[english] Spin

Author : C.D. Reiss

I mentally rolled my eyes, if such a thing were possible, and kept my physical eyes focused on the woman singing. She had a lovely voice. It wasn’t quite like a bird, but more like a dozen of them layered one on top of the other. The effect was hypnotic.
I glanced at my brother again. “Excuse me?”
“Yeah?”
“You just agreed that the Angels were superior to the Dodgers.”
He looked away from her, and I sensed the air between them rip. I hadn’t felt anything but annoyance with his lack of attentiveness until he looked at me again, and his entire face changed from voracious and single-minded to the usual bemused and arrogant.
“This season?”
“Are you even paying attention?” I asked.
“Look, you have six sisters and me. All your sisters will tell you to forget Daniel Browerpletely. I’m telling you to forgive him if you have to, but if you’re going to, just do it and drop it. I’m the one you keep talking to about him, and I keep giving you the same answer. So it sounds like you want to go back to him.”
He was in love with his ex-wife, who had left him for another man. Of course he’d be the most forgiving, and of course he was the one I chose to be with.
“I can’t. Every time I look at him, I can’t stop seeing him having sex with that girl.”
“Don’t look at him.”
I folded my hands on the table. I shouldn’t see my ex. Ever. But he’d called, and I had lunch with him, like a damned fool. He’d said it was business, and in a way, it was. We had a mortgage together, and bills, and I knew the intimacies of his campaign for mayor about as well as I’d known the intimacies of his body. But with so much...

 

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one.

h, Jonathan.

I mentally rolled my eyes, if such a thing were possible, and kept my physical eyes focused on the woman singing. She had a lovely voice. It wasn’t quite like a bird, but more like a dozen of them layered one on top of the other. The effect was hypnotic.

I glanced at my brother again. “Excuse me?”

“Yeah?”

“You just agreed that the Angels were superior to the Dodgers.”

He looked away from her, and I sensed the air between them rip. I hadn’t felt anything but annoyance with his lack of attentiveness until he looked at me again, and his entire face changed from voracious and single-minded to the usual bemused and arrogant.

“This season?”

“Are you even paying attention?” I asked.

“Look, you have six sisters and me. All your sisters will tell you to forget Daniel Brower completely. I’m telling you to forgive him if you have to, but if you’re going to, just do it and drop it. I’m the one you keep talking to about him, and I keep giving you the same answer. So it sounds like you want to go back to him.”

He was in love with his ex-wife, who had left him for another man. Of course he’d be the most forgiving, and of course he was the one I chose to be with.

“I can’t. Every time I look at him, I can’t stop seeing him having sex with that girl.”

“Don’t look at him.”

I folded my hands on the table. I shouldn’t see my ex. Ever. But he’d called, and I had lunch with him, like a damned fool. He’d said it was business, and in a way, it was. We had a mortgage together, and bills, and I knew the intimacies of his campaign for mayor about as well as I’d known the intimacies of his body. But with so much dead weight between us, I had trouble eating. In the end, of course, he’d asked for me back, and I’d declined while holding back tears.

“He keeps asking to see me,” I said.

“Jesus Christ, Theresa. He’s stringing you along.” Jonathan tipped his drink to his lips and watched the woman standing by the piano like a hawk observing a mouse. “I thought I had it bad.”

I felt a sudden ball of tension wrap up in my chest. I couldn’t exactly place it, but it irritated me. “Do you know her? The singer.”

“We have a thing later tonight.”

“Good, because I was going to say you might want to introduce yourself before you slobber on her. Maybe dinner and a show.”

He smiled a big, wide Jonathan grin. After his wife left, he’d turned into a womanizing prick, but he rarely let us see that side of him. He was always a gentleman, until I saw him look at that singer. It made me uncomfortable. Not because he was my brother, which should have been enough, but because of an uneasy, empty feeling I chased away.

“Go to Tahoe or something for a few weeks,” he said. “Slap some skis on. You’re giving yourself an ulcer.”

“I’m fine.”

The musicians stopped, and people clapped. She was good. My brother just applauded with his eyes and tipped his glass to her. When she saw him, her jaw tightened with anger. Apparently, he knew her well enough to piss her off.

He leaned over and whispered in my ear, “I know damn well how not fine you are.”

I looked him square in the eyes, and I knew his hurt matched mine. He healed himself by seducing whoever he fancied. I didn’t think I could use the same strategy. It stopped mattering when the singer made a beeline for our table.

“Hi, Jonathan,” she said, a big, fake smile draped across her face.

“Monica,” he said. “This is Theresa.”

“That was beautiful,” I said.

“Thanks.”

“You were incredible,” Jonathan said. “I’ve never heard anything like that.”

“I’ve never heard of a man trying to sandwich another woman between fingering me and f**king me in the same day.”

I almost spit out my Cosmo. Jonathan laughed. I felt sorry for the girl. She looked as if she was going to cry. I hated my brother just then. Hated him with a dogged vehemence because not only was he messing with her feelings, he still looked at her as though he wanted to eat her alive. When I saw how she looked at him, I knew he would win. He would have her and a dozen others, and she wouldn’t even know what was happening. I couldn’t watch.

“I’m going to the ladies’,” I said and slid out of the booth, not looking back.

I leaned against the back of the stall, staring at the single strip of toilet paper dangling off the roll. I had a few squares in my bag, just in case my brother brought me to yet another dump, but I didn’t want to use them. I wanted to dig into that feeling of emptiness and find the bottom of it.

You always have a few squares in your bag. And two Advil. And a tampon.

Daniel’s voice listing the stuff I carried for emergencies; his face, smiling as we went out the door for some charity thing; him in a tux, me in something, holding a satin clutch into which a normal woman couldn’t fit more than a tube of lipstick and a raisin.

“You got your whole kit in there?” he’d asked.

“Of course.”

“Space and time are your slaves.”

I’d been pleased at the way he looked at me, as if he couldn’t be more impressed and proud, as if I ruled the world and his servitude was the natural order. Pleased as a king opening a pie and finding the miracle of four-and-twenty blackbirds.

But though I’d been with him for seven years, he’d never looked at me the way Jonathan looked at that singer. Never. Maybe that was why Daniel had had sex with his speechwriter. He didn’t revere her; he f**ked her.

 

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Daniel had always called me Tink, short for Tinkerbell, because of my curvy, petite frame. A sprightly, delicate fairy. Not someone you looked at hungrily.

I saw the singer in the hall, looking distant and resolute at the same time, as if she was convincing herself of something. She stopped short when she saw me.

“I’m so sorry,” she said. “I was rude and unbecoming.”

I was going to deny it, but I was struck by a distraction that cut me to the core. I smelled pine trees, deep in the forest, damp in the morning after a night of campfires and singing. The burning char and dew mingled in the song-like trails of cigarette smoke, rising and disappearing. And then it was gone.

“My brother’s an ass**le, so I don’t blame you.” I regretted that almost immediately. I didn’t talk like that, especially not about family. I took her hand and squeezed it. “We both loved your voice.”

“Thank you. I have to go. I’ll try to see you on the way out.” She slipped her hand away and walked toward the dressing room.

I caught the scent again and looked in her direction, as if I could see the smell’s source. It could have come from anyone. It could have been the gorgeous black lady with the sweet smile. It could have been the plate of saucy meat that crossed my path. Could have been the waft of parking lot that came through the door before it snapped closed.

But it wasn’t.

I knew it like I knew tax code; it was him. The man in the dark suit and thin pink tie, the full lips and two-day beard. His eyes were black as a felony, and they stayed on me as his body swung into the booth.

The smell had come from him, not the other man getting into the booth. It was in his gaze, which was locked on me, disarming me. He was beautiful to me. Not my type, not at all. But the slight cleft in his chin, the powerful jaw, the swoop of dark hair falling over his forehead seemed right. Just right. I swallowed. My mouth had started watering, and my throat had gotten dry. I got a flash of him above me, with that swoop of hair rocking, as he f**ked me so hard the sheets ripped.

He turned to say something to the hostess, and I took a gulp of air. I’d forgotten to breathe. I put my hands to my shirt buttons to make sure they were fastened, because I felt as if he’d undressed me.

I had two ways to return to Jonathan: behind the piano, which was the crowded, shorter way, or in front, which was less populated but longer.

I walked in front of the piano. The less crowded way. The longer way. The way that took me right past the man in the pink tie.

I wanted him to look at me, and he spent the entire length of our proximity talking earnestly to the baby-faced, bow-lipped man next to him. I caught the burned, dewy pine scent that made no sense and kept walking.

I felt a tug on my wrist, a warm sensation that tingled. His hand was on me, gentle but resolved. I stopped, looking at him as his hand brought me to his face. He drew me down until he was whisper close. A sudden rush of potential went from the back of my neck to the space between my legs, waking me where I thought I’d died.

I couldn’t breathe.

I couldn’t speak.

If he kissed me, I would have opened my mouth for him. That, I knew for sure.

“Your shoe,” he said with an accent I couldn’t place.

“What?” I couldn’t stop looking at his eyes: brown, wide, with longer eyelashes than should be legal, hooded under arched brows proportioned for expression.

Was I wearing shoes? Was I standing? Did I need to take in air? Eat? Or could I just live off the energy between us?

He pointed at my heel. “You brought yourself a souvenir from the ladies’ room.”

He was beautiful, even as he smirked with those full lips. Did I have to turn away to see what he was talking about? It was that or put my tongue down his throat. I looked down.

I had a trail of toilet paper on my stiletto.

“Thank you,” I said.

“My pleasure.” He let go of my hand.

The space where he’d touched felt like a missed opportunity, and I went to the bathroom to return my souvenir.

two.

After I’d kicked Daniel out of my loft, Katrina moved in. Living alone had thrust me hip deep into depression, and her things around the house changed my feeling of complete emptiness into a feeling that something was right even when everything was wrong.

For her part, she was dealing with a career that had crashed and burned when she filed a lawsuit against the studio that had funded her Oscar-nominated movie. She said there were profits she was entitled to share; they insisted the production operated at a loss. Fancy, indefensible, and legal accounting proved them right, leaving her bank account empty and her career in tatters.

She and I were cars passing on opposite sides of the freeway. As a nearly-but-not-quite-famous director, she was on set at odd hours, and when she wasn’t, she was trying to hold her production together with spit and chewing gum. She couldn’t pay much, so her crew left for scale-paying gigs and had to be replaced, or they dropped out of a day’s shooting with grave apologies but no replacement. Set designers, assistant camera people, gaffers did it for love and opportunity. Production assistants, also called PAs, were the unskilled and barely paid necessities on set, and most likely to drop out.

Her script supervisor, the person responsible for the continuity of the shots, couldn’t work nights or weekends. After Katrina fired her line producer, who was in charge of keeping ducks in rows, she discovered he hadn’t hired a second script supervisor. She shrugged it off as the risk one takes in “the business,” then segued into a long pitch about my attention to detail, my love of consistency and order, and my eagle eye for continuity. She’d asked—no, begged—me to step in for evenings and weekends.

 

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I met her on set under a viaduct downtown at six a.m. The food truck was set up, and the gaffers and grips were just arriving.

