Gemma
What was it about being a celebrity that made people think you were deaf? Her outdoor security system might not have bass-heavy, theater-style surround sound, but she’d heard Sylvester loud and clear. That stupid tape would follow her to the ends of the earth.
Now, in addition to wondering if Adonis had found her bedroom performance sufficient, she had to wonder if he were scouring the Internet looking for her single most humiliating performance.
Once a single copy of something existed on the Internet, it could be copied thousands if not millions of times in seconds, minutes. She’d learned that simple mathematical formula the hard way.
Her lawyers had scoured the vast reaches of the globe, shooting out warning letters like bullets to website owners who willfully violated her privacy. Which had worked—in the United States and Western Europe. But China and Russia were like the Wild West of the Internet.
No amount of threats or lawsuits shut down those sites anchored in foreign countries. If their governments applied any pressure at all, and that was a big if, the sites shut down, and in the next breath, a new one popped up in their places.
After a few years, she got tired of paying four hundred dollars per hour to have someone with a law degree play the legal equivalent of the arcade game Whack-A-Mole. So the sex tape’s digital tracks lingered, easy enough to find by anyone with patience.
Gemma Hart duped by one Andrew O’Bryan.
It had to be why Adonis had left after one of the most significant days of her life. The presence of a sex tape made everything she’d said before a lie.
If he’d listen, she had so many explanations, a handful, a bundle. Gemma would happily heap them all on his lap for him to sort through, believe.
If he’d stayed.
But he’d left.
Run away like she was made of some kind of radioactive material. But maybe she was. Giovanni kept saying she had to let people in. Every person she did let through her defenses disappointed her in some way, big or small. Her hope that Adonis would somehow be different, especially if she were in charge, wasn’t at all turning out like she’d expected. He’d disappointed her from his first refusal. Then after she’d turned his no into a yes, he’d left anyway.
The buzzer sounded on time, and Gemma pressed the button, releasing the gate. The familiar yellow van eased up the twisting rise, disappearing then reappearing. Adonis parked where he always did, off to the side so as not to block her access.
Gemma girded all that needed girding, and stepped out the front door. Words of explanation died on her lips when Dominic’s truck immediately followed up the drive. The older Andreis hopped out of his truck before the younger. So much for a long talk.
“Time got freed up, Ms. Hart. Two for the price of one today. How’s that? We’ll get everything ready for the cabinet installers to come tomorrow. We’ll all be outta your red hair in no time.”
Dominic was already pulling tools and machines out of the back of the van, when Adonis opened his own door. The jolt that zinged from her belly to her toes was unexpected. Or maybe she should have expected it. From the day he’d taken over for his dad, he’d made her feel something where she’d been feeling a lot of nothing for a long time.
“Um, hi,” she gibbered out. She wanted to grab him by the shoulders, pull him down for a kiss. But she’d been raised on the wrong side of Europe. Public displays of affection were for those on the continent. She was stiff upper lips and all that.
“Good morning. We’ll be making a bit of noise today, but with Dad here, we can have the cabinet guys come tomorrow.” She looked at his eyes, shifted her gaze to his throat, his hands. She could see nothing of the affection that he’d heaped on her a mere two days before.
“I thought they weren’t due for a couple of weeks.” She was trying to remember what Adonis had said about the schedule, but she’d been looking at his strong arms and thinking about beds, not calendars.
“Your stuff is done early,” Adonis said, as if getting out of her house quickly was the most important thing in the world. “It’s easier for the carpenters if they can use their studio space for making new cabinets instead of storage for yours. Most clients are happy to have a project come in early.”
“I’d hoped…” She didn’t finish. The words “practice” and “repeat performance” bounced around her brain, but neither was appropriate with a parent around.
“You’d hoped what?” he asked like a builder instead of a lover.
“Right. You get to it. I’ll make myself scarce.” As fast as she could without running, or looking like the scared hares that ran from her parents’ dogs, she was out of the room.
