The Other Side of Us - By Sarah Mayberry Page 0,53
She was aware that he was working twice as fast as her.
Well, she was pacing herself. Contrary to his belief, she wasn’t foolish or reckless with her well-being. She valued her hard-fought-for stamina too much to blow it all in one day.
“What did you want to be when you were a kid?”
His question was so out of left field she stopped and stared at him.
He grinned. “Sometimes when I’m having trouble with a song I go back to the inspiration. Doesn’t get better than childish dreams.”
There was something incredibly appealing about the warmth in his eyes. For the hundredth time she found herself wondering how any woman could cheat on this man.
“I wanted to own a candy shop when I was a kid,” she said. “And when I got a little older, I wanted to be a flight attendant.”
He laughed, clearly amused by the idea of her pushing a food-service cart up the aisle. “You would totally suck at that.”
“No kidding.”
“So why did you choose TV?”
They’d filled the wheelbarrow again and she pondered his question as he pushed it up the driveway and dumped the load.
“I saw this documentary when I was about to finish high school—Baraka. It’s a nonnarrative feature, an amazing journey around the planet exploring humanity and nature....” She remembered the impact the film had on her when she’d first seen it.
“I think I saw that. Is there a scene with monkeys bathing in hot springs in the mountains somewhere?”
“That’s the one. I was so inspired, I saw it nearly a dozen times before embarking on the biggest documentary glom the world has ever seen. Nature, current events, history, I was insatiable. I’d registered to study business at university, but I changed my preferences at the last minute and took film and media classes instead.”
“How did the high-achieving parents take that?”
She was surprised that he recalled her throwaway comment regarding her parents. “They were worried. With good cause. As I discovered after I graduated and started doing the rounds with a proposal for my passion project—a documentary about Dr. Mary De Garis—there’s not a lot of money or interest in documentaries. Especially ones about obscure pioneering feminists in the medical field.” She pulled a face. “In hindsight, it probably wasn’t the best put together proposal, either. A little too much idealism, not enough commercialism.”
“So your dreams were crushed?”
“In a way. But I was so persistent, one of the producers I tried to get interested in the project was impressed by my ‘formidable pestering powers.’ That’s a direct quote, by the way.”
“Makes you wonder how he formed such a wrongheaded impression of your personality.”
God, she truly appreciated this man’s wit. It was a challenge to keep a straight face and stay on topic. “It does, doesn’t it? Anyway, he offered me a job as a production assistant, and I was away.”
Oliver paused, leaning his shovel against the wheelbarrow. “So deep inside the hard-nosed producer is a passionate documentary filmmaker?”
He grasped the bottom of his top and lifted it over his head, revealing a black tank top underneath.
“Um, I wouldn’t say that,” she said, more than a little distracted by the play of muscles in his arms and shoulders as he folded his shirt neatly and draped it over the railing of the porch. “I’ve always enjoyed the challenge of my work.”
“Not even a little itch to be behind the camera more directly?”
The sun chose that moment to come out from behind a cloud, gilding him in sunlight, and she lost the power of speech entirely. He had a very, very good body. Shoulders to weep over, arms to sigh over, a chest that made her fingers curl into her palms with the need to touch. Then there was his fine ass and awesome thighs....
She was staring, and she suspected that her mouth was slightly agape, too. Somehow she got a grip on her galloping, unruly libido and prodded her brain into action.
He’d asked her a question. She needed to answer it—and then she needed to check that she didn’t have drool on her chin.
“I don’t think so,” she said, a vague enough answer since she couldn’t really remember his question.
“How you doing? You need to take a break?” he asked, his concerned gaze scanning her face.
“No, no. I’m fine,” she said, even though she was uncomfortably aware that she was suddenly very hot.
She waited until he’d turned away before fanning the front of her top and rolling her eyes at herself. Honestly, anyone would think she’d never seen