Hollywood Sinners

70

Las Vegas



Elisabeth raked her fingernails down the man’s back, gasping as he moved on top of her.

‘Make me come,’ she whispered in his ear, tightening her muscles and arching her back. At a renewed pace he went to work, kissing her lips, her forehead, her neck. She screamed out, grabbing his ass and pulling him closer, moving with him. Together they climaxed violently, their bodies bathed in sweat.

Middle-of-the-day sex: there was nothing better. They had snatched an hour at lunch. It had been her idea.

He rolled off and lay back, breathing hard. Elisabeth ran her fingertips over his chest.

‘That was amazing,’ she said.

He looked at her, the trace of a smile on his face.

She touched his cheek with her hand, leaned in and kissed him slowly, meaningfully.

‘What was that for?’ he asked.

‘I just wanted to.’

The man watched her. ‘You know what I want.’

She sat up, shook her head. ‘I told you. I can’t. I can’t?

Alberto traced a line down her spine. ‘We can do anything, my love. Together, it is possible.’

She hugged her knees to her chest. ‘Do you think they’re watching now?’

‘Not here.’ They were safe in Alberto’s mansion. ‘I had the place checked out.’

She nodded. ‘This has got to stop,’ she said for what felt like the thousandth time.

‘Some things we cannot stop,’ he advised quietly. ‘They have an energy of their own.’

‘This is different. Other people are involved.’

He sat up. She looked in his eyes and saw a young stallion; she looked at his body, crinkled and sagging, and saw an old man.

What are you giving up Robert for? she asked herself. It was foolish to walk away from marriage to one of the most eligible men in America. And for what? An ancient Italian with about six years left? But while her head told her one thing, her heart said another.

‘You must tell St Louis,’ said Alberto. ‘Before the premiere.’ He gazed at her a moment, a little sadly, she thought, before he climbed out of bed and headed into the shower. The steady beat of water followed soon after.

The blackmailers’ ultimatum hung off her like a cross. They’re bluffing, she told herself, knowing she was a coward. They might not know anything. It’s an empty threat.

She put her head on her knees. Lana Falcon had been here for nearly two weeks and Robert was the happiest she had ever seen him. She had never made him that happy.

At least she had something she was keeping close to her heart.

With a flutter of reprieve she remembered the envelope she had found in her father’s office. It had to be from her mother, it just had to be. She’d seen Linda’s handwriting on things over the years and she’d recognise it anywhere. To think that her mother had left her this note, this little piece of her meant for Elisabeth’s eyes only, shone a bright light through the confusion in her heart. She’d hidden it away where no one could find it, savouring its potential, had nearly opened it several times before telling herself to wait–it was too good to rush.

Her father had no idea she’d taken it–maybe he was waiting till she was married to give it to her–and, in a situation over which she felt she was rapidly losing control, it gave her a thrilling sense of power.

Swinging her legs off the cotton sheets, Elisabeth slid open the bathroom door. Alberto’s naked form was just visible through the crystal glass.

She passed her reflection in the mirror, the back of her head a nest of sex hair. Brushing it out, she pinched her nipples to harden them and drew across the shower panel. Her lover’s white hair was sudsy and his body slick with water. She stepped in.

‘My darling …’

‘Shh.’ She put a finger to his mouth.

His cock hung sadly between them. Squeezing gel on to her palms she massaged till he was coaxed to attention, just about. She pushed him back on to the tiled seat and mounted him.

Whoever was threatening her had underestimated the strength of her armour. Her body was a weapon they could never defeat.

‘Breathe in; breathe out, and now deliver the note!’

Elisabeth delivered a note, but whether it was the right one or not was up for debate.

‘OK,’ said Donatella, her vocal coach, brushing back a thick mane that was more like fur than hair. Gold bangles, one in the shape of a snake twisted round her wrist, moved with her. ‘Claude, from the top, please.’

Claude, a mini-Liberace at the piano, raised his shoulders in an elaborate preparation for play then thundered down on the keys like his life depended on it. He swayed from side to side as if he were caught in some dreadful musical tide.

Elisabeth attempted to keep up with Claude pummelling on the ivories, looking at her for accompaniment with eyes wild, and Donatella cueing her in like a demented maestro.

