiet little voice that’s asking if Davis is doing the same to me. If that’s how he’s getting what he needs from this actress.

But maybe I want to be broken down too.

* * *

We are oddly silent as we pack up three hours later. I grab my coat and my purse and he gathers his phone and his notes, and the silence between us is full of unsaid things. As if neither one of us knows what happens next. Do we go our separate ways or do we find a way to reconnect when we leave the theater together? I want to say something, to ask a question, to make a joke. But I don’t know where to start. I don’t know what’s happening with us.

Then my stomach growls loudly as if it’s an ornery creature begging for food, and he laughs deeply. It’s the first time I’ve heard him laugh like this, the kind of laugh that takes over your body.

“Do I need to feed you?” he says in that playful way he has, and I can’t help but smile and crack up too.

“Evidently, I could really go for a burger and fries. Would you care to take me out on another date?”

His eyes light up, and whatever sadness filled the day is wiped out in that grumbling sound. I’d like to send a thank you note to my hungry belly for giving me a reason to spend more time with him. Time away from the play. “Yes.”

At the diner, we talk more and I ask him questions about all the shows he’s done and he tells me about his productions, sharing stories and anecdotes. I love hearing him talk about what he loves, and as he does, I realize I haven’t thought about Patrick in a long, long time. Not the way I used to. I haven’t lingered on images of Patrick’s face. I haven’t sought him out like he’s the balm for my strung-out heart. I haven’t needed him as a drug anymore.

A wave of understanding smacks me hard. That’s what Patrick has been. A drug. A good drug, a gentle drug. But a drug nonetheless.

And I hardly need my fix anymore. Because of this man here with me. This man is changing me.

And I don’t know what the hell to do next.

“What are you thinking?” he asks, as he bends his head to kiss my neck. A soft kiss. A sweet kiss.

That you make me feel all sorts of things. That everything with you scares the hell out of me. That I don’t know how to hide or pretend this isn’t happening anymore.