[Fontaines 01.0] The Sweet Taste of Sin
Page 25
Don’t show any shame, I tell myself. Don’t let them think they’ve broken you. The only thing I have left is my dignity.
I keep my head up high as I march back into the room. I look right at the Important People as I stride over to the chair where I left my purse—saving a special glare for Dante, since he looks almost amused by this whole situation. Well, fuck him.
I snatch my purse and turn around, ready to make a graceful exit, but to my surprise I find Luca in the doorway, flashing that charming, million-dollar grin right at me.
“Well,” he says to the room, “I think we’ve found our Isabel.”
I freeze in place, stunned. “What?”
“Cancel the other screen tests,” he says to the Important People. “This is her. You already said she was at the top of your list. I don’t even need to see the others.”
I’m surprised to hear that Luca has that much power over the casting decisions for this film—but perhaps I shouldn’t be. The other people in the room are rising from their chairs, and Kyle Jacobs comes over to me, extending his hand.
“It’s not official until everything’s signed,” he says, “but welcome to Cataclysm: Earth, Ms. Torres.”
I blink at his outstretched hand. “What’s going on?”
A bright laugh sounds behind me, and I turn to see Luca looking quite pleased with himself.
“Why don’t you and I have a chat, Emilia?” he says. “Just the two of us?”
He leads me out of the room, and I can’t decide whether the heat in my chest is from anger or embarrassment or something else.
“Emilia,” he begins, “…I may call you Emilia, right?”
“Sure,” I say, trying not to think about how lovely my name sounds in that voice of his.
His smile broadens, and a small flurry of butterflies erupts inside me. Keep it professional, Em.
“Emilia,” he says again, “I trust those people in there when it comes to your acting ability. Which means today was about two things—making sure we’d have on-screen chemistry, and confirming that you could keep up with me. As you know, they specifically wanted an up-and-coming actress for Isabel, but it defeats the purpose if she’s just going to fade into the background next to her more well-known co-stars. It also defeats the purpose if she’s too nervous and inexperienced to speak up for herself. We wanted someone who could hold her own—and I wanted someone who had the energy and vibrancy to match me scene for scene.”
“Oh,” I say, finally understanding.
“You passed my test,” he says. “Quite well, in fact.”
“But that only proved that I can stand up to you,” I point out. “Not any of those other things.”
“The rest of it was apparent even before my little test.” He leans a little closer, trapping me against the wall. “I knew from the moment I walked into the room that you have the necessary presence. Something about you draws the eye, Emilia—but I’m sure you know that already.”
My presence is nothing next to his—surely he has to recognize that.
He goes on, leaning even nearer. “You won’t fade into the background. In fact, I have a feeling you will light up the screen. Trust me, Emilia—after this film launches, everyone in Hollywood will want you.”
The way he says “want” sends a shiver through me. I look away from him, embarrassed again. I’m having a hard time believing that Luca Fontaine, of all people, thinks these things about me.
“You also said we needed chemistry,” I say, trying to shift the subject away from my alleged presence. “How can we know that before we’ve even acted together?”
I risk a glance up at him, and the curl of his lips is positively mischievous.
“Trust me,” he says, reaching up and brushing a stray bit of hair away from my temple. “When you’ve done this as many times as I have, you just know.” One side of his smile creeps a little higher, and the effect is devastatingly handsome. “You can feel it. Frankly, I’m surprised that you don’t feel it, too.” His hand slides from my temple down to my jaw. He hooks a finger beneath my chin, tilting my face up toward his. “I think we’re going to have a lot of fun together, Emilia.”
I can’t speak. My thoughts are all in a jumble.
Luca drops his hand, but his eyes are still bright and wicked as he steps away from me.
Oh, girl, you’re in trouble, I think as he walks back to the room.
And it only takes a month before I learn exactly how naïve and idiotic I truly am.
CHAPTER ONE
PRESENT DAY
Some mornings, it feels like there isn’t enough caffeine in the entire world to turn me into a normal human being. Fortunately, my on-set makeup artist is a miracle worker.
I sip my giant coffee as I survey myself in my trailer’s full-length mirror. The rising sun is just starting to peek through the trailer’s curtains, but I’ve already been here for over two hours, being transformed from just-rolled-out-of-bed Emilia into a badass warrior chick who looks like she’s been through hell and back. You’d think after two years of working in major feature films I’d be used to showing up to work at 4 AM, but it still usually takes a shot of espresso or two before I stop being a zombie. I thought I was exhausted during the production of Cataclysm: Earth, but so far the filming for its sequel, Cataclysm: Aftermath, has been even more grueling. We just wrapped up filming in the Mojave Desert last week, and now the rest of the movie will be shot in a soundstage here in Los Angeles.
You ready for today, Em? I ask myself in the mirror. The answer is a resounding, “No!” but I fight it down. I’m a professional, and I can handle any challenge this job throws at me.
I think.
I grab my robe and pull it on as I walk over to the sofa. My arms and legs are streaked with reddish-brown “apocalypse dust”—as Violet, my makeup artist, likes to call it—and though my body makeup is unlikely to go anywhere, I’d rather not stain the upholstery. I pull the robe snugly around me as I sit down and grab the television remote.