It was the same afternoon and they were gathered at Bernstein’s mansion to practise Elisabeth’s premiere piece. It was a song she had written herself–with a little help from Donatella, who’d been in the music business since the seventies–and was made up of a number of component parts, in the tradition of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody. It began quietly then built to a crescendo, before shying back to a pianissimo, then finishing with an operatic belt-out.

Donatella called time. ‘What’s wrong with you today?’ she frowned. ‘Your pitch is way off. Concentrate, Elisabeth.’

A fearsome woman in her late sixties, but from the back could have passed for forty, Donatella’s face was like tangerine peel, stretched by surgical procedures and swollen with Botox. In a black suit jacket and drainpipe jeans, with a good square foot of copper-coloured chest on show, her die-hard eighties style had finally come back in as a retro fashion choice.

‘Sorry,’ Elisabeth mumbled. ‘Can we start from “Starry night"?’

Donatella nodded briskly. Not many people could get away with telling off Elisabeth Sabell, but Donatella had been working with the family for decades: she had coached the great star Linda Sabell before her daughter. But while Elisabeth was the mirror image of her mother she had none of her vocal talent. She could hit the note–most of the time–but her voice was lacking something special. Still, it didn’t really matter these days, Donatella thought with a pang for the past industry. A good producer could work wonders, the voice was normally secondary.

Claude took it from verse two and the room erupted once more. Elisabeth felt like she was straddling a runaway horse, trying desperately to cling on as the music swept along, galloping towards the money note that she knew she couldn’t hit.

‘Tell me a story, tell me a lie; if you tell me the truth I surely will die. ‘

Donatella marched on, her breasts shaking with the rigour of her direction. Elisabeth felt her mouth go dry, the notes shrivelling up in her throat.

Focus.

I can’t. I’ve got to tell Robert I can’t marry him.

Rushing towards the highest point, Elisabeth’s voice cracked and she delivered the final punch as more of a limp slap. The note escaped her mouth then died on the floor in front of them like a wingless bird.

‘Ach!‘ Donatella shook her head. ‘You’ve got a lot of practice to do.’

Elisabeth looked at Claude, who was wearing an expression of such concerned pity that she wanted to smack him round his orange face.

‘I’ll do it,’ she said, out of breath.

‘I hope so,’ said Donatella, passing Elisabeth a glass of water, which she accepted gratefully. ‘The premiere is in less than eight weeks.’

‘I know,’ she mumbled.

‘You need to be ready,’ Donatella said, grabbing her purse. ‘Claudy!’

Claude sprang to attention like a dog.

‘This premiere will make you,’ she said sagely. ‘I’ve a feeling it’ll be a night to remember.’





71



Lana lay back on her bed at the Orient, staring up at the ornately decorated ceiling. The past two weeks had been bliss.

Since she’d arrived in Vegas she’d felt anonymous, uninhibited, but most of all free, which was ironic given her circumstances. She’d been forced to stay largely in her rooms, so had found time to be quiet; to read, to watch old movies–even to attempt a letter to Arlene. It was difficult. She hadn’t known where to begin, or how to account for her years of silence. Finding it near impossible to put it all into words, she’d suggested a meeting, maybe after the baby was born. It seemed important to explain in person everything that had happened, right from that day when they had taken her away. But then, partway through, she’d realised she didn’t even know if Arlene was still alive. With all her heart she prayed she still had the chance to make things right.

She checked the time. Eleven o’clock. Robert would be coming for her any minute. He’d been so generous–never had she encountered such a busy man, and yet he was unconditionally there for her. He’d visited her daily, sometimes just for minutes at a time depending on his schedule, and they’d caught up on the lost years. It was beyond the call of duty. She wanted him as fiercely as she ever had, but had been strict with herself–she was in enough of a mess already. Besides, Robert belonged to Elisabeth. He was in love with her, and she with him.

She hoped his company would restore her faith in men.

Lana cringed when she recalled the disastrous conversation she’d had with Parker Troy the morning after Rita had left. The first few attempts he hadn’t picked up. Then, on the fourth:

‘You’re what?’ Parker had shrieked, all high-pitched.

‘I’m pregnant,’ she’d repeated calmly. ‘And you’re the father.’

A long silence before he said in a sunken voice, ‘You can’t be. I mean … how?’

