Ryder knew it immediately he saw the first dailies. He called Paige and told her to get right over to the screening room.
She saw Tim and Eden together and agreed with him at once.
‘We’ve got to keep this film at a level,’ Ryder said. ‘I want it to be a
Last Tango
of the eighties – not a return
of Deep Throat.’
‘You have no problem with that, do you?’ asked Paige.
‘I have no problem, but Bonnatti will give me a hard time. Wait and see.’
Sure enough, several weeks into shooting, Santino demanded more. ‘I want more tits. I want more ass. I want more sucking and I want more fucking.’
‘Don’t hang back,’ Ryder urged. ‘Tell me what’s on your mind.’
Santino glared. He was putting up money for porno, and all he was getting were long shots and clever lighting and artistic shit.
‘Do it,’ he warned. ‘Or get your ass off my movie.’
Two days later Ryder Wheeler did exactly that.
Tim Wealth and Eden Antonio were appalled. Especially when Santino brought in a well-known sleaze director who lost no time in going right for the bone – in more ways than one.
Between set-ups, when Santino wasn’t hovering, and the ever-present Zeko was chasing extras, Tim consoled Eden in the privacy of one or the other’s dressing rooms. They came together urgently. Eden, nervous and edgy and hungry. Tim, surprised that he could summon up feelings he thought were long dead.
It didn’t take long before Santino became suspicious. He watched them in front of the camera and didn’t mind what went on – because he was in control and Eden was his property. But off camera he didn’t even want them to speak.
‘You’ve got to get away from him,’ Tim cautioned.
‘I know,’ Eden agreed.
Tim Wealth couldn’t figure out why he was getting involved. Shoot the flick and run. Santino Bonnatti was bad news. The serious kind.
‘If I came up with a big score we could go to Mexico and hide out,’ Tim suggested.
Eden nodded. Where was Tim Wealth going to come up with enough money to assure their safe flight?
That evening he dug in his suitcase – the one he had carried to Atlantic City on his last trip with his lover. Scrunched in one corner was a slip of paper. On it was written
Brigette Stanislopoulos
and a phone number.
Tim did not hesitate.
Brigette was bored. Being stuck in the Bel Air mansion for weeks with an army of servants and crazy Alice for company was the pits. She had come to visit her mother and Lennie, and practically the moment she arrived they had raced off to New York with hardly a hello/goodbye. Wow – they really wanted to see her, didn’t they?
She amused herself for a while by going through Olympia’s closet, all of her drawers, and her desk. Then she explored Lennie’s study, but he had a habit of locking things up – so she didn’t get very far in there.
Alice said, ‘Do you want to go to Disneyland, dear?’
Disneyland! Brigette gave her a filthy look.
Alice got the message. Disneyland was out. Instead they went to an X-rated movie on Hollywood Boulevard, and later cruised along in the back of Olympia’s white Rolls Royce with a uniformed chauffeur at the wheel, watching the hookers parade Sunset.
Brigette was fascinated. ‘Do they really get paid for it?’ she inquired, filled with curiosity.
‘Naturellement, ma cherie,’
replied Alice. She had been picking up French phrases from a well-developed foreign midget she had met in a bar. His name was Claudio, and he came from circus stock.
‘What do they
do?’
demanded Brigette.
‘What
don’t they
do’, replied Alice mysteriously. ‘Ooh la la!’
They returned to the mansion and played cards. Every day Brigette waited for the phone to ring, because she was quite sure Tim Wealth would call. While Alice wondered if she dare invite Claudio to the house. Lennie had been very specific with his instructions. ‘I don’t want
any
of your friends here, male, female, straight or gay. Not one of them.’
Poor little Claudio. He was gentle and quiet. And certainly very sexy for a small person. Surely Lennie would not bar Claudio from coming to the house?
‘I’m bummed out,’ Brigette complained constantly. ‘Can’t we do something funky for a change? Don’t you know any people?’
Alice did not understand what either bummed out or funky meant – both sounded rude to her. She sighed. Youngsters today were different. Brigette seemed such an advanced teenager. Or maybe she was normal. On impulse she phoned Claudio and invited him over.
‘I’ve got a friend coming,’ she informed Brigette.
‘Nice for them,’ the girl muttered.
‘He’ll take us out.’ Alice nodded to herself. She had had enough of playing baby-sitter. When Lennie had called and asked her to stay she had been thrilled. She wanted to be close to her famous son, not cut out of his life forever. But keeping an eye on a restless fourteen-year-old was not exactly what she’d had in mind. Claudio would definitely liven things up.
‘It’ll be nice to see
someone,’
grumbled Brigette. She was pissed at Tim Wealth. Weeks had passed and he hadn’t even called. Soon she would have to leave L.A. and return to school. Who did he think he was?
‘Yes,’ Alice mused happily. ‘We’ll have ourselves some fun with Claudio.’
‘Brilliant,’ said Brigette.
Alice simpered coyly. ‘We’ll get down and get funky!’
Brigette giggled. Alice always made her laugh with her birdlike movements, dyed hair and rouged cheeks. ‘Right on, grandma!’
The smile vanished from Alice’s face. ‘Don’t call me that, dear. It makes me feel ancient.’
* * *
In New York the battle was on. Dimitri Stanislopoulos’ will was a lengthy and complicated document. To everyone’s surprise he left the bulk of his money, business interests and estates to Lucky – to be held in trust for Roberto until he reached twenty-five.
Olympia was not exactly left out. She was to receive a lifetime allowance of a million dollars a year, which she considered an out and out insult. Brigette was to get double that amount, and also a twenty-five million dollar inheritance when she reached twenty-one.
‘How dare he!’ Olympia screamed, as they left the lawyer’s office. ‘How dare that senile sonofabitch do this to me!’