It’s become a morning ritual of mine—watching old sitcom reruns as I wait for them to call me to set. It might still be another hour or so before they’re done setting up all of the lights and everything, and in the meantime I can’t bear to sit around in the silence, thinking about today’s scene. I don’t even really pay attention to the show. I just find the noise soothing.
I take another long, slow sip of my coffee. I didn’t sleep much last night, but that’s nothing new. I’m coming to learn that I just don’t sleep well during the two to three months we’re in production—I’m too wound up. Too focused on my work. The caffeine probably doesn’t help, but it’s also the only thing getting me through the day.
My cell phone buzzes on the table beside me, but I ignore it. I know it’s just my mom calling me again, wanting to talk about Sara’s wedding some more. My older sister and her long-term boyfriend have finally decided to tie the knot, and my mom has been calling me twice a day for the past two weeks wanting to discuss details. Moms—even when they’re university professors like mine—apparently don’t understand phrases like “I’ve been working grueling twenty-hour days,” or even just, “Please, can we save this conversation until my next day off?”
Honestly, though, my hours are just an excuse. As happy as I am for Sara—it’s about damn time those two made it official—I get a knot in my stomach every time my mom calls to talk about the upcoming nuptials. And today, of all days, I don’t think I can handle her not-so-subtle questions about when my wedding is going to happen.
She has no idea that my engagement—like so much of my life these days—is one big, fat lie.
I lean over toward the table, adjusting the silver-framed picture sitting next to a vase of red roses from Luca. The photo is of me and my family at my little brother’s high school graduation. It’s from five years ago, just before I moved to L.A., but it feels like even longer. Javy still had braces then, and Sara hadn’t gone blond yet. Dad was still trying to pull off those wei
rd sideburns, and my mom was about fifty pounds heavier than she is today. Still, we all look so happy. It’s one of my favorite pictures of all of us.
I shift the frame, positioning it so it’s still visible even when I lean back on the couch. My family still lives in Atlanta—except for Sara, who’s currently working on her Ph.D. at NYU. We’re about as far away from each other as we can be in the Continental U.S., but it helps a little to have this photo close.
A knock sounds on my trailer door, startling me out of my thoughts.
“I’ve got your breakfast, Ms. Torres,” comes the familiar voice of Briana, one of the production assistants.
I leap up off the couch and go over to the door. Briana is there with a large paper bag in one hand and a tray of coffees in the other.
“Come on in,” I tell her with a smile, moving aside so she can enter.
Briana steps past me, masterfully juggling the food and drinks without even wobbling on her electric purple heels. Her shoes match the single purple streak across the bangs of her retro platinum bob. She’s got a Forties-style cat eye going on today, and her lipstick is a deep berry red. How she manages to look so cute and put-together at this hour is beyond me. She’s fresh out of film school, and her enthusiasm is insane. I swear she doesn’t even sleep—and yet unlike me, she still has boundless amounts of energy.
“You ready for your big scene today?” she asks cheerfully as she sets everything down on the table and starts sifting through it.
My eyes are on the fresh coffee she brought for me, and I hardly register her question. “Hm?”
“Your big scene. With Luca.” She gives me a wink as she hands over my drink.
Oh, right. I’ve been trying not to think about that—and failing miserably. Today Luca and I are filming our first sex scene together. My first sex scene ever.
“I’m ready,” I tell her with a smile. I can’t tell her the truth—that I’m so nervous I threw up twice last night.
“Speaking of Luca,” she says, reaching into the bag of food, “do you know where he is? Isaac asked me to ask you.”
“He’s late?”
Briana looks at me in surprise, and I realize my mistake right away.
“I… We didn’t spend last night together,” I say, my tongue tripping over itself. “Big scene today and all. We both thought it was better to get some sleep.”
“Oh,” Briana says, smiling again. “I totally understand.” Her eyes slide to the vase of roses on the table. “Are those from him?”
“Yes,” I say, glad she accepted my lame excuse. “He’s so sweet, isn’t he?”
“It must be so nice to work together,” she says, pulling my breakfast out of the bag for me. Today I’ve got an egg white omelet with some raw spinach. “I’ve always wanted to ask you—is it weird kissing him in front of the cameras? You know, since you two are…?”
Engaged? Doin’ it? Deeply and madly in love? She might have finished her question in a dozen different ways, and every single one of them would have been a lie.
But only Luca and I know that. For the past two years, since about a month after I was cast as Isabel in the Cataclysm: Earth franchise, he and I have been involved in what has proved to be the greatest acting challenge of my life so far: convincing the world that we’re in love.
It was Luca’s idea. Nothing sells a film like some good drama between co-stars, and he wanted Cataclysm: Earth to be huge. He had a contract and everything, spelling out what we could and couldn’t do, breaking down exactly when all of our dramatic “relationship events” would take place, laying out exactly what was expected of me. I knew this was my chance to really make it big, so I signed it.