‘Well, funnily enough, it went like this …’ Lana had lost patience. They’d both been irresponsible, not just her. Where did he think she’d been the past three months, out shopping for baby clothes with her girlfriends?

‘Does Cole know?’ he’d asked meekly, sounding like someone about to shit themselves.

‘Yes.’

‘And he knows it’s me? F*ck. Does he know it’s me? I mean, do you think he—?’

‘No, he doesn’t know it’s you.’

‘Good, OK. And it’s gonna stay that way, right?’ The relief was audible. ‘There’s no way he can find out–I’d be a dead man.’

Lana couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘I’m OK, thanks, Parker. You know, in case that figures anywhere on your list of priorities.’

‘Of course it does,’ he’d clarified swiftly. ‘But listen, Lana, I gotta tell you–I’m not ready to be a father.’

Lana baulked. ‘Oh, that’s funny. I’m not ready to be a mom either. It’s going to take some getting used to, huh?’

A pause. ‘You’re not considering having it, are you?’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘I just assumed—’

‘Then don’t,’ she cut in. ‘I am having this baby, with or without you, Parker. I’d like you to be involved for the sake of the child, so maybe you could—’

‘But what if I’m not it?’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘What if I’m not the father? There’s that chance, right?’

‘F*ck you, Parker.’ She’d fought the urge to hang up. ‘F*ck you.’

‘I’m just saying—’

‘Don’t just say anything, you a*shole.’

‘Look, I’ve got a career, Lana. I’m just starting out. You–you’ve kind of made it, yeah? You’ve done what you wanted so, like, I guess it’s the right time for you to have this kid. You know,’ he stammered, ‘if you want it. But for me, well, it’s not. And also,’ he tacked on hastily, as if it made the damnedest bit of difference, ‘I’ve got a girlfriend. I really think I should be left out of it, totally, so, like, it’s nothing to do with me.’

When Lana was sure he’d finished, she laughed. ‘God, you really are just a kid, aren’t you? And there I was crediting you with more than two brain cells. Turns out you’re just a juvenile prick after all.’

‘It’s not my fault,’ he’d whined. ‘You know what I think you should do. And if you don’t agree, why should I have to face the consequences?’

She could scarcely get to grips with his immaturity. ‘You may be heartless, Parker,’ she’d said eventually. ‘You may also be a shitty actor and a selfish sonofabitch, but do you know what I never thought you were?’

Silence. Then a grudging, ‘What?’

‘A coward.’

After they’d hung up she’d resisted breaking something. But, then, while she’d hoped for a little more support, she hadn’t counted on it. Parker’s baby was inside her yet she didn’t know its father at all.

Robert sent up a call, bringing her back to the here and now. They arranged to meet downstairs and the prospect filled her with nervy excitement, the kind she’d felt back at school; the kind that made it difficult to eat.

He was waiting for her in the foyer, handsome in a suit.

‘Want to spend some money?’ he smiled.

‘I don’t gamble,’ she said coyly.

‘Everybody gambles in Vegas. It’s the rules.’

She smiled. ‘In that case, I guess you’d better show me how it’s done.’

Lana had never hit a Vegas casino before. She found it disorientating, the bright lights and the high-strung buzz, the way glamour and sleaze operated side by side. It worked to a rhythm that got to your blood, chronic and unremitting.

‘Does this ever stop?’ she asked as they moved among the tables. Robert stopped to glad-hand a couple of high rollers, important-looking men with pink-hung cheeks and runny eyes.

He turned to her and grinned. ‘Not on my watch.’

Lana noticed the effect Robert had on his staff. News of the boss’s presence spread like a virus through the casino, with everyone working to a hundred and ten per cent. They wanted to do a good job for him because they liked him, she realised–but they were also a tiny bit afraid of him. It was respect. Something Cole had spent his life trying to master but he had perfected only intimidation.

At the roulette wheel Robert slipped into a game and told her to pick a number.

‘Er … I don’t know what to do.’

‘Black or red?’

‘Red!’

The ball dropped in. ‘No more bets!’

They got lucky. Lana went in again, then a third time. People were watching but she didn’t care. She was laughing, getting into the swing of it, happy with Robert at her side.

