Fame

by Tilly Bagshawe

  ‘Christina.’

  Chrissie spun around. A gleaming silver Rolls-Royce with blacked-out windows and polished chrome hubcaps had pulled alongside her. It was one of the most vulgar, ostentatious cars one could imagine, the sort of vehicle favoured by rap stars or newly signed NBA players. So she was doubly surprised when a familiar blond head poked out of the window, smiling broadly.

  ‘I heard you were in town. How incredible to run into you like this.’

  ‘Crazy,’ Chrissie agreed, smiling back.

  Harry Greene looked as suavely handsome as Chrissie remembered him. Physically, he was the antithesis of Dorian: blond and slim and always immaculately dressed (today he wore a cream linen Armani shirt and matching jacket and classic vintage Ray-Bans) versus Dorian’s dark, heavy-set scruffiness. In his manner, too, he was everything that Dorian wasn’t: attentive, flirtatious, thoughtful. There was nothing wild about Harry Greene, nothing uncontrolled, yet he exuded power in a way that made Chrissie feel flattered, excited and nervous all at the same time whenever he looked at her.

  ‘Are you busy?’

  Trick question, thought Chrissie. If I’m busy, that’s his cue to drive away. If I’m not busy, I look like a loser, like a spare part. She glanced at her watch. ‘Not for an hour or so. My meeting finished early, and I’m not picking Saskia up from ballet class till three.’

  ‘Great,’ said Harry, jumping out and opening the passenger door of his pimpmobile. ‘Hop in. I got something I wanna show you.’

  Chrissie looked hesitant.

  ‘Come on,’ insisted Harry, ‘It’ll be fun. I’ll get you to the ballet class on time, I promise. And on the way we can talk about how much we both despise your husband.’

  Chrissie laughed. That did sound like fun. And God knew she had nothing else to do.

  ‘OK. I’m game. But I can’t be late for my daughter.’

  Harry grinned, helping her into the car. ‘Trust me.’

  What Harry Greene wanted to show her was a house.

  ‘House’ was the technical term for the building. ‘Single Occupancy Four Seasons Hotel’ would have more accurately described the property, set behind the enormous stone gates of Coldwater Canyon on a five-acre plot of flat land. At the top of a half-mile drive lined with perfectly symmetrical poplar trees stood a mock-Tudor pile of well over 30,000 square feet. There were formal gardens with peacocks strutting around the lawns, koi ponds, multiple swimming pools complete with waterfalls and rock pools, and even a quarter-size golf course. Most impressive of all, though, were the views. Stepping out of the car, Chrissie could see right across the city to the Pacific and Catalina Island beyond. She felt like a queen, surveying her kingdom. Harry’s kingdom.

  ‘This is yours?’ she gasped, genuinely dazzled.

  ‘Not yet,’ said Harry. ‘It’s on the market for ninety million dollars. I’m thinking about it, but I need a second opinion. Shall we go inside?’

  Inside, the house was a tasteless riot of conspicuous consumption, as impressive as it was vulgar. You couldn’t move for marble and gold, from the floors to the taps to the door handles. Ridiculously over-the-top chandeliers hung in every room, even the maids’ kitchen, and flat-screen televisions emerged from the most unexpected places – inside closets, descending out of ceilings, rising up from floors, appearing ghost-like from behind two-way glass mirrors. The bedrooms, all fifteen of them, were laid with cream shag carpeting so thick and soft that if you took your shoes off it felt as if you were walking through custard, and the beds had all been dressed in vivid silks – purple, pink, orange, like a Miami nightclub owner’s wet dream.

  ‘What do you think?’ Harry asked Chrissie, halfway through the tour. They were in the gym-and-pool complex, a gaudily mosaiced room that was evidently supposed to be Roman in theme, but which had nonetheless been plagued by the curse of the chandeliers.

  ‘Honestly?’ said Chrissie. ‘It looks like Liberace ate too many sequins and threw up. Impressive but vile. You couldn’t live here, not without redecorating the entire place.’

  ‘Couldn’t you?’ Harry raised a quizzical eyebrow.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Chrissie blushed. ‘I couldn’t. I guess somebody must have liked it. Do you … is this to your … taste?’

  Harry shrugged. ‘I’m not sure I have a taste, as such,’ he said honestly. ‘With my movies, I care, I pore over every frame. But a house is just a roof over my head.’

