Читать книгу Fame and Wuthering Heights - Эмили Бронте, Emily Bronte - Страница 22

Sabrina awoke gripped with fear. A familiar fear: her bedroom door was rattling. It was him, Graham Cooper, the foster ‘brother’ who’d abused her as a kid back in Fresno, coming to ‘cuddle’ her, as he called it. Already she could smell the foul excitement on Graham’s breath, see his sallow, twenty-year-old cheeks flushing as he slipped under her bedclothes, telling her not to make a fuss, that he loved her, that she was lucky to have a roof over her head.

‘No!’ She sat up in bed, her heart thudding against her ribcage like a trapped animal. ‘Get out!’

‘Come on, Sabrina. It’s almost five. If you don’t get to wardrobe on time, Dorian’s gonna skin both of us alive.’

It took a few seconds for Viorel’s gravelly English voice to register. He wasn’t Graham Cooper. This wasn’t her childhood bedroom in Fresno. And she wasn’t a helpless, twelve-year-old nobody any more. She was Sabrina Leon, movie star, on the set of her latest film. And oh my god she was already late!

Pushing back the covers with a groan, Sabrina got up and walked to the window, opening the curtains. It was still dark outside, with only the faintest shards of dawn light pushing their way tentatively over the horizon. Sabrina’s room looked out over parkland at the rear of the house. In the half-light, she saw a family of deer sleepily getting to their feet beneath a sheltering oak, brushing against one another in the early morning mist. It looks so peaceful, Sabrina thought, with a pang. Like many people addicted to the thrills of city life, she wished she had the ability to switch off and enjoy nature without feeling so anxious all the time, as if life were somehow passing her by, leaving her behind in a trail of dust. I guess if you grew up somewhere like this, you’d learn how to do it. How to be at peace.

Tish Crewe had grown up here, of course. Maybe that was why she looked so annoyingly hearty? The girl positively radiated wholesome, rural goodness. Their paths had crossed for only a matter of minutes yesterday, but Sabrina had already taken a strong dislike to Loxley Hall’s mistress. Tish’s accent was so cut-glass it couldn’t possibly be genuine; besides which, Sabrina made it a rule never to trust a woman who didn’t wear any make-up. Look at me, they seemed to be saying, I’m so artless. Of course, Rasmirez had lapped it up. Sabrina could see at a glance how enamoured her director was of Tish Crewe, with her doe eyes and her cute kid and her whole motherly schtick. It was enough to make you want to throw up.

Dorian probably thinks she’s a lady. Unlike me.

Viorel Hudson seemed to like the girl too. Or maybe it was just the child he was interested in? Last night, when he’d shown Sabrina to her room, he’d been waxing lyrical about little Abel – how funny he was, and how smart. Sabrina’s own maternal instinct had been surgically removed years ago, along with her tonsils, but it was sexy to see a man being fatherly. At least, it was sexy when Viorel did it.

‘Are you up?’ Right on cue he stuck his head round the door. He looked revoltingly refreshed at such an early hour.

Sabrina stretched her arms into a long, cat-like yawn. ‘I’m up, I’m up,’ she sighed. ‘I’ll see you down there.’

The Wuthering Heights’ wardrobe and make-up departments consisted of two basic mobile-home-style trailers parked next to Loxley’s stable blocks. Along with the crew’s accommodation, catering vans, an editing suite and a temporary structure housing bathroom and laundry facilities, they made up what was known as the ‘Set Village’ – the hub of the production. Viorel was already in costume by the time Sabrina walked in. In a pair of high-waisted breeches, riding boots and a ruffled shirt, torn open at the chest, he ought to have looked quintessentially English. In fact, thanks to his dark colouring and three-day growth of beard, he looked more like a pirate who’d lost his cutlass.

Sabrina, by contrast, looked a thousand per cent LA in Victoria’s Secret pink pyjamas, a Juicy Couture silk puffa jacket and a pair of Ugg boots, her entire face hidden by a YSL leopard-print scarf. All that was visible above it were her eyes, puffy with tiredness and narrowed resentfully at the fact they were expected to be open at such an ungodly hour.

Viorel looked her up and down. ‘Well, well. If it isn’t Aurora, Goddess of the Dawn.’

‘Fuck off,’ said Sabrina, but Vio could see the smile in her eyes. ‘Thanks for waking me. I think I slept through, like, six alarms.’

‘My pleasure.’ After all her tantrums and standoffishness in LA, he was delighted that Sabrina seemed to have decided to cease hostilities between them. Dorian had given her such a hard time at the read-through, and again yesterday, sending her bodyguards packing, she probably needed an ally. Given that they’d be spending the next three months of their lives together, day in, day out, both here and in Romania; and that the only other female company available was the brain-dead Lizzie Bayer or the lovely-but-off-limits Tish Crewe, this was a relief.

‘Excuse me, darling.’ Maureen, the fat, motherly wardrobe mistress shooed Viorel out of the way. From the back of the trailer she dragged out a wooden folding screen.

‘You can undress behind here,’ she told Sabrina. ‘Give you a bit of privacy.’

Sabrina’s outfit, an intricate blue-and-yellow embroidered crinoline with hooped skirts and multiple lace petticoats, had been laid across two chairs next to where Viorel was standing. It was huge, taking up a good half of the available space in the trailer.

‘That’s OK,’ said Sabrina, ‘I don’t need it. Just bring the dress over here and I’ll step into it.’ Viorel watched as Sabrina slipped off her coat, boots and pyjamas. In seconds she was standing in front of him in nothing but a minuscule pair of thong panties. Her hands covered her nipples, but everything else was visible – the large, firm, perfectly rounded breasts, the boyish bottom without a hint of cellulite that was as tanned and smooth as the rest of her, the perfectly flat stomach defined, Viorel suspected, by genetics rather than hours of crunches in a gym. She’s magnificent, he thought, and gloriously unselfconscious. Although who wouldn’t be, with a body like that?