At least she hadn’t shown up to the door stark naked. Twice, she’d thought better of that. Both times, she was supremely happy that she had. Imagine the heart attack she’d have given Dominic.
The knock on her bedroom door nearly sent her through the beamed ceiling. Asking who it was passed through her mind. But who asked “who is it?” through a door inside their own home?
After dropping the latest glossy edition of Tatler magazine that was hardly keeping her attention, Gemma walked to the door and pulled it open with a swift jerk.
She simultaneously wanted to pummel him and hug him. He made the choice for her and did that one thing that disarmed her every time. He fisted a hand in her hair—this time in a messy bun she’d twisted in frustration—and tilted her head, making her ready to receive his kiss.
And she wanted that kiss. More than recriminations. More than explanations. The magic of that connection they’d had had haunted her all weekend. It was still there like a weak nuclear force.
She stopped his hand when it tugged at the J-shaped zipper pull on her sweatshirt.
“Your dad?” she asked. Despite her worldwide reputation for it, she was not interested in public displays.
“Went out to search for a double-gang box extender,” he explained.
It did not compute for her. “Double-gang—”
“Means he’ll be gone at least an hour. Maybe two if the taco truck he likes is out there. He likes tongue.”
Tacos and body parts made her head spin. Or it was him, standing there all strong muscles and clean sweat, the faintest hint of sawdust on his cheeks.
Before she could think better of it, she lifted her hand, cupped his jaw, and brushed at the tiny tan specs of curling wood.
“It’s not smart. It’s not rational. But I want you, Gemma. Now. Here.”
It was daft, and not all that thought out, but she wanted him too. Instead of admitting her growing weakness for him the way he’d just done, she guided him down until his lips met hers again. Holding nothing back, she plundered his mouth as he did the same.
All of her modesty, and hesitation, and shyness disappeared in the face of now. In the face of what she knew he could make her feel. The urge, suddenly, to be free of her velour tracksuit was undeniable.
Stepping back, she made quick work of removing her clothes. A heap of velour and silk was all that was left when she turned to walk toward the bed.
“Not so fast,” he said. Adonis snagged her hand and led her to the orange chair by the door. She’d never sat in the leather seat her interior designer had said was an accent piece, a counterpoint in design, or something like that. Something for show, not for sitting.
“Why?” Fast is what she wanted. Fast is what they needed.
“Wait.”
Without removing a stitch of his own clothing, Adonis knelt before her, and all of it—the inexperience, the nervousness—came rushing back.
“I’m sorry…”
“Don’t be sorry for your desires, Gemma. You deserve pleasure just as much as the next person, no matter what your resume.”
“Oh…” Her next words were lost, swallowed, forgotten when his head descended, when his strong, work-roughened hands braced against the insides of her knees, thighs. When he hooked under her legs and pulled her forward and feasted upon her as if he were a starving man and she was a banquet.
“You taste like the sun, moon, and stars,” he whispered, the words vibrating against her most sensitive flesh.
He might have said something more. He must have said something more because she’d followed some urgent command to hold on to the arms of the chair like she were holding on for dear life. Then it was all twisty and tight below her belly. She sucked in her breath, holding on to the pleasure until that very last minute when she couldn’t hold on anymore and all she wanted to do was let go, let the waves of feeling pulse along her body, making her all lightheaded and giddy and ready to tie him to her bed so he could do this again and again, and never leave.
All at once, he was shoving down his pants, fitting on a condom, and lifting her. To keep upright, she wound her arms tight about his neck and shoulders. The smell of her and him mingled with the heady scent of sex.
He shifted his hands and before she could gather breath, he’d impaled her. In just two days, she’d forgotten that he could make her feel so full, so wanted. Adonis’ eyes never left her. They roamed appreciatively over her face, hair, breasts, and all the rest. Appraisal that would normally have her squirming in her skin did exactly the opposite. It made her feel like everyone else for once. Human.
Nothing more.
Nothing less.
