Читать книгу Lethally Blonde - Nancy Bartholomew - Страница 12

I don’t slap Jeremy. I want to, but I realize this is just what he wants me to do, so I stop myself. Marlena is mad as hell, though, and she starts chittering and hissing at Jeremy, who seems highly amused by her. I watch all this and begin to formulate an opinion about my spoiled charge; he gets off on other people’s reactions. I suppose this makes him more of a true director than an actor, but it also fits with Renee’s supposition that Jeremy is staging the threats on his life in order to create publicity. I mean, Jeremy Reins is about as well known as any star in Hollywood. He doesn’t need more publicity, but now I see he craves it.

Andrea takes my arm as we’re walking toward the car, with Jeremy and Mark several yards ahead.

“Porsche, I’m so glad Renee sent you,” she says in a low voice. “I was afraid she might not follow through on this.”

I am trying to calm Marlena down and so I am not being my most tactful self when I say, “He’s full of shit and this is just a big game to him.”

To my total surprise, Andrea nods in agreement. “Actually,” she says, nodding to the two men ahead of us, “they’re both assholes at times, but you need to look past that.”

I’m not sure what to say. I mean, I think she’s just called her own husband an asshole, which even my mother, faced with her husband’s philandering, fails to do when the occasion really calls for it. So I switch to active listening mode and nod sympathetically. “So, you look past their behavior?” I murmur, using her own words to lead her on to her next thought because this is what good therapists do, they open the gate, but never shove the patient through.

“Yes,” Andrea says. “Mark is really an overgrown little boy who desperately wants approval, but he needs to feel that he is in charge. He blusters and tells me what I should and shouldn’t do, and then I just do as I please. You know what I mean?”

I nod and smile softly, but I’m thinking, why would you do that? We enter a building and as we follow the two men down a long corridor, Marlene falls asleep again—she is not therapist material.

“Jeremy is a lot like Mark, really,” Andrea continues. “He comes off like a spoiled brat, but he’s really quite insecure. Mark would give you the shirt off his back, but he needs to be praised. Jeremy’s the same way—he’s really very good-hearted.”

I forget therapist mode and fall into my new bodyguard persona. “Then why the threats on his life? Why set up a scenario like that? Why doesn’t he just buy a poor family a house or something?”

Andrea laughs and sound makes Mark look back over his shoulder at her. Andrea’s laugh sounds like wind chimes—high, musical and pleasant.

“Jeremy needs the drama and Mark loves to provide it.” Andrea’s eyes darken and a small frown furrows her forehead. “I think at first it was just to call attention to Jeremy’s new project. It’s a very dark picture about a religious figure who rises to become the leader of a powerful new nation. I think they wanted to blur the lines between the project and Jeremy the person, but something has gone wrong and Mark won’t tell me what it is.”

I switched back to therapist. “Mark won’t tell you what it is?”

Andrea almost whispers her answer, “no.” She takes a deep breath and pushes through double doors that lead to a waiting stretch limo. Jeremy and Mark are just climbing inside the car, and in order to finish her thought, she grips my arm tighter and pulls me aside.

“They don’t think I know about all this,” she says. “And really, I don’t. What I mean is, Mark would be terribly angry if he thought I was interfering with his business. We made an agreement when we got married years ago that I stayed out of his business affairs. He’s quite particular about that. I think his first wife nearly ruined him and he needs to feel as if his business is completely under his control now. So I learn what I can by listening when he’s talking and piecing things together.”

She glances at me, as if trying to gauge my reaction. “I don’t mean I intentionally eavesdrop. I just mean that when he says something, or if he’s on the phone, I pay attention. I try to look out for him. The entertainment business is ruthless, Porsche. The more I know about Mark’s business, the easier it is for me to avoid little pitfalls and unpleasantness in our social life. Do you understand?”

I am nodding like a bobblehead, but I am totally not sure at all about what she means. I assume she’s trying to tell me that the world is full of ruthless, dishonest people, but like, duh, who doesn’t know that?

“When these occurrences began with Jeremy, I noticed that Mark didn’t seem nearly as concerned as others were. Then I realized that Jeremy wasn’t just playing at not being frightened, he was genuinely enjoying the attention. I realized then that they’d concocted this entire scheme for whatever misguided reason they’d felt it necessary. But two weeks ago, everything changed. There hadn’t been any threats for almost three weeks and suddenly they started back up again. This time Mark was almost hysterical and Jeremy was scared to the point of seeming enraged at Mark. That’s when I knew…”

The limo’s rear window slowly slides down and Jeremy pokes his head out, waggling his finger in our direction.

