Just the memory of the passion in his voice made her shake her head in disbelief. A visual image of him and Nessa making love leapt into her mind, and she was as- tonished to realise she felt no jealousy: the idea of Simon sprawled in feverish desire on Nessa was slightly incon- gruous, but it wasn’t unbearably hurtful.
Moving to her bed, she sank on to it, toying with her silk nightgown in one slim hand as she frowned thoughtfully. Suddenly she remembered all his remarks about how dangerous grand passion was. Obviously, Nessa Vale was his grand passion, and always had been.
A deep loyalty to Simon tore her away from thoughts of betrayal. If he loved Nessa—what right did she have to try and stand in his way? Apart from that, she herself had been guilty of betrayal, even if it had been un- planned and accidental. One couldn’t stop passion rising any more than one could stop the earth revolving around the sun. How could she either blame or berate Simon for being human enough to love, feel passion, and stumble into betrayal?
Getting undressed, she slid into bed, her thoughts turning back to Jared, and the love that had exploded so passionately between them on the beach. Would he go straight to Nessa tonight? Jealousy shot through her like white-hot fire and she veered away from it, screaming silently. It was nothing like the way she’d felt when she imagined Simon making love to Nessa Vale.
Maybe I don’t care as much for Simon as I thought I did, she realised as she slid down, turning out the light, and, as soon as she was in darkness, her mind turned back to Jared, the man she loved.
She was angry and hurt that he had told her he wanted her on the casting couch. But she was also aware that he wouldn’t get what he wanted, as he would find out tomorrow morning, when she told Mike Camarra that she was going to reject the role.
Pain lit her blue eyes as she stared into the silent darkness of her bedroom, the only sound that of the fan whirring softly overhead, keeping the heat of the California night at bay.
What lay in the future now? Would she ever find love? Would she ever be a truly great star? What would happen to the future she had planned with her beloved friend, Simon, who had just betrayed her with the woman he obviously loved?
And would Jared ever forgive her her ambition…?
Next day, she woke from a searingly intense dream of Jared making love to her, and realised it was because he had reawoken the sleeping seductress in her body, made her burn with reawakened desire for his body.
Quickly, she pushed back the duvet, went to the bathroom and determinedly took a cold shower. No dreams of love or lovemaking today, she reminded herself sternly. If she was to survive this weekend, she would have to be businesslike, down-to-earth and very pro- fessional. Mike Camarra was a ruthless shark. She would have to make an appointment with him for this morning, and give him the news formally, making it absolutely clear she was not going to be talked out of her decision.
Later, she dressed in white jeans and a white lace top, then went downstairs to find everyone sunning them- selves at breakfast out by the glittering, hot blue pool.
‘Morning!’ Mike Camarra welcomed, standing by the barbecue where fresh meat and fish were being cooked in the open air. ‘Cooked breakfast or just a coffee and Danish?’
She walked coolly over to him. ‘Isn’t there any fruit?’
‘Plenty.’ He drew on his cigar, gestured to a large table groaning under fruit, rolls, et cetera. ‘How did your chat with Jared go last night?’
‘Oh…’ She hesitated, aware of the others listening in the hot sunlight. ‘Well, I’d like to have a word with you about that later, Mike. Would you mind if I requested an appointment? Some time this morning? In your study?’
Mike looked at her with a frown for a long moment, then gave a slow shrug. ‘Sure. Why not? Eleven suit you?’
‘That’s perfect,’ she said, because it gave her time to talk to Simon and break the news of her decision to him.
Mike frowned, flipped a swordfish steak over, every inch the rich movie mogul in dark blue silk robe, dark blue shorts, tanned paunch and grey-haired chest, his eyes hidden behind dark glasses. ‘Nothing went badly wrong last night, I take it? I mean—you are old friends, right? I’m sure I remember Jared telling me you’d known each other since way back when…’
‘Maybe she’s forgotten,’ Jared’s cynical voice drawled suddenly, and she spun to stare angrily at him, her heart thudding.
Mike waved cheerfully in greeting. ‘Morning, Jared! Sleep well?’
