Star Attraction

by Sorcha MacMurrough

  Perhaps Brad was just doing it as a challenge, she thought, just to see if she was a passionate bundle of nerves underneath her cool pinstripe suit. Only a few days ago Zaira would have rejected the idea of herself as passionate, but now whenever she saw those emerald eyes upon her, her stomach seized and her palms began to sweat. It was as if all her senses were enhanced as soon as he came near, filling her with a sensual warmth and desire she had never experienced before.

  Zaira forced herself to concentrate on the play, though it was difficult not to just stare at his amazing physique in open-mouthed admiration. Soon it was her turn to come on, and she tried to concentrate, but every time he looked at her, she was conscious of his magnetism, and also of her own deception.

  Zaira was also more than a little irritated that he seemed to take so little notice of either woman that he could not see Zaira and Zoe were one and the same. But then wasn’t that a credit to her acting ability? She didn’t want him to get too close. Or did she?

  By time they reached the scene where Hamlet and Ophelia have their last fight, she knew that she was only trying to fool herself. His hands gripping her arms set a shiver of excitement through her, and her head bent back, almost inviting him to stoop down and kiss her.

  For one bewitchingly long moment, Zaira was sure he would; she could feel his warm breath on her cheek as he paused. Then, he delivered the last of his lines and flung her from him, so violently that she actually did fall. She was completely unprepared for it, and the impact was like a bucket of cold water being thrown over her. She opened her eyes fully and stared up at him, and she could feel tears pricking the backs of her eyes at the thought of his rejecting her.

  “Sorry, I guess I caught you off guard,” Brad apologized, and held out a hand to help her to her feet.

  But there was an uneasy, almost hostile look in his eyes which she had never seen there before.

  “Not at all, the floor was a bit slippery, that’s all, and you're very tall. You pulled me off balance. Shall we try that again?” she asked coolly.

  Zaira could sense his reluctance as he agreed, but this time she did not make the mistake of getting carried away by her desire for him, and now her fall was controlled, but looked realistic.

  “Well done,” Brad commented, “that part was fine. But you were a bit wooden before. Try to take your mind off other things, and focus on Ophelia and her feelings for Hamlet.”

  Zaira thought that was fairly ironic considering that was essentially what she had been doing, but she took his point, that she was brooding far too much. She berated herself for having acted so foolishly. He probably had dozens of women throwing themselves at him every day, and she had just been one among many. The glamorous young Brad Clarke was famous for pursuing the unattainable; perhaps that was why he was flattering Zaira Darcy. She vowed silently that he would have no cause to think she was flirting with him ever again.

  “Right then, that was fine, we’ll start with act three on Saturday, if that’s all right, and Hamlet and Laertes will need a bit of fight practice, so I’ve booked in the fencing coach from the university as a special treat. I'll see you all at ten, as usual,” Zaira said in her most confident tone, and they all said their goodbyes to her and Brad as they left.

  “Do you fancy a drink?” Brad asked, completely unexpectedly.

  Zaira was not going to break her promise to herself. “No, thanks, I have plenty to do today. Maybe Saturday?”

  “What about tomorrow, day or evening?” he insisted.

  “Look, I’m sorry, Mr. Clarke, but I’m busy for the next few days, so I’ll get a few things out of the way, and we can talk Saturday. And now, I had better lock up the theatre, so I’ll see you then.”

  “Zoe, will you stop this Mr. Clarke nonsense? I’m Brad, that’s all, and I know we will have to work as colleagues, but you are not subservient or meant to be in awe of me. There's no need to keep your distance. And I'm sorry about what I did before, it’s just that I was taken by surprise,” he said with a shrug, not quite able to explain his feelings.

  Zaira was intrigued, but knew that the question she was dying to ask would be a very dangerous one, so she simply said, “I’ll try to remember that I’m your colleague, not your actress, but I think we have to keep that aspect of our relationship, if you could call it that, separate from the theatre here.

