away.
He shot Julia a glance over his shoulder. “Sit” was all he said.
Julia folded her arms over her chest, and sat. He was back in ten minutes, and dropped down beside her with a long sigh. “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen the queen of the Gs sloshed before. You want to tell me what that was all about?”
“I haven’t got a clue. But I intend to corner Eve at the first opportunity and find out.”
Curious, he traced a finger down the nape of her neck. “Just what was it you were going to do if Gloria touched you again?”
“Slug her on her pointy little chin.” He laughed, squeezing her against him. “God, what a woman. Now I only wish I’d been ten seconds later.” “I don’t enjoy altercations.”
“No, I can see that. Eve, on the other hand, has set up multiple altercations in one star-studded evening. Shall I tell you what you’ve missed during your tour of the gardens?”
If he was trying to calm her down, the least she could do was give him a chance. “All right.”
“Kincade has been waddling around looking fat and threatening, and failing to get Eve alone for a private chat. Anna del Rio, the designer? She’s been telling catty stories about her hostess, hoping, I imagine, to offset whatever catty stories Eve intends to tell about her.” He drew out a cigar. In the flare of his lighter his face looked tensed in opposition to the mild amusement in his voice. “Drake has been hopping around as though he had hot coals in his Jockeys.”
“Maybe that’s because I saw Delrickio and that other man in his office last week.”
“Did you?” Paul expelled smoke slowly. “Well, well. Back at the ranch—Torrent is looking pitiful—more so after he and Eve had a little tête-à-tête. Priest is doing a lot of posturing and hearty laughing. While he and Eve were dancing, he was sweating.”
“It sounds as though I should get back and see for myself.”
“Julia.” He stopped her from rising. “We need to talk about several things. I’ll come by tomorrow.”
“Not tomorrow,” she said, knowing she was only procrastinating. “Brandon and I have plans.”
“Monday then, while he’s in school. That would be better.”
“I have an appointment at eleven-thirty with Anna at her studio.”
“Then I’ll be there at nine.” He rose, offering a hand to help her to her feet.
She walked with him toward the sound of music and laughter. “Paul, were you coming to my rescue with Gloria with handkerchiefs and sympathy?”
“It worked.”
“Then we’re even.”
He hesitated only a moment before linking his fingers with hers. “Just about.”
The party didn’t fizzle out until after three, though by then only a few diehards had remained, slopping up the last of the champagne and licking the beluga off their fingers. Perhaps they were the wise ones, greeting the oncoming day with bleary eyes, floating heads, and overfilled stomachs. Many of those who had left at a more conservative hour lost a night’s sleep without the extras.
With a brocade smoking jacket wrapped around the enormous bulk that flirted gleefully with heart failure, Anthony Kincade sat up in bed smoking one of the cigars his doctors warned would kill him that much sooner. The boy he’d chosen to use that night lay sprawled among the silk sheets and feather pillows, snoring off a tidy dose of meth and a bout of brutal sex. Across his smooth, slender back a row of angry pink welts had risen.
Kincade didn’t regret putting them there—the boy was paid well—but he did regret he’d had to settle for a substitute. All the time he’d whipped, all the time he’d driven himself, hard and cruelly into the boy, he’d dreamed of punishing Eve.
Bitch. Whore-bitch. He wheezed rustily as he shifted his mountainous flesh to reach for the glass of port beside the bed. Did she think she could threaten him? Did she think she could toy and tease and dangle exposure in front of his nose?
She wouldn’t dare go public with what she knew. But if she did … His hand trembled as he slurped the wine. His eyes, nearly buried under the folds of sagging skin around them, glinted with venom. If she did, how many others might find the courage to walk through the door she’d opened? He couldn’t allow it. Wouldn’t.
He might be arrested, have to stand trial, even face prison.
It wouldn’t happen. He wouldn’t let it happen. He drank, he smoked, he plotted. Beside him, the young prostitute murmured in his sleep.
In Long Beach, Delrickio soaked in his whirlpool, letting the hot, jasmine-scented water beat over his tanned, disciplined body. He’d made love to his wife when he’d returned home. Sweetly, tenderly. His lovely Teresa now slept the sleep of the cherished.
God, he did cherish the woman, and hated the fact that while he’d steeped himself in her, he’d fantasied about Eve. Of all the sins he’d committed, this was the only one he repented. Even with what Eve was doing, what she was threatening to do, she couldn’t kill the hunger in him. And that was his penance.
Fighting to keep his muscles from tensing again, he watched the steam rise to smoke up the slanted windows and block the stars. She had been like that to him, like steam smoking up his senses, blocking his sanity. Didn’t she realize he would have kept her safe, happy, showered her with all the things a woman desired? Instead, she had spurned him, cut him out of her life with a finality and viciousness that had resembled death. And all because of business.
