The weight of their livelihoods sits heavy on my shoulders.
“Not a chance in hell,” Dante laughs.
“Come on! It’s a day off, and your character sheet’s getting dusty.” I’m grateful for their playful banter. It pulls me from my guilt spiral. “We’ll let you bore us with your historically accurate weapons rants…” Marcus grins.
Dante blows them a kiss. “Don’t miss me too much.”
As we walk away, I study his profile. “What’s their mysterious offer about?”
“They run this whole D&D campaign between takes. Been trying to rope me in since day one.”
“D&D?”
“Dungeons & Dragons. It’s a role-playing game. And I love to dabble in that sort of thing, but they do it so earnestly, huddled around a table with their dice and their carefully constructed fantasies about dragons. It’s all very wholesome.” I catch the curl at the corner of his mouth, and something in my chest shifts imperceptibly.
“Sounds better than sitting alone overthinking everything,” I admit, surprised by my own honesty. “At least they seem unfazed by yesterday’s drama.”
“Maybe take a page from their book,” he suggests.
“Says their resident favorite,” I tease, trying to lighten my own mood. “Your reputation does precede you.”
“And what exactly have you heard about my reputation, Miss Sinclair?”
“That you like—” The words stick in my throat. “People?”
“And?”
“And doing stuff with people.”
“Sex?” he asks flatly, examining my face. “I love to fuck, Reese. The way bodies find each other in darkness. The brief animal moments. How two people can occupy the same space and time and still feel utterly alone afterward.” I swallow hard, knowing I’m in dangerous waters. His golden eyes find mine, darkening. “Though celibacy can be just as intoxicating.”
As Dante’s words coil around me like smoke, Felix’s dramatic exit blurs into a fever dream. The production crisis gnawing at my insides dissolves into something hazier, less urgent. My mind, usually Olympic-level at catastrophizing, fixates instead on bodies finding each other in darkness.
I should be having a proper Hollywood meltdown in my cabin. Instead, I’m caught in Dante’s gravity, my anxiety meltinglike cotton candy in rain. “Quite the celibacy expert, aren’t you? What’s it been, forty-eight hours?”
“Thirty-six days,” he says.
The day of the table read. The day he met me. The number hits me like a confession, making my skin prickle with possibilities I have no business considering.
“Try three years,” I blurt out, immediately wanting to swallow the words back.
“No wonder you’re wound so tight during training.”
“I cannot believe I just told you that.” I press my palms to my burning cheeks. “The last twenty-four hours have already been a dumpster fire. Why am I adding kindling?”
“Don’t.” He towers over me like the ancient trees around us, all dangerous grace. “Your whole life’s been about the work. Even on Mars, people would know your face. Most relationships crack under that kind of pressure. The real ones, anyway.”
“Bold of you to assume I’m a relationship girl,” I challenge.
“Sweetheart.” The word drips with knowing.
I want to complicate things until they’re deliciously unsalvageable.
I’ll just blame the lack of sleep for my dwindling resolve.
This isn’t professional. I take a deliberate step back, though he radiates the kind of magnetic pull that makes my skin hum. I force myself to redirect.
Production. Focus on production!