  ‘Pretty expensive roof,’ said Chrissie. ‘If I were paying ninety million bucks for a place, I’d want it to be perfect down to the very last lampshade.’ She glanced around at the enormous gym complex and sighed. ‘There’s so much I could do to this place.’

  ‘Great. Design it then.’

  Chrissie looked at Harry. His face was impassive, unreadable. Was he serious?

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Why not?’ Harry shrugged. ‘You’re in LA now; you have some time on your hands. You know about interior design, spaces and what-not.’

  ‘Well, yes, but …’

  ‘I’ll knock ten million off my offer to pay for interiors, and I’ll pay you fifteen per cent commission.’

  ‘It’s very kind of you,’ said Chrissie, hugely gratified that a man like Harry Greene would trust her taste to that degree, and with something as personal and intimate as his own home, too. ‘But I can’t possibly accept. I’m not even a professional interior designer. It’s just something I’ve done with my own homes, you know, for fun.’

  Reaching into his jacket pocket, he whipped out a chequebook and a silver Montblanc pen and started writing. Ripping it off and folding it, he handed it to Chrissie. ‘You’re a professional now. Congratulations.’

  He looked at her, his cold, grey eyes boring into hers, and Chrissie felt all the protestations die on her lips. He’s like Rasputin, she thought excitedly, aware of the pulse of desire building between her legs. He’s so masterful, you can’t deny him anything.

  ‘In any case,’ Harry smiled, ‘I don’t think I would want to buy a house that you couldn’t live in. That sounds awfully limiting.’

  Chrissie’s heart skipped a beat. Is he suggesting what I think he’s suggesting?

  ‘Come on.’ Slipping a hand around the small of her back, Harry guided her back towards the stairs. ‘We can talk more about the house tomorrow. Right now we should get you to that ballet recital.’

  It was only later, once Harry had gone and she was back in Brentwood with Saskia, that Chrissie unfolded the cheque.

  It was for $1.5 million dollars.

  She wasn’t sure what game Harry Greene was playing, exactly. But with this sort of prize money thrown in on day one, Chrissie Rasmirez was in. If it all came to nothing, she could always fall back on Dorian. For all that he’d insulted her and ignored her and rejected her sexually, she knew in her heart of hearts that Dorian still loved her. All she had to do was pull away, and he came running, like a little lost dog.

  Yes, in an uncertain world, Dorian’s devotion was the one thing of which Chrissie was totally, unwaveringly certain.

  Outside Cecconi’s on Doheny and Melrose, the usual gaggle of paparazzi gathered on the pavement, ready to snap celebrity diners on their way home. There were a number of starry restaurants on this side of town: Il Sole on Sunset, Jen Aniston’s favourite; Katsuya on La Cienega, where the Simpson sisters hung out. But Cecconi’s remained the undisputed number one, at least in terms of genuine A-list. Simon Cowell called the restaurant his ‘kitchen’. Tom and Katie were regulars, as were Posh and Becks, who’d both had their birthday parties at the unprepossessing corner building with its French bistro interiors, complete with tiled floors and vast ham hocks hanging behind the bar for charcuterie chic. Gwen Stefani, Jack Nicholson, LiLo and Sam Ronson, Kobe Bryant … the list of celebrity clients went on and on, so much so that it had been known for ordinary citizens to face waits of up to three months to get a dinner reservation that wasn’t at 5.30 p.m. or 11.15 p.m.

  On a Tuesday in October, however, an
d early in the evening at that, none of the paps had expected much action. So when word spread that Viorel Hudson and Sabrina Leon had arrived for an early dinner, the excitement was palpable.

  In the six weeks since they’d been ‘out’ publicly as a couple, Sabrina and Vio had quickly risen to become the tabloid editors’ most wanted. Their unexpected love affair, the most photogenic event since Brad and Angie got together, had transformed Sabrina’s media profile overnight from Wicked Witch of the West to America’s Unlikeliest Sweetheart, and raised Viorel’s to undisputed A-list status. Together, they were a gold mine. US Weekly readers couldn’t get enough of how the handsome Mr Hudson had ‘tamed’ wild child Sabrina Leon. In love, and visibly aglow with contentment, Sabrina had ditched her trademark miniskirts and black leather for a softer, more feminine look. The fashion editors adored it, and the tabloids gorged themselves on the ‘Bad Girl Made Good’ angle, until even Sabrina’s agent, Ed Steiner, started to worry that the exposure might be too much and start to detract from her profile as an actress.