He forced his hand to relax and waited until the splinter of rage had been worked out of his heart. A man who thought with his heart made mistakes. As he had. It was his own fault that Eve had found out about some of the more unconventional parts of Delrickio Enterprises. Infatuation had made him careless. Still, he had believed, or made himself believe, that she could be trusted.
Then she had tossed Damien Priest in his face. She had looked at him, her eyes filled with disgust.
The former tennis player was a loose end that could easily be snipped at any time. But that would not make things right. It was Eve who could unravel his carefully woven cloak of respectability.
He would have to settle things, and he regretted it. But even before love came honor.
Gloria DuBarry cuddled beside her sleeping husband and let the tears stream down her face. She felt sick—too much liquor always upset her system. It was Eve’s fault she’d overindulged and had come so perilously close to humiliating herself.
It was all Eve’s fault. Hers and that nosy witch from back east.
They were going to see to it that she lost everything—her reputation, her marriage, maybe even her career. And all because of one mistake. One small mistake.
Sniffling, she stroked a hand over her husband’s bare shoulder. It was solid, sturdy, like a quarter century of marriage. She loved Marcus so much. He took such good care of her. How often had he said she was his angel, his spotless, untarnished angel?
How could he understand, how could anyone understand, that the woman who made her career playing freckle-faced virgins had indulged in a torrid, illicit affair with a married man? That she had had an illegal abortion to rid herself of the result of that affair?
Oh, God, how could she ever have imagined herself in love with Michael Torrent? What was worse, much worse, was that while she’d been meeting him in dingy motels, he had been playing her father onscreen. Her father.
Having to come face-to-face with him tonight when he was old, half-crippled … frail. It disgusted her to think that she had once held him inside her. Terrified her. She hated him She hated Eve. She wished they were both dead. Wallowing is self-pity, she wept into her pillow.
Michael Torrent was used to bad nights. His body was so riddled with arthritis that he was rarely free of pain. Age an illness had hulled him out, leaving just enough flesh and nerve in the shell for misery. Tonight it was his mind, not his body, keeping him from the luxury of sleep.
He could curse the age that had ruined his body, sapped him of energy, robbed him of the comfort of sex. He could we
ep knowing he’d once been a king, and was now less than a man. All the memories of what he had been jabbed at him like hot needles that gave no peace to tired flesh. But that, all of that, was nothing.
Now Eve was threatening to take away the little he had left. His pride, and his image.
Perhaps he could no longer act, but he’d been able to sate that thirst with the legend. He was revered, admired, respected, thought of by fans and associates as a grand old man, the one-time king of the romantic era of Hollywood. Grant and Gable, Power and Flynn were dead. Michael Torrent, who had ended his acting career graciously playing wise old grandfathers, was alive. He was alive and they stood up and cheered for him whenever he granted an audience.
He hated the fact that Eve would tell the world that he had cheated his best and closest friend, Charlie Gray. For years Michael had used his clout to see that the studio hadn’t given Charlie more than a sidekick roll. He had gone out of his way to sneak behind Charlie’s back and cuckold him with each one of his wives. How could he make anyone understand that it had been a game to him, a petty, childish game brought on by youth and envy? Charlie had been smarter, more skilled, and just plain nicer than Michael could ever hope to be. He hadn’t meant to hurt Charlie, not really. After the suicide, guilt had eaten at him until he’d confessed it all to Eve.
He’d expected comfort, solicitude, understanding. She’d given him none of those things, but had settled into a cold rage. The confession had doomed their marriage. Now Eve would doom what was left of his life with a bitter humiliation.
Unless someone stopped her.
Sweat popped out on Drake’s skin like bullets. Eyes wild, he wandered around his house, not nearly drunk enough to sleep. He was still fifty thousand short of the mark, and time was running out.
He needed to calm down, he knew he needed to calm down, but seeing Delrickio had scared him to the point of having his bowels turn to water.
Delrickio had talked to him politely, affectionately, and all the while Joseph had stood watching Drake with dispassionate eyes. It was as if the beating had never taken place—as if the threat it was meant to impart didn’t exist.
That made it worse somehow, knowing whatever would be done to him would be done without passion, with the cold, clear head of business to be transacted.
How could he convince Delrickio that he had an inside track with Julia when everyone had seen her with Paul Winthrop?
There had to be a way to get to her, to the tapes, to Eve. He had to find it. Whatever risks he took couldn’t be worse than the risk of doing nothing.
Victor Flannigan thought of Eve. Then of his wife. He wondered how he could have gotten so tangled up with two such different women. Both had the power to destroy his life. One through weakness, one through strength.
He knew he was to blame. Even loving them, he had used them. Still, he had given them both the best he had—and by doing so had cheated all three of them.
There was no going back and fixing it, certainly no way to change what already was. All he could do was fight to keep it from unraveling.