In fact, Sabrina was entirely conscious of what she was doing, and delighted by the effect it seemed to be having on her co-star. She’d resented Viorel when they first met in LA, because he was getting five and a half million dollars for this movie and she was getting nothing, and because she feared he’d steal her attention, and perhaps even make a play for sole top billing on the credits. Certainly, he was ambitious enough to try it – he’s almost as hungry as I am – and might even get away with it. Ed Steiner had the spine of an amoeba when it came to defending her interests, and Rasmirez had plainly already decided which of his two lead actors he favoured.

But seeing him again yesterday, Sabrina decided she’d changed her mind about Viorel Hudson. Not only was he fully fuckable, but he seemed genuinely eager to be friends. He hadn’t needed to wake her up this morning. He could have let her sleep in and face Rasmirez’s legendary temper, but he didn’t. At this point in her life, Sabrina needed all the friends she could get. Plus, she thought happily, if he likes me now, just think how much more he’s going to like me once I take him to bed. She was going to need something to do in this sleepy little corner of England, especially now that Dorian had confiscated Enrique.

‘Here you are.’ Maureen and her assistant carried the enormous dress over to Sabrina, rolling down the bodice so that Sabrina could step into the hooped skirt. ‘Hop in there before you catch hypothermia.’

Sabrina did as she was asked. Reaching down to pull up the dress, she let go of her breasts, deliberately giving Viorel a full frontal view. ‘Oops.’ She looked him in the eye and smiled.

Vio smiled back. Careful, he thought. She’s delicious, but she’s trouble.

‘I’ll go and get us some coffee.’

‘And a bagel for me,’ said Sabrina, not breaking eye contact. ‘I’m staaaaarving.’

So am I, thought Viorel, his dick hardening at an alarming rate beneath his skintight breeches.

Make-up took forever. Even though it was only the two of them in this morning’s scene, and neither of them needed to be aged or scarred or otherwise transformed, the process seemed to drag on and on.

‘You want to run through it?’ asked Vio, closing his eyes as yet another shade of base was applied to his lids. ‘We may as well do a line check while we’re stuck here.’

Sabrina, who was still fruitlessly trying to bring her BlackBerry Pearl to life, was about to say ‘no’. They were very different actors. Viorel seemed to want constant reassurance and ad hoc rehearsals, whereas she preferred the adrenaline rush of jumping blind into the first take. But, in the interests of their newfound friendship, she relented.

‘OK,’ she said, wincing as her hair was pinned tightly into her bonnet. ‘Hit me.’

As they ran through the scene, Vio felt the tension he’d been carrying around since the read-through drain out of him like pus from a lanced boil. Sabrina had shown promise at the read-through, but she’d been flustered, no doubt by Dorian’s bullying, and the dynamic between the two of them had never fully gelled. This was Wuthering Heights. The love–hate relationship between Cathy and Heathcliff was not just the most important part of the movie. It was the movie. Viorel knew that Sabrina’s performance could make or break his own, and that her reputation for making scenes difficult for her opposing actors was horrific. So it was wonderful, miraculous to hear how far she’d come since that day in LA, how much she had to give him. Her voice, her attitude, that precarious combination of arrogance and naiveté – it was Brontë’s Cathy to a tee. Vio responded in kind, finding a depth to his Heathcliff that he knew he hadn’t reached before, that he knew he couldn’t reach without Sabrina to help him.

Sabrina was happy too, aware of the chemistry between them. So much rested on this job, she’d found it hard to think of it as anything other than that: a job, an ordeal that had to be gone through in order for her to win her life back. Now, for the first time in a long time, she remembered what it was she loved about acting. The escape. The release. The passion.

The door to the trailer flew open. Dorian Rasmirez loomed in the doorway with a face like fury, waving the morning copy of The Sun like a weapon.

‘What the fuck do you think you are playing at?’ he roared at Sabrina, so loudly she felt as if her hair were being blown back, the way it did when baddies yelled in a cartoon. Her pulse raced unpleasantly as the fear welled up within her, but outwardly she managed to keep her cool.

‘I take it that’s a rhetorical question?’

‘You fucking idiot,’ said Dorian, opening the paper to page four and shaking it in front of Sabrina’s nose. When she read the headline, her stomach lurched.

‘RACE ROW ACTRESS TELLS BRITAIN’S BLACKS TO F*** OFF.’

Beneath the bold, black lettering they’d run a picture of her at Heathrow yesterday looking glamorous and starry, walking beside a mountain of Louis Vuitton luggage. Her face was set in a hard, uncompromising attitude that Sabrina remembered as fear, but that in print looked horribly like arrogance.

‘Read it,’ commanded Dorian. ‘Read it out loud.’

Sabrina took a deep breath. ‘Controversial Hollywood actress Sabrina Leon, the woman at the centre of a bitter Hollywood dispute after branding African American director Tarik Tyler a “slave driver”, yesterday astonished Britons by making a second ugly slur, this time against our own black community. When asked by our reporter if she had any message for black people in Britain who may have been offended by her original remarks, Miss Leon, who is in this country to film a remake of the British classic Wuthering Heights, replied that they could “f*** off”.’

‘That’s not true,’ said Sabrina, lowering the paper. ‘I never said that.’ There was a silence you could have cut with a knife. Then she added, ‘I mean, I did tell the guy to fuck off. The reporter.’

‘Jesus.’ Dorian shook his head in disbelief. ‘Why? Why did you say anything?’

‘Because he was crowding me!’ said Sabrina. ‘The whole pack of them. It was intimidating.’ She looked to Viorel for support. ‘You know what it’s like, right? It’s frightening.’

Vio nodded, but Dorian was having none of it.

‘Read the copy, Sabrina. They’ve got quotes from a whole bunch of witnesses, all of whom apparently heard you insult the entire black population of this country.’