“Let’s face it, Tee Dray,” she said, pointing the straw of her Big Gulp at me, “it’s not like they gave me enough money to pay union for weekend calls.” She wore a baseball cap over a tight black pixie cut that only she could pull off. A Vietnamese Mexican with an athletic build, she carried herself as if she owned the joint. Every joint. When we were at Carlton Prep together, she was a bossy outcast and the most interesting person at school.

“You’re paying me on the back end,” I said.

“Sure,” she said with a strong smile. “Forty percent, but I keep the books.”

We hovered over the coffee and fruit. It was still dark, the ambient hiss of the freeway above as low as it would ever be.

“You know what to do?” she asked.

“I have the binder from last time. Track shots, cuts, who’s wearing what, where their hands are, off-book dialogue, et cetera.”

“I really appreciate this,” she said.

“You deserve a comeback. I’d finance the whole thing, you know.”

“Then I’d feel obligated to sleep with you.” She winked. A flirtatious bisexual, she’d offered herself to me more than once, joking, then not, then joking again.

“I think I’m getting to the point I’d take you up on it,” I joked back.

We’d lost touch during college then reconnected when she got representation at WDE, where I ran the client accounting department. She had directed an action movie with heart and suspense that filled theaters for months. It was in the lexicon of greats, nominated for awards, watched and rewatched years after release. When she’d lost her contract with Overland Studios because of her lawsuit, I knew all the intimate fiscal details because I worked for her agent. She could cry on my shoulder or vent her frustration without explaining the nuances of studio math, or as she called it, ass-rape on a ledger.

A studio like Overland loaned a production company money to make a film then billed themselves interest. The interest compounded for the months of production then into the years following release until a blockbuster like Katrina’s wound up with no profits. No amount of litigation could erase the foul and totally legal practice.

Her current self-made episodic piece, to be shot in diners and under viaducts, was financed through a tiny holding in Qatar. Written, directed, and produced by Katrina Ip, it could put her back on the map. I couldn’t have rooted harder for anyone’s success.

“You need a man,” she said. “A rebound c**k to f**k the sad right out of you.”

“Nice way to talk.”

“The truth isn’t always nice. Let me set you up with my brother, and you can set me up with yours.”

“You don’t have a brother.”

“Can’t blame a girl for trying. What about Michael?” She raised an eyebrow, tilting her head. The lead actor in the production had made it clear he was interested in me and a couple of other attractive women on set. He was a man whore, but a nice one.

“I’m not ready,” I said.

“I know, sweetheart. It’ll come back. Some time.”

I pressed my lips together, and though the sun was just peeking over the skyline, it was light enough for her to see the prickly heat brush my cheeks.

“Theresa,” she said, “call is in four minutes. I’m going to have no time to talk. So tell me now. And fast.”

It was a miracle we’d even had time to talk already. Directing a movie was like having a wedding every day for four months. You threw the party but couldn’t enjoy it.

“I went out with Jonathan last night, and there was a guy. A man. I had toilet paper on my shoe and—”

“You? Miss Perfect?”

“Yes. I was so embarrassed.” I dropped my voice to a near whisper when Edgar, her assistant director, approached with a clipboard and a problem. “He was breathtaking.”

She leaned on one hip. “Los Angeles is wall-to-wall breathtaking.”

“He was different. When he touched me—”

“He touched you?”

“Just my wrist. But it was like sex. I swear I’ve never felt anything like that.”

“You tell me this now?”

Edgar got within earshot, and I dropped my eyes. Even thinking about that man in range of a stranger made me feel shameful.

“Kat,” Edgar spoke fast, “honey, the LAPD—”

“Give them the forms,” she shot back.

“But they—”

“Can wait five minutes.” She pulled me behind a trailer. The hum of the generator almost drowned her out. “You cried on my lap for hours over Danny Dickhead. Now you have a hundred-twenty seconds to tell me about this new one.”

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“I will cut you.” She didn’t mean it, of course. Even coming from the wrong side of Pico Boulevard, her threats were all affect.

“Brown eyes. Black hair.”

“You must be off blonds since Dickerino Boy.”

“Six feet. Built. My god, his hands. They weren’t narrow or soft. They were wide, and... I’m not making any sense. But when he looked at me, my skin went hot. All I could think about was… you know.”

“You got a number?”

“Not even a name.”

Her phone dinged, and three people approached at once. Her day had begun. She turned away from me but flipped her head back. “You just got woken up.”

 

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three.

en years ago, I couldn’t have gotten a donut three blocks away from my loft without getting jacked. In Los Angeles at the turn of the second millennium, the wealthy moved from the city’s perimeter back to the center. And if anyone was “the wealthy,” it was me.

We lived in an old corset and girdle factory. It had been abandoned in the sixties, used as a warehouse by a stonecutter and cabinet maker, then expanded and converted into lofts just before the Great Recession. The units had gone at fire sale prices. I could afford whatever I needed, but Daniel had insisted on paying half, and the recession hit him hard. So a short sale downtown loft at a million and change it was.

And I was stuck with it. He moved to Mar Vista after I kicked him out, and I commuted across town to Beverly Hills to run client accounting at WDE.

Studios did not cut checks to talent; they cut checks to their agents. The agents deducted their ten percent fee and sent the client the rest. Thus, Hollywood agencies were the beating heart of the industry, the nexus through which all money circulated.

And most of them were still cutting paper checks.

I’d been hired to move the company from paper to wire transfer, and I’d done it. I’d convinced old guard agents, grizzled actors, below the line talent, banks, and business managers to get into the twenty-first century. Many of our clients still insisted on bike-messengered and armored-trucked paper checks, but they were more and more the minority. New clients weren’t given a paper option.

I was still necessary to manage the rest of the paper trail, chase studios for payment, and run the department, but I felt my job was done. The only thing worse than the idea of living with my job was the idea of living without it, of drifting into a life without purpose. My sister Fiona had made an art form of it in her youth, and I’d watched her slip into debauchery. I’d do anything to not be her.

But there I was, closing my eyes and seeing those hated checks. I heard the tones of my follow-up call to the messenger service, the tip tap as Pam logged them in one by one, and I thought, I want to burn it all and then slip into oblivion. I never did. I dreamed about it sometimes while I spaced off looking at the numbers or listening to one of the agents throw his anxiety on the table when a client’s check was a day late.

I thought about law school then dismissed the idea. If I became a lawyer as well as an accountant, I’d be so valuable I’d be miserable.

“Hey, Fly Girl.” Gene stood over my desk. “Rolf Wente’s business manager needs you to follow up with Warner’s.”

I tapped my phone log. “We have calls out to them.”

“You look tired. How was the weekend? Do the whole party thing?”

If I didn’t answer, and if I wasn’t specific, he’d spend fifteen minutes telling me about his party habits. “Went to dinner the other night. We saw this lounge act. The singer was terrific. Faulkner. Something Faulkner. Like the writer.”

“Never heard of her,” he said.

“Nice voice. Original.”

“Whyncha send me the deets? Maybe we’ll get out there on the WDE dime. Bring the assistants. Make them feel loved.”

“Okay.” I turned back to my work, hoping he’d leave.

“And get on Warner’s, okay? We lose old Rolf, and we’re up the ass on the dry highway. Let me know about the singer by the end of day.”

I didn’t realize that by suggesting a musician, I was obligated to ride the company dime to yet another show at Frontage. I was exhausted even thinking about it, until I remembered the man with the pink tie. I grabbed my phone and went outside.

I walked by Barney’s. It was bridal month, apparently. High end designers had their white gowns in the window. Jeremy St. James had a jewel-encrusted corset over a skirt no more modest than a strip of gauze. Barry Tilden layered dove white feathers on skirt worthy of Scarlet O’Hara, topping it all with a bodice made purely of silver zippers.

“Deirdre?” I said when I heard her pick up. “You there?”

“What time is it?”

“Ten. What are you doing next Thursday night?”

Sheets rustled. “I have to be at the shelter late.”

“Wanna go out?”

“I can’t do anything fancy, Tee. It makes me sick.” My sister Deirdre despised the consumptions of the rich. She lived in a studio the size of a postage stamp and put every penny of her trust fund interest toward feeding the hungry. It was noble to the point of self-destruction.

“It’s not fancy. Kind of dumpy. I don’t want to go with just work people. They all look at me like they’re sorry for me about Daniel. I hate it.”

“I’m not a good buffer.”

“You’re perfect. You keep me on my toes.”

She sighed. “All right. You’re buying, though. I’m broke.”

“No problem.”

We hung up, and I fist-pumped the ivory Sartorial Sandwich in the last window. I needed Deirdre there to give me a reason to escape the WDE crowd, especially if the breathtaking man was there.

four.

ow many have you had?” I asked Deirdre.

“My second.” She took her hand off her mop of curly red hair to hold up two fingers. All eight of us shared the red hair, but only she had the curls. “Not that it matters.”

“It matters,” I said.

“No,” Deirdre said, putting down her glass. “It doesn’t. Do you know what matters?”

 

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“Let me guess. The poor and hungry?”

Deirdre huffed. I’d caught her before she could make her speech. She hated that. “You’ve got more money than the Vatican. You’re cute as a button. Yet you think you have problems.”

“Looks and money aren’t the whole of a person.”

“Don’t pretend they don’t matter. They do. If you saw what I saw every day.”

My sister was sweet and compassionate, but she was a belligerent drunk. If I let her, she’d tell me my sadness came from material idolatry and that it was time for me to give all my money to charity and live in service to the poor. I’d often considered the possibility that she was right.

The musicians had come by and then disappeared again. The lights dimmed, and she appeared by the piano singing “Stormy Weather” as if she wanted to rip the clouds from the sky but couldn’t reach high enough. Monica Faulkner, a nobody singer in a town of somebodies, stood in front of the piano singing other people’s songs in a room built for other purposes. She moved from “Stormy Weather” to something more plaintive. My God, she was fully committed to every word, every note.

There was no halfway with that woman. I’d seen her sandwiched between my brother fingering her and f**king her, and I’d felt bad. But not today, she had control over me. She sang in the tempo of keys clacking and printers humming. There was an open place inside me, past where the professionalism cracked and the weariness fissured and the sadness throbbed. She caressed that place then jabbed it.

I missed Daniel. I missed the hardness of his body and the touch of his hands. I missed his laughter, and the way he cupped my breast in his sleep, and the weight of his arm on my shoulder, and the way he brushed his light brown hair off his face. I missed calling him to tell him where I was. I was an independent woman. I could function fine without him or anyone. But I missed him, and I missed being loved. Once he’d cheated on me, all my delight in his love drowned in bitterness. I was wistful for something dead.

“You all right?” said a male voice.

Gene had left the table to come talk to me at the bar. He was my “type”: dark blonde, straight-laced, ambitious, easy smile, confident. But he was awful. Just the most awful Hollywood douchebag.

“Yeah, thanks.”

“She’s good. The singer. ”

“Great.” I felt an absence to my right, where Deirdre had been standing.

“I think we could do something with her. Little spit and polish, shorter skirt. Use the body. Sammy’s got Geraldine Stark under contract. She’s trying to move into fashion. Could be a tight package.” He winked as if I might not get his double entendre.

