Fade to Black (The Black Trilogy Book 1) (14 page)

“I love roses,” she said.

She held it to her nose, eyes closed, smelling the fragrance.

I drank her in. There was a childlike quality, innocence, about her as she did this, as if she’d never smelled a rose before. It left my head buzzing.

We arrived at a deserted beach in the middle of nowhere. I parked the car and got out. The air was nice and clean. The sound of the waves crashing against the shore was hypnotizing.

I walked to the front of the car and looked around to see if we were alone. There was nothing as far as my eyes could see.

When Livia did not follow, I walked around and tapped on the half-open window.

“Is this what you wanted?” I asked, a little confused.

She looked at me, then the surroundings, then back at me. I thought she looked scared.

“I shouldn’t be here,” she told me.

I sighed, bewildered.

“But don’t you want to be here?”

She twisted her hands nervously, and I opened the door, taking her silence as a yes.

“Isn’t this where you are supposed to be?” I asked.

She grinned and unfolded her long body from the car.

When she stood and looked at me, I guessed she must be five-nine, or five-ten, judging by the models I had dated.

“Hey, you’re not a model are you?” I asked, teasing.

She didn’t laugh.

“No. I’m nobody,” she whispered.

This struck me as odd. People normally did not reply in this way. She walked to the trunk and got out a blanket.

“I’m afraid to think what and who has been on this, but it’s what we have,” she said, apologetically, then strode past me to find a place to sit.

She moved like fluid. Delicate and graceful. I watched her with my hands in my pockets as she spread the blanket and sat cross-legged, waiting for the sun. I turned off the headlights, tossed my shoes in the back, and walked to join her. We sat in silence as the sun rose.

The sky turned different shades of dark blue, then light. The water was dancing to the dawn, putting on a show for its audience of two strangers.

It was majestic and beautiful. I sat a little behind Livia, just so I could watch her and not be noticed. I couldn’t guess her age, but she was young. Her face was like porcelain, smooth and lineless, except a thin scar just under her right eye.

Her profile was perfect, the strong line from the bridge of her nose to her pouty lips all in perfect proportion. When the sun was fully up, a tear threatened to fall from the corner of her eye, but she quickly wiped it away. I touched her shoulder.

“You okay?” I asked softly.

She jumped at my touch.

“Sorry,” I said.

Livia wiped her eyes.

“I’m fine.”

I knew that was a lie. This girl was anything but fine. She obviously had the weight of the world on her. I knew I had to seize the opportunity in front of me. I did not want to go back to the apartment complex just yet. I wanted to keep her here, and find out more about her, see if I could maybe get her to like me. I stood and started to undress. She looked up at me, shocked.

“What are you doing?”

I unbuttoned my jeans, and she looked away blushing.

“You ever skinny-dip?” I said, unashamed of my body, knowing the workouts and diet I’d been following were paying off.

“No. I mean, yes, when I was a child and foolish,” she said, looking down the beach so she wouldn’t see me.

I began walking to the water, and when I was waist-deep, I turned to her, throwing my hands up.

“This is life, Livia. Don’t you want to live it?” I asked as if I knew the secrets to life and this was one of them.

I thought she would get up huffy and mad. I thought she would demand we go back now. I did not expect her to stand and begin undressing. I stood still, watching her. Waves tried to knock me down, but I stood perfectly still, soaking up both the new sun on my back and the stranger before me.

I was taking in every movement, the elegance of her arms and legs, then the roundness of her breasts and hips. The soft places in between.

She walked, knowing I was watching her. I was focused on her beauty. Her hair flew playfully in the wind. Her nipples rose hard and alert as her feet hit the water.

I had the desire to reach out and take her. I didn’t. She dove like a swan into the salty drink. I followed. When we surfaced, we laughed like kids, swimming here and there.

“This is crazy,” she said, breathless and happy.

“You’re beautiful,” I said stupidly.

She grinned at me, embarrassed. I wasn’t sure, but I could almost feel the wrappings holding her together loosen. She said nothing, but turned to swim further out. I stayed within arm’s reach of her, feeling like any given moment she would disappear, and I would wake up in the back seat of Nathan’s car, stiff and hung over.

“Got any beef jerky left? I’m starving!” she asked, flashing me gorgeous white teeth.

I grinned.

“Yeah, about a dozen. I bought all they had!”

