I heard him mumble, “This is why it’s crap to make a bed” as he laid his full weight on me and my legs came up around him.

It was an hour before we made it to the shower.

Then at least another hour before we made it out.

That afternoon he told me that he had no real plans for the rest of that week and that, if it would be all right, he would like to “spend as much time with me as humanly possible.” Who was I to argue?

So we cocooned. We wrapped ourselves in a little bubble of lust and freaking cocooned. We railroaded right through what should have been our first twenty dates, all in four days time.

We ate at FatBurger for lunch almost every day. He was a freak for it. I made him go running with me at Griffith Park, but only twice. He had trouble keeping up with me the first time, and the second … well let’s just say we went a little George Michael behind a tree.

We drove for miles up PCH. He drove while I sat back relaxing, watching him in his sunglasses, looking sexy as all get out. We listened to music, trading iPods back and forth, playing each other our favorites.

We watched hours of DVDs. We watched The Office—UK and US versions, Flight of the Conchords, and we spent an entire afternoon watching a Corey marathon: The Lost Boys, License to Drive and Stand by Me.

We spent a morning at my new house, helping to place all my furniture.

I couldn’t believe how beautiful it had turned out, and I wasn’t even going to get a chance to enjoy it.

We talked for hours. I told him all about my new show and how nervous I was about it. He confessed to me that he was getting a little worried about all the hype Time was creating and whether he would be painted with the same teeny bop brush as other actors the same age.

We were barely sleeping at night, but we managed to sneak naps in each afternoon. We cuddled in my bed, usually with me wearing one of his shirts. It was how he preferred me to be, if he couldn’t have me na**d.

It always started out with me on my back and Jack draped across my chest.

I would scratch his head and he would trace little circles on my arm. His breath would get heavier—I had learned to recognize his sleep patterns. Right before he would really fall asleep, I’d turn on my side and he would fit his body into mine, holding me close against his chest, his arms under my shirt, holding my br**sts in his hands.

We stayed in and I cooked for us every night. Holly would usually join us and then retreat to her room as Jack cleaned up. He felt that he should do the dishes since I cooked, and I let him. I found that I could watch him do almost anything and be happy.

We would usually go for a swim after dinner, and he kept a bottle of wine on the side of the pool for us while we splashed and played. Sometimes, if I was lucky, he’d make us skinny dip.

We sang songs as if we were at freaking camp. I finally got him to play guitar for me, and he was amazing. Watching those fingers all over that guitar with the same tenderness and attention that they gave to me was amazing. And hearing him sing? He had a sweet voice, but rough at the same time. A little mushy, thick and wonderful. He was truly talented, and his voice hypnotizing.

He played some of his favorites, and some that he had written. He played songs he knew I knew so I could sing along. We were so trite. It was nice. He would strum absently while he watched me get ready in the morning, and when I’d make the bed (I’d taken back this particular duty) he’d write me my own little action soundtrack, his playing mimicking my motions. When he thought I should be moving faster, he played faster.

We kissed constantly. We kissed for hours. Whether we were at the table, in the shower (which was now always a synchronized event), in the hallway, on the couch, we kissed. Slow and sweet, furious and frenetic, wanting and needing, we kissed.

We touched. We were unable to keep our hands off each other. Whether it was hands being held across the hot tub or his hand on my thigh while we were driving, we were in contact, always. He would sweetly keep his hand in the small of my back when we were walking anywhere. I would curl my legs around him when we were watching a movie, and he would nudge at my hand like a cat until I scratched his head.

And we touched. There was virtually no part of his body that I had left unexplored, and the same for me. We were in an almost constant state of arousal.

He kept my Hamilton Brand fresh each day, providing new nibbles if it was fading at all. A look from him made my pulse faster, and we became so good at meeting each other’s needs that it almost was inconsequential that we had yet to really have … sex.

