Come A Little Bit Closer (The Sullivans #7)(5)

Damn it, he hadn’t signed Tatiana to star in his film with nefarious plans of seduction. He’d signed her because she was a great actress who was going to get better and better.

Were it not for two unfounded accusations in the span of minutes, he would have taken the time to answer Valentina more carefully. But as it stood, she’d been questioning his honor since the first second he’d met her sister. Silently, perhaps, but it had been there nonetheless.

His honor was everything to him, and now he felt like a bear poked one too many times by a long stick, coming out of his lair grumpy and with teeth bared in warning. Which was why he gave her an answer he knew was bound to aggravate more than soothe.

“Your sister has already signed the contracts.”

Instead of backing off at what many people would have construed as a warning, Valentina came closer to him, so close that he could smell the lavender in her shampoo.

“I asked around about you before we signed on for this movie. Everyone told me you were different.” Her eyes slid again to the phone numbers on his desk, then back to him. “But you’re just the same as everybody else, aren’t you?” Fire leapt to new heights in her eyes as she told him, “I don’t give a damn what she’s signed. If you do one single thing to hurt my sister, if you dare toy with her emotions or her body, I’ll—”

“Damn it, Valentina,” he said in a voice loud enough to break through to her, “I’m not going to seduce your sister!” He had to work to gentle his voice as he said, “Tatiana is young and beautiful and I’m going to work like hell to make sure she wins an Oscar for her performance in my movie. But I don’t want her.”

And yet, even as he reassured her about his intentions toward her sister, there was no way for him to keep the silent words I want you from hanging in the air between them.

He was sure that was what had her taking a step away from him as she said, “I saw the way you grabbed her and kissed her after the scene. And I saw the way she looked at you—like you hold the key to the secrets of the universe.”

It was because he had two sisters and a mother he loved that he realized just how badly he’d misplayed this situation with Valentina. Instead of going on the defensive and throwing the signed contracts in her face like the big bad movie star who only had to snap his fingers for the world to fall at his feet, he should have done whatever he could to reassure her that Tatiana was in safe hands.

“Your sister did such a great job with the first scene that I got excited, and I wanted her to know how thrilled I am to be working with her. But I honestly don’t think she took my enthusiasm for her performance in the way you thought she did.”

He could see that Valentina was still wary, but she took a deep breath and finally backed down enough to say, “I sure hope not.”

He’d thought her eyes were a dimmer green than her sister’s, but now he could see that they were a beautiful hazel, a clear green on the inside, deep brown on the outside. Smith had never been much interested in perfect, even less so after so many years in Hollywood where people hired doctors to rip them open and put them back together until they looked like the dolls his sisters had played with as kids.

He was also finally close enough to see the slightly dark smudges beneath the delicate skin under her eyes.

“It’s got to be exhausting being your sister’s watchdog all the time.”

“I’m not her watchdog. I’m her sister and I love her. I—” She sighed, letting her exhaustion come through for a moment. “I just need to make sure she’s safe. Always.”

“Your sister is lucky to have you to protect her, Valentina. But who’s protecting you?”

Her eyes met his again, wide with surprise...and an answering desire that she could no longer effectively mask as her hazel eyes dilated until the green near her pupil pushed out all of the brown along the rim.

Hot damn if he didn’t want to kiss her beautiful mouth as she lifted her chin and her eyes flashed at him one more time.

“I don’t need anybody to protect me.”

She walked out of his trailer without a backward glance.

* * *

“Val, there you are!”

Valentina could see that Tatiana was still glowing from both her excellent performance and Smith’s praise, but she was also clearly concerned about why her business-manager sister had yanked the executive producer and directing star of her new movie into his trailer after the first big take.

“You were fabulous,” Valentina said as she put her arms around her younger sister.

Where she was lean, her sister was curvy. While she was tall, her sister was small. She’d never been the beauty that Tatiana was, but Valentina had never wanted that. Not when she knew just how much responsibility came with great beauty—and how much pressure shone down through every spotlight.

“Do you need anything before you do close-ups?”

“No, I feel great,” Tatiana said, before adding, “Is everything okay?”

“Yes.” Valentina smiled. “Better than okay.”

And it was, at least where Smith’s designs on her sister were concerned. The last thing she wanted for her sister was to end up in a Hollywood relationship. Miraculously so far, it hadn’t been a problem with any of the men Tatiana had worked with, but Smith was at least a thousand times more charismatic than any of her other co-stars.