“When I first met you, the only things you ever cared about were shoes and boys.”
“Well I guess I grew up somewhere along the way. What about you, what do you want?”
“I want you, princess. I’ve always wanted you. I just don’t know that I can afford you.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means falling in love with you is about the stupidest thing I could ever do.”
“How do you figure that?”
He grinned, which I didn’t expect. “You really want to know? All right, because I think if you ever had the chance to be happy with a man, you’d run a mile. You say it’s what you want, but if happiness ever got close, I think it would scare you to death. Happiness comes and goes but regret and hurt are for life. What was it Marilyn said to you? You told me once. “Love something and it leaves you.” So why would you want to fool around with being happy when it can lead to so much hurt, right?”
“That’s so off base, it’s not even funny.”
“I never said I was an expert. Hell, it’s the first time I ever got in this deep, so what would I know? I’ll pour us another drink.”
“It doesn’t make sense to be afraid of being happy. It’s in the Constitution. The right to pursue happiness is in the Constitution, it’s sanctioned by George Washington himself.”
“Actually I think it was written by Jefferson and John Adams.”
“Why would anyone be afraid of being happy?”
“I don’t know. How old were you when your mother died?”
“What are you now, my shrink?”
“I’m just saying.” He got up and went to the kitchen. I heard him dropping ice into our glasses. He brought back our drinks, laid the cold glass on my bare stomach and made me scream. Then he knelt down and licked the condensation and the dry salt off my skin.
“You smell like the sea.”
“And I’m about as wet as the Pacific Ocean, if you care to check,” I whispered.
He lifted up my hips, slipped off my bikini bottoms and smiled up at me from between my thighs. He sipped his drink, and I gasped at the shock of his cold tongue between my legs. “Let me see if I can make you happy for a while,” he said. “It is your inalienable right, after all.”
The blue TV screen flickered in the corner, dark shadows going to war in the jungles. Just then it all seemed so very far away. I closed my eyes and shut them out.
Chapter 26
We drove north up to Big Sur. We parked the car down a sandy track and walked hand in hand through a limestone tunnel in the ridgeline. Once, they shipped tan bark out of there and there were still cable joists and bolts rusted into the rocks. The beach was protected from the Pacific winds by the arms of giant bluffs that curled around the bay. You could hear the steady beat of the breakers but the cove itself was flat and cobalt blue.
Seals basked on the rocks at the point.
We grabbed our towels and ran down to the water. We swam out to the headland and found a shallow tide pool, protected by the rocks.
If there was a day when I felt the most free, this was it. I could do anything and anything was possible. The water was clear and cool, I had a handsome man beside me and a career ahead of me. There was no Ray Charles song on the radio to torment me.
We sat in each other’s arms in the water, our eyes closed and our faces turned to the sun. The only sound was the cry of the gulls overhead.
“We won’t be able to do this too much longer,” he said. “There’ll be photographers and crazed fans chasing you everywhere.”
I laughed.
“I’m serious,” he said. “If you want fame, you’ll get it. But it has its downside.”
“Without you I wouldn’t be here,” I said. “I don’t just mean the lucky breaks, I mean getting out of Havana.”
“Imagine if I’d left you there. You’d be running the local People’s Gossip Committee and performing plays warning about the evils of capitalist America. Maybe you would have grown a beard as well.”
I pretended to cuff him and he caught my arm and pulled me towards him. He kissed me and his arms went around me and he tried to slip off my bikini bottoms.
“Don’t,” I said, pulling away. “Not here!”
“No one can see us.” He lifted me up and sat me on his lap.
“How can you be so hard when the water’s so cold?”
“It’s the effect you have on me.”
“Wait till we get home.”
“I can’t.” He already had my bikini bottoms down around my knees.
Then I heard laughter and saw a group of surfers heading down the beach. I pulled away and slid them back on. “They can see us,” I said.
“They’d need a U2 spy plane to see anything from there,” he said. “Anyway, so what if they could? The newspapers would love it. You could be scandalous like Marilyn. It would be good for your career.”
“You’re crazy,” I said, and splashed him and swam back to the beach. “Anyway,” I shouted back at him, “if I wanted scandal I’d get a younger man, someone who could keep up with me!”
“I can keep up with you just fine!”
“I’m twenty-two, you’re an old guy of forty.”
“I’m thirty-seven!”
“Maybe I should get myself a stud!”
“You’ve had no complaints so far.”
“Yeah but a year or two and I’ll have worn you out. A girl has to think about her future!”
Even though he gave me a head start we reached the beach at the same time and I started to run through the shallows, laughing. He chased me and tackled me and brought me down in the sand. I was still laughing when he rolled on top of me and kissed me again.
I’d never been so happy.
“I love you,” he said.
I stopped laughing and pushed him away. I got up and ran back up the beach and grabbed my towel. “We should be getting back,” I said.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“I mean it, princess. I want you to move your things over to my place.”
“Wow. That isn’t quite the romantic proposal I was waiting for.”