I needed it. And I knew he needed it. It was only a matter of time. But we both seemed to know that we wanted to wait for it to be—(Tonight, on a very special episode of Grace and Jack)—special. I wanted it to be special. Because somewhere, in all of this heightened, super sped up, crazy world of ours, we were moving beyond whatever this started out to be. And I found myself falling completely and totally in love with him. It almost hurt it was so good.

This was all kinds of f**ked up.

Late one night, on the fourth day of Grace and Jack Lockdown, we were lying in my bed, watching Say Anything. We were watching the part where Lloyd plays the song to her through the window. I sighed deeply, feeling Jack’s fingers as they gently worked at a knot in my hair.

“Oh, jeez, not you, too.” He laughed.

“What? Not me what?” I asked, tapping on his knee.

“You … all girls. You all love that scene. You all want the boy with the radio outside the window,” he teased, planting a kiss on my head as he finally worked the knot through.

“That’s not true. I mean, I love that scene. It’s iconic. And I love that song … my God, I love that song. But I don’t need the Grand Gesture.”

“The Grand Gesture?”

“Yeah, you know, he runs through the train station to bring her the flowers before she leaves. He drops down on one knee in front of a room full of her friends to propose and try to win her back. He says he loves her in front of a football stadium because he’d never had the guts to say it when it was just them.

I don’t want that. I don’t want all that schmaltz. It’s the little things, the daily choices. That’s the love.” I picked at a loose thread on the blanket. It was the closest I had come to telling him how I really felt. “I tell you what, if someone ever played a Peter Gabriel song outside my window, I do believe I would lock that very window,” I finished, turning around to look at him.

“Hmm, you are curious, Grace Sheridan. Just when I think I have you sorted out … ”

“Ah, you’ll never sort this out. It’s a mess in here. Stay clear, Hamilton. Stay clear.” I sighed, rolling back against him.

“So, no schmaltz, huh?” he asked.

“Well, a little schmaltz is fine. Every girl needs a little schmaltz. I do have a small romantic bone in my body.”

“Heh heh, you said bone,” he deadpanned.

“Oh, man … ” I laughed back, snuggling back down to him again and turning back to the movie.

We were quiet for a moment, watching, when he said, “Grace, do you mind if we turn this off?”

“Fuck no. I was just waiting for you!” I cried, pouncing on him. He laughed his surprise into my mouth, but then quickly turned on that Hamilton sex that I needed so badly.

We were already ready for bed, so he was wearing only his underwear-campaign-worthy boxer-briefs that still made me shake like a schoolgirl whenever I saw him walking across the room in them.

He’d started to unbutton my shirt when I pushed him back in the bed. I slowly swung a leg over him and straddled him. I had barely brushed him when his hands came up rough on my hips.

“Ah ah ah, love, slowly now,” I teased, as I began to unbutton my shirt for him. I settled lower down on his lap, feeling his hardness through his thin boxers. This time I had gone commando.

I hissed at the feeling of him pressing against my skin, and I relished the idea of how he would feel when he was inside me. I rocked my h*ps against him slowly, purposefully and watched as his face changed.

Slipping the last button through, I parted my shirt for him. I was na**d and his eyes drank me in. His hands left my h*ps to come up and around my breasts.

I moaned into his touch as he gently rolled my ni**les between his talented fingers. He tugged at me, and I cried out. His eyes were wild as he watched me above him, and I rocked harder against him, feeling the indescribable friction that our bodies were creating.

“Fuck, Grace. That feels amazing,” he groaned, his eyes becoming even wilder, his face almost animalistic.

I pushed him in the way that I knew only I could push him. I lowered my body onto his, pressing myself against him. I looked him in the eye and said,

“What would feel amazing is that tongue of yours. All. Over. Me.” I punctuated each word with a hard thrust, slamming my h*ps into his Rock. Hard. Mr.

Hamilton.

His eyes narrowed, and he unleashed a low growl from deep in his throat.

He lifted me off his lap with one swift movement, and I found myself with my knees on either side of his face. He grabbed at my hips, pulling me firmly down to his mouth. His tongue snaked out, and he licked me. Hard. I sucked a breath in sharply, my h*ps bucking frantically as he fought to hold me still.