‘Well, the witnesses are lying!’ Sabrina shot back. ‘I was talking about him, the reporter. I told him to fuck off, not anybody else. Why would I? You think I want to reopen this can of worms? You know, if you hadn’t been so damn high-handed and sent them away, you could have asked my bodyguards. They were there. They’ll tell you.’

‘Oh, great,’ snarled Dorian. ‘And are they gonna tell the ten million people who read this over breakfast this morning?’ He snatched the paper back from her. ‘All you had to do was keep your mouth shut.’ Turning on his heel, he stormed back out, slamming the trailer door behind him so loudly that everyone jumped.

For a moment, Sabrina just stood there, stock-still. Vio saw the tears in her eyes, saw the struggle as she fought to contain them. Then, after a few seconds, she sat back down in the make-up chair, her face as blank and unreadable as an empty screen.

‘You OK?’ he asked her.

‘I’m fine,’ she said briskly. Turning to Maureen, she asked: ‘How much longer?’

‘Not long, lovie. Five minutes, tops.’

Chuck MacNamee knocked on the door. ‘Ready on set when you are, Mo.’

‘Come on,’ said Sabrina to Viorel. ‘Let’s finish reading through the scene. Your line, I think. From “Does it really matter, Catherine?”’

You’re a good little actress, thought Vio. But he could see how scared Sabrina was. He hoped Dorian would ease up a bit once they started filming.

Dorian didn’t.

The morning shoot was long and gruelling. It was a hot day, a good ten degrees warmer than it had been the day before, and by eleven Sabrina was roasting in her heavy meringue of a dress. But Rasmirez didn’t seem to care, keeping her standing for hours under the glare of the lights, refusing her a chance to sit down or grab a glass of water, and rolling his eyes when Sabrina insisted on a break after three straight hours on set.

‘Either I go to the bathroom, or I pee right here on the ground,’ she said defiantly.

‘Go,’ Dorian growled. ‘You have two minutes.’

‘Come on,’ said Viorel, once she was out of earshot. ‘Give her a break. My horse is getting better treatment.’

Dorian glanced across at Heathcliff’s skewbald pony, contentedly gorging itself on a bucket of oats behind camera two. ‘Yeah, well. Your horse hasn’t single-handedly alienated the entire British press.’

‘It’s her first day,’ said Vio.

‘And she’s already fucked up.’

‘It was a mistake.’

‘Yes it was. A big one. Look,’ said Dorian, sensing Vio’s disapproval, ‘she has to learn. Actions have consequences. Of course the press were hounding her. What did she expect? Of course they were pushing her, trying to get her to lose her temper. That’s what they do. But that’s all the more reason to keep a lid on it. If people are trying to trip her up, if they want to think the worst of her, she’s only herself to blame for that.’

Sabrina was coming back. Vio dropped his voice to a whisper.

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘But just ease up a little, OK? Let her finish the scene. She won’t be able to give much of a performance if she drops dead from heat exhaustion. And neither will I.’

At four o’clock they wrapped for the day. Dorian headed straight for his room. There were bound to be a thousand emails and voice messages wanting his response to Sabrina’s latest blunder, and he needed to get some sort of statement out there before tomorrow.

On his way back to the house, he bumped into Tish. She’d been out to a local theme park with Abel. When she saw Dorian she flashed him the kind of megawatt, grid-lighting smile that forced you to smile back yourself.

‘How was your first day of filming?’

‘Awful. But thanks for asking. How was Thomas the Train Land?’

‘Oh, you know. Hell on earth,’ shrugged Tish. ‘Abel enjoyed himself.’ She turned around to look for him, but he’d already scampered off somewhere. She hoped it was for a slice of cake with Mrs Drummond, and not to pester the actors or film crew. At breakfast this morning he’d already coloured three cards: one for Deborah Raynham, the camera girl who always gave him sweets, one for ‘Princess Sabrina’ and one for Viorel – a therizinosaurus.

Dorian followed Tish into the house.

‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she asked him. ‘I bought milk and biscuits on the way home.’

‘I can’t,’ said Dorian. As they walked to the kitchen, he explained briefly about The Sun’s article and the problems Sabrina had caused. ‘I should have dealt with it this morning, but it was such a great day, I didn’t want to lose the light.’

‘I’m sure she didn’t mean it the way it came out,’ said Tish, wondering as she switched on the kettle why she was defending Sabrina, who – if yesterday’s behavior was anything to go by – was a loathsome little madam. ‘Our papers do have a way of twisting things.’

Dorian rolled his eyes. ‘You sound like Viorel.’

Tish made herself a cup of Lapsang and asked casually, ‘How was he today? I hope we didn’t tire him out too much yesterday, with the hospital and everything.’

Dorian watched in silence as Tish put far too much tea into the pot, lost in her own thoughts. ‘Might that not be a bit strong?’ he asked, after the seventh heaped spoon of tea leaves.

‘Oh!’ Tish blushed. ‘Sorry. I was, er … I was miles away.’

Damn it. Dorian frowned. Why couldn’t Hudson have left the girl alone?

‘Listen,’ he said, taking the stewed tea and emptying it into the sink. ‘Viorel’s a great actor and a nice enough kid. But he’s young. He’s looking for a good time, not for anything serious.’

Tish looked taken aback. Was it really that obvious she found Viorel attractive?

‘I know it’s none of my business and I’m probably over-stepping the line here,’ said Dorian. ‘But you’re a nice girl. I wouldn’t want you to get burned.’

Tish contemplated getting angry. It was none of his business. But she knew that Dorian meant the advice kindly. She also knew he was right.

‘Actors are a difficult breed,’ he told her. ‘Moody. Unpredictable. Trust me, I’m married to one. One minute you’re the hero, the next you’re the villain, and no one ever gives you the script in advance.’

‘It sounds exhausting,’ said Tish.

Dorian thought of Chrissie. Since his refusal to fly home to Romania for Saskia’s ‘Temperature-gate’ they were barely on speaking terms.