“I hope it works out,” I said. “I’m off to the ladies’.”

“See you back at the table.” He picked up his glass. “Don’t be a stranger.”

Deirdre wasn’t in the bathroom. I ended up looking at the same roll of toilet paper from two weeks ago. Still one square hanging. A different roll, obviously, but the same amount. Not enough.

Just not enough.

The hall outside the bathroom led outside, where a little seating area with ashtrays was blocked off from the parking lot. I heard yelling and repeated calls of “bitch.” Though I normally avoided disagreeable behavior, I went to look.

A red Porsche Boxster was parked in the handicapped spot, and on the hood, all five-eleven, hundred-and-fifty pounds of her, Deirdre sprawled on her back. The man yelling was six inches shorter and twenty pounds lighter—if I didn’t count the weight of the petroleum in his hair products. He wore head-to-toe leather and had a voice like a car screeching to a halt.

“Get. Off. The. Porsche.” He pushed her as he yelled, but she was dead weight.

“Excuse me,” I said.

He may have heard me. I had no time to think about that; the rest happened so fast. He pulled at Deirdre’s lapels, yanking her forward. Like a baby with a bellyful of milk, she projectile vomited. It splashed on his jacket, the ground, and the car. He squealed and let her go. She rolled off the hood, puking as she went, and landed on the ground.

“Fuck!” he yelled as I tried to sit my sister up against the wheel. “Shit. God. Puke? Puke is acid! Do you know what that’s going to do to the paint? And my f**king jacket?”

“We’ll pay for the damage.”

I was too busy with Deirdre to bother looking at the creep. She was unconscious. I squeezed her cheeks and looked into her mouth to see if she was choking. She wasn’t, because she threw up right down my shirt. I leaned back and said something like ugh, but it was drowned out by the man in leather.

“This is a custom paint job. Fuck! Bitch, the whole car’s gotta be redone. And I got a thing tomorrow.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled, tapping Deirdre’s cheek.

If he hadn’t been blinded by his rage and stupidity, Leather Guy probably wouldn’t have done what he did in front of me. Holding his arms so they didn’t touch the puke on his chest, he came around the car and kicked Deirdre in the hip.

“Hey!” was all I got to say.

I didn’t even have a chance to stand and challenge him before he fell back as if an airplane door had opened mid-flight. Then I heard a bang. I looked back at Deirdre, because in my panic, I thought she’d fallen or gotten hit by a car.

A voice, gentle yet sharp, said, “Does she drink like this often?” A blue-eyed man with a young face and bow lips crouched beside me. He didn’t look at me but at Deirdre. “I think she’s got alcohol poisoning.”

 

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Another bang. I jumped. A splash of vomit landed on my cheek, and I looked up at the hood of the car. Leather’s cheek was pressed against the hood of the Porsche.

“Spin,” Bow Lips said, “take it easy, would you?”

Above him, with his arm pinning down Leather’s face, was the breathtaking man, ignoring his friend. “Tell this lady you’re sorry.”

“He should apologize to my sister, not me,” I said.

“Fuck you!” The douchebag wiggled. He got thumped against the hood for his trouble. “I ain’t saying shit.”

Spin pulled Leather up by his collar and slammed his face on the hood until he screamed.

“I’ll call 9-1-1,” said Bow Lips.

“But I—” I thought you were this guy’s friend. I stopped myself, realizing he was going to call about Deirdre, not the creep getting his face slammed against a car.

“Say. You’re. Sorry,” Spin said through his teeth.

Leather’s face slid to the edge of the hood, wiping puke, until I could see the blood and paint-shredding stomach acid mixing on his cheeks from my crouching position. He spit a little blood.

He was a douchebag and he’d kicked my sister, but I felt bad for him. “It’s okay, really, I—”

“Yeah, we have an emergency.” Bow Lips. Unflustered. Into the phone “Alcohol poisoning.”

Bang.

“I’m sorry!”

“Do you believe him, Contessa?” Beautiful. Even beating the hell out of some guy on the hood of a Porsche. “Do you think he’s sorry?”

I caught a hint of an accent in his voice. Italian? He was speaking to me, one eyebrow arched like a parabola, his face closed with resolve, impassioned with purpose, yet calm, as if he was so good at what he did he didn’t need to break a sweat.

“Yes,” I said, “I believe him.”

“I believe he regrets it,” he said. “But I don’t believe he’s remorseful.” He leaned toward me on the owner of the Porsche, who was crying through a bloody nose. “What do you think?”

I don’t know what came over me. The need to be truthful turned me and that gorgeous man into cohorts. It was intimate in a safe way, and the creep in leather needed to suffer. “No, I don’t think he is.”

His smirk lit up the night. I feared a full-on smile might put me over the edge.

“Show her you mean it,” he said in Leather’s ear but looked at me. “Get the puke off this ugly f**king car.” He wouldn’t let the guy move. “Get it off.”

“Female,” Bow Lips said, all business. “Mid thirties. Built like a brick shithouse.”

“Lick that shit up, or you’re kissing the hood again.”

Leather choked and sobbed, blood pouring from his nose. I stood up and looked at the guy who had kicked my sister. I felt something pouring off the two men locked together on the car. Heat. Energy. Something that crawled under my skin and made it tingle. And when the creep stuck his tongue out and licked the vomit off the hood, the tingle turned to a release from anxiety I hadn’t realized I carried.

“That’s right,” Spin said. “You believe him now, Contessa?”

“Yes.”

Spin yanked the man up, and I knew from the look on his face that he was going to make the guy kiss the hood again. The distance and force applied would not just break, but smash bones.

I stood. “I think you’ve made your point.”

Spin’s face, so implacable, breached into something gentler, more open, as if an understanding reached not his intelligence, but his adrenal glands. He smiled. “I thought you’d enjoy a big ending.”

“My sister will be bruised. His face is cracked open. Justice is served.”

“Come volevi tu,” he said, yanking the creep back again. “Keys.” He held out his hand as Leather cried, tears streaking the mass of blood.

“No, man, don’t take my car.”

“This car?” He pulled the keys out of Leather’s pocket and hit a button. The doors unlocked, and the lights flashed. “You’re taking this low-class piece-of-shit car out of my sight.” He pushed the man inside and closed the door.

In a few seconds, the car started and screeched away.

“Ambulance coming,” Bow Lips said from behind me, his voice strained.

He had stood Deirdre up and was about to fall under her dead weight. His friend intervened and helped carry her to the smokers’ benches. From inside, I heard clapping. The singer was done. People would come out for their cigarettes soon. The breathtaking man pulled the sleeves of his jacket straight and touched his tie. Nothing was out of place.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Yes. You?” He took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and offered me one.

I refused with a tilt of my head. I glanced at Deirdre, who leaned against Bow Lips. He’d need to be rescued.

“I’m fine. Covered in throw up, but fine,” I said.

“You didn’t get upset, seeing that. I’m impressed.” He poked out a smoke and bit the end, sliding it out of its sardine-tight box while absently fingering a silver lighter.

“Oh, I’m upset.”

He smiled as he lit up, looking at me over the flame. He snapped the lighter shut with a loud click, taking his time. I had a second to run and sit next to my sister, take a step back. But I didn’t.

“You don’t look upset,” he said. “You’re flushed. Your heart is racing. I can see it.” He stepped forward. “Your breath, you’re trying to control it. But it’s not working. If I saw you like this in a different time or place, I’d think you were ready to f**k.”

 

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Just watching me, he let the smoke rise in a white miasma. My lungs took in more air than they ever had in such a short period of time. Foul language usually put the taste of tar and bile on my tongue, but from him, it sent a line of heat from my knees to my lower back.

“I don’t like that kind of talk.” It was out of my mouth before I realized I didn’t mean it.

“Maybe.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a white business card. “Maybe not.”

I took the card. Antonio Spinelli, Esq., and a number in 213. I glanced up to ask him what kind of lawyer made douchebags lick puke off a car, but he was already walking toward a black Maserati. Bow Lips gently leaned Deirdre against the wall.

“Thanks,” I said, pocketing the card.

“Take care of her.” He indicated that I should sit next to Deirdre before one of the many smokers exiting the club did. “She’s dangerous.”

I smiled at him and watched as he got in the passenger side and they drove away. I sat next to my sister and waited for the ambulance.

five.

put the card in my pocket and rode in the ambulance with Deirdre. My sister was chronically depressed, and she medicated with alcohol. We all knew the drill. She got wheeled in. People shouted. They took her vitals. A nurse gave me scrubs so I could get out of my puke-covered clothes. The V-neck top had wide sleeves and teddy bears in a cloudy sky. My dressy heels were absurd with the pink pants that were four sizes too big.

They gave Deirdre B vitamins, and once they’d determined that she hadn’t done any damage to her brain she couldn’t afford, they left me in the room with her. My stink-soaked clothes were in a plastic bag under my chair. Before, I’d call Daniel. But my new roommate and I had agreed that she’d be the person I checked in with, since checking in was what I missed most.

—I’m at the hospital with my sister. Everything ok. Won’t be home.—

The text came immediately.

—Breaking down the set in three hours. Need me to come?—

—Sure. Sequoia—

My jacket was crumpled in the plastic bag. I’d moved the lawyer’s card to the pocket of the scrubs for reasons I couldn’t articulate. It weighed forty pounds in my pocket. It had gotten warmer when the paramedics asked for my sister’s stats, her insurance, her age, how many drinks she’d had. It vibrated and buzzed as I waited for her to regain consciousness.

—Ok. Which sister?—

—Deirdre. She’s been in sri lanka. You never met her.—

—Boozy left-wing freedom fighter?—

—LOL yes—

I went out to the ER waiting room. Sequoia was a nice hospital, but the next few hours were going on the “really bad times not interesting enough to even talk about” list. The waiting room was active late at night, but slower, as if the horrors of Los Angeles took a break for a few hours. Babies fussed, and the TVs screamed joyful network news. I went to the vending machine and stared at the library of packages, unable to decide what I didn’t want the least.

A kid of about seven jostled me out of the way and jammed a dollar into the slot, punched buttons as if it was his job, and stood in front of me while the machine hummed. But nothing happened. No goodie was forthcoming.

I ran through the next day in my head. Katrina would have to drive me back to Frontage. I’d get my car, make it home, and—

There was a loud bang, as if a bullet had hit fiberglass, and I jumped, not realizing I’d spaced out. Antonio Spinelli, still in his black suit, touched the machine and, finding the spot he needed, banged again. Two bags of chips fell, and the kid jumped at them. The lawyer smirked at me and shrugged. He was more gorgeous in the dead, flat fluorescents than he’d been in the dark parking lot.

“You want something?” he asked.

He kept his eyes on my face, but I felt self-conscious about my scrub-clad body and dress shoes. “What are you doing here?” I sounded small and insignificant, probably because I was trying to speak while holding my breath.

He shrugged. “Getting you a late dinner.” He indicated the array inside the machine like a tall blonde turning letters. “Cheese chips? Ring Pop?”

I felt alone on a Serengeti plain with a cheetah circling. “You waited for me all this time?”

