“Respect?” Viève spat like a snake spitting venom. “Respect? I don’t care about respect.”
Obviously. With this tiny gnome, none of the rules of logic applied. “Then what is it? What did Holden do?”
“Fuck me,” Viève sobbed. “He won’t fuck me.”
*
“He won’t fuck her? Oops.” Zymar pointed to Jessica’s toothless babe of a boy Max, who giggled.
Jessica sat next to Zymar at the dining room table, across from her husband, Mike.
“He won’t remember,” Mike said, glancing from Max to Jessica. “Well, he might repeat it, but he won’t remember.”
Jessica looked first at Max and then at Mike. The feeling of calm she always felt when sitting with her two men was absent. She failed to regain her sense of equilibrium after her encounter today in Viève’s trailer. Usually Jessica shrugged off Viève’s tantrums as behavior from an overindulged child. But today Viève’s lack of self-respect and her insistence that her costar bed her had forced Jessica to ask herself the question: Why? Why, after she had received a law degree from Harvard did she choose to babysit petulant prima donnas? Jessica hoped that Mike’s arrival from Los Angeles two hours before, just as
Collusion
wrapped for the day, would cure her discontent, but anxiety still crackled through her like a brittle candy wrapper. She picked at her Chinese food.
“How do you like being a producer there, Jess?” Zymar asked. “Those actresses are nutty. There are reasons I never dated one.”
“Wasn’t Christina’s mother an actress?” Jessica asked, referring to Zymar’s full-grown daughter, who now worked as a VP at Lydia’s production company.
“We never really dated,” Zymar said between bites of his kung pao scallops. “We fucked like rabbits, she got pregnant, and we got married.”
“You romantic,” Jessica said and picked at her sea bass. She tossed her chopsticks onto the table and crossed her arms. “She’s nuts.”
Both Mike and Zymar paused and looked at Jessica.
“Well, she is and I can’t fix this.” Jessica turned her sour expression—pursed lips and furrowed brow—first toward Mike and then Zymar. “What? I’m going to tell Holden he has to screw his costar? I know that isn’t in Viève’s contract, no matter what her agent Tyler says.”
“‘Tis the lot of the producer to be dependent on the crazy creative types,” Zymar said.
“Jess, it could be worse,” Mike said. “Viève could overdose, or the director could run off to a Balinese brothel.”
“Let’s not go telling tales there, Mr. Fox. I do think I ran into you and your crew in Bali a couple years back.”
Mike cleared his throat and looked at Jess. “So how are the dailies?”
“That’s the thing. They’re great. Her performances are pitch-perfect and the sexual tension between the two of them is … well … it’s firecracker hot,” Jessica said.
“There’s your answer,” Mike said.
Jessica turned her confused look toward her husband.
“Have Holden tell her he can’t sleep with her until the end of the production,” Mike said.
“What? You’re kidding.”
“They have history together. He can tell her he wants to keep the tension tight, the performance hot, and not ruin it by diluting the buildup. Have Holden tell Viève he wants her, but she’s got to wait until the end of the shoot.”
“He’s a smart one, your man,” Zymar said to Jessica.
“I can’t force Holden to do that.” Jessica looked past Mike out the window, into the cold Toronto night. The fate of a $60-million film rested on an actress who maintained a tenuous grip on her sanity. But the ultimate responsibility for
Collusion
lay with Jessica. Her job as producer required her to bring the film in on time and on budget. If that meant asking her client and one of the biggest stars on the planet, Holden Humphrey, to have a false conversation with his costar to ensure the completion of
Collusion
… well, then Jessica had to make the request.
“It’ll work, Jess,” Mike said. “She’s crazy enough to buy it.”
“I don’t doubt she’ll buy it. But having the conversation with Holden? Making this request seems so intrusive,” Jessica said.
“Don’t worry, Jess. You’ll be able to figure it out. You always do.” Mike picked up a fortune cookie and cracked it open. He handed the piece of paper to Jessica.
Jessica read the fortune.
Lady Luck must be Mike Fox’s lover
, she thought.
“What’s it say?” Mike asked.
Jessica glanced at Mike. “Words of wisdom come your way.”
*
“You want me to tell her what?” Holden’s bright blue eyes were wide and he tilted his chin towards Jessica with complete disbelief. Jessica watched his reaction in his make-up mirror. She created this star. She had found Holden in obscurity, when she was a junior agent at CTA, and molded his career. Aside from his very brief stint with another agent, Jessica had repped Holden for his entire career. Now she still managed him and also produced a majority of his films.