  ‘You don’t need to worry about that,’ Sabrina told him, with a rare flash of her old arrogance. ‘Once Wuthering Heights comes out, they’ll start talking about my acting again. It’s the best work I’ve done, I’m sure of it.’

  From the paps point of view, the problem was getting a shot of them together. Sabrina, once the ultimate party girl and as easy to find out on the scene on a Saturday night as a gay man at a Barbra Streisand concert, had suddenly turned all homebodyish and reclusive. She and Vio were rarely out, and never in the clubs or up at the Chateau, their usual haunts. Sabrina’s new-found shyness extended to interviews as well. Whereas before she would happily spout off, drunk, about her sex life to any reporter who asked her, now she refused to answer any ‘intimate’ questions about her and Viorel’s relationship. ‘All I will say is that we’re very happy’ was as far as she’d go, a mantra repeated endlessly to journalists and TV stations across the country with a sweet, guileless smile. And, of course, her reticence only whetted the public’s appetite further. Just looking at Sabrina and Vio together, observing the body language, the way they leaned into one another and touched constantly, you could see that their sex life must be explosive. The fans couldn’t get enough.

  Tonight, dressed in a pale green Chloé gypsy skirt and flowing silk blouson top from Chanel, she breezed out of Cecconi’s a few paces ahead of Viorel, looking ravishingly angelic as she handed the valet their ticket. The clicking of cameras was deafening and, despite the restaurant security’s best efforts, a number of photographers broke ranks and ran towards Sabrina, pushing and shoving each other violently in their eagerness to get the closest shot. Sabrina looked panicked.

  ‘Hey. HEY!’ Viorel came forward, pulling Sabrina towards him and shielding her with his body. ‘Back off,’ he said angrily. ‘This is out of line, guys. You’re way too close. Leave her alone.’

  It was a terrific image, Vio playing knight in shining armour in vintage Levis and a dark blue Turnbull & Asser shirt, the quintessential Englishman-in-LA look, his dark, brooding good looks heightened by his anger. And Sabrina was in shot too, clinging to him for protection like a baby bird nestling under its mother’s wing. Fucking adorable.

  Pop pop pop went the flashbulbs. Vio was tempted to lash out and punch one of the paps but, knowing how much mileage they’d get out of him losing his temper, he restrained himself. Happily, his Bugatti arrived seconds later. With the help of security he was able to bundle Sabrina safely into it before driving away at speed, scattering photographers like dead leaves as he roared off along Melrose towards Santa Monica Boulevard.

  ‘You OK?’ he asked Sabrina, once they’d finally shaken off the last of the stragglers.

  ‘I’m fine.’ She reached across and laid her hand over his as it rested on the gear stick. It was incredible how physical contact with him, however minimal, instantly calmed her. She could feel her pulse slowing and the adrenaline from their run-in with the paparazzi ebbing like a receding tide. Soon they’d be home, cocooned from the world in their private Venice fortress. Sabrina still owned her house in the Hollywood Hills, but had spent only two nights there since they got back to LA, and had come to think of Viorel’s apartment on Navy as ‘their’ place. Last weekend they’d spent a blissful Sunday pottering around the furniture stores on Beverly and Robertson, picking out a new bed. Sabrina had never been the jealous type before, but with Viorel she found she couldn’t stand the thought of making love in a bed where he’d been with other women.

  ‘I know it’s superstitious and crazy,’ she told him, ‘but I want a fresh start. I want everything to be perfect from now on, you know?’

  Viorel did know. And it worried him. Love affairs were rarely perfect. He certainly wasn’t perfect. With every passing day, Sabrina’s expectations seemed to rise and rise like flood-waters at the levee. He tried hard to shake the feeling that eventually the flood would overwhelm him. That the intensity of Sabrina’s love would drown him. He tried to find the words to express any of this to Sabrina, but every time he looked at her loving, trusting face, his nerve failed him. They bought the new bed.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ said Sabrina, as they arrived at their underground garage and the door swung open to welcome them. ‘What are we gonna do about Christmas?’

