Blonde Ambition

by Zoey Dean

  The post-game party was at the home of Kyle Bauersachs, one of the substitutes on the Beverly Hills team. However, his father was the most successful personal injury lawyer in southern California, which was why the family owned one fantastic mansion off Bellagio Road in Bel Air and another oceanfront one in Malibu. Mr. and Mrs. Bauersachs permitted Kyle to host one post-game party per year, at the mansion of his choice.

  Kyle had chosen Malibu this year. To ensure a good crowd at the Van Nuys game, he’d passed the word that any student who brought his or her ticket stub could come to the after party. Some enterprising kid had printed fake stubs and sold them for five bucks a pop, which accounted for why guys pushing a decade older than high-school were hitting on the high school girls. And why so many cars were trying to get over Topanga Canyon that there was a traffic jam at the turn onto Pacific Coast Highway.

  Cammie somehow got separated from her friends soon after they came through the front door, so she strolled around on her own. The house was ultra-modern—in fact, it looked like it had been lifted wholesale from the set of A Clockwork Orange. All stark furniture, right angles, white walls, and vaguely phallic-looking sculptures, the main living room was a seething, writhing mass of students and friends celebrating the unlikely victory.

  Cammie saw Kyle coming out of the kitchen, a case of Belgian beer in his arms. He was still in his basketball jersey, since he hadn’t gotten into the game. His eyes lit up when he realized that Cammie Sheppard had actually showed up at his party. “Cammie! Hi!”

  She waggled two fingers at him. “Nice party, Kyle.” “Hey, thanks. Catch me later, let’s dance!”

  She nodded, thinking, Over my cold, dead body, you loser.

  She wandered into a game room, filled with pool tables, Foosball sets, and a giant plasma television that was showing music videos. To her left was a wide corridor that evidently led to a suite of bedrooms. A guy Cammie had never seen before leaned against the door frame and scanned her from head to foot and then back up again. At least twenty-five, and he already had a beer belly.

  Ex–USC frat boy, Cammie thought automatically. “What’s your name, sweetheart?” The frat boy was saying hello.

  “I don’t have one,” Cammie said, dripping vocal icicles. “When’d you graduate from the University of Southern California?”

  “Two years ago,” Frat Boy 25 said. “I’m Lenny. Kyle’s cousin. Mmm, you look good enough to eat. You been down to the hot tub, clothing very optional?”

  “Gee, I haven’t, Lenny. Not yet, anyway. You heading that way?”

  “Oh yeah.” Frat Boy 25 was practically drooling. “Well, when you get there, Lenny, go fuck yourself. That is, if you can unearth any equipment below that gut of yours.” Cammie pivoted and walked away, wondering why so many guys were such complete assholes and whether their mothers raised them to be that way.

  Cammie toured the living room—wall-to-wall dancing—went out to the deck—drugs, drinks, and various stages of foreplay—and headed down to the beachfront patio—all of the above. But she was alone. Everyone seemed to be having a fabulous time but her. She slipped off her shoes and let them dangle from her fingers as she left the patio and walked through the lush sand all the way to the ocean’s edge, where the raucous sound of the party mixed with the steady whooshwhoosh of the incoming swells.

  There she stood at the high-water line and stared morosely at the breakers. What was wrong with her lately? She just couldn’t seem to get into a party mood. Even flirting was starting to feel like wasted energy.

  Then Cammie saw movement in the moonlight about thirty yards down the beach. Adam Flood, in jeans and a sweatshirt. He was alone, too. Cammie watched as he skipped a flat stone against an incoming wave—the stone bounced five times before sinking into the water. Then he fished for something in his pocket, and Cammie heard the sound of a set of keys being extracted. Only then did he look up and see Cammie smiling at him.

  “Leaving?” she asked. “You’ve come the wrong way. Valet’s up by the Pacific Coast Highway.”

  Adam shrugged. “Don’t seem to be in a party animal frame of mind.”

  “Me neither.”

  Adam laughed. “Color me shocked. I thought ‘Party Animal’ was Cammie Sheppard’s middle name.”

