Page 12 of Howl for Me (Moonlight Magic Studios #1)

Chapter Ten

Cassidy

After a week of putting up with Johnny, I’ve stopped bothering to knock before entering his dressing room. He hates being interrupted, but he hates people tiptoeing around him even more. And today, I’m too tired to deal with whichever version of him I’m going to get.

He’s already there, sprawled on the couch like a bored god, cigarette hanging from his lips, eyes closed like the world’s a burden he can barely carry. His shirt’s undone, and for some reason that feels more deliberate than lazy.

“You’re late,” he says without opening his eyes.

“I’m not,” I reply, sitting next to him and setting my coffee on the table. “You’re just early for once.”

He grunts, and I take that as a win.

Hector appears a minute later, drops a thick stack of pages on the coffee table, nearly spilling my cup.

“New scene. Read it. Highlight any changes that need to be made or write down any questions in the margin. Johnny, you know the drill. Don’t be a dick.”

Johnny leans forward and flicks his ashes into my coffee cup. “No promises.”

Hector leaves without another word while I glare at this selfish man. Werewolf. Whatever.

“I was drinking that.” I don’t blink, waiting for him to realize what he did. Surely that wasn’t on purpose.

“And now you're not. It’s bad for you, stunts your growth. You’re welcome, by the way.” He wants to die today.

“And smoking isn’t? That was literally the only thing keeping me civil today.” I want to punch him in his stupid, handsome face.

He smirks, eyes locking with mine, and I hate the way it steals my breath.

Then, without breaking eye contact, he flicks the cigarette butt into my coffee.

It hisses, loud and deliberate, like it’s echoing the steam rolling out of my ears.

He doesn’t look away; just keeps staring, that smirk daring me to do something about it.

“Should I be scared?” he asks, voice lazy, but I can see it; the twitch at the corner of his mouth. He’s trying not to laugh.

I shift closer, sliding right up next to him on the couch. He doesn’t move.

Then I lean across his body, reaching toward the armrest where his pack of cigarettes sits.

As I stretch, my chest brushes his arm, my thigh presses into his leg.

I feel the shift in his breathing, feel the heat rolling off him.

And then I hear it, a low sound, deep in his chest. Not quite a growl, but not a laugh, either.

Something wild and warm, a sound that causes that slow burning feeling in my belly again.

Does he feel the same thing? I grab the pack, sit back down, and without a word, drop the whole thing into my still-steaming coffee.

“There,” I say, offering the sweetest smile I can fake. “Back to being civil.”

He watches me, eyes hooded and locked on mine till he noticed what I’ve done.

“You did not just do that.”

I keep that sweet smile for him. “Looks like I did.”

He leans forward and pulls the dripping pack from the cup, muttering curses under his breath. “Yeah, you’re as civilized as a damn racoon.”

I try not to laugh, try not to notice the still churning heat in my body. “If you’re done screwing around,” I say, flipping open the script, “we have work to do.”

“Can’t. Gotta go buy another pack now,” he teases, still close enough that his thigh is touching mine.

I roll my eyes. “No, you don’t. Come on, Johnny, for once can we just do the job so I can leave?”

He exhales, long and dramatic. “What’s the rush? You got a hot date or something?”

“Maybe I do.”

He snorts. “Calm down. We’ll do the stupid read-through. It’s porn, not the fucking Oscars.”

He finally starts reading. For a minute, it almost feels normal.

His voice is steady, rough around the edges in that deliberate way he does everything, like he’s always one breath from growling.

We get through a few lines without him making a joke or throwing in something off-script.

Reading lines with him only adds to the simmering heat under my skin.

His hand comes up to his chest, fingers grazing the center like something’s crawling under his skin. He scratches once, then again, slower this time, like he’s trying to rub something out.

“You good?”

He doesn’t answer. Just rubs at his nose and clears his throat like he’s trying to shake something off.

We keep going.

“I can hear your heartbeat. You’re scared. I like that.” His line comes out almost strangled. His shoulders tense. I can feel the heat rolling off him, more than before, like something in him is getting closer to the surface than it should be.

"What are you going to do to me?” I read the line more breathy than I intended and his entire body stiffens and moves away from me.

He clears his throat, tries another line, but his voice hitches again, and he rubs his chest like it aches.

I stop reading.

“Johnny.”

He exhales, like he’s been holding his breath for the last five minutes, and then slams the script down on the table hard enough to send one of the pages fluttering to the floor.

“I can’t do this.”

I blink. “What are you talking about?”

He stands like he can’t be in his own skin another second, pacing once, then twice, then raking both hands through his hair.

“I said I can’t work like this.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, go bum a smoke from someone if you're going to act like this. You’re such a baby.”

“It’s not the smokes, it’s you,” he growls

“I’m literally just sitting here.”

“Yeah,” he mutters, almost to himself. “That’s the problem.”

I stand too, heart thudding now for a very different reason. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He’s halfway out the door. “I can’t focus. Not with you sitting there, smelling like that.”

Slamming the door behind him, he leaves me standing here, sniffing myself.

This isn’t the first time he’s made a comment like that, and I still don’t get it.

I don’t smell. I know I don’t. I shower and I don’t wear heavy perfumes or anything.

There’s nothing on me strong enough to be a distraction unless he’s allergic to clean laundry and frustration.

I sink down on the couch and stare at the script he abandoned, lying there, taunting me with more work unfinished.

What am I supposed to do? How am I supposed to work with him if he hates me, literally down to the way I smell?

It’s humiliating that this is what’s going to make me lose my job.

