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“Screw the publicity,” Koranda said.
Dick Spano and Johnny Guy Kelly exchanged glances. They liked Jake, but he had strong opinions, and he could be a stubborn son of a bitch when he believed in something. “It’s not that easy,” Johnny Guy said. “She’s got some smart people behind her. They’d been waiting a long time to find exactly the right picture.”
“Bullshit,” Jake retorted. “All they want is a leading man tall enough to play with their little girl. It doesn’t go any deeper than that.”
“I think you’re underestimating them.”
Cold silence drifted their way from the back of the room.
“Sorry, Jake,” Spano finally said, not without some trepidation, “but we’re going to overrule you on this one. We’re making her an offer tomorrow.”
Behind them, Koranda uncoiled from his seat. “Do what you have to, but don’t expect me to roll out the welcome mat.”
Johnny Guy shook his head as Jake disappeared, then once again looked at the screen. “Let’s hope Cupcake up there knows how to take some heat.”
Belinda had dragged Fleur to all of Jake Koranda’s pictures, and Fleur had hated every one of them. He was always shooting someone in the head, knifing him in the belly, or terrorizing a woman. And he seemed to enjoy it! Now she had to work with him, and she knew from her agent exactly
how dead set he’d been against casting her. Part of her couldn’t exactly blame him. No matter what Belinda believed, Fleur was no actress.
“Stop worrying,” Belinda said, whenever Fleur tried to talk to her about it. “The minute he sees you, he’ll fall in love.”
Fleur couldn’t imagine that happening.
The white stretch limousine the studio had sent to pick her up at LAX delivered her to the two-story Spanish-style Beverly Hills house Belinda had rented for them. It was early May, unseasonably cold when she’d left New York, but warm and sunny in Southern California. When she’d come over from France three years ago, she’d never imagined her life taking such a strange direction. She tried to be grateful, but lately that had been hard.
A housekeeper who looked like she was at least a hundred years old let her into a foyer with white walls, dark beams, a wrought-iron chandelier, and a terra-cotta floor. Fleur took the suitcases away from her when she started to carry them upstairs. She chose a back bedroom that looked down over the pool and left the master bedroom for Belinda. The house seemed even larger than the photos. With six bedrooms, four decks, and a couple of Jacuzzis, it had more space than two people needed, something she’d made the mistake of mentioning to Alexi during one of their phone conversations that substituted for visits.
“In Southern California, lack of ostentation is vulgar,” he’d said. “Follow your mother’s lead, and you will be a wonderful success.”
She’d let the dig pass. The problems between Alexi and Belinda were too complicated for her to solve, especially since she’d never been able to understand why two people who hated each other so much didn’t get a divorce. She kicked off her shoes and gazed around the room with its warm wooden pieces and earth-toned fabrics. A collection of Mexican crosses hanging on the wall gave her a pang of homesickness for the nuns. Never once had she imagined making this particular trip alone.
She sat on the side of the bed and called New York. “Are you feeling any better?” she asked when Belinda answered.
“I’m miserable. And humiliated. How can a woman my age get chicken pox?” Belinda blew her nose. “My baby is going to star in the most talked-about film of the year, and here I am stuck in New York with this ridiculous disease. If I get scars…”
“You’ll be fine in a week or so.”
“I’m not coming out there until I look my best. I want them to see what they passed up all those years ago.” Another nose blow. “Call me the moment you meet him. Don’t worry about the time difference.”
Fleur didn’t have to ask whom Belinda was talking about. She braced herself, and—sure enough…
“My baby’s going to be doing love scenes with Jake Koranda.”
“If you say that one more time, I’m going to throw up.”
Belinda managed a laugh through her misery. “Lucky, lucky, baby.”
“I’m hanging up now.”
But Belinda had beaten her to it.
Fleur walked over to the window and gazed down at the pool. She’d started to hate modeling, another thing Belinda would never understand. And she definitely didn’t want to be an actress. But since she had no idea what she wanted to do instead, she could hardly complain. She had gobs of money, a fabulous career, and a great part in a prestigious film. She was the luckiest girl in the world, and she was going to stop acting like a spoiled brat. So what if she never felt completely comfortable in front of the camera? She did a darned good job of faking it, and that’s exactly what she’d do with this movie. She’d fake it.
She changed into shorts, twisted her hair on top of her head, and carried the script of Sunday Morning Eclipse out to the patio. She settled into one of the cushioned chaises along with a glass of fresh orange juice and gazed down at the script.
Jake Koranda was playing Matt, the lead, a soldier returning home to Iowa from Vietnam. Matt is tortured by memories of a My Lai–type massacre he witnessed. When he gets home, he finds his wife pregnant with another man’s child and his brother caught up in a local scandal. Matt is drawn to Lizzie, his wife’s kid sister, who’s grown up in his absence. Fleur was playing Lizzie. She thumbed to the script notes.
Untouched by the smell of napalm and the corruption in Matt’s own family, Lizzie makes Matt feel innocent again.