  “I’ve been jotting down some ideas about the book, and have had the go-ahead from the publishing house and the lawyers, as you probably already know, so let’s not mix business with pleasure or vice versa. If you want to see me on Saturday about business, we'll meet after the performance, or meet in your new office once it’s set up. Matt says you’re looking for a place.”

  Brad nodded, and said, “That’s true, but my problem is not being able to find something suitable in the area, and now I’m having trouble with my landlord about my subletting, so I'll probably end up homeless as well soon if I don't do something fast.”

  “Right, well, I’ll keep my eye out, and we’ll see how things are going on Saturday,” Zaira said, and she avoided his gaze. She ushered Brad out and locked up after herself.

  Once Zaira was certain he was gone, she whisked off her itchy wig, and ran her fingers through her hair in relief. She had just enough time to pop up to her office to change into her suit before her next lecture, and so she ran up to her office overlooking the park, and trotted down the corridor to the ladies’ room.

  Fortunately, it was time for lunch, so no one saw Zaira’s quick change. She scrubbed her face clean, redid her hair, and changed her clothes. At the last minute she remembered to take out her lenses and put on her spectacles. She thought amusedly of Superman making all his quick changes, and wondered what Brad would say if he ever found out what she was up to. But if she could keep if up a bit longer, she’d have a huge bank balance, freedom and security.

  Zaira walked back down to her office, and was arrested by the sight of a tall dark man in her office. Adjusting her eyes to the half-light, she saw Brad leaning on her desk writing something.

  “Oh, hello,” he said with an easy smile. “I was just in the neighborhood, so I thought I’d drop by and see how you were getting on, and if you’d like to come to lunch with me.”

  Zaira thought bitterly that he was obviously at a loose end if he was coming up here to invite her out, since he had been turned down by the attractive Zoe. But she tried to sound regretful as she informed him she was just on her way to teach.

  “How about dinner later then? I’m sick of eating by myself in restaurants. In fact, I'm sick of restaurants. That was one thing about my mother. She might have been the wife of a movie mogul, but she insisted on cooking everything herself,” Brad said, with a fond smile on his face.

  Against her better judgment, Zaira heard herself invite him over to dinner, and he accepted the offer enthusiastically.

  “Great, what time?” Brad asked.

  Zaira told him seven thirty and gave him the address as they went down the stairs together. As soon as she waved him out of sight, she began to panic over what she could possibly make, and ran through possible menus in her mind all the way home after the lecture.

  In the end Zaira opted for Italian, and so she got two different kinds of Italian sausage, some fresh tomatoes and peppers, and some Italian bread heavily encrusted with sesame seeds. A couple of bottles of red wine and some salad things, and Italian ice cream for dessert rounded off her shopping. As a rather daring after thought, she bought a bottle of gin and a couple of bottles of tonic, and hurried home to get ready.

  As soon as she got in the door she started the sauce, and rushed to make herself look casual but presentable. She pulled on a pair of well-worn but stylish jeans and a black smock top, and did her hair in a long plait down her back. The sauce bubbled cheerfully as she tore around the apartment trying to tidy everything away. She tried to remember the last time she had cooked, the last time she had shared a meal with anyone in her own home. Apart from staff functions, a
nd the occasional business dinner with Matt, she had not been out with anyone for any social occasion since Jonathan had left. Except for Raymond and Anna coming to see how she had settled in, she had never had any visitors there either.

  She turned on the CD player, a present from Matt last Christmas, and soon the apartment was filled with the strains of Vivaldi as she finished tidying. The apartment was huge, too big for Zaira, but Raymond had made sure she got first priority on the housing list, and so she had moved into the three bedroom, two bathroom apartment just over a year ago. She had a vast bedroom with a wonderful view of Washington Square Park, and the smallest bedroom she used as her study. It was light and airy, and an excellent size for an office. The second bedroom was fitted with a double bed and its own bathroom, but she had no one to invite to stay. Most of her friends had deserted her as soon as they had heard about Jonathan's criminal activities.