“I noticed you might need a ride home, so I followed the ambulance.”

“A lawyer. Chasing an ambulance.”

He smirked, and I wasn’t sure if he got the joke or if it was outside of his cultural matrix. “What kind of gentleman would I be?”

“Again. What are you doing here?” My mouth tasted as if a piece of week-old roast beef had been folded into it. I was wearing scrubs that wouldn’t have fit even if they were the right size, and my spiked heels felt like torture devices. My head hurt, my sister was in the hospital for alcohol poisoning, and a beautiful god of a man wanted to share a Ring Pop with me.

Antonio took out a bill and fed the machine. “I think I made a bad impression in the parking lot.” He punched more buttons than any one item required.

“Your intentions were good. Thank you for that.”

“My methods, however?”

Things dropped into the opening. Chips, candy, crackers, cookies, plop, plop, plop, plop. He must have put a twenty in there.

“I’m trying not to think too hard about it.”

“You were very composed.” He crouched to retrieve his pile of packages. “I’ve never met a woman like that.”

 

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“Except for looking aroused?” I crossed my arms, feeling exposed.

“That, I’ve met.” He handed me an apple, the one piece of real food available in the hospital vending machine. He looked at me in a way I didn’t like. Not one bit.

Except I did like it. I took the apple. I became too aware of the teddy bears on my shirt and my hair falling all over the place. My lips were chapped, and my eyes were heavy from too many hours awake. Maybe that was for the best. Looking early-morning fresh would have made his gaze seem sexual rather than intense.

He stepped back next to an uncomfortable-looking plastic chair, indicating I should sit. Holding my apple to my chest, I sat. He dumped our meal into the seat next to me and sat on the other side of it.

“How’s your sister?” he asked.

I sighed. “She’ll be fine. I mean, she won’t, because she’ll do it again. But she’ll be up and running by afternoon.”

He looked pensive, plucking a bag of nuts from the chair and putting it back. “It’s impossible to change what you are. You drink like that when you fight yourself.”

“How did you get so educated on the matter?”

“I had an uncle.”

He opened a granola bar, and I watched his finger slipping into the fold of cellophane, exerting enough pressure to weaken and split the bond between the layers. It took exactly no effort. A child could do it. But the grace of that simple thing was exquisite. I pressed my legs together because I kept imagining those hands flat on the insides of my thighs.

“It was my job to collect him in the mornings,” he continued. “He supported my mother, so he had to go make money. Every morning, I had to look for him. I found him in the street, in the piazza, wherever. Passed out with wine all over his shirt. I splashed water on his face and sent him to work at the dock. I mean, he called me a stronzo first, but I got the job done.”

His story opened doors and corridors to further questions. The possibility of spending hours in that waiting room with him was a little too appealing. I’d seen what he’d done to the man who’d kicked my sister, and I had the feeling he wasn’t a normal lawyer. Something was up, and finding out was akin to stroking a snake to feel the click of the scales.

“What are you doing here?” I asked. “In Los Angeles?”

He shrugged. “The California bar is easy. And the weather’s nice.”

“My name is Theresa.”

“I know.” He smiled at my shocked expression, looking about as concerned as a cat on a windowsill. “I used to see you on TV during Daniel Brower’s campaign for mayor. Part of it, at least. I think he might win.”

I must have turned purple, though my face didn’t shift and my shoulders stayed straight.

He cast his eyes down as if he’d said too much. “It’s not my business, of course.”

“It’s Los Angeles’s business, apparently, that my fiancé was having sex with his speechwriter. Any details in the paper you missed and want me to fill in?” I was having a complete emotional shut down. Not even his full lips or the arch of his eyebrows could pierce my veil of defensiveness. “That’s why you were watching me at Frontage that first night. Trying to put the face with the story.”

“No.”

“I’m not interested in your pity, or in you proving yourself, or anything for that matter.” I stood. I’d talked myself into a deep enough hole, and the shame of the entire incident swelled inside me. “Thanks for dinner.”

I spun on my heel and walked to the nearest door that led outside. I should have headed back to Deirdre. I should have gone to the ladies’ room. I should have gone to the desk. But outside looked so appealingly anonymous, as if I could walk into the darkness and disappear. Once I got there though, I had nowhere to go, and the cars speeding down LaCienega didn’t slow enough for me to cross. In any case, I couldn’t go far. Deirdre needed me.

I walked down the block as if I had a destination. I’d been foolish. I’d wanted him, spine to core, but he knew who I was. I couldn’t run away from what had happened with Daniel. Everyone knew, and any relationship I had would be painted with the brush of my humiliation. I felt that beautiful hand on my elbow, and part of my body continued forward despite his best effort.

“Wait,” he said, “you never let me finish.”

“I don’t want you to,” I said, letting him hold my elbow while I caught my balance.

“I was watching you because yes, I wanted to place the face.” I started to object, but he put his fingers to my lips and said, “And when I did, I was... how do you say?” He squinted as if trying to squeeze the word out of his brain. “Awestruck.” I pulled away and he let go of me. “Don’t go. It’s not what you think. Yes, I saw you on TV with Brower. You always stood so straight, even when they attacked you. Reporters, the other side, even your own people. And you never cracked. Then tonight, you stand up and tell me to stop hurting that man, like it’s your right under God to do it. You could run the world. Do you realize?”

I said nothing. I hated that he had observed my shame with Daniel so closely in such one-sided intimacy.

“Let me take you out,” he said. “My attention isn’t going to hurt you.”

“Look, I’m sorry. You’re nice enough. And I have to be honest, you’re handsome. Very handsome.” I couldn’t look at him when I said that. “But I’m a curiosity to you. To me, it’s still very real.” I folded my arms so he had to release my elbow. A bus blew by us with a shattering roar, sending a warm breeze through our hair. “I’m just not ready.”

 

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“Let me take you out anyway.”

“Tee Dray!”

I spun around. Katrina jogged toward me from the parking lot, carrying a huge satchel and wearing Uggs with her leggings. She was early, and not a minute too soon.

“I’m sorry,” I said, backing away toward Katrina. “I can’t.” I felt her at my back, panting.

“Hi,” she said.

I turned around and realized she wasn’t saying hello to me. “Katrina, this is Antonio.”

“Ciao,” he said with a nod before he directed his gaze back at me. “You have my card, Contessa.”

“I do.”

“Ciao then.” He smiled, nodded, and walked toward the parking lot entrance.

Katrina spun around to watch him as he turned and waved. “Holy f**king hot fire.”

“Yes. Holy hot fire.”

“That’s not the same guy, is it?” she asked.

“It is.”

“Is he an actor? I could use him. Fuck, I could write feature films about the way he walks.”

“Lawyer. Italian. Which is nice if you’re into that sort of thing. You’re early, by the way.”

“We actually got shit done.” We started back toward the hospital. “Michael was a bruiser. He asked about you,” she said.

“Not interested.”

“How’s your sister?”

“Should be awake by now. Can you wait for me?”

“An hour. Then you drive yourself home,” she said as if she meant it. She put her arm around my shoulder and walked me in.

six.

hey’ll send a priest if you want to see one,” I said, sitting by Deirdre’s bed.

“I don’t need counseling.” My sister looked flush and healthy and energetic, despite being waist-deep in sheets. Nothing like a mainline of B vitamins to bring a woman to the peak of health.

“They can’t release you without it. And I’m sorry, but I agree with the policy. You could have died.”

“I’m a grown woman.” She threw off her sheets, exposing a blue hospital gown that matched my scrubs.

I put my hand on her shoulder. “Dee, please. I’ve got your vomit all over my clothes. We can get Dr. Weinstein back if you want.”

She tucked one curly red lock behind her ear, where it would stay for three seconds before bouncing in front of her eyes again. “I want to go to work.”

“You need a break from that job. It’s turning you into a grouch.”

“I can’t do anything else,” she said. “I don’t know how.”

One of the downsides of being incredibly wealthy was the ease with which one could go through life without marketable skills. The only ability she’d developed was compassion for people who didn’t have what she had and contempt for those who did. Self-loathing went deep, a trademark Drazen trait.

“There’s a trade school around the corner,” I said. “You could learn to fix cars.”

“You think Daddy would buy me a shop in Beverly Hills?”

“Anything to get you out of social work. Heck, I’d buy you a shop.”

She put her face in her hands. “I want to do God’s work.”

I held her wrists. “God didn’t build you to see what you see every day. You’re too sensitive.”

She took her hands away from her face. “Can you go to that thing with Jon tonight? At the museum? I don’t think I can take it.”

Jonathan was only seen in public with his sisters in the hope of drawing back his ex-wife.

“If you give the counselor one hundred percent, I’ll go.”

She leaned back in the bed. “Fine.”

“Thank you.”

“You smell like a puke factory.”

I kissed her head and put my arms around my crazy, delicate sister.

seven.

atrina was in the waiting room, sleeping on her binder and drooling on the breakdown script for the next day.

I sat by her head and put my hand on her shoulder. I felt guilty for calling her while she was in production, and I felt lonely for needing her so badly. “Come on, Directrix. I’m driving.”

“Five minutes, Mom,” she whispered.

By the time Katrina dropped me at Frontage, my little BMW was the only car in the lot, and condensation left a polka dot pattern on my windshield. It was a 1967 GT Cabrio with chrome detailing that wasn’t happy about water drying on it. I shouldn’t have bought it. The car was a death trap. But Daniel had gone to the automotive museum’s auction to show his face, and I’d walked out with what he called LBT, the Little Blue Tink. He’d been annoyed, but I’d fallen in love.

I wasn’t ready to end the night. Though the rising sun would end it for me, I wasn’t ready to process it. It was almost six in the morning, and my brother never slept, so I called him.

“Hey, Jon,” I said. “I saw your singer last night.”

“I heard.”

I could tell by his sotto voice and cryptic words that he wasn’t alone. “You want the good news or the bad news?”

“Bad.”

“Everything’s fine, before you panic.”

“Okay, I’m not panicked.”

“Deirdre again.”

“Ah,” he said.

“And I didn’t just pour her into bed. She had to be hospitalized. Nothing a few B vitamins couldn’t fix, but honestly, I think she has a real problem. I saw her have two drinks, but she had a flask and she went to the bathroom, I don’t know, fourteen times.”

 

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“You’re exaggerating.”

“Not by much. So I’m coming with you tonight.”

“Fine.”

“Can I be honest?” I didn’t wait for his answer. “I think your perpetual availability isn’t helping draw Jessica back.”

“Very mature, Theresa. Very mature.”

“Take a real woman, Jon. Stop being a patsy.”

I never spoke like that to my brother or anyone. I rarely gave advice or told anyone to change, but I was tired, physically and emotionally. I hung up without saying good-bye. I had to get Katrina home and get ready for work.

eight.

got to my office, where Pam waited for me. My assistant had neon pink hair in a 1940’s style chignon, pierced nose and brow, and smart suit; a story of contradictions she called psychabilly. I hadn’t heard of it before or since, but when her boyfriend showed up looking like Buddy Holly with tattoos, I got the aesthetic.