“Loveys,” he calls. “Are you two going to join us, or must you gossip there on the street like common pigeons?”

His voice has taken on an exaggerated English accent, and as much as he is trying to keep the tone a gentle tease, no one is fooled by the act. Jeremy is tense and angry and working mightily to disguise it.

As we enter the car, Marlena wakes up at the sound of Jeremy’s voice and leers at him from the safety of Mommy’s arms. He stretches out a finger in Marlena’s direction and I say, “Watch it, she’ll bite you!” But to my amazement, she doesn’t, and Jeremy coos something unintelligible to her and turns his forefinger up right under her nose, offering her the meatiest part to bite down on. I suppose it is his way of apologizing for his earlier behavior and I am shocked when my normally suspicious ferret sniffs, but does not chew, the fleshy digit.

“That’s a love,” Jeremy murmurs and I am reminded that he is rated one of the ten sexiest men on the planet. Of course, I do not find him remotely attractive. To me, Jeremy Reins is a street urchin, thin, unkempt and ill-mannered. The word on him in my circles is that he is quite the slut and not at all discriminating about who he beds, male or female. Recently, all I’ve heard about Jeremy is that his tastes are now purely reserved for the male gender. Of course, that little rumor was put to rest quite quickly out there on the runway, but I realize I am allowing my mind to drift quite far off the task at hand.

“So, Porsche,” Mark says genially, “do you spend much time in L.A.?”

I take the flute of champagne that he hands me and sip it appreciatively before answering.

“No, I’m afraid I find L.A. to be rather tiring,” I say, but then I smile at him and hold my glass out in front of me. “However, I’ve never been treated so graciously.”

I hear Jeremy chuckle softly and ignore him as Mark smiles delightedly. “Ah, a connoisseur—I see we will have much to discuss.”

But I’m not thinking about champagne. I am thinking instead that I need to shake this man and his manipulative little client until they give up the truth about their little publicity gimmick and tell me how it seems to have gone out of control and taken on a dangerous life of its own.

I am about to ask this when Andrea interrupts her husband.

“Weren’t we lucky then, to have Porsche join us for the Oscars?”

She licks her upper lip nervously and I look at her flute and find it nearly empty. What’s with her? I wonder.

“I am so glad I called my old college buddy and learned of Porsche’s desire to attend the festivities. Of course, Jeremy, I know you’ll be glad to return the favor when you escort Porsche to CeCe Goldberg’s big do next week.”

The three of us are looking at Andrea like she’s suddenly sprouted an additional head. She’s babbling, talking like this is some elaborate play date she’s arranged and not a case of Jeremy’s life being on the line and me coming to the rescue, real or imagined…and of course, then I get it. That is exactly what’s going on. Jeremy and Mark have no idea why I’m really here, a fact Andrea seems to have omitted in her plea for help to Renee. She is pulling the strings like a puppet master and the three of us were all dancing.

“What?” Jeremy sputters. “Charity party? I hate that old windbag!”

“Oh, now, Jeremy, didn’t Mark tell you?” Andrea says, her voice taking on a soothing mother quality.

Mark is looking equally flummoxed. “Charity party? What charity party?”

Andrea manages to look sweetly frustrated with her husband, but I note the beads of sweat that pop out along the ridge of her upper lip.

“Now, honey, remember? You said Jeremy needed to plump up his image and also show his fans that he was not frightened by the threats on his life. You thought the Oscars and the party would be perfect opportunities, and what a coup to be going with Porsche. The press will be all over you two! I mean, Hollywood’s bad boy and New York’s ‘It’ girl, what an amazing duo you’ll be!”

Jeremy has started scowling and I believe I am seeing his first honest emotion. He is pissed.

“I can get my own date, you know,” he snarls.

“Of course you can, honey,” she coos. “But Porsche is the current ‘It’ heiress. Everyone knows her. She is co-hosting the Children’s Fantasy Party with CeCe and, well, you know the nasty little rumor mill has been working overtime about you and, well, your love life…. Having such a sexy, well-known, heterosexual woman on your arm…”

Andrea skitters to a stop here, her voice dying away as she tips the champagne flute to her mouth and drains the one lone drop at the bottom of her glass.

“I was only trying to help,” she says finally, lowering her glass and slowly raising her head to face Jeremy. Her voice is now that of a little girl, pleading for sympathy and understanding. As I watch, making matters even worse, Andrea’s eyes actually well up with fat tears that threaten to spill over onto her cheeks.

Jeremy and Mark are just lost and I make a mental note to nominate Andrea for my own “Best Actress in a Manipulation” category.