  “Maybe you don’t know me as well as you thought you did.” Cammie’s voice was almost a purr as she did an instant revise of her thought processes. Maybe flirting was fun after all. She fell in next to him, and they sauntered back toward the house. “You played a great game tonight.”

  He looked amused. “As compared to—?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, have you ever been to a basketball game before?”

  “Not recently,” Cammie admitted.

  “Not ever,” Adam corrected.

  “If you want to be technical about it. But I had fun.” About halfway back to the house they reached an array of cushioned wooden benches that belonged to Kyle’s family. Cammie sat and patted the seat next to her. But Adam rested on the next bench instead. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Man, I’m whipped.”

  She was about to offer to massage it for him, but something stopped her. “That last basket was fantastic.”

  “Thanks. You can’t imagine how many times I’ve taken that shot in practice and missed.” His smile crinkled the corners of his eyes. For the third time in twelve hours Cammie noticed how cute he was.

  “Fifteen? Fifty?” Cammie asked, though she knew Adam’s question was rhetorical. Then she remembered something that had been utterly unimportant in her life until this very instant. “You know, my dad has a skybox at the Staples Center. I’m sure he could hook you up if you wanted to see the Lakers sometime.”

  Cammie expected Adam to jump at the chance, but he didn’t. “You know, I’d rather play on that court when no one else is around than be in the stands for game seven of the play-offs,” Adam said softly. “Ghosts.”

  “Ghosts?”

  “Yeah. If you listen hard enough. Magic, Jerry West, Kareem. Ghosts.”

  Cammie had lived in Los Angeles long enough to know that Adam was referring to Los Angeles Lakers greats of the past. “Well, if you ever change your mind …”

  “Thanks.” He stood but hesitated. “Did you want to go back in, or—?”

  “Hang out with me a few more minutes, okay?” she pleaded. Then she took a shot in the dark. “I know you want to go find Sam, but … I thought we could talk.”

  He sat again, albeit reluctantly. And he didn’t say anything about Sam, which Cammie interpreted as a good sign. She stretched, showing off her diamond-and-ruby navel ring plus the gold belly chain that sat above the top of her jeans. She saw Adam notice it. How could he not? He was hetero and breathing, wasn’t he?

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Shoot.”

  “Well, I know that you and Anna … that is, I heard how badly she treated you.”

  Adam shook his head. “I don’t want to talk about that.”

  “I understand. It’s just … Sam is my best friend,” Cammie said, oozing sincerity. “And I really don’t want to see her hurt.”

  “Sam? We’re not … We’re buds.”

  Interesting. Because Cammie had been convinced that Sam wanted a lot more from Adam than friendship. Well, it served Sam right for spending her time with that bitch Anna instead of with Cammie. Cammie would have figured out Adam’s only-friendship vibe a long time ago and warned Sam that Adam wasn’t into her.

  Adam checked his watch. “Hey, I really have to go, Cammie.”

  “Never hurry, never worry.” Cammie smiled, quoting her favorite childhood book, Charlotte’s Web.

  Adam grinned. “You’re an E. B. White fan?”

  “That book always reminds me of my mom,” Cammie said, standing up and stretching luxuriantly. “Can I walk you back to the house?”

  Adam stood, too. “Sure.”

  Out of the corner of her eye Cammie spotted Sam heading toward them. “Bu
t first,” Cammie said, “there’s something I’ve wanted to do ever since that final buzzer went off.”

  “Yeah?” Adam asked.

  Making sure that she and Adam were positioned so that Sam had the best-possible sight line, Cammie wrapped her arms around Adam’s neck. Then she gave him the softest, most promising of kisses. “Good job,” she whispered in his ear.

  “Uh … thanks,” he said, edging slightly away from her.

  Understandable. He’d probably never been hit on by a girl with as powerful a mojo as Cammie’s. But the truly, deeply weird thing was, at that moment, her focus wasn’t on showing Sam who was boss. She wasn’t even thinking about how much Adam had to want her after that. Because the most bizarre thing had just happened: she was the one, not him, whose breath caught in her throat. Because all she wanted to do was to go on kissing Adam Flood.