‘It is. But you know, when you love someone, you’ll put up with anything, right?’

‘Well, hopefully not anything,’ said Tish. ‘You have to know where to draw the line.’

For a split second, Dorian wondered how different his life might have been if he’d married someone like Tish – sensible, reasonable, self-assured – and not the wildly needy Chrissie. He hoped Tish’s level head extended to her own love life and that she steered clear of Viorel Hudson.

‘Don’t worry,’ she said, reading his mind. ‘I like Viorel, and Abel adores him. But I have no intention of making my life more complicated than it already is.’

‘You forgive the meddling?’

‘Of course,’ said Tish, adding a touch sadly, ‘My own father died last year. It makes a nice change to have someone looking out for me.’

Jeez, thought Dorian. She looks on me as a father? Working with Sabrina Leon must have aged him even more than he thought.

On her way up to her room, Sabrina passed the kitchen and saw Dorian sitting at the table with Tish, laughing it up, as relaxed and avuncular as Santa Claus. Of course he’s sweetness and light with wholesome Lady Letitia, she thought bitterly. It hadn’t escaped her notice yesterday, the way that Dorian had automatically taken Tish’s word over Sabrina’s about that stupid non-incident with the car. To see the two of them now, so companionable and touchy-feely, you’d think they were lifelong friends. Or maybe it was more than that? Maybe Dorian patron-saint-of-marriage Rasmirez isn’t as squeaky clean as he makes out?

Trudging up the back stairs to her room, Sabrina tried to put her bastard director out of her mind and focus on the evening ahead of her. After filming, Vio had offered to take her out to the pub for supper and she’d jumped at the chance. She was under contract not to touch a drop of alcohol, but she was still looking forward to it. With any luck, tonight would mark the beginning of a beautiful friendship with her sexy co-star. Unless Rhys or the dreadful Jamie Duggan decided to join them – or, worse, Lizzie Bayer, who’d already been nicknamed ‘Mimi’ by Chuck MacNamee and his crew because she talked about herself so much. Sabrina thought this was hilarious, but had no intention of joining in the general cast banter or becoming ‘one of the gang’ on set. That wasn’t what stars do. Stars remained aloof, fraternizing only with others of their own status. In this case that meant Dorian Rasmirez or Viorel Hudson. Sabrina knew which of those she preferred.

It’ll be just the two of us, she thought happily. Viorel and me for the whole summer, with no competition and no distractions. A summer affair was just what she needed to lift her spirits. That and for the movie to be a hit. But it would be. Having hot sex with one’s co-star off set invariably made for better love scenes once the cameras rolled. If Dorian Rasmirez was determined to make her life on this movie a misery, which if today was anything to go by he quite plainly did, then Viorel Hudson could be her consolation prize.

Starting tonight.

Back in her room, Sabrina crashed for a couple of hours, exhausted after the traumas of the day. When her alarm went off at seven, she was so out of it that it was a struggle to open her eyes, but the prospect of a night out with Viorel propelled her up and into the shower, and after ten minutes beneath the pounding hot jets, she felt fully revived. Opening her still-unpacked trunk, she pulled out a sexy new pair of white Fred Segal trousers and a floaty chiffon blouse from Chloé. The trousers were skin tight, but the overall look was casual and effortless. It wouldn’t do to let Hudson think she’d tried. To heel or not to heel, she thought, holding up a pair of hot pink Manolo sandals and some simple Fendi ballet pumps. Fuck it. She pulled on the heels. One could take this low-key shit too far.

Rough-drying her still-damp hair, she spritzed herself with Gucci Envy, dusted a little bronzer across her cheekbones, and opened her bedroom door. On the floor in front of her was a folded note with a set of car keys on top. Sabrina picked up the note and read it.

‘Sorry Angel. Terrible migraine. Gone to bed. I left you the keys, in case you still fancy getting out of Dodge tonight. Will make it up to you soon, promise, V xx.’

The disappointment hit her like a punch to the stomach. She was angry with herself for caring so much. After all, it was only one dinner. And it was only Viorel Hudson who, if Dorian had let her keep Enrique, she probably wouldn’t be bothering to try to seduce in the first place. Even so, standing there in her sexy pants and heels, it was hard not to feel a bit like Cinderella at midnight. She also wondered whether Vio really had a migraine, or whether this was some sort of petty power game he was playing to get her attention. He’d been fit as a fiddle all day on set. It had certainly come on very suddenly.

Pocketing the car keys, she was about to change back into flip-flops and wander down to the kitchen – most of the actors skipped Mrs Drummond’s buffets and ate supper in the catering trailer with the crew, but Sabrina had no interest in making small talk with cameramen – when she suddenly changed her mind. Sabrina had never been to a British pub, and although the thought of dinner alone was not exactly appealing, it was better than spending the night here making conversation with Tish Crewe and her housekeeper, or, worse, getting cornered again by Rasmirez. She was pretty sure she remembered the way down into the village.

Fuck it, she thought. I’ll go.

The Carpenter’s Arms in Loxley was a low-beamed, medieval building, built in the same warm stone as the rest of the village, but covered almost completely at the front by blossoming violet wisteria. It had an old-fashioned swinging sign, a pretty beer garden overlooking the village green and, on a warm, late spring evening like this one, it was packed.

Sabrina didn’t even have to step out of the car for people to turn and stare. Just the sight of Vio’s rented Mercedes SL 500 pulling into the car park was enough to set tongues wagging, and see pint glasses being set down warily on wooden picnic tables. When Sabrina actually walked in, you could have cut the silence with a knife.

‘Table for one?’ she asked the barman, nervously. What had felt like a casual outfit back in her room now seemed ludicrously over the top. Everyone else here seemed to have at least one item of clothing held up with string. Perhaps this had been a mistake.

‘We’re a bit busy at the moment, love,’ the barman began, but he was interrupted by his wife, a stocky woman with wobbly, butcher’s arms and a distinctly lesbian haircut, who grabbed Sabrina’s hand and pumped it vigorously, as if she were a fruit machine in a Vegas casino.