“Well, I guess if you put it that way,” Jeremy says, recovering quickly and turning to give me his standard insolent smirk, “I’d love to escort the little waif. Now tell me again, who you are? An heiress?”

I drain my glass and hold it out to Mark for a refill. It takes everything I have not to slap the patronizing attitude right out of Jeremy’s skinny little body. He knows full well who I am; everybody knows who I am! I force a smile and meet his eyes.

“Now, tell me again, Jason,” I say. “You make commercials?”

Jeremy’s eyes glitter dangerously for a split second before he laughs, tilting his champagne flute in my direction. “Touché!” he says softly.

Two hours later, we arrive at Paradise Ranch and I get my first glimpse of what is to be my home for the next week or so. It takes my breath. I am expecting gray and brown desert or something, but instead the green is so lush and verdant that I am tempted to remove my pumps just to feel the cool grass between my toes. Instead I climb out of the limo and stand beside it, breathing in the fresh, salty air of the nearby Pacific Ocean and listening to its dull pounding against the rocky shore somewhere in the nearby distance.

“It’s quite something, isn’t it?” Jeremy asks, appearing by my side. The ever-present smile is still in place, but in his eyes I see the need for my approval.

“I thought you said this was a working ranch?” I say, remembering that he expects me to be a bitch and not wanting to disappoint him. “Doesn’t look like one to me. Where are the horses? Where’s the farm equipment? I don’t even see a cowboy.”

But as I say this, the massive oak front door opens and two people emerge from the mansion, a reed-thin woman with long, curly red hair and, as if summoned by a genie, a genuine cowboy, with boots, hat, mustache—the whole package.

I can’t take my eyes off of him and it must be obvious because Jeremy chuckles and says, “Good enough for you?”

Oh, yes. This one is quite good enough, all right. He walks toward us, or should I say, saunters, with this half swagger. His hat is pushed low on his face, shadowing his features, but even so, I can see the thick mustache that almost drips off his chin, and I catch a glimpse of dark, dangerous eyes and a weathered face—not old, but lined enough to give away his occupation. This man lives in the saddle, I think, and immediately picture him riding, first horses, and then, well…never mind!

I force myself to look away because I’m thinking that any fool could read my thoughts about this stranger, and I watch the woman at his side. Zoe Feller is instantly recognizable, even if I hadn’t attended the same parties with her, or seen her in almost every Oscar-nominated movie she’s ever made. Zoe looks fragile, but don’t let that fool you. She is driven by her work, immersing herself in her roles so completely that, for the length of the project, she is her character.

I watch her walk beside the cowboy and immediately decide they are most definitely not a couple. In fact, I almost wonder if she is even aware of his presence. She seems, instead, to be totally focused on Jeremy. Her blue eyes burn feverishly as she walks purposefully toward him, slowing to an almost regal pace as she draws closer, then stopping and, if I’m not mistaken, bowing her head and half-genuflecting.

“You’re back,” she breathes. “I thought you’d never come.”

Jeremy’s expression doesn’t change, but his eyes do. I am learning to read the man now, I think, and it is always the eyes that give him away. He has locked onto Zoe with an intense, cold stare, as if he’s daring her to question him. I shiver involuntarily as I watch her flinch and take one tiny step backward.

“Why are you here?” Jeremy asks, but it is not his voice any longer. I hear the words, but still can’t believe the change in him. The tone is deep, sonorous and commanding. It is the voice of a much larger, stronger man, but still, it is coming from the actor beside me.

“There are details,” Zoe says softly. “I thought we should go over them before we shoot tomorrow’s…”

“And I told you that I would summon you when I wanted you. Why are you here?”

Zoe raises her head, and I realize we are watching a scene in progress. Her eyes lock with his, briefly—long enough for me to see anger and pain, defiance that is quickly replaced by submission.

“I. Need. You,” she says, each word uttered in a halting gasp, almost forced from her against her will.

Jeremy smiles, and it is the cruelest of his expressions because he is lording it over the poor woman. “Yes,” he murmurs. “Indeed you do.”

The cowboy makes his move, stepping between them and breaking the mood with his body.

“Can you two knock this shit off a minute? We’ve got problems.”

Zoe tosses her head impatiently, starts to protest, and is silenced by a look from Jeremy.

“Sure, buddy. What’s up?” Jeremy says.

How in the hell has he just done this? I wonder. Jeremy’s voice has switched from Lord of the Manor to western ranch hand. His tone is two octaves higher and slightly squeaky. I look at his eyes and see nothing but a happy glint. Whoever this cowboy is, Jeremy genuinely likes him.

The cowboy looks in my direction, lets his gaze move to encompass Mark and Andrea, and I hear him say, “We need to talk. Privately.”