He put a hand on her arm. ‘Time out,’ he said, giving the dealer a wink as they departed the table. ‘Fortunes change.’

Afterwards they took a seat in the bar. It was innovatively themed, its side tables embroidered with a trompe l’oeil poker hand and each chair stamped with a suit. Lana was reminded of Alice in Wonderland. She might well have disappeared down the rabbit hole for how it all felt.

Robert ordered them drinks.

‘I’m glad you came,’ he told her, sitting back and looking at her. His gaze burned.

‘It was fun. Never knew I had a gambler in me.’

‘I mean that you came at all. Here.’

Lana looked away nervously. Outside was the Orient’s Dragon Garden, its verdant lawns and stone fountains glinting in the sun.

‘I didn’t think I’d see you again,’ he said quietly.

Lana nodded.

Robert took her hand. ‘I don’t want that to happen any more. I never want to not know how you are, where you are. If you’re happy. Do you understand?’

‘Robert—’

‘I mean it,’ he said firmly. ‘No more running. You’re too important to me.’

She drew her hand away.

‘I shouldn’t have said that.’

Lana shook her head. ‘I’m glad you did.’ She paused. ‘I want us to be friends.’

His voice was hollow. ‘Of course.’

‘Rita called this morning.’ She sipped from her glass.

‘And?’

‘Conversations are happening. Cole’s got a great lawyer on board but Rita doesn’t seem worried.’

‘She’s a remarkable woman.’

‘She is.’

Lana put down her drink. ‘It’s safe for me to go back. I’ll leave at the weekend.’

He nodded, had been expecting it. ‘How do you feel?’

‘Scared. But I have to do it. I have to face the consequences of what I’ve done.’

There was an awkward pause.

‘I don’t want you to go,’ he said. It was a statement, entirely unsentimental.

Lana was honest. ‘Neither do I.’

‘Then don’t.’

She searched his eyes. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Stay here.’

‘Why?’

His gaze was serious, the look she had loved so long. ‘Because I want you to.’

In that instant, the world changed.

‘Lana, there’s something I have to say.’ He watched her solemnly. ‘I don’t want to marry Elisabeth. I thought I did, but I don’t. I convinced myself it was the right thing but it’s not. Please, don’t interrupt, let me just do this.’ He leaned forward. ‘All I can think about is you. Only you, always you. Since you walked away from us, not a day, not an hour, not a single minute has gone past when I haven’t thought about you.’ A beat. ‘I’m yours. You have me, you always did and you always will.’

‘Robert …’

‘I haven’t finished. I love Elisabeth. I do. But not in the way I love you. The way I love you is different, I can’t explain it, like it’s a different part of me I’m loving you with, and that part can’t ever belong to somebody else.’ His voice shook. ‘I don’t care how long I have to wait, how much I have to face, what it means for any of this’–he gestured around him–’but I’m not getting over you again.’ He bowed his head. A frown furrowed his brow. ‘I can’t marry her.’

Lana’s heart was thumping. ‘Did you just say all that?’ she whispered.

‘I’ll say it again.’

The fire that had been dead in her caught light. ‘You don’t need to,’ she said. ‘I can remember it.’

He took her hand again, not caring who saw. ‘Say it could work.’

‘We’d hurt people.’

‘Not in the long term.’

‘It’s impossible.’

He laughed, looked about him, then at her. ‘Anything’s possible. Wouldn’t you say?’

She laughed with him. ‘It’s crazy.’

‘The only things worth it are.’

Lana shook her head, squeezed his hand. ‘Robbie Lewis, what have you done to me?’

He smiled. ‘Not nearly enough.’

She smiled back.





72

Los Angeles



‘I am not terminating this marriage contract.’

Cole Steel banged his fist on his lawyer’s table, sending a brown puddle of coffee spilling over the rim of his cup.

In his downtown office, Randy H. Ford shuffled a bundle of papers on his desk. He was a sharp-featured man with abundant grey hair and half-moon glasses that perched on the end of his nose. In the business for over thirty years, Randy was one of the best lawyers that money could buy.

He looked between Cole and Marty King, unperturbed. ‘It’s what Rachel Manelli is pushing for, I’m afraid. We need to consider all avenues open to us.’