‘Busy? Course we’re not busy, Dennis,’ she said, smiling ingratiatingly at Sabrina and revealing a row of half-rotten teeth. ‘Table for one, was it? Follow me. I’d expect you’d like somewhere nice and private, would you?’

‘Thank you. That’d be great.’

The landlady led Sabrina to a recessed corner of the room, where an old man was nursing the dregs of a pint of bitter. ‘Let me clear that away for you, Samuel,’ she said briskly.

‘But I’m not finished,’ the old man protested, as she physically prised the glass out of his gnarled hands.

‘You are now. We need the table. Lady’s having dinner.’

‘Oh, please, you mustn’t disturb your customers on my account,’ said Sabrina, embarrassed. Insisting on special treatment at Hollywood clubs was one thing, but she wasn’t in the habit of turfing harmless seniors out on the street, especially not in a little village joint like this one. ‘I can wait.’

‘Nonsense,’ the landlady laughed nervously. ‘Sam doesn’t mind.’

‘Yes, I do,’ muttered the old man with an air of hopelessness as he was dragged from his cosy corner and propelled towards the snug bar.

‘There now,’ said the landlady, ignoring him and turning back to Sabrina. ‘You make yourself comfortable. Dennis’ll be over with a menu in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.’

Feeling more awkward than she had since high school, Sabrina sat alone at her stolen table, cursing Vio Hudson. What the hell was she doing here? Grateful for the low lighting, she slunk back as far as possible into the corner and, a few moments later, hid herself behind the large, leather-bound menu. Deciding that as she was here, in a British pub, she ought at least to do the thing properly, she ordered steak and kidney pudding and chips. She was contractually forbidden to drink, but no one was here except for the locals, and they could barely see her in the gloom, never mind the contents of her glass, so she ordered a double vodka and tonic, following it swiftly with a second. By the time she’d finished that, and eaten the chips (she took one bite of the pudding and almost gagged), she found she was feeling less awkward and, for the first time since arriving in England, relaxed.

‘You’re that actress, aren’t you?’ A young girl having supper with her parents approached Sabrina’s table. She looked to be about eleven, with braces on her teeth, and wearing a low-cut pink top that revealed nothing at all but which she clearly thought of as teenage and cool. ‘Can I have your autograph?’

‘Of course,’ Sabrina beamed. She used to resent autograph hunters. In the States they were like locusts, they’d swarm you anywhere – at the doctor’s office; while you were on the phone. But she realized with a twinge of panic that this kid was the first person to ask for her autograph since before she went to Revivals, over four months ago now.

‘What’s your name?’

‘Michaela,’ said the girl shyly.

Running her pen across the back of the cardboard coaster, Sabrina felt a rush of pleasure like a heroin shot in the arm.

‘There you go, Michaela. It was a pleasure to meet you.’

The child skipped away happily, clutching her treasure. Sabrina was gazing after her, basking in her own magnanimity, when she felt a tap on her shoulder.

‘I sincerely hope that was a mineral water.’

Dorian Rasmirez was towering over her, holding her empty glass in his enormous, fat-fingered hand. He was wearing corduroy trousers and a chunky knit fisherman’s sweater, which only added to his already substantial bulk, and he was smiling, the first time Sabrina had ever seen him do so. He’s happy because he’s caught me out, she thought dully, but she was too tired to care. She felt like an exhausted salmon about to be eaten by a bear.

‘Of course,’ she lied, wearily. ‘Ask at the bar if you don’t believe me.’

‘I don’t believe you,’ said Dorian, pulling up a chair and sitting down opposite her. ‘Luckily for you, however, I don’t care. You’re entitled to a drink after today.’

Sabrina’s eyes narrowed. Was this a trick?

‘Why are you being nice to me?’

‘Would you rather I wasn’t?’

‘What are you doing here anyway?’ She eyed him suspiciously. ‘Did you follow me?’

Dorian laughed, a deep, throaty laugh that shook his whole chest and made people turn around to look at him. ‘I have better things to do with my evening. Like trying to undo the shit-storm you caused with your little impromptu press conference at Heathrow yesterday.’

‘Look, I’ve said I’m sorry,’ said Sabrina, who felt the beginnings of a migraine coming on herself.

‘Did you?’ Dorian raised an eyebrow. ‘I must have missed that.’

After three tense hours on the phone, pacifying everyone from the British Institite of Race Relations to the American Screen Actors Guild, he’d walked the forty minutes into Loxley village to try to clear his head. Stopping at the pub had been an afterthought, but he was glad he’d had it. The landlady waddled over. Dorian ordered a malt whisky for himself and ‘the same again’ for Sabrina, who instantly tensed.

‘For Christ’s sake, relax. If I didn’t fire you for this morning’s papers, I’m not going to fire you for having a drink. Just don’t make a habit of it.’

The drinks arrived. Dorian raised his glass. ‘To our movie.’

Cautiously, Sabrina did the same. ‘To Wuthering Heights.’ After a short pause, she added, ‘I’m not a racist, you know.’

‘I believe that,’ said Dorian, truthfully.

‘That’s why I didn’t want to apologize to Tarik Tyler. I know I should have. It made me look so much worse, not saying anything for so long. But it would have been like I was admitting I said something I never said, you know? Like I viewed people a certain way because of their colour. It’s bullshit. So what if his grandmother was a slave? My grandmother was a crack whore, but you don’t hear me banging on about it.’

After months on the wagon, the alcohol was quickly going to her head. Not only was she babbling, but she found herself staring at Dorian in a way she never would have if she’d been sober, examining his features closely for the first time. When he wasn’t scowling, or shouting, he was actually quite attractive in a rough-and-ready, Sean Penn kind of way. Of course he was old, and certainly not handsome in the way that Sabrina liked her men – no one was going to sign Rasmirez up to model Calvin Klein underwear any time soon, that was for damn sure. But there was definitely something about him.