And it worked. Our little show began the moment my signature was dry on the contract, and Luca and I have been in the spotlight ever since—one day making out on the beach, the next breaking up, the next starting baby rumors…and over and over and over again until I was convinced people would be bored with us. Instead, it only made them more obsessed.
And now I have a rock the size of a golf ball to wear on my finger.
My engagement ring is currently locked in my safe here in the trailer—I can’t exactly wear it during filming—but I can still feel the weight of it on my finger.
“Ms. Torres?” Briana prompts. I remember she asked me a question.
“It’s a little weird to kiss him in front of the cameras,” I say, “but you get used to it. It’s our job.”
Actually, kissing isn’t the issue here—Luca and I have done that plenty of times before. The issue is that today he and I are supposed to do a lot more than kiss, and we have no experience there—at least not with each other. In fact, our contract expressly forbids it. Absolutely no sex allowed. Luca was adamant about that part of our legal arrangement—claiming that based on his experience, sex just complicates things—and I know how to take a hint.
Briana smiles warmly at me, and I feel a yawning emptiness in my gut. Some days I’d give anything to tell someone—anyone—the truth. To give up the illusion for an hour. To have one person in my life with whom I can be completely genuine. Part of me thinks that under different circumstances, Briana and I might have been real friends. But I know I couldn’t bear to keep lying to her then, and my contract with Luca has some pretty strict rules about who we can and cannot tell.
My eyes fall again to the photograph on the table. Luca’s family knows the truth about us, but I haven’t had the heart to tell mine. My parents—especially my mom—would never understand. They don’t know how relationships work in this industry, and they definitely wouldn’t get why I willingly entered into such an arrangement. My parents have been madly in love since the first time they laid eyes on each other on their first day of college, and now they’re professors at the same small university. Things work differently here—assuming I want a lasting career in this business.
“Well, I should go give everyone else their breakfast,” Briana says, picking everything up again. “Have fun today.” She gives a suggestive wiggle of her eyebrows.
“Fun” is probably the last word I’d use to describe today, but I’ll fake it. Just like I fake everything else in my life.
Don’t get me wrong—I love my job. From the first time I ever attempted acting—in a nativity play at church when I was six—I loved it. It was like the ultimate game of make believe, one where everyone else watching believed it, too. As I got older, I sought out every chance I could to act—I auditioned for every play at school, attended drama camp every summer as a teenager, even appeared in a couple of commercials for local car dealerships. One day I was playing Mercutio in my high school’s production of Romeo and Juliet, and the next I was showing off the features of the latest Honda Civic. Every minute of it was pure fun—every day I got to be a new person, try on a new life. I was determined to make a career of it.
So here I am, living the dream. Which today means rubbing up on the guy I’m fake-engaged to and pretending to have the best orgasm of my life in front of a gazillion cameras.
You know—just your average Tuesday.
I look down at my sad little omelet. I’d give anything to stress-eat some donuts this morning, but Roxie, my nutritionist, has me on a crazy-strict diet right now.
My phone buzzes again. My mom sure is being extra persistent today.
Maybe it’s not your mom, I think, remembering what Briana said about Luca being late. Maybe my “fiancé” is calling to tell me where he is. Luca is many things, but he’s never late. He’s as professional as they come. And he’s put me in a very tricky position, as far as our little relationship act goes.
Of all days for him to be late, he has to pick today. The day when I’m already so flustered and nervous I can hardly think straight.
I grab my phone and shove it beneath my ear. “Hello?”
But though it’s a male voice that greets me, it’s not Luca. It’s Javy, my little brother.
“Em,” he says breathlessly. “Em, you have to help me.”
“I…I need money, Em,” he says.
“For what? What happened? Are Mom and Dad—”
“They’re fine. But I might not be.” He lets out a long breath. “Please, Em. You have to help me.”
“Not until you tell me what’s going on.”
“I can’t. I just… Em, I need twenty thousand dollars—”
“Twenty thousand dollars? What the hell have you done?”
“I can’t tell you now. But please, Em—”
“Javier Torres, you’re not getting a dime unless you tell me what’s going on. Do Mom and Dad know?”
“No. And you can’t tell them.” He’s sounding more and more desperate by the second. “Please, Em. I’ll explain everything later, I promise. I just need twenty thousand. That’s nothing to you.”
I close my eyes. He certainly knows exactly which buttons to push. Since being cast in Cataclysm: Earth, I’ve tried many, many times to give my family money—God, do they need it—but every single one of them has either been too stubborn or too proud to accept it. Until now.
“Tell me what you need it for,” I urge again.
“I can’t, Em—”
“Tell me.”
A knock sounds on my trailer door, and I mutter a curse under my breath.
“I have to go,” I tell him. “They’re ready for me on set. I’ll call you later, okay?”
“Please, Em. Don’t tell Mom and Dad.”
“I won’t,” I promise against my better judgment. “But you better tell me what this is all about. Are you in any immediate trouble?”
“Just call me back later.”
The knock sounds again.
“I’m coming!” I call to whatever PA was sent to fetch me. To Javy, I say, “I’ve got to run. Call you later.”