If her arms weren’t turning into jelly, she could have stayed like that for hours. Adonis pumping into her oh so slowly, panting out his appreciation and desire. Her answering hiccough of arousal as a second wave came over her. But it didn’t last forever, no matter how hard she tried to hold on to the sensation. His rhythm eventually broke, turning into rapid thrusts that stoked her banked fire, until both were raging. Until she came squeezing him, milking an orgasm from him.
Carefully, as if she were the Queen’s china, he lifted her and set her back upon the orange leather accent chair. A chair she’d certainly never be able to look at without reliving just this moment.
Awkwardly, and without a word, he shuffled to the bathroom.
A quick glance at the clock told her an hour had long passed. They were in discovery danger. So she scooped up her clothes and put them all back into place, zipping her jacket to the throat, hiding the tender flesh she was sure, even without looking in the mirror, was well abraded by his soft, spiky stubble.
Needing something to come down, she wandered to the dresser and poured herself a glass of sherry. Turning a second glass over, she poured a small amount for Adonis.
The pocket door lumbered open.
“I borrowed an extra toothbrush,” he said.
She tried not to squirm with all that phrase implied. Her mind reached out, grasping for purchase.
“Why’d you leave on Saturday?” It wasn’t at all what she’d meant to ask. Why wouldn’t he leave? She’d made it clear, in no uncertain terms, that she needed him for a service. Once rendered, he’d felt free to go. Now that he’d come back without her begging or cajoling, the question had frothed to the top of her mind and bubbled from her mouth.
“I needed to figure out if you’d lied to me.”
She wanted to play dumb, act like an actress with no brain between her ears. She’d done it dozens of times to get what she wanted, avoid what she didn’t.
Not now. Somehow, this seemed like the time to tell the truth. But the lump in her throat wouldn’t cooperate. Her mouth wouldn’t let her form the right words. And the right words were so very necessary at this point.
The buzzer sounded, as if on cue.
“I have to go let your dad back in,” she said without hesitation. It was so much easier talking about doors, gates and codes, than talking about Andrew O’Bryan.
“Answer me, Gemma.”
“Later. When your dad is safely tucked in bed. I promise to tell you exactly what you need to know.”
Later came after sundown. Later, after she’d walked Granger, inspected the handiwork of father and son Andreis, her gate buzzed. Elation and dread were with her in equal measure.
He was silent upon reentry.
The moment the door closed and the electronic lock clicked, she said, “I didn’t have sex with Andrew O’Bryan.”
“Who’s that?”
“Andy O’Bryan, rehab rebound extraordinaire.” When no sign of recognition crossed Adonis’ face, she continued. “He’s an actor. Really talented. Brilliant really. Has a massive cocaine addiction. Despite all that, he works, all the time. When he’s not here in Malibu or Rancho Mirage at one recovery program or another, he’s on set.”
She could practically see the light bulb of recognition go on above Adonis’ head. It was the same light bulb that winked on when someone stared at her a beat too long as they put it together in their head that she was, in the flesh, the same woman they’d seen on the big screen.
“Let’s go upstairs. The second bedroom… Just come,” she said. Her liquor cabinet was temporarily relocated in that room. She’d need a drink or twenty to talk about this. Plus her big computer was up there. It was both a show and tell kind of thing.
“He’s been in like dozens of movies,” he said after he’d taken a seat on the small couch she’d jammed into the room, along with the bed that had already been there and the table she was using as a temporary desk and drink-mixing corner.
“Yes, loads.”
“He’s sober though, right? Has been for a decade. I’m sure I saw that on some TV interview.”
For the briefest moment, she thought it odd that Adonis would know anything about Andy, but maybe he was as much a tabloid checkout-stand reader as most Americans were. It was one trend that she wished the UK had kept all nice and tidy on her side of the pond, with its strong libel and privacy laws keeping it all in check. The American celebrity free-for-all was horrid for everyone in her business.
“Don’t know. Wouldn’t bet my life on that,” she said. She knew better than anyone that what was written so very rarely reflected the truth.