‘So why are you here?’ she asked him.

‘Same reason as you. I had a shitty day, I needed a drink, and this is the only pub in town. Plus, a friend told me not to drink here, which of course made me curious to try it.’

‘A friend? You mean Tish Crewe?’ Sabrina asked archly.

‘Yes, as it happens.’

‘You like her, don’t you?’

‘I do,’ said Dorian, either missing the insinuation or choosing to ignore it. ‘I like you too, Sabrina.’

This was too much for Sabrina, especially delivered with such a straight face. She laughed so hard she choked on her drink, spraying vodka and tonic all down the front of her blouse and narrowly avoiding giving Dorian an impromptu shower.

‘Really?’ she spluttered, cleaning herself up with a napkin. ‘I’d love to see how you treat actresses you don’t like.’

‘I treat them exactly the same,’ said Dorian. ‘I’m not in the business of favouritism. If Viorel or Lizzie or Rhys had been all over The Sun this morning, I’d have yelled just as hard at them.’

Sabrina looked at him sceptically.

‘It’s true. You personalize everything, Sabrina. I’m not your enemy. If it’s an enemy you’re looking for, try the mirror.’

Sabrina opened her mouth to argue with him, but decided against it. She was too tipsy to defend herself properly, and anyway it made a nice change to be having a semi-civil conversation.

‘Tell me about yourself,’ said Dorian, taking a long slow sip of his whisky. It was delicious.

‘Tell you what?’ said Sabrina. ‘The sob story? Rags to riches? Doesn’t everybody know that already?’ She put on her best whiney, facetious voice: ‘I’m Sabrina Leon, and I’m from a bwoken home.’

Dorian just looked at her, arms folded. Waiting.

‘You really wanna know? OK fine.’ Sabrina jutted out her chin defiantly. ‘My mom was a heroin addict. Dad was a petty thief and general, all-round douche bag, or so I’m told. I never met him. I first got taken into care when I was eighteen months old.’

‘First? You went back to your parents?’

‘To my mom, twice. The first time she left me with “friends”, who tried to sell me to pay off a drug debt.’

‘Shit.’ Dorian had heard this story from Sabrina’s agent, but had assumed it was apocryphal.

‘The second time the neighbours called the cops after I almost died climbing out of a second-floor window. Mom’s boyfriend was hitting her round the head with a frying pan. I thought I was gonna be next.’

‘How old were you then?’

Sabrina took a sip of her drink. ‘Three.’

Saskia’s age.

‘By five they made me a permanent ward of the state. Which pretty much saved my life, although after that I was constantly on the move, bouncing around from one foster home to another.’

‘What were they like, your foster parents?’ asked Dorian.

Sabrina smiled. ‘Which ones? There were the Johnsons. They were nice. I lived with them for a year and a half until their older daughter got fed up with sharing her bedroom and they dumped me back on the doorstep of the children’s home like an unwanted Christmas puppy.’

Dorian winced.

‘Then there were the Rodriguez family. The dad, Raoul, believed in “old-fashioned family values”. That basically meant beating me with a bamboo cane across the backs of my legs when I was late home from school, or left food on my plate.’

‘Jesus Christ,’ said Dorian.

Sabrina smiled. ‘Yeah. It wasn’t the Waltons, but it was better than the next place. The Coopers.’

‘What happened there?’ asked Dorian.

‘Their son, Graham …’ Sabrina began, then broke off suddenly. ‘You know, I don’t really wanna talk about it. Anyway, it doesn’t matter ’cause I ran away and spent the next two years on the streets. Which actually wasn’t as bad as it sounds.’

‘How old were you then?’

‘Twelve,’ said Sabrina matter-of-factly. ‘I got off the streets at fourteen, but I learned a lot in those two years.’

I’ll bet you did, thought Dorian.

‘Such as the fact that men are assholes who only want one thing,’ Sabrina went on. ‘Luckily, they’re also mostly idiots, so if you’re smart you can use that filthy, one-track mind of theirs to your advantage.’

It was an unusually frank confession. Dorian could imagine just how many men in Hollywood Sabrina Leon had manipulated over the years to claw her way to the top. Now he knew where she’d learned her skills.

‘It was acting that really saved me,’ Sabrina continued. ‘A guy named Sammy Levine ran a youth-theatre company on the outskirts of New Jack City, where I was living at the time. I loved Sammy.’ Her eyes lit up at the memory. ‘He was passionate about theatre, passionate about kids. He was gay, and kind of flamboyant, and he could be tough as old nails when he wanted to. I remember he made me audition four times before agreeing to give me a part in West Side Story. And it was a fucking walk-on! Can you believe it? Rosalia.’

‘You remember the name of the character you played?’ Dorian was impressed.

‘Of course,’ said Sabrina, surprised. ‘I remember all my parts. They’re part of me. Anyway, I was so mad at Sammy. I thought I should have been Maria. Fuck it, I should have been Maria. I was the best.’

‘If you do say so yourself,’ Dorian grinned. Like everyone else in Hollywood, he knew the rest of the story. Tarik Tyler heard an NPR programme on the radio one morning about Levine’s Theatre and drove up to Fresno to take a look. He saw Sabrina, cast her, an unknown, as Lola, the lead in his first Destroyers movie. And the rest, as they say, was history.

‘So drama got you off the streets,’ said Dorian. ‘But what about now?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean what motivates you, today. Why do you act?’

Sabrina shrugged. ‘Because I can, I guess.’

‘Oh, no no no, I’m not buying that.’ Dorian leaned forward and looked her right in the eye. ‘What do you feel, when you walk out on stage or in front of a camera?’

Sabrina had been asked the question before. Every good director wanted to get inside her head, to find out what made her tick so they could draw it out in her performance, get the maximum emotional bang for their buck. With Dorian, however, she sensed that his desire to understand came from somewhere deeper. It wasn’t just artistic. It was personal.