We made our way back to the blanket after a few minutes of swimming. I tried to be respectful and not stare. I wanted to look at her and melt into her. I just knew she would dress, and I wouldn’t see her flesh again today. I made my way to the car and grabbed the goods along with the now warm beer. When I turned to walk back to the blanket, Livia surprised me again. She was lying on her back with her arms on her forehead, still nude.

I had seen many women naked. I had never seen anything as beautiful as this woman. She was slightly too thin, like she worked too hard or was sickly, but that was her only flaw. I drank her in as I slowly walked toward her. I stood looking at her in the sun.

Her arms were over her closed eyes. She reminded me of a bird, or some small animal warming in the sun. She had goose bumps from the wet. Her nipples were hard and standing.

She had a small pool of water in her belly button. I fought the desire to bend over and suck it out. There was a deep scar just above her trimmed pubic hair. There were small scars on her torso here and there that reminded me of cat scratches.

I drank her in like old wine, savoring every inch of her. I stood erect and in awe. She must have felt my presence, because she moved her arm to look at me.

“What?” she asked innocently.

I cleared my throat, hoping the bag hid my obvious mood.

“Nothing,” I lied easily, just as innocent.

I was drunk, but hadn’t had a drink in hours. I knelt on the blanket, and began to sift through the bag. Livia propped herself up on her elbow and looked in the bag with me.

When I looked up, saying something about the warm beer, I met her eyes. Damn. I was falling hard and fast through deep rivers of chocolate. She didn’t look away.

She drank in my face and licked her lips absently. I swallowed nervously. I was never nervous with women. What was wrong with me? Wasn’t I immune to naked, beautiful women by now? But here I was, acting like a schoolboy being examined by a hot teacher. I forgot the bag and put my hand to her face, leaning close to her wet lips.

“May I?” I asked in a hoarse whisper, every breath breathing deeper into hers.

She did not protest, and I bent to kiss her.

I found her breast with my free hand, and ran my other through her long hair. I laid her back on the blanket, not wanting to go too fast, but unable to control the now raging desire I felt running through my body. I pulled away from her mouth with great difficulty.

I began to kiss, lick, and softly bite her collarbone, then her breasts. Small seductive noises came from her throat. I made my way down until her legs were parted and my mouth on her. She shook under my probing tongue, making soft, incoherent sounds of pleasure.

After she shook from her release, I made my way back up her body, pausing for only a moment at her breasts. Her hands were all over me, crazed as much as I was.

When I entered her she bit at my wrist, which only fueled me further. I kissed her frantically. I did not want to stop. Her legs tightened around my waist, I arched my back, and pounded her into the sand. Making beastly sounds of my own, finally I collapsed in exhaustion on top of her.

I could feel her heartbeat, and I’m sure she could feel mine. After I caught my breath, I rolled over beside her. We lay in the sun for a long moment breathing heavy.

I was not drunk. I was not high. I was fully in the moment with one of the most beautiful women I’d ever met. I wanted to soak it up and never leave this spot. The movie be damned. The world be damned. I had found bliss on earth. Frenzied and crazy as it was, I couldn’t wait to do it again.

We slept intertwined in the morning sun. When we woke, we made love again, then ate our convenience-store goods, then swam the day away. We lay on the blanket, talking quietly to one another, exhausted from sex and the sea. When she dozed with her back to me, I looked for what I’d felt in the water. When I saw the roughly healed scar on her left upper shoulder blade, about six inches long, I thought it odd.

It was a bad injury, and it had healed poorly. I traced it with my fingers, wishing to smooth its surface, knowing whatever made this scar must have caused her great pain. I hadn’t noticed her open eyes and was caught off guard when she spoke.

“It was a burn,” she said, and offered no further explanation.

I bent my head and brushed the scar lightly with my lips. I held her and did not want to push the subject now, not while we were drunk on each other. I would ask later. I ran my fingers down the curves of her body, tracing her ribs. There were light bruises there, and a faded black bruise on her hip. It was unspoken, but I knew in my heart someone had put these on her purposefully and probably the burn scar as well.

She lay silently, watching the fading light as the sun set, and allowed me to touch her. I laid my head on hers, and watched the last sliver of orange disappear from the sky.

We packed silently and drove in silence, not wanting to spoil the air with idle, meaningless chatter. I was paranoid about love, so I’d never known what it was. Was this love, or merely a deeper form of lust? I looked over at Livia. She was looking out the window. I could see a reflection of sadness on her face when we passed under a streetlight. I pulled her to me and kissed her hair. This was not lust.