“So, O’Bryan…”
“Watch,” she said in answer. She pressed the spacebar on the little keyboard and all fifteen minutes of ignominious glory lit up the screen.
She wanted to get down on her knees and thank Giovanni for her ability to stand in this room at this moment not wanting to die of shame.
Instead of watching the video, because she'd been there, she watched Adonis. And if experiencing it hadn't burned the searing memory in her brain, being bombarded by clips of it over and over again surely did.
The video started with O'Bryan in the bedroom of his Bel Air mansion. She hated the word mansion in the States, but all twenty thousand square feet of O’Bryan’s house couldn’t be described in any other manner. In the video, the dark-walled and coffered-ceilinged room was flooded with light from the open windows and California sun. He adjusted the camera position. Coke-fueled rapid-fire speech blasted from the speakers hidden in corners of the room.
“Folks, you're about to see the great deflowering of Hollywood's sweetheart, Gemma Hart. If you've turned on your television for more than a moment, then you know that we've been seeing each other since the filming of Entwined Souls.
“As things have heated up between us, she's shared a secret with me that she's never told anyone else. Gemma Hart is a virgin.” O'Bryan did a mock double-take.
“I know, right? But that aunt Sharon of hers has kept a tight leash on her all these years. At least that's what Gemma says. From what I've seen of Sharon Hart though, Gemma's inherited some wild woman genes. Coming right up, we'll get to see. Is she a Madonna or a whore in bed? I’d lay Vegas odds on the first one, but you never know. Maybe the British have some secret steam. Stay tuned.” O’Bryan stroked his own jaw in obvious self-admiration. “Damn, I should have gone out for the part of that TV news anchor in Earthquake: Aftershock. I'm pretty damned good at these teasers.”
At least Adonis wasn’t laughing at O’Bryan’s crude attempt at humor. O’Bryan had, of course, been the star of the huge blockbuster Earthquake and its sequel. Her agent had gleefully informed her, in his usual tone-deaf manner, that O’Bryan had been paid forty million for the first, sixty for the second.
The video jump cut. The room was a bit darker with the plantation shutters closed. O'Bryan winked at the camera before she walked into the room. No matter how evolved she became or how much she’d talked this out with Giovanni, Gemma had to turn her head.
Adonis' swift intake of breath told her he wasn't blind, and unlike her, hadn’t tuned out. Into the movie frame she'd walked, all Fredrick's of Hollywood. Dolled up like a professional. How she'd spent hours trying to get sexy just right, and failing miserably. She looked like a tarted-up teenager trying to sneak into a central London club. It wasn't much of a good look on anyone at fifteen, and it wasn't a good look on Gemma in her twenties.
O’Bryan had his profile facing the camera. Most directors she’d known wouldn’t use that angle to open a scene. When O’Bryan’s pants dropped and he lifted his erect penis from his briefs, the reason for the positioning became obvious.
“I can’t watch this,” Adonis said, hitting a key that stopped the action.
“I’ve seen it hundreds of times,” she said after a fortifying sip of sherry. “It gets easier.”
“Can’t you tell me what happens?”
“I’ll fast forward.”
Mouse in hand, she scrolled to the half eleven mark. Just after the knob-polishing bit, the screen appeared to go to static. When the fuzz cleared away, Gemma was lying on the extra-large king-size, topless. Her bottom, at least, was covered by Andy’s duvet.
“Are you sleeping?” Adonis asked, his expression puzzled.
“Since I wasn’t on a coke bender, I got tired.” She left out the copious amounts of alcohol O’Bryan had plied her with. Not that she was blaming him. She’d been as keen to drink that night as he’d been to get her pissed. She hadn’t had the coke to offset the effects of alcohol like he’d had though.
O’Bryan’s face filled the camera’s frame. “I swear,” he said. “The batteries on this Flip are the worst. They’re supposed to last two hours, man. But I had to set it up early. So…you missed it folks. But let me tell you, it was good. She was so ripe, so sweet. A little bit of a whore, way more Madonna. But I’m sure I can change that. Virgins are my favorite flavor.”