Lennie was not really interested in Olympia’s hysterical complaints. He had just come face to face with Lucky for the first time in three years, and he felt as if someone had kicked him in the stomach with a steel-toed boot. She was as wildly beautiful as ever in a simple black suit, her jet curls pulled severely back from her face.
She had walked toward them and offered a hug of sympathy to Olympia, who had shrugged her off with a cold glare.
He didn’t know what to say. Everything seemed inappropriate. Hey – the big movie star was speechless. ‘How are you?’ he managed to mumble.
She barely glanced in his direction. ‘Fine, thank you,’ in clipped tones.
And that was it. The full extent of their conversation, followed by hours of boredom while the will was read.
He had tried to catch her eye, but she was aloof, and very remote, which destroyed him. It seemed that as far as Lucky was concerned it was over. And there was no way he could convince her otherwise while he remained married to Olympia. ‘It’s all that bitch’s fault,’ Olympia ranted on. ‘She brainwashed him. She coerced him. But she needn’t think for one moment that she’s getting away with it, because she’s not. My lawyers will fight it every inch of the way – every goddamn inch.’
* * *
The newspapers descended like a plague of ants, and Lucky, who had always managed to keep a fairly low profile, suddenly found herself the centre of attention. As Mrs Stanislopoulos, she had kept in the background. But as the Widow Stanislopoulos, and the inheritor of most of Dimitri’s fortune, she was suddenly thrust unwillingly into the limelight. Unwanted headlines began to appear. Pictures were dug up from her days as Senator Richmond’s daughter-in-law, the opening of the Magiriano, and more recent ones from the Hotel Santangelo opening night.
D
AUGHTER OF
F
ORMER
M
OBSTER
H
ITS THE
J
ACKPOT
creamed one tabloid, S
ANTANGELO
K
ID
G
ETS
R
ICH
Q
UICK
offered another.
It wasn’t long before industrious digging produced the story of her attempted rape at the hands of Enzio Bonnatti, and the subsequent shooting. It had taken six years to make the headlines but now it was hot news, S
TANISLOPOULOS
H
EIRESS
K
ILLED
R
APIST
.
She was outraged by the sudden loss of privacy, and when they printed a picture of Roberto, playing in the pool at the Magiriano where he was staying with Gino, she really freaked out, and called Gino immediately. ‘What the hell is going on?’ she demanded. ‘Why are you letting them photograph Roberto?’
‘I’m not,’ he replied grimly. He too was upset by the unwelcome thrust of publicity. ‘I got security guards throwin’ the newspaper bums on their asses, but I can’t control the tourists with their cameras,’ he complained.
‘I want Roberto out of there,’ Lucky said urgently. ‘At once.’
‘I know,’ Gino agreed. ‘I was thinkin’ along the same lines.’
He told her his plans. Costa and Ria had rented a house in Beverly Hills for the month. They were flying to L.A. that evening, and he planned to take Roberto and CeeCee and go with them. ‘I can’t put up with the shit goin’ on here,’ he said. ‘This way nobody will know where we are, an’ we’ll get some peace.’
‘Sounds good to me,’ said Lucky. ‘I’ll join you as soon as I can.’
‘No rush,’ Gino assured her. ‘Roberto’s safe with me.’
‘I know,’ she replied quickly. ‘But I miss him.’ And she did. Desperately. A hotel was no substitute for a son.
They talked some more, and at the end of the conversation she felt better. She could finally turn to Gino in times of trouble. He understood and was always there for her. Right now she needed someone.
Lennie.
Still married to Olympia.
Why had she ever thought they had something going?
If only she could get to Lennie. Eden knew he would lend her the money to free herself from the deadly clutches of Santino Bonnatti. With Ryder Wheeler off the movie, things deteriorated day by day. Her scenes with Tim presented no problem. They were steamy, but she could handle it because she was with him. However, when Santino insisted the rape scene go back in, she knew she was in trouble.
A hulking actor from hard core movies appeared on the set to play her assailant. And she sensed, without a doubt, that Santino had told the director to run the scene to its limit.
Tim slipped her some pills before he was ordered to leave the set. ‘Take ’em,’ he commanded. ‘They’ll get you through.’
She did as he said, and felt better immediately.
Santino was sitting ringside when she was called to start the scene. He sat in a director’s chair behind the camera, a leer on his face, and the stub of a stinking cigar stuck between his teeth. ‘Lotsa luck, honey,’ he said, the concerned boyfriend.
She smiled vaguely. The pills had taken her to another place where nothing mattered.
The director, a New Yorker with dyed hair and slit eyes, said, ‘Let’s go with the flow, sweetie. Live it. Feel it. I’m going for one take in long shot, then we’ll move in for the close ups.’
‘Do I look beautiful?’ she murmured.
‘Hot stuff, sweet ass. You’ll have every
schlong
in the theatre at full mast.’
She licked her thin lips and waited for the magic word, ‘Action’.
The director called it and they were away.
She moved into the scene like the pro she was.
Eden Antonio.
Great screen beauty.
She wore a satin nightgown and not much else.
The hulking actor lurked behind a curtain waiting for his moment. At a signal from the director he moved into shot, huge and sinister. He grabbed her quickly. She was like a helpless doll in his vicious grip.
She relaxed and went limp in his arms.
‘Struggle!’ the director hissed.
‘Yeah, struggle,’ Santino repeated, leaning forward, sweat beading his brow.
Why did she have to fight? Whatever happened now was inevitable, all the struggling in the world wouldn’t stop it.
Feebly she attempted resistance.
The hulk loved that. He ripped at satin, lifted her bodily, and threw her down on the bed.
The pills had an anaesthetizing effect. She was glad. Getting raped on camera had never been a career goal.