“Well I’ve never actually said that to a woman before. It’s a big step for me.”
“Am I supposed to be impressed?”
“What is it you want from me?”
“I want to be married. I want a ring! That’s what I want.”
“Well, I just don’t know if I’m the marrying kind.”
“Isn’t it time you grew up, Reyes?” I turned away and started walking back up the beach.
“Can’t we just leave things as they are?”
“Sure we can, if that’s what you want.” I stubbed my toe on a rock. It hurt like hell but I didn’t even break stride, I didn’t want to spoil my dramatic exit. When I got to the car the sand was burning my feet and the leather upholstery was too hot to sit on. He took his time following, of course, so I burned my feet as well.
I didn’t say a word about it.
We didn’t say much on the drive back down the Pacific Highway. My head just kept going over and over it. Move in with him, Magdalena, what harm is it going to do? You practically live there now. He told you he loved you, isn’t that what you always wanted to hear from him?
Yes, but if I move in with him, what am I going to do the day he moves out? If I stay just a little bit apart from him at least I’m still in control of everything. I’ll still have my own place and he won’t be able to hurt me because it won’t be forever, it’ll just be for fun.
I started rehearsing what I needed to say to him in my head. “I love you too, Reyes, but you scare the hell out of me. You’re everything I ever wanted, and while I was dreaming about you chasing me it was all okay because everything was in the future and the future is something you can put off till tomorrow.
But if I let myself love you, now, today, I mean really love you, and then one day you leave and don’t ever come back, I’m totally screwed. I love
you too damn much already, so I’m going to keep you at arm’s length.
So don’t tell me you love me and don’t ask me to move in. Let’s just stay over here in the land of “maybe” a little longer because I know one day you’re going to break my heart.”
By the time I had my speech all worked out, he had already retreated too far for me to reach him. I couldn’t make myself say any of those things, so I didn’t say anything at all.
The sky had clouded over by the time we got back and it was starting to get cool. Anyway, I had scripts to read. I told him I had to head back into Westwood.
As I drove away I knew I should have felt sad, but instead I just felt relieved. I was back in control. I had been a little too happy, dangerously happy. It seemed Reyes was right about me all along. When Jefferson and Adams put together their Constitution they must have been thinking of someone other than me.
When I got home I turned on the television for the news. Soviet ships steaming towards Cuba had been turned back by Kennedy’s blockade. The news anchor said that if they had not turned around Kennedy had given orders to sink them. While we had been making love on the beach, the world had been teetering on the edge of war.
Chapter 27
Two weeks later I drove out to Reyes” place, as the sun set over the valley. I had the radio on, I heard the newsreader say something about Cuba: the missile crisis was over--the Russians had backed down. I wasn’t sure how to feel about it. I guessed there was no choice, but it meant Kennedy wouldn’t invade Cuba now and risk upsetting the Russians after he’d worked so hard to avert a world war.
I guessed I’d never go back home now.
It was the last day of filming Wings of Eagles, it was late and I was tired and anxious. I’d seen the rushes of that day’s work and I wasn’t sure if my performance had been strong enough. It was hard trying to steal a scene from Steve McQueen.
It would be months before the movie was released, and I still didn’t know how many of my scenes the director would cut. Dios mio, I had pinned everything on this. If I got good reviews I could get my own picture next year; if it bombed, there was a chance my entire career could go south with it. I just wanted a drink, perhaps a swim, then to sit and talk it over with Reyes. Somehow he always calmed me down and put things in perspective.
I found him in the bedroom, packing.
“What’s going on?”
“I just got a call. I have to get a flight to Miami tonight.”
“Tonight? Just like that?”
“That’s the way it is in this business.”
“What business, Reyes? What the hell is it you are going to Miami to do?”
He zipped the holdall and threw it on the bed. “You know I can’t talk about that. Where are you going?”
“I need a drink.”
“You need to get me to the airport.”
“Get a cab.”
The bottle clinked on the glass as I poured two fingers of rum into a glass with some ice. My hands were shaking. He stood framed in the doorway and stared at me. “What the hell is your problem, princess?”
“You, you are my problem. How long is it going to be this time, Reyes? A week? Four months? A year?”
“I don’t know.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Same as you did last time. Drive my car all over town, have lunch at Chasen’s, be a big movie star.”
“I’m not a big movie star. I’m a twenty-two-year-old sex bomb who doesn’t appreciate being left behind on her own.”
“You knew what my life was like before you got involved with me. This is my life, princess.”
“You’ve only just got back from your last mysterious adventure.”
“It’s my work, it’s not a holiday.” I watched him dial the number for a cab. He wasn’t bluffing. I slammed my glass on the counter, walked over and snatched the phone out of his hand. “I’m sorry, I’m just tired. I’ll drive you.”
He slung the holdall over his shoulder. “Good. Let’s go then.”
We didn’t say much to each other in the car. He was right, I didn’t own him, but that worked both ways.
He didn’t own me either.