  ‘Do we have to “do” something about it?’ asked Vio, parking and switching off the engine. ‘Last time I heard, you couldn’t stop Christmas from coming. Some guy called the Grinch tried once, but apparently it came all the same.’

  ‘Ha ha, very funny,’ said Sabrina. They stepped into the elevator. Seconds later they were in the apartment. ‘I meant are we gonna stay here, are we gonna go away some place?’ She kicked off her shoes. ‘Cabo’s real romantic at Christmastime, but part of me thinks we should stay home and do the whole shebang, you know? We can get a tree, we can bake pecan pies …’

  We, we, we, thought Vio. ‘It’s not even Halloween yet, sweetheart.’ Sinking down on the couch he reached for the TV remote. ‘Let’s see how we feel. Keep it spontaneous.’

  ‘OK,’ said Sabrina. She tried to sound unconcerned, but Vio could hear the disappointment in her voice. ‘Sorry. It’s just, I never really had a proper Christmas before.’

  Vio put down the remote. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well,’ Sabrina sat down next to him, ‘I mean, obviously I had Christmas. But the last few years I spent it with Camille and Sean, looped out of my mind.’

  ‘Oh.’ Vio frowned. Sabrina’s vacuous hangers-on had called her ceaselessly the first week they got back to LA, to the point where Vio had had to persuade her to ditch her old phone and get a new number. The last thing she needed was those parasites back in her life.

  ‘And before that I was always filming somewhere,’ said Sabrina.

  ‘On Christmas Day?’

  ‘Sure. I made sure I was working Christmas Day.’

  Vio looked puzzled. ‘Why?’

  Sabrina shrugged. ‘I kinda always had a bad time with Christmas. When I was a kid, in Fresno, the Christmases in the children’s home were so sad. The staff would make an effort, give you presents and all. But it was so fake, everybody trying real hard to act like a family, when in reality nobody there gave a shit whether you lived or died.’

  ‘How do you know they didn’t give a shit?’ asked Viorel gently.

  ‘How did you know your mother didn’t give a shit about you?’ asked Sabrina. ‘You’re a kid. You just know.’

  Vio nodded understandingly. He couldn’t argue with that.

  ‘Plus, in my case, my “house father”, the guy at the home who was kind of in charge of me, snuck into my room on Christmas Eve when I was twelve and tried to put his dick in my mouth. So that was like, you know, “Merry Christmas!”’ She laughed, rolling her eyes, but Vio could see the pain underneath, the scar this bastard had left behind him. ‘That kind of finished things off for me.’

  ‘Poor baby.’ He pulled her closer, slipping his hand
s beneath her silk Chanel blouse, stroking the bare skin on her back. How could anybody treat a twelve-year-old kid like that? he thought bitterly. No wonder she’s been so fucked up.

  As always when he touched her, Sabrina’s response was instant, her back arching and her pupils dilating. She kissed him greedily, pulling his face closer with her hands, opening her mouth as she pressed her soft lips against his hard ones and wriggling out of her skirt like a snake shedding its skin. Within a few seconds she was naked in his arms, a smooth, caramel-limbed, exotic creature offering herself up to him completely. No man could resist this, Vio told himself. Sabrina’s desire was a huge aphrodisiac, but at the same time it could be so powerful, so overwhelming that at times Vio felt out of his depth, like a leaf being dragged along in a fast-flowing current. Many women had wanted him, but Sabrina seemed to need him in a way he’d never experienced before. As if by their physical union she was somehow sucking the life force out of him, feeding from his desire for her like a mosquito gorging on blood. He wanted to pull back, to slow things down, to distance himself. But how could he when she was so ridiculously desirable, a complete virtuoso between the sheets? Not to mention the fact that, in the last few days especially, she’d started opening up to him about her childhood and the horrific experiences that had shaped her life. Sabrina Leon, who never showed vulnerability – to anyone. She trusts me, thought Vio. If I break that trust, I’m as bad as every other asshole who’s abused her or let her down. He desperately did not want to be another ‘bad man’ on Sabrina’s lifelong list of losers and users.

  Sabrina undid his belt buckle one-handed and straddled him on the couch, the palest pink nipples of her magnificent breasts on a tantalizing level with his mouth, brushing his lips with a feather-light touch, then pulling away as he opened his mouth to try to kiss them. Viorel groaned with pleasure, unbuttoning his Levis and releasing his rock-hard erection.