And as he turned restlessly in the big, empty bed, he ached for Eve, and feared her. In much the same way he ached for and feared a single bottle of whiskey. Because he’d never been able to have enough of either. However many times he had pulled himself away from both addictions, he was always dragged back. Though he had learned to hate the drink even as he thirsted, he could only love the woman.
His church wouldn’t condemn him for draining a bottle, but they would for one night of love. And there had been hundreds of nights.
Even fear for his soul couldn’t make him regret a single one of them.
Why couldn’t Eve understand that whatever it did to him inside, he had to protect Muriel? After all these years, why was she insisting on exploding all the lies and secrets? Didn’t she know she would suffer as much as he?
Rising, he turned away from the bed and walked to the window to stare at the lightening sky. In a few hours he would go to his wife.
He had to find a way to protect Muriel, and to save Eve from herself.
In his suite at the Beverly Wilshire, Damien Priest waited for the sun to rise. He didn’t use liquor or drugs to dull his mind to sleep. He needed it awake, alert, so he could think.
How much was she planning to tell? How much would she dare make public? He wanted to believe that the party tonight had been orchestrated to make him panic. He hadn’t given her the satisfaction. He’d laughed, swapped stories, slapped backs. Christ, he’d even danced with her.
How silkily she’d asked him how his sporting goods chain was doing. How malicious her expression had been when she’d commented on how well Delrickio was looking.
But he’d only smiled. If she’d hoped to make him afraid, she’d been disappointed.
He sat, staring out the dark window. And was very afraid.
Eve settled into bed with a long, satisfied sigh. As far as she was concerned, the night had been a tremendous success. Over and above the pleasure of watching a select few jump through hoops, she’d enjoyed watching Julia and Paul together.
There was an odd and sweet sort of justice in that, she thought as she let her eyes drift closed. And it was all about justice, wasn’t it? That and a healthy dose of revenge.
She was sorry that Victor was still upset. He would have to accept that she was doing what she had to do. Perhaps he would before too much longer.
Feeling the huge, lonely bed around her, she wished with all her heart that he could have stayed with her tonight. Loving him would have capped off the evening, then they could have cuddled together and talked sleepily until sunrise.
There was still time for that. Eve closed her eyes tight and hung on to that one simple wish.
As she drifted off, she heard Nina come down the hall, move into her room to pace restlessly before shutting the door.
Poor girl, Eve thought. She worried too much.
By nine o’clock Monday morning, Julia had stretched, curled, crunched, pumped, sweated, and steamed. Her body had been twisted, kneaded, pummeled, and rubbed. She left the main house carting her gym bag that contained her sweaty leotard and towel.
She was covered in less than attractive sweats, and tugged down the shirt as she passed Lyle lazily waxing the car outside the garage.
She didn’t like the way he looked at her, or the fact that he always seemed to be doing something along the route the mornings of her workouts. As always, she greeted him with cool civility.
“Good morning, Lyle.”
“Miss.” He touched the brim of his cap in a move that seemed more suggestive than servile. “Hope you’re not working too hard.” He liked to imagine her in the gym, wearing something skimpy and spandex and sweating like a bitch in heat. “I sure wouldn’t say you needed all that exercise.”
“I enjoy it,” she lied, and kept walking, knowing he watched her. She shook off the itch between her shoulder blades and reminded herself to keep the shades drawn in her bedroom.
Paul was waiting on the terrace, his feet propped on a chair. One quick glance had him grinning. “You look like you could use a tall cold one.”
“Fritz,” she said, and dug into the pocket of the gym bag for her keys. “He’s working on my deltoids. My arms feel like two stretched-out rubber bands.” After opening the door and tossing bag and keys on the kitchen table, she headed for the fridge. “He’d have been a star in the Spanish Inquisition. Today, while I was suffering on the slant board, he made me confess I like Devil Dogs and Ho-Hos.”
“You could have lied.”
She snorted, pouring a glass of juice. “Nobody can look into those big, sincere blue eyes and lie. You’d go straight to hell. Want some?”
“No, thanks.”
By the time she’d drained the glass she felt nearly human. “I’ve got a little more than an hour before I have to change for my appointment.” Refreshed and ready for business, she set the empty glass on the counter. “What did you need to
talk to me about?”
“A number of things.” Idly, he ran his hand down the length of her ponytail. “The tapes, for one.”
“You don’t have to worry about them.”
“Locking the house is a good precaution, Jules, but it isn’t enough.”
“I’ve done more. Come on.” She led the way through the house to the office. On the journey he noted that she had vases and pots of flowers everywhere. A good many of the milky-white blooms from the party had found a home. “Go ahead,” she invited him, pointing toward the desk drawer. “Take a look.”
Paul opened the drawer to find it empty. “Where?”
It grated a little that he hadn’t seemed surprised. “They’re in a safe place. The only time I have any of them out is when I’m working. So …” She shut the drawer. “If anyone tried to poke around