Her Leading Man

by Duncan, Alice

  “This is great!” Lovejoy called from the sidelines through the megaphone Martin usually used. “You two are fabulous together!”

  “Yes,” Christina muttered. “I thought so, too. Once.”

  Martin’s heart pitched and heaved like a wild thing caught in a net. “Here,” he said roughly, “let me drape this around you.”

  “Yes, master.” Now she sounded sarcastic.

  “Damn it, Christina, you’re not being fair.” He held out the towel, and she stepped from the tub and into his arms. He wrapped them around her, along with the towel, and turned her so that she faced him

  He stared down at her; she stared up at him. Martin heard a vague babble of voices behind him. Lovejoy’s. Pablo’s. A couple of others. He couldn’t make out the words, but they sounded excited.

  It wasn’t until Christina’s eyes fluttered and closed, and his lips descended upon hers that sanity returned with a wallop. Lovejoy all but shrieked, “That’s perfect! Spectacular! The public’s going to love it! That’s the best kiss I’ve ever witnessed in a picture! You two are great together!”

  Martin yanked himself away from Christina in horror. “Good God.” He hadn’t intended to show the world how much he craved the woman.

  She blinked up at him as if she didn’t know what had happened, either. Her hand shook when she lifted it and pressed her fingers to her lips.

  When Martin took an unsteady step away from her, he realized Lovejoy was actually jumping up and down with ecstasy on the sidelines. He cleared his throat “Um, I guess we did that part pretty well.”

  Her eyes were still huge and luminous, like dusky pools of pure emotion. Martin got the feeling he might fall into them if he wasn’t careful.

  “Yes,” she whispered. “I guess we did.”

  “Damn it, Christina . . .” But Martin didn’t know what to say.

  She nodded, and his control broke like a dry towel snapping. He reached out, grabbed her to him, and kissed her again, like the man his character was supposed to be. A man driven mad by jealousy and adoration over a woman he couldn’t completely conquer. It appalled him to know how aptly the description fitted himself, Martin Tafft, formerly levelheaded motion picture producer and director. He also didn’t care for the conquer part, but it resonated in his head like an echo.

  As was written into the story line, Paul Gabriel, playing the role of Pharaoh’s wicked brother, crashed onto the scene at that point. Both Christina and Martin whirled around. If Christina was in anywhere near the same state of befuddlement as Martin himself, Paul’s arrival had truly shocked her.

  Martin didn’t know if she was acting when she stumbled backward and had to brace herself on the edge of the tub. She looked great. Christina, however, would look great in anything. Or nothing. Martin knew it for a fact. Damn it all.

  “Cease pawing that woman, you scoundrel!” Paul cried out in his ringing high-pitched voice. If the pictures were ever able to accommodate sound, Martin feared Paul would have to go into another line of work.

  Martin took a ferocious step forward and held out his hand in a gesture meant to cow the other man into fear and trembling. Which was silly; why would one of the most powerful men in the kingdom quake away from a slave girl’s low-class, impoverished lover? But it wasn’t Martin’s place to question the writers. Phineas Lovejoy had an unerring instinct for public tastes, and Phineas Lovejoy had said this picture was going to be the greatest in Peerless’s history to date.

  “Stay away from this woman, you vile cad!” Martin cried, feeling like an imbecile as he did so. “This woman isn’t for you.” Which would have been true even if they weren’t talking slave to Pharaoh’s brother, since Paul Gabriel didn’t find women sexually attractive in the first place.

  “But she’s such a lovely little thing, Marty.” Paul went so far as to waggle an eyebrow. It would probably look great on the screen, but it made Martin want to laugh. Which was an improvement over his mood of moments earlier. “If I went for women, I’m sure I’d like her best of all.” He took a swaggering step toward the couple, who were sort of huddled together at the bathtub. Paul looked admirably powerful and fierce, even if he did sound like a toy poodle.