‘In fits and starts,’ Jared said, striding across to the breakfast area, sexy in jeans and a black tight-fitting T-shirt, dark eyes flashing contemptuously over Christie. ‘Must have been the champagne.’
‘At least it was vintage,’ Mike laughed. ‘Fancy a swordfish for breakfast?’
Jared frowned, peering at the grill. ‘Any chance of home fries with it?’
‘A man after my own heart!’ Mike clapped him on the back, chewed his cigar over to one corner of his mouth, and called out, ‘Rosita! Get this man some home fries!’
‘Si, Senor Camarra!’ The dusky beauty bobbed a curtsy.
Jared looked at Christie. She looked back at him. Her eyes were hidden by dark glasses, but they blazed with love and anger, her face tightening with pride as she lifted her blonde head, almost in challenge. He might despise her now, but he would feel very differently after she had had her meeting with Mike Camarra.
‘How about you, Chris?’ Jared asked sardonically. ‘Pleasant dreams—or unpleasant?’
‘Very pleasant indeed,’ she replied swiftly, lifting her blonde brows, still keeping that look of challenge on her beautiful face.
Jared frowned, obviously disbelieving.
‘In fact,’ Christie said with a smile, ‘I feel better than I have done for years. Marvellous. Full of hope for the future.’
His hard mouth parted in shock.
‘That was a pretty speech!’ Mike Camarra laughed, flipping a waffle. ‘Anything to do with your meeting with me at eleven?’
‘Meeting?’ Jared’s dark brows jerked together.
‘Sure,’ Mike drawled, obviously aware that some- thing was rotten in the state of California today, and that he was interfering with passionate undercurrents. ‘We’re getting together very formally indeed, aren’t we, honey? In my office, eleven sharp.’
‘Anything to do with Tigresse?’ Jared bit out under his breath, glaring at Christie. ‘If so, it should come to my attention as director. Unless you want to see Mike in his capacity as head of the studio…?’
Christie lifted her brows, and said softly, ‘That’s nothing to do with you, Jared. Mike is my boss. I often have formal meetings with—’
A heavy brass ornament suddenly sailed out of a bedroom balcony window on the east wing and crashed on to the terrace, fifty yards away.
‘Hey!’ Mike shouted angrily up at the hot balcony. ‘You can pay for that, whoever threw it! My wife bought it in Japan last—’
‘Sorry, Mike!’ Nessa stormed on to the balcony like Joan Crawford in a white satin fur-trimmed neglige, her eyes spitting fire. ‘I’m just trying to get an uninvited guest out of my bedroom!’
There was the distant slam of a door.
Nessa disappeared from the balcony.
‘Never a dull moment,’ Mike commented wryly.
‘Passionate pair, aren’t they?’ Millie called from the table she sat at a few yards away, beneath a gaily-fringed parasol with Bobby Datchett, the notorious Hollywood womaniser of the last thirty years. ‘Do you remember the first night we met them, Mike? Nessa broke every single piece of crockery on the dining-table, just because Simon said he didn’t like the dinner she’d served.’
Christie flushed, angrily aware that everyone was grinning at her, and that she now looked very much like the betrayed fiance. It was, of course, humiliating. Suddenly, she realised that Millie had known it was Simon in Nessa’s room, and also that she had known Simon and Nessa were a couple…
How long had it really been going on, then? she won-
dered in shock, staring up at the deserted sun-bleached balcony, the palm trees towering beside it into a halcyon blue sky.
‘Stop staring like that,’ Jared murmured, stepping beside her suddenly, his voice low enough only for her to hear as he took her arm. ‘Everyone knows what’s between those two—don’t let them see how bad you feel about their love affair, or—’
Her head turned as she gasped, staring. ‘You knew?’
‘Of course!’ He frowned, his voice still low. ‘They were one of the most famous couples in Hollywood. Don’t tell me you didn’t know?’ His sharp eyes noticed the humiliated flush on her face. ‘Oh, great. So Simon’s even worse than you are when it comes to amoral—’
‘Mind your own business!’ she snapped under her breath. ‘Simon just wanted to forget her, that’s all. He didn’t know she’d be here.’