“Holden, please. You don’t have to do it. Just say it. Tell Viève you want her, you’re attracted to her, but you just can’t sleep with her.”
“Jessica, she’s crazy. If I tell Vieve that, I’ll never be able to get rid of her.”
Jessica twitched her pursed lips from left to right. Holden was correct—on all counts. Vieve was crazy and if he did tell the little nutjob that he wanted her she would in fact be on him like a cat in heat. After their last breakup, Holden threatened a restraining order before Viève finally left him alone. But this conversation between Viève and Holden needed to happen.
“Okay, I know. But, Holden, please. We are so close to wrapping. We have nine days. Nine! But she’s losing her mind—completely. Yesterday she had a nervous breakdown because you haven’t hit on her.”
“She’s nuts.”
“Look, I know, but—”
“What about Mary Anne?”
Jessica locked her gaze onto Holden. Why would he mention Mary Anne Meyers? “How does Mary Anne fit into this equation? Your thing with Mary Anne was forever ago.”
Holden looked away from Jessica and instead gazed intently at his lap. “Yeah, but she’s doing the rewrite for
Sexual Being
.”
“Mary Anne’s a complete pro,” Jessica said. “Besides, she’ll never know … And why would she care? She’s practically married to Adam.”
“Adam? Who’s Adam?” Holden asked.
“Her live-in boyfriend for the last two years. They met right after
Seven Minutes
. He’s in London doing a play.”
A frown flickered across Holden’s face.
“Please, Holden. Do this for the film. Do it for me. I promise I’ll get Viève away from you once we’re in post.”
Holden looked up and met Jessica’s gaze.
“Okay,” Holden said. “But, Jessica, you owe me one.”
*
Holden shivered in the cold Canadian air as he tromped through the snow. He didn’t understand women. He never had. He tried, he really did. He read books about women … okay he started books about women but rarely did he finish. He went to therapy, he tried to listen and understand, but a firm grasp of what a woman wanted escaped his reach.
Most men would wonder why Holden even cared. Women wanted him. They threw themselves at him. But he’d become tired of the random sex. His mother had told him that he needed someone to love. Every time he called his mother asked him about nice girls.
What could he tell her? He lived in L.A.; there were no nice girls.
Mary Anne seemed like a nice girl—a smart girl—a girl that Holden’s mother might like, or so he had thought, until he heard about Adam.
But Viève? This one? This actress? Certifiable. He’d tested the goods, and although the package looked sweet, the inside was rotten to the core. Holden knocked on her trailer door.
“Come in,” Viève called.
Holden pushed open the trailer door. Darkness greeted him. He looked toward the back of the trailer where a single candle flickered. He could barely make her out, but there she was, waiting, curled up amid silk pillows and wearing only a thong.
“Jessica said you were stopping by.” Viève rolled onto all fours and crawled toward him. “Come on, come over and sit with me,” she said.
Holden stepped back as if moving away from a reptile. “There’s something I need to talk to you about.”
Viève stood and took a step toward him.
He watched her naked form slink closer. Yes, Viève was quite a package. He felt himself grow hard in spite of his dislike for her. She had a perfect ass. Oh, the things he used to do to that ass. His dick grew harder.
“Holden.” Viève leaned into him and pressed her breasts against his chest. She ran her hand up and down his jeans. “Don’t you miss me? Don’t you miss us?” She pushed him backward onto the built-in couch and straddled him, unbuttoning the top of his jeans.
This tiny creature rubbed herself against him and Holden closed his eyes. He swam in the hot feeling that gripped his belly and crawled down the backs of his thighs. “Yeah,” he said. Her pussy was so tight, he remembered. But her tits were little, not like Mary Anne’s. Mary Anne! He opened his eyes and grabbed both Viève’s hands just as she started to pull down his zipper. “Viève, I can’t.”
Viève’s eyes narrowed and she pulled her hands from his grasp. “Why the fuck not?”
“Look, baby.” Holden put a hand on each of her hips to still the motion of her pelvis rotating on his. “I want to.” He reached up and held Viève’s chin. “I’ve been thinking, and I want us back.”
“You do?” Viève asked.
“Yeah, but right now, I’m afraid it’ll ruin the film.”
“What?”