  Zaira went into her little study last. She had made huge amounts of progress with the screenplay, thanks to the fact that she had the book on computer disc, and so could alter the text to suit the new format. She flicked a few buttons and soon she had her new file printed out to show Brad when he arrived. She would try to keep their dinner as businesslike as possible. After her experience with him today, she knew she could not let him even begin to guess how she felt.

  Zaira fluffed up the cushions on the sofa, and was just about to set the table when the bell rang. Her palms sweating, her heart aflutter, she moved slowly towards the door.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Brad entered the apartment, looking spectacularly handsome in a bottle green sports coat which set his eyes off to perfection, with his black polo neck sweater and black trousers. He was carrying a huge bouquet of red roses, and a couple of bottles of champagne, as well as a cake and a box of chocolates.

  “Here you are, darling, a token of my appreciation for taking pity on me, a lonely Californian lost in the East,” he said with a smile, as he stooped to peck her on the cheek.

  Zaira blushed furiously, and tried to cover her confusion by exclaiming, “How lovely, thanks so much.”

  Zaira busied herself with looking for a vase, but her hands shook and she made rather a bad job of arranging the flowers. She put them on the dining table and caught Brad looking around the apartment. It was pretty impersonal as homes went, for most of the things in it had been there already when she had arrived. He could not find anything incriminating about her lying around, she hoped. He admired the view out the window, and then asked to see the rest of the place. She conducted the brief little tour, and ended up in the small study.

  “Here you are,” she said, handing him the sheaf of papers she had prepared. “That’s what I’ve managed to come up with so far.”

  He weighed the papers in his hand, and whistled. “Well, someone has been burning the midnight oil. But I’ll save these until after dinner, otherwise we’ll talk about nothing else all night.”

  He admired the small office, and indeed the whole apartment, and then they went back into the living room, where she sat him down and poured him a gin and tonic.

  “I’ll put the champagne in the fridge, and maybe it will be cold enough for after the meal. It’s nothing fancy, just Italian food,” she said rather self-consciously.

  “Which is my favorite,” he said, “and smells fantastic. Don’t tell me you’ve done sausage and peppers, because that’s my absolute favorite.”

  She nodded and he laughed. “Then I hope you have lots of bread to sop up the sauce with.”

  Zaira replied, “Of course,” and smiled herself. “And for garlic bread if you like, but I didn’t know how you felt about strong flavors.”

  “The more the better,” he answered, and followed her into the kitchen to help her butter the bread and crush the garlic.

  “Clarke’s revenge,” Brad laughed. “If I ever come across any snotty actress, I dazzle her with my looks and then breathe fire all over her, sometimes in words, and deliberately in garlic. It won’t waste my breath, or my breath mints, on people who think they know everything, like your friend Peter Duffy the other day.”

  Zaira giggled. “He’d certainly had it coming to him for a long time, so I wouldn’t worry too much. We’ve been rehearsing for ages, and he's lurched from one disaster to the next,” she said, licking the butter off her fingers as she put the bread in the oven.

  She busied herself stirring the pasta to avoid his awesome presence, which seemed to fill the small kitchen with electricity. “It’ll be ready in about five minutes,” Zaira told him.

  “Great, I’m famished,” he said. “Here, give me those things, and I’ll set the table.”

  He picked up the plates and cutlery before Zaira could protest, and was out the door in a second.

  She stood thoughtfully for a moment, amazed at the ease with which they got on together. Brad was so friendly, unassuming, unpretentious, not at all like the papers had led her to believe. But then, he himself had just admitted that he was demanding as a director, and did not tolerate impolite behavior from anyone he worked with. Probably the ones who had spoken to the gutter press were all enemies who had run afoul of him in the past.