‘Any more than I knew you’d be here.’ He studied her, eyes narrowing, and gave a terse nod. ‘Yes, I guess we’re all in the same rocky old boat. Come on, get some breakfast and sit down. I want to talk to you.’
Christie angrily let him lead her to the fruit table, not wanting to cause a scene in front of the others. She chose melon and blueberries, then walked with Jared to the table farthest from the others, closest to the inviting, cool blue waters of the swimming pool.
‘So what’s this meeting with Mike?’ Jared demanded when they were seated beneath the fringed parasol. ‘Are you thinking of telling him about my four-poster casting couch? If so, Christie, I warn you—’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ she said flatly. ‘I wouldn’t be such a fool. Mike’s been around, he’s no stranger to Hollywood immorality. I expect he’d just smile if I told him you’d demanded sex in exchange for the role!’
Jared leaned back, eyes narrowing. ‘So what’s the plan?’
She ate a blueberry and did not reply.
‘Come on! I know you only just arranged it with him, because otherwise he’d have told me about it last night! It must have something to do with our argument on the beach. So what is it? Tell me, or—’
‘I’m going to refuse the role of Lelie,’ she said un- steadily, and ate another blueberry in the stunned silence that followed.
He was leaning back in the chair, utterly frozen, his eyes wiped clean of expression. All around them crickets buzzed in the gardens, and a little multi-coloured dragonfly flew across the swimming pool looking for lilies.
‘Is this some kind of trick?’ he demanded thickly.
‘No trick.’
‘Come off it, Chris!’ He sounded sure of himself, but his voice was rough with shock. ‘You’d sell your soul to the devil for that part!’
‘Apparently not,’ she said huskily. ‘I certainly draw the line at selling my body to you—and you’re only a close relation of the Prince of Darkness.’
‘Nice to know you’ve got my measure at last!’ he bit out thickly, and leaned forwards, powerful hair- roughened forearms on the table, the glitter of his wrist- watch dazzling as the sunlight caught it. ‘But don’t think for one second that I believe you really intend to refuse the role of Lelie, because I remember only too well your excitable words last night! How it was going to fulfil all your dreams, give you everything you wanted, give you—’
‘Morning, Simon!’ Millie called into the centre of their heated conversation.
They both looked round instantly to see Simon walking stiffly across the terrace with an unmistakable black eye.
‘Oh, my God…!’ Christie was on her feet at once, appalled as she went across to him. He saw her and flushed dark red, punching himself briefly and oddly in the arm, then clutching it for a long moment. The bruise around his eye must have been made last night. It was livid purple with faint yellowing at the edges.
‘Good morning, Christie,’ Simon said thickly, his grey eyes blazing a warning to her not to show sympathy or concern or even to mention his black eye. ‘I slept pleasantly. Did you?’
She stopped in front of him. ‘Yes, I—I slept very well.’
‘Good.’ He nodded curtly, then turned to Mike. ‘A swordfish steak, if you please, Mike.’
‘Oh, that Ivy League accent,’ Mike said with a grin much like the ex-swordfish.
‘Your home fries, senor!‘ Rosita was suddenly walking across to Jared with a plate of fresh cooked home fries.
Simon looked at Christie. ‘Where are you sitting, darling?’
‘Over there,’ she said huskily. ‘With Jared. Come on, I’d be delighted if you’d join us, darling.’
Together, they began to walk across the hot stone terrace to the table where Jared sat watching them with hard, narrowed eyes and a tight-lipped expression.
‘Isn’t Nessa coming down yet, Simon?’ Millie called gaily.
‘I wouldn’t know!’ he replied stiffly.
‘Too busy ducking the guided missiles, huh?’ Bobby Datchett called, laughing like mad and clapping his hand. ‘Violence, violence!’
Simon carried on walking rigidly to the table, where he and Jared glared at each other, both bristling with male aggression.
‘Love the eye make-up,’ Jared drawled mockingly as Simon sat down. ‘I understand my girlfriend applied it for you?’
Christie’s heart soared with sudden acid jealousy, her face whitening as she stared at him, thinking, Oh, God, please stop me feeling this, stop me loving Jared, stop me going crazy with all this unwanted passion.