I met Ted for lunch at Chasen’s. It was when I knew that I had arrived in Hollywood. It was just the second time he had taken me to lunch; the first time was to tell me I had won the audition for Wings of Eagles, but this time it was because he wanted to be seen with me. He was announcing my arrival.
The chili at Chasen’s was legendary - Elizabeth Taylor was in Rome shooting a picture about Cleopatra and I’d heard she’d had the owner fly some out to her - but Ted wasn’t interested in the food. He went there to see and be seen. It was like an insider’s club with its red leather booths and wood panelling. Celebrities and movie people like him were always given a booth in a room off to the side so they wouldn’t be bothered by ordinary people staring at them.
“So you made a big impression on the Brother in Lawford,” he said.
“Even though I didn’t sleep with him?”
“You shouldn’t joke about these things. Screwing the right people can be as good as winning an Oscar.”
“Without the speeches.”
“Well, you can thank who you want afterwards--everyone gets a minute.”
I was never sure when he was joking and when he was serious.
“So he wants you to go to their pool party on Sunday.”
“Who?”
“Peter Lawford.”
“I don’t even know where he lives.”
“Malibu. But don’t worry about directions, they’ll send a car for you. Show plenty of skin. The Kennedys will be there.”
“The President?”
“He was supposed to stay in Palm Springs with Frank, but these days Sinatra’s too much of a political liability. He can’t really sleep in Frank’s house when his brother is trying to put all of Frank’s mafia friends in prison.”
I had forgotten all about this. I vaguely remembered the invitation but I hadn’t expected anything to come of it. “Why me?”
“You’re beautiful and you’re a novelty. Make the most of it.”
I tried to make sense of what he’d just told me. I was going to meet the President and Bobby Kennedy? I still remembered the good-looking senator with the million-dollar smile who had once visited my father’s club in Havana four years before. Now he wasn’t just the President of the United States, he was Jack Kennedy. How fast the world can change.
I sat there, stunned.
“I hear Reyes is back in town.”
“What?”
“I said, I heard Reyes is back in town.”
“Yes, he got back a couple of weeks ago. He’s had to fly to Miami again. He won’t be back for a week or two.”
“Perfect. It’s not the sort of party you can bring a date to.”
“You sound like a pimp, Ted.”
I wondered what Reyes would say if he heard I was going to a pool party with the country’s two most powerful men. He would probably make some smart joke about it.
Or perhaps he’d be jealous. I wished he would be jealous, it would teach him a lesson.
And then Angel walked in.
He was with three other men, clearly not movie people, though Angel was beautiful enough to be mistaken for a movie star. He wore a silk suit and more jewellery than me, every inch of him gangster. He looked me over, as all men did when they first saw me, then his expression changed when he recognised me.
He walked over. “Hey, baby, this is a surprise. Wow, you really look something.” He kissed me on the cheek, shook hands briefly with Ted then ignored him. “It’s good to see you again. I hear you’re doing real well, I always knew you would.”
“Thanks. I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“I like the movies, I come to LA once in a while to see people, maybe play some golf with Frank. The family still has a lot of friends in the entertainment business.” He looked me up and down, a more intimate inspec
tion this time; my dressmaker didn’t even look that close. “You really are looking fine.”
“How’s Miami?”
“Most of Havana’s there now. You walk down Biscayne and it’s like walking along the Prado. They got a sign at Boyero Airport, “Will the last one out please turn off the lights.” That’s what people think of Fidel and his fucking Revolution, right?” He slid into the booth next to me even though I didn’t remember anyone inviting him to sit down. “So you going to be in another picture anytime soon?”
“I’ve just finished shooting a picture with Steve McQueen,” I said, happy to let him know there was more to life than being his mistress.
“Hey, that’s terrific, you’ll have your name up in lights this time next year.”
“I’m working on it.”
He lowered his voice. “I still miss you, baby, you know that? Maybe we could have dinner while I’m here.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
He gave me a sulky look; it didn’t go with the suit. Poor Angel wasn’t accustomed to getting blown off. “Hey, well good luck with everything. When you’re a big star send me an invite to a premier or something.” He gave me a wolfish smile and was about to leave, then turned back as if he had just remembered something. “Hey, I hear you’re with Reyes these days.”
“Maybe,” I said and wondered how he knew. But of course he knew, he and Reyes knew the same people, that Jack Rubenstein, or Ruby, or whatever his name was, and Winstone and all those other spooks and crooks from his Havana days.
“Be careful with him,” he said.
“I can look out for myself.”
“Yeah? Because you know, this is what that guy does. You fall for him and he’ll break your fucking heart. He’s got a girl in Miami, you know that, right?”
Maybe I gave myself away, just for a moment, because I saw a flicker of satisfaction on his face.
“Well, I’ll see you around,” he said, and then he left to rejoin his three associates without even a glance in Ted’s direction.
Ted just stared at me. “Oh, my God. You know that guy?”
Naked In LA (Naked Series Book 2) Page 11