“Lovely manners,” I murmur softly, just loud enough for Jeremy to overhear but not loud enough to reach the oaf in the cowboy hat.

Jeremy laughs, looks at the cowboy, and says, “I think Miss Rothschild finds you a bit coarse, Sam.”

I feel my face start to flush and the cowboy says, “That would be her problem, not mine.” He looks at me again, only this time giving me a real thorough up and down. He appears not to like what he’s seeing.

“Sorry, ma’am,” he says, touching the brim of his hat in a mock salute. “I don’t always have time to coddle Jeremy’s lady friends. You see, we have real work to do around here and right now, I have business I need to discuss with your boyfriend. So if you’ll excuse us, I’ll be sure and get one of the maids to show you where you can powder your pretty little nose while you’re waiting on lover boy here.”

Marlena wakes up, no longer able to sleep with the cosmic energy becoming so disturbed around her, cracks one sleepy eye in the cowboy’s direction and hisses.

“Just exactly who died and made you God?” I say, and start to move past Jeremy to plant myself right in front of the overblown bully. “I am not a plaything. I am not a bimbo. I am a guest of Mr. Reins and I do not appreciate rude behavior.”

I spin around to look at Jeremy. “If he were my hand, I’d fire him.”

“If I were your ‘hand’ as you call it, I’d quit!” the cowboy says.

“Well?” I say to Jeremy. “Are you going to let him talk to me like that?”

Jeremy seems to be enjoying himself at my expense. He grins and then says, “Aw, now, Porsche, don’t mind Sam. He might not come on smooth like you’re used to, but his heart is in the right place. He’s my manager, and when he says he has a problem, well, believe me, I’d better go hear what it is.” He looks back at the cowboy, his grin slowly growing wider. “Sam, this is Porsche Rothschild. I’m helping the poor dear out a bit. She’s hosting a charity party and doesn’t have a date, so she’s here for the week, slumming.”

Before I can protest, Jeremy looks at Andrea and inclines his head in my direction. “Lovey, why don’t you help Porsche get settled in while I borrow your hubby and try and sort out this mess, all right?”

“But what about me?” Zoe wails. “I need you, too!”

Jeremy looks at Zoe and becomes the king again. “Wait in the library,” he says coldly. “I’ll come find you when I’m finished.”

The men walk away without a backward glance. Zoe appears to have lost herself in her role again because she is following three yards behind Jeremy, head down, pacing slowly back into the mansion.

“What in the hell is going on here?” I manage to ask Andrea.

She shrugs. “Welcome to Hollywood,” she says. “Where nothing is real, true or genuine. Everyone is trying to be someone or something else and no one is ever satisfied with things as they are.”

“So, do Zoe and Jeremy have a thing or what? I mean, why does she act that way with him?”

Andrea smiles. “It’s the project. She’s totally immersed herself in it, not just her role, but in the entire project. It’s Zoe’s concept, after all, and she and Jeremy are co-EP’s—executive procedures—on it.”

“Oh,” I say, nodding but not really understanding at all.

“Apparently Zoe’s been spending a lot of time finding her muse and exploring her spirituality. She’s like that, you know. Anyway, somehow in the process of all this, she read about some of the more ancient pagan rituals and religions. That’s where the idea came from for the script. She plays the love interest to Jeremy’s high priest or something. I think it’s a domination theme, you know, she’s the subservient follower to his Rasputin.”

I am about to say something really awful, like, who in their right mind would adore Jeremy Reins, but stop when I remember the way Jeremy transformed himself into a complete Adonis in the Peloponnesian War epic that got him nominated for an Oscar last year. Before either of us can continue, the security gate at the end of the driveway swings open and a white cargo van begins winding its way toward us with the two bodyguards, Scott and Dave, sitting in the front seats.

“Good,” Andrea says, sighing. “I feel better knowing they’re here.” She looks at me and makes a hasty attempt to retract her statement. “I mean, not that you didn’t do a great job of…”

“Listen, you’re the one with the brown belt. All I did was yell and shove Jeremy out of the way of a couple of killer paparazzi. I couldn’t take on a real threat! I don’t think there’s a thing wrong with feeling relieved to have a little help, even if we are awesome paragons of female strength and ability.”

I grin as I say this last part, because I most certainly do not think I am in any way prepared for real danger in the near future. I know Jimmy “The Heartbreaker” Valentine tried his best with me back at Gotham Roses Central, but practice only goes so far when real life intervenes. What in the world was I thinking, jumping into something like this?

It doesn’t matter that the morning’s “threat” hadn’t been a real attack, the people involved had all been frightened and I sense there is something more sinister going on than I’ve been told.