‘I feel fear,’ she said honestly.

‘Of what?’

‘Of it ending. Of failure. Of going back to where I started.’

Dorian asked her the million-dollar question. ‘So why did you turn on your mentor, the man who helped you more than anyone? It doesn’t make sense.’

‘You mean Tarik?’ said Sabrina dismissively. ‘Firstly, I didn’t turn on him. It was a throwaway remark. He turned on me. Second of all, everyone says it was Tyler who discovered me and I guess that’s true in Hollywood terms. But Sammy Levine was the one who really changed my life. Sammy showed me the magic. He showed me how to do it.’

‘Do what?’ asked Dorian, quietly.

Sabrina’s answer was unequivocal.

‘Escape. I act for the same reason I drink. And fuck around and shoot my mouth off at airports. I act to escape.’

It told Dorian everything he needed to know. As a kid, Sabrina was escaping from others, from the grim reality of her life. Now she was escaping from herself, from the fears that still so evidently drove her. She’s so like Cathy, he thought. Part of her wants to fit in, to be accepted and loved. But another part of her wants to escape, to be wild and passionate and free. I was right to cast her.

‘Come on,’ he said gently. ‘I’ll drive you home.’

They walked out to Viorel’s car, Sabrina swaying like a ship in the breeze in her Manolos, fumbling in her Hermès Birkin bag for the keys. ‘They’re definitely in here somewhere,’ she kept muttering to Dorian. At some point in the last two hours, the sky had grown dark, and the throng of drinkers crowding the beer garden had thinned to a die-hard trickle. Dorian was gazing upwards, marvelling at the clearness of the starry sky, and wondering if his darling Chrissie was admiring the same view in Transylvania, when a belligerent young man approached them.

‘Oy. You!’ He was talking to Sabrina, but she was too preoccupied in her car-key search to notice him. This seemed to enrage the man more. ‘Oy, bitch. I’m talking to you. Are you deaf or something?’

Dorian stepped forward. ‘Hey.’ He put a hand on the man’s shoulders. ‘Easy.’

The guy was shorter than Dorian, and slightly built, but he was young and fit and had an air of aggression about him that made Dorian wary. His hair was cut army-short and he wore drainpipe jeans and a shiny red Manchester United football shirt, from which his tattooed forearms protruded like two white, freckly twigs.

‘Easy?’ he snarled, shrugging off Dorian’s hand. ‘D’you know who she is, mate? She’s a fucking racist. Don’t you read the papers?’

The man looked like such an unlikely champion of Great Britain’s black community that Dorian assumed he was simply drunk and looking for trouble. Unfortunately, by this time, Sabrina had realized what was happening, and appeared quite happy to oblige him.

‘Excuse me,’ she said haughtily, brushing past him to hand the Mercedes keys to Dorian. ‘You’re in our way.’

‘Don’t you push me, you cow!’ The man lunged forward. Without thinking, Dorian grabbed him by the shirt. He spun around and threw a punch, narrowly missing Dorian’s left eye.

‘Get in the car,’ Dorian told Sabrina, still struggling to keep his would-be opponent at arm’s length.

‘Why?’ said Sabrina defiantly. ‘You think I’m scared of this pathetic little prick?’

‘You what?’ The man turned around again, his face like fury. Sabrina was on the passenger side of the car now, but a couple of strides and the man would be within striking distance. ‘I’m a prick? You think you own the whole fucking world, don’t you? We don’t want scum like you in this country. You make me sick.’

‘Sabrina!’ Dorian shouted. ‘Get in the car! NOW!’

Sabrina did as she was told, but not before hissing ‘asshole’ at the tattooed man, forcing Dorian once again to have to grab him and manhandle him down the lane before running back and scrambling into the driver’s seat himself. He hit central locking and started the engine. As they drove away, he could see a furious red-shirted figure sprinting after them, hurling obscenities.

He turned to Sabrina, who seemed blissfully unconcerned in the passenger seat.

‘For God’s sake,’ he snapped. ‘Why do you engage them? Can’t you see it only makes things worse?’

‘Oh, so this is my fault now?’ said Sabrina. Dorian noticed that her features had reset themselves to their default position of belligerent defiance. Was this what Saskia was going to be like when she got older?

‘You called him a prick.’

‘He was a prick.’

‘Maybe. But people are angry, Sabrina,’ Dorian said sternly. ‘You must take some responsibility for that. You’re in a position of great privilege, you lead a life most ordinary people can only dream of, and you’ve abused that privilege.’

‘Give me a fucking break,’ muttered Sabrina under her breath.

‘No,’ said Dorian hotly. ‘I will not give you a break. What do you think would have happened if I hadn’t been there just now to help you? To keep that man from attacking you.’

‘I’d have survived.’

‘Like hell you would.’

‘Well, if you hadn’t gone all Lord Capulet on my bodyguards yesterday, I would have had some protection.’

‘And if you would learn to walk away occasionally, you wouldn’t need it,’ said Dorian, exasperated. ‘That’s the last time you leave Loxley Hall unaccompanied.’

‘What?’ Sabrina exploded. ‘You can’t do that! I’m not your fucking prisoner.’

After all the shit Dorian had had to deal with on Sabrina’s behalf today, not to mention just saving her ass from Mr Man United, this was the last straw. Slamming on the brakes, he skidded to a halt just outside Loxley’s gates, leaned across Sabrina and opened the passenger door.

‘You’re right. You’re not my prisoner. If you want to walk, walk.’

‘What?’

‘Now’s your chance. Go back to LA and see if you can find someone else prepared to work with you. Go on. Go!’

The two of them sat glaring at one another in the darkness. For a few awful seconds, Dorian thought Sabrina was going to call his bluff and get out of the car. When she didn’t, he was relieved, but it was a relief tinged with regret. He could tell just by looking at her that she had completely shut down again. He’d lost her. All the progress they’d made this evening had been for nothing. Reaching across her again, he pulled the door closed. Sabrina shrank back against her seat, as if his arm were a rattlesnake about to sting her.