  Five Different Camera Angles

  Anna twisted her key into the front door of her father’s house and disarmed the alarm before it could send a silent alert to the Beverly Hills police department. Once the alarm was off, she slipped out of her black velvet Chanel ballet flats and dangled them on two fingers as she headed upstairs to her room. Before she undressed for the night, she remembered that she’d turned off her cell phone at Dublin’s, so she powered it back up. It hadn’t been activated for thirty seconds before it chimed.

  “Hello?”

  “Anna? Are you okay?” Ben. Sounding panicked. “Yes, I’m fine,” she assured him.

  “I called you four times,” Ben said. “Once you didn’t answer, the other times your phone was off. You scared the piss out of me.”

  “I was working,” Anna said as she sat on her bed. “Clark Sheppard took me to the set of Hermosa Beach.”

  “And kept you until midnight?” Ben asked. “What a schmuck.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t pick up your calls.” She wondered what she should tell Ben about Danny Bluestone. If anything.

  “As long as you’re all right. So, listen. Didn’t you mention that tomorrow was some kind of city education conference, so there’s no school?”

  She had.

  “So I thought we could spend the day together. Maybe head down to the South Bay beaches or up to Carpinteria—the weather’s supposed to be great. And then tomorrow night we can have dinner at my house. My parents want to meet you. If you can deal, that is. So, you up for it?”

  “Sure,” Anna said. Ben’s idea really did sound like fun, except perhaps for the dinner-with-the-parents part. But she couldn’t very well tell her boyfriend that she didn’t want to meet his folks. And Clark hadn’t said anything to her about having to work that day.

  “Great. I’ll pick you up early, say nine?”

  She agreed, they said good night, and then Anna hung up. For a moment she sat on her bed, staring at nothing, convincing herself that she really did want to spend the day with Ben. It would be fantastic. All those romantic feelings for him would still be there. She was sure of it.

  She picked up her messages. Ben. Ben again. And then her father, calling from Arizona.

  “Hey, sorry I missed you. I just wanted to tell you that your sister’s doing fine at White Mountains. She actually hugged me before I left—that’s gotta be some kind of progress. I spoke with one of the counselors there, who’s pretty optimistic. So listen, I’ve decided to take a few more days off, maybe a week. Thought I’d drive over to Taos in New Mexico and get in some skiing. Thought you might want to join me. Call my cell and let me know. Hope you’re not too lonely rattling around in that house. Make sure Django takes care of whatever you need, honey. Ciao.”

  He clicked off. So did Anna. She pulled off her clothes and padded into the bathroom to shower, thinking that it was typical of her father to suggest that she join him, as if school and other commitments simply didn’t exist.

  After her shower she slipped into the antique lace nightgown her grandmother had given her on her last birthday, got into bed, and turned out the light. Moonlight streamed in through the window; arched lines of light and dark played over her paisley quilt. She lay there, gazing at them, wondering at her own behavior.

  Beware of what you wish for.

  Anna had wished for Ben. Her wish had come true. Yet only a few days later she’d found herself with Danny, as if she didn’t have a boyfriend at all. And what about Django? She liked him. A lot.

  Anna knew what her best friend in Manhattan, Cyn, would say. Cyn would tell her in that all-knowing way she had that flirting meant she wasn’t ready to be tied down. But what if it simply meant Anna was fickle? Or that she was afraid of a real relationship? The last thing she wanted was to be like Cammie Sheppard, who reveled in flexing her sex appeal simply because she could. It was so … so … tawdry.

  No. That wasn’t her.

  So what, then? She snuggled under the covers and closed her eyes. Her final thought before falling asleep was this: What if it meant that she really did want a relationship … but she had simply picked the wrong guy?

  All Anna’s fears of the night vanished with the morning sun. Ben picked her up at nine on the dot; he looked hot in simple khaki shorts and a white tee. It had been Ben’s idea that they drive down to Hermosa Beach but hers to offer a tour of the TV show set later in the day. So what if she had enjoyed a mild flirtation with Danny the night before? She was in a relationship, yes, but she wasn’t dead. That Ben declined her offer didn’t bother her at all.