Yes, I was overly attracted to her, but beyond the physical elements, there was a magnetic pull toward her, an energy I’d never known, and I was nearly certain I would never feel it again.

Livia curled up like a cat beside me as we drove to the apartment complex. I stopped and parked where the car had been the night before.

“Nathan will probably have called the car in stolen by now,” I said, and Livia smiled.

“I’m due on set at three in the morning,” I told her. “Can I see you when the shoot is done?”

Livia looked up at me and reached to kiss me.

“Meet here at the car, or if Nathan takes it, here in this spot, agreed? At six this evening?”

I noticed I sounded like I was begging, but I didn’t care.

Livia nodded. There was a distance in her eyes that made me weary. I wrapped my arms around her middle, inhaling deeply the sweet perfume and salt of her hair.

I spotted Viola’s rented Pontiac in front of my apartment.

“Great,” I said sardonically, allowing my unwilling arms to release her.

“What?” Livia said, following my gaze.

I shook my head.

“My pain-in-the-ass handler is here.” I put my eyes back to hers. “Here? At six?”

Livia nodded.

I kissed her again, and watched her go in the opposite direction. When I could no longer see her frame in the dim lights, I made my way to the unit I was staying in. We would be leaving in three days, and I planned on spending every one of my breaks with this beautiful and mysterious woman. I looked back to where she had left me. A ghost in the night.

chapter eighteen

I looked to see which direction Livia had gone, dumbfounded that I hadn’t asked where she was staying. I would find out, and I could always ask Nathan or Lana. When I got inside the apartment, Viola started on me without warning.

“Where the hell have you been? You think you can just disappear for twenty-four hours? You do not have a life when a studio owns you. If there are any drunken bar fights in the tabloids tomorrow, I will personally kick your ass.”

I shut my eyes and shook my head.

“Jesus, Viola,” I started, but this didn’t help her mood.

“Don’t you bring Jesus into this. He has nothing to do with anything we are talking about,” and on and on she went.

It lasted at least ten minutes. All the while Sheldon sat, still in makeup from filming earlier, smiling at me.

When Viola had appeared to be finished with me, he said, “Sure you want this life?”

Viola shot him a nasty look.

“Don’t you add to this. You, with your tiny bits in movies. You could’ve won an Oscar by now, but no, Mr. I-Don’t-Want-To. You’re wasting my time and energy. Did you wrap today?” she added for clarity.

“Sure did. Two takes, and done,” he told her, grinning

Viola nodded, returning to her professional self.

“Now,” she said when she saw me narrowing my eyes at Sheldon. “You will be on set in an hour. They have bumped our flights to Mexico for early afternoon…”

I held up my hand.

“Wait, what?” I demanded.

Viola turned an icy stare on me.

“Did I not speak English?”

I stared back just as hard.

“We don’t start filming Mexico for another four days,” I said, pissed off now.

Viola closed her heavily lidded eyes with what I thought was annoyance, but her voice was like speaking to a child about how yes, one plus one does equal two.

“You did not read your schedule. We have to be ready and waiting in Mexico by mid-week. We have to check in and do rehearsals and test lighting. Come on Ryan you know the drill by now.”

I gaped at her trying to take in what she was saying.

After going back and forth for twenty minutes, I got in the shower, fuming. I let the hot water wash my anger away. I would leave a note at the car, and explain that I would be in Mexico for two or three weeks tops, then after that it was Rome for another four weeks. I would leave my number and my New York address. And apologize profusely. And hope Livia would not think she was a one-night stand.

I ran my hands through my hair, flashing back to the way her skin felt in the sea, the way the salt tasted on her body once on the beach. I opened my eyes and tried to clear my head. No matter what I did, I was worried I’d never see her again. A feeling that was brand new to me. I liked it, but my heart felt heavy.

Viola opened the bathroom door.

“Let’s get a move on, hotshot. We leave in ten minutes.” She closed the door again.

With the heaviness in my chest, I hurried out of the shower, and into the same clothes I’d just taken off. I didn’t bother looking in the mirror. Hair and makeup would shave and clean me up. I wrote out the information I would leave at the car as quickly as I could, thinking I would tell Sheldon to be on the lookout as well. When I yelled for him down the hall, Viola sighed heavily.