“No,” he warned, his eyes hard as he stared up at me, green blazing.

He licked me again. Harder.

I rocked my hips, desperate for the friction, and he growled again. He pulled me down once more, roughly, and began lapping at me, quickly, violently. His mouth closed around me, sucking greedily at me.

I was all kinds of wet.

I came fast and hard, in his mouth, on his tongue. Before I could even recover, his teeth—oh, my God, his teeth—teased at me. He took me into his mouth again, and with his lips pressed firmly around me, his teeth nipping and his tongue darting over me, the sensations were unlike anything I had ever felt before.

Then he moaned.

He moaned and he groaned and the vibrations rang through me. I screamed his name repeatedly as I rocked my h*ps back and forth. His hands dug into my hips, bruising my skin, keeping me in place, not letting me go. My screams became wordless as the series of orgasms ravaged through me, making me shake violently. He was groaning under me, his tone guttural and his face furious as he watched me come down.

He was not done with me.

He flipped me over, nudging my knees apart almost carelessly. His eyes burned into me as he dragged his fingertips from my mouth, down the center of my body, between my br**sts and below. He teased at me for a moment, watching my face as I became more and more frustrated with his swirling fingers.

Just before I began to pull my own hair out, he plunged two fingers deep inside of me. My back arched off the bed, h*ps wild at his touch. This is what I needed. I needed him from the inside. Once again, he found that spot, his J-Spot, and he stroked me intently, while his other hand pressed down. He brought his face to mine and kissed me, sucking my lower lip into his mouth.

The push and the pull, the soft and the hard, the sweet and the salt of it all was too much, and I exploded again, screaming his name once more and making him smile.

I opened my eyes and saw him kneeling over me. I scrambled up, sitting up on my knees and yanked his boxers down quickly. My head was still spinning from the intense orgasms this man had just given me, but I couldn’t focus on anything other than the sight of him. Huge, hard, swollen and perfect.

Placing one hand on him and the other on me, I watched his face as I addressed us both. I wanted to come with him.

His eyes traveled down to my hand on his length and then to my other hand that was feverishly working my own sex. I switched hands, my wetness coating him, making him moan as I worked him. I could feel myself getting closer again and I slowed, wanting to wait for him.

“Come with me, Jack,” I panted, almost crying with the torture of watching his perfect face as he raced toward his own orgasm. Both of his hands shot out to the back of my neck, lacing his fingers behind me. I cocked my head to one side, leaning on his arm, kissing his skin wherever my lips could reach him.

He closed his eyes, sighed my name, and came … with me.

Beautiful.

Minutes later, we were wrapped as closely as we could be, arms and legs entwined, skin on skin. I was running my nails through his hair while he slipped toward sleep. I kissed him softly on each eyelid, the tip of his nose, and finally his mouth.

I loved him.

Simply.

In the morning when I woke, he was gone. On his pillow where his gorgeous head usually lay, was a single piece of paper.

Grace,

I have looping today. I should be home by 3.

Out to dinner?

Last night was … I have no words.

Jack

There was a little arrow at the bottom, indicating I should turn it over.

There was one more line:

I’m leaving you with just a little schmaltz: schmaltz I laughed through my tears.

Chapter 18

That morning I spent putzing around. Jack was going to be looping, and I took the opportunity to get caught up on some of the stuff that I had let fall behind while we were in the cocoon.

I got caught up on the freelance project I was finishing. I could work on some smaller projects from New York, but with the salary I would be making, I could essentially stop freelancing.

I was going to be able to support myself as a working actor for the first time in my life, and I almost had to pinch myself to believe it.

I also started packing, deciding what I would send ahead to New York and what I would bring to my new house. Shit. There was still so much I had left to do and hardly any time to do it. I could feel myself beginning to panic a little.

I needed to drop the voiceover class I had just signed up for. I needed to switch my Martha Stewart subscription to New York. Crap, I didn’t even know where I was living yet.