“You look wrung out,” she said, as if wrung out was a compliment.

I’d cleaned up as much as I could, but make up could only achieve so much. “Thanks. I was sober for the whole thing. Did the late list come through?”

“It’s printing. Arnie wants to see you,” Pam said as she tapped on her keyboard. She chronically tapped out beats on the table and her knees.

“Did you get a new piercing?” I touched my forehead.

“Like it?” She waggled her brows and handed me a folder with the day’s check reports. “Bobby got one on his... you know.” She pointed downward.

I couldn’t imagine what kind of face I made. Something broadcasting distaste and empathy, probably.

“It’s hot,” she whispered. “And for my pleasure.”

“Grotesque, thank you.”

“The DA’s been calling you.” Pam had started calling Daniel “The DA,” since he was the district attorney, when we broke up. She said uttering his name made her sick, and though I told her I could fight my own battles, she’d never said his name again.

“What’s he want?” I said around the lump in my throat.

“Lunch. I said you were busy.”

“Set it up.”

She looked at me over her rhinestone frames.

“I can handle it. Get us into the commissary,” I said.

No one in the WDE commissary even bothered glancing at a mayoral candidate, or the mayor, or anyone for that matter. Everyone there worked in the business, so everyone had an important job. To approach someone in the commissary meant you didn’t have access to them elsewhere. No one would admit they weren’t cool enough to get a meeting with Brad Pitt. Too bad the food there tasted like cheap wedding fare.

“Your Monday three o’clock’s been cancelled,” Pam said.

“What? Frances?”

“Frances doesn’t have the clearance to cancel a meeting for you.” She pointed at a little double red flag on the time block. “Only Arnie’s girl does.”

I checked my watch. “I’m going to see him. Hold down the fort.”

“Held. I’ll set up the lunch.”

I left her wrinkling her nose while she dialed Daniel’s number.

***

In Los Angeles, windows separated the dogs from the bitches.

Not my saying. My sister Margie said it, and when I told Pam, she believed it so ardently she repeated it regularly. When I was moved to the only office in accounting with a window, she called me a newly minted dog.

Once.

“Oh, Ms. Drazen, you know it’s a compliment.”

“No one should ever repeat anything my sister says. She’s out of her mind.”

That one window, which took up only half the room—while all the other executives had full walls of Los Angeles behind them—could have meant the world to so many. To me, it didn’t change a thing. I’d been born into four generations’ worth of money. I had a job because I wanted one, which meant I could leave at any time. My value wasn’t in my loyalty, but in my skill, which I’d take with me if I left.

The two walls of windows in Arnie Sanderson’s office sat at right angles. Across from the north window was a twelve-foot-high mahogany shelving unit that housed antique tools of the agent’s trade. Typewriter. Approval stamp. Cufflinks. Crystal decanter and glasses. Photos of agents gladhanding household names. The only things missing were a collection of super-white dental caps and rolled up hundred-dollar bills coated with cocaine residue.

“Theresa,” he said when I came in. His jacket pulled at the gut, even though it was custom made, and his tie was held by a gold bar so out of style, it would be back in style in six months. “You all right?”

I assumed he was referring to the dark circles that screamed late night out. “Gene took some of us to see an act last night.”

“Ah, Gene. I’m sure the bill will be of magnificent proportions. Sit.” His smile, which sparkled from his white teeth to his eyes, was the product of decades of asking for things and getting them.

I sat on the leather couch. “It’s nice to see you.”

Actually, it wasn’t. Being invited to his office meant something was wrong, especially in light of my three o’clock Monday meeting’s cancellation.

“Can I get you something? Water? A drink? Hair of the dog?”

Only half the staff came in half sober on Fridays. It was the life. As if proving my unmade point, he poured himself a drink as amber as a pill bottle.

 

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“I’m fine.”

“I hear you’re on Katrina’s set. Michael’s movie,” he said.

Agents and producers called talent by their first name whether they’d ever pressed flesh with them or not. Arnie, of course, was one of the few who’d actually earned the right that everyone else took for granted.

“Script supervising in off hours. It’s fun.”

“I imagine you’d be good at continuity. And you picked the one director we represent who’s a walking time bomb.”

“She’s my friend.” I was suddenly, inexplicably, unusually nervous, as if he could see right through me.

He sat across from me and crossed his legs, an odd gesture for a man. “She’s dangerous. She has entitlement issues. After that lawsuit with Overland, she’s poison, to be honest. Be careful.”

“Have you ever known me to be anything but careful?”

“You are famously vigilant.” He smiled, but it was reserved. He really didn’t want me working with Katrina; it was all over his face. “I wanted to thank you for getting so many of our clients off paper. Saves man hours and money. They love us for it.”

“It’s what you hired me to do.”

“Everything’s running so smoothly, I thought you might have a little time on your hands?”

“I still have to run the department,” I said. “But if you had something in mind, I’m open to it.”

“Well, it’s irregular, if you will.”

“I’m not much of a pole dancer.”

He laughed gently. “Well, as that wasn’t on your resume, I’m sure we can overlook it.” He sipped his drink. “We rep a kid right out of USC. Matt Conway. You may have heard of him?”

“Oscar for best short last year.”

“Nice kid. Shooting a little movie on the Apogee lot. They have some nice European sets over there. Mountains in the back, the whole thing.”

“I’ve seen it,” I said.

“He rented a dozen or so vintage cars. The little stupid boxy things with the long license plates. Well, the company that owns the cars has audit privileges, in case anything going wrong. It’s irregular, like I said, but they’re exercising the right, and they insisted the head of our accounting department do it. I thought they meant our internal accounting, but they meant you.”

“Me?”

“Normally, I’d tell them to go pound sand, but this isn’t some prop company. There are powerful people involved, and if I say no, the phone’s going to start ringing.”

“What am I looking for?”

“He’ll tell you,” he said.

“I have a department to run.”

“Is that a no?”

“It’s just a statement of fact.”

“Good. We have a gentleman from the fleet rental and a representative from the studio coming at three, Monday.”

Three o’clock. Of course. Arnie hadn’t taken no for an answer in thirty years.

***

Daniel had been to the commissary before, on bank holidays when he had off and everyone in Hollywood worked. So when I got there, he was comfortably tapping on his phone, left alone for an hour during a tight campaign. Seeing him work the device tightened my chest. I’d thrown his last phone in the toilet.

“Hi,” I said, sitting down and putting the linen napkin on my lap.

He pocketed his phone and smiled at me. “Thanks for seeing me.”

I nodded, casting my eyes down. When would I stop playing the injured party? Why did I fall into victimhood so easily?

And why did he fall into the role of evildoer without so much as a blink? His hunched pose, something his handlers had trained out of him a year ago, returned. That lock of light hair, the one he used to brush away in a move the cameras hated, dropped in front of his forehead. I saw the effort he expended to not move it. I saw the extra tightness in his fingers as they wove together in front of him. I saw everything, and when I would have made an effort to relax him before, I just felt a thread of satisfaction.

I hated our dance. It made me sick. But I didn’t know how to stop the music because I still loved him. The man who let me arrange the house any way I wanted, who laughed at my stupid jokes, who rubbed lube on me when I wasn’t working right. The man who made such good but failed efforts to get me to orgasm with his fingers or his dick in me.

“How’s Deirdre?” he asked then continued when I tilted my head. “One of the admins saw a Drazen admitted and called me. She thought it was you.”

“Is that even legal?”

He shrugged. “I know people. It’s my job. Is she okay or not?”

“She’s fine.”

I’d ordered our food ahead of time, and it came to our table in wide-rimmed white dishes that would go out of style at the turn of the next century.

“How have you been?” He shuffled his food around with the heavy silver fork. Because of his childhood impoverishment, he ate as quickly and cleanly as a steamshovel on amphetamines, so he only ate when his company was distracted by conversation.

“Fine, thank you. I’m script supervising for Katrina when I can, so I’m a little tired. But it’s fun. She got Michael Greenwich for the lead, and he’s been incredible. On the strength of his performance alone, she’s hoping to get distribution.”

He huffed. “I’m surprised anyone wants to deal with her after the lawsuit.”

 

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“Yes, she’s just another uppity woman asking for what she’s due.”

“You know I don’t mean it like that, Tink.”

I stopped chewing. He wasn’t supposed to call me that anymore. I looked out the window. “One day, we’re going to get over this,” I said, looking again at the man I loved. “Until then, let’s avoid the small talk.”

He cleared his throat. “The thing with us, it hurt me. My numbers. Especially on the east side, where they’re really conservative.”

“Yes, I know.” God, the ice in my voice. It felt like someone else was talking. I could will myself quiet. I could will myself honest. But I couldn’t will myself warm.

“I don’t want you to think I’m just talking about what happened like it’s all about me and the campaign, okay? But that’s the business of the lunch. If you want to talk about it on a more personal level, I’m happy to.”

“You’re fine. I get it. Go on.”

“I have a Catholic Charities thing Thursday,” he said.

“Okay.”

“They’re supporting me because I’m not sitting still on income inequality, but the thing with us—”

“And Clarice.”

“And Clarice—who is gone—was a sticking point. They almost pulled out. So I’m here to ask for a symbolic gesture from you.”

“Of?” I asked, but I knew what it was.

“Of forgiveness. Christian forgiveness that’ll play with the San Gabriel Valley. Your family is a big diocesan donor. It won’t go unnoticed.”

“What does this symbolic gesture of Christian forgiveness entail?”

“If you could attend the fundraiser and stand by me.” He held up his hand as if warding off an objection I hadn’t yet made. “Not as my fiancée, obviously, but as a supporter. As someone whose priorities are my own.”

I chewed. Swallowed. Sipped water. I knew I’d agree, but I didn’t want to throw myself at his feet. He didn’t deserve it. Or I didn’t.

I’d heard a lot about what Daniel deserved. I’d heard that he was a worthless scumbag, and I’d heard promises to make his life in the mayor’s mansion a living hell. Those promises meant nothing to me. No one would hurt Daniel over infidelity. In five years, it would be forgotten. So I’d kept my venom to myself in public, and I released it around my family and Katrina.

But something came into my mind—a vision of Antonio beating Daniel’s head against a car. I smelled the blood and heard the crack of his nose as it broke from the impact. I imagined a tooth clacking across the metal, his contorted face as he said he was sorry, and Antonio and I partnering over the difference between his regret and his remorse.

“Why are you smiling?” he asked.

I changed the subject. “We decided the public appearances weren’t working.”

“And normally, I’d think it would just remind everyone of my weakness. But in this case, if people see you forgiving, they might follow. I can’t win unless I do something.”

I leaned back, appetite gone. “I can see the op ed pieces now. Another political wife forgives her overambitious man’s failings with other women. Judge her. Don’t judge her. She’s a feminist. She’s the anti-feminist. She’s a symbol for all of us. None of that falls on you. It’s all on me.”

“I know.”

“You are so lucky I don’t want Bruce Drummond in office.”

The air went out of him. He didn’t move, but I saw the slight shift of his shoulders and the release of tension in his jaw. “I can’t thank you enough.”

“We’ll figure something out.”

“I’d still marry you if you’d have me back.”