Simon didn’t reply to Jared’s taunt, but instead began to eat his steak while Christie poured him some orange juice, her hand shaking as she thought of Jared’s hard, male body moving passionately between Nessa’s slim white thighs. Damn him to hell! She put the orange juice down, jealousy shooting through her veins. He’s ruining my career and I’m powerless to prevent him. And the worst part was that she knew she still secretly, stupidly hoped that he might love her again once he found out she was serious about refusing the part.
Her eyes flicked to his tough, handsome face. He had been so sincere last night. So loving, so trusting—surely he couldn’t be seriously involved with Nessa Vale, any more than she herself was seriously involved with Simon? She had to believe that, or she would never make it through this weekend with her self-respect intact. The only other option she had was to believe that Jared was a snake, a rat, and a promiscuous cheat, and if she be- lieved that, even for one second, she would despise herself for being so deeply in love with him.
Suddenly, she saw the heart of Jared’s dilemma more clearly than she ever had. Was that how he felt about her? Oh, God, let it be that, because, if it was, he would surely change his mind once he knew she had refused to do the picture. And then, hot on the heels of that thought, the one that had eluded her since last night- had Jared felt no other option but to throw her in at the deep end? Was his casting couch demand just a test? If it was, she was about to pass it with flying colours, and, all career ambitions aside, it made no difference whether it was a test, a spontaneous impulse, a ruthless desire for sexual revenge or an act of self-defence from a man who had been bitterly hurt. The fact was that she could not accept it and would, therefore, have to refuse the role. Arguing with that inside herself would only cause her further pain. The best thing to do was just accept it, stand by her decision, and see it through. Then leave love in the lap of the gods…
She hoped they would reward her integrity and courage.
‘Christie,’ Jared said tightly, watching her with nar- rowed eyes. ‘I’d like to have a word in private with you. After your meeting with Mike. Shall we say—midday, in my bedroom?’
Simon looked up, baffled. ‘What meeting with—?’
‘I don’t think your bedroom is an appropriate place to discuss business, Jared,’ Christie cut in coolly. ‘Shall we instead meet at midday in the drawing-room?’
Jared’s mouth twisted in a cynical smile. ‘Fine! There are plenty of couches in there, just perfect for casting!’ Getting to his feet, he treated her to a contemptuous look before striding away to the barbecue
area, leaving his home fries and swordfish steak barely eaten.
Christie watched him go with hungry eyes, her heart thudding at the prospect of that meeting. How would he react? He had obviously made it midday so he could speak to Mike before he saw her, and that was con- firmed now by the fact that he stood talking to Mike by the barbecue in what was obviously a serious business discussion. Oh, how she prayed he would rediscover his love for her, as he had done last night, before she made that fatal error.
‘What on earth is going on?’ Simon asked under his breath. ‘What are all these meetings for?’
She turned to him, took a deep breath, and said, ‘Simon, prepare yourself for a shock. I’m going to refuse the role of Tigresse.’
He dropped his knife and fork with a clatter. ‘What!’
‘Don’t even think about trying to talk me out of it.’ Her face was strong, determined. ‘And don’t ask me why I’ve made the decision. The only thing you need to know is that I have made it, and that nothing you do or say can change my mind.’
He stared at her. ‘But…this is simply absurd, Christie! You’re surely not cancelling the biggest opportunity of your career, just because of Jared Buchanan, are you?’
‘Yes,’ she admitted thickly. ‘But it’s not for the reasons you think, and I’m certainly not prepared to tell you what the real reasons are.’
‘But you must tell me, Christie! Not only am I your agent, but I’m your fiancé!’
She arched blonde brows. ‘I might say the same to you about that black eye you’re sporting.’
He went red, lowering his lashes. ‘I…’
Silence trailed between them. Birds were singing in the open air all around them, and the sweet scent of the Pacific was mingling with the scent of barbecued meat.
‘There’s a lot more to your relationship with Nessa than meets the eye,’ Christie said under her breath. ‘I’m not going to pry, Simon, because I can see you’re going through hell.’
Blue Fire Page 9