  They breakfasted at Two Hussies, a restaurant on the corner of the Strand, the broad pedestrians-only strip of restaurants and boutiques that met the asphalt walk by the beach. It was unusually warm for January, and they were able to sit outside, overlooking the sand and surf. Ben sat next to her so that they both faced the ocean, an arm draped loosely around her shoulders. A steady stream of runners, joggers, and Rollerbladers passed them on the walkway, either heading north toward Santa Monica or south toward Palos Verdes. The asphalt, Ben told her, stretched for seventeen miles.

  “Man, this is the life,” he said with a sigh. “I read in the Times today that the high in New York yesterday was three degrees. Fahrenheit. Hard to believe.”

  She leaned into him. “Does it make you wish you weren’t going back?”

  He grinned at her. “You make me wish I wasn’t going back.”

  Their waitress, clad in a skintight abbreviated Hussy logo shirt and short-shorts that looked spray-painted to her thighs, brought their breakfast: eggs Benedict for him, a veggie omelet for her. The waitress refilled their coffee, offered a perfunctory smile, and headed back inside. Anna checked to see if Ben’s eyes followed her retreating butt. They didn’t, so she repositioned her napkin on her lap, uncomfortable that she was testing him like that.

  “This is so different from the East Coast,” she mused, trying to make conversation.

  “How’s that?” Ben asked as he cut into his eggs.

  Anna took a sip of coffee. “We had a house in the Hamptons for years. East. God, I loved it. An old colonial, right on the beach, on a street that looked as if you’d gone back in time,” she remembered. “My mother sold it when Susan started high school—she never said why. Susan and I were ready to go back, like we did every summer, and she casually dropped that she’d sold it, just like that. After that, we’d stay there with friends, but it was never the same.”

  “So how was it different than this?” Ben asked.

  Anna toyed with a slice of omelet. “Oh, it’s all snotty wealth and good breeding—or people trying to pass as that,” she said with a laugh. “One year a good friend of my mother’s had a show at Downtown Guild Hall. Of course, she insisted that Susan and I dress up in little Lilly Pulitzer outfits, and—”

  “Whoa, back up. What kind of show where?”

  “An art show. Modern art. But it was really Susan and I who were on display. ‘Cross your ankles when you sit, girls. Don’t muss your dresses, girls.’”

  Ben shook his head. “What about beaches and sand castles and playing with dead crab
s?”

  “We did all that,” Anna agreed. “But everything is so much more formal than this. They do their best to keep the riffraff out. It’s difficult to describe.”

  Ben hooked his pinkie to hers. “Well, we’ll just have to go back there together. Who knows? Maybe one day we can buy your old house.”

  She smiled because it was such a sweet notion. “Or maybe I’ll visit you at Princeton in the spring and take you to Montauk Point. It really is spectacular.”

  Ben put his fork down. “Can you lighten up on the Princeton talk?”

  Why was he so irked? It didn’t make any sense to her. Unless … yes. That had to be it.

  “Are you worried about your parents being able to afford it?”

  “Afford what?”

  “Princeton. Tuition.”

  “It’s complicated.”

  Anna shrugged. “That’s okay. I’ll listen.”

  “It’s not money,” Ben told her earnestly. “It’s just that I’m still worried about my mom and dad. Dad’s going to Gamblers Anonymous meetings. And Mom’s doing okay. But still.”

  “I understand. But you were the one who told me that we have to stop trying to be the ones to fix our families. That it wasn’t our responsibility.” She bit off a piece of her omelet and chewed it thoughtfully.

  “I did.” Ben smiled. “Sometimes it’s easier if you don’t practice what you preach—if your head tells you one thing and your heart tells you another. Anyway, I have it all worked out with Princeton. If I get back there at a reasonable time and do okay on my midterms, there’ll be no problems.”

  “Sure?” Anna asked.

  “Sure.” Ben balled up his napkin and threw it on the table. “Nah. Enough of this serious East Coast crap. I’m a California boy, and you, my dear, are now an honorary California girl. So what do you say we do something totally West Coast?”

  “Get wasted and have sex on the beach?” she teased. “Hell, yeah!” Ben threw his head back, laughing. He saw the waitress out of the corner of his eye and motioned for the check. “But first, let’s get out there.”