She watched Adonis watch O’Bryan walk over to her. The coked-up actor tweaked her nipples, jiggled her breasts for the camera, then followed with more lewd pantomiming.
“There’s no sex on the sex tape?” Adonis asked, turning from the computer.
“Can we not debate the definition of sex like a certain American president? It was all very much Brown Bunny for a good ten minutes.”
“Brown Bunny? Is that some kind of English phrase?”
“No. It’s a crap movie where the writer slash director slash star ends his film with a ten-minute oral sex sequence where he’s the recipient.”
“Seriously?”
“American cinema. What can I say?”
“So…”
“So O’Bryan walked about telling everyone in the world he shagged me. Anyone’s best guess is that he sold the tape to a Russian media network. Don’t know how much money he got.”
“He sold you out for cash?”
“I don’t really care about that part. But he was on every teatime entertainment chat show. I got lewd suggestions over meetings with directors, he got an eighty-million-dollar payday the next year. But to answer your other question, I didn’t lie to you. We never had intercourse. I may not be that smart, but I knew better than to do it with him.”
“Did you want to?”
“I thought I did. I thought I would. But he was high. I have no idea if he loved me like he said. I’m not even sure he liked me. Doesn’t matter. I made my choice that night. And believe it or not, in that, he honored my decision. He violated me in a thousand ways, a million different times, but not that night.”
“Did he go into recovery after that?”
“Yes. No. Maybe.” She shook her head in dismissal. “Does it matter? Addiction is no excuse for bad behavior.”
“Amends?”
“Now it’s you speaking the foreign language. What do you mean?” She squinted, trying to make heads or tails of his question.
“Did he make amends? You know, apologize, I guess. Try to fix this.”
“I’m sorry I shot your dog.” Gemma threw up her hands in exasperation.
“What?”
“It’s like the neighbor coming to your cottage saying he shot your best hunting dog by accident. Sure, Andy came to apologize. I was at the agency for a meeting. He was there, I think, signing the papers making him the highest-paid actor in history.”
“What did he say?”
“I’m in a tiny room with my agent, Sylvester, and some kind of intern. Andy comes in with his super-agent, and an entire entourage who probably got a conference room the size of an ocean liner. I haven’t been in that room, with its one-hundred-eighty-degree view of Hollywood, in ten years.” God, she’d shown her petty self-pitying side. Course correction was in order. She continued the story, minus the pity. “My agent stops my meeting so he can speak. ‘Sorry for the tape,’ O’Bryan says. ‘Now that I’m sober, I see that I’ve hurt you. I’m here to make amends.’ That’s the word you said, right?”
Adonis nodded in confirmation. Then he frowned. “That’s it?”
“I had no effing clue what he was talking about. He’s done about a thousand shitty things, and he’d never apologized for the tape. So Sylvester asks what he’s going to do. Andy’s assistant tosses a check on the table. ‘Maybe you can donate to Monica Lewinsky’s foundation or something.’”
“How much?”
“Ten million.” Gemma shrugged. No amount of money could wipe away what he’d done.
“What did you do?”
“Made an anonymous donation.”
“Does Monica Lewinsky have a foundation?”
“I have no idea,” she said. For a long couple of days, she’d read everything she could get her hands on about the White House intern. In the end, she thought Monica had been lucky that the only evidence of her stupidity had been a blue dress. Life before the Internet had been grand. “I gave it away to the RSPCA.”
“Is that a group for exploited women?”
“I hardly think a couple of other clueless actresses and I count in the realm of exploited women. I made a bad choice. I can’t say about the others. It’s possible they did it for the exposure. Can’t truly know. It’s the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.” It was and always had been the most worthy cause in her eyes, protecting those who could not protect themselves.
“Have you forgiven him?”
“Forgiven Andrew O’Bryan for ruining my life? Making me the laughing stock of the industry? For having stupid clips of this video, with tiny plaster-size censor strips across my chest, showing up next to anything I’ve ever done? No, I’d say that I haven’t yet found the power to forgive the little entitled shit.”
