LITMIR.BIZ

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to play her.” Nina sucked in a breath. “That’s why I wanted to meet with you.”

      He arched an eyebrow and waited for her to go on.

      “Every actress from here to London wants to play Sonia. It’s the role of a lifetime. Paul got me a chance to read for the part, but the producers weren’t convinced. I’ve been stereo-typed as the ditsy romantic interest for too long. They don’t see me as the intense, hard-core action type. They’re looking for someone more heroic.” She flinched at the last word.

      “And you thought I could toughen you up to help you get the role? If it helps, you’re already my hero. It takes guts to do what you did tonight – to stay true to yourself.”

      She bit her lip. “I guess there isn’t any point bothering now. They’ll never take a chance on me after tonight.”

      “You turned down a marriage proposal. It’s not like you mainlined heroin in front of everyone or got so wasted they had to call the cops.”

      “I might as well have. Paul has a lot of influence and I hurt his feelings.”

      It wasn’t his feelings that were hurt. Dom shook his head and stretched out on the sand. “The days of any one person controlling this business are long gone. He’s not the only one with friends.”

      He knew a few people, too. But how much did she really want this? Because he wasn’t going to put himself out for some fickle actress who wasn’t prepared to do the work. His reputation was all he had going for him right now and he wasn’t about to throw it away for a pretty face. Pretty faces were cheap as dirt in this town.

      Character, now that was a different creature entirely.

      Nina bit into the burger, taking her time over it before she spoke again. “I’m still an idiot. I could have said yes and then changed my mind later, in a less public place.”

      “He’s the idiot. Who in their right mind proposes to a woman in front of a crowd like that?” Only someone with an ego the size of the Antarctic would be so confident of being accepted. Only someone who cared more about the spectacle than about the woman he’d proposed to would share such a private moment with a room full of strangers.

      Or… “When an actor has been on the market as long as Paul de Angelo has, without even one failed marriage behind him, the rumors start.”

      “Paul is NOT gay.”

      “He doesn’t need to be for the gossip to spread. You know that. You’ve obviously heard the rumors. But an engagement would shut them up for a little while. A very public engagement at the party hosted by the hottest celebrity magazine on the planet would shut the rumors up a whole lot longer.”

      She bit her lip as she digested the thought. “You think he was only dating me for his image?”

      He hoped she didn’t want an answer, because he couldn’t answer honestly without offending her. Not that she looked particularly offended. Or heart-broken. “Why didn’t you want to marry him?” he asked instead.

      She shrugged and looked away, but nothing could hide the flush that stained her neck and cheeks. Not even the moonlit darkness.

      “Tell me,” he coaxed. “There’s no one here but you and me, and the sea.”

      She shuddered, still not looking back at him. “I couldn’t imagine spending the rest of my life with him. I’d grow bored and I’d want excitement, and quite frankly I don’t see any point making a promise to spend my life with someone, knowing from the very beginning that I wouldn’t keep it.”

      He nodded slowly. He hadn’t realized they had so much in common. He grew bored quickly too and craved excitement, and he never made promises he couldn’t keep.

      “How would you propose?” she asked, licking her fingers.

      The question was unexpected and not one he had an answer for. He hadn’t given proposals any thought before. The opportunity had never come up. Or to be more precise, he’d never met a woman he liked enough to live with, let alone marry. He loved women, with the emphasis on the plural. But settling down with just one? She’d have to be something really special for him to give up all the others.

      He shrugged. “Some place like this, I guess. Some place special, where we can be alone. Shall we take a walk?”

      They dumped the paper bag in a garbage can and walked along the beach, sipping their sodas. The tide crept in, filling up the tidal pools.

      Nina walked with her arms wrapped around herself, his jacket incongruously large on her, dwarfing her curves. He didn’t need to see them to remember those voluptuous curves. He’d spent the handful of weeks they’d worked together admiring them.

      She’d gone out of her way to tempt him with them too, not that it had taken much effort. With her throaty, sexy voice, full, red lips and big, dark eyes that could go from a dangerous glint to wide and innocent in a moment, she was temptation personified.

      But contrary to popular opinion, he was able to control his impulses. Nina was different from the other women he met. Though she batted her eyelashes at him, same as every other woman, she didn’t look at him like he was an object. And if he was honest with himself, it terrified him.

      He was okay with being objectified. He didn’t mind that most women only wanted him for his body. Their low expectations were easy to satisfy.

      He wasn’t sure Nina would be satisfied.

      They strolled in silence and he left her alone with her thoughts as he enjoyed the stillness and the soothing tumble of the breakers on the shore.

      One thing in Nina’s favor: she didn’t feel the incessant need to talk. With most women in Hollywood there was only one thing that made them stop talking. Admittedly, then they were usually moaning his name instead.

      They reached the end of the long curve of beach and paused.

      “You know, I’ve never been to the beach in LA,” Nina said. She wrapped her arms around her chest, hugging herself as if she was cold. But she wasn’t cold. She looked almost haunted.

      “You should make more effort. We have some great beaches. Some excellent surfing, too.”

      She shuddered. “No thanks. I don’t like the sea.”

      And there was his deal-breaker. He loved the sea and spent every spare moment at the beach. He lived within a stone’s throw of the ocean just so it would be the first thing he saw every morning.

      They meandered back the way they’d come, Dom splashing through the shallows, Nina keeping as far away from the lapping edge as she could. He watched her out the corner of his eye.

      In public she always appeared so confident, so sparky, but here, alone in the dark with no one to primp and pose for, she seemed a different person, vulnerable, lost. It tugged at him.

      As he’d told Graydon, he was a sucker for a damsel in distress.

      He paused to look out across the restless ocean.

      He’d heard of the Revelations project somewhere, and that it was in pre-production. He didn’t know much, but he’d heard enough to know that it was very different from any movie Nina had done before. It wasn’t surprising she was a long shot for the role, but if she wanted it enough, he had no doubt she could do it. He’d watched her perform opposite his friend Christian in Pirate’s Revenge and he knew she was worth more than the roles she usually played.

      He could help her. Unconsciously he rubbed the constant ache in his hip again. Why was he even considering it? He wasn’t in any shape to conduct an actress boot camp.

      He could find someone else to train her… He discarded the idea as quickly it came. Perhaps it was the arrogance of professional pride, but the thought of her spending all her time the next few weeks working with someone other than him made his stomach revolt.

      “What are you

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