  “Don’t make me laugh, Paul, or we’ll have to do this again, and I don’t think Martin would last through another take.” Christina had pulled her towel up so that it covered the lower part of her face. Martin imagined she was grinning underneath the towel. Only her huge, beautiful eyes were visible, and they conveyed heaps and heaps of anxiety. Martin was sure the public would feel appropriate anguish on her behalf. They just loved to see females in distress. He wasn’t sure what that revealed about the American character, but he feared it boded ill for Christina’s future plans as a voter and a doctor. It was hard to feel sorry for a medical doctor, or to consider a physician as somehow weaker than one was oneself.

  Martin, who had lost any impulse to laugh, growled, “She’s right. Let’s get this over with.”

  “Well, then, chum, you’d best state swinging at me so that we can fight and fall all over each other, and you can beat me up.” Since his back was to the camera, Paul waggled his eyebrows again. “Now you I could go for, Marty, darling.”

  “Good God.” Martin didn’t dare roll his eyes, but he heard Christina giggle behind her towel. “All right, try not to get too excited, Paul.”

  He strode aggressively forward, and Paul did likewise. They met in the middle of the floor and engaged in battle. Martin tried his best to remember the choreography, but he wasn’t used to the acting side of the business, and he feared he wasn’t doing it right. He whispered, “Am I supposed to punch you now?”

  “No,” Paul whispered back. “We have to struggle manfully for another couple of seconds. Remember?”

  “Right. Okay, struggle hard, because I’m going to grab you by the shoulder and push you. Don’t fall and break your neck or anything.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it, darling.”

  Martin understood that there were many men of Paul’s persuasion in all of the art forms, and he had no qualms about working with them. It did, however, make him a little queasy to think that Paul might be getting a kick out of this fake fistfight. Christina would tell him that was merely one of his prejudices rearing its ugly head, Martin thought unhappily. Still, he tried to do a good job. He shoved Paul, making it look as though he were doing so with all his might, although he didn’t push very hard at all.

  Paul reacted brilliantly, staggering backward, until he pretended to come up against the bathtub.

  Christina screamed, as she was supposed to.

  Paul muttered, “For the love of God, sweetheart, you don’t have to screech so loudly. This is pretend, remember?”

  “Sorry,” Christina murmured from behind her towel. Martin saw that her eyes were twinkling like gemstones with life and laughter. He wanted to rush over to her, pick her up in his arms, and make away with her. Instead, he shook his fist at Pharaoh’s bully of a brother.

  Paul, pretending to be irate now—as well he might be, if he were a nobleman being bested by a slave—drew a wicked-looking sword out of the scabbard strapped around his waist In reality, the blade was fashioned out of rubber and cardboard, but it looked real. “All right, you blasted upstart, you’re going to get yours now.”

  Martin backed up as Paul stalked toward him, sword drawn, and looking as mean as the devil. Martin, who knew Paul liked nothing better than cultivating his elaborate flower gardens on his estate in the part of the city now known as Hollywoodland, would have liked to grin. He didn’t, mainly because he really wanted to get this scene in the can in one take.

  Paul was almost upon Martin, whom he’d backed up against a wall, when Christina did what she was supposed to do. Picking up the elaborate hand mirror that had been resting on a table, she rushed up behind Paul and clubbed him with it. The mirror, which looked as though it would pack a real wallop, was made out of rubber. It did, however, make quite a thunk.

  Paul sank to
the floor like a sack of meal.

  “Oh, my gosh, Paul, did I hurt you?” Christina appeared properly horrified, only this time she wasn’t acting.

  But Paul, safe from observation since the camera at this point was supposed to focus on Christina, winked at her. “You were perfect, sweetheart. Now the two of you run off and play together. I’m going to be here for a while. Maybe take a nap.”

  He groaned and rolled over, as he was supposed to, and Christina looked up from his prone form and into Martin’s eyes. They stared at each other in feigned consternation for approximately three seconds, then Lovejoy called, “Wonderful. Now grab hands and take off! We don’t want the viewing public to get bored while you stare at each other soulfully.”

  “Right,” Martin growled. He gave what he hoped looked like a convincing start and reached out to Christina.

  She, pretending to be stunned by the violence she’d just witnessed—and perpetrated—backed up and dropped the mirror on the floor. Actually, it dropped onto Paul and bounced off, and she muttered, “Bother.”

