HE KEPT KISSING AFTER CUT

The director called cut, and the Oscar winner kept chasing my mouth. We were shooting a sex scene. Behind the monitor my exboyfriend, the director, lost it.

He pulled me into the equipment alcove and told me the silent treatment and the breakup were all his fault. Then he yanked me against his chest.

And of course, that was the exact moment my husband, the Oscar winner, walked in on us. "Why haven't you let go yet, wifey?

Does he feel that good holding you?" That night he asked it against my ear, over and over. "Does he sit as deep in your heart as I do?" Chapter 1 After a whirlwind marriage to Ashton Vance, Best Actor winner, we ended up on the same production.

Good news: he's the male lead, I'm the female lead. Unhinged news: my exboyfriend is on the directing team.

And the real kicker: our first scene is the one where I seduce the male lead. Meaning I get to show my ex exactly how I seduce my husband??? The 2nd AC clapped the slate.

I braced myself, wrapped around Ashton from behind, slid my fingers across his chest and down his stomach, and went up on my toes to breathe against the back of his ear. "Your body runs so hot.

Why are you always so cold with me?" Ashton caught me by the throat and slammed me back against the wall. "Talk. How did you get in here?" I couldn't get a breath.

The strap of my slip slid down while I struggled. Right before anything showed, Ashton reached up and tugged the strap back into place.

Behind the monitor the director called cut. "What was that?" I froze, staring at Ashton, blank. His face was perfectly calm, but his earlobes had gone red. "Careful, wifey.

Don't flash the room." My whole face burned as I looked around at the crew. Thank God the sound was off. Everyone was busy with their own work. Nobody had noticed us.

Ashton is at the peak of his career. How does he have zero instinct for keeping the marriage private? That night I went back and forth about it and finally texted him. [You busy?

I, um… I need to talk to you about something.] [Wifey, my door's open.] I peeked out of my room, made sure the hallway was empty, and snuck across into his.

Ashton had nothing on but a towel. I swallowed. Before I could get a word out, he grabbed my hand and laid it flat on his abs.

We were close enough that I could see the veins standing up under his skin. My eyes went wide.

My heart was going absurdly fast and my face was burning. "What are you doing…" He said it like it was the most reasonable thing in the world. "Wifey, next time you need something, just tell me.

I'll come to you." I pulled my hand off him, fast. "No — what I wanted to say is, let's keep this quiet for now.

On set we act like strangers." "Like strangers?" "Is this about that exboyfriend you split with a year ago?

You don't want him knowing, so you don't want it out there?" "You saw your ex once today and figured out you're still not over him?" Porter Thackeray and I had accidentally made eye contact exactly once.

We hadn't said a single word to each other. How did Ashton even figure out he was my ex?! "You've got it wrong.

I just think it's better for you and better for me if we don't go public." "I signed a marriage license with you.

I wouldn't—" He looked straight at me. "Wouldn't what?" "Wouldn't still be carrying a torch for him." "Porter and I ended clean." "So I'd rather we kept it quiet for now.

This has nothing to do with him." Chapter 2 "Don't worry. I have my own limits and my own sense of proportion now that I'm married.

I broke up with my ex, and broken up means broken up. I don't go back to exes, and I'm not going to get tangled up with him.

I mean what I say." There was no humor at all in Ashton's dark eyes. "Fine." "We'll do it your way.

No going public." What I didn't count on was that the day after I swore up and down I'd have nothing to do with my ex— Porter came looking for me.

I was through hair and makeup, sitting in my own trailer with the script.

He came in, shut the door, and the first thing out of his mouth was, "Why were you coming out of Ashton's room last night?" We'd agreed to keep it quiet, so I wasn't about to tell him straight out what Ashton was to me. "What answer are you hoping for?

That I got here off the casting couch?" Porter frowned and came closer. "Larkin, I know you're not the kind of person who takes shortcuts." "I'm just reminding you.

Don't go to a man's room at night. People talk." We broke up. Who is he to be policing me now? I gave him a polite smile and let it sit. Porter's hands were clenched tight.

He let out a small sigh. "What did I do wrong? Why do you have to make me out to be this monster?" Porter and I dated for two years in college.

He was the serene, arthouse kind of director, and his father was one of the big names — that Thackeray — with a network and projects that could be handed straight across to him.

His family had the road paved for him. So while we were together, he could give me every bit of his attention without anything pulling at him.

Me, I was a green nobody actor back then, on the outs with my family over studying acting, running all over the place for auditions, scrapping for parts.

But the main reason we broke up wasn't that we were never in the same place. It was that he wanted something clean. Porter couldn't stand the parts I took when I was doing bit work.

A sex worker with a lot of skin showing.

Or the kind of scheming secondlead who drugs the heroine to destroy her, has it all backfire on her, and ends up shooting a sex scene herself.

We'd had vicious fights about it. "No man who actually loves a woman would be willing to let her go work as a stripper!" So he wanted me to quit acting and move into another industry.

