He began unbuttoning his dress shirt—slow and methodical—one button at a time. He wasn’t showing off, wasn’t even paying attention to the room, just stripping down with the same control he brought to everything else.
“Arms higher, please,” Laurent said gently.
“Oh—right, sorry.” Liam lifted his arms, but his gaze drifted back to Jacob almost immediately. He tried to keep his eyes on the neutral places, the safe spots, but his attention slipped lower. He was caught by the slow reveal of skin and the lines of muscle tightening with every button undone.
Jacob shrugged the shirt off and handed it neatly to the designer. He stood bare from the waist up as she circled him, holding swaths of fabric against his frame. Jacob didn’t move unless asked. He just stood there perfectly composed.
Laurent crouched, tugging at Liam’s hem. “You’ll need to shift your stance.”
“Yeah, sure.” He obeyed, though his eyes stayed fixed on Jacob. They slid past his ribs, down the firm ridges of his stomach, to that sharp V disappearing into his waistband—until he realized with a jolt what he was staring at.
Heat shot through him. He jerked his eyes up, startled, like he could erase the fact that he’d just been staring at Jacob’s crotch.
What the fuck. Why am I—
But it was too late; the damage was already done. The image had burned itself into his brain, seared like a brand: the heavy outline of his dick straining against black trousers. It was huge, even at rest. Bigger than it had any right to be.
His pulse pounded in his ears so loudly he almost missed Laurent asking him to turn.
“Liam?”
He blinked down, scrambling. “Yeah—sorry. Just distracted.”
The man smiled faintly, chalking a quick line at the seam. “You’ve got too much energy for a fitting, huh?”
Liam forced a thin smile. He tried to focus on the sting of pins brushing his side and the rustle of fabric being adjusted. Anything that wasn’t Jacob standing half-naked across the room.
Long after he left the studio, he couldn’t shake the fact that for a few stupid and dangerous seconds, he’d been staring at Jacob Wolfe’s cock, and the sight had short-circuited his brain.
Chapter 6
Jacob
The first two weeks of pre-production passed in a blur of activity. Hair and makeup tests, dialect drills, and early rehearsals were already underway, including blocking sessions where every bit of physical movement was mapped out—where someone stood, how they crossed a room, reached for a hand, or even leaned in for a kiss.
The last rehearsal had ended over twenty minutes ago. Lights dimmed across the soundstage, one by one. Most of the crew was already gone, even Ellen had vanished, shouting something about an early call in the morning as she disappeared into the dark.
Jacob stayed. He leaned against the fake kitchen wall, water bottle cool in hand, watching the space empty itself out. He liked this part, the way the set stopped pretending to be real the moment everyone left. The quiet stripped everything bare and made it easier to breathe.
Usually he was the only one hanging back, but today Liam hadn’t gone either. His jacket was still draped over a chair, while he sat on the counter, sneakers thudding a soft rhythm against the cabinet door. He couldn’t seem to be still, energy leaking out of him in restless shifts of his body, every movement tugging at Jacob’s eyes before he realized he was watching.
“You always hang back after?” Liam asked at last.
Jacob turned his head. “Sometimes.”
“Why?”
He considered lying, but decided against it. “The quiet helps me switch gears. Reset.”
Liam hummed, gaze drifting to the edges of the stage. “Weird how fake everything looks once the lights are off.”
Jacob made a low sound of agreement. His eyes should have slid away, but they didn’t. Liam licked his lower lip, and Jacob’s focus caught there—something sharp flashing through him before he forced himself to look elsewhere. The fact that he’d noticed, rattled him to his core.
He didn’t want to think about the kiss, but it bled in anyway—the shock of Liam’s mouth opening under his, the startled sound he’d made. It kept replaying when Jacob least wanted it to. He told himself it had been nothing more than a scene, but the memory had lodged deep. His body remembered, no matter how hard he tried to forget.
“You’re hard to read,” Liam said suddenly.
Jacob’s attention narrowed. “Does that bother you?”
