Meg Maguire – Caught on Camera (страница 1)
“Take your clothes off.”
Kate’s mouth curled up with a devilish twitch.
“Beg pardon?” He swallowed.
“You heard me, Ty. Strip. You trust me? Get your clothes off. Everything but your underwear.”
Ty’s eyes bored through the camera into hers. She felt it then, The Shift. Saw it in the way his muscles tensed. He licked his lips. “This is really what you want?”
“Getting there.” Kate made her voice as smugly casual as she could, hoping the thick weight behind it would pass for boredom.
He unbuttoned and unzipped his pants and let them fall down his legs, revealing the powerful thighs that haunted Kate’s dreams. Rock climber or not, Ty was built like a swimmer.
His body was long and lean, with cresting hip muscles that drew Kate’s attention straight between his legs to the bulge in his boxer briefs. Lust banished Kate’s misgivings and cemented her determination to see this through.
“How long have you wanted to see this, Katie?” he asked, turning the tables on her.
“From the very start.”
Dear Reader,
Welcome to my very first Blaze novel! To say I’m flattered that you’ve picked up this book would be the understatement of a lifetime.
Though I’ve never been trapped in the snowy wilds of Saskatchewan with an Australian free climber (yet), I did throw myself fully into the research process for Caught on Camera. Much of that research consisted of forcing my then boyfriend, now husband, to watch hour upon hour of reality survival programs with me. That’s hour upon hour of rather fit and capable men performing rugged acts of bravery, often shirtless.
Needless to say, it pained me greatly. Though neither of the hosts of my favorite shows were the basis for Ty’s character, I offer my most heartfelt thanks for their suffering. Equally warm thanks go to the unseen masses behind the cameras and credits—I only hope Kate does your fascinating jobs a bit of justice.
And to my readers, thank you! If you have thoughts to share, please find me through my website www.megmaguire.com, blog or on Twitter. I’d love to hear your reactions to this, my first ever Blaze book.
Enjoy!
Meg Maguire
Caught on Camera
Meg Maguire
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Before becoming a writer, Meg Maguire worked as a record store snob, a lousy barista, a decent designer and an overenthusiastic penguin handler. Now she loves writing sexy, character-driven stories about strong-willed men and women who keep each other on their toes…and bring one another to their knees. Meg lives north of Boston with her husband. When she’s not trapped in her own head she can be found in the kitchen, the coffee shop or jogging around the nearest duck-filled pond.
To Amy and Jen, who read it first and helped make it better.
To Laura and Brenda, who recognized my voice behind all the profanity and newbie mistakes, polished me up and gave me a chance to shine.
To my parents and big brother, my extended family and best friends, so supportive it’s unnatural.
To the economy, for taking away my day job at the exact right moment.
And above all, thanks to my husband…for putting up with me.
May all your ptarmigans be willowy.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
1
KATE SCANNED THE TREES, one thought on her mind—food. Food being a very loose term. Roots, seeds, rodents, carrion…nearly anything would do in this desolate wasteland. In every direction, miles and miles of slushy spring snow, acres of scrubby pines, but lunch…?
“Fat frigging chance,” she muttered. Then she saw it—a little clump of twigs in the crook of an old tree, a bird’s nest. “Come on, eggs.” Kate searched for handholds. She dug her boots into the knobby bark, locked her thighs around the trunk. Inch by slow, slippery inch, she made her clumsy ascent, mumbling a drum solo to herself. “Buh, buh-buhbuh-buh…” At moments like this, she always got the show’s theme song stuck in her head.
Each episode opened with a flurry of bongos and a glimpse of misty green wilderness. Every few beats a new image flashed onto the screen—a man wading hip-deep through a rushing river, scaling a sheer cliff face, striking a flint. Words burst onto the screen—Dom Tyler: Survive This! The title disappeared to make way for a second bout of montage overlaid with credits that went ignored by most viewers in favor of the handsome man with his dirty blond hair and fascinating eyes, arms like a boxer and smile like a natural-born con man.
