Page 45 of The Reunion

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen Ransom Joel speechless.

“I don’t know how we went six seasons doing scenes like the one we just did without us ever ending up likethis.” He swallows. “Together.”

Something Bre said the night of the Fanline dinner floats up to the surface of my memory:What if he just never realized he was in love with you? He might not have realized how into you he was back then, but he is definitely into you now.

I lean back against the trailer door, hear it click shut behind me. “We have had some pretty epic scenes,” I say, grinning as he takes a step closer. His trailer’s one of the bigger ones, but right now, it feels perfectly intimate.

“I was so distracted on set, Liv—I couldnotstop thinking about you.” He presses me gently against the door, buries his hands in my hair. His lips are dangerously close to mine. “I’ve wanted to do this all morning.”

I’ve wanted to do this for forever.

“Logically, I think youhaveto kiss me now so you’re not as distracted during your next scene, right?” I say.

“I like the way you think, Livvie. It’s a good thing I actually know my lines for this one.”

“It’s a good thing I’m not going to be on set to distract you for this one,” I counter, and he grins.

I settle my hands at his waist, his bare skin hot beneath my palms. “Better that way,” I say, the husk of my last word barely making it out as he closes the distance between us.

His lips are soft and warm, sweet with a trace of coconut still on them. It’s a deep, slow kiss, with infinitely more dimension than its countless scripted counterparts we shared over the years. It’s incredible how different it feels, just us, alone together; how every kiss on camera was just a shadow of the real thing. There’s a hungry tension between us now—a clear and mutual desire to explore every new angle, but at a pace that lingers—though the lingering is quickly giving way to something ravenous. I wantmore, and I want to savor every minute of it.

Ransom clearly wants the same. He’s got one hand in my hair, one hand on my hip, and from the sounds he’s making, he doesn’t mind one bit that my hands are equally interested in exploring; I trace the lines of his stomach with my fingertips, feel him press harder against me when I do.

He presses a kiss into the curve of my neck, sending a spark of chills coursing through me. I run my hands up the length of his muscular abdomen, his skin hot beneath mine as I pull him even closer. He plants another kiss just under my jaw, then finds his way to my mouth again, and time is a glittering, intoxicating blur. It’s dizzying and perfect and everything I never knew we could be together—

Until a knock sounds from the other side of the door, a mere inch and a half of metal and vinyl separating whoever it is from my shoulder blades, pressed up against it. We break away on instinct, Ransom running a hand through his disheveled hair, my kisses still swollen on his lips. It is alook.

“Ransom?” Evy’s voice is the aural equivalent of a Valentine’s heart, sweet and hopeful and—in this moment—entirely irritating. “Bryan’s ready for you on set. Should I wait to walk you there?”

“Oh, thank you,” he calls out. “No need to wait—just tell BryanI’m on my way.” And then, more quietly, his striking eyes holding steady on mine, he says, “You are gorgeous, Liv, did you know that?”

It’s all I can do to not pick up exactly where we left off before Evy interrupted us. “You’re not so bad yourself,” I reply, understatement of the millennium.

We stand absolutely still, waiting to move until we’re sure Evy’s not right outside his door anymore. One glance at the clock tells me time hasflown.

“I hope you really do know your lines,” I say, as Ransom slips a thin, mint-green V-neck on. I will never cease to be envious of how easy guys have it when it comes to getting ready for a shoot.

“Eh, I’m about fifty-fifty,” he says, with the dimple I know means he’s only saying it to make me laugh. “I’ll be fine. Text you later?”

“Yes,” I reply. “Yes,please.Now, get to set before Bryan comes down here and kills us both.”

At precisely five o’clock, Jimmy drops me off outside the London West Hollywood, a posh Beverly Hills hotel whose delightfully secluded rooftop pool has become a regular meeting spot whenever Mars, Attica, Bre, and I get together for dinner and drinks to talk business. It’s the sort of place where we can talk freely—mostly—as no one has ever blinked twice at my presence, especially not the waitstaff, who’ve seen far more famous people than me. From what I’ve observed, anyone else around is either just as well-known or wishes they were; those in the first camp don’t bother to eavesdrop, while those in the second speak so loudly it’s obvious they’re hoping someone will.

When I step out of the elevator, the hostess directs me to a table in the far back corner. I’ve been here so many times, but I will never get over this view: skyscrapers off in the distance on one side, Hollywood Hills on the other. The rooftop itself is its own little oasis, with the sparkling blue water of the pool its focal point, surrounded by rows of pristine white pool chairs and umbrellas, all of it set off by accents ofgreenery in the form of hedges, neatly manicured strips of grass, several palm trees, and a wall of ivy at one end of the pool.

Attica waves me over when she sees me, mid-sentence as usual, ever the multitasker. Mars sips chilled water from a glass, studying the menu even though she knows it by heart; she takes off her oversized sunglasses when I settle in at my seat and gives me a closed-lip smile.

“Liv!” Bre exclaims. “We ordered you that same chardonnay you raved about last time—hope that’s okay! I’ll drink it if you want something different.” She gestures to the wineglass in front of me, fresh and full, the glass frosty with condensation. It must have arrived just before I did.

“No, that’s perfect, thanks.” Even if it hadn’t been the longest day on set in history, it would still sound great—crisp and refreshing and cool for this touch-too-warm summer evening. I take a sip, and it hits exactly right.

“How’d it go this afternoon?” Mars asks. Presumably, Bre’s filled the others in on my disastrous start to the day. I texted a quick update on my break earlier about how we’d had our fair share of first-day setbacks but left out the fact that it was Ransom who’d slowed the shoot down this morning—and I definitely didn’t mention that I’d played a significant part in how hard he struggled today.

I also might have left out certain other details about Ransom.

“Better than this morning, but honestly, that isn’t saying much.” I take another sip of chardonnay. “My scene went well, though.”

As well as it could, given that the scene we shot this afternoon was one of the so-called “jarringly flat” family scenes—the good news was that everyone seemed pleased with my performance. The not-so-good news was that we had to take an extended break after Millie botched the same line sixteen times in a row.

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