Watching the View
Miranda sat in her chair, enjoying the breeze as dusk claimed the mountain where they were currently shooting. She smiled and decided that this was as close to heaven as she was going to know. The landscape around her was glorious, the air was crisp and smelled sweetly, and she was surrounded by people she had come to care for a great deal more than she ever expected.
“Hello sister,” Karl said, dragging his chair over next to her and plopping down. He pushed his sunglasses down on his face, which looked rather ridiculous against his costume and the lack of daylight left, and looked out at the view. “Beautiful.”
“It really is.”
“I was talking about you, Mir.”
Miranda’s cheeks flushed and she swatted him. “Do stop that.”
“It’s not my fault that you’re absolutely breath-taking,” Karl replied. He rested his hand on her arm and squeezed.
“This is hardly the behavior of a sibling relationship, Karl.”
He grinned unabashedly, his fingers drawing patterns into her skin, and said, “No camera’s running right now. Just you and me.”
“And a ton of crew and cast watching us.”
He glanced around and said, “No one’s looking now.”
“Karl…” she began. She had prepared a list a few nights ago of why this was a very bad idea. They were working together and relationships between actors on set rarely ended well. But the list vanished from her brain as he took her hand and rubbed his thumb over the top of it.
“We’re both adults and we both want it. I see nothing wrong with acting on these feelings.”
She stood up and pulled her hand free. She thought about storming off, but that wasn’t her style and she really didn’t want to leave him. She loved the way she felt when she was around him, light and lost in the moment. Instead, she hovered over him like a teacher might and said, “There is most definitely something wrong with acting on it. We’re supposed to be able to show more restraint than a couple of lovesick teenagers.”
He wrapped his legs around her, bringing her closer to him, and he raised his eyebrows and asked, “This sort of restraint?”
“Stop it.”
His hands moved up her sides and cupped her face, brushing the hair away from her eyes. He leaned in closer until they were sharing a breath and asked, “Or more like this?”
“Karl…” She managed to get out before his lips brushed against her own. And she meant to push away, she really did, but he smelled so good and his warm hands felt wonderful against her cool cheeks.
As he pulled away from the kiss, he looked around and grinned. “Not one person even noticed us.”
“Mighty proud of yourself, aren’t you?”
“Pretty much.”
She couldn’t help but smile as her fingers ran through his hair. She said, “Lucky I like that about you.”
{fin}