“Daniel, really—”

He leaned forward as if propelled. “Hear me out. Not as the maybe mayor. As me. Dan. The guy you taught how to walk straight. The guy who bit his nails. That guy’s going to be seventy years old one day, and he’s going to regret what he did. I want you back. After this campaign, win or lose, let me love you again.”

Joy, terror, shock, sadness all fought for my next words. None of them won the race to get from my brain to my mouth.

“I swore I wouldn’t do what I just did,” he said. “But I miss you. I can’t hold it in anymore.”

My words came out with no emotion in them. “I’m not ready.”

“I’ll wait for you, Tink. I’ll wait forever.”

I didn’t respond because I couldn’t imagine myself being ready, and I couldn’t imagine committing myself to anyone else.

nine.

n Monday, I had twenty minutes before my meeting with the fleet guy and the studio rep, exactly enough time to get briefed by Pam.

“Studio’s sending a courier,” she said, leaning into the screen. “They said you could handle it.”

“Wow,” I interjected, “they don’t even pretend to care.”

Pam dropped her voice to nearly inaudible. “Rumor is Matt got the cash for his short from a Hollywood loan shark, and Overland covered the note to the tune of way too much. So if there’s a bus coming, he might get thrown under it.”

“They need to get their own accountants to do their dirty work. They have the best of the best.”

She slipped her rhinestone horn-rimmed glasses halfway down her nose and looked at me over them. “What do you think you are?”

 

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“Adequate, since you asked.”

She shook her head and went back to work. I cleared my desk of a few million in incidentals before going to the conference room to do Arnie his favor.

***

The conference room was huge, set into the office’s bottom floor. Two sides were glass, looking over the reception area, and the other two walls were glass, looking out onto Wilshire Boulevard. It was designed for big faces to be seen together by the rest of the agency and by whomever was waiting in reception. Appointments might be based around making sure Mr. Twenty-Million-Dollar-A-Picture Actor was seen shaking hands with Mr. Academy-Award-Winning-Director in front of Ms. Top-Agent just as Ms. Actress-Who-Refused-The-Nude-Scene waited for an appointment. Like everything in the entertainment industry, it was maximum drama, maximum visibility.

Every time I went into that particular conference room, I checked the smoothness of my stockings, the lay of my hair, the seams between my teeth, even when I was just meeting a messenger to pass over audit materials. What used to arrive in a banker’s box of paper and ledgers and folders now came in the form of a flash drive and a manila envelope with a few summary sheets, which were useless. They were delivered by a short man in shorts, sneakers, and a flat cap. Matt’s line producer.

“I’m Ed, nice to meet you,” he said as he shook my hand and slid the hard drive and envelope onto the table.

“Nice to meet you too. What do we have here?”

“Everything up to the minute for the whole production. Hope you can help with this. It was kind of unexpected.”

I was about to respond and open the summary schedules so I could ask intelligent questions. Then I was going to finish my work and pick up dinner. I was feeling a turkey sandwich, salad, and bottle of water.

But that got shot out the window in a storm of hormone shrapnel when I saw Arnie coming through reception with a man in a dark suit named Antonio Spinelli. They were talking, but through the window, I saw Antonio’s eyes flick up at me and a smile stretch across his face. I frowned when Arnie opened the door to the conference room.

“Ms. Drazen,” he said cheerfully, “how is the handoff going?”

I slid the papers from the envelope just to distract myself, but my hands shook with rage or nerves. Possibly both.

“Just got here,” said Ed.

“This is Mr. Spinelli,” Arnie said in full agent-smarm. “He rents exotic cars to the business.”

“I know,” I said, cutting off my boss in a way I never would. I immediately caught my faux pas and held out my hand. “We’ve met.”

“Ms. Drazen.” He took my hand, and I felt tingling heat between my legs. “I wanted to say hello before you started.”

“Hello,” I said flatly, releasing his hand but not his gaze, which seemed just as physical.

“Great,” Arnie said. “I’m heading into a meeting.” He shook Ed’s hand, nodded to Antonio, and left.

When the glass door clicked behind him, I spoke. “We’ve got it from here, Ed.” I shot him a look. We were on the same side. I was watching out for him.

As if he understood, he nodded. “Later.” Ed tipped his cap and left.

Only the pull of the air between Antonio and me remained.

“This is flattering,” I said, “but it’s not going to work.”

“You can’t prove they didn’t take care of the cars?”

“Oh, you name it, I can prove it.”

“Good, I wanted the best.”

“You got me instead, but that doesn’t mean you’ve got me.”

“So you say.”

I tried not to smile. That would only encourage him. The last thing the arrogant ass needed was encouragement. “I won’t deny I’m attracted to you. I’m sure I’m not the first. But I’m not a conquest. I don’t like being chased, especially not through the offices of WDE. This is my job, Mr. Spinelli, not a mousehole. You can’t stick your paw in and hope to catch me. I don’t care to mix business with displeasure. Now if you’ll excuse me.”

I reached for the flash drive and envelope, and he stood in my way, getting close enough for me to catch the forested smell of his cologne.

“I could kiss you right now,” he said.

“You wouldn’t dare.”

The windows suddenly felt like cameras. I felt the presence of everyone’s eyes as if they were pressure on my skin.

“I will. And you might push me away, but not before you kiss me back. You know it. I know it. And everyone else in this office is going to know it,” he said.

“Don’t.”

“See me then. Let me take you out Thursday night.”

I was relieved. That was the perfect out. “I have plans on Thursday.”

“Cancel them.”

“I can’t. It’s a fundraiser.”

“Catholic Charities?” He raised an eyebrow. If it was at all possible for him to look sexier, he did.

“Yes.” I stood straight. I didn’t want to have to explain it, but I had a compulsion to excuse myself I had to quell.

“Good.” He stood straight. “I was invited to that. We’ll go together.”

“No!”

“So we should see each other another time, then?”

Of course not. We should be together some other never. But I hesitated, and that was my mistake.

“I think I should see you before the fundraiser,” he said, “because I want to go with you and show Daniel Brower what he’s missing.”

 

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“You going to take him out to the parking lot and beat him up for me?”

“He deserves far worse.”

Knowing better than to encourage him, I held up my chin. “I’ll decide what he deserves. Thank you, though.”

“Good. I’ll pick you up Wednesday at eight.”

“I’m busy.”

“I’ll have to kiss you now then.” He stepped forward.

I swallowed because his lips, a step closer to mine, were full and satiny, and more than anything, my mouth wanted to feel them.

“Follow me please,” I said like an automaton.

I brushed past him without waiting for a response, walking out the door and down the hall with the manila envelope in my arm. I nodded to my associates and knew he was behind me from the sense of movement and heat at my back. I slipped into a windowless, empty conference room and closed the door when he entered.

“Mister Spinelli—”

On the way to the closed office, I’d prepared a short speech about respecting my boundaries, but I swallowed every word when those satin lips fell on mine. His kiss was a study in paying attention, reacting to me as I reacted to him with increasing intensity. When his tongue touched mine, I lost myself in desire. His hands stayed on my neck, and I became aware of their power and gentleness.

When I put my hands on him, he moved closer, and with a brush on my thigh, I felt his erection. Oh, to be anywhere else. To explore that rigid dick, to feel it in me while those lips hovered over mine. My legs could barely hold me up when he kissed my neck.

“Wednesday,” he whispered, the warmth of his breath and timbre of his voice as arousing as the touch of his lips.

“You don’t really care about the cars.”

“No, I don’t.”

“I’m not making it up. I told my friend I’d be on her set after work Wednesday. I can’t ditch her. Friday. We can do Friday.”

“I accept the spirit of your agreement.”

He reached behind me and turned the doorknob. I put my hair in place and thought cold thoughts. He left, and I watched him stride down the carpeted hall. I didn’t move until he was out the office door. I couldn’t believe he left it like that, without setting up a definite time and place for me to be flat on my back. I felt ill at ease as I scooped up the audit materials and headed back to my little window in my little office in my little corner of the Hollywood system.

ten.

ou want to f**k her.”

Michael nodded. He and Katrina sat on stools at the counter of a tiny coffee shop she’d rented for the scene with staff all around. I held my clipboard and waited, having been told to stay within Michael’s eyesight.

“Right,” he said.

“You know if you f**k her once, she’s yours.”

This conversation happened as if no one was around. As if there weren’t three gaffers playing with the lights and keys with clothes hangers clipping wires and aligning scrims. As if the assistant camera person wasn’t holding up his little light meter to every color of everything and calling out numbers.

“You have to f**k her,” Katrina said with real urgency. “You’re not getting it.”

“I’m getting it.”

Katrina hauled off and slapped Michael in the face. The sound echoed in the halls and rooms of my brain. I flinched and looked at them. I wasn’t supposed to. That was very personal actor/director business, and everyone else had the good sense to ignore it.

Michael made eye contact with me as it happened.

“That,” she said. “That feeling. Right now.”

“I have it,” he said, putting his hand to his lips as if he wanted to hide his face.

“Good. Get to makeup.” She winked at me as Michael strode off, then she called to the cameraman, “We’re shooting him from the right. Have the stand in mark it.” She walked off, barking more orders, and I marked the change in angle on my clipboard.

We would be filming late, and I girded myself with coffee and the knowledge that helping Katrina, even in the tiny role as part-time script supervisor, would right a great wrong that had been done her.

Michael played the scene, which did not include the woman in question, but her best friend. His character was about to bed her out of spite, like a man on a mission to save his testicles. He was riveting. He seized the scene, the set, the crew, and the mousy character who had no idea what she was getting embroiled in. He put his hands up her skirt as if he owned what was under it, but his character didn’t take an ounce of responsibility for what he was doing.

“Cut!” shouted Katrina.

I noted the shot and take, but only after the scene was fully broken. “There’s your Oscar,” I mumbled to Katrina.

“I just want someone to touch this thing with a ten-footer.” She took my clipboard and flipped through the pages on it. “We never got that last line on page thirty. I think we can ADR it.”

“I think WDE will get behind you. Honestly. As long as you promise not to sue anyone again.”

She made a pfft sound that promised nothing. “Dinner break, everyone!”

A production assistant ran up to me as I tucked my papers away. “There’s a man here asking for you.”

It took me about half a second to figure out who he was. “Dark hair and brown eyes?”

“Yeah. He brought dinner.”

“Of course he brought me dinner.” I had to process that while fixing my hair and straightening my sleeves.

 

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“No,” he said. “He brought everyone dinner. He brought you wine.”

***

Movie sets that weren’t dependent on sunlight stayed up all day. So though I’d shown up at six p.m. to relieve the other script supervisor, the set had already been up for twelve hours. Because no one left when there was work to be done, meals and snacks were provided to the entire crew. Bigger productions got more services, with above the line crew (actors, director, producers) getting gourmet catering, and below the line crew (camera, grips, gaffe, PA, AD, on and on and on) getting something good but less noteworthy. On Katrina’s set, everyone got the same mediocre food from a truck wedged into the corner of the parking lot. A few long tables with folding chairs took up parking spaces. The day Antonio showed up for dinner, our French fry and burger habit was broken.