  As the pasta boiled, Zaira reflected that it was wonderful to cook for someone. In her life with Jonathan, he had always been too busy to share meals with her, and in any case he had never liked any of the foods she prepared. He had hated Italian, or indeed anything ethnic, which is all she ever made once she began to cook for herself as a young woman. She loved trying new recipes, and bought cookbooks avidly. It was the one luxury she kept from her old life, and they stood proudly on a shelf of their own in the kitchen.

  Brad went over and flicked through a few of them, making intelligent remarks about his preferences, and obviously as knowledgeable about Mexican and Middle Eastern food as herself.

  “What lovely books,” he admired.

  But Zaira got the feeling that he was trying too hard, so she replied frostily, “Yes, they are nice, but it’s expensive to eat that way, and I haven’t exactly been rich lately. Besides, there’s not much point in cooking for one.”

  Brad nodded and looked around him thoughtfully before disappearing into the living room again.

  Zaira came out with two full plates of sausage and peppers, with pasta, and then brought the salad. She brought the wine and bread next, and admired Brad’s graceful movements as he opened the bottle for her and then sat down.

  He praised the food, the wine, the apartment, everything, over and over again, until Zaira wondered exactly what he was up to. She certainly enjoyed his compliments, but she kept getting the feeling she was being manipulated by Brad in some subtle way. He chatted amiably about every topic she brought up, especially classical music and literature, and she began to enjoy herself in spite of her wariness of him.

  Once they had finished eating, Zaira told Brad to sit down on the sofa and start to read her work, and handed him a red pencil for making corrections and comments. She felt especially vulnerable now, for he was going to criticize and comment on her work. She knew that this was a very different kind of writing from her novel and her academic work, and was afraid that he would think she wasn’t up to it after all.

  Rather than stand there watching him score out dozens of passages, Zaira fled to the kitchen to make coffee and cut the cake he had brought. She also got out the ice cream, and opened the box of chocolates. She checked the champagne which she had left to chill in the freezer, and found it cold enough to drink. Feeling very daring, she decided to take it out and placed it on the coffee table with two glasses.

  He observed her movement, and she tried to read his expression as he looked up. Her heart began to pound as the emerald eyes caressed her own, and for a moment she was sure he would come to her, kiss her. But no, he merely smiled, and said, “Fantastic. Absolutely brilliant! You've captured their voices and emotions perfectly. This really does call for the champagne!”

  Brad slapped the papers down on the table with a f
lamboyant gesture.

  Zaira could see he had merely ticked the first five or six pages, but had not scored out anything. With a sigh of relief, she went back to the kitchen to bring out the rest of the things, and as she put them down on the table as well, Brad said, “Here, help me.”

  She picked up the glasses, and the cork popped with that wonderfully unique sound. As the champagne fizzed out into the glasses and onto her hand, Zaira felt a complete and utter joy which she had never experienced before. Brad was here, he loved her script, he was thoughtful, kind, breathtakingly handsome. And dangerous.

  He raised his glass in one hand and toasted, “To us!” but instead of drinking from his glass, he captured her wet hand, and slowly began to lick the champagne off the back of it with a silky caress that made her weak at the knees.

  “Brad!” she gasped, but could not manage to bring her hand away.

  “Delicious,” he murmured, but then almost as if he caught himself doing something which he shouldn’t have, he stood up stiffly, and said huskily, ”Sorry, my dear, I got carried away, and after all, it’s a terrible thing to waste champagne. Now drink up, while I finish reading the rest of this.”

  Zaira sat down in the armchair next to the sofa, and stared at Brad’s handsome profile. The tingling sensations had not diminished, but rather grew stronger as she examined every inch of Brad critically, in an effort to find some flaw in him which she could dislike him for.

  But no, Brad Clarke was infuriatingly perfect. She couldn't help but admire his wavy hair, with the mysterious red glints made her hand ache to touch it. His neck was strong, and his shoulders massively broad. His chest muscles rippled with his every move, and he had a firm midriff, without an ounce of spare flesh on him anywhere. His legs were strong and supple, and she remembered again the first time she had met him, when his jeans had molded to his magnificent body..