They drove on.

So much for the entente cordiale.

When she finally got back to her room, Sabrina slammed the door and sat down on the bed, shaking with anger. What the fuck? She felt betrayed, humiliated. Rasmirez had tricked her, playing ‘good cop’ so she’d open up to him, which stupidly, stupidly she had, then putting his preachy, you-do-as-I-say hat back on the minute they got in the car. As if it were her fault some yob had attacked her! And what was she supposed to do, sit there and take it while guys threatened and harassed her, accusing her of things she’d never done?

Angrily, she kicked off her shoes and pulled off her clothes, flinging them in a heap at the foot of the bed. There was a knock at the door. Sabrina ignored it.

Rasmirez, come to deliver round two of his lecture. Well he can kiss my ass.

A second knock was louder and more insistent. Furiously, Sabrina walked over and opened the door in her underwear, lips curled and nostrils flared in defiance. ‘What now?’

Vio stood in the hallway in sweatpants and a T-shirt, admiring Sabrina’s semi-naked body for the second time that day. Her bra and panties were both made of sheer lace, so he could see the faint pink outline of her nipples and the dark border of neatly trimmed fuzz between her legs. He smiled appreciatively. ‘Hi.’

Following his eyes downwards, Sabrina blushed. ‘Sorry. I thought you were Rasmirez.’

Viorel’s eyebrow shot up. ‘That’s how you’d open the door to Dorian?’

Realizing belatedly how it must look, Sabrina blushed even harder. ‘Jesus, no! I mean, it’s not like that. Nothing like that. I thought you were in bed, that’s all. Sick.’

‘I was. I heard the door slam. Thought I’d check if you were OK.’

‘I’m fine.’

Indeed you are, thought Vio with a sigh. Three paracetamols and a few hours’ sleep had done little to take the edge off his migraine, but the sight of Sabrina’s deliciously voluptuous body appeared to be working wonders. Locking on to his lust like a missile finding its target, Sabrina stood on tiptoes and reached her arms around his neck.

‘D’you wanna come in?’

She pressed her lips to his and felt her libido release like an opened dam, all the anger and frustration of her evening with Dorian flooding out of her. Clearly, Vio felt it too, kissing her back passionately, his tongue hungrily darting between her lips, his hands warm and rough as they roamed over her skin. They staggered inside, locked together, and fell back onto the bed. Sabrina closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of him, a heady combination of aftershave, sweat and a faintly minty smell of mouthwash. She could feel his rock-hard erection beneath his sweat pants – at last, some good news! – and slipped a hand beneath his waistband, coiling her fingers slowly around his dick, one by one.

Vio groaned. Then, with every last fibre of his willpower, he removed her hand, pulling it back up to his mouth and kissing it. ‘We can’t.’

Sabrina looked at him, surprised. ‘What do you mean? Sure we can.’

Vio sat up and ran a hand through his hair. He frowned, annoyed at himself. ‘No. We can’t. I can’t.’ He shook his head, like a dog drying itself off after a swim, as if he could somehow physically ‘shake off’ his desire for her.

Sabrina pouted. ‘You don’t want me?’

‘Of course I do,’ said Vio truthfully. ‘You’re so fucking sexy it hurts.’

Mollified slightly, Sabrina gave him a quizzical look. ‘So what’s the problem?’

‘You’re my co-star,’ said Vio. ‘I never get intimate with co-stars. Not till after we wrap, anyway. It’s a policy.’

‘You’re kidding?’ Sabrina looked astonished. She tried to think if she’d ever had a co-star she hadn’t fucked. No one came to mind. ‘Why on earth not?’

Viorel shrugged. ‘It’s distracting. It affects the dynamic on camera.’

‘But we’re lovers on camera,’ said Sabrina. ‘Shouldn’t that help?’

‘Frustrated lovers,’ Vio corrected. ‘Unrequited lovers. Heathcliff sleeps with Isabella, remember? Not Cathy.’

‘Oh. So you’d rather fuck Lizzie, you mean?’

Vio shuddered. ‘No. Good God no. Look, it’s not just the professional thing. You know as well as I do, on-set romances can get complicated. Someone always ends up wanting more.’

‘Not me,’ said Sabrina, truthfully.

‘I’m not good at monogamy, even in short bursts.’

‘Perfect. Me neither.’

Vio hesitated. He didn’t doubt that sex with Sabrina would be fantastic. Certainly, there was no one else at Loxley he had the remotest interest in sleeping with, other than Tish Crewe, whom he wasn’t allowed near. None of the make-up or prop girls were even vaguely attractive; the one camera girl, Deborah, looked like a librarian and Lizzie Bayer was borderline retarded. But he knew that the instant they slept together, his relationship with Sabrina would change irrevocably. Whatever she said now, she would end up wanting more from him than he knew how to give. Women always wanted more. It was embedded in their DNA.

‘I should get back to bed.’

Sabrina hesitated. She had zero experience of sexual rejection. What did one do in these situations? On the one hand it was agonizingly frustrating to have to sleep alone tonight. But on the other hand, the prospect of a challenge was novel and exciting. Viorel Hudson had thrown down the gauntlet. Policy, indeed! She would seduce him eventually, of that she had no doubt. And how satisfying it would be when she finally got to watch that vaunted willpower of his crumble.

‘Fine.’ She smiled sweetly, unhooking her bra and letting it fall into her lap, cupping her magnificent breasts admiringly, as if she’d never seen them before. ‘I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow then. Be a darling and turn the light off on your way out, would you?’

It was all Vio could do not to whimper. He walked to the door and turned off the light.

‘Goodnight, Miss Leon.’

‘Goodnight, Mr Hudson,’ Sabrina whispered. ‘Sweet dreams.’