He had a bottle of red wine tucked under his arm and wore a grey sports coat with blood red polo. A woman in her sixties stood under his arm as he talked to Katrina. In front of them were four chafing dishes, plates, utensils, and a line of people.

“You do not get to invade my set,” Katrina said, but I saw her eye the food ravenously. It was peasant food—meaty, saucy deliciousness that would satiate everyone for another four or five hours.

“Mea culpa,” he said. “Your script supervisor accepted a dinner invitation, and Zia Giovana thought it would be rude to bring only for us.”

“It’s my fault,” I said. “I forgot to tell you.”

She spun and gave a smirk just for me. “You lie.”

“If it means you can just eat, I’m guilty as charged.” I pointed at Antonio. “You, sir, are pushy.”

“As charged,” he said. “Let me make it up to you.”

“I think you just did.” A plate of lasagna was pushed into my hands, but Antonio took it from me and passed it to the person behind me.

“Come on. I’m not feeding you outside a trailer.”

He pulled me, but I yanked back. “I have to work.”

Katrina didn’t even look up from her food. “We have to set up the next shot. I’ll text you when I need you. Get out of here.”

I let Antonio put his arm around me and lead me onto the sidewalk. He held the wine bottle by the neck with his free hand. The neighborhood was light-industrial hip, with factories being converted into lofts and warehouses housing upscale restaurants.

“There’s a place around the corner,” he said. “No liquor license yet, so you bring your own.”

“Let me see.” I held my hand out for the bottle and inspected the label. “Napa? You brought a California wine?”

“It’s not good?”

“It’s a great wine, but I figured, you know, Italian?”

He laughed. “I was trying to not be pushy. Meet you halfway.”

“This is how you say ‘not pushy’?”

“You can run. I won’t chase you.”

“You won’t?” I handed him the bottle.

He smiled. “Yeah. I will.”

“Has it occurred to you that the chasing might be what you like about me, and that if I stop running, you might get bored?”

“I don’t get bored. There’s too much to do.”

“It’s funny,” I said. “That’s kind of what I find most boring. Everything to do.”

“You’re doing the wrong things, no? What do you love?”

We crossed onto a block of restaurants. The cobblestone streets were crowded. Tables were set on the sidewalks. Heat lamps kept the chill at bay.

“I don’t love anything, really.”

“Come on. The last thing you enjoyed, that made you feel alive.”

I stopped walking, feeling disproportional frustration with his questions.

He turned to face me and walk backward. “Kissing me doesn’t count.”

“Funny guy.”

A parking valet in a white shirt and black bowtie nearly ran into me, dodged, and opened a car door.

“Think hard,” Antonio said. “The last thing that made you love life.”

“Saying it would be inappropriate.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I could learn to love this thing too, I think.”

My annoyance turned into cruelty. “The last thing I loved doing? Working with Daniel on his campaign. I miss it.”

Still walking backward, arms out to express complete surrender, he said, “Then, to make you happy, I announce that I will run for mayor.”

I laughed. I couldn’t help it. He laughed with me, and I noticed how reserved it was for a man who claimed to enjoy life.

He was on me before I could take in another second of his smile. He pushed his mouth on mine, his arms enveloping me, his hands in my hair. My world revolved around the sensations of him, his powerful body and sweet tongue, his crisp smell, the scratch of the scruff on his chin, and the way he paid attention to his kiss.

I matched his attention so carefully that when we got knocked into by a valet, I gasped. Antonio pulled me close, holding me up and protecting me at the same time.

The valet held up his hands. “I’m so sorry.” He backed away toward a waiting car, reaching for the handle.

“You’re sorry?” Antonio asked. “You don’t look sorry.”

I’d be the first to admit he didn’t look sorry. He looked interested in opening the car door.

“It’s okay, Antonio. He didn’t do it on purpose.”

 

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He looked down at me for a second before looking back at the valet. “He could have knocked you over.”

“But he didn’t.”

The valet opened the door with one hand and with the other, in a slight movement that could be denied later, flicked his hand, as if dismissing Antonio. Quick as a predator, Antonio took two steps toward the valet and pushed him against the car. I stepped into the street, heel bending on the cobblestone, and got between them. The valet’s face was awash in fear, and Antonio’s had an intensity that scared me.

“Antonio. Let’s go, before I have to go back to work,” I said.

He held his finger up to the valet’s face. “You’re going to be careful. Right?”

“Yeah, yeah.” The man looked as though he wanted to be anywhere else.

He stepped back, and I put my hand on his arm. He looked at me with an unexpected tenderness, as if grateful I’d pulled him from oncoming traffic.

“Is there a problem here?”

The authoritative voice cut our moment short. Antonio and I looked to its source.

A short man in a zip-up black jacket and black tie, with a moustache and comb-over, appeared to recognize Antonio when we turned toward him. “Spin.”

“Vito.” Antonio looked the man up and down, pausing on his tag for Veetah Valet Service – Proprietor. He touched it. “Really?”

“I can explain.”

“Yes, you can. After I bring the lady to our table. You’ll be here.”

“Yes, boss.”

Antonio put his arm around me and walked toward an Italian restaurant with tables outside.

“What was that about?” I asked.

“He works for me. I’m going to have to talk to him for a minute.”

“It wasn’t a big deal about the valet.”

“It’s not about the valet.”

I dropped my arm from his waist. He’d closed himself off so suddenly that touching him seemed out of place.

A young man with menus approached. “Outside or inside?”

“In,” Antonio answered, giving the waiter his bottle.

He brought us to a table inside. Antonio held my chair for me and sat across the table, looking a million miles away.

“What happened?” I asked. “You look really annoyed.”

He took my hand. “Trust me, it’s not you.”

“I know it’s not me. What did that guy do?”

“He’s not supposed to run other businesses while he works for me. That’s the rule.”

“That’s a weird rule.”

He smiled but looked distracted. “Let me go talk to him. Then you’ll have my full attention.”

I tapped my watch. “Quickly. I could turn into a pumpkin at any moment.”

After Antonio walked away, the waiter returned with two glasses and our bottle of Napa wine. He poured a touch in my glass, made small talk, filled both glasses, and left.

I waited dutifully, tapping on my phone and watching people. I was walking distance from home and a few blocks from the set, but I wanted to be at that table. I was hungry, and I liked the Antonio I’d walked there with.

The wall facing the street was all windows. Past the rows of outdoor tables, I saw the lights change and cars roll by. Valets ran back and forth with keys and tickets. Antonio came into view, pinching a cigarette to his mouth and letting the smoke drift from out casually. What a stunning man he was. Maybe not in the same affable mood as he had been on the walk to the restaurant, but the intensity that condensed around him made me unable to look away.

He took a last drag and flicked his cigarette into the street. Then he walked in, smoke still drifting from his mouth. “Sorry about that,” he said when he sat.

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah. Just a little talk.”

The waiter came, we heard the specials, and ordered.

Antonio picked up his wine. “Salute.”

I held up my glass and looked at his when they clinked. His hand was firm and powerful, all muscle and vein, and his knuckles were scraped raw. I brushed the backs of my fingers against them.

“Antonio? Were you just talking? Or do they drag when you walk?”

He smiled. He’d gone out tense and returned relaxed. “One of the valets pushed me into a wall. I tried to break my fall, and this is what happened. These guys, they’re paid per car, so they all jump to open doors a little too quick. How is the wine?” His smile was deadly.

“Good. What part of Italy are you from?”

“Napoli. The armpit of Italy, my mother used to say.”

“And you came here for the weather and the easy access to litigator privileges?”

He smirked. “Do I have to answer everything right away?”

“Chasing me around won’t go well if you don’t.”

He leaned over and touched my upper lip. Having him that close, I wanted to let those fingers explore my body. “You tell me where you got this scar. Then I’ll tell you why I came here.”

“I got the scar from a boy.”

“Ah. And I came here because of a girl.”

Appetizers came, filling little dumplings drenched in red sauce. He slipped a couple on my plate then a couple on his.

“You followed a woman here?” I watched him eat with clean efficiency.

“I followed men.” He moved on to the next subject as if his life wasn’t worth lingering on, brushing it off with a practiced, charming facility. “And this boy? His cutting wit, perhaps?”

 

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“His high school ring. This girl. Was she chasing you?” I looked at him over my wine glass.

“No. She’s back home.”

“The girl is home, and you chased a man here because of her?”

“Close enough. What happened to the boy?” he asked.

“He’s dead.”

“Note to self. Don’t scar Theresa Drazen.”

I raised my wine glass to my lips to hide my expression. He’d gotten closer to a truth than he realized.

“So you own a hell of a lot of cars, a restaurant, and you’re a lawyer,” I said. “You contribute enough to the charity of your choice to get invited to the fundraisers. Oh, and you don’t like Porsches. You can beat a guy nearly unconscious with your bare hands. You’re a very interesting guy, Mister Spinelli.”

He touched my hand with the tips of his fingers, finding a curve and tracing it. “Running an accounting department for the biggest agency in Hollywood. Working on the mayoral candidate’s campaign. Helping your friend with her movie in your spare time. And the most poised, graceful woman I ever met. I’m not half as interesting as you.”

I formulated an answer, maybe something clever or maybe I’d continue to ask uncomfortable questions, but my phone dinged. It was Katrina’s new AD.

—We’re starting in ten—

“This has been fun,” I said. “I have to go.”

He stood, reaching into his pocket. “I’ll walk you.”

He tossed a few twenties down and went to the door with me, putting his hand on my back as we exited. I pressed my lips together, avoiding a silly smile. I liked his hand there.

I didn’t see Vito around. The valets were still working the block quickly, if less exuberantly.

“Tell me something,” I said. “Why weren’t you afraid that someone would call the cops that night with the Porsche? I mean, if you didn’t break that guy’s nose, I’ll eat my shoe.”

“Tell me what you think. Why would that be the case?” He put his hands in his pockets as he walked.

“That’s a common debate team switch. Putting the speculation on me.”

“Speculate.” He smiled like a movie star, and I couldn’t help but smile back.

“I’d rather you told me.”

“Maybe I’ve met enough cops in my profession to know how to talk to them, should it come to that.”

“Which profession is that?”

“I’m a lawyer.”

I hadn’t thought much of our harmless back and forth, but when he reminded me he was a lawyer, I caught a tightness in his voice. He glanced away. Most people were puzzles one had to simply collect enough pieces to figure out. My questioning had merely been fact-harvesting until he subtly evaded something so simple.

“If I look up criminal cases you’ve filed, what would I find? I mean, cases where you’ve dealt with the LAPD.”

He looked down at the curb as we crossed the street, holding me back when a car came even though I’d stopped.

“I’m a lawyer for my business. I’ve only had a couple of clients, and mostly they need my help talking to the police. Anything else you feel like you need to know?” He said it with good humor, but there was a wariness to his tone.

“Yes.” We got to the outer edge of the set, where the street was closed off to keep it silent.

“What?”

I knew I shouldn’t ask, but I was tired and still hungry, and the wine had sanded away my barriers. “Is Vito still outside the restaurant running his business?”