“He’s gone already. Let’s go!”

Following an irritated Viola to her rental, I muttered for her to wait.

“Please, give me one second.”

In frustration, Viola growled at me. I ignored her and headed to the Camaro, but it was gone. I looked around. It was nowhere in the lot. Viola pulled up beside me.

“Let’s go,” she demanded.

I looked around the complex, and the car was nowhere in sight. An ambulance and police cars were parked a building away, but no Camaro.

“Damn it!” I screamed.

Viola said nothing, just kept inching forward with each step I took, frantically looking for a car that wasn’t there. I stood in the middle of the parking lot. I had no last name, no apartment number, no nothing. I kicked the side of the Pontiac as I made my way to the passenger side. I threw open the door, got in, and slammed it shut. I was in a black mood, and Viola knew to say nothing to me.

On the way to my trailer for makeup, paranoia crept up. What if I was the one-night stand? Livia did not care for me one bit. In fact, I had to talk her into going, and I talked her into everything else. I smacked my forehead, and said, “Idiot!”

A guy carrying a boom mic muttered, “Sorry,” and hurried away as if I’d been taking to him.

I stomped up the steps, feeling like a used postage stamp. Hours later, Sheldon came to watch. He stayed back, away from everyone, chewing on his already short nails. When we finally wrapped, he told me Nathan had been shot and was in the hospital.

“What?” I said, shocked, thinking of the police cars.

“They think Nathan and Lana had an all-night drug binge with one of her suppliers. Things got ugly. Lana was shot in the neck. Nathan fought them and was shot. It was pretty bad. He had surgery and it looks like he’s going to be okay now. He’s with his sister at the hospital,” Sheldon told me.

I called as soon as I was in my trailer, and the set was being torn down. An operator connected me to Nathan’s room. A woman answered, and I had to pause.

“Livia?”

My heart stopped.

“No,” she said calmly. “This is Piper, Nathan’s sister.”

Her nose was stopped up, no doubt from crying. My heart started back up, but the heaviness returned.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Is Nathan able to talk? This is his friend, Ryan.”

Silence, then muffled voices, and then Nathan got on the phone. He sounded terrible.

He assured me all was well, and that he would be staying with his sister and her husband for a while in Tennessee. After I hung up, I looked for Sheldon. When I found him cracking jokes with the stage guys twenty minutes later, I didn’t hesitate.

“Do you know a girl, a friend of Lana’s maybe, or Nathan’s, named Livia?”

We walked toward a waiting Viola.

“No bro,” Sheldon said. “How come?”

I shook my head.

“Damn it.” I explained very little as to why I was asking.

I would find her one way or another. I headed to the airport with mixed feelings of dread and uncertainty. I tried to sleep but was too distracted. I did some coke and drank bourbon slowly, allowing the warmth to take over. By the time we reached Mexico, I was stoned and pissed off at the world.

…

Days flew by, and no word from Nathan. I couldn’t reach him either. When I finally spoke to Roger, he explained that Nathan was staying with family in Tennessee.

“Nathan is getting clean. It might be best if you gave him some time to sober up. He’ll return your calls. Just give him time to deal with the withdrawal, and get stronger.”

I agreed this was the best, and left it at that.

I thought of Livia day and night. When drug-induced sleep would finally find me, I closed my eyes, hearing her voice. Tasting her skin. I could not locate her. No one could find a Livia who stayed at the apartments.

Darkness was settling in my head and heart. In no time, Viola, Sheldon, and I were off to Rome. As we took off, I looked out the window of the plane, wondering if somewhere down there was a girl I was for sure in love with.

I sighed a heavy sigh and tried to sleep, listening to Sheldon tell me about Beatrice meeting him with the girls when they landed. They would stay for a while and might even look at some property. I tried to be happy for him, but he knew me well.

“What’s up, bro?”

I kept my eyes closed, and shook my head. 

“Nothing. Just tired.”

“You act like you’re in a funk. Better snap out of in or you know Viola will have your ass.”

“Just let me be Sheldon. I’m not in the mood to be lectured,” sounding every bit the asshole I was.

Sheldon left me to my thoughts.

I only saw him twice in Rome. I returned to filming and drowned myself in booze every chance I got, trying to keep hope alive that I would see Livia again, and maybe she could understand that I didn’t leave by choice, and I didn’t have control of my own life. I rolled my eyes thinking of just how dumb that sounded.