  “I don’t think it will matter,” Martin told her. “If the camera caught it, nobody will notice because they’ll be watching us. He still held out his hand. Now he made an impatient gesture with it, as if urging Christina to flee with him. “Come on. I think we’ve dawdled enough.”

  As if to add punch to Martin’s claim, Paul moved on the floor. “Groan, groan,” he said. “Groan, groan, groan. Okay, you guys can run away now.”

  Taking this as his cue, Martin leaped over Paul’s body, grabbed Christina’s wrist with no further ceremony, and dashed to the door of the bath room, dragging her behind. The only reason she dragged was because she was supposed to be a helpless female appalled by the events that had just transpired. As the scene was written, she was supposed to glance back several times at the man she’d lately beaned as if she were horrified by her own action.

  Martin thought ironically that if it had really been Christina in that tub, and if some man had burst in upon her, she’d probably have drowned the bastard. The Mayhew females he’d met thus far in his life didn’t take kindly to being imposed upon, nor did they wait around for men to rescue them.

  And that, he decided on a sour note, was probably why he and Christina were doomed to suffer through a failed love affair.

  But that was nonsensical thinking, he told himself as Paul staggered to his feet and shook a fist at the retreating pair. Just because she was independent didn’t mean she wasn’t a lovely and loving woman. Nor did it mean that she couldn’t exist in a happy relationship with a man. Him, for instance.

  Blast it all, he couldn’t afford to worry about all of that now. He had to see what Phin thought about the scene. If they had to shoot the blasted thing again, Martin might just have to pitch a fit.

  Another fit.

  The two of them stopped running a little way away from the bath room set and watched as Paul stumbled toward the door. After swaying artistically for several seconds, he stooped to pick up his fallen sword.

  “He’s really good at this,” Christina said. There was a laugh in her voice.

  Martin noted with appreciation that she hadn’t withdrawn her hand from his. He glanced at their clasped hands, and his heart gave another one of its painful lurches. He loved her so much. And she was so far removed from anything he’d ever known or understood of life. He really didn’t know what to do with her. Except love her.

  Martin had lived long enough to understand that it wasn’t love that made the world go round, however. Some form of natural or physical energy did that, and love didn’t have a thing to do with it. Damnation, he was depressed about this. He said, “Yes. Paul’s great.”

  “As long as pictures never start talking, he’ll be able to act in them forever.”

  Christina’s words were so similar to his own thoughts of a few minutes earlier, Martin smiled at her. “You’re absolutely right.”

  She sighed, lifting her toweled bosom. Martin longed to rip the towel away from her body and lavish his love upon it. But the cameras still cranked, and people still watched from behind the roped-off barrier, and Lovejoy was still directing at the top of his lungs from behind Martin’s megaphone.

  “I think Mr. Lovejoy is enjoying this,” Christina murmured. She giggled. “Better be careful, Martin, or you’ll lose your job and have to take up acting.”

  “God forbid.” But for the first time since he’d begun working in the industry, Martin thought he wouldn’t mind losing his job. He did not, however, want to take up acting. He wanted to retire altogether. Lovejoy shouted from afar, “Great! You’re doing great, Paul! All right, now, run after them!”

  After taking several more seconds to pretend to get his rattled brains settled, Paul struck a dramatic pose, shook his dagger in the air, and rushed out through the archway Martin and Christina had used moments earlier.

  “And—Cut! Fantastic! That was perfect!”

  “Thank God,” Martin mumbled under his breath. More loudly, he called out to Lovejoy, “We don’t have to reshoot it, do we?”

  At his side, Christina chuckled. Martin turned to offer her a slight frown. “Well, I don’t like you parading around like that.”

  “I don’t like it, either,” Christina said pointedly. “It’s my job.”

  “Hmm “ Martin decided to drop the subject. They’d already fought about it And he’d fought about it with Lovejoy, too. Plus, Christina was right, and he was wrong, and he didn’t like it. He also dropped her hand, although it cost him a qualm, and trotted over to Lovejoy “How’d it look?”