And he put my work in those words while he was at it.

With my dignity in pieces, I couldn't keep it in either. "If you look down on me, then why did you keep telling me you supported me chasing my dream?" "You knew my career plan from the start.

You knew I came out of a conservatory, that I'd be trying every kind of role there is." "If you'd told me you minded, we never would have started." When he loved me, he said over and over that he'd make me the lead in his frame.

When he stopped, he decided I embarrassed him. That argument ended with us breaking up, and I hadn't seen him in a year. And now he's asking me what he did wrong.

I didn't want to go another round with him. I stepped around him. "And maybe the director should keep some distance. Don't be alone in a room with an actress.

People talk." I opened the door and walked right into Ashton's dark, unreadable eyes. He gave Porter one brief glance. Then he left without a word.

A year ago, Porter came to visit the set while I was shooting a kissing scene with another actor. He couldn't take it, and he blew up at me.

Now he's the one directing my next kissing scene.

Before we rolled, Porter very professionally walked us through the blocking, then called a closed set and kept only the people we needed.

He didn't even want lights, just a couple of camera ops and the boom op. We were set. The 2nd AC called the slate. "The Wilding Dark, scene five, take one. Marker.

Action!" The door of a quiet, warm room swung open. Chapter 3 Ashton locked an arm around my waist, lifted me straight off the floor, and pinned me to the wall. The room was dim.

He threw me down into the soft bed, and when I pushed myself up on my hands he leaned over me with his back to camera and mimed undoing his shirt. Then the camera pushed in.

Ashton held the back of my neck, his mouth hot and wet, moving slowly up from my chin. On camera it was the two of us turning over into that kiss, and it was beautiful.

From across the room, Porter called cut. "Good. That's the take." Porter's voice came from behind the monitor a few yards away.

I couldn't believe the last setup of the day had gone that smoothly. One take, no pickups, not a single note from the director. I thought we were wrapped.

Ashton acted like he hadn't heard a word from his director. His fingertips moved to the shell of my ear, he tilted his head, and he kissed me again, deep. It was. So. Rough.

My head went completely blank. Porter watched the frame, saw me start kissing him back, and finally couldn't sit there anymore. He walked off.

For a full minute after the director called cut, Ashton kept chasing my mouth. He kissed my lipstick right off.

On my way to the hairandmakeup trailer to get fixed up, an arm shot out of the equipment alcove and hauled me in.

Porter stared at my mouth, still wet and shining and a little red, his face stiff. "I called cut.

Did you not hear me?" "Why did you kiss him back?" "If he wants to stay in it, that's his business. We'd stopped rolling.

You could have just not gone along with it!" "Or is it…" "Did it actually do something for you, him kissing you?" What standing does he have to interrogate me. What is he to me.

My tone was ugly. "Yes. He's a great kisser, I couldn't stop. That a problem?" He smiled, and it was bitter. "Larkin, is this revenge?

Revenge for me being petty back then, for getting jealous, for not being able to stand watching you shoot a kissing scene, so I threw a fit and told you to pull back from the business, and said ugly things to you, and stonewalled you until you gave in?" "You made a whole show of not being able to get enough of him, just to get to me, didn't you?" Porter's eyes went red on the spot.

The longer he talked the more they shone, and his voice started to shake. "Breaking up with you because I was jealous was immature.

Wanting you to quit acting because I was possessive meant I wasn't thinking about how you felt. I've thought about it, and I won't be like that again.

So please stop doing this to get back at me. I can't take it." He cried like this when we broke up too. I looked away, calm. "Porter, we've been broken up a long time.

You still can't move on?" "The day you spat on my job and asked me to give up my work, that was the day I realized I didn't like you that much anymore." My nose stung.

Every time I think back to that breakup I feel wronged all over again. He still thought I was just throwing a tantrum.

He gave my clothes a light tug. "That isn't how it is." "We only broke up.

It's not like we stopped loving each other." I took a step back, putting distance between us. "Don't lie to yourself." Maybe my deliberate distance stung him, because Porter suddenly pulled me into his arms. "Then what is love?

Since we broke up there hasn't been one day I didn't miss you." "I'm sorry. The breakup, the stonewalling, it was all my fault." "Don't hold it against me.

Please." "Let's get back together, okay? I'm begging you." I frowned, uncomfortable, and was just reaching up to push him off me.

Out of the corner of my eye I caught a tall figure in the doorway. My heart nearly beat out of my chest, and I stood there staring at the man I'd signed that license with.

My lawful husband. Chapter 4 Ashton leaned against the doorframe. When our eyes met he studied me and raised an eyebrow a fraction. "Do you like it that much, him holding you?

Why haven't you let go yet, wifey." "Does he feel that good?" I shoved Porter off me in a scramble. I went after Ashton, all the way to his trailer.

He shut the door and threw the lock, one clean motion. "Ashton, listen to me