“Babe, we’re so hot on-screen because of all the tension. Can’t you feel it?” He leaned forward and let his lips brush against her neck. “I mean, you remember what it’s like, don’t you?” He could feel her pushing into him, surrendering to him. She had to agree—believe—leave him alone. Holden slipped two fingers beneath her thong and began to massage between Viève’s legs. “With us.”
“Uh-huh,” Viève breathed out.
“It’s so hot,” Holden whispered. Viève’s breath grew shallow as he continued to gently push against her with his fingers. He watched her head tilt back and felt her hips rock against him. “Baby, I want it hot. You feel it, hot like this.”
Holden felt how wet she was. She slid between his fingers as he sat there watching her arch her back.
“Fuck, yes, please, please, please,” she moaned. Holden pulled his hand away just as Viève’s body stiffened. “Please, no, baby, don’t stop, you can’t stop.” Viève rolled onto the couch.
He looked at her on her back with her legs spread open to him. He had no desire for her. But he was an actor.
“Baby, I can’t. It’s not time yet.”
“Then watch me, please, will you watch me?” Viève begged, placing her fingers on her clit. “Like you used to, baby, just like you used to?”
Holden exhaled and looked into Viève’s eyes. “Yeah, baby, I’ll watch.”
Rule 6: Always Say Less Than Is Necessary
Kiki Dee, Publicist
Kiki Dee slipped off her Prada flats and eased herself onto her king-size bed. Pain gripped her middle, and a dull throb pulsated at the top of her head. Today was her first day home after her extended post-op recoup visit to the Peninsula Hotel. Tomorrow she’d return to her office. She slowly leaned back into the pillow on her bed. The pain in her abdomen ached worse than three hundred crunches. She glanced in the mirror on the ceiling above her bed and saw that the bruising around her eyes and nose that had turned from a deep purple to apple green two days before now contained hints of yellow.
Beauty was painful.
Kiki glanced at the KDP mobile command center Boom Boom had established in the bedroom. Three fax machines and a laser printer buzzed. Boom Boom worked at a laptop with a BlackBerry and two cell phones beside her, and Kiki’s landline had been rerouted to serve as their six-line office phone. Today, Kiki had finally returned all her calls, and her phone sheet, the lifeline to all business in Hollywood, was caught up. She leaned farther back against the pillow and picked up her copy of Daily Variety, the industry’s trade paper.
BROCKMAN BUSTS BOX OFFICE, the headline read. Kiki smiled as she scanned the article. The bonzo box office numbers were a true testament to Kiki’s skills as a publicist.
Kiki continually managed to keep under wraps something that was an open secret in Hollywood but completely unknown to the rest of the world: that Steven’s marriage to an amazingly beautiful young starlet was in fact fake, and Steven really lived with his true mate for life, Billy, a former male model and London club owner. A well-planned obstetrical visit and the careful use of a turkey baster had resulted in the birth of Steven’s daughter, Sylvan.
If the red states discovered Steven’s nonhetero tendencies, his career would be severely stunted and the studios would lose a huge amount of ticket sales. Everyone had a vested interest in keeping Steven’s sexuality secret—double retainer for Kiki—both the studio and the star paid her a fee.
But not even Steven’s secret was as big as the one she witnessed prior to being sucked, poked, and tightened. Despite Kiki’s drug-induced fog—she didn’t care what anyone said, morphine and anesthesia were the best—she knew that what she saw at her plastic surgeon’s office was real.
*
Kiki first glimpsed the starlet as she exited the celebrity elevator in Dr. Melnick’s office. (After all, she couldn’t very well go through the lobby with the unwashed masses.) Kiki saw the figure disappear into exam room three, across the hall from Kiki’s assigned room, and wondered why the mini-goddess needed to visit a plastic surgeon. Kiki watched Melnick’s nurse knock on the door that had just closed across the hall.
“The doctor is running about ten minutes late,” the nurse called into the room.
“Okay,” a voice answered.
The nurse placed the chart in the chart holder beside the door and waddled back toward the front of the office.
There was no mistaking that face. And anyway, Dr. Melnick reserved this portion of his office space—the exam rooms and one surgical suite—exclusively for A-listers and the publicists, managers, agents, and attorneys who could refer the A-listers. There were only two entrances: the elevator from which Kiki emerged and the door through which Dr. Melnick’s nurse exited. Kiki glanced at door number three.