Cole shook his head in disbelief. ‘It defies belief that Lana’s doing this to me!’ He turned to Marty. ‘She’s the one who messed this whole goddamn thing up!’

Randy leaned forward. He removed his glasses and pinched the thin bridge of his nose. ‘As your lawyer I do need to acknowledge that a dissolution would be in our best interests.’

‘How?’ Cole spat. ‘By making me the gullible f*cking chump? I don’t think so.’ He laughed mirthlessly. ‘I begin shooting in a few weeks, then what? The movie’s scheduled for release in the same month as some bastard offspring?’

Jesus, he felt awful–and, judging by Marty’s poorly concealed reaction when they’d met earlier this afternoon, he looked it, too. Sleep had eluded him since Lana had vanished, along with his appetite.

Oh, he knew where she was hiding. She’d only gone and run off to Vegas, thinking she could get a free deal from that hotelier he’d introduced her to. Rita Clay had been to see him on her return: she’d said that Lana would come back, but that she needed time. Time? What a f*cking joke. She hadn’t taken time to think about her husband in any of this, had she? Rita had also assured him that if he tried to seek her out they would go straight to the papers and tell them everything. Apparently Lana was willing to risk it–the bitch knew how to hit him where it hurt.

‘It will end on our terms.’ Randy poured himself a glass of water. ‘For me, this makes it an attractive proposition. Think carefully, Cole. Your wife is pregnant and unwilling to maintain that the child is yours. If the contract is dissolved we can mitigate damage caused to you. That is my primary concern.’

‘Well, my primary concern is how in the hell it’s going to make me look!’ Cole jabbed his chest with a finger. Marty reached out to calm him and Cole slapped his hand away.

‘Exactly my point,’ said Randy evenly. ‘Your wife has stated that she wishes to continue with the pregnancy, meaning that she will give birth to a third party’s child with or without your consent. The option given to us is to take control of the story that emerges–up to a point agreed with the other side, of course. If we fight for the contract we will still face the same outcome, only it will look decidedly worse from where you’re standing.’

Cole had never felt so impotent.

‘I always treated her well,’ he lamented, looking at Marty for reassurance. His agent, sensing he was up, nodded obediently. ‘I never hurt her; I gave her everything she wanted …’ Except what she went out and got.

His eyes hardened. ‘I want this baby to be mine,’ he told Randy.

‘It won’t happen. They’ll never agree.’

‘We’re still in contract!’ cried Cole hysterically. ‘There has to be something in there that entitles me to have a say in this! Here, give me that.’ He snatched the papers.

‘I’m afraid not,’ said Randy. ‘Nothing that covers your wife getting pregnant by a third party.’

‘Can you stop freaking saying that?’

Randy sat back, watching Cole flip through the contract like a man possessed. When he’d finished he looked at Marty accusingly. ‘Great.’

‘We’ll talk in the morning,’ said Randy. ‘Once I know the facts we can start building this case. You’ll be frank with me about everything.’

Marty winced. Cole would love that.

‘I’ll talk her round,’ said Cole suddenly, as if a great idea had just dawned on him. ‘When she comes back.’ He looked between the two men. ‘She has to come back, doesn’t she? We’re still maintaining this, right? She’ll listen to me. If I can just get through to her—’

Randy shook his head. ‘We should avoid discussing this directly—’

‘She can’t really want to go it alone,’ Cole went on, his plan gathering pace. ‘What woman does?’

The other men looked unconvinced.

‘Come on, Cole,’ said Marty eventually, standing up. He shook Randy’s hand.

Cole stayed seated. ‘It’s like you’re both giving up. How am I supposed to work with that?’

‘This is bigger than us, Cole,’ said Marty gently. ‘Especially now that a third party is involved.’

‘Stop with this third party goddamn bullshit!‘ Cole roared. ‘Soon as I find that jackass I’ll—’

Marty stepped in. ‘Cole …’

His client rose from the chair. Even in built-up heels Cole was the shortest man there. His voice was menacing. ‘We invented this. So tell me–how the hell can it be bigger than us?’

Randy and Marty exchanged glances.

‘Nothing is bigger than me,’ announced Cole, pushing himself up on his toes. ‘Nothing and no one. They want a fight? Fine. But I’m telling you now, they’ve picked the wrong freaking guy.’