“Mind getting the door?” he asked, and Lara did an almost excited tap-dance.
“Sure.” I opened the door and let Lara take the lead. She wandered out into the back yard, and I followed, taking in the sight. I wanted to know everything about Lukas, and I stored up every detail like it was gold. The back yard was spacious andneatly kept, with the patio he’d mentioned the obvious crown jewel.
I shot him a look. “A little firepit? This thing has a chimney. It could have its own zip code.”
Lukas smiled at me, all cheeky and innocent looking. “It’s not the biggest I could’ve gone, but I didn’t want to go overboard.” He set the glasses down on a table and poured wine into them.
“This is a different wine, but it’s still a red. It’s a bit sweeter.” Lukas handed me my glass and I took it, relishing the way our fingers had to brush against each other for the briefest of moments.
Wine was probably a bad idea. I was already so attracted to him that I could barely see straight, and now we were in the back yard as the sun dipped out of the sky. Lukas twisted a knob and the fire roared to life. Yep, I was pretty sure the scene surrounding me could’ve been ripped from any romantic movie.
I lowered myself onto a chair near the fireplace and leaned back, feigning a level of casualness that I didn’t feel. “It’s nice out here. Quiet.”
“It’s a good neighborhood.”
Looking around, I noticed the tall fence. “Lots of privacy.”
“We shoot out here sometimes. I try to protect the neighbors from seeing things they don’t want to see.”
“You film outside?” I looked down and realized that people had probably had sex on the chair I was using. And then I realized there probably wasn’t a surface in his whole house that hadn’t been fucked on and, that strangely made it easier to relax.
“We try to do as many outdoor shoots as the weather allows.”
I wasn’t about to confess that I’d never had sex outdoors. Or in a car. Or any place that wasn’t a bed or a couch, though I did get a hand job in a bathroom once. Instead, I took a large swallow of wine.
“Doing the post-production tick exam must be fun,” I quipped, immediately regretting my snark. It wasn’t Lukas’s fault that I felt woefully inadequate. That was all on me, my lack of experience, my sheltered upbringing, and my not-very-outgoing nature.
Then Lukas tipped his head back and laughed, and I loved the sound and the little wrinkles around his eyes. He was a little older than me, a little older than the guys I usually went for, but a lot more experienced. Rather than it being a turn-off, it was the opposite for me. I understood why he’d had trouble finding someone to do this particular job for him because the more I knew about him, the more he appealed to me. My crush was one glass of wine away from turning into a full-blown infatuation.
“Outdoor shoots definitely have their own challenges.”
Lara grumbled as she lowered herself down to the ground a few feet away.
“Like what?” I asked, unable to contain my curiosity.
“Weather. Wind can be a bitch if it’s too cold or too aggressive. A nice breeze is fine, but it’s hard to shoot with high winds. They make too much background noise. Lighting can be challenging, especially in outdoor structures like barns.”
“How many barns have you filmed in?”
He swirled his wine around in his glass. “A few. Barns are always popular, and people like the whole roll-in-the-hay fantasy, even though the reality is that hay is itchy and scratchy and uncomfortable as fuck.”
“People do love a good cowboy.”
“It’s the chaps. And the jeans. And the idea that cowboys have access to rope.”
Heat flared in my stomach and climbed up my face. I attributed it to the wine and the fire and not the mental image of Lukas with rope.
“So barns. What other outdoor venues are popular?” If I was going to write this book, I was going to have to push past any discomfort when it came to talking to Lukas about these things. And it wasn’t so much discomfort as it was just plain old yearning. Lukas was magnetic. He was easy to talk to, easy to get along with. He never made me feel like I shouldn’t have complaints or bad experiences because I’d never struggled the way he did.
“Cars. Roadsides. Truck stops. Hiking trails. Poolsides. Tents. Campers. Basically, if you can dream it, I’ve probably done it.”
“Roadsides? Doesn’t that get risky? What if you get caught?”
“It’s all in the power of the camera angle and the editing. What we do is find a remote road and take a few innocent-ish shots. We take as much footage of the surroundings as we can and then we go someplace on private property with a similar sort of woodsy backdrop and finish the shoot there. The magic happens in the editing after when we make it look like we were on the side of the road the whole time.”
“Do you hire someone to do that, or do you do it all yourself?”
“I mostly do it myself.” He leaned back in his chair and crossed his feet at the ankles. The sun had dipped below the horizon now, and approaching shadows contrasted with the flickering firelight, making Lukas look almost ethereal. His short beard looked softer now, and I couldn’t help the way my stare lingered on his mouth whenever he talked.