Kate knew the show’s opening by heart. Heck, she’d filmed half the footage herself. And she knew Dom Tyler by heart, too. Those arms and that smile belonged to her boss, her best friend. And it was his fault she was halfway up a tree in the desolate wilds of Saskatchewan just now, wrecking her jeans with sap.
Wincing at the bark digging into her thighs, she took a deep breath and hauled herself onto a thick branch, ten feet off the ground. Bingo—eggs.
“Woo hoo!” She pumped her fist in the air. Glancing toward the campsite, she bellowed, “Ty! I’ve found your lunch!”
A faint noise of acknowledgment drifted through the otherwise silent landscape. Balancing on the limb, Kate slid the video camera strapped across her back forward and shouldered it. She aimed the viewfinder at the three illfated eggs nestled in the wreath of twigs and hit the record button.
“Songbird eggs,” she murmured into the mic. “Need a confirm on the species. Early spring is one of the best times of year to find bird eggs if you get lost in the Canadian wilderness—double-check that fact. They can be cooked, or eaten raw if fire is scarce, and they’re a great source of protein.”
The show was an hour long, forty-two minutes after commercials. Forty-two minutes of Dom Tyler explaining how to stay alive in some of the world’s harshest environments—a different location each episode. Though his looks likely distracted most viewers from actually retaining any of the lessons.
For nearly every shot that made it to air, just off camera stood Kate, armed with the stern poise of a lion tamer and a hastily acquired vocabulary to rival David Attenborough’s. She researched and wrote nearly half of the show’s narration. It was Dom Tyler’s name in the title and face on the screen, but she was the one behind him, cracking the whip, keeping the show and its host on track.
She let the camera roll a few more seconds before shouldering it and fumbling back down the trunk, hopping the last few feet to the soggy ground.
“Ty?” Ty, because he winced whenever anyone called him Dominic. Kate headed toward the fire they’d set up by the river, shouting to him as she picked pine needles from the front of her jacket. “We’re going to need to get you up there. I want some climbing and hand shots. I made some notes you can record in postproduction.”
She rounded the bend at the edge of the woods and discovered why Ty wasn’t shouting back. Sitting splay-legged on a fallen tree, he had one of the other cameras perched on his broad shoulder, its lens trained on Kate, red light blinking. As she neared, she heard him narrating for his own amusement, a raised whisper in the Australian accent that earned them at least a quarter of their ratings.
“…the natural habitat of the Kate Somersby. We can see from her stance that this approach is one of postured aggression, though the look in the female’s eyes suggests that mating may be on her mind. Let’s wait and see what she’s after.” Ty abandoned the voice-over as Kate pushed her boot against the front of his vest, toppling him harmlessly backward into the wet snow.
She crossed her arms over her chest and mustered her best fed-up assistant glare. It was day two of their three-day exile in this snowy wasteland, and cold was not her strong suit. “Some of us have been scaling trees, Ty. Earning our saddle sores.”
“That’s one way to get your rocks off.”
“I need you up there.” She stared down at her professional partner of the past two and a half years, blatantly appraising all six feet three inches of him, from his boot-clad feet up to his unruly golden-brown hair and sideburns, and that evil, evil eyebrow. His chin and jaw were peppered with several days’ blond stubble. By the time they got back to L.A. he’d probably have a full-on beard. It wouldn’t do a thing to disguise his movie-star good looks, just as his clothes couldn’t trick their viewers into forgetting what was hidden beneath, once they’d caught a glimpse.
Kate knew what lay beneath the thermal shirt Ty currently wore under his vest, too. She knew it with more familiarity than she’d known the body of any former lover, despite the fact that she and Ty had never so much as kissed. That disappointed certain parts of her, relieved others. She loved her job too much to risk it over something as stupid as hormones. And she loved Ty, too—as a friend. She wouldn’t risk losing him, either…though the thought of such a mistake had certainly kept her warm on a few cold nights.
She gave Ty’s hovering foot a soft kick. “C’mon, up you get. Eggs.”