Maybe if i just punch him in the nose he won’t be able to smell me and we can finish these lines.

I sigh, rub a hand over my face, and grab the script before it can get left behind for someone else to pick up. I hug it to my chest and walk out of the room, trying not to let the heat in my face follow me down the hallway.

Of course, Hector is outside his office, deep in conversation with Demitri, our lighting tech, who also happens to be a mothman.

Although his appearance can be a little jarring at first, I like Demitri.

He’s tall, quiet, and unsettlingly graceful.

I always fight the urge to stare at his wings.

They shimmer with flecks of deep blue and green, twitching occasionally.

His big red eyes flick to me as I approach, and he gives a slow, polite nod before pretending to check something on his clipboard.

I try to slip past without drawing attention, but Hector clocks me immediately.

“Cassidy,” he says, “Leaving so soon?”

I stop. “Actually, do you have a second?”

Demitri nods to Hector and me, and leaves us to go do whatever Hector was barking at him to do before I interrupted.

I lower my voice. “Weird question, but... do I smell?”

Hector blinks, just once. “Like a human.”

I sigh. “Nevermind.”

His gaze sharpens. “Johnny say something?”

“No,” I lie too fast.

He watches me like he knows I’m full of shit and is just choosing not to call me on it just yet.Then he nods at the stack of papers in my arms. “How’d the read-through go?”

“Well—”

He cuts me off. “I’m assuming it went well, seeing as how you both are done for the day.”

I don’t miss the sarcastic tone he has; he knows damn well we didn’t read through these lines.

He taps the top page. “So well that Johnny left his script and stormed out the door in excitement.”

“I was just—”

“You were just on your way to drop them off,” he says, cutting me off again with a grin that’s all teeth.

“What? No, I—”

“Don’t know his address,” he finishes, already pulling a pen from behind his ear and scribbling something down on the back of a production memo.

He tears the paper off and hands it to me before I can argue. “You do now.”

I stare at it. “Hector, I don’t even have a—”

“You have legs. You have the script. That’s more than enough.”

He turns back toward his office, done with the conversation before I can get another word in.

I look at the address in my hand.

A simple delivery that’s all this is. Drop off his script and leave.

Forty-five minutes on a crowded, uncomfortable bus later, I’m standing on Johnny’s porch, staring at his sun-bleached welcome mat. I stand on the doorstep longer than I probably need to, clutching the script. Just get this over with Cassidy.

I knock and wait, heart pounding. No answer. I lean in and listen. Somewhere inside, faint and distant, music is playing. So he’s home.

I knock again, louder this time. Still nothing.

I glance down at the script in my arms, then back at the door. I should leave. I should just stick it in the mailbox or leave it on the porch and walk away. I came all this way, though. Hector will know if I didn’t follow through. And I’m not about to give Johnny any ammo to call me unreliable.

So I try the knob. It turns.

The door creaks open an inch, and I immediately want to close it again, but my voice betrays me.

“Johnny?” I call out, hovering in the doorway. “It’s me. Hector made me drop off the script.”

Nothing. The music’s a little louder now, spilling into the hall, echoing just slightly off the walls. I step inside slowly, cautiously, like I’m walking into a werewolf’s den uninvited, because I fucking am.

“Just dropping this on the table,” I say, more to myself than to him.

The bathroom door is cracked just enough to let a slice of steam curl into the hall.

The shower’s on. He must not have heard me over the water and the music.

I can’t help but smile when I hear his voice.

He’s singing. Soft, low, just a hum and a few lazy lyrics slurred between breaths.

I take a step forward. The script is still tight in my arms. Just drop it off, I tell myself. Coffee table. Out the door.

"Cass.” his voice filters through the music

“Yeah,” I call out automatically, feeling caught, half-turning toward the bathroom. “I’m just leaving the—”

He says it again.

Only this time, there is no mistaking, it’s a moan.

“ Cass .”

The wet, steady rhythm of his hand. The slick glide of skin meeting skin. The soft grunt of breath catching in his throat.

My whole body locks. My breath stalls in my throat, heat rushing so fast through me I feel dizzy. I should leave. I should turn around, walk out, pretend I never heard any of this.

But I don’t. I stand there, feet rooted to the floor, stomach flipping, pulse pounding between my legs. Water rushes behind his voice, but it doesn’t drown out the sound of his hand working faster, wet, urgent, and obscene. There’s no mistaking it now. No room for denial.

Johnny Howler is jerking off in the shower, and he’s doing it to me.

“Fuck, Cassidy…” he groans, voice slurred, breath shuddering between every word. “You smell so fucking good. Can’t stop thinking about it.”

The rhythm of his strokes quickens, filthy and desperate. I hear it in his breathing, in the way he pants like he’s chasing it, like he’s right on the edge and falling fast.

There’s a scrape of something sharp. Nails, maybe against tile.

A sound catches low in his throat, raw and strangled. He must have shifted. The growl that tears out of him isn’t human.

It rips through the air, feral and guttural, something deep in his chest; something not fully tamed.

“Oh..oh..ohhh fuck yes..” His voice pitches, broken and hoarse. “I’m cumming. Shit…I’m…I’m fucking…cumming…”

It crashes out of him like a wave, loud, throaty, drawn-out, and I don’t wait to hear the rest.

I bolt.

I drop the script on the coffee table and I shove the door open. My heart slams against my ribs, heat still radiating through my entire body, blood roaring in my ears.

He came. He came to the thought of me.

And I need to get as far from that house as possible before he realizes I heard every second.