“Entitled?”
“His father is Elton Lamb.”
Adonis didn’t pretend not to know Lamb. Even unplugged Montana survivalists had heard of the world-famous director. “Didn’t know that.”
“One of Hollywood’s dirty little secrets. Half the people I work with are related to each other. Nothing like being discovered in your backyard sandbox.”
“Sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry about. I fell into this, and here I stay. Part of me wants out. But you know what? I don’t have any other marketable skills, except dog training.”
“I’m sorry I questioned you about the tape. It was inappropriate.”
“Oh, yeah, okay,” she said, taken aback by his immediate apology.
“I should have taken your word for it on something that was so important to you.”
“You sound positively enlightened. That’s a relief.” Most men would have stammered around their stupid statements, never fully apologizing for their crap assumptions.
His smile, so rare, lit up the room. It made her want to celebrate. “You must have some sherry. I’d offer champagne, but until the wine fridge is installed, everything’s in storage down on the west side. There’s a place near the Four-oh-five freeway, if you can believe it, that stores wine—”
“I can’t.”
“Of course you can. Let me get you a glass. It’s nothing expensive, by any means. I want to toast to us being on the same page. You don’t think I’m a lying slag and I know you’re not a caveman.”
She fished around for a clean glass. She’d put the earlier one in a bin to be washed later. But she was sure there were a couple of clean ones left. The service that came to take the dishes wasn’t due until day after tomorrow.
“You should forgive O’Bryan. People do all sorts of crappy things. Have you considered that it was the addiction, not him?”
“I think I’m going to take back everything I said about you not being a caveman. Some actor who neither lacks for work nor money sneaks pictures of me, half naked, performing, doing…” She’d gotten to a point where she could watch the video, but saying it out loud was still hard. “And you think it’s his addiction?” Not his penis or vanity, she wanted to add, but didn’t because talking about such things was crass.
“Sometimes it takes people hitting rock bottom before they can come out the other side a better person.”
“You don’t even know Andy O’Bryan. Or do you? Please don’t tell me you’re some big fan, here to tell me to sit down and be quiet. Because he’s rich and famous, that it’s okay to take advantage of me. Don’t think I haven’t heard it before. A thousand times, from a thousand people. Please tell me that’s not what you’re saying.”
Her head was going to literally explode. Leaving tiny pieces of brain matter all over the newly painted walls.
“If there’s one thing I can’t stand about Hollywood, it’s this town’s ability to excuse men their bad behavior. Have sex with a thirteen-year-old girl, flee the country, win an Oscar.”
“But I do know O’Bryan,” Adonis insisted. He patted his chest like he and the actor were bosom buddies.
“You what? All along, you…and you didn’t tell me.”
Of all the emotions she’d prepared for, sympathy for her victimizer wasn’t one of them.
“No, that’s not what I meant. I don’t know O’Bryan. Not personally. I’ve never met him or anyone who works with him. What I’m trying to say is that I could be O’Bryan. The reason I can’t drink your sherry, the reason I think you should forgive him is because…”
“Because?” It was taking all of her strength to hold it together. To not kick him out and curse herself for more years of bad judgment. “Why?”
“Because I could be him.”
“How could you be an entitled asshole who hurts women? Do you have a secret past I don’t know about?” Adonis was astonishingly good looking in a ruggedly handsome, non-assuming way. She was starting to flip through the files in her brain, trying to place him on TV, in a commercial, in a movie. Surely she’d remember someone like him if he’d been kicking around Hollywood when she was a kid—but maybe not.
His nod was slow, sure.
She braced herself for what was about to come. It seemed as if she’d spent half her life bracing herself for directors who didn’t like her work, for casting agents who could give her a job, for her aunt slash former manager’s latest screw up. Bracing herself was well within her area of expertise. She nodded, ready.
Adonis’ blink was slow. Then he spoke, his tone somber and deliberate.
“I’m an alcoholic, Gemma. And it took me taking someone’s life before I realized it.”