  Phineas Lovejoy was in rapture. “It was perfect. I swear to God, Martin, you were great.”

  Pablo Orozco glowered from his folding chair that had been set under an umbrella. Martin heard his bitter chuff of breath and figured the actor was in a stew. But it was his own damned fault for fighting with the camel-riding teacher, and Martin had no patience with him.

  Come to think of it, maybe he was being too hard on Pablo. While it was true Pablo Orozco was the scum of the earth, it was also true that if he hadn’t been an ass and broken his arm, it would have been Pablo toweling Christina off as she arose from the tub. Martin turned to glare at Pablo, who glared back.

  Yes, he decided at once. It was better this way. Much better.

  “Bah,” Pablo growled. “You weren’t strong enough.”

  Martin blinked at him, trying to reconcile Pablo Orozco and strength in his own mind and failing. He didn’t resent the actor’s bitter comment; he chalked it up to professional jealousy.

  “Don’t worry, Pablo. I’m not after your job. I’d as soon it had been you.” Which was a flat lie, but Martin’s diplomatic nature was gathering power within him, and he’d spoken the words automatically.

  “I’m not.” Christina’s voice came, hard as rocks, from behind him. “You’re a toad, Pablo, and I’m glad you didn’t get to kiss me.”

  “You’re only afraid of what my kiss would do to you.” Orozco smirked.

  All of the diplomacy within Martin vaporized instantly. His hands balled into fists, his eyebrows dipped, and he took a menacing step in Orozco’s direction. He might have continued to the chair, hauled Orozco out of it, and punched him in the jaw, except that Christina grabbed the hem of his toga—or whatever Egyptians wore—and clung to it like a barnacle, holding him back.

  “Don’t do it, Martin. He’s not worth it.”

  Some of the ugliness tarnishing the air evidently penetrated Lovejoy’s ecstasy. He took a hasty step in order to place himself between Pablo Orozco and Martin Tafft. “Yes, now,” he said in a loud voice, then cleared his throat. “Well, I think that went very well. Very well. So . . .”

  He turned to Christina, rubbing his hands as if he were still relishing what had recently transpired and been captured on film. “Do you want to change for the banquet scene, Christina? It’ll be the last one for the day, and I’m hoping to get it in the can in one take.”

  Martin breathed deep
ly. Calm down, he commanded himself. Calm down. There was no reason for him to blow up because Pablo Orozco was a disgusting reprobate who wanted to add Christina to his long list of conquests. Christina had better sense than to fall for a fake like him.

  “Martin.”

  Christina was Martin’s lover. She didn’t want anything to do with a slimy actor like Pablo Orozco who thought he was God’s gift to women.

  “Martin?”

  All he had to do now was calm himself. Martin breathed deeply, recalling from something he’d read once that deep breathing helped to soothe one’s nerves.

  “Martin!”

  Martin jumped, startled, and glanced around wildly, expecting to see some sort of desperate emergency in progress. Instead, he noticed everyone staring at him. They all wore expressions of patience and understanding.

  “Um, I beg your pardon?” He tried to smile but couldn’t.

  “I said,” said Christina, “will you go with me to the hotel. You probably need to change, too.”

  Change. Change? Change into what?

  Enlightenment dawned. “Oh! Change! He swallowed and felt ridiculous. “Sure. I’ll go with you. Yes, I probably need to change, too.” He glanced at Lovejoy, who was looking faintly exasperated. “Right. Next scene. Banquet, isn’t it?”

  “Right.” Christina grabbed one of his now-limp hands and commenced tugging him toward the hotel.

  Martin followed meekly.

  Pablo Orozco muttered, “Fah!”

  Fourteen

  “Honestly, Martin Tafft, I don’t understand you one little bit.”

  Furious with him and with everything and everybody else in the world, Christina yanked the wet garment she’d worn in her bathing scene over her head.

  “First you leave me sitting in that tepid water for an hour while you argue about something that’s been settled for months, then you scold me for being in the blasted tub—and doing a nude scene certainly wasn’t my idea!—and then you try to start a fight with Pablo Orozco, who isn’t worth the time of day, much less the energy it would take to pop him in the jaw.”