The look on his face melted me, as if a fissure had opened and he was trying desperately to keep the lava from pouring out. Then he smiled as if just having decided to let it all go. “Contessa, you are trouble.”

“Is that good or bad?”

“Both.”

My phone dinged again. I didn’t look at it. I knew what it was about. “I have to go.”

“Come volevi tu.” He cupped my cheek in his hand and kissed me quickly before walking away, the picture of masculine grace. He didn’t look back.

eleven.

strapped up my stockings with the TV on. I saw it behind me in the mirror. Daniel wore his pale grey suit and tie, ice in the sun. He’d done well at the debate that afternoon, keeping himself poised, still, and focused. He was the perfect Future Mister Mayor.

BRUCE DRUMMOND: My opponent hasn’t opened a serious case against any crime organization in over a year. Just because it’s peacetime, do we sit on our laurels?

I hadn’t heard from Antonio since he’d left me at the set. I’d been tempted to reach out to him, but to what end? As I watched Daniel, I knew I still had feelings for him. How could I get involved with someone else? How could I take Daniel back? How could I use another man to break my holding pattern?

DANIEL BROWER: Believe me, my office has been gathering information and evidence against a number of organizations. We won’t open a case unless we’re sure we have the evidence we need. Please, let the people know if your administration will recklessly accuse citizens, so they can start looking for an independent prosecutor.

Antonio would be at the fundraiser. Though I was excited to see him, despite the fact that I had to avoid him, he’d become tight and unreadable. He’d avoided telling me about his business, and his story about being pushed by a valet was absurd. Vito hadn’t gone home whistling Dixie. Antonio was Italian. From Naples. Was he a lawyer or criminal? Or both?

 

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BRUCE DRUMMOND: In closing, I love my wife. She’s the only woman for me, and that’s why I married her. As your mayor, I’d never distract—

I liked nice men. Lawful men. Men with a future, a career, who could safely support children. I wasn’t the type to look for the dangerous, exciting guys.

The dress went over my head in one movement. I twisted, struggled, and got the zipper up by myself.

***

It was eighty degrees and humid as hell, the wettest, nastiest, buggiest fall in L.A. history. Totally unexpected. Nothing anyone from the Catholic Charitable Trust could have foreseen when they’d planned an outdoor event ten months before. A string quartet played in the background, and wait staff carried silver trays of endive crab and champagne flutes. I made my way through the crowd alone, smiling and sharing air kisses. The house was a Hancock Park Tudor, kept and restored to the standards of a hotel as if the taste had been wrapped, boxed, and shipped in from a decorator’s mind.

I was standing by the pool with Ute Yanix, talking about Species—the only raw foods place in L.A. that served meat—when Daniel crept up behind me. Ute’s eyes lit up like a Christmas tree, and she brushed back her long straight hair like a silk curtain. Daniel did have a certain something. That thing had made him a frontrunner before the race even started.

“Ute, I’m glad you could make it,” he said.

“You know I support you. All Hollywood does, whether we say it in public or not.”

“I appreciate you being here publicly then.” His hand found mine. “It’s even more important than the donation.”

She laughed a few decibels louder than necessary. “Now more than ever, huh?”

And with a look at me, the heiress in the candidate’s corner, she implied the ugliest things. The first and most dangerous was that Daniel had been running the campaign on my money and now couldn’t.

“I assure you, donations have always been appreciated.” My smile could have lit the Hollywood sign.

The sexting incident was never mentioned on the fundraising floor, but in the bathroom, whispered voices, offered words of support, empathy, understanding, and others were clearly derisive. I had stopped fielding both sentiments.

I didn’t hear the rest of the conversation. Over Ute’s shoulder, I saw a man in a dark suit. Lots of men in dark suits milled around, but they had jeans, open collars, ties optional. He wore a suit like a woman wore lingerie, to accentuate the sexual. To highlight the slopes and lines. To give masculinity a definition. He held his wine glass to me, tearing my clothes off and running his hands over my skin from across the room.

“...but what you’re going to do about the traffic—”

“I’ll be Mayor, not God.” They both laughed.

I’d lost most of the conversation during my locked gaze with Antonio Spinelli. “Excuse me,” I said to my ex and the actress. “Duty calls.”

I walked into the house. The unwritten rule was if the party was in the backyard, guests stayed in the backyard. Wandering off into the personal spaces was bad manners, but I couldn’t help it. I went to the back of the kitchen, to a back hall with a wool Persian carpet and mahogany doors.

“Contessa.”

I didn’t have a second to answer before he put his hands on my cheeks and his mouth on mine. I didn’t move. I didn’t kiss him back. I just took in his scent of dew-soaked pine, wet earth, and smoldering fires. He pulled back, unkissed but not unwanted, his hands still cupping my face.

He brushed his thumb over my lower lip, just grazing the moist part inside. “I want you. I haven’t stopped thinking about you.”

“What happened then?” All my resolve to not use him as a rebound went out the window. “You froze me out yesterday.”

“I don’t like answering questions about myself.”

“I can’t be with you if I don’t know you.”

“Do you want me?”

His breath made patterns on my face. I could have pushed him away, but his attention was an angle, a point of reference, and I was but a line defined by it.

“Yes,” I whispered, putting my head against the wall.

“Let’s have each other then. My body and your body. No expectations. No questions.”

Before I could get offended, he kissed me hard, hurting me. His tongue probed my lips, my teeth, pushing my head against the wall. I was aware of every inch of his body, its warmth, its supple curves, the hair on his face, and I yielded. My insides melted, pooling between my legs. I moved with him like a wave, tongues dancing, jaws aligning. I fell into that kiss, its taste of wine and sweet water, the hum vibrating from the back of his throat. I thought I would burst from my hips outward.

He pulled away with a gasp, still close to me, his eyes darting across my features. “You’re blushing. And you’re panting, just a little.”

I couldn’t speak. I wanted him to kiss me again. My body wanted it. The hairs on my arms stood up when I thought about it.

He put his hand to my chest, between my br**sts, and pressed a little. “Your heart is beating hard. This is what it takes.”

He moved his hand slightly, brushing my hard nipple through my dress. I wanted him to stop, but I didn’t want it to end. If I spoke, the spell would be broken. I’d have to go back to the other me, that spurned, unwanted woman. I opened my mouth but just shook my head. What had I become? What was wrong with me?

“Since the minute I saw you,” he said into my neck, “I’ve wanted to open your legs and take you.”

 

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His words had fingers, and as he spoke, they drifted down my body, fondling me and arousing me. No one had ever spoken like that to me, because I would have laughed with discomfort. But when Antonio said it, I forgot everything but his voice and the image of him moving over me.

“I’m not good at casual sex,” I said in a breath.

“I never said it would be casual.”

I didn’t know what he meant. I didn’t know how sex could be just two bodies meeting without being classified as meaningless. I couldn’t wrap my head around it because he was near me, his hands on my hips, the scruff of his face brushing my neck.

“Take me,” I said before I thought about it.

Like a cat leaping into action, he pulled me through an ajar door, clicking it behind us. We were in a bathroom with marble tiles and double sinks. White curtains. A thousand details I couldn’t absorb because his lips were on mine.

When I heard him lock the door, I surrendered to what was happening. I stopped worrying about where I was or what the future might bring. I tangled my hands in his hair and kissed him for all I was worth. He pulled my knee up over his hip, stroking the back of my thigh. I tried to remember to breathe, but when he leaned into me and I felt the hardness between his legs against the softness between mine, I forgot.

“I’m going to f**k you right here,” he growled. “Are you ready?”

“Yes.” The word came out in a hiss.

“Yes, what?” He pushed against me. “What do you want me to do to you?” He took my hands from his hair and put them above me, pinning me to the wall as he kissed my neck.

“Fuck me.” I said it so softly a butterfly wouldn’t have heard me.

“Say it again. But this time, own it.”

“Fuck me.” A little louder.

He let go of my hands. His fingers brushed past my br**sts to my waist, where they pushed me down against his erection.

“You are so sweet,” he whispered, wrapping my other knee around him, pinning me with his hips. “Dolce. The way you don’t like to say the word f**k, and you say it to me anyway. I know how bad you want me to make you come.”

With that, he hitched me up and carried me to the vanity. He balanced me on it as he kissed me, grinding between my legs and driving me crazy. I yanked up my skirt.

“Antonio,” I said, “protection.”

“I have it.”

I spent a little time worrying about having sex with a man who carried condoms around. Just a second. Just a stab of my real self, the one who was going to walk out of that bathroom when we were done. He took half a step back and pulled my knees apart. I leaned back as he slipped his fingers under my garter belt, finding the crotch of my panties.

“I like these,” he said.

“Thank you.”

He poked his finger through the lace and yanked with his other hand. The lace gave way with a bark of a rip, leaving my underwear with a gaping hole. He stroked me. I didn’t know if I’d ever been that wet.

“I can’t help it. I have to taste you.” He put his face at the inside of my thigh and brushed his tongue on the sensitive skin. His hands stroked, tongue flicking, lips a soft center to the roughness of his face. When he made it to my pu**y with a soft suck at my clit, I moaned. “Do you like it?” he asked before he circled my opening with his tongue.

“Yes.”

“Yes what?”

“Yes, suck it. Eat me. Take me with your mouth.”

The string quartet purred outside, and the party hummed along while I begged for a man’s tongue on me. His tongue flicked, finding every want, every emptiness, and filling it with sensation. He sucked just a little then ran the flat of his tongue over my clit until my pu**y felt like a bursting balloon.

“Antonio.” My voice squeaked. I was on the edge.

“Come,” he said, looking up at me. “I’m still going to f**k you.”

When he put his lips on me again, his eyes watching me over the horizon of my gathered skirt, I let him fill me. I came hard, lifting my hips as he grabbed my thighs to keep me from falling over. I was beyond cries, beyond words. I was just a receptacle for the pleasure of a tiny percentage of my body.

I didn’t have a second to breathe before he positioned himself above me. His pants were open, and his dick lay against my engorged clit. I reached down. He’d gotten it out and wrapped while he was eating me.

“You’re very skilled,” I said. “And you’re huge.”

He put his fingers in me. I was sensitive and swollen, soaked in desire.

“You’re tight. So tight. Fuck.” His eyes went to half-mast, and he sucked in a breath. “Spread your legs all the way.”

I did, and he guided the head of his dick into me. I stretched when he thrust, a little sting of pain drowned by pleasure.

“You okay?” he asked.

I nodded. I felt as if I had a telephone pole in me, but I wouldn’t complain about it. Maybe I should have asked him to go slow, because he shoved himself in until my expression told him he couldn’t go any farther. He shifted my hips then pushed forward. He found space to fill and drove into me up to the base, pushing his body into me. I put my hands on his face, and he leaned down. We were eye to eye, nose to nose, bodies moving together, the swell of tension returning.

“You’re beautiful,” I said, my thumb on his lips.

He kissed my thumb, running his tongue along the length as he f**ked me. We were dressed up but joined in our most vulnerable places. My back hurt where it was pushed against the stone vanity, and my shoulder was jammed into a cabinet. I heard the sounds of the party, and one of my shoes was about to fall off. I felt ripped apart by the size of him.